Daughter of Catalonia

by Jane MacKenzie

  ‘I knew him quite well after the war, but he would never talk about those days. He had a misshapen arm that no one ever mentioned, and he was always weak, and I know he had problems sleeping. But his biggest problem was with drink. After his wife died Jordi looked after him. He only died three or four years ago, and until then Jordi had done little else but take care of him. It isn’t easy for Jordi to take you up there to where it all happened, but I believe it’s good for him to go there too, otherwise I wouldn’t have suggested it.’

  Madeleine was silent, aghast. The lines from Machado came back to her, the war deeper yet than war. They were all, it seemed, part of a history that was bigger than themselves, and hers was only a small part. All those years that she had spent interred in the cold house in Forsham, Jordi had been struggling to support and take care of his damaged father. How old would he have been when his father was shot? Fifteen? Sixteen? Old enough to take on the burden but not old enough to do so without damage. No wonder if he didn’t want to go back to the site with her. She looked up at Philippe.

  ‘I think I have more to learn than I realised,’ she said.

  ‘You’re doing just fine,’ he reassured her. ‘None of it is easy, for either of you.’ He removed her hand gently from where it clung to his arm, and they went on hand in hand.

  The cemetery was ornate, full of marble mausoleums reflecting the sunlight, framed by the cypress trees, but Luis’s grave was very simple; a white stone cross on a square stone base. The inscription read only ‘Luis Garriga, 1903–1944. Mort pour la France’.

  ‘He should really have been buried in the military cemetery,’ murmured Philippe, as they stood together facing the headstone. ‘But it was all I could do to have him buried at all at that time. I only put the headstone on after the war. And of course, Luis wasn’t French, or in the army. It would all have been a bit complicated back then.’

  Madeleine traced the inscription with her finger. ‘I prefer it like this. Papa wasn’t a military man. He was a writer who was forced into action by two wars, one which destroyed his country, and one which destroyed him. He would have liked that he was buried simply by a few friends, as close as possible to Spain.’

  ‘That’s probably the best epitaph he could have, Madeleine, ma petite. I even queried whether I should really give him a cross, knowing how he felt about religion. But I did want him to be honoured like a real soldier, so I chose the same headstone as they all have.’

  ‘He wouldn’t have minded.’ It was true, Madeleine thought. Luis was far too humorous to be bothered by a mere cross. Being close to Spain would have been far more important.

  ‘How far are we here from the border with Spain?’ she asked.

  ‘As the crow flies? Maybe seven or eight kilometres. That’s why passeurs like Enric worked from the Vallespir.’

  ‘Enric?’

  ‘Jordi’s father. That’s what he did during the war – helped people over the border to Spain. Your father worked with him for years. In fact, if I’m not mistaken, it was he who took you over from near Céret in November 1942.’

  This second revelation took Madeleine’s breath away once and for all, and she acquiesced dumbly when Philippe suggested they should move on.

  Jordi was still sitting where they had left him by the market square, a cigarette in his hand, and a second or perhaps third cup of coffee in front of him. A few crumbs remained on a plate beside him, and Madeleine was relieved to see that he looked a little less forbidding. Indeed, as they approached he smiled, and signalled to the waiter.

  ‘You must be needing a coffee,’ he suggested, and Philippe nodded and sat down with obvious relief. Jordi took coffee too. Perhaps it was the caffeine which had lifted his mood, Madeleine mused. She wondered how long it had been since he last visited the site where the Maquis had lived. Surely he must have been back since the war? As she drank her café crème she hoped that Philippe was right, and that this visit would be helpful to Jordi, and not just an ordeal.

  She was less tense as they drove out of the town, on a narrow road which snaked up into the hills above, and was able to appreciate better the spectacular view of Amélie-les-Bains and the river below. The hillsides were green with a forest of trees which hugged the road, but occasionally the road would open out, and new valleys would appear. It was very beautiful now, but it might not be quite so lovely in winter, she thought, and she wondered what sort of accommodation the men who lived out here in hiding had had.

