by Colm Toibin
Over breakfast, she almost asked them how her grandmother had come to sell this land, but once more there was too much confusion with the children for her to be able to fix on one of them with a direct question. Soon, her father went into the village, Nuria disappeared upstairs and her mother and the children dived into the pool. It was still only ten o’clock in the morning. She wondered how she would spend the day. Despite her mother’s invitation, she did not change into the bathing suit Nuria had found for her and join them in the pool. Instead, she walked around to the front of the house, noticing that the path down to the beach had been blocked off by a new wall. She walked down the drive and along the narrow dusty road until she came to the first group of bungalows, the ones that did not have a view of the sea. A few of them, she saw, were inhabited. The fact that they were joined to each other when none of the old traditional houses on this part of the island were joined like that, and that they had security bars on the windows, reminded her of how much she had hated the grubby tourist villages in Majorca when she had been there years before. She supposed that there were many places like this on Menorca too, but had never imagined that they would come so close to her grandmother’s house.
Later, when Nuria appeared and said that she was going into the village to collect some cooked chickens she had ordered the day before, Carme said she would go with her in the dusty car, their father having taken the new one.
‘What happened here?’ Carme asked as they came to the bungalows.
‘You’d better ask father.’
‘What does it have to do with him?’
‘He built them.’
‘Who let him do that?’
‘Ask him.’
‘I’m asking you.’
When she looked at Nuria, she saw that her sister was concentrating on the road as though there were something dangerous coming towards them.
‘Granny worried about money a lot.’
‘She owned the entire building in Barcelona, and the shares.’
‘The building in Barcelona is rent-controlled, and she didn’t want to sell the shares.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because she was afraid to touch her savings or the capital. She wanted the income from them because she wanted to go on sending you money every month in London and she wanted to give me the same, and don’t complain about that.’
‘She had plenty of money.’
‘She didn’t think so.’
‘So she sold that old fool prime building land?’
‘Yes, and he built the houses.’
‘What does he know about building?’
‘Nothing. Which is why he has a problem.’
Nuria parked the car but kept her eyes fixed on a point beyond the windscreen and did not move.
‘And what is the problem?’ Carme asked.
‘She sold him the land, but there was a clause that he could build houses on it if he liked, and he could rent them and the money was all his, but he couldn’t ever sell them without her permission. That’s what the clause said. She insisted on it.’
‘She liked holding on to things, didn’t she?’
‘And now he wants to sell them because he owes the bank money and he’s having problems with the repayments. Or at least he wants to sell some of them.’
It took Carme a moment to understand the implications of what her sister was saying.
‘Did we inherit that clause?’
‘Yes, we did.’
‘So he needs our permission, our signature.’
‘Yes, he does.’
Carme almost laughed out loud.
‘Don’t gloat,’ Nuria said.
‘I think we should get the roast chickens before they grow cold,’ Carme said.
As they drove back to the house they did not speak for a while. Carme waited for Nuria to ask her something, but then realized that Nuria intended to say nothing.
‘Have you seen a lawyer?’ she asked eventually. ‘I mean your own lawyer.’
‘No,’ Nuria said.
‘Why not?’
‘I’ll tell you why not, because the man I’m married to invested in some of the bungalows, and he wants them sold too. Both Jordi and father think it is the best time to sell.’
‘Does Jordi have problems at the bank too?’
‘No.’
‘Does he need the money?’
‘No, but he likes selling when the time is right.’
‘Are you sure that father needs our permission to sell?’
‘Yes, I am. And so is he. No one will buy unless we sign.’
Over lunch, her mother suggested that Carme move into the bigger room and leave her parents the room she was occupying, or they could move into one of the other smaller rooms.
‘We can move out now, can’t we, Paco?’ her mother said.
Her father nodded in assent.
‘I mean, you’ve been away for so long.’
Her mother smiled.
‘I think Carme is happy where she is,’ Nuria said. ‘And we’re only going to be here two more nights.’
‘She might like us to move now,’ her mother said. ‘And if she does, we can be out in a second.’
‘I’m fine where I am,’ Carme said.
‘No, really …’ her mother continued.
‘That’s enough about it, mother,’ Nuria said.
The change in her mother’s attitude was too deliberate; she saw that Nuria was embarrassed by it.
‘Well, our room is lovely,’ her mother went on, ‘we always love it, but the two of you will have to decide if you want to redecorate. You know, the plumbing …’
‘Yes, there’ll be plenty of time for that,’ Nuria said.
Soon, the children began to attract everyone’s attention and the man who had come the previous evening returned and went into the house with Carme’s father.
‘I wish he didn’t come during meals,’ her mother said.
‘Don’t offer him coffee, mother,’ Nuria said. ‘We need a bit of peace today.’
Carme asked her sister if there was a place on the island where she bought clothes and Nuria mentioned a shop in Ciutadella where she knew the owner.
‘Oh, don’t go there today,’ her mother said. ‘They have most of it closed off for the festival tonight. You’ll never get parking.’
‘They’ll open again at five,’ Nuria said. ‘But they’ll be closed tomorrow. I can call her if you want.’
