The Guardian of Secrets and Her Deathly Pact

by Jana Petken

  He shouted at Carlos again. “Do you know who I am? I’m not Harry Miller. My name is Joseph Dobbs, and this is my fucking son. Now take me with him. Where he goes, I go. Do you get it now, you stupid fucking Spanish halfwit!”

  Carlos took a step backwards and pulled Pedro back with him until Joseph stood in front of them both. Pedro watched the faces of the two men and knew that there was only one way this could end. Carlos looked to Pedro for permission. Pedro nodded his head slowly, which meant it’s all right. Do it. Carlos understood. They stared at each other for a second longer, communicating with unspoken words, but Joseph was oblivious and continued to shout.

  “That’s my son, you git! I’m not supposed to be here!”

  The gun glinted in the sunlight, and Carlos pointed it at Joseph’s head. Joseph’s face was creased in confusion. He stared into the barrel of the gun, then at Pedro.

  “Son, save me,” he pleaded.

  The gun fired. The bullet hit Joseph between his eyes, just above his nose. He fell to the ground dead, lifeless eyes staring up at the sun.

  Pedro sat on the truck’s floor and looked one last time inside the corral where Joseph’s Dobbs’s dead body lay surrounded by blood. Carlos’s face appeared at the back of the truck, and for just an instant, Pedro saw a slight curve of his lips before the truck’s flap swung shut. He closed his eyes and held his head in his hand; it was over for one of them. Joseph Dobbs was dead, and all he could feel was relief. He smiled.

  They bumped along rocky terrain, flat deserted fields, and highways strewn with burned-out tanks and army trucks. Refugees with belongings wrapped in old sheets eyed the convoy with caution and fear. Pedro lifted the torn flap on the side of the truck, watching and listening to insults being thrown at the walking wounded and old women begging for food or water. Shouts of ‘¡Viva España!’ and ‘¡Viva Franco!’ echoed around the convoy, and the nationalist soldiers stood with arms outstretched in fascist salute, killing the defeated refugees who refused to salute back. Pedro slumped back and closed his eyes.

  Jaime, a tool worker from Albacete, sat beside him. Every now and again, he lifted the torn flap and peered from left to right. He had a quizzical expression and nudged Pedro, who had dozed off from sheer exhaustion.

  “I don’t think they are going to kill us, you know. We’ve come too far. We’re almost at the Madrid suburbs. I don’t get it, do you?”

  Pedro looked through the holes in the flap and shrugged his shoulders. For the first time in days, he dared to hope that maybe, on this occasion, he’d survive. Carlos’s presence in the corral had been a shock to him. He still had no idea why he was with the nationalists, but he was sure of one thing: today he had saved his life.

  “Beats me,” he said to Jaime. “But as long as we’re not being shot, I don’t really care where we’re going! What do you think happened to the foreigners?”

  “I think they’re probably dead by now,” Jaime said matter-of-factly. “They didn’t separate us for nothing, did they? Anyway, what use are they to the rebels alive?”

  “Shut your filthy communist mouth!” a guard told Jaime before hitting him with the butt of his rifle. “One more word out of you and it’ll be your last. You’ll all find out where you’re going soon enough.”

  Just before dawn, they arrived at a nationalist garrison and were quickly hosed down with water and disinfectant. They were then given nationalist military uniforms to put on before receiving bowls of hot murky liquid with beans floating on the top. Pedro laughed, and the sound threatened to bubble over into a fit of hysterical giggles. With every passing minute, the reason for being there became more and more apparent to him. He wasn’t going to be shot; he was going to join the other side again!

  A nationalist officer, the highest ranking there, marched towards them with great pomp and ceremony. Pedro watched the man’s slow progress through the lines of prisoners and stifled another giggle; he was as short and fat as General Franco, he thought, finding the whole situation bizarre. Christ, he really was suffering from hysteria now.

  It was morning, and the sun blinded the prisoners’ eyes, which were already red and irritated due to lack of sleep. The officer stood on top of the back end of a tank and pushed out his chest in a display of exaggerated authority.

  “We have captured more than one hundred thousand prisoners such as yourselves, and I have the pleasure of informing you that you will now be re-educated and will fight with nationalist units. So you see, the next time you scum of the earth hold a gun, it will be to kill the communist and socialist masters you once served! And if you’re feeling sorry for yourselves, think again. You’re the lucky ones. Half the prisoners brought here have been sent to labour camps. Now if you don’t like this idea, we will not force you to join us. We will simply shoot you and put you out of your misery. It’ll mean that I’ve got fewer mouths to feed. If I had my way, I’d shoot you all right now and be done with you. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Fight with them or be killed by them,” Pedro whispered to Jaime later. “What do you think history will say about us? Will we be known as traitors? That we sold ourselves to the nationalists for the price of our lives? Or will they understand our actions and say that we did what any man who wanted to see his family again would do?”

  Jaime shook his head and smiled. “To tell you the truth, friend, I don’t really care what history says. I’m just glad to be alive and glad that I wasn’t killed last week by some communist bastard for taking too long to have a shit. Anyway, the first chance I get, I’m going to make a run for it back to Albacete. I’ve had enough of this fucking carry-on!”

