After this, they became interested in seeing movies. In the town where they lived, there was a single dark cinema that smelt of stale popcorn and disinfectant, and on Sundays, after eating together, they went to the evening session to shake off the boredom and the damp. Even then, they showed films in their town that would take many years to arrive in Spain: Rebecca, Citizen Kane, Red Dust, Gone With The Wind …
‘And you’ve just got to see,’ explained Dolores to the astonished sheep, ‘how Scarlett O’Hara pulled the curtains right off the windows to make a dress with them …’
And she herself replied:
‘Well of course, she had no other option!’
On the mountain, the Winterlings were alone, but they felt good. ‘We should have been born as sheep,’ said one to the other. ‘Or as cows,’ her sister replied. They broke into laughter.
In the evening, they came back down the mountain, happier and chattier, tipsy from the anise. Sometimes, they sang rhymes and little songs they had learnt in the camp at Eastleigh: Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool?
And the other sister would sing: Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full.
As well as their interest in movies, they had developed a unique proclivity for the lurid details of sicknesses, raped women, murders, burnt children, and all sorts of other grim fascinations. And they talked about these things while they came down the mountain, in the same slow and swinging trot as the cow.
‘Do you remember,’ said one to the other, ‘when a pig bit the ear off that kid from that house up there?’
‘I remember, I remember … I mean, here in Tierra de Chá, the pigs are bigger than the cows; they terrify the lot of us! And do you remember when that man from Sanclás smashed into the wall, and every single one of his teeth fell out?’
‘You don’t have any teeth either …’
The other one stayed silent.
‘And you?’ said the other, breathing in sharply. ‘Do you really think you’re the prettiest rose in the bunch? Your bottom is quite large.’
‘My arse, you mean?’
‘I said bottom.’
‘Scarecrow!’
‘Don’t call me that, it’s so ugly!’
They both lowered their heads.
‘Shut up,’ murmured one of them.
‘Yes, shut up,’ murmured the other. ‘Right now I think we should shut up.’
‘Put up and shut up!’ they shouted in unison, just as they arrived back at the road.
In the evening they fed the chickens, chased off snakes, sewed, and prepared a vegetable soup. They ate dinner, listened to the radio, went to sleep, and were happy. On Tuesdays, they bathed, and so, instead of sewing, they went down to the river at dusk. On Sundays, they didn’t leave the house for even a moment. They cleaned it thoroughly and changed the bed linen.
Sometimes when they came down from the mountain there would be men in the square, piling up the gorse to make manure, and then they’d walk on with great strides (one pulled the other along by the arm) ignoring the catcalling and taunting — baby, hot stuff — that was directed only towards Dolores.
When they arrived at the house, on the days that this had happened, Dolores would start making dinner or fetch water from the well. But Saladina would be burning up inside. The muscles in her face would tighten, and her lips, formerly pressed together, would burst open like a flower. She’d roll her eyes and shake with laughter, a waterfall of laughter, and dash into the shed to hide, as quick as lightning.
She would re-emerge with her gaze fixed on some distant point in the countryside, serious, with a ladder over her shoulder and a set of shears in her hands. The need to repress her feelings had forged the habit of pruning.
She pruned the fig tree with such vigour that sometimes she even pulled a few tiles from the roof. The branches, the figs, click, click, the leaves and the tiles would fly through the air, and the chickens would run for cover.
When she had finished, the ground in the orchard would be a mash of figs and foliage. Exhausted, she would go back into the house hunched over, her face covered in snot and tears, her eyes puffy from laughing and crying at the same time. Her sister would bring her the bottle of anise and a glass, and put her feet up. Then she would go out to sweep up the branches and the mangled figs.
10
The most beautiful time of day in Tierra de Chá was when the sun hung motionless overhead, the river was calm, and the chickens clucked after laying their eggs.
Tuesday afternoon. Off with the clogs, off with the stockings. It was bath time. Off with the skirts, and the knickers too. Off with the doublets.
Holding hands, making energetic movements and singing loudly to ward off the cold, the Winterlings would go down to the river, hissing like cats. Once a week, if it was sunny, they lathered up from head to toe.
They scrubbed each other’s waists, breasts with erect nipples, behinds like mandarin skins, and legs with abundant flesh.
One day, just as they were rinsing off their hair, pouring water over themselves with a ladle, a nauseating gust wafted over, a rancid stench like gasoline or a wet jumper.
Sniffing the air, one Winterling said:
‘It’s the priest.’
Soon they heard what sounded like the creaking of an old cart. The other Winterling added:
‘He’s come for the offering.’
They ducked down into the water at the same time, leaving only their heads above.
At first the priest didn’t see them, and passed by, pulling his cart. But when he saw their clothes on a bush, he stopped and turned around.
‘Daughters of God!’ he exclaimed, covering his eyes with his hands. ‘So there you are! In the water …’
He walked backwards, his eyes shut tightly, up to the riverbank to speak with them.
‘Don’t get out!’ he said, sensing the movement of bodies, then hiding himself behind a bush. ‘What are you doing in the river?’
The Winterlings explained that they were just having a bath. Water and soap. Was he suggesting that no one in Tierra de Chá ever had a wash? In England, you didn’t need to go outside to wash yourself — you could bathe indoors. Every house had a bath.
The priest listened to them, perplexed.
‘And do they wash the animals in the bath as well?’
‘Is he a bit simple?’ whispered one of the heads in the water.
‘You’ve come to collect the offering, haven’t you?’ yelled the other head. ‘Well, you should know you don’t fool us; we don’t have to pay it. We don’t even go to church.’
Dolores got out of the water, and got dressed as quickly as she could. From the bush, Don Manuel looked without wanting to look. The first thing he noticed, when she came back fully dressed, was her hair. It was different to the hair of other women that he knew in the area. It wasn’t curly, or straight, but slightly wavy. She had big eyes, almost green, with thick eyelashes, and her skin was slightly pink. A narrow waist, and wide hips. And her breasts — he couldn’t quite take his eyes off them.
He came out of his hidey-hole. He said he wasn’t coming to collect an offering but rather to settle a small matter that had been bugging him lately, that had to do with the old lady who lived over on Bocelo Mountain. He bent down to adjust the things in his cart, and stood there pensively. He couldn’t keep it to himself a moment longer! The old woman was the devil incarnate. Making him go up every day to see her. And now she had it in her head to get back ‘the piece of paper’. He moved the sugar so it wouldn’t spill from the paper cone it came in, and stole a glance at the cabbage that the baker’s wife had given him. A cabbage?
Did the Winterlings remember the old lady?
On Bocelo Mountain, near Tierra de Chá, there was a rueiro, or tiny hamlet, with three or four very humble houses: simple, low to the ground huts in the form of a box, with thatched rooves
and beaten-earth floors, inside which there was nothing more than a hearth with a fire always lit, and a few cavities in the wall, dark as a wolf’s mouth, with straw mattresses and patchwork quilts that served as bedding.
In one of these houses — the Winterlings remembered, how could they not? — lived an old lady with a face like a root, very small and knotty, almost a dwarf, who smelt like smoke and old blankets. She was very sick, and so every day for the last few years, Don Manuel went up on horseback to comfort her, and, if things turned for the worse, to administer her last rites.
It could be pouring down with rain, the whole valley could be covered in the most insidious mist, but, early every morning, the good man rode up on his horse, zigzagging through the mountain passes, struggling with the inclines to arrive at the hut and administer holy oils, and whisper heavenly words in her ear. ‘Well, old girl, you’re going to Our Lord.’
And then, trying her hardest to show her teeth, the old lady smiled in thanks. The few teeth she had left were a filthy yellow, like horse teeth.
That day, the day he encountered the Winterlings in the river, Don Manuel had had to bring his visit forward. First thing in the morning, while he sipped on freshly pressed grape must in the tavern, a fieldworker came in yelling that the old woman on the mountain was barely breathing, and that the priest had to go up and give the last rites. ‘Oh, so she’s ready to die!’ he yelled back from the corner of the bar. ‘I was there just yesterday.’
‘I’m telling you, Father, this time she’s dying!’
And so Don Manuel had no other choice but to finish off his must, go by his house and put the holy oils in his satchel, and head once again towards the mountain.
The rain was bucketing down. Before he arrived — and because he thought it might be the last time he climbed the mountain — he couldn’t help feeling a tiny tingle of pleasure in his heart.
When he got there, he found that, in truth, the old lady was in quite a bad way. She gave off a coarse rasping sound that was almost drowned out by the deluge outside. The priest reflected, with a certain degree of remorse, that the thoughts he had just had were hardly Christian.
‘Old lady, my little old lady.’ Like every other day, he anointed her with oils on the eyes, the nose, and the feet, and told her that God already kept her in His glory.
Silence fell. It had stopped raining, and the sky had cleared. It was cut through with a superb rainbow. The priest saw this as a sign: God was thanking him for all his years of sacrifice.
After a while, the old lady suddenly opened her eyes. Her face was all shrunken and leathery, cracked up with tiny creases, particularly around her small dry eyes, and her nose was pointed like the beak of a bird. All she had left was one tuft of grey hair. She looked around her, and, seeing the light that filtered through the cracks in the hut, sighed. ‘Well, looks like I’m feeling a bit better.’
Hearing this, the blood rushed to the priest’s face. He had already packed up his holy oils and was about to leave.
‘It’s time to kick the bucket, woman! Christ, that’s what we’re here for!’ he bleated.
And then the old lady sat up, a little put off by his words. She said:
‘I can’t, Father.’
‘You can’t what?’
‘Die.’
‘Here we go. The piece of paper. You can’t die because of a piece of paper you signed thirty years ago. But dying is so easy! People go and die every single day!’
The old lady asked the priest to come nearer. She whispered to him:
‘People are saying that Don Reinaldo’s granddaughters are in town. That they have returned …’
‘The Winterlings,’ said Don Manuel.
‘Exactly,’ said the old lady. ‘Bring them to me. I have to talk to them to settle this business about the piece of paper. As soon as I have that sorted, I’ll be out of your hair as quick as I can; you’ll see, Father.
