The waiter nodded respectfully and set off toward our pursuer’s table to deliver the message. When the watchman heard the instructions, his face dropped. He remained at the table for another fifteen seconds, torn, and then galloped off into the street. Fermín didn’t bat an eyelid. In other circumstances I would have enjoyed the episode, but that night I was unable to get Bea out of my mind.
“Daniel, come down from the clouds, we have work to discuss. Tomorrow, without delay, you must go and visit Nuria Monfort, as we said.”
“And when I’m there, what do I say to her?”
“You’ll find some topic of conversation. The plan is to follow Mr. Barceló’s very sensible suggestion. You make her aware that you know she lied to you knowingly about Carax, that her so-called husband Miquel Moliner is not in prison as she pretends, that you’ve discovered that she is the evil hand responsible for collecting the mail from the old Fortuny-Carax family apartment, using a PO box in the name of a nonexistent solicitors’ firm…. You tell her whatever is necessary to light a fire under her feet. All in a melodramatic tone and with a biblical expression. Then, just for the effect, you leave her to stew for a while in her own juices of unease.”
“And in the meantime…”
“In the meantime I’ll be waiting to follow her, an objective I plan to put into practice using the latest techniques in camouflage.”
“It’s not going to work, Fermín.”
“O ye of little faith! Come on, what has this girl’s father said to you to get you into this frame of mind? Is it the threat you’re worried about? Don’t pay any attention to him. Let’s see, what did this lunatic say to you?”
I answered without thinking. “The truth.”
“The truth according to Saint Daniel the Martyr?”
“You can laugh as much as you like. It serves me right.”
“I’m not laughing, Daniel. It’s just that I feel bad seeing you punish yourself. Anyone would say you’re about to put on a hair shirt. You haven’t done anything wrong. Life has enough torturers as it is, without you going around moonlighting as a Grand Inquisitor against yourself.”
“Do you speak from experience?”
Fermín shrugged.
“You’ve never told me how you came across Fumero,” I said.
“Would you like to hear a story with a moral?”
“Only if you want to tell it.”
Fermín poured himself a glass of beer and swigged it down in one gulp.
“Amen,” he said to himself. “What I can tell you about Fumero is common knowledge. The first time I heard him mentioned, the future inspector was a gunman working for the anarchist syndicate, the FAI. He had earned himself quite a reputation, because he had no fear and no scruples. All he needed was someone’s name, and he’d finish him off on the street with a shot in the face, in the middle of the day. Such talents are greatly valued in times of unrest. The other things he didn’t have were loyalty or beliefs. He didn’t give a damn what cause he was serving, so long as the cause would help him climb the ladder. There are plenty of riffraff like him in the world, but few of them have Fumero’s talent. From the anarchists he went on to serve the communists, and from there to the fascists was only a step. He spied and sold information from one faction to the other, and he took money from all of them. I’d had my eye on him for a long time. I was working for the government of the Generalitat at the time. Sometimes I was mistaken for the ugly brother of President Companys, which would fill me with pride.”
“What did you do?”
“A bit of everything. In today’s radio soaps, it would be called espionage, but in wartime we’re all spies. Part of my job was to keep an eye on types like Fumero. Those are the most dangerous. They’re like vipers, with no creed and no conscience. In a war they appear everywhere. In times of peace, they put on their masks. But they’re still there. Thousands of them. The fact is that sooner or later I discovered what his game was. Rather later than sooner, I’d say. Barcelona fell in a matter of days, and the boot was on the other foot now. I became a persecuted criminal, and my superiors were forced to hide like rats. Naturally, Fumero was already in charge of the “cleanup” operation. The purge was carried out openly, with shootings on the streets or in Montjuïc Castle. I was arrested in the port while attempting to obtain passage to France on a Greek cargo ship for some of my superiors. I was taken to Montjuïc and held for two days in a pitch-dark cell, with no water or ventilation. The next light I saw was the flame of a welding torch. Fumero and a guy who spoke only German had me hung upside down by my feet. The German first got rid of my clothes by burning them with the torch. It seemed to me that he was well practiced. When I was left stark naked and with all the hairs on my body singed, Fumero told me that if I didn’t tell him where my superiors were hiding, the fun would begin in earnest. I’m not a brave man, Daniel. I never have been, but what little courage I possess I used to tell him to go screw himself. At a sign from Fumero, the German injected something into my thigh and waited a few minutes. Then, while Fumero smoked and watched me, smiling, he began to roast me thoroughly with the welding torch. You’ve seen the marks….”
