“Come on, Daniel. We’re leaving. You go first.”
I did what I was told. As I walked away, I turned for a moment and saw Fermín kneel down by the old lady and kiss her on the forehead. She gave him a toothless smile.
“Tell me, Jacinta,” I heard Fermín saying. “You like Sugus candies, don’t you?”
ON OUR CIRCUITOUS PATH BACK TO THE EXIT, WE PASSED THE REAL undertaker and his two cadaverous assistants carrying a cheap pine coffin, rope, and what looked suspiciously like a recycled shroud. The committee gave off a sinister smell of formaldehyde and cheap eau de cologne. The men’s bloodless skin framed gaunt, canine smiles. Fermín pointed to the cell where the body of the deceased awaited and proceeded to bless the trio, who nodded respectfully and made the sign of the cross.
“Go in peace,” mumbled Fermín, dragging me toward the exit, where a nun holding an oil lamp saw us off with a harsh, condemnatory look.
Once we were out of the building, the grim canyon of stone and shadow that was Calle Moncada seemed to me a valley of hope and glory. Fermín breathed deeply, with relief, and I knew I wasn’t the only one to be rejoicing at having left that place behind. Jacinta’s story weighed on our consciences more than we would have wished to admit.
“Listen, Daniel. What would you say to some ham croquettes and a couple of glasses of sparkling wine here in the Xampañet, just to take away the bad taste left in our mouths?”
“I wouldn’t say no, quite frankly.”
“Didn’t you arrange to meet up with the girl today?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Ah, you devil…you’re playing hard to get, eh? We’re learning fast….”
We hadn’t taken ten steps toward the noisy tavern, just a few doors down the street, when three silhouettes materialized out of the shadows and intercepted us. Two positioned themselves behind us, so close I could feel their breath on the nape of my neck. The third, smaller but much more menacing, blocked our way. It was him. He wore the usual raincoat, and his oily smile oozed irrepressible glee.
“Why, who have we here? If it’s not my old friend, the man of the thousand faces!” cried Inspector Fumero.
It seemed to me I could hear all Fermín’s bones shudder with terror at the apparition. My loquacious friend could manage only a stifled groan. The two thugs, who I guessed were two agents from the Crime Squad, grabbed us by the scruff of our necks and held our right wrists, ready to twist our arms at the slightest hint of a movement.
“I see from your look of surprise that you thought I’d lost track of you long ago, eh? Surely you didn’t think a piece of shit like you was going to be able to crawl out of the gutter and pass for a decent citizen. You might be stupid, but not that stupid. Besides, I’m told you’re poking your nose—and it’s quite a nose—in a whole pile of things that are none of your business. That’s a bad sign…. What is it with you and those little nuns? Are you having it off with one of them? How much do they charge these days?”
“I respect other people’s asses, Inspector, especially if they are cloistered. Perhaps if you became inclined to do the same, you would save yourself a hefty bill in penicillin and improve the number and ease of your bowel movements.”
Fumero let out a little laugh streaked with anger.
“That’s right. Balls of steel. It’s what I say. If all crooks were like you, my work would be a party. Tell me, what are you calling yourself these days, you little son of a bitch? Gary Cooper? Come on, tell me what you’re up to, sticking that big nose of yours in the Hospice of Santa Lucía, and I might let you go with just a warning. Come, spell it out. What brings you two here?”
“A private matter. We came to visit a relative.”
“Sure, your fucking mother. Look here, you happen to have caught me on a good day, otherwise I’d be taking you to headquarters and giving you another session with the welding torch. Come on, be a good boy and tell your pal Inspector Fumero the truth about what the fuck you and your friend are doing here. Damn it, just cooperate a bit, and you’ll save me going over this smart little kid you’ve chosen as a sponsor.”
“You touch a single hair of his and I swear that—”
“You scare me to bits, really. I just shat in my pants.”
Fermín swallowed, as if to hold in all the courage that was seeping out of him. “Those wouldn’t be the same sailor-boy pants that your esteemed mother, the Illustrious Kitchen Maid, made you wear? That would be a shame; I’m told the outfit really suited you.”
