"That's my glass, Father," he said.
The priest apologised with a quiet smile. He put the glass back on the table, where Penelope was impatiently drumming her lacquered nails, and then, nodding briefly, he and Macarena went on their way without another word. Gavira took a long gulp of whisky. He watched them thoughtfully, while Peregil, behind him, breathed a sigh of relief.
"Take me home," pouted Penelope.
Gavira, watching his wife and the priest disappear around the corner, didn't even turn. He emptied his glass and only just stopped himself from smashing it on the ground. "Fuck you," he said.
He handed the glass to Peregil, with a look that was as good as an order. Peregil, with another resigned sigh, shattered the glass on the ground as discreetly as he could. As he did so, he startled an eccentric-looking couple just then passing the bar: a fat man dressed in white, with a hat and walking stick, and, on his arm, a woman in a polka-dot dress, with a kiss-curl like Estrellita Castro's, carrying a camera.
The three of them met up just around the corner, beneath the Arab portico of the mosque, on the steps that smelled of horse manure and old Seville. Don Ibrahim seated himself with difficulty, ash from his cigar dropping onto his paunch.
"We were lucky," he said. "There was enough light to take the photos."
They deserved a few minutes' rest. He was in a good mood, feeling satisfied with a job well done. Audaces fortuna llevat, and all that; although he wasn't too sure that llevat was the right verb.
La Nina sat down next to him with a jangling of bracelets and earrings, the camera in her lap. ‘I’ll say," she agreed in her husky voice. She put her shoes down and rubbed her bony legs, which were covered with varicose veins. ‘Peregil can't complain this time. By God he can't."
Don Ibrahim fanned himself with his panama and stroked his singed moustache. In this moment of success, his cigar smelled glorious. "No," he said festively. "He can't. He saw himself how it was all carried out with impeccable, almost military precision. Isn't that right, Potro? Like commandos in the movies."
Since no one had told him to sit down, El Potro stood, as if on duty, and nodded. "Exactly," he said.
"Which way did the lovebirds go?" asked Don Ibrahim, placing the panama on his head.
El Potro glanced down the street and said they were heading toward the Arenal; plenty of time to catch up with them.
Don Ibrahim took the camera from La Nina's lap and handed it to him. "Go on, take out the film before it spoils."
Obediently, manoeuvring with both "his good arm and the one in the sling, El Potro opened the camera while Don Ibrahim searched for the other roll of film. At last he found it, took it out of its box, and handed it to his associate. "You did rewind it, didn't you?" he asked casually. "Before opening the camera?"
El Potro, very still, stared at Don Ibrahim. Suddenly he snapped shut the camera. "What was it I was supposed to rewind?"" he asked suspiciously, arching an eyebrow.
Holding the new film in one hand and his cigar in the other, Don Ibrahim looked at him for some time. "Shit," he said.
They walked in silence to the Arenal. Macarena turned to look at Quart from time to time, but neither of them spoke. There wasn’t much to say and he couldn't ask whether the encounter with her husband had been an accident or planned by her. He would probably never know, he thought.
"This is the way he went," Macarena said at last, when they came to the river.
They descended wide steps that led to the quays of the Guadalquivir, at the foot of the ancient Arab tower named Torre del Oro. There wasn't the slightest breeze, and the shadows of the palms, jacarandas, and bougainvilleas were motionless in the moonlight.
"Who?" he asked.
"Captain Xaloc."
Dark and still, tourist boats were moored to pontoons along the deserted bank. The black water reflected the lights of Triana on the opposite side, bounded by strings of car headlights on the Isabel II and San Telmo bridges.
"This was Seville's old port," said Macarena. She wore her jacket round her shoulders and still clutched her leather bag to her chest. "Only a century ago, there would have been ships docking here . . . The remains of the great trade with America. Ships sailed down the river to Sanlucar, then Cadiz, before crossing the Atlantic." She walked forward and stopped by a flight of steps leading down to the dark water. "Old photographs show all kinds of vessels - brigantines, schooners, skiffs - moored on both banks . . . Over there were the fishermen's boats, and boats with white awnings that brought the cigarette girls over from Triana to the tobacco factory. All the cranes and the warehouses were here on this quay."
