“I think you are.”
“It is normal for charitable souls to wish to hide their light under a bushel, to avoid the gratitude and publicity due to them. Now be frank with me, Señor Don Romualdo and please own up to your great virtues. Is it true that you are being put up for a bishopric?”
“What, me? I’ve not heard of it.”
“Are you from Guadalajara, or from that province?”
“I am, madam.”
“Do you have a niece called Doña Patros?”
“I don’t, madam.”
“Do you say mass at St Sebastián’s?”
“No, madam, at St Andrew’s.”
“And is it also not true that someone gave you a wild rabbit a few days ago?”
“It’s possible, ha, ha! But I don’t remember it.”
“In any case, Señor Don Romualdo, you are quite sure that you do not know my Benina?”
“I think – well, I can’t be sure that I haven’t seen her, dear lady. I have a feeling that I may have done so.”
“Oh, I thought as much, Señor Cedrón, how happy you make me.”
“Keep calm! Now is this Benina a woman who dresses in black, about sixty years old, with a wart in the middle of her forehead?”
“That’s it, that’s it, Señor Don Romualdo – very well-mannered, but sprightly in spite of her age.”
“Further details: she begs with a blind North African called Almudena?”
“Heavens, no,” exclaimed Doña Paca stupefied and scared, “Good Lord, not that! I see that you do not know her.” With a glance at Frasquito she sought confirmation for the truth of her statement. Ponte looked at the priest, then back at the lady, tormented by doubts that troubled his conscience.
“Benina is an angel,” he ventured to say. “Whether she begs or not, and I don’t know whether she does, she is an angel, I give my word of honour.”
“Nonsense! My Benina begging and walking the streets with a blind man.”
“A Moor, apparently,” said Don Romualdo.
“I have to admit,” said Ponte with honourable sincerity, “that a couple of days ago when I was walking through the Plaza del Progreso, I saw her sitting beneath a statue with a blind beggar, who looked as if he might have – come originally from the Riff.”
Such was Doña Paca’s bewilderment, that her joy suddenly turned to sorrow and she began to feel that the words being spoken were an illusion, that the people she was speaking to were fictitious, and that everything was untrue, including her inheritance. She feared a rude awakening. Closing her eyes, she said to herself: “Oh God, free me from this terrible doubt, kill this idea. Is it true, is it false? Am I Rafaelito Antrines’ heir? Do I have enough money to live on? Does Nina beg? Is a Moor her companion?” Then on sudden impulse she said: “All right! Hurrah for Nina. Let her live with her Moor and all the Moors of Algiers, but let her come to me, let her come home, even if she brings her African in her shopping basket.”
Don Romualdo burst out laughing and, explaining when and how he had come across Benina, said that through a friend of his, an assistant priest at St Andrew’s, a man of much learning and a distinguished scholar who dabbled in oriental languages, he had met the Arab Almudena and the woman who accompanied him. He had been told that she was servant to a widow lady, an Andalusian who lived in the Calle Imperial. “I could only assume that this was Señora Doña Francisca Juárez, whom I had yet to have the pleasure of meeting and today, when I heard you lamenting the disappearance of your maid, I thought to myself: ‘If the lost woman is the one I think it is, let’s look for the dog and we’ll find its tail. Let’s look for the Moor and we’ll find the odalisque, I mean, the person you call…’ ”
“Benigna de Casia. De Casia, sir – from which comes the joke that she is related to Santa Rita.”
Señor Cedrón went on to explain that, not due to his own merits but to the confidence shown him by the governors, he was patron and chief administrator of the old people’s home La Misericordia; and as applications for admission were addressed to him, he could not walk down the street without being badgered by beggars and was continually having letters of recommendation and appeals for admission showered upon him. “One might think that our country was nothing but a seething mass of poor people and that the nation should be turned into one vast asylum, where there is room for all of us, from the first to the last. We shall soon be Europe’s biggest workhouse the way we are going. I have mentioned this matter, because my friend Mayoral, the priest who is interested in oriental languages, spoke to me about obtaining admission in our Home for Almudena’s companion.”
“I beseech you, Señor Don Romualdo,” said Doña Francisca, now in great confusion, “not to believe a word of all this. Take no notice of the false Beninas who may pop up here and there and concentrate on the genuine one, the one who works as a daily help in your house each morning, receiving much bounty, from which I have benefited through her. That’s the true one, the one we have to seek and shall find with the help of Señor de Cedrón, his worthy sister Doña Josefa and his niece Doña Patros. You deny knowing her to hide your saintliness, but it won’t work with me, no sir. I know that you’re a saint and that you don’t want anyone to know about your secret acts of sublime charity, but since I know about them, I say it all out loud. Let’s look for Nina and when I have her back again, we’ll both shout together: ‘A saint! A saint! A saint! A saint!”’
All Señor Cedrón could make of this speech was that Doña Francisca Juárez was soft in the head, and believing that it wouldn’t do any good to explain or argue, he closed the subject and took his leave, promising to return the following day to do the paperwork and hand over, against a proper receipt, the sums already owed to the beneficiaries. His departure took a long time, because both Doña Paca and Frasquito repeated their expressions of gratitude some forty times between the sitting-room and the staircase and kissed the priest’s hand as many or even more times. When the great Cedrón finally disappeared down the stairs and the lady from Ronda and the gallant from Algeciras found themselves alone and behind closed doors, the former said:
“Frasquito, darling, is it all true?”