I nodded. Fermín spoke in a calm tone, with no emotion.
“These marks are the least important. The worst ones remain inside. I held out for an hour under the torch, or perhaps it was just one minute. I don’t know. But I ended up giving them the first names, surnames, and even the shirt sizes of all my superiors and even of those who were not. They abandoned me in an alleyway in Pueblo Seco, naked and with my skin burned. A good woman took me into her home and looked after me for two months. The communists had shot her husband and her two sons dead on her doorstep. She didn’t know why. When I was able to get up and go out to the street, I learned that all my superiors had been arrested and executed just hours after I had informed on them.”
“Fermín, if you don’t want to tell me all this…”
“No, no. I’d rather you heard it and knew who you’re dealing with. When I returned to my home, I was told it had been expropriated by the government, with all my possessions. Without knowing it, I had become a beggar. I tried to get work. I was rejected. The only thing I could get was a bottle of cheap wine for a few céntimos. It’s a slow poison that burns your guts up like acid, but I hoped that sooner or later it would work. I told myself I would return to Cuba one day, to my mulatto girl. I was arrested when I tried to board a freighter going to Havana. I’ve forgotten how long I spent in prison. After the first year, one begins to lose everything, even one’s mind. When I came out, I began to live on the streets, where you found me an eternity later. There were many others like me, colleagues from prison or parole. The lucky ones had somebody they could count on outside, somebody or something they could go back to. The rest of us would join the army of the dispossessed. Once you’re given a card for that club, you never cease to be a member. Most of us came out only at night, when the world isn’t looking. I met many like me. Rarely did I see them again. Life on the streets is short. People look at you in disgust, even the ones who give you alms, but this is nothing compared to the revulsion you feel for yourself. It’s like being trapped in a walking corpse, a corpse that’s hungry, stinks, and refuses to die. Every now and then, Fumero and his men would arrest me and accuse me of some absurd theft or of pestering girls on their way out of a convent school. Another month in La Modelo Prison, more beatings, and out into the streets again. I never understood the point of those farces. Apparently the police thought it convenient to have a census of suspects at their disposal, which they could resort to whenever necessary. In one of my meetings with Fumero, who by now was quite the respectable figure, I asked him why he hadn’t killed me, as he’d killed the others. He laughed and told me there were worse things than death. He never killed an informer, he said. He let him rot alive.”
“Fermín, you’re not an informer. Anyone in your place would have done the same. You’re my best friend.”
“I don’t deserve y
our friendship, Daniel. You and your father have saved my life, and my life belongs to you both. Whatever I can do for you, I’ll do. The day you got me out of the streets, Fermín Romero de Torres was born again.”
“That’s not your real name, is it?”
Fermín shook his head. “I saw that one on a poster at the Arenas bullring. The other is buried. The man who used to live within these bones died, Daniel. Sometimes he comes back, in nightmares. But you’ve shown me how to be another man, and you’ve given me a reason for living once more: my Bernarda.”
“Fermín…”
“Don’t say anything, Daniel. Just forgive me, if you can.”
I embraced him without a word and let him cry. People were giving us funny looks, and I returned their looks with eyes of fire. After a while they decided to ignore us. Later, while I walked with Fermín to his pensión, my friend recovered his voice.
“What I’ve told you today…I beg you not to tell Bernarda….”
