by Roman Payne
“‘And so, some months later, the grand negress gave birth on the floor in the couple’s shabby apartment. For all her size and strength, the poor new mother was made weak from childbirth and suffered a fever, so it was up to the father to cradle the infant, wash it, etc…
“‘You can believe the horror suffered by Juan Gomérez when he first saw the child and looked at its face and saw how black, how very coal-black, the baby’s skin was. You see, his wife was an African negress, but she was sweet-chocolate in color. While Juan was extremely fair, almost blond, being a pure Spaniard of entirely European descent. So the baby should have been a mixture of white milk, and milk chocolate. But he wasn’t, he was coal-black! His color matched the color of the great negro cousin that had stayed with the couple up until seven months prior when he was sent back to Africa. Little Juanito, you see, was not Juan’s child. The baby began to cry the moment he was born and didn’t ever stop. Now a babe just born, his crying resembles nothing in this world; while this little baby’s crying voice sounded just like its mother’s husky cousin, and nothing like her gently swooning husband. That, and his face was darker than a sky without moon or stars. Nothing so black could be born of a light cheese-colored man and a toffee colored woman. No, this could not be Juan’s child. And yet, Juan had given nine months of his life to feeding that strange baby inside its mother. Our little palefaced Spaniard was horrified. While his wife was in a fever from child-birth, Juan went to the kitchen and took a large carving knife, the kind that is used to carve pork-ham, and in order to prevent his having to toil sixteen-hour days any longer to put food in the mouth of that creature whose genes didn’t belong to him, he went and sliced the newborn baby through the chest twice with the knife. His eyes gushed tears, spilling over the iron carving knife and the infant’s corpse—meanwhile, as Juan servedup tears, he saw his wife looking at him through her own eyes veiled in fever that bulged with horror—horror, for they knew what had happened. She squealed with terror and fell unconscious.
“‘Juan, aware of his guilt, and of his own accord, walked to the police station and gave a clear testimony of what he had done. He was promptly arrested and a picture of the crime was portrayed for the citizens of Sevilla and all of Spain, and surprisingly, many people took Juan’s side—especially the women! Those in the courthouse saw how small and fearful and trembling this man was. His lawyer explained how long he worked day and night to feed the gluttonous, loose-legged woman who went boozing and carousing with the little money he earned. While Juan had slaved in the kitchen cooking food for his pregnant wife, she had sat at the table patting her stomach in full awareness that the baby inside wasn’t his, but rather her cousin’s. Still, she let her poor husband slave to nourish the child that was conceived in incest and out of adultery. So when the child was born and Juan discovered the truth, he was overcome with rage. He was like a man who was drunk. He ran for that carving knife and sliced the baby up and that is all that he could have done. The press and the public were undecided. The majority of ‘sensible’ citizens wanted to see Juan set free. He was dying in prison—almost dead from fever, you see, his moral suffering was killing him. Night and day, Juan trembled in his cell in terror from the fact of his own crime.’
“When Master Dragomir finished telling me of the crime,” Pulpawrecho went on, lowering his tone and slowing the pace of his story, putting his newspaper down. He looked down his strange nose at me. He asked me then what I thought of the court case. “Should Juan Gomérez hang? Or should he be set free?”
“Enough, Pulpawrecho! Let me tell our guest a little of the events that followed…” And Dragomir continued the night the two of them met…
“So I set down my paper after telling Pulpy here about Juan Gomérez and asked Pulpawrecho what he would do if he were the judges. ‘Would you have him hanged? Would you set him free?’ . . . Pulpawrecho all the while sat trembling in the chair you’re sitting in now, his fingertips white as all the blood had left them. He gripped the edge of the desk. I heard the clock on the wall tick: tock, tick, tock. Just then, Pulpawrecho darted off out of this room and down the stairs. I was sure I’d scared him with my story. I heard him out on the street a moment later, his shoes slapping on the stones as the sound grew fainter and fainter…
“So I went on reading my paper. And to be honest, within minutes, I forgot all about this strange visitor; and I was surprised when he later returned. It’s easy to forget such little men as Pulpawrecho until they do startling things! Pulpawrecho returned an hour later and rang the buzzer quickly, impatiently. I went and opened the door myself—of course, myself, I had no servant then! So, I opened my door and Pulpawrecho entered into my study and held out a bundle wrapped in a wool blanket.
