"Enrique, did you hear me?"
"About arriving on Friday in Málaga? Yes. Take a cab from the airport to the AVE station. You'll have to book a seat for the train on the Renfe website. Let me know what time you'll arrive in Córdoba. I'll pick you up at the station."
"Great! Thank you, Enrique." Lili paused again before surprising herself. "I'm sorry about my abrupt departure and not saying goodbye. I'll explain on Friday."
After Lili ended the call Enrique suddenly felt much better. She'd acknowledged her actions. She hadn't forgotten him. She was coming to visit. He was going to see her again. He now possessed her phone number.
With a new energy he called María. Could she, with anyone else if needed, undertake the equivalent of a monster spring clean on the house to make it fit for living in and even for guests? That María comprehended his intentions was clear when she asked if he wanted the house redone, to remove the atmosphere of his father without quite eliminating his memory. If Enrique, as she had always called him, could pay for a couple of extra people over two days, all could be complete by Thursday evening.
Enrique relished the memory. María had been as good as her word. In two days the house was remade from its gentle senility to being fresh and open. Old curtains and carpets had been whisked away. Features like the shutters across the windows were spruced up and brought back to life. The garden was tidied.
The renewal was possible because his father had possessed simple tastes and had kept the house painted simply, in white. Nothing could be done, however, about the traditional Spanish heavy wooden furniture so typical of his parents, grandparents and previous generations, and even less about the long line of gloomy family portraits.
María produced a miracle in those two days. When Enrique challenged her about how she'd managed it María confessed she and her mother had spent many long hours arguing about the ways they might improve the house if it was theirs. What neither had expected was the opportunity. But, once offered, they were ready. María Madre, despite her age, had insisted on contributing. Both Marías volunteered deeper changes, though these would take longer.
Enrique savoured his expulsion while the tornado took over. So bowled over had he been by the improvements to the house and his humour he decided to go to Málaga on the Friday morning to meet Lili.
He'd misjudged his timing. Having parked at the airport Enrique saw Lili climb into a taxi and disappear. He pursued the taxi to the train station where, parking illegally, he sidled up as she paid off her driver. He took her luggage to his car and was obliged to charm a policewoman into not giving him a ticket.
He reflected on the drive back to Córdoba. The start hadn't been auspicious. His dislocation of Lili's careful arrangements had annoyed her. It took almost half of the two-hour journey to Córdoba for her irritation to subside.
From there they could not stop talking.
The same day: on the road to Úbeda
Lili broke her drive slightly south of Valdepeñas. After refuelling, she decided to extend the break to buy a drink. Coffee was out. Instead, she'd ordered an agua con gas. She drank it without checking. It was Vichy Catalán, a strong-tasting, salts-loaded water. It was too late to change. Lili carried her bottle and glass to a table where she attempted to watch the afternoon Noticias on the television. She couldn't concentrate.
Instead her mind replayed what had occurred upon arriving at Málaga station all those years ago. After paying for her taxi to the station she had turned to witness her luggage being stolen. She'd chased the thief until he encountered a policewoman, at which point she recognised it was Enrique with her suitcase. An imminent parking ticket negotiated away, they drove off together with minimal greetings.
Lili remembered how she had been cross with Enrique. Why hadn't he warned her he was picking her up? Now she possessed a paid-for but unused AVE ticket. She'd seethed for the first part of the journey. Gradually, as her annoyance dissipated, she'd seen the funny side and tried to talk.
Enrique had responded in monosyllables. Whether this was attributable to his focus on negotiating the roads out of Malaga or because he was peeved about her attitude, she was unsure. It took a further half-hour before both relaxed and all of a sudden they were back to talking as they had in Italy.
She asked about his father. Had his death been expected? From this emerged a dry description of his chilling inheritance. In Enrique's words a bunch of trees, some rundown houses and lots of sandy land encumbered by a deluge of debts made to his father by legions of banks and other financial businesses.
From his phrasing, Lili deduced Enrique was in a state of blind funk. He had no idea what to do and no one to provide measured advice. From what she heard the family lawyer was a waste of fees. This didn't surprise her. The lawyer sounded like too many other Spanish ones she'd encountered in her banking career, delighted to offer whatever advice they believed their client wanted to hear without realising they were paid to give independent, informed counsel. She had sacked three such firms, each of whose partners all but fainted when she explained. That they hadn't understood only confirmed that her wisdom to dispense with their expensive praise was correct. If given the chance, she would do the same to Enrique's useless representative.
While listening to Enrique pour out his miseries the happier she became. He described woes he'd told nobody else. Like herself, he relaxed as he talked. Even better, she'd been through a similar situation in Canada. She knew what to do and how to do it. The question was, would Enrique accept his need for her help?
Better still, she had a six-month sabbatical. Her fear of burn-out had justified her request to her superiors. They'd all experienced similar doubts. Without fanfare or fuss she was granted six months minimally-paid leave with an option for a further six months unpaid. This was the bank's unsubtle way of encouraging her to reappear as soon as possible. After all, the bank knew she had a high-maintenance lifestyle and it owned the outsize employee mortgage on her Richmond apartment.
