Martutene

by Ramón Saizarbitoria

  The American says, “You’re terrible.” That’s how the show always ends. Julia is sure that that sentence—“the mathematics of music is written down right there”—and all the rest of it is something he’s underlined from somewhere, she’s sure he didn’t come up with it himself.

  She concentrates on reading the start of her Spanish translation of “Bihotzean min dut,” afraid something might sound “creaky”: “The literature teacher was collecting his pupils’ papers when the headmaster came in. His face was pale. He spoke in a low voice—“Ana’s father’s been hit by a bomb”—but the pupils in the first rows heard him. The teacher wanted to say something and opened his mouth several times, like a fish, but before he could get anything out, the headmaster had already replied to the implicit question. ‘He’s dead.’ The whispering went from row to row and grew to a racket, and you could tell that the pupils were glad that the class had been interrupted.” She wonders if it really happened like that.

  Now there are two swallows sitting on the one-handed angel. One is on the still-complete arm, the other on the head. She once saw a pigeon perched on the tip of a sword in an equestrian statue of Joan of Arc. It was bronze, and it sat in the middle of a square in some French city whose name she’s forgotten. She wanted to take a photo of it, but it took off again before she could get her camera out. Each time she remembers that, though she doesn’t know why, she regrets not having been able to take the photo, not because she thinks it would have been a good photo but to be able to know what city it was. She doesn’t even remember who she was with. Perhaps it was with Martin. It probably was with him, but she doesn’t want to ask him, just in case it wasn’t, which is a possibility. She finds that gap in her memory incomprehensible—worrying, too.

  Could it be, as Martin has sometimes accused reproachingly, that she only holds onto bad memories?

  Memories. When the young American asks the writer why he has that big map of Sicily on the wall—it’s at least three by four feet—he says he wants to go and live on the island sometime. In Syracuse, in fact. Apparently, that “sometime” is going to be when his parents die, although his saying “when I don’t have to take care of them anymore” may lead people who don’t know him to think that he’s a loving son who changes their diapers and accompanies them on walks. Julia doesn’t think he’s ever going to carry out that plan of his, and in fact she doesn’t care anymore—if she ever did care—that he doesn’t include her in it. Because he’s never talked about the two of them going away; he never really talks about the two of them, about their future in relation to each other. What really annoys her about his fantasy—and she does believe it to be no more than pure fantasy—isn’t him leaving her out of it, it’s the need to make it happen in Syracuse. Before she met Martin, three years and seven months ago, Syracuse represented for Julia a feeling of nostalgia for a far-off place, beautiful abundant gardens, the smell of lemon trees, and the taste of honey. It was Henry Salvador’s music set to Dimey’s poem, and when she listened to it (“J’aimerais tant voir Syracuse / L’île de Pâques et Kérouan / Et les grands oiseaux qui s’amusent / A glisser l’aile sous le vent”—and in what other language could you get away with saying something so corny?), it was like white doves taking flight from her breast—I would so much like to see Syracuse / Easter Island and Cairo / And the large birds who sport / At flying under the wind. Sicily had been her fantasy, and she wanted reality to never spoil it for her. That was why she always ignored the great package deals in the travel agency windows advertising “Sicily: flight, hotel, and car rental,” but Martin talked to her about it so much that she finally gave in to the temptation. He was so obstinate about spoiling her dream, about ruining that exact spot, Syracuse, for her. She found everything there irritating—the heat, how Baroque it all was, the tourists in ecstasy ogling at Greek and Roman ruins, the locals believing themselves to be Archimedes, Plato, and Livy. They never got around to what she wanted to do and spent the whole trip looking for a restaurant as good as the excellent Italian restaurant they once found in London, that was all they did. After all the boring walks, on which he was only interested in the menus at the restaurants, he’d complain about having aching legs and about the uncomfortable seats in their rental car—an Opel, she doesn’t remember the model. Mosquitos attacked them at night. She told him she’d never go anywhere else with him, and she hasn’t. And now Syracuse is the memory of a nightmare. She’s never put Henry Salvador’s song on again, and whenever she hears it by chance, she cries bitterly.

  They’re still talking about Montauk. The young American has mentioned Frisch’s plausibility two or three times. She quotes paragraphs with the devotion of a Jehovah’s Witness repeating verses from the Bible, and Martin tries to find them in the Spanish edition, licking his finger to turn each page. Harri, too, usually tells him off about that habit of his—she wouldn’t let anyone else get away with it—and about the fact that he bites his nails. Julia doesn’t tell him off any more. She feels ridiculous in the role of mother.

