rising even higher as he scribbles a note on the pad. What is he writing?
‘Were you taking any drugs? Besides alcohol?’
I cock my head not understanding and then the sudden memory of Kate snorting coke in the back of the cab and taking out her little pillbox dances into my head. ‘No,’ I say. ‘Definitely not.’
‘And your friend, did she take any drugs?’
I open my mouth. ‘I … um … I don’t know. Maybe,’ I hedge. I don’t want to get into trouble or get Kate into trouble and I’m not sure what the laws are here, though I know cocaine obviously isn’t legal. I don’t want the police thinking any worse of Kate than they are already and I don’t want to admit something that could get her arrested when she shows up.
Nunes looks at me sternly, his brown eyes drilling a hole right through my skull. ‘Did you buy drugs from these two men?’
‘What? No!’ I say, shocked. ‘Absolutely not.’ I shake my head and a flurry of nerves hits me. I twist my hands into knots in my lap. ‘That isn’t what happened. We met them in a bar. And invited them back – that’s all.’
But now he’s planted the idea I wonder if it’s possible that’s where Kate went at four in the morning. Was she buying more drugs? Maybe I should admit that Kate was doing coke. I don’t know what to do. I feel like I’m being interrogated and that I should ask for a lawyer – which is ridiculous as I’m just trying to report my friend missing.
Nunes sighs loudly and puts his pen down on the notepad. I wait for him to say something. I came here hoping that if I told someone – someone official – they could help somehow, do something, but he doesn’t seem to be reacting with any kind of interest, let alone urgency. ‘Have you considered that your friend might have gone off with these two men somewhere?’ he asks me.
I struggle not to roll my eyes. ‘Yes, but she wouldn’t go without telling me.’
‘You were unconscious – you said it yourself – maybe she did tell you but you don’t remember.’
‘But she hasn’t called all day.’
Nunes shrugs again. ‘Maybe she wanted to be by herself. Or maybe she wanted to be with these two men.’
I start to shake my head – no, that’s not it – I know her. I know she wouldn’t just walk off like this and not come back and not tell me where she was. But Nunes cuts me off before I can say anything else. ‘I’m sure she’ll turn up. People go missing all the time.’
‘That’s reassuring,’ I say, stonily.
‘People go out and have fun and forget the time. You said she recently went through a divorce and was looking to have a good time; that’s why you came away. If your friend was drinking and doing drugs—’
‘I never said she was doing drugs,’ I mutter.
He ignores me. ‘Maybe she is passed out in a bed somewhere. It happens.’ As he says it he gives me a pointed look and I glare back at him as much as I dare. I’m a foreigner and he’s a policeman. I definitely don’t want to piss him off, but if I wanted judgement I’d go to confession and see a priest, and I had enough of that during the first twenty-two years of my life to last me until I die.
‘And what if she’s passed out somewhere and in trouble?’ I press. ‘What if she’s hurt?’
‘Did you check the hospital?’
I nod. ‘Yes.’
He scribbles something else on the pad. ‘We’ll check too.’
‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘Should I file a report that she’s missing?’ I ask, feeling silly. It seems so over the top and I don’t know the protocol in Portugal.
‘No,’ Nunes says, standing up and walking to his door, which I take as my cue that this interview, or whatever you could call it, is over. ‘You have to wait twenty-four hours before you can report a person missing.’
‘OK,’ I say. The thought that I might be back here tomorrow makes me want to burst into tears. Surely Kate will show up before then?
Nunes shrugs, bored, trying to usher me out of the office. ‘Don’t worry,’ he says. ‘She’ll turn up.’
Chapter Ten
Once again, I find myself standing on a pavement trying to figure out what to do next. I feel desperately alone, with a slightly panicky feeling of being far from home, among strangers.