Secrets of Spain Trilogy

by Caroline Angus Baker

  “No one will be there on Sunday, though,” Jaime said.

  “We’ve changed the bombing to tomorrow,” Apolinar replied, “for maximum impact. Did you hear the rumours that the Moroccans are planning an attack on the Spanish state? Franco’s world is crumbling. The people are rising up and taking over now. The daily reports that state Franco improving health are all bullshit. Soon Franco will be dead, and we will be free.”

  “Free to hurt others?” Jaime asked.

  “It’s a case of revolution,” Alazne spat at Jaime. “We aren’t smothering infants in their beds. We are hurting people like the police and government, those who hold people back, those who reap all the rewards of Spain. People have gotten murdered. Babies get stolen from their leftists mothers. Laws are passed destroying the rights and views of people like me.”

  “We can’t get justice any way other than joined groups like ETA, FRAP or GRUPO,” Apolinar added. “Killing the devils in power is the only way to freedom. Also, we will get Alazne little ‘problem’ aborted and get this job done. We will get added as an active cell of GRUPO after the bombing.”

  “Don’t worry,” Alazne said when she looked at Jaime incredulous expression. “It’s a lot to take in all at once.”

  “Yes, let’s get some sleep,” Apolinar agreed. “Tomorrow the others will arrive and we can find something to eat.”

  “I was hoping maybe we could talk,” Jaime stumbled as both Alazne and Apolinar settled themselves down on couches for the night.

  “Tomorrow,” Alazne mumbled as she folded an old blanket over herself. “I’m tired. Tomorrow.”

  “I might go downstairs and have a cigarette,” Jaime said.

  “Whatever you like,” Apolinar said and flicked off the light, plunging the room into darkness, other than the light that came in through the threadbare curtain over the balcony doors.

  Jaime fumbled for his suitcase and headed out the door of the filthy apartment. He found his way down the stairs, but the smell of the tiny plaza wasn’t much improvement to stench of the safe house. Jaime moved away from the orange streetlight outside the front door and sat in the centre of the plaza on the sole wooden bench seat. He felt too tired to get his cigarettes even from his suitcase. Jaime couldn’t stay with Apolinar, but he didn’t wish to leave Alazne there either. The only side of Valencia that Jaime knew was the luxurious end, with the hotels he stayed in with Paco.

  The city seemed silent. All those who had been in the larger plaza down the street must have retreated as the cold of the night set in the old town. The odd door banging shut, the odd car engine in the distance knocked at the silence. Jaime had never seemed so alone; the crumbling cobbles beneath his feet looked as weary as he felt.

  The squeaking door opened, and Alazne appeared. She shut the door behind her and crossed her arms over her chest in the increasing cold. Alazne sat on the seat next to Jaime, and he had the desire to put his arm around her. “Why are you doing this?” he all but whispered.

  “It seems the right thing to do for my country,” she said, her arms still tight around herself.

  “Violence never helped anything. No one who set off bombs or killed men ever achieved anything. There is honour is standing up for rights and people. There is dignity is affecting change. But bombing the Town Hall, attending riots, setting fires, none of that helps, Alazne.”

  “People like me don’t get to make changes any other way. Either we can just be shoved along with the masses, doing what we’re told or get imprisoned for having other ideas. I don’t have a rich father to elevate me in life.”

  “But is this act, this viciousness, do you think it’s right?”

  “I don’t want to be helpless, Jaime, I want to be powerful.”

  “I don’t think you’re helpless.”

  “Please don’t say you’ve gone all soppy because we had sex one time.”

  “Hey, it wasn’t me losing my virginity at Rebelión. I’m young, but I’m not stupid, nor innocent, Alazne. I want to like you, but you’re so… so…”

  “Poor?”

  “You’re as lovable as a cactus.”

  Alazne smiled, but worry took over her features. She held her hand up to hush Jaime. “Listen,” she whispered.

  Jaime glanced around but heard nothing. A second later, a bang came from around the corner of the apartment building, like a trash bin falling on the ground.

  “Quick,” Alazne said and pulled Jaime’s shirt. She dashed across the plaza and hid behind the only car parked in the square, a beat-up red Seat. Jaime fell to his knees next to Alazne, lost in confusion.

