It is Monday, November 3, 1924, and the first day of the revolutionary adventure has come to an end.
“BONJOUR!” SAYS A SOFT FEMALE VOICE from outside the cottage in the morning: Leandro leaps out of bed and rousts the other two with kicks.
“Get up, get up, ya lazybones! Get up and get dressed, we have a visitor.”
His tone is totally different from last night. It seems that Antoinette’s presence has robbed him of his courage. When Pablo and Robinsón have dressed, the crypt keeper’s daughter enters. She is a tiny but robust young woman, carrying a pot of milk and a basin for the morning’s wash and shave.
“Buenos días,” she repeats her greeting in Spanish.
“Buenos días,” the two men reply, somewhat embarrassed. It has been a long time since either of them has woken up to a woman’s face.
Leandro lights the fire and sets the milk to warm up, while Antoinette advises them to dress warmly, because it’s cold enough to frost a beard out there. She then uses tongs to pick up a round stone from next to the fireplace and holds it over the fire for a few moments before dropping it into the milk, which quickly boils. “My grandmother always did it this way. It gives it a nice toasty flavor,” and she smiles in a way that leaves Leandro literally drooling. The four of them drink their milk around the table. An awkward silence sets in. Pablo starts to get the sense that he and Robinsón are third wheels at this party. The vegetarian does not seem to catch on, and is contemplating Antoinette with the cherubic smile of one who feels himself in harmony with the entire universe.
“Well, you lovebirds, we’d better be going. Things to do, right, Robin?”
“Ah, yes, yes, we should go. Where?”
“First of all we’ll go buy berets, because that’s what people wear around here. We attract too much attention looking like this.”
“Ah, no. Nothing doing. The bowler stays.”
“Fine then, come with me to send a telegram.”
“As you wish.”
“Come on then.”
“Let’s go.”
And the two friends leave the cottage, thanking Antoinette and reminding Leandro that they are to meet the others at the square at noon.
“See you there,” says the Argentine.
“Yes, see you then,” says Pablo, and he and Robinsón make their way through the labyrinth of graves and tombs, a path that they will retrace several times over the next three days of anxious waiting before they launch themselves into the revolution.
In Saint-Jean-de-Luz, time seems to slow down. The minutes seem like hours, the hours like days, and the days like weeks as they wait to receive the signal to cross the border. In the meantime, the most sensible thing would be for the revolutionaries to avoid being seen too much in the village, stay hidden in houses and inns, try to go unnoticed. But who is going to manage to box in this troop of angry men? Thus, early in the morning, the village of Saint-Jean-de-Luz fills with dozens of Spanish anarchists and syndicalists, excited and anxious, trying to kill time until lunch by shopping for berets and knives, emptying glasses of wine in the taverns, or catcalling the few young women who dare to cross the square alone. Some of them stand in circles, imprudently discussing the best way to carry out the revolution, each sure he knows the key. Others prefer to hole up in taverns playing mus, such as the four ruffians of the Villalpando clan, who with their dog-eared cards earn their reputation as incorrigible gamblers. There are also those who engage in more lucrative but less honorable pursuits, such as Perico Alarco and Manolito Monzón, who get kicked out of a butcher shop for trying to put a chicken in their bag.
Pablo takes advantage of the morning to send two telegrams, one to the Beaumonts and the other to old Faure, who will surely hit the roof when he reads it. Mr. Savage will not yet have realized that his Spanish typesetter has gone behind his back to print several thousand pamphlets on La Fraternelle letterhead. He also will not have found out what Pablo is about to discover as Robinsón is trying on a beret in a hat shop run by a Basque man named Mendiburutegia.
“I’m only trying it on to kill time,” says Robinsón as Pablo smiles to see how the beret changes his friend’s appearance. “I’m not giving up my bowler for one of these floppy rags.”
And then it is Pablo’s face that changes, and he goes running out of the shop.
“Hey, it’s not that ugly, is it?” Robinsón asks the haberdasher, contemplating himself in the mirror.
But what gave Pablo a jolt and sent him running into the street was not the effect of seeing his friend in a beret, but the appearance of someone familiar through the window.