She fell silent, turning towards the Paseo del Arenal, the dome of the Maestranza Theatre, the modern buildings that stood between them and the tower of La Giralda, lit up in the distance, and Santa Cruz, hidden from view.
"It was a forest of masts and sails," she added. "That was what Carlota saw from the pigeon loft."
They walked along the quay in the shadows cast by the trees in the moonlight. A young couple was kissing in the light of a street-lamp, and Quart saw Macarena watching them with a thoughtful smile.
"You are nostalgic," he said, "for a Seville you've never known."
Her smile widened, then her face was again in shadow. "That's not true," she said. "I knew it well, and still do. I've read and dreamed a lot about this city. Some things my grandfather and mother told me. Others I simply knew instinctively." She touched her wrist, where her pulse beat. "I feel them here."
"Why did you choose Carlota Bruner?"
Macarena took a moment to answer. "She chose me." She turned to Quart. "Do priests believe in ghosts?"
"Not really. Ghosts don't stand up to electric light or nuclear power ... Or to computers."
"Maybe that's their charm. I believe in them, or at least in a certain type of ghost. Carlota was a romantic young woman who read novels. She lived wrapped in cotton wool in an artificial world, protected from everything. One day she met a man. A real man. It was as if she'd been struck by lightning. Unfortunately, Manuel Xaloc fell in love with her too."
Occasionally they passed the motionless shadow of someone fishing from the quay, the ember of a cigarette, a glint of light at the end of a rod and line, a splash in the calm waters. A fish flapped on the paving stones of the quay, gleaming in the moonlight until a hand returned it to the bucket.
"Tell me about Xaloc," said Quart.
"He was thirty years old and poor, a second officer on one of the steamers that sailed between Seville and Sanlucar. They met when Carlota took a journey downriver with her parents. They say that he was also handsome, and I imagine that his uniform added to his looks. You know that's often true of sailors, soldiers ..."
She seemed about to add something but left the sentence unfinished. They passed a tourist boat moored to the quay, black and silent. Quart managed to make out its name in the moonlight: LOVELY.
Macarena went on. "Xaloc was caught lurking by the railings of the Casa del Postigo, and my great-grandfather Luis had him fired. He also used all his influence, and it was considerable, to make sure that the man didn't get a job anywhere else. Desperate, Xaloc decided to go to America to seek his fortune. Carlota promised she would wait for him. It's the perfect plot for a romantic novel, don't you think?"
They walked side by side, and once again their steps occasionally brought them so close together that they almost touched. Suddenly Macarena stepped around an iron bollard in the darkness, and she was right next to Quart, brushing his side for the first time. She seemed to take an age to move away.
"Xaloc boarded his ship here," she said. "A schooner called the Nausica. Carlota wasn't even allowed to come and say goodbye. From the pigeon loft she watched the ship sail down the river; it wouldn't have been possible for her to see him from so far away, but she claimed he was on deck, waving a handkerchief until the boat was out of sight."
"How did things go for Xaloc?"
"Well. After a time he was given comman
d of a ship and smuggled goods between Mexico, Florida and Cuba." There was a hint of admiration in her voice. Quart could picture Manuel Xaloc on the bridge of a ship, a column of smoke on the horizon. "They say he wasn't exactly a saint, that he also did some pirating. Some of the ships that crossed his path sank without trace, or were found mysteriously adrift, plundered. I suppose he was in a hurry to make his fortune and return . . . For six years he sailed the Caribbean and he acquired quite a reputation. The Americans put a price on his head. One day, out of the blue, he landed in Seville with a fortune in banknotes and gold coins and a velvet bag that contained twenty wonderful pearls for their wedding."
"Even though he'd never heard from her?"