  The next morning, the ramifications of Pedro’s forced transfer into the enemy camp came in waves of disbelief, ironical amusement, and finally depression. He could make a run for it too, he supposed, but run where and to whom? His commitment to and belief in the war had subsided. He had always sympathised with the plight of the peasants, but he now hated the thought of the Russians using the Spanish military as though they were nothing more than puppets on strings, which they could pull and cut on a whim. The other and more personal damage that the situation had caused was that he had witnessed his own father’s death and felt nothing but relief. What kind of a man did that make him?

  “Where do you think they’ll send us?” Jaime asked, interrupting Pedro’s thoughts.

  “I don’t know. They’ll probably use us as gun fodder on the front lines,” he told him absently, still thinking about Joseph Dobbs.

  Chapter 77

  María found a letter from Carlos. It sat on top of the bed in the tiny room she shared with another nurse. She picked it up and shook her head. As usual, Carlos knew her movements even before she did! The note read:

  Please meet me in our cafe at two o’clock tomorrow.

  I love you,

  Carlos’

  A week after Jack’s death she’d returned to Madrid’s general hospital. She had gone through periods of mourning, incredible loneliness, and the intense war-weariness that living in the capital now brought. On the first day of their return, Lucia decided to go back to Valencia. They had been given the news about Pedro missing in action, but Lucia was convinced that he was still alive and that ‘missing in action’ meant exactly that. Her decision to move back to Valencia was one that had been immediate and unbending.

  “If Pedro is missing, I just know that he will try to make it home, so that’s where I’m going to wait for him,” she told María.

  María had greeted the news with pessimism. She believed her brother was dead. She knew Pedro was not like Carlos. Pedro would never have gone this long without finding a way to make contact. There were couriers who ran between the lines, just like postmen. They travelled for miles, delivering mail and orders, and she and Lucia were not difficult to find.

  As though reading her thoughts, a courier knocked on her door just before she left the hospital to meet Carlos. He handed her a letter from Lucia, who had apparently arrived safely in Valencia
, wished her well, and left for some unknown destination. There was also a letter in the mailbox from her mother, dated weeks before; she recognised the writing on the envelope. She put both letters into her bag, not wanting to read them until she reached the cafe and had a steaming mug of hot chocolate in front of her. It was a grand occasion now when a letter came.

  She wrapped the scarf around her head and pulled on her boots. Madrid was freezing over in one of the coldest and bleakest winters in living memory. The city had deteriorated into a hovel of homeless, starving people, and despite the evacuation programme a year ago, it was crammed with refugees, swelling the population by more than half. Various committees had supervised the construction of the shelters, mainly in empty houses and apartments, and they had also organised food supplies. Committee members, foreign journalists, and Soviet advisers were generally well looked after, but for the majority of the population, the daily allowances were hardly sufficient. Desperate to feed hungry children, women stripped the bones of horses and mules killed by the bombing or shellfire. Cats and dogs were also eaten and put into thin watery soups to improve the taste. Most people, however, were still trying to achieve some normality in their lives. They went to work and used the trams, even though their tracks had to be repaired on a daily basis. The metro was also still being used, although the people joked that the line went even farther than the front line, and if one missed one’s stop, he could come out on the far side of it.

  After trudging through the snow, which had arrived in a blizzard the night before, María reached the cafe, grateful to be out of the cold and misery of the streets where the dead and starving people lay. This cafe held great affection for her not only because it was her and Carlos’s meeting place, but also because it was the only place where one could still find a hot drink and occasional meal, if one had the right connections, she thought, and Carlos apparently did.

  She was much too early for her meeting with Carlos and didn’t expect to see him for another hour. She was also hungry, but the waiter informed her that only hot and cold drinks were being served. How different things were now, she thought. She remembered the sumptuous lunch she had shared with Carlos at their last meeting almost a year ago, the last time she had seen him.

  After ordering her hot chocolate, she ripped open the first envelope and settled herself comfortably in the corner of the bustling cafe, filled with foreigners and communist officials.

  Dearest María,

  We have received the wonderful news that your brother Miguel is alive and well. I’ve enclosed a copy of his letter and hope it brings you as much joy as it did us.

  Her heart soared. She unfolded the enclosed letter and began to read:

  Dear family,

  It has taken me far too long to pluck up the courage to write to you all. I only hope that I have your forgiveness and your love and that it is not too late to tell you all that I am sorry. Although I have not spoken to you in almost two years, I want you to know that you have been in my heart and mind constantly, even though sometimes I put you all to the back of it. I know some in the family disagree with my views, but my views are who I am, what I am. You have never told me to change them; you are not guilty of that crime. I, on the other hand, am guilty for shutting you out of my life because I did not accept that you too have your views which make you different from me but nonetheless still family, still loved.