‘No, I’ll drive in and have a walk around,’ Carme said.
She went upstairs, passing on the way her father and his visitor, who were going through a ledger with close attention. She had a shower and put on fresh clothes before setting out for Ciutadella. She would have a coffee while she waited for the shops to open.
Almost everything she saw in the small boutique on a shaded side-street in the old city to which her sister had directed her was simple and light. And yet the clothes were designed in a way so different from what she had bought in England that they all seemed strange to her. She tried on a number of outfits, but felt that she would need new skin and new hair and a new expression on her face before she could wear them. She was sorry that she had not asked Nuria to come with her; Nuria at least would have been able to keep the owner at bay. But she might also have given her advice about sandals, or suggested that she deal with her hair, her nails and her skin before she begin to buy skirts and tops, no matter how right they were.
The owner, who was alone in the shop, appeared offended when she handed her back the clothes she had tried on.
‘I’ll need to come with my sister,’ she said. The woman made no effort to disguise her irritation and looked at the clothes as though they had been soiled. She herself was dressed in a severely cut grey dress. She was wearing shoes that could have been slippers they were so light. She was also wearing too much jewellery, rings and earrings that were too big. Her suntan had to be fake, but Carme could not be sure. In London, her look would have stood out, been too elaborate, b
ut here, even in this small city on the island, it seemed almost natural. Carme sighed and checked herself in the mirror and walked out of the shop.
As she made her way slowly along the street, she stopped to look into the window of an antiques shop. Her mother’s remark about redecoration came into her mind and she wondered if she and Nuria should talk about buying some good old furniture. Suddenly, she noticed a piano that seemed familiar. When she pushed the door and went inside to check, she also found two rocking chairs, unmistakably the same as the ones her grandmother had owned, and realized that the piano on display was her grandmother’s piano, which had come from Cuba and had been in the wide corridor leading to the staircase of the house. When she looked around she saw other furniture that also belonged to the house. As the owner approached, she knew that she would look to him like someone who had bought property on the island in the recent past, an outsider. She spoke to him in a deliberately hesitant Spanish.
‘And these,’ she said, ‘where did they come from?’
She pointed to the piano and the chairs.
‘They were from the house of an old lady who died,’ he said. ‘They would need restoration, but they are very good.’
‘How much?’ she asked.
He gave her the price, which was high.
‘Have you had them for long?’
‘No, a month or so,’ he said.
‘I’ll take them,’ she said.
She probably, she thought, should have bargained. Now, as the owner watched her, she did not want to give her name or address, or even a cheque or a credit card in case he recognized her name.
‘Can I come and pay you on Monday?’ she asked. ‘When the festival is over?’
When he agreed, he asked for a name.
‘I’ll give you my husband’s name,’ she said. ‘Ian Lee. Will that do?’
‘Your Spanish is very good,’ he said.
‘Thank you.’
He wrote the name down using a large black marker and put it on the piano.
‘I’ll see you on Monday,’ she said.
‘Enjoy San Juan,’ he replied. ‘Make sure you come in early tonight and see the festival before it gets rowdy.’
‘I will,’ she replied.
Over supper, while Nuria was upstairs, having taken the children to bed, and there was a strained silence at the table, Carme mentioned that she thought she might drive into Ciutadella later to see the festival.
‘Oh, we never go to that any more,’ her mother said. ‘Not for years now. No one goes.’
‘No one?’ Carme asked.
‘No one we know. It’s too full of outsiders and tourists now.’
‘It’s been completely spoiled,’ her father said.
There was silence again, broken only by the sound of crickets and frogs beyond the swimming pool. Carme watched her parents and was tempted for a moment not to say anything, or to wait until Nuria came back. But there was something about the way her mother was eating, something so self-satisfied, that she could not contain herself.
‘Completely spoiled,’ Carme said in a low voice, ‘like the view from this house.’
Her father sipped a glass of water, her mother stared into the distance.
‘Like the view from this house,’ she repeated, raising her voice.
Her parents pretended that she had not spoken.
‘Did you hear what I said?’ Carme asked. ‘Spoiled like the view from this house. Don’t you agree?’
As Nuria returned to the table, her mother moved as though to say something.
‘Excuse me,’ Carme said to her father, ‘don’t you agree with what I said? Or have you grown deaf as well as fat?’
‘Carme!’ Nuria said.
‘He has grown fat selling our property to tourists and now he has the nerve to complain about them spoiling things!’
‘Keep calm, everybody,’ her father said.
‘By the way, I bought the furniture back. I found it down a side-street. The old piano and the rocking chairs. And if you sell anything else,’ she turned to her father, ‘I will call the police.’
‘Oh, listen to the communist!’ her mother said. ‘The police! Will that be the Russian police? Or the Chinese police?’
‘The bungalows are ghastly,’ Carme said.
‘Do you know why your grandmother sold the land?’ her mother asked. ‘So she would have enough cash in the bank to send money to you every month. How we used to laugh as we went to the bank together! You know, even the manager used to laugh as your grandmother would announce that she wanted to send money to her little communist in London.’