“Julianín!” he shouts. Julián Fernández Revert, the young typesetting assistant from La Fraternelle, turns on his heels. He holds one of the revolutionary flyers in his hands.
“There’s an erratum here, Pablo. You owe me five cents,” he says, with all the innocence in the world. “And please, don’t call me Julianín. I’m not a kid. In fact, it’s my birthday today …”
Pablo stands there not knowing what to say, looking at him with an impossible mixture of confusion, anger, and joy.
“Well then, happy birthday, big man,” he finally exclaims, “but I assume you didn’t come here to celebrate with me, or to collect your five cents.”
“Of course not, I told you before that I wasn’t going to stand around doing nothing. I’ve come to liberate Spain. Thing is, I fell asleep and was a bit late getting to the station,” he says, lowering his gaze, ashamed, “but last night I caught another train with two other fellows who also missed the first train. We arrived a couple hours ago.”
Pablo doesn’t know whether to hug him or slap him, so in the end he opts for cursing:
“Goddammit, holy shit, Julián,” he backs down, dropping the diminutive. As a welcome gift, he brings him into the shop and buys two berets, one for each of them. Robinsón, for his part, walks out wearing a sleek new bowler, wanting to be presentable for his return to the mother country.
WHEN THE REVOLUTIONARIES CONVERGE AT THE dining lodge for lunch, the man from Guernica advises them to stop meeting at his restaurant because they are starting to arouse suspicions, despite their many newly purchased berets. He has no problem serving them food, of course, but if they want to keep organizing conclaves and conventicles (his words verbatim), it would be better if they met somewhere a little out of town, maybe at La Nivelle golf course on the other side of the river. Some revolutionaries try to protest, asserting that they shouldn’t draw much attention in a village like Saint-Jean-de-Luz, which was used to seeing lots of Spanish laborers looking for work, especially since the coup d’état that brought Primo de Rivera to power. But they have no choice but to heed the Basque’s wishes, and they end up heading to the golf course, about five minutes by foot from the central square. Some of them, spurred on by wine or the cold, sing obscene or revolutionary songs as they leave the village. El Maestro ambitiously tries to sing “La Donna è mobile,” and a choir of whistles accompanies him. When they finally arrive at the golf course, it is Juan Riesgo who speaks first, his hunch exacerbated by the cold.
“I managed to speak with Durruti this morning,” he says. “But the telephone signal was terrible. You can imagine, during the first call there was a crossed signal, and I was listening to a conversation between a theater agent and his lover, a young actress who wouldn’t stop crying. So Durruti didn’t tell me much, we can’t run the risk of police intercepting our calls.”
In fact, what Juan Riesgo has been able to learn is that the weapons deal has failed, though he prefers not to tell the others so they don’t lose hope. What he does tell them is that the Committee of Paris is asking for patience, and confirms that the comrades in Perpignan are also waiting for the signal. Someone asks if it’s true that Caparrós has been arrested, to which Riesgo replies that he cannot confirm that rumor. On the other hand, he can say that Jover has succeeded in finding refuge in Barcelona, from whence he will be able to lead the internal insurrection, and it is to be as
sumed that when the thing is ready he will send the coded telegram (whose secret code words, “Mama has died,” have been inevitably spreading among the men gathered in Saint-Jean-de-Luz). Also, insofar as possible, the members of the Group of Thirty who have remained in Paris will join the rest of them at the border; the plan is that Ascaso will go to Perpignan and Durruti will come here to Saint-Jean-de-Luz. It is then that someone proposes sending an emissary to Spain to investigate the situation firsthand. But Juan Riesgo opposes this.
“That’s an unnecessary risk. Also, we’d have to consult with the Committee of Paris first. They’ve insisted we not make unilateral decisions. You know that coordination between the various groups is essential.”
“Look, Juanito,” replies Gil Galar, his Merovingian mane blowing in the breeze, “we’re the committee now. We’re the ones here in the trenches. We can’t keep consulting the Three Musketeers about everything, they have enough problems back in Paris.”
