The Anarchist Who Shared My Name

by PABLO MARTÍN SÁNCHEZ

That Christmas Eve thirteen people dined together at the inn, a number no one failed to notice. Surrounding the oaken table that dominated the dining room, there was a traveling pharmaceuticals salesman, a livestock dealer built like a wine barrel, a pair of newlyweds trying to get to Lisbon to see the Atlantic Ocean, and four comic actors from a traveling company who livened up the evening with jokes and songs, as well as the hosts Don Veremundo and Doña Leonor, and the provincial inspector, Don Julián Martín Rodríguez. Even though both boys had already taken their First Communion, they were seated at a separate table, and they left off chatting for a while as they slurped their cabbage soup and heartily devoured the duck, which, truth be told, no one refused, despite Catholic doctrine’s prohibition against eating meat on Christmas Eve. Only the traveling salesman dared to object, albeit timidly, that Our Lord would not be happy to see this footed animal served at his table, but Doña Leonor gave the excuse that due to the snow no fish had been delivered to Béjar that week and they weren’t going to celebrate Christmas Eve with vegetable soup. That settled that.

  “Salamanca has an excellent climate for raising duck,” said the livestock dealer, his mouth full of food. “There are a lot of chestnuts growing around here, and that’s what ducks love most. But you have to roast the chestnuts first, of course—”

  “I’ve heard,” one of the actors interrupted, his booming theatrical voice hoarse with revelry, “that they also eat walnuts.”

  “Yes, it’s true,” the dealer avowed, wiping the grease from the corners of his lips, “But that gives the meat an oily taste. In other regions they feed them a slurry of potato, wheat flour, and milk. But I’m telling you: nothing beats chestnuts.”

  “And how did you make this delicious sauce?” the newlywed bride asked the hostess.

  “Secret recipe,” Doña Leonor replied with a half-smile.

  “Well, it’s scrumptious,” said one of the actresses, licking her fingers.

  “Chili peppers these days don’t have the punch they used to,” the traveling salesman tried to interject, but no one paid him any mind.

  At the children’s table, the conversation took a few unexpected turns:

  “Do you know how many hairs there are on a human head?” Robinsón asked, stroking his own hair which was wiry as a bristle brush.

  “No,” replied Pablo, who had never really given the matter much thought.

  “A hundred thousand!” said the innkeeper’s son, opening his eyes wide as if he had found a treasure. “And you know what else?”

  “No, what?”

  “You know how snakes lose their skin and grow a new one? We do the same thing with our hair! D’you know how long it takes to replace all the hairs on your head?”

  “No, how long?”

  “Three years!”

  “And what happens if they fall out but no new hairs grow?” Pablo asked.

  “What do you think? You end up bald!”

  When there was nothing left of the duck but greasy bones and fond memories, the time came for sugar cookies and zambomba drums, sweet wine, and caroling. Don Veremundo offered cigars to all the men, and everyone took one graciously except the fussy traveling salesman, who first wanted to make sure they were not from Cuba. The actors recited some lines to great applause from the improvised audience, and Julián finally took the floor, after some urging.

  “Chance or Providence has decided that we would all spend this special night together, though just a few hours ago we were all strangers. I’m not going to lie to you: I would have preferred to spend Christmas Eve with my wife and my little Julia, and not just with my son Pablo and all of you. But since God wanted it this way, let’s enjoy the evening!”

  “Give us some good advice for the new year, Inspector!” the livestock dealer requested, chewing his words and a sugar cookie at the same time.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t give advice,” Julián said. “You’ll have to excuse me, but usually when people ask for advice, they don’t follow it, and when they do it’s to have someone to blame when it doesn’t work out.”

  Everyone laughed at this remark except the livestock dealer, who did not expect such a response. He finally washed down the sugar cookie with a big swig of sweet wine and, turning to the innkeeper, asked:

  “And will there be a midnight mass, despite the snow?”

  “Of course,” replied Don Veremundo, wiping his nose with his stump, “The townsfolk have spent all day clearing snow off the streets and scattering salt, so anyone who wants to can go to the church of San Juan, it’s not far from here.”