"Yes. I suppose Xaloc was a romantic too. He assumed that my great-grandfather had prevented Carlota from writing and he had faith in her love, and in a way he was right. She told him she'd wait for him, and she was still waiting in the tower, watching the river." Macarena stared at the black current. "She had gone mad two years before his return."
"Did they get to see each other?"
"Yes. My great-grandfather was devastated. At first he refused. He was an arrogant man and blamed Xaloc for the misfortune. In the end, on the advice of doctors and his wife's pleas, he agreed to a meeting. The captain came one afternoon to the courtyard that you know, in his merchant navy uniform: navy blue, gilt buttons . . . You can picture the scene, can't you? His skin was weathered by the sun, and his moustache and sideburns had turned grey. They say he looked twenty years older than he was. Carlota didn't recognise him. After ten minutes a clock struck and she said, 'I must go to the tower. He may return at any time.' And she left."
"What did Xaloc do?"
"He didn't say a word. My great-grandmother was weeping and my great-grandfather was plunged into despair. Xaloc picked up his cap and left. He went to the church where he'd hoped to be married and gave the priest the pearls he'd brought for Carlota. He spent the night wandering around Santa Cruz, and at dawn he left on the first ship that set sail. This time nobody was there to watch him wave his handkerchief.''
There was an empty beer can on the ground. Macarena nudged it into the water with her foot. They heard a faint splash and both watched the small black shape float away.
"You can read the rest of the story," she said, "in newspapers of the time. While Xaloc was on his way back to the Caribbean in 1898, the Maine was blown up in the port of Havana. The Spanish government authorised privateering against North America, and Xaloc immediately got hold of a letter of marque. His ship was a very fast cutter, the Manigua, armed and with a crew recruited from riffraff in the West Indies. He sailed around probing the blockade. In June 1898, he attacked and sank two merchant ships in the Gulf of Mexico, and had a nighttime encounter with a gunboat, the Sheridan, in which both ships were badly damaged ..."
"You sound as if you're proud of him."
Macarena laughed. He was right. She said she was proud of the man who might have been her great-uncle had the stupidity and blindness of the family not interfered. Manuel Xaloc was a real man, to the end. Did Quart know that he went down in history as the last Spanish pirate, and the only one in the Spanish-American War. His great achievement was breaking the blockade of Santiago. He entered the port at night with messages and supplies for Admiral Cervera, and then on the morning of the third of July he headed out to sea with the other ships. He could have stayed in port since he was a merchant seaman and wasn't under the orders of the squadron, which everyone knew was doomed. It consisted of old and poorly armed ships that didn't stand a chance against the American battleships and cruisers. But he set sail. He went last, after all the Spanish ships, having gone forth one after the other, had been sunk or torched. He didn't think of escape. Instead, he headed for the enemy ships at full steam, with a black flag hoisted alongside the Spanish one. When he was sunk, he was still trying to ram the battleship Indiana. There were no survivors."
The lights of Triana, reflected in the river, flickered softly on Macarena's face.
"You know the story well," said Quart.
She smiled slowly. "Of course I do. I've read accounts of the battle a hundred times. I've even kept the newspaper clippings in the trunk." "Carlota never knew?"
"No." Macarena sat on a stone bench and searched in her bag for her cigarettes. "She waited another twelve years at that window, staring at the Guadalquivir. Gradually the port declined and there were fewer and fewer boats. The schooners no longer plied up and down the river. And one day she too disappeared, from the window." She put a cigarette in her mouth and pulled out her lighter. "By then, the story of Carlota and Captain Xaloc had become a legend. As I said, there were even songs about them. She was buried in the crypt of the church where she would have been married. And by order of my grandfather Pedro, who was the new head of the family after the death of Carlota's father, the twenty pearls were used to represent tears on the face of the Virgin."
She lit her cigarette, shielding the flame of the lighter with her hand. She waited for the lighter to cool and then tucked it back under her bra strap, apparently unaware that Quart was watching her every move. She was engrossed in the memory of Captain Xaloc.
