The Book of Murder - By Guillermo Martinez & Sonia Soto Page 0,44
thought of them as crime fiction and they were popular with prisoners. I said that over the years I’d received letters from inmates of various prisons, sometimes pointing out mistakes in my books and suggesting their own stories as subjects for future novels. He asked to see the letters so I gave him those I’d kept. He talked about Truman Capote while he was looking at them. He was proud to have read In Cold Blood and be discussing it with me. He showed me the rather bizarre anonymous letters. They read like something written by a scorned mistress. He asked if, as a writer, I could infer anything about the author, male or female. I never dreamed he might be setting a trap, or suspected me of having written them. Up until that moment I thought he simply wanted to know about my correspondence with inmates of that prison. I told him the little I could tell about the person who’d written the letter and that’s when he mentioned Luciana. He’d already made inquiries at her psychiatric clinic and apologised for bringing up something so personal from the distant past. I showed him her letter. He compared the handwriting to that of the anonymous letters. She seemed to be more of a suspect than me. He said he was used to receiving confessions in the most unexpected and strange ways. He mentioned The Tell-Tale Heart by Poe. I think he wanted to show me that he too had read a few books. We chatted for a while about crime writers and he looked around my library. I realised he was hoping I’d give him one of my books, so I did and finally he left. It was the last I heard about both the investigation and Luciana, and I assumed that was the end of it. Until I got your call.”
He went to the desk, where I’d left the magazine, and replaced it in the drawer. He lowered the window blind and motioned for me to follow him. We returned to his study in silence. The little stack of papers was still on the table, but I didn’t move to pick them up.
“So is there anything else you’d like to ask?”
I had lots more questions but I knew he’d be reluctant to answer any of them. I decided to try anyway.
“She says here that you loathed anything to do with public exposure. I remember myself how you were almost invisible for years. But then suddenly all that changed.”
Kloster nodded, as if he too had found it surprising.
“After Pauli died I thought I was going to lose my mind. And I would have if I’d stayed shut up in this house. Interviews, conferences, invitations, they all forced me to shave, get dressed, go out, remember who I once was; to think and act like a normal person. They were my only link with the world out there, where life went on. I did it all because I knew that as soon as I got back here I’d be alone again with just one thought. They were my outings to normality, my way of keeping sane. I was playing a part, of course, but when you’ve lost all will to exist, to persist, playing a part can be the only defence against madness.”
He indicated for me to follow him. “Come with me,” he said. “There’s something else I’d like to show you.”
We made our way to the corridor where I’d seen the first photograph in the gloom. He flicked the switch and the corridor was lit up. The walls were lined with photos of all sizes, hung very close together, like a ghastly collage, showing the daughter’s image repeated in a multitude of poses. As we walked down the corridor Kloster said simply: “I loved taking photos of her. These are the only ones I managed to save.”
He opened a door and we entered a small room. The walls were bare and the only furniture was a chair in one corner and a metal filing cabinet with a small oblong machine on top. When Kloster turned off the light in the corridor I realised it was a projector. The wall facing us was lit up, there was a click and Kloster’s daughter appeared, miraculously returned to life. She was crouching in the distance in what looked like a park or garden. She stood up and ran towards the camera, holding a little bunch of flowers. She headed towards us, happy and