  “What, you’re not planning to come with us?” the traveling salesman implored.

  “No, you’ll have to excuse me, I suffer from indigestion and I don’t do so well with big meals like this—”

  “There’s nothing better for indigestion than Parodium Tonic,” the traveling salesman interrupted, always eager to turn a sale.

  “But my wife and son would be glad to go along, wouldn’t they?” Don Veremundo continued, looking at his wife.

  “Of course,” replied Doña Leonor, knowing that what her husband really could not stand were the rites and robes. Julián also had little appetite for such things, but his duty compelled him to certain sacrifices, though he would need to follow it with a good dose of spiritual bicarbonate in order to get to sleep.

  As midnight approached, the retinue prepared to leave for the church, with Doña Leonor leading the way and the actors singing silly folk songs. However, when they stepped outside, the frigid air quickly silenced their warbling. A few snowflakes were falling, and the men turned up the collars of their overcoats, while the women clutched their dress skirts in one hand and used the other to keep their shawls from blowing away. The two boys straggled a bit behind, slowed by Robinsón’s limp. His orthopedic device made it difficult to find footing amid the snow and salt.

  “Go on ahead with the rest, I know the way,” said the innkeeper’s son, proudly.

  But Pablo did not leave his side until they reached the church. The crowd waiting outside was agitated, everyone having run out of small talk. A man with a cane and patent leather shoes was getting down from a carriage, followed by a woman wrapped in a mantle of Persian lambswool, while the panting horse tried to keep warm by urinating on the snow, creating a cloud of vapor like incense smoke. Seeing the elegant couple arrive, the beggars huddling around the parish door took their stiff hands from their pockets and begged for alms. Inside, the people thronged and the organist got ready to play the celestial notes of the Puer Natus Est Nobis. The sanctuary was dominated by a vague shadow favorable to contemplation, but also to dissolution, especially for those who had imbibed too many spirits with dinner. The twinkling light of the tapers could not penetrate the far corners of the church, and some congregants took advantage of this for some decidedly unecclesiastical necking. When the organ went tacit, the priest lifted his voice over the gathered faithful and, adjusting his embroidered chasuble, began to recite the Epistle of Saint Paul to Titus.

  “Follow me,” someone whispered to Pablo, and he turned to see Robinsón disappearing into the shadows. He looked up at Julián to seek permission, but the inspector seemed to have fallen asleep listening to that velvety voice speaking of piety and hope. He made his way through the crowd and followed Robinsón to the retrochoir, where an altar boy was manning a little wooden door hidden in the shadows.

  “Hi, Juan,” Robinsón whispered.

  The altar boy nodded his head and looked around.

  “I brought a friend,” he added, pointing to Pablo.

  “That wasn’t part of our agreement,” said the altar boy with a gangster-like tone.

  “I’ll give you double, if you want.”

  “Alright then, enter,” and he opened the way for them, extending his hand surreptitiously.

  Robinsón passed him an elongated packet, which immediately disappeared as if by magic, and signaled to Pablo to follow him. A few steep, narrow staircases led up to the organ. The priest
recited the last few words of the Epistle, and the instrument roared to life again, startling the two boys.

  Over here, Pablo read on his friend’s lips.

  Two or three meters from the imposing organ, just behind the big man pumping the instrument’s bellows, there was a small gap in the balustrade. From there, hidden from the far-off eyes, the two boys could see out onto most of the church: in the pulpit, the chaplain was getting ready to read the Gospel of Saint Luke, while the parishioners, rich and poor, young and old, monarchist and liberal, were piled up on the benches, in the side aisles, and around the baptismal font, and the most fervid were squeezing together against the railings of the main altar.

  “What did you give him?” Pablo asked, intrigued by the scheming.

  “Who, Juan? Nothing, just a couple of my dad’s cigars. Look, do you see that man there, leaning on the confessional booth?”

  Pablo turned his gaze in that direction and could make out, well-lit by a nearby taper, a man of about fifty years of age, repeatedly nodding off.