  A wasted morning. Harri appears on the path in the yard and waves a hand. She sees her bend down, pull out one of the bottles that Martin stuck in the ground to frighten off the moles, and throw it onto a heap of dried grass in front of the shed. She’s talking as she comes into the house. “Planting those bottles all around was the last straw for this sad yard.” She always says something before saying hello. She’s on her way to Bilbao—she waves her hand in the air and moves her hips—and she’s popped in to give the sociologist some papers. And to tell her that their meeting with Abaitua’s been postponed. And she’s brought them some croissants.

  The American girl uses a fountain pen. An old Parker with a metal cap. She also uses a notebook, in which she writes down the new appointment with Abaitua; it looks old, its black oilskin edges are worn, and an elastic strip of the same color holds it closed. In the short time Julia’s known her, she’s realized that the American loves outdated, old-fashioned things, which she, Julia, first experienced when they were just normal things and no longer particularly appreciates. When Harri gives her the chance, the American girl tells her that she forgot her file folder with the photocopies of Montauk in Abaitua’s office, and this time Julia thinks that the gestures she makes to express how worried she is about it looks real enough. Harri says he must think she did it deliberately, like her namesake in the novel—the same pleasantry Martin said before—and this time Julia understands it without the need for any explanations.

  They all start talking about Montauk again, and she feels left out once more.

  Apparently, what Harri’s most interested in is to what extent the description of the weekend the writer called Max spent with the forgetful character Lynn at a place called Montauk is based on his own experience, whether it actually happened to the Swiss writer Max Frisch, which is something that seems completely irrelevant to the writer from Martutene. Who cares about that, it’s all fiction, at the end of the day. The argument he usually uses to justify writing about their suffering, his and hers, their joint misery. Then the young American very seriously confirms it, almost in a whisper, seemingly sorrowed at having to remind them of such a well-known phrase: “Every self, even the self that we live and die, is an invention.” The writer gestures to show that he quite agrees and, believing that not to be enough, allows himself to affectionately pat her on the back. He looks at Julia with an expression that she can’t quite classify—something between insulting and despising—seeming to say, “Have you seen that, you fool? This young charming girl from Yale has perfectly understood something that you can’t even grasp.”

  But Harri is not intimidated, “But did Max Frisch really have a thing with this Lynn?” The response she gets is no more than a charitable silence. “Please excuse me, I studied science,” she adds. Apparently, ambiguity offends her rational character and she has to know whether the things she’s told are true or false. She takes the English version out of her pocket and sp
ends a while looking through the pages for something. Then she holds it in front of the young woman and points to a passage, which the latter reads aloud: “I should like to be able to describe this day, just this day, our weekend together, how it came about and how it develops I should like to tell it without inventing anything . . . I want to invent nothing; I want to know what I notice and think when I am not thinking of possible readers.”

  Who says that, she asks again, Max Frisch, or the writer who Max Frisch is describing? Are they the same person?

  “But who cares about that?” says the writer.

  “I do, because I want to know if I’m being told the truth.”

  “Oh, the truth!” says the American.

  On truth and literature. As she listens to them, Julia remembers the dinner parties they used to have, lying around on the floor with their friends, trying harder to convince than to understand, everyone attempting to give the most brilliant quotes. At that time, too, Julia used to listen more than she spoke. Using quotes seems pedantic to her, but she also finds it disagreeable and gets embarrassed when she sees people struggling to express ideas that have already been precisely put forward in books, as if they were the first people to ever debate such difficult matters.

  But Harri is no hypocrite, and Julia likes her a bit because of that. After saying she studied science, she dares to ask things that other people wouldn’t for fear of looking dumb. Julia holds out her hand to ask her for the book, and Harri’s response—she doesn’t know how comic it looks—is to hold it protectively against her chest, and Julia has to promise she’ll give it back before Harri lets go of it.

  Yes, that’s what Montaigne says in the English translation: “This book was written in good faith, reader.”

  It doesn’t take her long to confirm that “la blanca y velluda chaqueta” is “the shaggy white jacket” in English. It’s on the sixth page: “When later I was helping her into her shaggy white jacket.”

  Tell me!

  Repite él a menudo, como si alguien pudiera contarse algo a él mismo.

  The English version, on the other hand, goes:

  Tell me!

  He often says, as if a person could describe himself.

  “Describe himself,” not, as in the Spanish, “tell himself something.”