“‘Master,’ he said to me, ‘Please, let me call you Master… I found what you were asking me for.’ He outstretched his arms with a frenzied look on his face. I looked at the bundle and realized it was an infant child, all bundled-up.
“‘A baby?” I inquired, “I asked you for a baby?’ … ‘More or less,’ panted Pulpawrecho, ‘You asked me what I would do in this situation, in this court case, how I would handle the adulteress and her cuckolded husband, the murderer of the child. Well, here is my response…’ Pulpawrecho thrust the baby into my arms. Its little infant feet stuck out black, like two lumps of coal, from beneath the wool blanket. His little hands flopped out of the blanket and I saw that even the fingertips were midnight black. It seemed only the bottoms of the feet were a little rosy. They were rosy and they quivered lightly as the wind blew.
“‘I brought you the baby,’ said Pulpawrecho.
“‘So you did.’
Dragomir turned to me, delivering the final blow to the story, “So then I drew back the blanket. I drew back the blanket and saw that the little black baby was dead!”
A cold silence fell over Dragomir’s study, here and now in the present moment where we found ourselves; the clock ticked on the wall and it caught my attention and I wondered if it was the same clock that had ticked back on that first night when Pulpawrecho had entered this room with a dead infant wrapped in a blanket.
“Do you understand, Saul, what this all means?” “No, Dragomir.”
“I knew by Pulpawrecho’s gesture of bringing the child, (and he knew that I knew), that if he would listen to my story about a dead child and hear me ask him what he would do in such a situation, and then immediately run out and come back within an hour holding a dead child that is very much like, if not the exact same child as the one in my story, then I knew that he would do anything for me—anything! Pulpawrecho proved himself in that one hour to be…”
“To be…?”
“The perfect servant!”
Upon hearing this, I recoiled with a mixture of revulsion and awe.
“…El sirviente perfecto!” he roared with laughter.
I turned to the side and spat. Pulpawrecho looked at my reaction and rubbed his moist palms together, grinning with wet teeth and eyes that shone with self-satisfaction, for he knew that he was the perfect servant, and that he would stop at nothing to serve his master.
When I looked back up, Dragomir was gone from his chair. He came up behind me and placed in my hand a ball of sticky black opium.
“Give me fifty reales, unless if you prefer to pay in gold.”
I examined the opium and smelled it. It appeared to be the same that we had just smoked; yet looking at the ball in the light, I noticed there was a strange green shimmer to it. I had never seen opium with a similar green shimmer, although it smelled fine and I just smoked some with them without ill-effect. I gave the green shimmer no more thought and placed three gold escudos on the desk where the opium had been.
“Where else in Spain are you going to go visit?”
I told him I was going to Madrid, then to Valencia, then to Barcelona, before heading to France. When I said Barcelona, he lit up and grew very spirited.
“You’re going to Barcelona? When? In one month you will be t
here? Here, I have an idea. Give me your opium back, I’ll give you a bit more.”
I gave the drug dealer back the two-gram ball of opium he had sold me and watched him slice and weigh a larger block equaling four times what he had originally sold me. Those eight grams, he cut down the center. “Here is for you,” he said, presenting me with one four-gram block. Before I wrapped it in a piece of vellum paper I inspected it again near the candle and saw that this piece too had the same strange green shimmer that the last piece had. I gave it no more thought, though, and put it in the vellum paper and tucked it into my pocket. Green, I would find out soon enough, was my unlucky color.
“Why don’t we make this a proper commission?”
“What sort of commission?” I wasn’t interested in business. I had the money my old business partner Juhani sent me in Alexandria, and I would have much more money as soon as I got to Madrid.
“First, take your three escudos back.”