  Silence turned to chaos as half a dozen figures, all dressed in black, balaclavas over their faces, stormed the plaza. Jaime and Alazne watched from underneath the old car as several of the men threw themselves against the locked door the apartment building, smashing the wood to pieces. Jaime caught the sight of a gun under the glaze of the streetlight. Heavy military boots banged up the stairs of the building, and Jaime couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe.

  “We have to run,” Alazne whispered.

  “I can’t, my suitcase…”

  “Fuck the case, Jaime-boy! It’s the secret police! Do you want your head bashed in or do you want to make a run for it?”

  Two masked men stood at the door, and Jaime couldn’t see how they could slide away without the two men catching a glimpse of the pair. Jaime didn’t dare try to look at their covered faces, as if eye contact could get used as a weapon against him. “Who are the secret police?”

  “You’re the spawn of Franco’s Brigada Especial,” Alazne whispered. “These are ultra-right wing terrorists who exact revenge, and the government and police take a blind eye since they’re all on the same side. Some might even be legitimate policemen. What are we going to do about…”

  Alazne whispers trailed off as the men came through the door again. In the dim light, they saw Apolinar being dragged by his arms. His head swung forward; his bare feet are not attempting to stand. Liquid dripped from his mouth, and Jaime assumed it to be blood. The gunmen tossed Apolinar on the cobbles and stood around for a moment, before one man stepped forward and kicked Apolinar in the stomach, but the man didn’t make a noise. The assassins must have knocked Apolinar unconscious in the apartment. The rest of the masked men all took turns, kicking and stomping the lifeless body on the ground. Bile rose in Jaime’s throat, ready to throw up as he watched group brutality taken out on a single man, unable to protect himself. After what must have been forty or fifty stomps, one man pulled out a handgun from the heavy belt on his waist and fired once. The shot ran out through the plaza and echoed up through the buildings and into the night. Jaime threw himself on top of Alazne on instinct; his pulse raced, his mouth dry, his vision blurred. In an instant, all the men were gone.

  Alazne pushed Jaime from her and raced to Apolinar’s body. Jaime noticed a few movements of curtains around the plaza as he ran after Alazne. The shot wasn’t muffled at all; everyone would have heard the gun, but most would be too scared to investigate.

  Alazne fell to her knees as she started to cry. Apolinar wasn’t even recognisable anymore; his face nothing more than a bloody mash of skin and bone. His hands; all the fingers looked broken, his arms contorted and snapped at the elbows. His bare feet bled where they got stood on, and countless more injuries probably hidden under his clothes, all stained with his blood. The single bullet had gone straight through his heart.

  “How did they know?” Alazne wept, her words muffled by the hand over her lips. “How did they know what we were planning?”

  Jaime shook his head as Alazne glanced up at him; tears stained her cheeks.

  “What if they got to Raul and Davíd?” Alazne’s voice wobbled as she spoke. “What do we do?”

  “We need to get out of there!” Jaime cried. The sound of sirens in the distance; someone in the plaza had called the police. “Alazne, what if they police assume we killed him?”

  “They would have killed me. Killed us. We
should all have gotten killed tonight.”

  Jaime pulled Alazne from the body of her friend and looked around for his suitcase. Gone. “They took my bag.”

  “Was there anything inside to identify you?”

  Jaime patted the pockets of his jacket, his wallet safe. “I don’t think so, just clothes.”

  “The terrorists will have trashed the apartment; we need to… to…” Alazne’s eyes pointed straight at Apolinar’s dead body. She wasn’t able to comprehend the danger they faced.

  “We need to go!” Jaime said and yanked her from the scene. Her bare feet left bloody footprints as they darted from the plaza down unruly narrow alleyways, eager to escape the chaos of murder. Alazne’s words echoed in Jaime’s hearts. They would have killed us, too.