Inspector Fumero’s face paled, and all expression left his eyes. “What did you say, motherfucker?”
“I was saying it looks like you’ve inherited the taste and the charm of Doña Yvonne Sotoceballos, a high-society lady….”
Fermín was not a heavy man, and the first punch was enough to knock him off his feet and into a puddle of water. He lay curled up in a ball as Fumero meted out a flurry of kicks to his stomach, kidneys, and face. I lost count after the fifth. Fermín lost his breath and then, a moment later, the ability to protect himself from the blows. The two policemen who were holding me down with iron hands were laughing dutifully.
“Don’t you get involved,” one of them whispered to me. “I don’t feel like breaking your arm.”
I tried in vain to wriggle out of his grip, and, as I struggled, I caught a glimpse of him. I recognized his face immediately. He was the man in the raincoat with the newspaper who was in the bar of Plaza de Sarriá a few days earlier, the same man who had followed us in the bus and laughed at Fermín’s jokes.
“Look, the one thing that really pisses me off is people who stir up the shit from the past!” Fumero cried out. “Things from the past have to be left alone, do you understand? And that goes for you and your dumb friend. Look and learn, kid. You’re next.”
The whole time I watched Inspector Fumero destroy Fermín with his kicks under the slanted light of the streetlamp, I was unable to utter a word. I remember the dull, terrible impact of the blows raining down mercilessly on my friend. They hurt me still. All I did was take refuge in the policemen’s convenient grasp, trembling and shedding silent tears of cowardice.
When Fumero tired of striking a dead weight, he opened up his raincoat, unzipped his fly, and began to urinate on Fermín. My friend didn’t move; he looked like a bundle of old clothes in a puddle. While Fumero discharged his generous, steamy cascade over Fermín, I still couldn’t speak. When he’d finished, the inspector zipped up his trousers and came over to me, sweaty-faced and panting. One of the police officers handed him a handkerchief, and he mopped his face and neck. He came closer, until his face was only a couple of inches from mine, and he fixed me with his stare.
“You weren’t worth that beating, kid. That’s the problem with your friend: he always backs the wrong side. Next time I’m going to fuck him up like I never have before, and I’m sure it’s going to be your fault.”
I thought he was going to hit me then, that my turn had come. For some reason I was glad. I wanted to believe that his blows would cure me of the shame I felt for not having raised a finger to help Fermín, when the only thing he was trying to do, as usual, was protect me.
But no blow came. All Fumero did was pat me on the cheek.
“It’s okay, boy. I don’t dirty my hands with cowards.”
The two policemen chuckled, more relaxed now that they knew the show was over. Their desire to leave the scene was obvious. They went off laughing in the dark.
By the time I went to his aid, Fermín was trying in vain to get up and find the teeth he’d lost in the dirty water of the puddle. His mouth, nose, ears, and eyelids were all bleeding. When he saw that I was unharmed, he attempted to smile and I thought he was going to die on the spot. I knelt beside him and held him in my arms. The first thought that crossed my mind was that he weighed less than Bea.
“Fermín, for God’s sake, we must get you to a hospital right away.”
He shook his head energetically. “Take me to her.”
“
To who, Fermín?”
“To Bernarda. If I’m going to go, I’d rather it was in her arms.”
·32·
THAT NIGHT I RETURNED TO PLAZA REAL, TO THE APARTMENT that I’d sworn years ago I would never set foot in again. A couple of regulars who had witnessed the beating from the door of the Xampañet Tavern offered to help me take Fermín to a taxi rank in Calle Princesa while a waiter called the number I had given him, to give warning of our arrival. The taxi ride seemed endless. Fermín had lost consciousness before we set off. I held him in my arms, clutching him against my chest and trying to warm him up. I could feel his tepid blood soaking my clothes. I whispered in his ear that we were nearly there, that he was going to be all right. My voice trembled. The driver shot me furtive looks through the mirror.
“Listen, I don’t want trouble, do you hear? If he dies, you get out.”
