Quart sat turning this over for some time. At last he stood and walked up the aisle to the high altar, his steps echoing beneath the elliptical dome of the transept. He stopped in front of the altarpiece and beheld the carved figures of Macarena's ancestors at prayer on either side of the Virgin of the Tears. Beneath her regal baldachin, accompanied by cherubs and saints, surrounded by leaves and flourishes of gilded wood, Martinez Montanes's carving was visible in the semidarkness, with light from the windows filtering through the rational, geometrical structure of the scaffolding. She looked very beautiful and very sad, her face turned upwards almost reproachfully, her palms empty, open, held out as if she were asking why her son had been taken from her. Captain Xaloc's twenty pearls gleamed gently on her cheeks, her crown of stars and her blue tunic. Beneath the tunic her bare foot rested on a crescent moon crushing a serpent's head.
"... And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed ..."
The voice came from behind him. Quart turned and saw Gris Marsala. She had come in noiselessly in her trainers.
"You creep like a cat," said Quart.
She laughed. As usual her hair was tied in a plait, and she wore a baggy sweatshirt and jeans spattered with paint and plaster. Quart pictured her applying makeup in front of a mirror before the bishop's visit, then her cold eyes multiplying in the fragments of shattered mirror. He looked for the scar. There it was: a pale line three centimetres long on the inside of her right wrist. He wondered if she'd meant to kill herself.
"Don't tell me you came to Mass," she said.
Quart nodded. She smiled indefinably. She noticed that he was looking at her scar, and turned her arm to hide it.
"That priest," said Quart.
He was about to add something but didn't - those two words said it all. After a moment she smiled again, as if at a private thought! "Yes," she said quietly, "that's exactly it." She seemed relieved and stopped hiding her wrist. She asked if he'd seen Macarena. Quart nodded.
"She comes here every morning, at eight," she said. "With her mother on Thursdays and Sundays."
"I would never have imagined she was so devout."
He hadn't intended it to sound sarcastic, but Gris Marsala stiffened and said, "Look, I really don't like your tone."
He took a few steps towards the altarpiece, regarded the Virgin, then turned to the woman again: "I'm sorry. But I had dinner with her last night, and she confuses me."
"I know you had dinner." Her blue eyes were fixed on him. "Macarena woke me at one in the morning and kept me on the phone for almost half an hour. One of the many things she said was that you would come to Mass."
"That's impossible," said Quart. "I came on impulse."
"Well, she was sure. She said that you would come, and would begin to understand." She stopped and looked at him with curiosity. "And have you?"
"What else did she tell you?" He tried to sound casual, ironic, but was afraid it was obvious that he wanted to know what Macarena had told her friend the nun. He was annoyed with himself.
Gris Marsala pursed her lips thoughtfully. "She said lots of things. That she likes you, for instance. And that you're not as different from Don Priamo as you think. She also said you're the sexiest priest she's ever seen." She smiled mischievously. "That was exactly how she put it."
"Why are you telling me this?" "Because you asked."
"Please, don't make fun of me. I'm too old for that. Look, my hair's grey, like yours."
"I like your hair that short. So does Macarena." "You haven't answered my question, Sister Marsala." She laughed, and her eyes crinkled.
"Drop the title, please." She pointed to her dirty jeans and the scaffolding against the walls. "I don't know if any of this is appropriate for a nun."
It wasn't, thought Quart. Nor was her part in the strange triangle formed by the two of them and Macarena Bruner. And maybe a fourth, Father Ferro, should be included. Quart couldn't picture Gris Marsala in a convent, in a nun's habit. She had come a long way since Santa Barbara.
"Will you ever go back?"
She took a moment to answer, looking down the nave at the pews piled up by the door. She hooked her thumbs in the back pockets of her jeans, and Quart wondered how many nuns could have worn jeans like that - she was as slim as a young girl. Only her face and hair showed age. There was still something very attractive about her, about the way she moved.