  30

  Mallorca, España ~ Junio de 2014

  A rare event for the bullring in Palma de Mallorca – an actual bullfight. The plaza de toros usually hosted concerts or others sports, such as tennis. But this time, all 11,620 seats were filled with bullfighting fans to see ‘El Valiente’ Beltrán perform for the King, who had just abdicated; though his son had not yet taken the throne. The laws of Spain couldn’t even come up with a way to allow the King to abdicate; parliament was passing emergency laws to make everything final. The constant calls and protests for a Republic were not as manic now as in the early days of the abdication. With the King staying at his summer home on the island of Mallorca, Cayetano had the opportunity to perform for the man himself one more time, inside the Coliseu Balear.

  For the six fights of the afternoon, Cayetano got placed at third and sixth, usually a position for less-skilled toreros, but they wanted to make sure the crowd stayed until the end and watching Cayetano Beltrán had that direct effect. Mallorca, as usual, had anti-taurinos, bullfighting haters, present outside the ring – signs and jeering denouncing the event. Cayetano’s pre-performance interview had been messy – he had been asked about the rumours of horn-shaving, so the bulls he would face wouldn’t be a threat. Cayetano responded with the fact that horn-shaving doesn’t reduce injuries because the horn is misshapen and harder to judge. Plus the bull would be angrier – horns become tender like too-short fingernails. The typical curses pre-fight - the fans and autographs hunters made worse with the anti-taurinos – made the trip to the ring from the hotel a chaotic drama. It was no wonder Cayetano insisted the children always stayed behind, even though they were permitted into the backstage areas.

  One journalist remarked that Cayetano was a maxima figura del toro, not just a figure in the industry, a rare feat, but a grand figure, a maestro worthy of the title. Everyone wanted to see Cayetano every time he defied a dramatic Spanish death. The question got posed – would the Prime Minister attend if Cayetano got killed in the bullring? He laughed and said Luna wouldn’t bother to invite Spain’s leader, to the gracious laughter of the crowd, all keen for a photograph before the event. Cayetano hadn’t been pique sec – in the ‘dry dock’, injured during the season. What was coming for Cayetano – broken ribs, arms, lower legs? A damaged neck, back, chest? But was that what the people wanted to see? Injuries? If so, Cayetano said he would refuse to participate, which satisfied the anti-bullfighting league, since they wanted the bloodletting to end. That was the thing about bullfighting – no one sat on the fence; people took one side or the other. Nothing would change their opinions either way.

  The event got billed as Maestro ‘El Valiente’ Beltrán Morales and two other fighters. The gente clave, the ‘key people’, were all there too, there for the spectacle rather than the art form. They wanted to see ‘El Valiente’ - part ballet dancer, part assassin. A primal urge for a violent ugliness would become beauty amongst the sparkling suits and art mixed with blood.

  Luna stood against the barrier as Cayetano became a man without a shadow in the centre of the ring, with a chestnut bull, a heavy animal still light on its feet. The smell of stale smoke hung in the air as Luna stood with Paco and watched the disturbed sand under Cayetano’s feet, already splattered with blood.

  “The bull,” Paco muttered through a puff of cigar smoke, “it has bravura, a willingness to charge.”

  Luna nodded as she folded her arms over her soft white shirt. Just with a slight flicker of the cape, the bull charged at Cayetano. The beast brushed against his suit, royal blue dipped in gold, but Cayetano’s feet didn’t move, to the cheer of the crowd.

  “His footwork is perfect today,” Paco continued. “Caya moves like flower opening in the early summer sunshine.”

  “Even the most stereotypical macho Spanish man sounds like a poet at the bullring,” Luna smiled.

  “Well, true beauty calls for such words.” Paco paused as Cayetano did the revolera pass, a swinging movement of the cape, and everyone cheered. He added a veronica, the classic two-handed pass, but it was time for the kill. The fighter before Cayetano had been flung into the air by the bull, and the kill was messy. Cayetano didn’t intend for anything as ugly; Luna shut her eyes and missed the moment the sword slipped into the morillo, the bulging neck muscle of the animal, which had charged right at the blade. More cheering made her open her eyes, and the bull was already dead. Right on cue, the people were on their feet, waving their white handkerchiefs to the president of the corrida so that Cayetano could be awarded an ear for the kill.

