The Street of the Three Beds

by Roser Caminals-Heath

  * * *

  As usual, when the time came to decide what school the heir should attend, his parents held opposite views. Roderic favored—of course—continuity, which dictated that his son should go to a religious school in the neighborhood such as La Salle or the Marist Brothers. Far from being a devout Catholic, he held a lukewarm attitude towards religion typical of those who consider it neither essential nor superfluous. As an ornament, it did no harm and could actually do some good. Lídia, for her part, argued that the boy would assimilate religious values just by belonging to a family that attended Sunday mass and observed Catholic rituals. On the other hand, at the French Lyceum Maurici would at least learn a foreign language. If he started early, by the time he was sixteen he’d be proficient in French. Besides, he’d socialize with the sons of the well-to-do.

  Roderic listened attentively to his wife’s proposition. He was a man who measured words, both on their way out and on their way in. That the school should emphasize language was no doubt an advantage. He had the ambition of becoming a business owner in a not too distant future and it would be useful that junior could handle customers from foreign countries. After all, it wouldn’t be the first time that he’d heeded Lídia’s advice and, so far, he’d had no reason to regret it.

  Encouraged by his positive reception, Lídia took the opportunity to drop in passing that a carriage should take the boy to school. Here she met with greater resistance. When Roderic objected to an extra burden on the budget, she protested, “You don’t expect him to take the streetcar, do you?”

  “When I was his age I walked to school.”

  “Yours was close. The Lyceum is too far for him to walk.”

  And so they hired a carriage.

  When Maurici was twelve, Grandpa Aldabò died of a massive stroke. Shortly afterward, his son sold the store. With the profits, plus some savings he’d accumulated, he formed a partnership with the owner of a factory in Poble Nou that made silk stockings. A couple of years later Roderic’s partner, already in his seventies and childless, sold him his half of the business. Roderic Aldabò had realized his dream.

  The carriage was busier than ever now that it drove both the boy to school in Rambla de Catalunya, and Roderic to the factory at the other end of town. On some Saturdays, he took his son to his office so that he’d gradually acclimate himself to his future kingdom. The young heir’s visit constituted an event. No sooner did the workers detect his presence than they stopped the looms and stood in line to greet him. Maurici walked down the row calmly, with the air of a little man of the world, condescending to shake hands with each employee—from old timers in their sixties to girls younger than himself. At the end of the ritual he went into the office with his father, who threw his arm around his shoulders and whispered discreetly, “When you grow up, all these workers will be under your responsibility.”

  Under Roderic Aldabò’s direction, the once modest factory expanded. The relatively young industrialist started by renovating the looms. Soon he conquered new clients and, over time, new markets. Not only did he supply some of the best retailers in Barcelona, but also in other Spanish cities and even in Paris. Thanks to the purchase of stock in the metal industry and other minor investments, his little empire branched into other territories beyond textiles. Not powerful enough to join the ranks of the manufacturing aristocracy, he’d taken his place in the second tier of the much maligned, ever enduring Barcelona bourgeoisie. Surely his son, blessed with personal charms and a budding talent as a social butterfly that he’d always lacked, would climb the last step to the top.

  At that time the apartment in Passeig de Sant Joan underwent a thorough makeover. Silk wallpaper from England, Persian rugs, a porcelain collection, blood-red Venetian crystal: everything dated back to the dawning of their golden age. The maid got reinforcements: a permanent cook, a seamstress twice a week, and a caterer to serve ever more frequent banquets. Fully into the era of Roderic the Great came the annexation of a summer villa and the occasional sojourn to a posh hotel on the coast. Needless to say, it was Lídia and the boy—plus a few sporadic members of the Palau family—who enjoyed these amenities. Roderic Aldabò did nothing but work. He was the family production unit. His lifestyle—wildly extravagant for a merchant that, after all, had not risen to la crème de la crème of the business class—had earned him the title of “the Count of No Account.” For a small factory owner, an apartment in an industrial suburb such as Poble Nou would have been more suitable than one on the pretentious avenue in the Eixample, just as a balcony in a neighborhood theater, as opposed to one in the Liceu opera house, would have done very nicely. Roderic’s account, however, remained robust and, as for his aspirations to an aristocratic title, they were nonexistent. Deep down, he remained the same petit bourgeois that grew up in a corner store in the old city. He’d rather have soup than consommé, Spanish than Havana cigars, hen’s eggs than sturgeon’s, for he was far more adept at the ethics of work than at the aesthetics of pleasure.

