“What I don’t understand,” Julia said, looking over Munoz’s shoulder, “is why the empty spray can was left on the bonnet. We were bound to see it there. Unless the person who did it had to leave in a hurry.”

“Perhaps it was just a warning,” suggested Cesar from his leather armchair beneath the stained-glass window. “A warning in the worst possible taste.”

“It was a lot of trouble to go to though, wasn’t it? Preparing the aerosol, letting the air out of the tyre and then pumping it up again. Not to mention the fact that she risked being seen while she was doing it… It’s pretty ridiculous,” she added, “but have you noticed how I’m referring to our invisible player in the feminine? I can’t stop thinking about the mystery woman in the raincoat.”

“Perhaps we’re going too far,” said Cesar. “When you think about it, there must have been dozens of blonde women in raincoats in the Rastro this morning. Some might have been wearing dark glasses. But you’re right about that empty can. Leaving it right there on the car, in full view. Really grotesque.”

“Not so grotesque perhaps,” said Munoz, and they both looked at him. Sitting on a stool, with the small chessboard laid out on a low table, he was in his shirtsleeves, which had been shortened with a tuck just above the elbow. He’d spoken without raising his head from the chess pieces. And Julia, who was by his side, saw at one corner of his mouth that indefinable expression she’d come to know well, halfway between silent reflection and the suggestion of a smile, and she knew he’d managed to decipher the latest move.

He reached out a finger to the pawn on square a7, without touching it.

“The black pawn that was on square a7 takes the white rook on b6,” he said, showing them the situation on the board. “That’s what our opponent says on the card.”

“And what does that mean?” asked Julia.

“It means that he’s declined to make another move which, in a way, we were afraid he might. I mean, taking the white queen on e1 with the black rook on c1. That move would inevitably have involved an exchange of queens.” He glanced up from the pieces and gave Julia a worried look. “With all that that would imply”

Julia opened her eyes wide.

“Do you mean he’s declined to take me?”

Munoz’s face remained ambivalent.

“You could interpret it like that.” He studied the piece representing

the white queen. “And, if that’s the case, what he’s saying to us is: ‘I’m quite capable of killing, but I’ll only do it when I want to.” “

“Like a cat playing with a mouse,” murmured Cesar, striking the arm of his chair. “The man’s an utter villain!”

“The man or woman,” Julia said.

Cesar clicked his tongue.

“No one’s saying that the woman in the raincoat, if she was the one in the alley, acted on her own. She might be someone’s accomplice.”

“Yes, but whose?”

“That’s what I’d like to know, my dear.”

“Anyway,” said Munoz, “if you forget the woman in the raincoat and concentrate on the card, you might reach a different conclusion about the personality of our opponent.” He looked at each of them in turn before pointing to the board, as if he considered it a waste of time to seek answers anywhere but there. “We know he has a twisted mind, but it turns out that he’s also extremely smug. He, or she, is also arrogant. He’s playing with us.” He indicated the board again, urging them to study the position of the pieces. “Look, in practical terms, in pure chess terms, taking the white queen would have been a bad move. White would have had no option but to accept the exchange of queens, taking the black queen with the white rook on b2, and that would leave Black in a very bad position. Black’s only way out then would have been to move the black rook from e1 to e4, threatening the white king. But the latter would have protected himself simply by moving the white pawn from d2 to d4. Then, seeing the black king surrounded by enemy pieces with no possible help, checkmate would have been inevitable. Black would lose the game.”

“Do you mean,” asked Julia, “that all that business with the can left on the car and the threat to the white queen is just a bluff?”

“It wouldn’t surprise me in the least.”

“But why?”

“Because our enemy has chosen the move I would have made in his place: taking the white rook on b6 with the pawn that was on a7. That eases White’s pressure on the black king, who was in an extremely difficult position.” He shook his head admiringly. “I told you he was a good player.”

“And now?” asked Cesar.

Munoz passed a hand across his forehead and looked at the board thoughtfully.

“Now we have two options. Perhaps we should take the black queen, but that would force our opponent to carry out an exchange of queens,” he said, looking at Julia, “and I don’t like that. We don’t want to force him to do something he’s already decided against.” He shook his head again as if the black and white pieces confirmed his thoughts. “The odd thing is that he knows that’s how we’ll think, which has its advantages, because I see the moves he makes and sends to us, whereas he can only imagine mine. Yet he can still influence them. Up until now, we’ve been doing what he wants us to do.”

“Have we any choice?” asked Julia.

“Not so far. But later we might.”

“So what’s our next move?”

“We move our bishop from f1 to d3, threatening his queen.”

“And what will he or she do?”

Munoz paused before answering. He sat unmoving before the board, as if he hadn’t heard the question.

“In chess too,” he said at last, “there’s a limit to the forecasts one can make. The best possible move, or the most probable one, is the one that leaves one’s opponent in the least advantageous position. That’s why one way of estimating the expediency of the next move consists simply in imagining that move has been made and then going on to analyse the game from your opponent’s point of view. That means falling back on your own resources, but this time putting yourself in your enemy’s shoes. From there, you conjecture another move and then immediately put yourself in the role of your opponent’s opponent, in other words, yourself. And so on indefinitely, as far ahead as you can. By that, I mean that I know where I’ve got to, but I don’t know how far he’s got.”

“According to that reasoning,” Julia said, “isn’t he most likely to choose the move that will do most damage to us?”

Munoz scratched the back of his neck. Then, very slowly, he moved the white bishop to square d3, placing it near the black queen. He seemed absorbed in deep thought while he analysed the new situation.

“One thing I’m sure of,” he said at last, “is that he’s going to take another of our pieces.”

The sound of the telephone made her jump. Unhurriedly, she removed the solvent-soaked plug of cotton from the corner of the painting on which she was working – a stubborn bit of varnish on a tiny area of Ferdinand of Ostenburg’s clothing – and put the tweezers between her teeth. Then she looked distrustfully at the telephone by her feet on the carpet, wondering if, when she picked it up, she would once again have to listen to one of those long silences that had become the norm over the last couple of weeks. At first she’d just held the phone to her ear without saying anything, waiting impatiently for some noise, even if only breathing, that would indicate life, a human presence, at the other end, however disquieting that might be. But she found only a void, without even the dubious consolation of hearing the click of the phone being put down. It was always the mystery caller – male or female – who held out longest. Whoever it was simply stayed there, listening, showing no sign of haste or concern about the possibility that the police might be tapping the phone to trace the call. The worst thing was that the person who telephoned her had no idea that he was safe. Julia had told no one about the calls, not even Cesar or Munoz. Without quite knowing why, she felt ashamed of them, humiliated by the way they invaded her privacy, invaded the night and the silence she had so loved before the nightmare began. It was like a ritual violation, without words or gestures, repeated every day.