Lili said nothing of this to Enrique. Instead she prompted him with question after question. She assembled a picture of his problems as well as various skeletal solutions.
On reaching Córdoba he'd taken her to a hotel so she could freshen up and rest. She'd been touched that he had already paid for the hotel and dinner was booked for later. By late afternoon she'd had the time for a rest followed by a walk around Córdoba.
Leaving the motorway café Lili drove on towards Úbeda. Yet her thoughts stayed with that first weekend. The dinner had been chaste and proper. She'd not mentioned her sabbatical, not wanting to push too hard, too soon. But she remembered liking him more and more. Enrique had a decency about him that was rare, plus he did not seem to expect her to hop into his bed.
The next day she had been invited to his house for a lunch, prepared and served by a pretty lady called María. Lili had tried to work out if María represented competition. It emerged that Enrique and María had grown up together as brother and sister during the many years when María's mother had been his father's housekeeper.
The house she didn't like, it being too fusty despite a recent makeover. Located in what Enrique asserted was the best part of Córdoba, it was close to the cathedral within the mosque.
From their evenings in Italy she knew his normal home was to the east in a place called Úbeda. More questions confirmed that the Úbeda house was, for Enrique, preferable to the Córdoba one, not least because it had enabled him to preserve a suitable distance from his father. Lili asked if she might see Úbeda. For the first time since Málaga genuine enthusiasm appeared in Enrique's eyes. She'd made the right request and they agreed to go the next day.
Nothing came up about how long she was staying. In truth, that weekend, she didn't herself know. She wouldn't ever have predicted it would be more than ten years.
Now she was returning to Enrique, with the real possibility she'd be leaving forever. Despondency crowded in again as she left the A4 towards Úbeda.
The same day: Ú
beda
Enrique sat up and checked his watch. Lost in reminiscences he hadn't telephoned Lili as she'd requested. He hastened to his mobile, knowing that calls could keep her awake and safe. So much depended on her.
"Lili, are you okay? I nodded off."
"I'm fine, more alert than expected at this stage."
"That's good. Where are you?"
"Passing 'el centro del mundo' as your old friend Pedro used to call Vilches. Not more than half an hour as long as I don't get trapped behind a truck. You don't need to worry about me now. Just have that fire stoked up and a drink ready, though not coffee."
Enrique disconnected and put more wood on the fire. It was olive wood, he noticed in passing. Not surprising. It would still be burning when Lili arrived.
Re-seated, he indulged in more memories of her first visit to Úbeda. She had fallen instantly in love with this house, even in the state it was in then, being nowhere near as fine as today. What had appealed was its unusual combination of terrace and salon. At the top of the house these enjoyed views south over the Guadalquivir valley towards Jódar with the Sierra Mágina mountains behind. It had been a cold, sunny day, which brought out the house's best aspects.
Back then, the slopes down to the river and beyond were not, as now, covered in dense groves of olive trees. Yes, there had been olive trees but these were dispersed according to tradition rather than the modern methodical lines now sown for maximum production. In part she was to blame, but that came later.
After a fine lunch in the centre of Úbeda, followed by a walk around its renaissance buildings, they'd headed back to Córdoba, taking the opportunity on their way to visit some of the trees and lands in his father's bequest. As he drove she surprised him yet again.
Lili started by telling him she was sure she knew of ways to extricate himself from his financial troubles and followed this by disclosing her six-month to one-year sabbatical. That was shock number one. Shock number two was her insistence that solving his financial problems would be her primary task with her secondary one being the creation of a viable business from those very lands he'd shown her without enthusiasm.
Enrique recalled his alarm, and pleasure. She was taking charge. She was going to be staying, though the issue of where never arose.
Lili brought up a big question, one of many he'd been unable to face.
"Do you like your father's house? Do you have any attachment to it?"
"I grew up in it, but no. While María has improved it, all I think of are the gloomy years visiting my father in decline. It has few good associations for me, other than growing up with the Marías. Why?"
"Does it have loans secured on it?"
"No. This was the one asset my father never raised money against, though he was close to doing so when he went downhill. Even my Úbeda house is used as security. But not Córdoba."
"Better and better. Step number one: sell it, tomorrow."
"That'd break the Marías' hearts."
Lili ignored this. If she could not leap this hurdle she might as well give up.
"Think about it. If your description is accurate it'll sell fast and for a premium. The monies you'd receive could be used to pay off some of the loans, which I'll renegotiate for you using the prospect of some repayment as a lever to improve your borrowing terms. By the way, I'm pretty certain from what you've described that your father was being ripped off by his lenders. We'll sort that and reserve a part for investing into producing premium olive oil."
"But Lili, you know nothing about farming, or olive oil. You said it yourself. You're a Canadian who grew up in Ottawa, a city."