“El Chino’s in Barcelona,” Riesgo reminds him.
“He could be on the moon for all I care,” replies Gil Galar. “We can’t even speak with them safely! I think the comrade’s idea isn’t so silly. I’ll go if nobody else has the balls.”
“It’s not a matter of balls,” says Santillán, the former civil guardsman, “but of brains, although some of you seem to think with your gonads. If we decide to send an emissary, it makes sense to send someone from around here, someone who knows the terrain, don’t you think?”
Gil Galar says nothing, biting his tongue in the face of such an indisputable argument. After a few more speeches, they come to a compromise: if they still have not received a telegram after twenty-four hours, they will send three emissaries to the other side of the border, chosen among the revolutionaries from Saint-Jean-de-Luz who know the area best: one will go to Irún, one to Vera, and one to Zugarramurdi. Also, that will leave time for Juan Riesgo to get in touch with the comrades in Paris to find out what’s going on, though their opinion will not be considered authoritative in any way. Then, since it is starting to rain and there is no shelter to be found on the golf course, the revolutionaries return to the village and disperse.
However, all of that talk will have been in vain. They will not need to send anyone across the border, because a character many of them have been waiting for is about to arrive: Max Hernández, known as “El Señorito,” who will make his entrance in Saint-Jean-de-Luz wearing a top hat and leaning on a cane with a mother-of-pearl grip, the type that often conceals a knife inside.
X
(1908–1909)
THERE ARE TIMES WHEN LIFE GOES by in slow motion. Especially as the line between life and death grows thin. Such was the case that winter morning at the Fountain of the Wolf: when the gunshot rang out, time seemed to slow down, as if it wanted to postpone the fatal outcome. Angela’s unexpected arrival, her heartbroken scream at the sight of the duel, caused Pablo to turn at precisely the moment that Rodrigo’s weapon gave its fiery report. The bullet emerged from the Gastinne Renette, carved a path through the mist, and struck Pablo in the left breast. The brutal impact sent his body flying, and it hung there, suspended in midair as though the earth had a momentary lapse of gravity. Then, little by little, he fell downward, leaving his hat and pistol still floating. When he hit the ground, the scene snapped back into clock time.
“Noooooo!” Angela was still wailing.
Pablo’s body lay supine, a trail of blood streaming from his mouth. The girl fell on him and lifted his face, kissed his lips, and overflowed with tears of rage, suffering, and pain, and he had time to caress her face, smile, and say, “Don’t cry,” before losing consciousness. Rodrigo stood paralyzed, his arm extended and the lethal weapon exhaling smoke from its mouth as the seconds leapt to their feet like jacks-in-a-box and ran to the spot where Pablo lay motionless. Angela cursed them, tearing her hair and beating her breast. Then she saw the pistol that had fallen at her beloved’s feet, and she grabbed it with both hands.
“Don’t come any closer!” she shouted.
But Don Diego kept coming. When he reached out his arm to snatch the pistol from her, Angela pulled the trigger, but no shot was heard—only the smack of her father’s hand—showing once and for all that this had been a mock duel, a foul ruse, a murder dressed in the guise of a gentleman’s challenge. The lieutenant colonel’s gloved hand struck Angela with such force that she crumpled to the earth, slack-jawed and semiconscious. Don Diego went to Pablo’s body, verified that the wound was sufficiently mortal, and placed a cheap revolver in Pablo’s limp right hand, a Velo-dog model made in Eibar, of the same caliber as the Gastinne Renette. Then, taking Angela in his arms, he abruptly ordered:
“Let’s go. Let someone else discover this accursed suicide.”
Father Jerónimo pushed Pablo’s eyes shut and gave him his last rites as the other men hurried off down the road, not knowing that the scion of the Martín family did not have his heart under his left breast.