Dragomir took the other four gram block and placed it inside a silver snuffbox. “Have a look beneath the lid.” I opened the box and saw a portrait of Dragomir’s face in miniature. It was a shocking portrait. Dragomir looked grim and haunting.
“I compliment your portrait artist. The resemblance is truly startling.”
“Please put that snuffbox in your pocket. I want you to take it to someone. You see, Barcelona is a city I know well. I lived there for six years before coming here to Andalusia. The mistress I was in love with then, she is still in Barcelona now. I haven’t written or visited her in six years but lately I cannot stop thinking about her. Please honor me with this commission, my friend Saul, and when you fulfill my request, I will reward you handsomely with money.”
“As I told you, money doesn’t interest me.”
“Well then please, for the sake of your honor and elegance, return the favor of tonight’s hospitality by swearing to me that you will take this commission to my mistress in Catalonia. I’m entrusting you with my only remaining portrait, and my last silver snuffbox. Make sure that she gets it. I don’t want anything from her in return, and you might enjoy her company, she must still be very beautiful. Her name is Penelope Baena, she is still at the same address, I verified this recently, it’s right in the center of the city and you just have to give her the box and maybe have coffee with her, and pay her my respects.”
“Why don’t you send it by courier? It’s a safer bet. I might eat up your opium and melt down your silver.”
“Surely Saul is joking! You would never do a thing like that! Certainly not a Homeric man such as yourself. And certainly not to Dragomir, anyhow!”
I was puzzled why he trusted me, and why he didn’t send his present via courier. I would find out.
“Please, no jokes, damn it! For the sake of your honor and your elegance, return the favor of tonight’s hospitality by swearing to me that you will take this commission to Señorita Baena. The opium, the snuffbox, and my portrait, you must deliver them into no hand other than that of Señorita Baena’s. The other four grams is my gift to you for your troubles. Señorita Baena is a lovely creature, she lives in a tiny apartment on the first floor in Barcelona’s Barrio Gòtico, and she runs the herborista1 downstairs on the ground floor at street-level. I did some checking and she is still there. She sells herbal blends for magic spells, purges, anesthesia, health tonics and the like. I left all my old mistresses for her and was completely happy until one night Penelope had a vision that I would contract a plague within six months and die three days later. All the people who were near me when I had the plague would all die within three days of my death; according to her vision, I was doomed.
“She’d closed-up her shop early when I came one night to see her and a man in the shadows approached me and begged me to come around the corner to talk to him. I put my hand on the handle of my gun in my pocket and followed him. When we reached a dark place, he opened his hands and showed me a roll of gold doubloons. He said this was a gift from Señorita Baena. He told me of her vision and said that she was too cowardly to tell me in person because she didn’t want to catch my sickness and die. The man in the shadows told me to go down south and cure myself with heat and a good diet, and to return to Barcelona if I wasn’t dead in no less than a year’s time. I loved the crazy woman and I dropped a tear on the roll of money as I handed the messenger a doubloon and told him to tell her I was going to Andalusia and that I would never return, for I would certainly die within the year. That was five years ago.
“…Knowing that that crazy woman is still in Barcelona, I am charmed that you are going there. Revenge is gentle when the wronged-one seeks to avenge what was done out of madness, and the victim didn’t lose his fortune. That woman gave me enough money to set up business here in Málaga. She did me a favor with her stupid vision. Now you may fall in love with her. I don’t want you to love her; but if you do end-up loving her, please treat her well and love no others. She was the only woman good enough for me in all of Barcelona. She was a genius at this, clever at that, stupid at nothing. An ardent temptress with a beautiful body, she put spells on all men around her. So please, travel with the snuffbox, and when she sees my portrait and numbs herself with my opium, tell her that I am alive and in perfect health, that I am well-known in Málaga and I speak fondly of her. Remember her address…”
1 HERBORISTA: The Spanish word for a person who practices pharmacognostic medicine—or, the practice of using medicines and drugs as they are found in a natural state; in plants, herbs, mushrooms, resins, etc.). Pharmacognosy is known commonly as ‘herbalism.’ Herboristas may be known in English as ‘herbalists.’
