The Anarchist Detective (Max Cámara)

by Webster, Jason

  ‘Not long after Stalingrad Franco began negotiating our retreat. Of course, I had to be up in arms, like the rest. There was already talk of staying behind. It was a ruse, they said. Typical Franco. Let the world know that he wasn’t officially supporting Hitler any more, but keep on fighting all the same. They started making preparations – applications to stay on, to be absorbed into SS divisions.

  ‘A lot of them managed to stay behind, but I got drafted back. I was alive, I’d done my bit. Or so I thought. No medal, no mention in dispatches. But I’d killed. More than my fair share of young men just like myself. Except they were fighting to save their homes, their country. I was a foreigner, fighting someone else’s war against a people I had no grudge against, no hate for. Yet I’d survived, and in order to do that, I’d killed.

  ‘I was in Barcelona when I heard that Maximiliano had been executed. It had taken place a week before, as we’d been freighted across lands with swastikas flying from every public building. On Franco’s personal insistence he’d been shot, rather than garrotted. I had that to thank him for. All those dead Russian boys had bought for my father a second or two less pain and panic in his dying.

  ‘And back to civilian life, a grieving, widowed mother to look after. More surviving – I’d got good at it in Russia. It didn’t feel so different in many ways. We both worked where we could – she ended up cleaning for the wife of the military governor, the man who signed Maximiliano’s death warrant. I got a job at a mechanic’s – oh, there were dozens of jobs I did back then.

  ‘I handed the Mauser rifle in, when we were demobbed. They asked if I had anything else. I still had the Luger, kept it tucked into the back of my trousers, but said no. I don’t think the NCO believed me, but they only searched my bags and didn’t find anything, so they let me go.

  ‘And I don’t know why. Perhaps I should have got rid of it. I’ve still got a magazine for it, somewhere.

  ‘But I’d grown fond of it, for some reason.

  ‘They’re funny like that, guns.’

  EIGHTEEN

  Tuesday 3rd November

  HIS LEG WAS sore, but he could walk. After taking some more pills and pacing up and down the corridor half a dozen times he could move almost without a limp.

  Hilario was still asleep. Cámara went into his room to check he was all right, nodding to Alicia when he came out.

  They had some coffee, then Cámara downloaded the photos he’d taken the day before and put them on a memory stick while Alicia showered and got ready to go.

  ‘I’ll walk you there.’

  ‘There’s no need.’

  ‘It’ll be better. It’s just going to get stiff otherwise.’

  There was a mist that morning and the streets were pale and milky. After the rush of early workers moving around the city, the roads were now scattered with parents and grandparents taking small children to nurseries and play schools. A mother with a pushchair wriggled past them on the narrow pavement, her little girl, perhaps one year old, staring out ahead as she nestled a doll against her chest.

  Alicia’s hand squeezed around Cámara’s. They didn’t talk about that now. It had come up once, a few days after he’d arrived with his suitcase at her Madrid flat early in the summer, but the child of his that she’d aborted at the start of their relationship would have been about the same age. Cámara only glanced down briefly at the little girl. His hand tightened instinctively in response to Alicia’s grip, but his mind was taken with other things.

  Grief and anger over the abortion had consumed him for too long. He’d left that behind in Valencia. It didn’t form a part of him any more.

  They had ten minutes at the station before her train arrived.

  ‘Time for another coffee?’

  ‘No, thanks. I’m already wired as it is.’

  She leaned up to kiss him.

  ‘Let me know what happens.’

  ‘I will.’

  ‘I’m worried.’

  ‘Don’t be.’

  ‘It’s easy to say that.’

  ‘It’ll be fine.’

  ‘I’ll . . . I’ll give you a call.’

  She kissed him again.

  ‘Sometimes it’s as if I can’t see into your eyes. They’re open, yet they’re closed. As though a film covers them, made up of all the terrible things you’ve seen.’

  He handed her her bag and watched as she passed through ticket control, found her carriage, and boarded.