  “I rate that bull a nine out of ten,” Paco shouted over the sound of the cheering, and Jaime nodded in agreement. He had just wandered over from where he stood with Miguel, there to hand the sword to Cayetano when he was ready. Cayetano got awarded a bloody ear and waved it with pride and dedicated the fight to the King. Alonso and Eduardo stood with Cayetano in their suits of red and silver, clapping their hands.

  “You don’t know what a bull is like until you have opened him up, isn’t that what everyone says?” Luna asked, and Paco put an arm around is daughter-in-law.

  “This one,” he said to Jaime and gave Luna a kiss on the cheek.

  “Selective breeding over 300 years gives the ganadería, where this bull came from, a distinct advantage when providing aggressive animals,” Luna added. “The cape flies true or you will die on the sand.”

  The second bull for Cayetano had even more to offer in its toreabilidad – its bullfighting ability. For the first time, Luna heard Paco utter the bull was a perfect ten, a catedral, a huge black Iberian monster of an animal. Cayetano dedicated the kill to the King before even starting.

  “Don’t get too cocky,” Paco muttered as he watched his son. “Don’t get too fancy on style, keep it fresh but traditional.” He spoke as if Cayetano could hear him. Given the thousands of hours of practice, Cayetano probably could hear it in his mind. “Don’t lose touch with the bull, keep your focus.”

  The sun had faded, and artificial light filled the corrida. Cayetano’s suit sparkled, living up to its title of suits of lights. With every graceful move on his feet around the bull, the sparkles danced, and the crowd cheered, peppered with ¡oles! or gasps. Cayetano had found his perfect evening on the sand. Even the toristas, the bull worshippers, of the crowd were enjoying themselves and the dance of death. The bull tired; it looked sick as it weakened from the battle; sweat covered Cayetano and blood caked in the oily and wavy hair on the bull, named Luchador - fighter, contender.

  Cayetano did the mariposa, a spectacular pass with the cape behind his back, which always made Luna nervous, just as he did when he sat on his knees with the cape before the angry bull. But when came the hora de verdad, the moment of truth, Luna again shut her eyes for the sword and its violent movement. The crowd erupted again, and Luna opened her eyes in time to see the poor animal slump over, a single step left before death welcomed its soul.

  This time, a lace handkerchief on the balcony appeared and Cayetano got awarded two ears, both dedicated to King Juan Carlos, who sat high out of view in the shade. Cayetano had done everything expected and more. Cayetano was on track to retiring a classy, unbeatable champion.

  Outside the expensive
hotel, Cayetano had to autograph everything from restaurant menus, to books, photos, arms and more. Selfies with phones got sought. Heat. Lights. Shouting. Shoving. Always the act for Cayetano before he retired into the plush boutique hotel for the evening. The place had a rooftop bar, closed for the Beltrán and Morales families. Despite being two kilometres from the sea, its salty scent wafted over the rowdy party while the children played between the adults.

  Cayetano sat back in a soft lounger, his feet bare as he reclined. Luna sat next to him on a couch with a glass of wine in her hand. The rest of the family sprinkled out around the place, dim lights giving them a view out over the seaside city.

  “This is it,” Cayetano said and crossed his ankles. “I know what I want for next year.”

  “Which is?” Paco asked and fingered his cigar. Luna forbade anyone smoking near the children so all Paco could do was hold his little pleasure.

  “Those bulls tonight were excellent. Rebelión bulls are well-bred, but we could make them better,” Cayetano continued.

  “We try, every day,” Pedro said with a grin from too much pre-dinner vermouth.

  “I know, but I want to concentrate my effort on the breeding. We are part of the multi-billion Euro bullfighting industry. I want to take over Rebelión full-time.”

  “The words I’ve longed to hear!” Paco cried with his arms outstretched, and Jaime and Pedro laughed.

  “But I want to take over the Cuenca bullring. We need to spread our resources,” Cayetano continued.

  “We can do that,” Pedro said and picked up his red wine.

  “But what I want the most, is to start a training school for budding toreros,” Cayetano said, his face serious. “Rebelión could sponsor young guys, tutor them. There are plenty of up-and-comers who can’t get a start in this financial climate. Perhaps we can discover the next great torero until Paquito comes of age.”