  They only had three kilometres or so to travel to where they would leave the car. Jordi signed to Philippe to draw over by a small lay-by, and then the roles were reversed.

  ‘I’ll leave you two to do this one on your own,’ Philippe announced. ‘I’ll take a walk around here and wait for you. But take your time. There’s no need to hurry.’

  ‘We’ll only need an hour, no more.’ Jordi looked down at Madeleine’s feet, and nodded approval at her flat walking shoes. ‘It’s not far,’ he told her, ‘but it’s a rough track in places.’

  It was not only rough, but a steep climb as well through endless trees, the ground carpeted with dead leaves which masked the track, which grew increasingly narrow as they climbed. Here there were no spectacular views and the track was not overlooked from anywhere. Madeleine trudged behind Jordi, who made no conversation, and just pushed ahead and left her to follow. After about twenty minutes he branched off the track, and led her along a very narrow path which was almost indistinguishable between the trees, and they then emerged onto a rough, uneven plateau, almost completely surrounded by a miniature red cliff of shale and earth, with trees perched uncertainly above, their roots poking through the shale, and presumably binding the cliff sides together. Here Jordi stopped, and turned to Madeleine.

  ‘This is it. This was their camp,’ he said baldly.

  Madeleine looked round in amazement. ‘But there’s nothing here! I thought there would at least be some shelter, a stream for water, something? Where did they live?’

  ‘Oh, there was a shed, quite a big one, which they built for themselves. And another small shed where they cooked. But there’s no trace of them now. The wood has all been taken away to be used elsewhere. And they had water. You can’t see it from here, but there’s another path like the one we just came through, on the other side over there, which leads to a small stream which comes from a source further up the hill. It’s often dry in the summer, despite the source, and they had to store water, but in winter they had fresh supplies. But there weren’t many men here, you know, not like the really big Maquis groups up by Thuir and Prades. They had caves there and old mineshafts they used to live in. Here they were much more out in the open, but they needed some people this side of Canigou, and this close to the border.’

  ‘Like your father? Philippe tells me he was the passeur who guided me and my family over to Spain in November 1942. I remember him, I think. He seemed a really big man, at least to me then, a bit taller than my father, and he took us to a little cottage over the border. There was a man there who took us down in a cart with a donkey to join a train somewhere. I was only six, so I don’t remember the details, but I remember being hidden under a tarpaulin in the cart.’

  Jordi smiled his first genuine smile. ‘That would be my father’s cousin, Felip. The rest of the family lived near Jonquera, but Felip lived in the hills near his sheep. He loved helping my father after we had to leave Spain. He felt all the time that he was fighting the Germans that he was also fighting Franco. One Fascist was the same as another, he would say. At first, of course, my father was helping Spaniards to get into France and out of Franco’s hands. It was only later that he started taking people in the other direction. Felip sheltered people going in both directions.’

  ‘He gave us soup.’ The memory came back to Madeleine suddenly. ‘I was cold, and it was wonderful.’

  ‘So you were six when you left France?’ This was the first sign of curiosity Jordi had shown.

  Madeleine sighed. ‘Yes. We had to leave
before the Germans came, because my parents had both rather incriminated themselves through the work they were doing, and of course my mother was half English, which didn’t help. We were supposed to return after the war was over, but then my father died, so we never came home.’

  ‘You see here as home?’

  ‘The only memory I have of family life is of here.’

  ‘How ironic.’ His voice had a bitter edge, but it didn’t close her out. ‘My only memory of real family life is from before the exodus, the Retirada, before we had to flee Spain. From when we arrived in France, life just became more and more complicated.’

  Madeleine wanted to ask him about his father, but it was too soon. She stayed on less personal ground.

  ‘Would you go back to Spain if you could?’

  ‘Right now? To live under Franco? No. I don’t think I could, and in any case Spaniards who left can’t go back – they get arrested. I slip over the border sometimes to see my family, and they manage all right, but there are too many silences, and watching your neighbour, and gritting your teeth rather than fighting back. I don’t think I could live like that. But one day! One day I’ll be able to go back.’