"I don't know," she said thoughtfully. *Maybe it depends on this church, on what happens here. I think that's why I haven't left." She spoke without looking at Quart, squinting at the sunlight in the doorway. "Have you ever suddenly felt a void where you thought your heart was? The feeling lasts only a moment, then everything goes on as before, but you know that things aren't the same and you wonder what's wrong."
"And do you think you'll find the answer here?"
"I have no idea. But we search in places that may have answers."
Quart shifted uneasily from one leg to the other. He didn't like this sort of conversation, but he had to persevere - it might yield clues.
"I think," he said, "we spend our whole lives roaming round our tombs. Maybe that's the answer."
To make it sound less important, he smiled, but she wasn't fooled by the smile.
"I was right. You're not like other priests."
Quart didn't ask what that meant. They were both silent as they walked up the nave, past the walls with flaking paint and the cornices with tarnished gilding. At last she spoke again.
"There arc things," she said, "places, people that leave their mark on you. Do you know what I mean? No, I don't think you do yet. I mean this town. This church. And Don Priamo, and Macarena." She stopped and smiled mockingly. "You need to know what you're getting into."
"Maybe I have nothing to lose."
"It's strange to hear you say that. Macarcna says that's the most interesting thing about you. The impression you give." They were by the door now. "As if, like Don Priamo, you have nothing to lose."
The waiter turned the handle of the awning until Pencho Gavira and Octavio Machuca's table was shaded. A bootblack sat at the old banker's feet, polishing his shoes.
"Could I have the other foot now, sir?"
Machuca obediently placed his other foot on top of the box decorated with gold tacks and litde mirrors. The bootblack positioned the guards so as not to stain Machuca's socks and then proceeded conscientiously with his task. He looked like a Gypsy and was very thin, with tattoos all over his arms and lottery tickets sticking out of his shirt pocket. He must have been over fifty. The chairman of the Cartujano Bank had his shoes polished every day at 300 pesetas a time, while he watched the world go by from his table on the corner of La Campana.
"Some heat," said the bootblack.
He wiped the sweat running down his nose with a hand blackened with polish. Gavira lit a cigarette and offered him one. The bootblack placed it behind his ear without stopping the brushing of Machuca's shoes. With a cup of coffee and the ABC on the table in front of him, the old man looked down with satisfaction at the job the bootblack was doing. When the bootblack finished, Machuca handed him a thousand-peseta note. The bootblack scratched the back of his neck, confused.
"I don't have any change, sir."
The chairman of the Cartujano smiled and crossed his legs. "Well, charge me tomorrow, Rafita," he said. "When you get some change."
The bootblack returned the note, raising his hand in something that vaguely resembled a military salute, and headed off towards the Plaza Duque de la Victoria, his little seat and box under his arm. Gavira saw him pass Peregil, who was waiting at a respectful distance outside a shoe shop, a few steps away from the dark-blue Mercedes at the kerb. Machuca's secretary was going through some papers at a nearby table, quiet and efficient as always.
"How's that business with the church going, Pencho?"
It was a routine question, like asking after the health of a relative. Old Machuca picked up the newspaper and leafed
through it vaguely, until he came to the obituaries, which he read with great interest. Gavira leaned back in his wicker chair and watched the patches of sun gaining ground at his feet and moving slowly towards the Calle Sierpes.
"We're working on it," he said.
Machuca was engrossed in the obituaries. At his age it was comforting to see how many acquaintances had died before him. "The members of the board are losing patience," he said without looking up. "Or, to be more exact, some of them are. Others are hoping you'll fall flat on your face." He turned a page, smiling wryly at the long list of relations praying for the soul of Mr Luis Jorquera de la Sintacha, illustrious son of Seville, Commander of the Order of Mafiara, who passed on after having received extreme unction, etc. Machuca and all Seville knew that the deceased had been a complete crook who'd made his fortune smuggling penicillin in the years after the Civil War. "There are only a few days left before the board meets to discuss your plans for the church."