  War has taught me so many things, mostly about the importance of having something and someone to fight for. Without family, a man fights for nothing but his own gratification. I tried that once, and it led to nothing but self-loathing. To hear your voices and see your faces around the dinner table again is what now keeps me going. I have met with shallow and false people who have made me realise, perhaps too late, that you are the most important people in my life and that they were not.

  I think about María and her passionate love affair with the land as well as her wonderful sense of humour, which used to amuse me, although I never showed it, and a sense of knowing that I wish I too could possess. Marta, with her desire to serve God and her sweet tender nature that calms us all, never knew how much I loved her, for I did not give her the time of day. I will rectify this and hope that I may have the opportunity to know her better in the future. Pedro is strong and idealistic yet with a sincerity I envy and lack.

  Mother and Father, you have always been there for me no matter what I’ve done, so please don’t give up on me.

  I cannot tell you where I am or what I’m doing, but I can tell you that I pray every night for your good health. You can write, if you want, to the address on the back of this sheet of paper. It would mean so much to me if you did. I love you all.

  God bless you.

  Your son,

  Miguel

  Tears of joy stung María’s eyes. She wanted to jump on top of the table, shout, and proclaim to the world that her brother was alive. Instead, she sipped her chocolate and grinned at the people passing her table. At length, she began to resume reading the letter from her mother.

  María, you must not think the worst about Pedro. I feel that he is alive. As his mother, I would just know if he were dead. Father has spoken to some people at the Spanish Medical Aid centres from both the nationalist and republican camps, and they have promised to find out all they can about his unit and what happened to it. I cannot believe that a whole battalion has simply disappeared without a trace, so I am confident that he will be found somewhere. I will remain optimistic.

  Your father is keeping relatively well, although he cannot venture outside at the moment, as it is so cold and would only worsen his condition. You cannot imagine the impact Miguel’s letter had on him. He now walks around the house with a spring in his step and has smiled more in the last week than in the last year.

  The aunts are well, still fighting, and still trying to prove themselves useful, although I can’t keep up with the balls of wool and needles I’ve had to buy for your auntie Rosa, who insists that she’s going to knit for the entire nationalist army, including General Franco himself!

  Merrill Farm is back to its days of former glory. The hop gardens are healthy and yielded one of the best crops in years this summer. Tom Butcher’s son John has done a marvellous job here in the last twenty years, but it breaks my heart to see him and his wife mourn the loss of their son Peter. They have asked me to thank you for getting the news of his death to them and for being with him at the moment of his passing. It’s all so terribly sad, isn’t it? Such a waste as well.

  Many years ago, I would have laughed if someone had suggested that I give up Merrill Farm, but my heart is in Spain with its people, and La Glorieta is my home. Pedro has always made it clear that he wishes no part of his Kentish inheritance, and I know that neither you nor Miguel has ever had any interest in Merrill Farm either. This has also urged me to take another step back and admit that although I cannot bring myself to sell it or give it to John Butcher outright, I no longer feel it is a necessary part of our lives. There is so much more to worry about now.

  María, write to us. You don’t seem to be yourself lately, and it worries both your father and me to think that you are hiding things from us. We know you so well, and we know that you often think of other people before yourself. That’s not a bad thing, but sometimes a little self-pity can be a good thing, and it is much healthier than bottling up the sadness we detected in your last couple of letters. It must be horrific in your hospital, where you see pain and suffering every day, where bombs flying through the air give no respite from the war and wounded. Your father knows how it is and is still suffering horrible nightmares from his few months there. We want you to consider coming to London, even for a short time; please tell us that you will at least think about it.

  I leave you with all our thoughts and prayers and hope to see you soon.

  Love,

  Mother and Father

  María folded the pages and thought about her mother’s words. What was she doing here? This was not even h
er home. La Glorieta was. Valencia was. She had come here to be near Carlos, but he might as well be on the other side of the planet for all the time she’d spent with him. She knew in her heart that she would not go to England or leave Spain for even a day, but why was she in Madrid? She pondered the question and could find no justifiable answer. She had been given her trade certificate months ago and was now a nurse, although her training would continue.

  She looked up at the door and then out of the window. There was still no sign of Carlos. She was so engrossed in her thoughts that she almost forgot about the other unopened letter until she spilled some chocolate on it. She wiped the envelope dry and tore it open.

  Dear María,

  I am at La Glorieta, your home. When I was told that it had been transformed into a hospital and convalescent centre for the wounded, I jumped at the chance to transfer there, for where else would Pedro go? There were many letters from him on my return, just as you suspected, but unfortunately, none were sent after June, and I saw him after that.

  It was a strange and unsettling feeling to read about his war after seeing him in the summer. He didn’t tell me half the things he’d been through, and I wish now that he had. I have asked all the people I can find if they have information that may lead to us finding him. I even went to Francisco’s house; he was most helpful and asked after all your family with genuine affection. He told me that all was not lost with regards to Pedro, as the republican government hadn’t sent an official letter to your family (he told me it was standard procedure to report a soldier’s death in this way), and that until we did receive news to the contrary, we should remain hopeful that Pedro is alive. You could have no idea, María, how much better I felt after speaking to him.