“I won’t tell Bernarda or anyone else. Not one word, Fermín.”
We said farewell with a handshake.
·37·
I COULDN’T SLEEP AT ALL THAT NIGHT. I LAY ON MY BED WITH THE light on, staring at my smart Montblanc pen, which hadn’t written anything for years—it was fast becoming the best pair of gloves ever given to someone with no hands. More than once I felt tempted to go over to the Aguilars’ apartment and, for want of a better outcome, give myself up. But after much meditation, I decided that to burst into Bea’s home in the early hours of the morning was not going to improve whatever situation she was in. By daybreak exhaustion and uncertainty helped me to conclude that the best thing to do was let the water flow; in time the river would carry the bad blood away.
The morning dripped by with little activity in the bookshop, and I took advantage of the circumstance to doze, standing up, with what my father described as the grace and balance of a flamingo. At lunchtime, as arranged with Fermín the night before, I pretended I was going out for a walk, and he claimed he had an appointment at the outpatients’ department to have a few stitches removed. As far as I could tell, my father swallowed both lies whole. The idea of systematically lying to my father was beginning to unnerve me, and I said as much to Fermín halfway through the morning, while my father was out on an errand.
“Daniel, the father-son relationship is based on thousands of little white lies. Presents from the Three Kings, the tooth fairy, meritocracy, and many others. This is just one more. Don’t feel guilty.”
WHEN THE TIME CAME, I LIED AGAIN AND MADE MY WAY TO THE HOME of Nuria Monfort, whose touch and smell remained indelible in my memory. The cobblestones of Plaza de San Felipe Neri had been taken over by a flock of pigeons, but otherwise the square was deserted. I crossed the paving under the watchful eye of dozens of pigeons and looked around in vain for Fermín, disguised as heaven knows what—he had refused to reveal his planned ruse. I went into the building and saw that the name of Miquel Moliner was still on the letterbox; I wondered whether that would be the first flaw I was going to point out in Nuria Monfort’s story. As I went up the stairs in the dark, I almost hoped she wouldn’t be at home. Nobody can feel more compassion for a fibber than another fibber. When I reached the fourth-floor landing, I stopped to gather up courage and devise some excuse with which to justify my visit. The neighbor’s radio was still thundering at the other end of the landing, this time broadcasting a game show on which contestants tested their knowledge of religious lore. It went by the name With a Little Help from the Lord, and reputedly held the whole of Spain spellbound every Tuesday at noon.
And now, for five points, and with a little help from the Lord, can you tell us, Bartolomé, how does the Evil One disguise his appearance in front of the wise men of the Tabernacle, in the parable of the archangel and the gourd, in the Book of Joshua? a) as a young goat, b) as a jug vendor, or c) as an acrobat with a monkey?
Riding on the wave of applause from the audience in the studios of Radio Nacional, I planted myself in front of Nuria Monfort’s door and pressed the bell for a few seconds. I listened to the echo spread through the apartment and heaved a sigh of relief. I was about to leave when I heard footsteps coming up to the door. The peephole lit up like a tear of light. I smiled. As the key turned in the lock, I breathed deeply.
·38·
DANIEL.”
The blue smoke of her cigarette coiled around her face. Her lips shone with dark lipstick; they were moist and left marks that looked like bloodstains on the filter she held between her index and ring fingers. There are people you remember and people you dream of. For me, Nuria Monfort was like a mirage: you don’t question its veracity, you simply follow it until it vanishes or until it destroys you. I followed her to the narrow, shadowy room where she had her desk, her books, and that collection of lined-up pencils, like an accident of symmetry.
“I thought I wouldn’t see you again.”
“I’m sorry to disappoint you.”
She sat on the chair by her desk, crossing her legs and leaning backward. I tore my eyes away from her throat and concentrated on a damp spot on the wall. I went up to the window and had a quick glance around the square. No sign of Fermín. I could hear Nuria Monfort breathing behind my back, could feel her eyes brushing my neck. I spoke without taking my eyes off the window.