  * * *

  Maurici’s academic progress didn’t keep pace with that of his father’s business. He barely passed his courses with undistinguished marks and cared for no particular subject. In fact, he didn’t even care about grades. His parents, troubled by this indifference, made an appointment with the principal. In spite of his tolerant, progressive ideas about education, the man admitted, “Your son is no scholar. He doesn’t pay attention in class and doesn’t complete his homework. He just won’t concentrate. His teachers have talked to him and I myself have tried to reason with him more than once. It’s hopeless. He has the misfortune of being too charming. It comes too easy for him to make new friends: other boys always follow him around because he’s fun to be with. The things he thinks up! The other day Mr. Ribas, the math teacher, found it difficult to control the class. All because Maurici looked out of the windows and realized it was raining in the courtyard but not in the street. That was enough to get him started. When he pointed out this curious phenomenon to the rest of the students, they all jumped up from their seats and began to run from one side of the classroom to the other. Poor Mr. Ribas was sweating bullets trying to make them go back to their desks. I don’t mean he’s a bad boy or has a mean streak in him; it isn’t that. He simply doesn’t like to study. Aside from some natural ability for music and sports, he doesn’t care about schoolwork.”

  As usual, Roderic Aldabò pondered over what he’d just heard before he answered, “Perhaps this won’t be a serious problem, since we run a business and Maurici’s livelihood is secured. Even so, we’d like him to pursue a higher education.”

  The principal sat back and took a deep breath. “Frankly, Mr. and Mrs. Aldabò, it’s unlikely he’ll succeed.”

  It was a blow: a dark spot on their as yet flawless horizon. Roderic and Lídia weighed several options: to give Maurici a good scolding and subject him to strict discipline, to hire a home tutor, to take him to another school . . . Finally, after considering each option at length, they decided that a year in a Swiss boarding school would be the best solution. Confined to a regime of intense study, he might develop the intellectual habits necessary to thrive in the university. At least it would do him good to speak no other language than French for an extended period of time.

  Of course, the prospect of a year at a school buried in a Swiss valley seemed as seductive to Maurici as a year in a prison colony. Country life—including his family villa—bored him to death. The thought of being away from his cousins and school friends—surrounded by mountains and cows in a cold climate, cut off from that Barcelona atmosphere in which he blossomed like an orchid in a hothouse—made him sick. He threatened to run away from home or from school as soon as he got there. Roderic and Lídia played deaf, they didn’t bother to argue. When he turned thirteen, they whisked him off to a school surrounded by idyllic scenery in the heart of the Alps. It was exactly his idea of hell.

  He came back an inch taller, with a deep baritone and the golden tan of a consummate skier. A
s far as his French went, although it wasn’t as grammatical as his mother would have liked, it boasted an elegant pronunciation that sufficed to impress when he dropped a few sentences in a timely fashion. In years to come, that linguistic patina would be more than enough to ingratiate him to his father’s French clients. When, on his return from Switzerland, family and friends asked him about his experience, he shrugged. “Oh, it wasn’t so bad.”

  As soon as he resumed classes at the Lyceum, Maurici announced that he didn’t want the carriage waiting for him in the evening. He’d walk home with a few classmates who lived along the way. As they strolled down the avenue, they threw cherry bombs at the feet of startled pedestrians while he directed racy remarks in French at the girls.