“I was going to ask you the same thing. Are we dreaming? What do you think?”
“I just don’t know. I can’t think, my brain’s missing, my memory’s missing, my Nina’s missing!”
“I’m missing something too. I can’t think straight.”
“Have we gone off our heads?”
“What puzzles me is why does Don Romualdo deny that his niece is called Patros, that he is being put up for a bishopric and that he had a present of a rabbit?”
“He didn’t deny the rabbit, excuse me, he said he didn’t remember.”
“That’s true. Suppose the Don Romualdo we have just seen turns out to be a phantasm, created by witchcraft or black magic – suppose he just goes up in smoke and there’s nothing left, just a shadow, a delusion?”
“Holy Mary, Mother of God! Suppose he never comes back?”
“Never comes back! Never comes back and brings us the …” As he said this, Frasquito’s thin, weak countenance took on a look of tragic terror. He passed his hand over his eyes and fell into the armchair with a croak, suffering a stroke similar to the one he had on that terrible night, between the Calle de Irlandeses and the Calle de Mediodía Grande.
34
With Doña Paca’s diligence and help from the rope maker’s little girls, Ponte soon recovered from this new attack of his malady and by dusk they both agreed that Don Romualdo Cedrón was a real person and that their inheritance was an unquestionable fact. Despite this they remained in a state of suspense until the following day, when the bountiful priest appeared in person once more, accompanied by a notary who turned out to be one of Doña Francisca’s old acquaintances. Papers were examined without any difficulties, the matter was concluded and the heirs of Rafaelito Antrines received, as an advance on their annuity, bank notes the number of which seemed quite fabulous
to them both, due no doubt to the absolute emptiness of their purses. Possessing money, an unheard of event for so many years of her life, had a very strange psychological effect on Doña Paca. Her mind clouded over, she even lost track of time and she couldn’t find the words to express the ideas which buzzed inside her head like flies on a windowpane, trying to pass through it from the dark to the light. She wanted to talk about her Nina but uttered nothing but nonsense. She could hear that Frasquito and the other two were discussing the subject, but to her, their voices sounded like those of people arguing a long way off, and only a word here and there was audible. As far as she could make out, they seemed to be saying that the fugitive would return, that they had some clue to her whereabouts, but nothing more. The three men were standing, the notary next to Cedrón. The former was tiny with a beak for a nose, and he looked for all the world like a parakeet about to perch on a tree trunk.
At last the two amiable gentlemen departed, full of kind offers of assistance and affectionate gallantries, and the lady from Ronda and the gentleman from Algeciras, left alone, occupied themselves for quite some time wandering around the house, going aimlessly from one room to another, now into the kitchen, now into the dining-room, then immediately out again, exchanging nervous words when they bumped into each other. Doña Paca, it is true, felt that her happiness was spoilt by not being able to share it with her companion and support during all those years of penury. Ah, if Nina were to come now, what a pleasure it would be for her mistress to give her the big surprise, beginning by complaining bitterly at the lack of cash – and then showing her a handful of bank notes. What a face she’d pull, she’d be open mouthed! And the things she’d be able to do with that pile of cash. “I don’t care what people say,” Doña Paca thought, “God never finishes things off properly. In good fortune as in bad, there’s always something left out, something contrary. In the worst disasters, He always allows some respite; in the joys permitted by His mercy, He always forgets some little detail, the lack of which spoils everything.”
At one of the encounters, between the sitting-room and the kitchen or between the kitchen and the bedroom, Ponte suggested that they should celebrate by going out to eat at a restaurant. He would be delighted to invite her, as a small tribute to her generous hospitality. Doña Francisca replied that she would not appear in public until she could do so as decently dressed as befitted her station. When he countered that by eating out they would save the trouble of preparing a meal at home with only the ropemaker’s little girls as helpers, she declared that until Nina returned the kitchen range should not be lit, and that they could have everything they required sent round from Botín’s. Her appetite was reviving for good, well-flavoured food and it was time, my goodness, after so many years of forced fasting, to sing the Resurrection Alleluia!
“Come, Celedonia, put on your new skirt and go to Botín’s. I shall write down on a piece of paper what I want, so that you make no mistake.” No sooner said than done – and what else should she order to celebrate that day of days, but two roast chickens, four fried whiting and a good piece of sirloin, to be helped down by ham in a sweet sauce, “angels’ tresses” and a dozen little marzipan cakes… wonderful!
But although the prospect of this restorative banquet excited Doña Paca, it didn’t tempt either the imagination or the will of Frasquito, who ever since he had money in his pocket had had a wild devouring longing to go out of doors, to run, to fly even, for he felt that he was growing wings.
“Señora,” he said, “there’s something I must do this evening, I simply have to go out. And I must have a little air: I feel sort of queasy. Exercise does me good, believe me it does. Also I have to see my tailor, if only to get myself up to date with the fashions and to start the process of getting something made for me to wear: I’m very choosy and take a long time to decide what cloth I want.”