“A few days ago, a good friend of mine discovered that the property administrator responsible for the old Fortuny-Carax apartment had been sending his correspondence to a PO box in the name of a firm of solicitors, which, apparently, doesn’t exist. This same friend discovered that the person who for years has been collecting the mail to this PO box has been using your name, Señora Monfort—”
“Shut up.”
I turned around and saw her retreating into the shadows.
“You judge me without knowing me,” she said.
“Then help me to get to know you.”
“Have you told anyone about this? Who else knows what you’ve said to me?”
“More people than you’d think. The police have been following me for a long time.”
“Fumero?”
I nodded. It seemed to me that her hands were trembling.
“You don’t know what you’ve done, Daniel.”
“You tell me,” I answered with a harshness I didn’t feel.
“You think that because you chance upon a book you have a right to enter the lives of people you don’t know and meddle in things you cannot understand and don’t belong to you.”
“They belong to me now, whether I like it or not.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying.”
“I was in the house of the Aldayas. I know that Jorge Aldaya hides there. I know he was the person who murdered Carax.” I didn’t know I believed these words until I heard myself saying them.
She looked at me for a long time, choosing her words carefully. “Does Fumero know this?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’d better know. Did Fumero follow you to that house?”
The anger in her eyes burned me. I had made my entrance playing the role of accuser and judge, but with every minute that passed, I felt more like the culprit.
“I don’t think so. Did you know? Did you know that it was Aldaya who killed Julián and that he’s hiding in that house? Why didn’t you tell me?”
She smiled bitterly. “You don’t understand anything, do you?”
“I understand that you lied in order to defend the man who murdered the person you call your friend, that you’ve been covering up this crime for years, protecting a man whose only aim is to erase any traces of the existence of Julián Carax, who burns his books. I understand that you lied to me about your husband, who is not in prison and clearly isn’t here either. That’s what I understand.”
Nuria Monfort shook her head slowly. “Go away, Daniel. Leave this house and don’t return. You’ve done enough.”
I walked away toward the door, leaving her in the dining room. I stopp
ed halfway and looked back. Nuria Monfort was sitting on the floor, her back against the wall, all concern for appearances gone.
I CROSSED THE SQUARE WITH DOWNCAST EYES. I CARRIED WITH ME THE pain I had received from the lips of that woman, a pain I felt I deserved, though I didn’t understand why. “You don’t know what you’ve done, Daniel.” All I wanted was to get away from that place. As I walked past the church, I didn’t at first notice the presence of a gaunt, large-nosed priest standing at the entrance holding a missal and a rosary. He blessed me unhurriedly as I passed.
·39·
I WALKED INTO THE BOOKSHOP ALMOST FORTY-FIVE MINUTES LATE. When my father saw me, he frowned disapprovingly and looked at the clock.
“What time do you think it is? You know I have to go out to visit a client in San Cugat and you leave me here alone.”
“What about Fermín? Isn’t he back yet?”
My father shook his head with that haste that seemed to take over when he was in a bad mood. “By the way, there’s a letter for you. I’ve left it next to the till.”
“Dad, I’m sorry but—”
He waved my excuses aside, threw on raincoat and hat, and went out of the door without saying good-bye. Knowing him, I guessed his anger would evaporate before he reached the train station. What I found odd was Fermín’s absence. Since I’d seen him dressed up as a vaudeville priest in Plaza de San Felipe Neri, waiting for Nuria Monfort to come rushing out and lead him to the heart of the mystery, my faith in that strategy had crumbled away. I imagined that if Nuria Monfort did go down to the street, Fermín must have ended up following her to the pharmacist’s or the baker’s. A grand plan! I went over to the till to have a look at the letter my father had mentioned. The envelope was white and rectangular, like a tombstone, and in the place of a crucifix it bore a return address that managed to crush what little spirit I had left for that day.