“Just floor it and shut up.”
By the time we reached Calle Fernando, Gustavo Barceló and Bernarda were waiting by the main door of the building, along with Dr. Soldevila. When she saw us covered in blood and dirt, Bernarda started to scream in panic. The doctor quickly took Fermín’s pulse and assured us that the patient was alive. Between the four of us, we managed to carry Fermín up the stairs and into Bernarda’s room, where a nurse, who had come along with the doctor, was getting everything ready. Once the patient was laid on the bed, the nurse began to undress him. Dr. Soldevila insisted that we all leave the room and let him get on with his work. He closed the door on us with a brief “He’ll live.”
In the corridor Bernarda sobbed inconsolably. She moaned that now that she’d found a good man, for the first time in her life, God came along and wrenched him away from her without mercy. Don Gustavo Barceló took her in his arms and led her to the kitchen, where he proceeded to ply her with brandy until the poor thing could hardly stand up. Once the maid’s words became unintelligible, the bookseller poured a glass for himself and downed it in one gulp.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know where to go…” I began.
“That’s all right. You’ve done the right thing. Soldevila is the best orthopedic surgeon in Barcelona.” He spoke without addressing anyone in particular.
“Thank you,” I murmured.
Barceló sighed and poured me a good shot of brandy in a tumbler. I declined his offer, and it was passed on to Bernarda, past whose lips it disappeared as if by magic.
“Will you please go and have a shower and put on some clean clothes,” Barceló said. “If you go back home looking like that, your father will die of cardiac arrest.”
“It’s all right…. I’m okay,” I said.
“In that case stop trembling. Go on, you can use my bathroom, it’s got a water heater. You know the way. In the meantime I’m going to call your father and tell him…well, I don’t know what I’ll tell him. I’ll think of something.”
I nodded.
“This is still your home, Daniel,” said Barceló as I wandered off down the corridor. “We’ve missed you.”
I found Gustavo Barceló’s bathroom, but not the light switch. I took off my filthy, bloodstained clothes and hauled myself into Gustavo Barceló’s imperial bathtub. A pearly mist filtered in through the window that gave onto the inner courtyard of the building, with enough light to reveal the outline of the room and the pattern of the enameled tiles on the floor and walls. The water came out boiling hot and with much greater pressure than our modest bathroom on Calle Santa Ana could offer; it seemed worthy of a luxury hotel such as I’d never set foot in. I stood under the shower’s steamy rays for a few minutes without moving.
The echo of the blows raining on Fermín still hammered in my ears. I couldn’t get Fumero’s words out of my mind, or the face of that policeman who had held me down. After a while I noticed that the water was beginning to get cold, and I assumed the reserve in my host’s boiler was coming to an end. When I had finished the last drop of lukewarm water, I turned off the tap. The steam rose up my body like silk threads. Through the shower curtains, I noticed a still figure standing by the door, her marble gaze shining like the eyes of a cat.
“You can come out. There’s nothing to worry about, Daniel. Despite all my evil doings, I still can’t see you.”
“Hello, Clara.”
She held out a clean towel toward me. I stretched out my hand and took it, wrapping myself in it with the modesty of a schoolgirl. Even in the steamy darkness, I could see that Clara was smiling, guessing at my movements.
“I didn’t hear you come in.”
“I didn’t call. Why are you taking a shower in the dark?”
“How do you know the light isn’t on?”
“The buzzing of the bulb,” she said. “You never came back to say good-bye.”
Yes, I did come back, I thought, but you were very busy. The words died on my lips; their animosity seemed distant, ridiculous.
“I know. I’m sorry.”
I got out of the shower and stood on the mat. The steamy air glowed with specks of silver, and the pale light from the window was a white veil on Clara’s face. She hadn’t changed a bit. Four years of absence had not helped me.
“Your voice has changed,” she said. “Have you changed, too, Daniel?”
“I’m just as stupid as before, if that’s what you’re wondering.”