"That was my grandfather's homage," Macarena went on, "to the memory of his sister and the man who might have been his brother-in-law. The church is all that's left of them now. That, and Carlota's things, the letters and all the rest of it." She glanced at Quart, as if she'd just remembered he was there. "Including that postcard."
"There's also you, and your memories."
There was no joy in Macarena's moonlit smile. "I'll die, just like the others," she said quietly. "And the trunk and its contents will end up in an auction, surrounded by other dusty objects, just like everything else." She drew on her cigarette and exhaled the smoke abruptly, almost scornfully.
Quart sat beside her. Their shoulders touched, but he made no effort to move away. The fragrance of jasmine, blended with the smell of tobacco, reached him. "That's why you're fighting your battle," he said.
She nodded. "Yes. My battle, not Father Ferro's. A battle against time and oblivion." She spoke so quietly that Quart could hardly make out her words. "I belong to a breed that's dying out, and I'm fully aware of it. It's lucky, really, because there's no longer a place for people like me and my family, or for memories like mine ... Or for beautiful, tragic stories like that of Carlota Bruner and Captain Xaloc." The ember of her cigarette glowed. "I'm just waging my own personal war, defending my space." She spoke louder and addressed her words directly to Quart. "When the time comes for me to die, I'll accept my end is near with a clear conscience. Like a soldier who surrenders only when he's fired his last bullet. Having done my duty to the name I bear and to the things I love. That includes Our Lady of the Tears and Carlota's memory."
"Why must it all end like that?" Quart asked gently. "You could have children."
Something flashed across the woman's face. There was a long silence before she spoke again. "Don't make me laugh. My children would become litdc aliens sitting in front of computer screens, dressed like the kids in American sitcoms. To them Captain Xaloc's name would sound like something out of a cartoon." She threw her cigarette into the river. "So I'll pass on that ending. Whatever there is will die with me."
"And your husband?"
"I don't know. For the time being, he's in good company, as you've seen." She laughed contemptuously. "Let's make him pay all his debts . . . After all, Pencho's the kind of man who likes to rap on the bar for his bill and leave with his head held high." She bowed her head, and that gesture seemed an omen or a threat. "But this time the price will be high. Very high."
"Does he still have a chance?"
She turned to him, surprised, mocking. "With whom? With what? The church deal? With that little tramp with the big tits? With me?" As she moved in the darkness, her eyes reflected distant lights and the pale glow of the moon. "Any man would have a better chance with me. Even you."
"Please, leav
e me out of it," said Quart. His tone must have been too emphatic, because she paused, interested.
"Why should I leave you out? It would be a wonderful way of taking my revenge. And very pleasant. At least I hope so."
"Revenge against whom?"
"Against Pencho. Against Seville. Against everything."
The shadow of a tug, silent and flat-bottomed, moved down river. After a while, the muffled rumble of motors reached them, as if unrelated to the boat itself, which seemed to move unaided on the current.
"It looks like a ghost ship," she said. "Like the schooner Captain Xaloc sailed away on."
The only light on the vessel, the solitary port-side light, cast a red glow on her face. She followed the boat with her eyes until it took the bend in the river and the green light on the other side showed. The red gradually disappeared, and there remained only a tiny green dot that receded into the distance until it too faded completely.
"He appears on nights like this," she added. "When there's a full moon. And Carlota looks out of her window. Would you like to go and see her?"
"Who?"
"Carlota. We could go into the garden and wait. As when I was a child. Wouldn't you like to come with me?" "No."
She looked at him for a time in silence. "I wonder," she said, "where you get your damned composure from."
"I'm not as composed as you think." And Quart laughed quietly. "At the moment my hands are trembling."
It was true. He had to stop himself from reaching out and clasping her head, under her ponytail, and pulling her to him. Dear God. From some deep recess of his mind came the memory of Spada laughing. Abominable creatures, Salome, Jezebel. The devil's creation. She put out her hand and linked fingers with Quart, and found that he really was trembling. Her hand was warm. It was the first time they had touched other than in greeting. Quart released his hand carefully, and punched the stone bench hard with his fist. The pain shot up into his shoulder.