  She didn’t look back.

  Cámara was already out on the street again, his hands thrust deep into his pockets.

  Had it been a day like this, cold and misty?

  He sniffed. Memories were stirring inside him. Something about Hilario’s revelations, saying goodbye to Alicia.

  It had had this same feel – that day. Although thinking back it had been late summer when Hilario had come for him. The end of the holidays, a new school year about to begin. He hated that time of year.

  It should have been a relief. And in some ways it was. July and most of August had gone and he and his father had barely moved from the flat. A couple of times, at the beginning: doing the shopping together, a walk around the park late one evening, when the sun had almost set and the air was beginning to cool. His father had said something about going to the coast, perhaps. Getting the car and driving away, just the two of them. Perhaps down to Valencia. They could find somewhere cheap, a hostel perhaps. Or even sleep rough – in the car, on the beach. Wherever. That was the great thing about the summer – the elements were kinder, at least at night-time.

  He was still only twelve, but Cámara had loved the idea. Later he wondered if that had been an early warning sign, his father already showing the decay, the lack of consideration for his only remaining child. Sleeping rough – it sounded fun, and it could have happened. But it was too late. He just couldn’t see it then.

  He started heading to the shops more on his own. His father seemed to sleep a lot during the day. It was normal in the summer, when the hours of darkness became a refuge from the sharp-eyed sun. But even the young Cámara knew it was excessive: not for his father’s sake, but for his own. Friends were avoiding him; they said he stank. After four days slouching around empty bottles and unwashed dishes, he spent half an hour in the shower trying to scrub off the grime.

  More orders came in for drink. From his pocket, his father would pull out crumpled peseta notes and hand them to him, telling him to go to the little neighbourhood supermarket that had opened on the next street. Wine and beer at first. And Cámara had joined him, sipping cans in secret, then more openly as his father had encouraged him.

  The demands for stronger drink became more frequent. Anis and whisky. Then just whisky – DYC, the cheap brand, from Segovia. Cámara tried it in the kitchen one evening while his father slept on the sofa. An hour later – although it could have been less – he just remembered having enough strength to cough and roll on to his side as the vomit stuck in his throat. Some time afterwards he’d found himself in the bath, still clothed, cold water lapping around his groin. The vomit on the kitchen floor had not been cleared up – that was his job.

  One night a woman had shown up. He’d never seen her before, or had any idea who she was. Cámara was sitting at the table in the living room, studying for some retakes he had to do in September when he got back to school. His father answered the door when the bell went, and in came this tall, skinny young woman with short black hair and a small brown leather handbag that flapped over her hips as she walked. What was the point of something so small, he thought. What on earth could you put in there? Besides, he was hungry. A day had passed since they’d last eaten properly and he was hoping his father might fix them something. Was the girl here for dinner?

  She gave him an intense, odd look as, wordlessly, she walked past, following his father down the corridor. The bedroom door opened, they stepped inside, and Cámara was left on his own. He never saw the girl leave.

  The following morning his fathe
r poured whisky on his cereal: the milk had run out.

  It was probably around that time that his father lost his job. He hadn’t worked properly since Concha’s death. And the men at the printing cooperative were very helpful. The printworks had shut down altogether at first, partly out of respect, and partly because all the members were helping in the search for the missing girl. A week after the funeral they’d started again, but orders started slowing up – people said they didn’t want to bother them when they were coping with such a tragedy. The real reason, everyone knew, was because they didn’t want to be associated with something so dark and painful, as though an evil stain had attached to them through what had happened, and the family and anyone close to them had to be avoided. Superstitious crap, they’d all denounced it as, but they were worried; things would have to improve if the co-op were to survive.

  But Ricardo, Cámara’s father, was told to take his time; there was no rush. He had other things to think about – keeping the rest of his family going, and looking after a wife quickly crumbling under the strain.