And more of a coward, I thought. She still had that same broken smile that hurt, even in the dark. She stretched out her hand, and, just as on that afternoon in the Ateneo library some eight years before, I understood immediately. I guided her hand to my damp face and felt her fingers rediscovering me, her lips shaping words in silence.
“I never wanted to hurt you, Daniel. Forgive me.”
I took her hand and kissed it in the dark. “No: you must forgive me.”
Any possibility of a melodrama was shattered when Bernarda stuck her head around the door. Despite being quite drunk, she realized that I was naked, dripping, and holding Clara’s hand against my lips with the light out.
“For the love of Christ, Master Daniel, have you no shame? Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Some people never learn….”
In her embarrassment Bernarda beat a retreat, and I hoped that once the effects of the brandy wore off, the memory of what she had seen would fade from her mind like the traces of a dream. Clara moved away a few steps and handed me the clothes she held under her left arm.
“My uncle gave me this suit for you to put on. It’s from his younger days. He says you’ve grown a lot and it will fit you. I’ll leave you, so you can get dressed. I shouldn’t have come in without knocking.”
I took the change of clothes she was offering me and started to put on the underwear, which was clean-smelling and warm, then the pale pink cotton shirt, the socks, the waistcoat, the trousers, and jacket. The mirror showed me a door-to-door salesman whose smile had abandoned him. When I returned to the kitchen, Dr. Soldevila had come out of the bedroom to give us all a bulletin on Femín’s condition.
“For the moment the worst is over,” he announced. “No need to worry. These things always look more serious than they are. Your friend has a broken left arm and two broken ribs, he’s lost three teeth, and he presents a large number of bruises, cuts, and contusions. But luckily there’s no internal bleeding and no symptoms of any brain lesion. The folded newspapers the patient wore under his clothes to keep him warm and accentuate his figure, as he puts it, served as armor and cushioned the blows. A few moments ago, when he recovered consciousness, the patient asked me to tell you that he’s feeling like a twenty-year-old, that he wants blood sausage sandwiches with fresh garlic, a chocolate bar, and some lemon Sugus candies. I see no problem with that, though I think it would be better to start off with fruit juices, yogurt, and perhaps a bit of boiled rice. Moreover, as proof of his vigor and presence of mind, he has asked me to transmit to you that, when Nurse Amparito was putting a few stitches in his leg, he had an iceberg of an erection.”
“It’s just that he’s very manly,” Bernarda
murmured apologetically.
“When will we be able to see him?” I asked.
“Not just yet. Perhaps by daybreak. It will do him good to rest a bit. Tomorrow, at the latest, I’d like him to be taken along to the Hospital del Mar so he can have a brain scan, just for our peace of mind. But I think we can rest assured that Mr. Romero de Torres will be as good as new within a few days. Judging from the marks and scars on his body, this man has got out of tighter spots. He’s a true survivor. If you need a copy of the report to take along to the police—”
“It won’t be necessary,” I interrupted.
“Young man, let me warn you that this could have been very serious. You must report it to the police immediately.”
Barceló was watching me attentively. I looked back at him, and he nodded.
“There’ll be plenty of time for that, Doctor, don’t worry,” said Barceló. “What’s important now is to make sure the patient is well. I myself will report this incident tomorrow morning, first thing. Even the authorities have a right to a little peace and quiet at night.”
It was obvious that the doctor took a dim view of my suggestion to keep the incident from the police, but when he realized that Barceló was taking responsibility for the matter, he shrugged his shoulders and returned to the bedroom to continue with his treatments. As soon as the doctor had disappeared, Barceló told me to follow him to his study. Bernarda sighed on her stool, numb with brandy and shock.
“Bernarda, keep yourself busy. Make some coffee. Nice and strong.”
“Yes, sir. Right away.”
I followed Barceló to his study, a cave blanketed in clouds of tobacco smoke, which curled around columns of books and papers. Echoes of Clara’s piano reached us in discordant spurts. It was obvious that Maestro Neri’s lessons hadn’t done much good, at least in the field of music. The bookseller pointed me to a chair and proceeded to fill his pipe.