  Madeleine studied Jordi’s rough face twisted in passionate defiance, his dishevelled clothes and unruly hair, and could see his point. She couldn’t picture this belligerent man living quietly under an alien regime. He would make a good resistance fighter himself, but he would need action, not quiet, underground anti-Franco activity.

  ‘So for now you’re here,’ she said as matter-of-factly as possible. ‘And you’re running the gallery below where you live?’

  ‘Yes. I make my living as a potter, making things that will sell to tourists.’ Again his voice had a bitter edge. ‘But when I can find time I’m a sculptor. We weren’t allowed to go to school here, when I came to France, not at first anyway, and then came the war, so there wasn’t much chance of any real schooling. I don’t even write French well, so I’m not much good for anything else. But thankfully we had a neighbour who had a good business making ceramics after the war, and he gave me a job cleaning up and stuff, and then I found I had a talent. It’s a nice soft place, Céret, for selling anything arty. People come all year round to the museum. So after a while I was able to afford the rent on the gallery, but I mostly sell other people’s stuff. It sells better than mine.’

  Madeleine felt almost uncomfortable in the face of Jordi’s fierce intensity. He seemed to pin her to the rocks behind them with those unblinking brown eyes. Then he turned away abruptly.

  ‘Is there anything more you want to know about this place?’ he asked.

  Madeleine looked around her. ‘I don’t know what to ask. I find it so strange to think of my father and yours living here for a year and half. It seems incredible.’

  ‘They weren’t here that long. At first your father was just in a safe house near Céret. My father worked from home in Céret too, until someone denounced him and he had to go into hiding. They had a couple of bases, I think, and kept moving them, but they ended up here about five months before the end. Just after the New Year, it was, in 1944.’

  ‘And you were allowed to come up here?’

  ‘Allowed?’ Jordi laughed, with real humour. ‘Oh no, I wouldn’t say I was allowed! I came once with my father and I thought I was going to be shot!’

  ‘What is that boy doing here?’

  The Maquis’ unit commander stood rigid in front of the door of the shed, his face contorted with anger. Jordi shivered in the freezing February air, and tried to make himself as small as possible behind his father.

  Enric pointed to the sack of potatoes at his feet. ‘He helped me to carry this up here.’ His voice was unapologetic. ‘He’s of an age where he can be handy. I don’t see why he shouldn’t be. You’ve never complained yet about all the provisions he brings up here on his bike.’

  ‘But he didn’t bring them here! You brought them here. You met him on the road before, and you weren’t stupid enough to bring him all the way to the camp.’

  Other men emerged from the rough shed behind the commander, most of them surprisingly young, some dressed in makeshift combats, others in overalls, none of them dressed for the outdoors, having come outside in a hurry at the commander’s words. There would be maybe eight or ten of them, Jordi thought, although he hardly dared to raise his eyes from the scrubby ground at his feet. As a group they could hardly have been more intimidating.

  ‘The sack was too heavy to carry on my own. He brought fresh bread too, and some cheese. Have a look.’

  Enric walked forward, leaving Jordi exposed on his own in the clearing. He didn’t dare move, and fastened his eyes on his father’s back.

  ‘I don’t care about the cheese, you damned fool! You could have left the stuff hidden down below and it could be collected later. Instead of which you’ve shown a child the way to the camp.’

  ‘Except he’s not a child,’ Enric protested. ‘He’s only a year younger than young Montagnard here. If I didn’t need him to watch out for his mother he’d be here with me full-time, doing proper guide work.’

  ‘Well he’s not here, is he!’ the commander snarled. ‘While he’s living down there this camp can be of no interest to him.’

