—Many men were executed —the trained officer said in closing.— Among them, your husband.
They took her by van to the San Martín polyclinic. That is where Vicente’s body was. She asked if she could take him with her to hold a wake for him. They told her she could not.
—Come back with a coffin. From here you go straight to the cemetery. Oh, and it has to be before Friday. If not, you won’t find him here.
She came back with a coffin. And they went straight to the cemetery. With a police escort. It was only after the last clump of dirt had fallen that the last policeman withdrew.
***
In Boulogne, where Carranza and Garibotti lived, the process was similar, only with one strange variation. The man in charge of retrieving all the ID booklets was tall, heavyset, and dark-skinned; he had a mustache and a deep, husky voice. He wore light pants and a short, olive green jacket: the uniform of the Argentine Army.
He was not brandishing a .45 caliber pistol in his right hand anymore.
At 7:00 p.m. on Monday, the eleventh, he stepped out of a jeep in front of Garibotti’s house.
—I’ve come to collect your husband’s booklet —he said to Florinda Allende, without introducing himself.
—It’s not here —she replied.
—Look for it. It should be here.
He entered the house.
One of the railroad worker’s sons, Raúl Alberto (thirteen years old), was sitting on the fence.
—Are you Garibotti’s son? —the driver of the jeep asked him.
—Yes.
—The guy they killed?
The boy didn’t know anything about it . . .
The dead man’s booklet did not turn up. The tall, heavyset man crossed the street and knocked on the door at Carranza’s house. Berta Figueroa did not yet know the fate of her husband or the whereabouts of the booklet.
—I don’t know anything. He’s the one who should have it.
—Look for it, ma’am, it has to be here because he says it’s here —the military-police officer insisted.
Berta let him in and went looking for the ID.
Fernández Suárez stood looking at the large portrait of Nicolás Carranza that was hanging on the wall.
He was surrounded by Carranza’s children looking at him shyly, their eyes wide and full of curiosity.
—Was that your dad? —the man asked Elena—the same “tall man” whose order was responsible for the fact that, though she didn’t know it yet, the little one no longer had a dad.
—Yes —she responded.
—How many brothers and sisters do you have?
—Five —the girl answered.
—And you’re the oldest?
—Yes.
Just then, Berta Figueroa returned with the booklet.
—Is my husband in jail? —she dared, anxiously, to ask.
—I don’t know, ma’am —the Chief of Police of the Province of Buenos Aires replied in a hurry.— I don’t know anything.
And from the jeep he added, with a voice huskier than before: