The Watcher in the Pine
Page 31
Tejada declined politely, but the conversation lasted until the steep walls of the gorge fell away into the green fields of the Liébana. Carvallo helped them unload their luggage when they reached Potes, and then drove the truck back to the post, promising to return to help move the trunks if he was needed. As it turned out, the guardia’s aid was not necessary. Father Bernardo had been waiting at the fonda for them, and volunteered to help with the luggage. “I wanted to invite you to dinner,” the priest explained, when Tejada thanked him for his assistance. “I thought Señora Fernández might be too tired from traveling to prepare anything, but it’s always nice to have something to eat in the evening if you’ve had a busy day.”
The Tejadas accepted the priest’s offer with gratitude. It was twilight, and the first evening stars were just starting to twinkle as the lieutenant and his wife reached the parish house, along with their host. Dinner was all the priest had promised. The food was good and the conversation was friendly and general. Toño woke up shortly after the plates were cleared, and Elena excused herself to nurse him.
“Your wife looks well,” Father Bernardo said when the door had closed behind her. “Motherhood suits her.”
Tejada nodded. “I think so,” he said. “But it’s probably our trip, as well. She was glad to see her parents.”
“Very natural,” Father Bernardo agreed. “But, if you’ll allow me to say so, you look well also, Lieutenant.”
“Fatherhood,” Tejada said smugly, and the conversation turned to Toño until Elena returned with the baby, once more sleepy and silent.
The priest set out a plate of early strawberries for his guests, and was modestly pleased with their gratitude. “It’s the least I could do,” he explained earnestly. “I’m glad you’re back. We were afraid we’d lost you after that business with the sergeant and everything.”
Tejada and his wife exchanged glances. Then Tejada said lightly, “I wish all the people of the valley felt as you do, Father.”
“Oh, I’m sure many do,” Father Bernardo replied encouragingly. “Señor Rosas, for instance, must be pleased you’ve returned.”
“It’d be nice if he showed it by building us a permanent barracks,” Tejada said. “And maybe a school for Toño.”
“I’m sure he’s working on the barracks.” Father Bernardo laughed. “As to the school, you know that I’d be happy to help with that.”
“So would I.” Elena spoke up from the armchair where she was cradling Toño.
The priest frowned, but Tejada looked at her with affection. “I know,” he said. “Both of you just need the space to teach. And I think the Guardia owes Potes a school.”
“Perhaps you’d better let Señor Rosas focus on the barracks first,” Father Bernardo suggested gently.
Tejada nodded. “I’ll make Señor Rosas speed up his blessed construction schedule!” he promised. “And if he starts clucking about Devastated Regions not having the manpower, I’ll . . .” He paused, trying to think of something sufficiently awful to threaten to do to Rosas. “I’ll build them both myself!” he finished finally.
Elena laughed. “You don’t know the first thing about building anything!” she said fondly.
Tejada looked at the sleeping Carlos Antonio. “Maybe it’s time I learned,” he said.
Afterword
Potes today is a thriving town of about twenty-five hundred people, a center for hiking, kayaking, and other adventure sports in the Picos de Europa, and a popular summer destination for Spanish tourists. The town is still the capital of the comarca of Liébana. The Torre del Infantado is currently being restored, but it retains its impressive silhouette. In the autumn of 1946, the Guardia Civil moved into the historic mansion, which had been completely renovated for its use, and where it is still housed. I would like to thank all of the citizens of Potes, who graciously swallowed their astonishment at the sight of a lone American visiting their town in the middle of February and shared their history and their memories with me.
I have adjusted their story somewhat to fit the needs of the novel. All my events and characters are completely fictitious, but I have tried to make the landscape of The Watcher in the Pine fairly accurate. Eusebio Bustamante’s photographs of Potes before and after the Civil War, collected in the Albúm de la Liébana, capture both the beauty of the town and the devastation wrought by the fire of 1937. Mónica Álvarez Careaga describes the work of the General Directorate for Devastated Regions in Potes in her article “La reconstrucción de la villa de Potes (1939–1959).” Although Devastated Regions was a real entity, the harassed Señor Rosas is my own invention, and it must be said in fairness to his real-life counterpart, Juan José Resines del Castillo, that the reconstructed plaza of Potes is an exceptionally beautiful spot.
The political climate of the story is also real. The end of the Spanish Civil War in 1939 signaled the beginning of a desperate guerrilla conflict between the Spanish Army, the Guardia Civil, and the Policía Armada (later the Policía Nacional) on one side, and the maquis, remnants of the defeated Republican army, and a few dedicated rebels on the other. The maquis operated throughout Spain, but they began their campaign in the north in Galicia and the Asturias. One of the most famous guerrillas of the region was “Juanín,” Juan Fernández Ayala, a native of Potes. Born in 1917, Juanín was imprisoned at the end of the Civil War, and during the period in which The Watcher in the Pine takes place, he was in Santander’s Tabacalera jail. He was released at the end of 1941, and took to the mountains shortly afterward. He was apparently a man of considerable courage and ingenuity and his exploits read like updated Robin Hood stories. He survived in the hills until a shoot-out with the Guardia in 1957. Today, the tourist brochures of the Liébana region hail him as a local hero. The Sten machine gun and Astra pistol taken from his body are on display in Madrid in the Guardia Civil section of the Museum of the Army, a bizarre tribute from his enemies. Although the action of The Watcher in the Pine takes place somewhat earlier than the years when Juanín was active, I have drawn heavily on Pedro Álvarez’s biography, Juanín: el último emboscado de la postguerra española, for the setting and details of the guerrilla movement in Potes. Alfredo Cloux’s Juanín Web page (http://es.geocities.com/los_del_monte) and its lively bulletin board were also invaluable to me, providing both sources of information and a chance to meet the children and grandchildren of the maquis (and their foes), as well as a few survivors of the period.
The maquis were most active in the early and midforties, especially the period between the Allied invasion of France and the end of World War II, when they hoped (and Franco’s government feared) that the Allies would invade Spain as well, and topple the last remaining Fascist government in Europe. I am indebted to José-Antonio Vidal Sales’s book Maquis: la verdad histórica de la “otra guerra,” a wonderful combination of oral history and analysis, for information about this period as well as the marvelous “Paisajes de la Guerrilla/Landscapes of the Guerrilla” (http://es.geocities.com/eustaquio5/index.html), a companion to Alfredo Cloux’s Juanín page. Javier Corcuera’s moving documentary La guerrilla de la memoria also sheds light on the maquis through interviews with the handful who still survive.
Franco’s anti-Communism and loudly proclaimed neutrality at the end of World War II won him support in Britain and the United States, and by the time the first American military bases opened in Spain in 1953, the maquis had despaired of foreign intervention. Many fled over the Pyrenees to France. Others, like Juanín, were captured and killed by the Guardia. A few hid in the mountains as outlaws until the 1960s. Jesus Torbado and Manuel Leguineche’s book The Forgotten Men tells the story of one, Pablo Pérez Hidalgo, who actually survived in the Sierra Bermeja until after Franco’s death in 1975. Only after learning that a general amnesty had been declared by King Juan Carlos did he surrender to the Guardia Civil in December of 1976.