I admit that Dragomir had charmed me with his story of Señorita Baena. Were it true that she was the only woman in Barcelona worth loving, I would’ve been happy to give as well as receive her presents.
“You’re leaving so quickly?” Dragomir asked.
Behind me I could hear a small roar. A roar?, a snore, rather. It was Pulpawrecho. The servant who had been so lively only moments before was now scrunched up on a bench in the far end of the room. He now slept and snored loudly in an opium daze.
“I’m going to the port to find a hotel for the night,” I said. “There’s a good pension above Gordita’s Wine Shop. Not too many roaches or bedbugs, although it’s a bit noisy.” I gathered up my satchels and as I was doing so I cast an eye on Pulpawrecho on the bench.
“Why is he gnawing on his wrist like that?” I curled my lip in alarm. Pulpawrecho was scrunched-up in the fetal position devouring his own wrist the way a dog lying in a corner gnaws on a bone or a piece of hide.
“Poor Pulpawrecho was taken from his mother’s breast too soon, it seems. He used to suck his thumb when he first entered my service. I found it unseemly for a servant of mine to suck his thumb like a baby, so I disciplined him. He needed to suck something though, so I let him chew his wrist while he sleeps. Won’t you sit back down a minute? When are you leaving Málaga?”
“You are the clairvoyant,” I said, “you should know when I’m leaving!”
“Ha-ha, no please sit down… I am no clairvoyant. At least not the ‘S.V. Dragomir, Clairvoyant’ people take me for. That is only one of the hats I wear …and the one I am wearing now. You see, I’ve worn a lot of hats over the years… Heaven’s, you are all flushed! Please have some water… Okay, you look better now. Do you know how old I am? I’ll be forty-two in a few days. Yet I’ve worked in many trades, I’ve lived many lives. I’ve been an actor, a magician, a contrabandista, a pawnbroker, a hired sharpshooter, a priest, a gambler… I even tended bar and worked as a fry cook. Yes, a fry cook!, if you can believe that. I’ve been to jail a few times, but I was born an honest child like we all are. The road shakes you up. You know the road, Saul. You’ve traveled your fair share. I like you and you interest me, this is why I am telling you this. That I am a charlatan and not a clairvoyant, that is no harm to my ego. I pay dear little Pulpawrecho who is sleeping over there an honest wage for all the services he offers me,
and I live as I please. I had a large shipment of Turkish opium arrive in Gibraltar two weeks ago, and that is why I am able to help you with the stash you have in your pocket. Your meeting miss Baena will be of personal use to me. People are around to help other people in this world. Do you believe that? I really will pray for you, Saul, once our ways part. As I said: You do interest me.”
I wanted to leave, I was dizzy. But curious about one thing, I asked, “This story you and your servant told about how you met, I know that he was following this poor girl in the street. She looked ‘baffled’ as he put it. And once he saw her leaving through the courtyard, she looked, he put it… ‘even more baffled’ than before. It was no doubt because of something you told her that she looked even more baffled than when she had arrived. You read her fortune, of course… so what exactly was the ‘bonne aventure’ that you told her?”
“Oh, I did read her fortune—or rather I guessed at her fortune. But it was because she sought me out for that and paid me.”
“Sought you ought? How? Your servant said she was running through the street and stopped in front of the sign stating your profession, and she kissed her hands. She must have been hoping for answers in life, and she stumbled on your house by chance.”
“Certainly not. A lot of people come to me from the port. My services are advertised down at the port where the boats come in and directions are given to where I can be found. Wherever one finds a port city, one finds travelers coming from abroad from somewhere or another by sea, and everyone who is traveling from abroad by sea seeks two things: to first find land, and then to find their fortune. She was no exception. Once she gained land, she wanted then to gain her fortune. She came to me and I saw her vulnerable state and her young age and thought to refuse her a consultation. But she offered to pay me and even insisted on it, emptying her little purse of five gold pistoles. I’m not one to refuse five gold pistoles! This is a hard world for one with money in his pocket. For one without, it is impossible!”