  When the time came to start at the university, his parents met with no resistance. Not that he looked forward to dragging his feet down the halls of academia for the next five years, memorizing tomes of mercantile laws riddled with Latin and recited by moldy professors. But he wasn’t entirely deprived of pride. He hoped one day to wear the halo of personal prestige and he appreciated the value, however symbolic, of a degree. The family council chose the field of Law because it was the most decorative. Maurici would be a businessman; nobody expected him to practice as a lawyer. But he’d have the status of one: he’d bear the academic stamp, all the more admired for being ornamental. And folks would say, “The son of the Aldabòs is a lawyer.” For this reason, and no other, he registered at the university. It was a bumpy road, from which he was periodically sidetracked to go horse riding or to play pool or cards or the part of Romeo in some secluded little hotel uptown. The day came when he took his last class and Roderic Aldabò, foreseeing a lackluster performance at final exams, resorted to an acquaintance that held a high-ranking position in the City. The obliging professor who conducted Maurici’s orals provided the answer every time the student stalled; whenever the latter drew a blank, the examiner smiled and rushed to fill in the void. And so it came to pass that Maurici, at age twenty-five, was, technically, a lawyer.

  Chapter 3

  It was a sleepy, rainy afternoon a few days after his birthday. He was playing poker with his cousin Albert and two friends from law school, Jaume and Sebastià, in the room known as “the Scene of the Crime” in the Equestrian Club. Between them, Jaume and Albert had cleaned out his pockets.

  Maurici and Albert were senior club members. They’d learned to ride in the grounds of the old Equestrian in The Ramblas along with children of old blue bloods and those of the recently knighted. Established pedigrees and new money mingled without distinctions. In 1907 the Equestrian had moved to a new location in Plaça Catalunya and opened with an art exhibit sponsored by the Gironas, one of the most prominent families in the city. Both the Aldabòs and the Palaus had been invited. The days of Amphitrite seemed part of a very distant past.

  The Scene of the Crime was as gloomy as its name implied, except for the red and green uniforms worn by the staff. Aside from the quiet, white-haired waiter who served drinks, there were no interruptions to distract the players from the game. The magazines, some of them in English and in French, were confined to the comfortably furnished reading room; political and literary discussions, to the bar and adjacent rooms. At the barbershop on the top floor Maurici and his friends, like many other members, debated current events, from the first automobile manufactured in Barcelona—called Hispano-Suiza—to the latest drama staged at the Romea theater.

  Maurici had managed to keep Rita out of his thoughts. He saw her through a lens that made her appear as small, remote, and unreal as the image of Amphitrite, his first love. If she intruded unexpectedly, his attention would divert to a conversation—he instinctively avoided solitude—or to any form of escapist entertainment. That afternoon he sipped French cognac—half humiliated, half amused by an overwhelming defeat at the poker table where he was usually unbeatable. The players began to stretch and fidget in their chairs like bears coming out of hibernation. The three hours of immobility were taking their toll.

  “That’s enough for today, don’t you think?” Jaume said tiredly.

  Maurici threw him a scornful look. “Easy for you to say, now that you’ve swept away my whole week’s earnings.”

  “Come on, now, don’t exaggerate. You know what they say: unlucky in cards, lucky in love.”

  The loser insinuated a smile and shook his head. “Nobody’s walking out of here till I get my revenge.”

  “Are you kidding?” Sebastià chimed in. “At this rate, we’ll be here all night.”

  “No excuses. Another round of drinks and one more game. This one will make it or break it, you’ll see.”

  “Maurici, my legs are stiff from sitting here,” Jaume insisted. “There will be time enough for your revenge some other day.”

  “If your legs are stiff, my ass is dead.” Sebastià opened his mouth to yawn. “Come on, let’s hit the street.”

  “Albert, what do you say?” Maurici asked his cousin.

  “I say let’s call it a day and go home.”

  “Home?” Jaume jumped in alarm. “It’s only six o’clock.”

  “I know, but tomorrow I have to go to Tarragona with Father.”

  “Tarragona? Haven’t you collected enough votes in Barcelona?” Sebastià asked maliciously.

  Albert and his father, Enric Palau, were members of the conservative Lliga Catalana. Sebastià’s father, on the other hand, was a staunch supporter of the monarchic party that met at a mansion in the old town.