‘Montse, shut up!’ her father said.
‘Her lazy little communist, too lazy and useless to work and too lazy and useless ever to finish a course.’
‘Montse, I asked you not to …’
‘How we used to laugh when she said it! The little communist living off her granny. And now the little communist is eating our food. And complaining about the view.’
‘Montse, we are going to need …’ her father seemed angry and agitated.
Carme turned to her father.
‘Need what?’
Her father stood up.
‘Come on,’ Carme said, ‘finish it. Sit down and say what you were going to say.’
‘You know what we need you to do, Carme,’ her father said, sitting down again. His voice was calm. ‘Nuria has told you. I asked her to tell you.’
Carme looked at Nuria, who kept her head down.
‘Who sold the furniture?’ Carme asked.
‘It was rotten,’ her mother said.
‘Rotten, that’s a good word,’ Carme said. ‘Taking land from an old lady, that was rotten. And has your husband grown fat too, Nuria, has he grown fat too on the profits you made from her?’
Nuria got up silently and went into the house.
‘Every stitch you’re wearing was paid for by the poor old lady,’ her mother said. ‘And you phoned once a year, that is what she got in return. And you come back just in time to claim your inheritance!’
‘Just in time, that’s right,’ Carme said. ‘Just in time.’
She stood up and left the table. Upstairs, as she fetched her keys and some money, she passed Nuria in the corridor without speaking to her. As she left the house again, she saw that her parents were still sitting at the table. She walked by them and went to the car and drove into Ciutadella.
There were lines of cars parked on both sides of the narrow road on the way into the city and there was a sound in the distance of firecrackers going off and people shouting. It was pitch-dark as she walked along, but she knew that the dawn was only three or four hours away. It was St John’s Eve. She would already have missed the early part when sacks of hazelnuts were left in the square for people to take and throw at anyone at all, a friend, a lover, a stranger, an enemy. She was amused at the idea that she could have thrown one each at her father, her mother and her sister, and they, in turn, she supposed, could have thrown one with even greater force back at her.
She was still disturbed by one thing her mother had said. She did not mind the part about being called ‘her little communist in London’. It was typical of her grandmother to make such jokes and to tell them to her bank manager if he would listen. But she was wounded by the statement that she had phoned only once a year. It was true. She had often thought of phoning more often, but she never did. She should have got in contact more often, there was no excuse. She had let too many years go by, it was as simple as that. The regret came to her sharply now as she walked into the city centre, the place her grandmother had loved most in the world.
Carme knew how much her grandmother would have loved now to come in alone with her like this for a few hours of the festival, watching the horses parading through the streets. As she turned a street corner and saw the yellow sand spread on the cobbles to keep the horses steady, Carme whispered a few words to her grandmother’s ghost. She said she was sorry. She said it was too late now,
she knew. But she was back here and she was sorry. Sorry that she had stayed away so long. And sorry too that she had not been in touch more.
From the doorway of a house a woman stopped her and offered her a pomada in a tiny plastic glass from a tray. She laughed as she took the drink and had her first sip. The taste brought her back years; the mixture of lemonade and local gin made her feel that she was in her teens and had come here with Nuria and her friends. At that time she was the youngest of all of them, she remembered, and had to beg her grandmother for permission. And then her grandmother had overseen everything, had ensured that Carme did not look either too young or too sophisticated, and made her promise that she would have just one or two pomadas, no more, and that she would stay close to Nuria, and that she would keep away from the boys who ran after the horses. When Carme had promised that they would be home early, she remembered her grandmother saying that that would be a mistake, that no girl on the island had ever come home on St John’s Eve until well after the dawn, and that Carme and Nuria were not to let the family down by breaking that tradition.
It was strange, she thought, to be alone like this in the streets of Ciutadella. In the busy parts of London, even at night, a young woman walking alone, or sitting alone, or going to the cinema alone, would not be unusual. Here, no one was alone. There were even no couples. Young men walked around in large groups, or five or six girls wandered in the streets with five or six boys, or older women walked up and down in groups of three or four. She was, she saw, the only person on her own, and that, she supposed, made her look like a tourist more than anything else. Yet, despite what her parents had said, there appeared to be no real tourists. Maybe because it was after midnight the tourists had all gone to bed, whereas people from the island knew that midnight was the time when things began. And no one seemed like an outsider either; people greeted each other with familiarity and appeared fully at home as they lined the narrow streets now and waited for the horses and their riders to come galloping through.
The horses were bigger than she remembered and they came at speed and were greeted with shouts and cheering. The riders were dressed in medieval costumes and were unflustered as groups of young men moved out into the middle of the street to block their progress; the men placed themselves under the bellies of the horses, using their shoulders as, almost gently, they began to lift the animals so they were standing on their hind legs. The horses had been trained, she knew, not to kick or panic, but still there was a sense of struggle and drama that came from the shouts of encouragement from everyone in the street and from crowds at the upper windows of the houses. The men were trying, as though it were a competition, to hold the horses in the air for as long as they could before lowering them to the ground to stand on all fours.