  “That’s Don Agustino Rojas, my schoolmaster. I bet you anything he’s drunk. And do you see that woman in the first row kissing her prayer book? That’s the mayor’s sweetheart. He’s that guy over there, who keeps looking over at her whenever his wife isn’t watching …”

  Pablo tried to discern in the crowd all of these people who Robinsón seemed to know like family, as silence fell and the priest started to read the passage on the birth of the baby Jesus:

  “And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn …”

  Pablo let his eyes wander around that sacred space commemorating a birth that had happened 1,899 years ago, and though the plumes of incense were indifferent to his nonfunctioning olfaction, a strange calm came over him. He fit his head between two balustrades, while Robinsón went on telling him stories, and his gaze fell on a girl wearing a festooned blue dress. He could not see her face because she was directly beneath them, but she captivated his attention. To her left, a man dressed in colonial style was holding her hand firmly.

  “That’s Angela,” Robinsón whispered, seeing that Pablo could not take his eyes off of her. “She’s only been here in Béjar for a year. Her parents went to Cuba before she was born, and now they had to come back. They live just across from me.”

  “And who is that man holding her hand?”

  “That’s her father, Don Diego Gómez, Lieutenant Colonel of the Spanish army in the war overseas,” said Robinsón as if reciting from memory a refrain he had repeated a thousand times. “He was General Weyler’s right-hand man. Now he’s retired, but they say that he has fought three duels, and he lost a finger in one of them. That’s why he always wears gloves.

  “And what happened to the others?” Pablo asked without taking his eyes off of Angela, perhaps thinking about the history of the unfortunate Évariste Galois, the intrepid mathematician whose story fascinated Pablo’s father.

  “What others?”

  “The ones who fought duels with him.”

  “They’re all pushing up daisies.”

  At that moment, a boy approached Angela and whispered something in her ear, but she appeared to ignore him.

  “Who’s that?”

  “That’s her idiot cousin. I’ve fought him seven times. His name is Rodrigo, Rodrigo Martín.”

  “Wow, that’s my last name.”

  “Yeah, it seems there are a lot of Martíns.”

  “And did he come from Cuba too?”

  “No, no. He was born in Béjar. His family was one of the richest in town, but his parents died when he was little.”

  At that very moment, when the priest finished his reading and the organ came back to life, the girl in the blue dress, the daughter of Don Diego Gómez, without really knowing why, lifted her eyes upward, where they met the eyes of Pablo, the son of the provincial inspector. She stayed like that for a few seconds, with her mouth open and her neck craned uncomfortably, trying to figure out who the boy was looking at her from the bars of the balustrade. He too held there, paralyzed, unblinking, blushing in the darkness. And so they would have remained until the Nativity Mass or maybe even until New Year if Rodrigo Martín had not wanted to know what his cousin was looking at. Robinsón pulled back from the railing, dragging Pablo with him.

  “Damn it,” he murmured. “If he saw us, we’re doomed.”

  “Why?” Pablo asked, when he had recovered from the surprise.

  Robinsón took a moment to respond, but his response was a double confession:

  “Because I’ve fought him seven times and never won once. And because Rodrigo is in love with Angela.”

  Pablo felt a strange constriction in his chest, as if he were suffocating. The organ music went on majestically, inundating the church with notes and many congregants’ eyes with tears. A few days later, the new year would arrive and, after it, the new century. The streets would fill with automobiles, the skies with airships, and the cities with cinematographs, while Pablo was filling his heart with love and dreams.

  – 5 –

  The publishing and distribution of anarchist literature during those months corresponded to the International Bookstore at 14 Rue Petit, which served as the headquarters of the International Anarchist Publishing Group, under the direction of Férandel; as the publishing house of the trilingual bulletin Revista Internacional Anarquista, founded in November; and, finally, as the residence of the Spanish Committee of Anarchist Relations.

  ANTONIO ELORZA,

  El anarcosindicalismo español bajo la dictadura

  “WHAT A DIRTY TRAP,” PABLO REPROACHED Robinsón as they were leaving La Rotonde last night. As they were arriving at home, he added, “You deserve to spend the night on the floor with Kropotkin.” But Robinsón’s only reply was his most innocent smile.