  She hadn’t lasted long. Poor old Ana, they’d said. Such hardship for a mother to lose her daughter like that. But few had come to the funeral. The doctors made out that it was an accident, but no one fooled themselves it was anything more than an attempt to save face for the family – and for themselves. It was standard practice to give someone in her condition sleeping pills. No one, it appeared, had stopped to think that she might be a suicide risk. She had another child – the boy, Max – to look after. No mother would abandon her son like that.

  But she had.

  One morning Cámara had woken to find his mother had simply vanished.

  ‘She left,’ someone – a family friend he’d found crying in the kitchen – said. ‘Last night. She just went.’

  He thought she might have gone to the shops, or gone to see friends, or something. But that she would come back. This was a temporary thing. Strange, yes, and the faces that dared to peer down at him wore curious, indescribable expressions. But it would not last for ever. His mother would return.

  Finally, when he realised what had happened – although no one told him straight; he remembered having to piece it together for himself – he went into his room and put his fist through the window.

  The bandages were in the bathroom, on top of the mirror cabinet. He found a stool, grabbed the box, and bound the wound himself.

  The day of his mother’s funeral had certainly been cold; he wore a soft black woollen jumper his grandfather had given him for Christmas just a few weeks before. It was as if he’d known he was going to need it. But they said that about Hilario – that sometimes he seemed to see the future, or behave in a way that suggested he knew things. A brujo, someone had called him once. And they’d laughed. He was a bit of a joke – fun, a bit strange, kept his distance from his family; there was some suggestion he’d fallen out with Ricardo, his son, years back. No one would say over what. But a wizard? A man of magic? No. He might be lots of things, but not that. He was just a crazy old anarchist, living in the past, quoting proverbs most of the time.

  His memories of that spring after his mother’s suicide were unclear. He’d been at school, his father at home most of the time. Perhaps he’d gone to the co-op as well. He couldn’t say. They’d simply carried on. The two of them alone in the flat, with neither Concha nor Ana at home with them now. There had been lots of takeway food, he seemed to remember, and cartons crushed in the corner of the kitchen waiting to be thrown out with the rubbish.

  Then the summer came, and the removal of the school day took away the last remaining structure to their lives.

  The talk of a holiday, of sleeping rough on the beach, came to nothing.

  Meanwhile the flat became less and less inhabitable.

  It felt as though his father hadn’t exchanged a word with him for weeks, perhaps since the beginning of August. He was continuously drunk, either crashing around the flat in occasional rages, or slumped in front of the TV, his eyes burning into the flashing blue screen. They ate bread, crisps, chocolate, stale breakfast cereals . . . Cámara hadn’t shat properly for days.

  And then Hilario, his mysterious grandfather, had come. He didn’t ring, or knock. He’d got his own key from somewhere. This man he barely knew, with a kind, lived-in face, smiled at Cámara and told him to pack his things.

  Cámara could hear him talking to his father in the living room as, confused but secretly relieved, he grabbed bundles of unwashed clothes and stuffed them into plastic bags. A couple of books as well – one on Greek myths that he’d read and reread since his mother had given it to him on his seventh birthday; another, a history of El Cid. Somehow he knew he might not be coming back for some time.

  Down in the living room Hilario was still talking, but Ricardo remained silent. After a pause, footsteps approached his bedroom door and Hilario’s face appeared once more.

  ‘Time to go.’

  And so began something new – a life with Hilario, in his flat on the other side of the city. And Pilar, his housekeeper, moving silently around them, like a shadow. He’d hated it at first: his so-called anarchist grandfather had been strict with him, enforcing mealtimes, bedtimes, study times. Later he understood how much he needed it; he’d become almost feral, eating and sleeping whenever the urge took him. A return to a disciplined life proved painful, and he raged against it, while longing for it at the same time.

  ‘You have to learn to control yourself, otherwise your instincts and desires will control you,’ Hilario told him. It was nonsense. So much for freedom and anarchy. But his grandfather didn’t see it that way.