"True. But I know finance and banks and you know about wine growing, from that fancy degree you lectured me about. You're going to refocus, on olives rather than vines."
Enrique chortled to himself. He held dear the memory of the extent of her plans for him and for the future, and she hadn't finished there. By the time they arrived back at her hotel he knew what each of them would be doing for the following weeks. In addition to selling his father's house this included making visits to the properties he owned, to find what else might be saleable, plus setting up individual meetings with all of his creditors. As if this was not enough he had received instructions to crash induce himself into how to grow olive trees and harvest their fruits.
In the following month he had never been so busy, or as happy. Lili was a Canadian dynamo. On the Monday, after apologising to the Marías, the house was on the market and appointments with the largest creditors set up.
By Friday, his head was deep in the literature of olive production where he discovered many possibilities. Lili was right. There were similarities as well as differences to grape growing. He was enthused for the first time since university.
To cap that extraordinary first week Lili conducted an unofficial auction to sell his father's house. At the end of this he accepted a cash bid three times higher than the estate agent's estimate. A Ceutan bidder was determined to own a Córdoban house close to where his Sephardic ancestors had once lived. Three times the amount! He'd been unable to disguise his disbelief as he listened to Lili manipulate the price up as three would-be buyers competed.
With the house all but sold Lili displayed a different side the following week when they visited his creditors. She dangled the imminent payment for the house like a carrot. The country bankers were like camels. Their desperation to receive any repayment from their loans produced far lower interest rates with elongated repayment terms and, in some cases, partial write-offs. At the first meeting Enrique had been mesmerised by Lili's brutal negotiating style, as were her targets, those bankers. After that he did not dare open his mouth.
By the end of week three his basic financial affairs had become manageable. Two plausible offers had been received for the Tunisian properties. The Ceutan decided to buy his father's furniture for an absurd sum because it was 'authentic'. Enrique had been bemused when Lili told him. He was not surprised he still possessed the gloomy family portraits. The Ceutan had, he apologised, no interest in these.
With the house sale completed he plucked up courage to suggest that Lili come to live with him in Úbeda. It seemed the least he could do when she had insisted on paying her own hotel bills in Córdoba after that first weekend. He'd felt so happy when she agreed.
Nevertheless, despite such pleasant memories, Enrique's sense of foreboding increased. Even as she drew closer to home, he was no longer sure if he wanted to see Lili or not.
Friday: Tallinn
Oleg began to warm down. He'd managed almost 20K on the running machine in under two hours. The recorded football match he'd watched had ended. Bayern Munich had won – again.
The only way he could train during an Estonian winter was indoors. Yet running on a machine was boring. His solution was to arrange his sessions when a decent football game was broadcast as this distracted him. Two forty-five-minute halves, albeit with a dull quarter of an hour of commentator chat between them, side-tracked enough for him to cover a reasonable distance.
He pressed the stop button and dismounted. He glanced around to find Andrei on a rowing machine. Andrei had arrived earlier and completed his own deep weights workout, one which Oleg wouldn't have dreamt of attempting.
On a vacant rowing machine alongside Andrei, Oleg fixed his feet in the foot rests and set the resistance to low. He detested rowing, as did Andrei, but it was the one gym machine they could both agree to use at the same time. He and weights did not work, while Andrei on a running machine was laughable. It was like watching a barrel attempting ballet. They'd tried skiing machines and other cross trainers. Finally they'd resorted to rowing machines. These had the advantage of providing a discreet side-by-side opportunity where he and Andrei could exchange information. No one would suspect anything other than two fitness freaks analysing their workout regimes or conquests or whatever.
The idea had been Andrei's after he'd learnt that both of them were members of a local chain of health clubs cal
led MyFitness. They'd joined at different locations. By upgrading their membership they now could meet at any of the MyFitness gyms. Under the cover of keeping fit they would meet in a different club each time. Oleg always arrived first. His running lasted longer. Andrei's sessions were short but intense. Afterwards they would talk on the rowing machines, or in the changing room and showers, before disappearing as they had come, in different directions.
Today they were in the MyFitness centre beneath the Solaris shopping centre. It was not an inviting place. Underground, it had no external views. But it was well equipped with weights, machines and television screens. It was conceivable they came here too often but it was still less than once every three or four months. Their chances of being associated were minimal.
"How was your run?" mouthed Andrei, trying hard on the rowing machine. His thighs were so massive, in keeping with the rest of him, it was difficult to keep the chain moving to and fro at a comfortable angle. In a real rowing shell, his outrigger would have had to be raised considerably to accommodate his bulk.
"Not too bad. Not fast, but long. But let's skip the training comparisons while no one's nearby. How's the bugs-side?"
"Good idea. We make progress. I never thought anybody could persuade me to become a bug-breeder. You're priceless, Oleg." Andrei offered an ironic snort. "The tests are done. I'm pretty sure I understand the breeding cycle. Now all we have to do is seed enough and we'll be ready for the next harvest."
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