  Today he has come to invite Pablo out to eat. Having worked hard all morning, Pablo eagerly accepts the invitation, making an effort to forget the dirty trick at La Rotonde.

  “Today I’m going to take you to the vegetarian café on Rue Mathis,” says Robinsón, tugging at his beard with delight. “It’s time to celebrate, because since last night, we’re in the same boat.”

  “We’ve always been in the same boat, Robin, but until now you never seemed so intent on making sure I drown with you. Do you really think this revolutionary movement is going to succeed?”

  “If I didn’t think so, I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing.”

  “Well, I’d wager that in Spain even the rats have figured it out, with all the ruckus you’re making. Martínez Anido must be licking his chops.”

  “That’s the paradox of any revolution, Pablito. On the one hand, you have to shout so that the people can hear about it and get on board, and on the other hand, you have to whisper so that the ones you want to take down don’t hear about it. Of course they’re aware in Spain that over here we’re getting ready to overthrow the government; they’ve known it since day one of their coup. And they’re afraid of us—of course they’re afraid of us, because they can control the people on the inside, but not us, especially since the French government is protecting us more than they’d prefer. Look what happened with the repatriation of Cándido Rey: the prime minister fired the guy who authorized it for not respecting the right to asylum. And now it seems that Primo is going to have to suck it up and send him back to us. In any case, the important thing is keeping the plan secret, so they don’t know how or when or where we’re going to arrive. And of course they don’t know that, since we don’t even know ourselves!”

  The two friends smile as they leave La Fraternelle and head toward Place des Fêtes to catch the metro. As they walk past the Point du Jour, they hear shouting inside. They turn their heads and see Leandro going berserk, cursing as he tries to strangle the café’s owner, Monsieur Dubois, who, pi
nned against the bar, is trying to defend himself by feebly kicking at his attacker. Pablo and Robinsón run inside and release the prey from Leandro’s clutches. Dubois falls on the floor panting, while the two friends try to shove the Argentinian giant out the door. The latter finally goes out, leaving in his wake a string of the worst French insults he knows, which are not worth listing here: just go ahead and think of the nastiest curses that come to mind, and with a little luck you’ll be halfway there.

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” Pablo shouts while making the final effort to get Leandro out of there. “Have you gone mad, or what?”

  The Argentinian is still out of his head, hollering in the direction of the Point du Jour like a man possessed, until Pablo, who has never seen him like this, smacks his face, leaving him agog mid-insult. There is a brief moment of silence and uncertainty, until Leandro lifts his hand to his cheek, spits on the ground and steps on the sputum, which is more of a compulsive tic than a sign of disgust (he once accidentally spat on a dog and had to chase it for several blocks until he managed to step on it).

  “Come on, let’s get out of here before Dubois calls the police,” Pablo says, and after a few seconds he adds: “You like vegetarian food, Leandro?”

  “Are you kidding?” the Argentinian barks, still smarting. “In my country eating plants is against the law.”

  “Then today’s the beginning of your life of crime. Sorry.”

  And the three young men descend into the metro, headed for the vegetarian restaurant.

  “Damn, che, even my daddy never smacked me like that,” Leandro complains, rubbing his chubby cheek, while he asks for three second-class tickets.

  “Maybe he should have,” Pablo replies.

  Since today is Sunday, the metro is less busy than usual and there are a few seats free, which would be unthinkable during the week in a city where hundreds of thousands of people take the underground every day. The advertising industry has taken note of the business potential, and the station walls bear brightly colored posters, such as this one for Dubonnet liqueur, an image that many Parisians are talking about: a cat behind a bottle that bears a label depicting a cat behind a bottle, which in turn has a label depicting a cat behind a bottle, and so forth until you can no longer make it out. Leandro plops himself into the second-class seat, which protests bitterly, its wooden bones creaking; perhaps it envies its colleagues in first class, covered with leather upholstery to soften such assaults.