  “I know what happens when we hit the street. We never get home before dawn. My train leaves at seven o’clock tomorrow morning. If I oversleep, Father will give me hell.”

  “Not to worry,” Jaume said reassuringly, winking at the others. “By midnight, everybody in the sack.”

  “Speak for yourself,” protested Sebastià, who lived off his family income and got up as late as he pleased.

  “If you insist so much, I won’t be the one to ruin your afternoon. I must tell you, though, I don’t have a cent to my name. Albert, I’ll have to borrow from you. You’ll get it back.” Maurici stuck his elbow in his cousin’s ribs.

  “That’s a funny one! What good is it to beat you at poker, then?”

  “I’ve done the same for you lots of times.”

  “Fine, fine. The thing is, where do we go?”

  “We could go to the Alhambra and shoot some pool. I’m sure I’ll beat you this time.”

  “Haven’t you had enough games for one afternoon? I’m for some variation. Let’s check out the Paral·lel.”

  “I don’t know why you always want to go to that side of town.”

  Maurici invariably wrinkled his nose at the prospect of heading down to the harbor. To go into that neighborhood was to return to the days of the dingy gun store and the execution he’d watched nearby. Why not go to the Condal, which was in a nicer area, to play squash?

  Jaume rolled his eyes. “There we go again! Do you really want to hit a ball now?”

  “Anything but the Paral·lel.”

  “Juicy tarts, at the Paral·lel,” Sebastià licked his lips.

  Jaume smiled wickedly. “Maurici has already had his fill of those.”

  “If nothing else, it’ll feel good to stretch our legs,” Jaume said. “Look, it’s stopped raining.”

  Draining their glasses and yelling, “Evarist, put it on my account!” they set sail for the Paral·lel.

  * * *

  They strolled with their hands stuffed smugly in their pockets as if an invisible wall protected them from the promiscuity of the street, confident that they could immerse themselves in it and resurface unpolluted. It was exciting to play the part of the libertine, to taste the ambiguous fruits of the urban tree, to join a mongrel breed of lowlifes and struggling artists only to emerge unscathed, reaffirmed in the superiority of their own caste. The experiment validated their condition as gentlemen and ratified their self-regard. But, to prove their point, they needed blue-collar prophets of ana
rchism and starlets who strutted their stuff on decrepit stages.

  In truth, they weren’t the experts in vice they pretended to be: they merely dabbled in depravity. The most promising of them in this respect was Sebastià, who found more pleasure in cheating women than in seducing them. He also found pleasure in cheating his father. Whenever he ran up gambling debts, he told him he needed money for an impoverished, imaginary friend who suffered from an equally imaginary disease. He was exceedingly proud of the title Jaume had conferred upon him: “The Trickster of Barcelona.”

  While Sebastià and Albert discussed politics, Maurici’s eyes wandered indifferently through the hustle and bustle of the promenade. His attention turned briefly to a makeshift shack called The Working Man’s Barbershop, even though on Sundays it was closed. On the opposite side a sign advertised two women built like Amazons who shared the stage name of The Vitamins. An endless line waited outside the cinematographer to see a Max Linder film.

  Sebastià was getting tired of walking. “Let’s have coffee and cognac at L’Espanyol.”

  The first round was followed by a second. Albert and Jaume ordered anisette and Maurici absinthe to go with the flow. At the next table, men in working clothes played dominoes while the waitresses and a few idle women inspected the new customers. Sebastià’s eyes and hands wandered toward the female traffic, until twenty minutes later the others yanked him out of the café that reeked with smoke and proletarian sweat. It wouldn’t be the first time that, after having had one too many, he started a row in a public place. Feeling somewhat euphoric, they resumed their walk.

  As they went past the Barcelonès theater, Albert shouted, “Let’s go in to see some wrestling!”

  “Not a chance!” Jaume objected, his tongue thick with alcohol. “I haven’t come this far to see a couple of fellows in underpants rolling on top of each other.”