When the phone had rung for the sixth time, she picked it up, and was relieved to hear Menchu’s voice at the other end. Her relief lasted only a moment, however, for Menchu was extremely drunk. Perhaps, Julia thought with some concern, she had something stronger than alcohol in her blood. Raising her voice to make herself heard above the buzz of conversation and music, half of her phrases stumbling into incoherence, Menchu told Julia that she was at Stephan’s and then recounted some confused story involving Max, the Van Huys and Paco Montegrifo. Julia didn’t understand, and when she asked her friend to explain again what had happened, Menchu burst into hysterical laughter. Then she hung up.

The air was heavy, cold and damp. Shivering inside her cumbersome three-quarter-length leather coat, Julia went down to the street and hailed a taxi. The lights of the city slid across her face in flashes as she nodded now and again in response to the taxi driver’s unwanted chatter. She leaned her head back on the seat and closed her eyes. Before leaving, she’d switched on the electronic alarm and locked the security door, turning the key twice in the lock. At the downstairs door she couldn’t help casting a suspicious glance at the grid next to her bell, afraid of finding another card there. But she found nothing. The invisible player was still pondering his next move.

There were a lot of people at Stephan’s. The first one she recognised was Cesar, sitting on a sofa with Sergio. The young man was nodding, looking charming, his tousled blond hair over his eyes, as Cesar whispered something to him. Cesar was sitting with his legs crossed, smoking. The hand holding the cigarette rested on his knee; he waved the other in the air as he spoke, close to his protege’s arm but never quite touching it. As soon as he saw Julia, he got up and came to meet her. He didn’t seem surprised to see her there at that hour, with no make-up on and wearing jeans.

“She’s over there,” he said, pointing to the interior of the club with a neutral look on his face that revealed, nonetheless, a certain amused anticipation. “On one of the sofas at the back.”

“Has she been drinking a lot?”

“Like a fish. And I’m afraid she’s oozing white powder from every orifice. She’s been making suspiciously frequent visits to the Ladies; she can’t need to pee that often.” He regarded the ash on his cigarette and gave a wicked smile. “She made a scene a while ago at the bar: she slapped Montegrifo. Can you imagine, my dear? It was really” – he savoured the idea like a connoisseur, before uttering the word out loud – “delicious.”

“And Montegrifo?”

Cesar’s expression became cruel.

“Fascinating, darling, verging on the divine. He left in that stiff, dignified way of his, with a very attractive blonde on his arm, a bit common but well-dressed. She was so embarrassed, the poor thing, as well she might be. You couldn’t really blame her.” He smiled with intense malice. “I have to admit, Princess, that the chap has style. He took the slap very coolly, without batting an eyelid, like tough guys in the films. A very interesting man, that auctioneer of yours. I must admit he behaved impeccably. Cool as a cucumber.”

“Where’s Max?”

“I haven’t seen him tonight, I’m sorry to say.” Again that perverse smile appeared. “Now that really would have been fun. The icing on the cake.”

Leaving Cesar, Julia walked into the club. She greeted several acquaintances without stopping to talk, and saw her friend Menchu sitting slumped on a sofa, alone. Her eyes were glazed, her short skirt was hitched up and she had a grotesque tear in one leg of her tights. She looked ten years older.

“Menchu.”

She looked at Julia, barely recognising her. Mumbling incoherently, she shook her head and let out the short, uncertain laugh of the drunk.

“You missed it,” she said after a moment, her voice slurred. “That bastard – standing right there he was, half his face bright scarlet.” She pulled herself up and rubbed her reddened nose, oblivious to the inquisitive, scandalised looks of people at nearby tables. “Stupid arrogant sod.”

Julia felt everyone’s eyes on her; she could hear muttered comments and she blushed.

“Do you think you can manage to stand up and get out of here?”

“I think so. But first, I must just tell you…”

“Tell me later. Let’s go.”

Menchu struggled to her feet, clumsily pulling down her skirt. Draping Menchu’s coat over her shoulders, Julia got her to walk towards the door in a relatively dignified manner. Cesar came over to them.

“Everything OK?”

“Yes. I think I can manage.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Out in the street Menchu swayed, and someone yelled an obscenity at her from the window of a passing car.

“Take me home, Julia. Please.”

“Yours or mine?”

Menchu looked at her as if she had some difficulty recognising her. She was moving like a sleepwalker.

“Yours,” she said.

“What about Max?”

“It’s all over with Max. We had a row. It’s finished.”

They got a taxi and Menchu hunched up in the back seat. Then she burst into tears. Julia put an arm around her trembling shoulders. The taxi stopped at a traffic light and a brilliant shop window lit up Menchu’s ravaged face.

“I’m sorry. I’m a…”

Julia felt embarrassed, uncomfortable. It was just grotesque. Damn Max, she said to herself. Damn the lot of them.

“Don’t be silly,” she said, interrupting.

She saw the taxi driver observing them curiously in his rear-view mirror, and when she turned back to Menchu she caught an unusual look in her eyes, a brief flash of unexpected lucidity, as if there was still a place inside untouched by the fumes of alcohol and drugs. She was surprised to see something of infinite depth, of dark significance. It was a look so inappropriate to the state Menchu was in that Julia felt disconcerted. When Menchu spoke, her words were even stranger.

“You don’t understand anything,” she said, shaking her head in pain, like a wounded animal. “But whatever happens… I want you to know…”

She stopped abruptly, as if biting back the words, and her gaze became lost once more in the shadows, leaving Julia perplexed. It was too much for one night. All she needed now, she thought, feeling a vague apprehension that augured no good, was to find another card by the entry bell.

*****

But there was no card that night, and she could devote herself to looking after Menchu, who seemed to be moving in a fog. Julia gave her two cups of coffee before putting her to bed. Feeling like a psychiatrist seated by her couch, she gradually managed, with great patience, to reconstruct out of the incoherent babblings exactly what had happened. At the worst possible moment, Max, ungrateful Max, had got it into his head to go off on a trip, some stupid story about a job in Portugal. She was having a bad time and his going off like that seemed a selfish dereliction of duty. They’d argued, and instead of resolving the problem in bed, as they usually did, he’d slammed the door on her. Menchu didn’t know if he intended to come back or not, but she didn’t give a damn either way. Determined not to be alone, she’d gone to Stephan’s. A few lines of coke had helped to clear her head, leaving her in a state of aggressive euphoria. With Max forgotten, she sat in her corner drinking very dry martinis and eyeing a gorgeous guy who’d noticed her. Then the mood of the night suddenly changed. Unfortunately for Paco Montegrifo, he turned up too, accompanied by one of those bejewelled bitches he was seen with from time to time. The matter of the percentages was still fresh in her mind and she thought she detected a certain irony in the way he greeted her. As they say in novels, it was like a knife being turned in the wound. She delivered a single slap, thwack, a real humdinger, that caused a great stir amongst the clientele. A huge uproar ensued, end of story. Curtain.