  Enric didn’t reply, and a silence hung between the two men. The men by the shed stood equally silent, expressionless but with watchful eyes. Then a figure pushed his way between them and moved forward. Astonished, Jordi recognised Luis, who used to visit them in Céret sometimes when his father still lived at home. So he was here too, with Enric! Jordi hadn’t known – this was something his father hadn’t told him. Luis was a Spaniard too, another Catalan, surely a friend? He had eaten with them many times. Now, Jordi knew, he would have been given some other name, since no one was supposed to know any of the Maquis’ names. He looked Jordi straight in the eye without any apparent recognition.

  ‘Do you remember how you came up here this afternoon, son?’ His voice was gentler than the commander’s. Jordi gulped, and took courage.

  ‘No,’ he lied. ‘I was following my father, and all I could see was his back. The sack was heavy, and we had it over both our shoulders. I was right up close behind him. I didn’t have any time to look around me.’

  ‘Sure?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Then all we have to do is take you back down blindfolded, and there’s no harm done.’ Luis turned to the commander. ‘Would that not work? We take the boy back down, and then we eat his bread, and next time he stays on the road where his father normally meets him.’

  Enric was still standing in front of the commander, the cheese and bread in his hands. There was another silence, and no one moved, then the commander barked, ‘Montagnard!’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Bring a scarf for a blindfold, and get that boy out of here. And boy!’

  ‘Yes, sir?’

  ‘You forget you ever came here, or even what your father’s name is, right?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘And boy!’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Thank you for the provisions. Tell your mother we know what it must cost her to send them to us, when there is so little food for anyone. Thank her for me.’

  Jordi grinned at Madeleine. ‘And do you know, he really meant it! He was genuinely grateful. And of course he wanted to be sure the supplies wouldn’t dry up! But I was glad to get out of there that day, I can tell you!’

  ‘I bet!’ Madeleine returned the grin, feeling braver herself. It was a glimpse of her father, the merest glimpse, but a good one. ‘So you only came that one time?’

  ‘Just the once, until after the war.’ Jordi’s grin faded. ‘Then I came back to see where the bastards destroyed my father.’

  ‘So what happened, Jordi? How did the Germans find the camp?’

  Jordi hunched his shoulder in a new gesture of exclusion.

  ‘They were betrayed,’ he said roughly. ‘It happened all the time.’

  He made a
move back towards the gap in the cliff side.

  ‘Come, we have to get back. Philippe is waiting for us, and I have a gallery to run.’

  Very few words were exchanged on the way down the hill to the car. Philippe was waiting for them, smoking a Gauloise. He offered one to Jordi, who accepted it, and they stood for a moment smoking in a very male silence. Madeleine crossed to the other side of the road, and looked up at the hill. The entrance to the track was inconspicuous, and further up it, when you reached it, the smaller track leading to the camp itself was almost invisible in the trees. It would have been a thousand to one chance for the hideout to be discovered by the Germans by accident. So they had been betrayed, but by whom? A local, currying favour with the Nazis? Surely there were precious few German sympathisers by the summer of 1944, with the Allies on the verge of retaking France. Or had the resistance group been infiltrated? Did Jordi know? He had certainly not told her everything he knew.

  As they climbed back into the car, Madeleine touched Jordi on the arm and asked, ‘Will you show me your gallery?’

  ‘If you want,’ was the brief reply, but to her relief his voice was softer again.

  The gallery was a tiny space crammed with artwork, paintings by a number of local artists on the walls, and on every available surface sculptures and hand-painted ceramics, most of which were Jordi’s. His sculptures were of sullen peasants and labourers, an enraged, powerful bull and another injured, suffering beast, more anguished than angry. The ceramics were painted with images of labour and heat, and with bodies and lovers, sometimes touching, sometimes at gaze. His work was raw, hot, loaded with colour and completely untempered.

  Jordi moved around opening shutters while Philippe and Madeleine wandered and touched. The work seemed to want to be touched. There was no attempt at cool displays or elegant presentation of the works, but the space was light and the colours glowed, and the pieces sat alongside each other in unfashioned harmony. Jordi referred to a new organic movement of art which Madeleine had never heard of, but she thought he didn’t actually follow any movement, just his own basic instinct for beauty and anger.