Gavira nodded, his cigarette in his mouth. The Saudis of Sun Qafer Alley would be landing in Seville twenty-four hours before the meeting to purchase Puerto Targa at last. And with a signed contract on the table, nobody would dare say a word.
"I'm putting the final touches on it," he said.
Machuca nodded slowly a couple of times. He looked up from his newspaper to stare at the passers-by.
"The priest," he said. "The old one."
Gavira paid attention. But Machuca was silent for a moment, as if trying to find the right words. Or maybe he simply wanted to needle his successor. Whatever the old man's reasons, Gavira said nothing.
"He's the key," said Machuca. "Unless he gives in, the mayor won't sell, the archibishop won't secularise the land, and your wife and her mother won't back down. That Thursday Mass will really screw things up."
He insisted on referring to Macarena as Gavira's wife. Although technically it was true, it made Gavira very uncomfortable. Machuca refused to accept the end of the marriage he'd brokered. It was also a kind of warning: Gavira's succession wasn't assured while his marital situation remained equivocal and while Macarena went around publicising that fact. High society in Seville never forgave certain things. It had accepted Gavira when he married the daughter of the dukes of El Nuevo Extreme Whatever Macarena did with bullfighters or priests, she was high society. Gavira wasn't. Without his wife, he was just a parvenu.
"Once I've dealt with the church," he said, "I'll sort things out with her."
Machuca looked sceptical as he turned the pages of his newspaper. "Don't be too sure you'll be able to. I've known her since she was a child." He leaned forward and sipped his coffee. "You might manage to get the priest out of the way and level his church, but the other battle you'll lose. Macarena has taken it personally."
"What about the duchess?"
The banker gave a hint of a smile. "Cruz respects her daughter's decisions. And she's in complete agreement with her over the church." "Have you seen her recently? The duchess, I mean." "Of course. On Wednesday, as usual."
One afternoon a week, Octavio Machuca sent his car to collect Cruz Bruner while he waited for her at the Parque de Maria Luisa, where they took a stroll. They could be seen there, under the willow trees or sitting on a bench in the Glorieta de Becquer on sunny afternoons.
"But you know what your mother-in-law is like." Machuca's smile widened. "We just chat about the weather, and the plants and flowers in her garden, or Campoamor's poetry . . . And every time I recite that bit, 'The daughters of the women I so loved kiss me now as one kisses a saint,' she laughs like a young girl. It would be vulgar to mention her son-in-law, or the church, or her daughter's failed marriage." He motioned at the defunct Levante Bank, on the corner of the Calle de Santa Maria de Gracia. "I bet you that building that she doesn't even know you're separated."
"You mustn't exaggerate, Don Octavio."
"I'm not exaggerating."
Gavira sipped his beer and said nothing. It was an exaggeration, of course. But it summed up the personality of the old lady. She lived cloistered like a nun in the Casa del Postigo - among shadows and memories in an old mansion now far too large for her and her daughter, at the heart of a historic district that was all marble, tiles, wrought-iron gates, and flower-filled courtyards complete with rocking chairs, canaries, piano music, and siesta. She was unaware of what went on outside her house, except on her weekly walks full of nostalgia with her late husband's friend.
"I'm not trying to interfere in your private life, Pencho." The old man watched him from beneath half-lowered lids. "But I often wonder what happened between you and Macarena."
Gavira shook his head stoically.
"Nothing in particular, I can assure you," he said. "It was just that life, my work, all created tensions, I suppose ..." He took a drag on his cigarette and exhaled smoke through his nose and mouth. "And, you know, she wanted a child right away." He hesitated a moment. "I'm in the middle of a battle to secure my position, Don Octavio, I don't have time for nappies. So I asked her to wait ..." He took another sip of beer, because his mouth suddenly felt very dry. "To wait a little, that's all. I thought I'd managed to convince her and that everything would be fine. Then suddenly one day, that was it. She left, slamming the door behind her, and declared war on me. Maybe it coincided with our disagreement over the church." He frowned. "I don't know, maybe everything coincided."
Machuca stared at him coldly, curiously. "The business with the bullfighter," he suggested, "was a low blow."