WHEN HE REGAINED CONSCIOUSNESS, THE FIRST thing he noticed was that he was lying in a bed. The incantatory litany of the Tantum Ergo reached his ears. He made an effort to open his eyes and thought he saw a shadow gliding out of the room, which was small and austere like a monastic cell. From a niche on the wall, a figure of the Virgin Mary observed him with a pious gaze: it was the Virgin of El Castañar, appearing to be keeping vigil over him. He swallowed and noted the bittersweet taste of blood. Then he remembered Angela’s crying eyes and the acute pain that had made him lose consciousness. He didn’t know if it was hours, days, or weeks that had passed, nor how he had gotten here, and he wondered for a moment if perhaps he was dead—maybe this was Heaven or Purgatory. Surely it was not Hell, because why in God’s name would there be a Virgin presiding over the room if it were? But when he tried to sit up, a tremendous stabbing pain in the chest reminded him he was still alive. He touched the painful spot and discovered that his torso was wrapped in bandages. He had difficulty breathing, his head hurt, his mouth was dry, and his strength failed him, so he closed his eyes and went back to sleep.
He was awakened shortly thereafter by the sound of a man clearing his throat, quietly but incessantly, like a nervous tic. He tried in vain to remember where he had heard that cough before. He opened his eyes halfway, and Father Jerónimo’s aquiline nose entered his field of vision, accompanied by a Franciscan monk with a sharply pointed beard.
“Praise God,” exclaimed the priest when he saw Pablo opening his eyes.
“Yes, praise God,” echoed the Franciscan.
“Where am I?” Pablo asked. And then: “Where is Angela?”
The two holy men exchanged a knowing look, and the monk left the room, as silent as a cat or a shadow.
“It is best if you do not excite yourself, my son,” Father Jerónimo tried to calm him. “The worst has passed. The important thing now is for you to recuperate. Here, take this,” he said, stirring the contents of a cup with a spoon.
“What is it?” asked Pablo, wary.
“Quinine, for the fever … with a few drops of laudanum for the pain. Are you hungry?”
Pablo nodded his head as he drank the potion, which tasted like bitter almonds.
“I’m not surprised. You’ve been in a delirium for a week and haven’t eaten a bite.”
The priest left the room and returned a little while later with a steaming bowl. It was a vegetable soup, bland but comforting, and Pablo ate it in little sips, under the incredulous gaze of Father Jerónimo, who was babbling expressions of lament peppered with latinisms that he himself translated, somewhat loosely:
“Aye, amantes amentes—lovers gone mad,” he sighed, turning his eyes upward and adjusting his collar. “A miracle. It is a miracle. It is written in the scriptures: Mors certa, hora incerta—death is certain, but its hour is not. A miracle, truly a miracle.”
Hearing the priest’s words, Pablo remembered the fortune-teller in the woods and wondered if his good luck amulet had saved him from this first death. But
he quickly pushed the thought from his mind, tormented by more pressing doubts. When he finished his soup he felt better, and had the strength to launch a volley of questions:
“Where am I, Father? Where is Angela? What happened to me? Who brought me here? Who knows—”
“Shhhh,” the curate cut him off, lifting his index finger to his lips. “Do not overexert yourself, my son, it’s not good for you. And give thanks to God for saving your life. When you recover, you will be able to ask any question you like. You are in the Sanctuary of El Castañar, but Brother Toribio and I are the only ones who know, so you needn’t worry about anything. Please rest, and remember what Seneca said: pro optimo est minime malus—the best is the least bad …”
These words did nothing to calm Pablo, indeed had the opposite effect. He closed his eyes and waited for the cleric to leave the room. When he heard the door open and shut again, he tried to stand to his feet, but he fell to the floor like a man struck by lightning: another terrible pain in the chest nearly knocked him unconscious. He managed to stumble back into bed and settled in as best as he could. He had to admit it: the damned priest was right. After all, he thought, if I’m alive I suppose it’s thanks to him.
“When I served your last rites and closed your eyes,” explained the priest the next day, as Brother Toribio changed his dressings and cleaned his wound, “I noticed that there was still warm air coming from your mouth. I wanted to call Dr. Mata, but he had already gone off down the road. Then I thought it would be better to say nothing, so I came to seek help from my good friend Brother Toribio, doctor of medicine.”
The Anarchist Who Shared My Name Page 23