Sooner or later, she says, Spain will find the courage to confront the Franco years and their insidious legacy.
The circumstances of the baby’s “death” follow a pattern familiar to those investigating the decades-long theft of children.
Maqueda is also certain a change is coming, one that could yet bring her 80-year-old mother some degree of comfort.
Chato Galante, who was stripped of his youth in the prison cells and torture rooms of Franco’s Spain, likes to joke that he is an “unrepentant optimist”.