  Then somehow – and no one had been more surprised than him – he passed his retakes at the beginning of the new term. No need to redo the entire school year. It felt good, a relief, and while his moods moved violently in many directions, he knew Hilario was the one to thank. He hated him, but he needed him. He had to stay.

  His father lasted three more months. Shortly before Christmas he was found by a neighbour in the same living-room chair, the television still on.

  His heart had stopped beating.

  He’d told Alicia some of this – the outline – when he’d arrived on her doorstep towards the beginning of the summer. But not all. The details weren’t always clear. But they were coming more into focus now, driving a wedge, taking him further away, further into himself.

  NINETEEN

  THE CEMETERY WAS divided into several sections, almost like neighbourhoods, with a central ‘square’, each one surrounded by high walls where coffins were placed in niches before being closed over with a metal plaque with a name and occasionally a small photograph, now curled and blanched in the light.

  Cámara walked in, expecting to be the first visitor of the day, but already an elderly woman wearing a black skirt, black stockings and shoes, black woollen jacket pulled over her black blouse and a black scarf wrapped around the back of her short grey hair, was shuffling past the cypress trees. She had a yellow plastic shopping bag in one hand and a bunch of white flowers in the other.

  He checked the time on his phone: he had a few minutes.

  The path took him down the central avenue before narrowing and veering to the left. It was breezy, and he pulled his coat around him more tightly, hunching his shoulders against the cold of autumn.

  Two, perhaps three years had passed since he’d last been here. Hilario had never been one for encouraging regular visits, but he wasn’t going to ban them either. Not that banning was something he did, but he’d made it clear that self-pity or wallowing in negative emotion of any kind was looked down on.

  Remember, yes. But allow space for forgetting as well.

  And so for a few years he’d come on All Saints Day, joining the thousands of other mourners placing flowers in the small metal vases in the niches. Hilario had joined him the first few times, silently to begin with, but then vocalising his criticism more until one year he refused to go. Enough time had passed, he
said. The dead were gone, and lived with him every day. He didn’t need to make an annual show of caring. Besides, he found the commercialisation of dying, the florists and the expensive undertakers’ fees, obscene.

  Cámara had gone on his own anyway, cursing, not caring, alone. He was about to turn eighteen; he didn’t need his grandfather with him in the first place.

  And it was easy to forget, then, that Hilario himself grieved. They were members of his family, too.

  Concepción Cámara Reyes.

  Concha’s niche was low down, on the first row, near the end of the red-brick wall. He’d brought flowers the last time he’d come, he felt sure, but they would have rotted long since. Perhaps someone had removed the dead stems from the vase for him. He’d seen that on occasion – a woman, usually, helping to maintain a niche that had nothing to do with her or her family, but out of a sense of respect, stepping in where others should be doing their duty. And perhaps with a view to keeping the niches around her own loved one’s tidy and clean.

  Some bypassed the problem by placing plastic flowers in the vase instead. He could see why they did it, but even plastic flowers weathered badly, gathering dust and looking as old and unloved as the wilting petals of their less ersatz companions. So what could you do? Nothing, just leave the niche bare and unadorned? Or come more regularly and leave fresh blooms by a polished plaque, every week like the black-clad widows who regularly inhabited the place, living more with the dead than the living.

  Hilario was right, perhaps. Only those left behind needed cemeteries. But you could choose how to grieve – or not.

  He traced his fingers over her name, feeling the tiny ridges of the brass under his fingertips. Only his mother had called her Concepción; he, his father, everyone else, had used the shortened form. Sometimes he’d thought about changing the plaque: it would be more fitting to have ‘Concha’ written there. It had been one of the ideas that had come to him in late adolescence, part of his attempted move into adulthood when, comparing himself to his school friends, he realised that, parentless, he had a freedom to make decisions, an autonomy, that they couldn’t enjoy. Hilario wasn’t a parent – at most he was a guardian. Someone he could throw off and disregard with ease. Aged eighteen, nineteen, Cámara could do whatever he wanted, go anywhere.