  Apparently, it’s one of those things that everyone, not just Forster has said. “Fiction is truer than history.” But Harri doesn’t accept Aristoteles’, Forster’s, or Faulkner’s words (the American girl’s added that Faulkner said that fiction is often the best fact), she doesn’t accept that you have to go “beyond what’s there” or “further than skin-deep.” She studied science. Julia often wonders if it wouldn’t be ideal, from a pedagogical standpoint, to make sure there was a student like her in every lecture hall, someone who would dare to ask questions and not get overawed by pretty phrases. Harri insists—how can something you make up be truer than what someone who’s actually seen it says—but the writer insists as well. “Reality can be stranger than fiction, but fiction’s truer.” Julia believes him, although she wouldn’t be able to define the idea if she had to; the conviction with which he says it is the most convincing argument for her.

  Harri has to leave and signals with her hand to ask Julia to give her the book back. It’s obvious she finds the subject boring, but before she leaves, she tells them that they haven’t convinced her and that she finds it exasperating not knowing whether what she’s been told is true or has been made up, and she pays no attention to the American girl’s shrugging her shoulders and smiling in despair. It’s Lynn who takes the book from Julia and gives it back to Harri. “‘This book was written in good faith,’ the man on the plane said. Isn’t that true? That’s important.” Her smile shows amusement but not mockery, and that’s how Harri takes it, and she says in all seriousness that she’s right. And as she puts the book in her green briefcase, she says, “Do you know what I think?” She thinks that while she’s reading the sentence, the man from the airport is reading it, as well—that’s very important for her—perhaps he’s reading it right now, they’re sharing those words, they’re saying them to each other and listening to each other say them. She opens the book at random and reads, “Why this weekend in particular?” And she theatrically closes her eyes. Then says, “I don’t know, it’s as if I’m hearing his voice.”

  There’s an uncomfortable silence, because the rest don’t know if she’s being serious. Julia says she’s crazy, and she should leave, she’s going to be late. She doesn’t know why those histrionic expressions of Harri’s affect her so much. “Sometimes I think you envy me,” she answers, and this time it’s clear it’s a joke. The other three don’t take their eyes off her, and after very carefully putting the book in her bag, she picks up some of the index cards lying on top of the table, pretending she’s doing so secretly, and her playing around leads to Martin trying to stop her from picking them up, but Julia gets worried that the American girl may think they’re doing it all seriously. She herself is used to it, of course. Harri holds the cards up in the air and as far from Martin as possible, and he pretends to do all he can to take them off her. Let me read them, she shouts in a tearful child’s voice. “Pleeease.” She wants to know what lies he’s writing at the moment. Now she holds the cards behind her back, and the writer has to put both his arms around her. They fall onto the sofa like children. Somehow Martin gets ahold of the cards, he tears them up into tiny pieces and throws them up into the air, which Harri protests about. She sounds convinced as she says, “You’re a fool, they could be worth a lot of money one day.”

  They go with her out to the car. They talk about the zoning and development provisions that are slated to come into effect in the neighborhood. About how the current economic climate might affect those plans. Harri has the most information and seems to know what she’s talking about. She also replies very seriously when the American girl mentions something about work to her. Nothing like that silly, girlish routine she often puts on. She seems to guess what they’re thinking, because after opening the iron gate and complaining that it’s creaking just as bad as always because they haven’t put any oil on it, she reproaches them for not asking her about the man at the airport. They don’t need to ask her. She says she’s decided to take direct action. She smiles enigmatically and refuses to tell them her plans. She says to Martin, “You know what? I’m convinced I’m going to have an experience that’s already been written about somewhere.” She seems to be talking seriously, and then, to lighten things up a bit, she ruffles his hair and wonders if he’s going bald. “As you can see, I tell the truth.” She laughs. And then when she says he should go see a dermatologist, Julia—who’s been waiting for a good opportunity to ask her if she’s set up her mammogram appointment with Abaitua yet—replies that she would be better off tending to her own needs rather than his. She starts teasing again and asks if she’s jealous. She jokes about Abaitua, as well, complaining about having to show her breasts to a gentleman in order to see if she’s got cancer or not, a gentleman for whom she could easily lose her head. The American girl says she’s bad. The three women laugh. They agree that he’s an interesting and affable man. But Martin doesn’t. He disagrees with them; he’s jealous. He thinks Abaitua’s quite arrogant. He still has more to say, when the American girl interrupts him sharply, “Well he thinks very highly of you.” The seriousness with which she says it would have been comical if her voice hadn’t broken a little, and Julia is moved by the firmness she displays in criticizing her landlord. Doctor Abaitua thinks that he’s a great writer, and the great writer, afraid that he may have annoyed her, takes a step back. He says he knows that the man reads his work (he looks at Julia for help), he’s one of his few readers, and that, too, says nothing good about him. He chuckles. He’s known him for ages, and his wife, as well. Perhaps as a way of getting back at them for finding Abaitua interesting, he praises his wife, Pilar Goytisolo. She’s a doctor, as
well, and she was a great beauty, she still is, he says.