"A very low blow." So was mentioning it, but Gavira kept that observation to himself. "And there were a few others, after she left me. Men she knew before she was married, and that Curro Maestral, who was already hanging around." He threw his cigarette down and ground it out viciously with the heel of his shoe. "It's as if she wanted to make up for the time she wasted on me."
"Or to get her revenge."
"Maybe."
"You must have done something wrong, Pencho." The old banker shook his head with conviction. "Macarena was in love with you when she married you."
Gavira looked around without seeing anything. "I swear to you I don't understand," he said. "Revenge for what? I didn't have my first affair until a good month after she left me, by which time she'd been seen with that winemaker from Jerez, Villalta. By the way, with your permission, Don Octavio, I've just refused him credit."
Machuca raised one of his bony, claw-like hands, brushing it all aside. He knew of his successor's recent liaison with a well-known model. No, Macarena had too much class to create a scandal over her husband's skirt-chasing. If all wives did that, Seville would be in a real mess.
Gavira fiddled with his tie. "Well, we're in the same boat, Don Octavio. The godfather and the husband both in the dark."
"With one difference," said Machuca, and a smile appeared again beneath his sharp, cruel nose. "The church and your marriage are both your business, aren't they? I'm just an onlooker."
Gavira glanced over at Percgil, who was still standing by the Mercedes. His jaw tensed. "I'll step up the pressure."
"On your wife?"
"On the priest."
The old banker's rasping laugh rang out. "Which one? They've been multiplying like rabbits lately." "The parish priest. Father Ferro."
"Right." Machuca too glanced at Peregil out of the corner of his eye. He sighed deeply. "I hope you'll have the good taste to spare me the details."
Some Japanese tourists passed, carrying huge rucksacks and looking very hot. Machuca put the newspaper down and said nothing for a moment, reclining in the wicker chair. At last he turned to Gavira. "It's hard walking a tightrope, isn't it?" he said, the predatory eyes mocking. "That's how I spent years, Pencho. From the time I smuggled the first consignment from Gibraltar after the war. And then when I bought the bank, wondering what the hell I was getting myself into. Anxious, sleepless nights ..." He shook his head. "Suddenly one day you find you've crossed the finishing line and you don't give a damn anymore. No one can touch you, however
hard they try. Only then do you start enjoying life, or what's left of it."
He smiled wearily.
"I hope you get there, Pencho," he said. "Until then, you must pay the price without complaining."
Gavira motioned to the waiter and ordered another beer and another coffee. He ran a hand over his hair and glanced absent-mindedly at the legs of a passing woman. "I've never complained, Don Octavio," he said.
"I know. That's why you have an office on the main floor on the Arenal and a chair beside me here, at this table. While I read the paper and watch you."
The waiter brought the coffee and the beer. Machuca put a lump of sugar in his coffee and stirred it as two nuns from Sor Angela de la Cruz walked by in their brown habits and white veils.
"By the way," the old banker asked suddenly, "what's happening with that other priest?" He stared after the nuns. "The one who had dinner with your wife last night."
It was at moments such as these that Pencho Gavira showed his mettle. He forced himself to watch a car turn into the street and then disappear around the corner, while he tried to still the pounding in his ears. He took about ten seconds before he arched an eyebrow and said, "Nothing. According to my information, he's still carrying out his investigation on behalf of Rome. Everything's under control."
"So I hope, Pencho." Machuca raised his cup to his lips with a slight grunt of satisfaction. "Nice place, La Albahaca." He took another sip. "I haven't been there for some time."
"I'll get Macarena back. I promise."
Machuca turned to face him, "You have a brain. There could be no better future for Macarena than with you. That's how I saw it from the start ..." He laid a hand lightly on Gavira's arm; the hand felt bony and dry. "I appreciate your qualities, Pencho. Maybe you're the best thing that could happen to the bank now. But the fact is, at this point I couldn't care less about the bank. It's your wife I care about. And her mother."
The Seville Communion Page 19