The old lady lay back down, and pulled the covers right up to her ears.
‘You’re ugly, Father,’ she said, uncovering herself a little. ‘And you stink.’
11
Don Manuel finished packing away the foodstuffs he had in the cart. He stood there with his fingers entwined, twiddling his thumbs.
‘The old lady says she wants to see you. She found out you’re back in the area, and she wants to ask something of you. She says it has something to do with your grandfather and that until it’s settled, she can’t go.’
‘Go where?’ asked the head that was still in the water.
The priest stopped twiddling and exhaled through his nose.
‘She keeps going on about some piece of paper she signed. I promised her you’d come with me tomorrow.’
While he waited for their response, the priest set to choosing a tasty morsel from what he had in the cart. That morning he had requisitioned some filloa pancakes, bread, a pot of honey, sugar, and a cabbage (did the baker’s wife think she’d get away with little vegetables now?), and he was salivating at the prospect. Climbing Bocelo Mountain had whetted his appetite.
‘In any case, it’s about time you came back into the fold,’ he added, putting a filloa pancake in his mouth. ‘All that business had nothing to do with you two.’
He looked up, and there was the other Winterling. The exchange that then took place between the three of them was quite absurd: while the prettier Winterling made her excuses, the uglier one and the priest inspected each other like scared animals.
‘The what?’ said the uglier Winterling.
While he thought about the answer, Don Manuel chewed the cake with his mouth open, not taking his eyes off her.
He hadn’t always been like this: it began with the death of his mother. The Winterlings remembered that before leaving the village, around the year 1936, Don Manuel still lived with her. She was a sickly and gossiping woman. Because she never left the house during the day, the mother wanted her son to tell her everything that went on in the village. And after the idiot had told her in great detail all of the most intimate secrets of confession — like a certain person’s case of adultery or the lechery of another — his mother always said the same thing: ‘Bah, is that all you’ve got today? Maybe one day you’ll bring me something interesting!’
But that was all part of the past; that woman was now dead, and the priest only fulfilled one role now: glutton.
‘Exactly, that.’ Repeated the priest, swallowing the filloa pancake.
‘What do you mean, ‘that’?’
The priest finally looked away.
‘I was saying that it’s time you two got together with everyone else in the village …’
‘Are you calling us sheep?’ said the Winterlings in unison. The priest took in everything with a glance: the house, the orchard, the chickens.
The fig tree twisted and sprawled over the house, its branches invading the windows without panes.
‘You’re very lonely out here …’
‘We’d be even more lonely without loneliness,’ they replied.
‘We’re all sheep, or we end up becoming them. It’s good to be part of the flock; it’s warm and gives comfort,’ said Don Manuel, taking up the handle of the cart again. ‘Tomorrow morning don’t take the animals up the mountain; I’ll come and get you, and we’ll visit the old lady.’
And that’s how it went. The next day, before the sun had even risen, Don Manuel was out the front of the Winterlings’ house, waiting for them. When they saw him at the front door, the Winterlings wanted to flee through the back door. But there was no escape. Don Manuel had blocked the back door with his cart so that they couldn’t slip away.
There was nothing else for it but to go up Bocelo Mountain with him. While they got ready to leave, they asked him inside to sit by the hearth. But when they came down from the bedroom, Don Manuel wasn’t where they had left him. They found hi
m snooping around the cowshed, checking out the cow.
‘The cow is fat,’ he said, hearing them enter.
‘She certainly eats,’ they said.
The Winterlings sidled up slowly; then, one on each side, they gently nudged him towards the door.
‘You’ve got a fair stench in here,’ said the priest, still scanning the cowshed.
‘Just a regular stench,’ they said somewhat nervously, still nudging him. ‘Just a regular cowshed stench …’
But the priest wrinkled his nose to sniff at the air, and did not appear to want to leave.
‘The thing is, it smells foul, but not like cows or manure or even gorse. It smells like …’
But before he could finish his sentence the Winterlings had him outside (‘a woolly bear caterpillar, that’s what you smell of …’). They were ready to head up the mountain, the sooner the better, they had plenty to do — so what was he waiting for?
It was the first time they had been required to interrupt their routine, and this troubled them. Along the way, the priest wanted to make conversation. He asked them what England was like.
‘Drizzly and melancholy,’ said one of them.
‘Drab …’ added the other, looking at the ground.
Don Manuel also wanted to know if what he had heard was true: that priests over there could get married. The Winterlings told him yes, over there priests could get married.
The priest had no further questions.
They entered the hut, lowering their heads and treading carefully. They found the old lady sleeping. Don Manuel had to shake her several times.
‘I brought you the Winterlings, old lady.’
The old lady smelt of smoke. She didn’t even stir. She seemed despondent. The priest uncovered her roughly, and began applying holy oils to her feet. She had big, cracked, dirty feet. At last the old lady croaked out:
‘Who did you say you brought?’
‘Here are the little girls,’ yelled Don Manuel. ‘But they’re not so little any more …’
The Winterlings Page 4