“Yes, yes, you go about your business – but don’t overdo it and think of this happy event as a lesson, as I see it, provided by Providence. I have become a firm believer in the rule of order and intend to keep accounts and write down every little thing I spend.”
“Yes, and write down the credits too. I’ll do the same – well, I did it once but it did me no good, believe me, my dear friend, it did me no good at all.”
“If one has a regular income, the important thing is to keep the debits within the credits and never to go beyond that. For Heaven’s sake, Ponte dear, let’s not commit the folly of not caring whether they balance again. I now realise that Trujillo is right.”
“Señora, I have drawn up more balances than I have hairs on my head and I can tell you that the only result was to make me lose my balance.”
“Now that we have God’s blessings, let us keep order. Might I ask you to get me an account book, notebook or whatever they’re called when you’re shopping if it’s no bother.”
“Of course, of course! Frasquito will bring her not one book but half a dozen and with all his love!” And with this promise he ran out into the street, hungry for air and light, longing to see people and to enjoy the world. In one stretch, walking without thinking, he reached the Paseo de Atocha without realising where he was going, but then he turned back again, because he preferred houses to trees. He really disliked trees, possibly because he had felt, when he passed them at moments of despair, that they held out their branches for him to hang himself on them. He wandered aimlessly in the streets, looking at the windows of the tailors’ shops with their displays of fine cloth and at others selling ties and elegant shirts. He also glanced at the restaurants and at all the other establishments which in his long life of degrading penury he had contemplated so despairingly.
He spent some hours in this blissful idleness, without feeling tired. He felt strong and healthy, robust even. He cast a fond and even protective eye over all the pretty or passable women he passed. The window of a smart perfumery gave him a good idea: he had let his white hairs go in an unseemly manner without dressing or disguising them with black dye, and that splendid shop gave him an opportunity to remedy that serious defect. Inaugurating the campaign to restore him to his former self he started with the renovation of his ravaged countenance. It was at this shop then, that he changed the first note from the bundle that Don Romualdo Cedrón had given him. After examining the choice of articles, he purchased a large store of those he considered necessary and paying without haggling he gave instructions for the bulky parcel of perfumes and dyes to be delivered to him at the house of Doña Francisca.
As he came out, he thought of the need to find a decent inexpensive boarding-house for himself, appropriate to the annuity he was to receive, for he was determined not to overspend. He would never return to Bernarda’s doss-house, except maybe to pay her for the seven nights that he owed and to give her a piece of his mind. Ambling on in this way and smiling to himself as he did his sums, he realised that the hour had come where his stomach began to tell him that man cannot live on daydreams alone. Problem: where to eat? He soon rejected the idea of entering a good restaurant. He could not appear in one looking like a scarecrow. Should he go, as he had done in times of poverty, to Boto’s eating house? Oh no, they had always seen him there with his hair dyed. They would be shocked to see him suddenly old, his hair white. Finally, remembering that he owed honest Boto for quite a number of meals already, he thought that he ought to go there and reward the proprietor’s confidence with prompt payment, offering serious illness as excuse for the delay – evident from the appearance of his unpainted face. He aimed for the Calle del Ave Maria, and went rather shyly into the tavern, pretending to blow his nose as he passed through the outer room, to hide his face behind his handkerchief. It was a narrow place, crowded because of the number of people who came attracted by the cheapness and good flavour of the fare. Beyond the main part of the tavern, which was not very large, there was a narrow passageway also with a table in it, its bench placed against the wall, and then, up two steps, was a small room with a low ceiling, in which there
were two long tables, one on each side, with only enough space between them for the serving lad to pass. It was here that Ponte always came, believing that he was most protected from the curiosity and prying of the customers here. He would sit anywhere there was a free place, if indeed there was any, for it happened sometimes that it was full up, with the clientele sitting like sardines in a can.
That evening, late as it was, Frasquito sneaked into this inner room to find himself in luck, for there were only three people inside, and one of the tables was empty. He sat in the corner near the door, a very private place, where the public, that is, the people in the tavern, would be unlikely to see him. But there was another problem: what should he order?
Usually, the poor state of his purse limited him to one real’s worth of stew, which with bread and wine came to forty céntimos; or else he had a similar ration of dried cod, done in a sauce. Either of these, with a piece of flat Spanish bread which he ate down to the last crumb, dipping it in the gravy and drinking with it the small ration of wine, had given him a sufficient, succulent meal. Sometimes, instead of the stew he chose the hotpot and sometimes, but very rarely, the chicken hash. Of tripe, snails, meatballs and other poor fare he never partook.
Well, on this occasion he asked the boy for a complete list of what there was, and after a show of indecision, proper to someone who did not feel hungry and was looking for something tempting enough to give him an appetite, he decided on the chicken hash.
“Have you got toothache?” asked the boy, seeing that he still kept his handkerchief in front of his face.
“Yes, son, very painful indeed. Don’t bring me the usual bread, bring me the French.”
Misericordia (Dedalus European Classics) Page 22