by Helen Young
‘What are you saying?’
Camilo shrugged. ‘I’m not saying anything.’
Luke thought about it. ‘If I didn’t find them, it could be that they just changed churches.’
‘Could be.’
They walked on in silence. The street ahead filled. They had to slow their pace as the crowd thickened. They were students mostly. Young men together, women by themselves or the two mixed up into groups.
‘I’m sorry to hear you’ve already hired someone for the draughtsman role. I thought I’d found someone for you,’ Camilo sighed. ‘With real talent.’
‘You Osorios are so helpful.’
‘We try,’ Camilo said. ‘Although I don’t know what you mean.’ He stopped. ‘I’m sorry – she’s here.’
‘She?’
‘Yes,’ he said, grinning. ‘And I said I’d introduce you. Can you just play along? I’ve already said you’re coming.’
‘All right, if you like.’
They’d stopped before a large building, standing aside to let the crowd filter in around them. Luke looked up. The word Faenza was carved into the lintel above its vast doorway that was more like the opening of a circus tent, he thought. The building took up most of the street. You couldn’t miss it. It was a very public venue for a political meeting organised by a party that wasn’t in power.
‘It’s a cinema,’ Camilo said, watching him. ‘And her name’s Felisa Mejía.’ He entered the building and Luke followed.
Inside, it didn’t take long for him to lose sight of Camilo. The journalist left him in the lobby and went in search of his friends; friends he said he wanted to introduce to the British architect. Luke stood to one side, feeling wholly different. From the street every type of person poured in: street cleaners, shop clerks and those who kept the administrative arm of the city running.
‘Will he be here? Dr Gaitán?’ Luke asked a passer-by. The man frowned at him and walked on.
‘He thinks you’re policía.’
Luke turned to the woman at his side. Her eyes were darker than honey, black almost, like molasses. She looked at him and blinked.
‘Do you think I am?’
‘Yes,’ she said, quite seriously. ‘You don’t belong here.’
‘How so?’
‘You’re too exotic.’ Her smile was different to Catherine’s, more alarming in fact. ‘Here comes Milo.’ Luke turned to see Camilo walking towards them.
‘Luke, I’m sorry,’ Camilo said. He was breathless. ‘I see you’ve found Felisa. Señorita Mejía, I mean.’
Felisa bit her bottom lip. ‘Ah, the architect.’
‘Shall we go in?’ Camilo asked, putting his arm around her.
Luke followed behind. The pair looked about the same age – and about half of mine, he thought. While Camilo affected a type of poverty in the way he dressed, Felisa looked like she was trying to raise herself above this. Inside the hall, most of the seats had already been taken. Camilo found three towards the back. Felisa tried to take the furthest one, placing Camilo in the middle, but he refused, insisting she sit beside Luke, and he on the side closest to the wall. Neither of them spoke.
‘Camilo says you’re looking for work?’
‘Does he?’ Felisa turned to face Luke. In the darkness, her eyes shone brighter. He was aware he was staring.
‘That you’re a draughtsman,’ he said, coughing.
‘I’m not,’ she said, laughing self-consciously so that he was embarrassed. He looked over her head at Camilo who caught his eye and shrugged.
Luke turned to the front. For Camilo’s sake, he had tried. The crowd was silent now. From offstage a man appeared, sending the room wild – it was the kind of rapture heard after a performance, not before it. Luke wasn’t used to it – the way the people beat the floorboards to pieces with their shoes and all for this sinewy man with a bald top.
‘This is Gaitán?’ he asked her.
‘No,’ Felisa whispered, coming close. ‘It’s one of the contributors to Gaitán’s newspaper, Jornada. His name is Over Gómez.’
She pronounced the ‘v’ softly, as though coaxing it towards a ‘b’. Luke did the same in his head, trying to get it just as she had. He wasn’t that exotic. Over Gómez approached the lectern.
‘Gaitán thanks his loyal friends for attending tonight’s meeting. We apologise for the earlier confusion over the venue; as you know, these things are never simple.’
‘Will Gaitán return my ten centavos for the tram?’ a man shouted.
Gómez was silent for a moment.
‘What is your name, my friend? No, you don’t have to say. Tell me, is this the first time something in your life has changed course?’
‘It’s not.’
‘And usually, is it not your employer, your boss, who decides that course for you?’
‘And my wife!’
The room erupted.
‘Yes, yes,’ Over Gómez said, joining them. ‘So, tonight there was a change in your course, but it was you who decided. Not another man. After that first disappointment you could have gone home, but no, you came here. You chose to continue.’ Over Gómez addressed the room. ‘You’re all responsible for your individual paths. We’re equal in that.’
The audience loved that and beat the floor again. Seeing that they loved it, this Over Gómez took a little bow.
‘That man’s path is ten centavos down, though,’ Felisa whispered.
‘You must keep the spirit of what we are trying to achieve alive. In fact, you must raise it above spirit. You must make it concrete, make it flesh. If the politicians take from you, take from the politicians. They’re just men.’
‘We’ll be arrested!’ someone shouted.
‘I’m talking about organised marches, protests and pickets, not vandalism. No man, woman, or child should act alone. You know the government is weak. You know they’re fighting to keep you low by starving you of hope. They seek only to fill their own bellies and leave yours empty. It’s what their fathers did and grandfathers before that, all the way back to the shores of Spain.’
‘Gaitán didn’t win last time, he split the party,’ said another.
‘Because people were afraid. He’s a man who cannot be bought. He fights for absolute change, not partial. He demands absolute loyalty, not half-vowed allegiance. Look what happened to Karrera who was once his friend. He who called himself liberal. He refused to give up his parliamentary position when Gaitán was shunned by the rest of them. He refused to stand with him when the time came to show his loyalty. No! That’s why Gaitán asked that the people punish Karrera. That’s why it had to be done.’
Luke knew this. He was talking about the politician who’d been pelted with eggs so publicly. It frightened all of them, these politicians, that Gaitán could ask such a thing and the people would deliver.
‘To some, that commitment is a terrifying concept, wouldn’t you agree?’ Gómez continued. ‘If you trust yourself to Gaitán, he will stand by you. The purpose of tonight is to leave here with this message. There are pamphlets and flyers on two tables positioned at the back of this hall. Take this literature with you and return to your homes. Give them to your neighbours. Push them through letterboxes. Through the will of the people we will change things, but only through the will of all the people.’
After the session, they filed out with the crowd. Camilo led them on foot to a coffee shop two blocks over that he said was the regular post-lecture meet-up. Inside, it was packed and the three of them sat hunched awkwardly around a too-small table. The mood inside the café was high, like they’d all attended a wedding and loved both the bride and groom.
‘You see,’ Felisa said, staring at Luke across the table, ‘these lectures are nothing new. Gaitán only shows for the big ones that pull in the huge crowds now.’
‘Not always, Felisa,’ Camilo said.
‘Milo, it’s what he wants,’ she said, gesturing at Luke. ‘He only came to see Gaitán.’
‘Not only,’ he said
. ‘Tell me more about Jornada.’
‘It has an incredible circulation,’ she said.
‘I’d like to read it.’
Felisa caught Camilo’s eye. He couldn’t decide if it was a look that said: when is your friend leaving? He didn’t want to. And he’d handed Blanco the draughtsman job. When there was—
‘Milo here will lend you a copy.’
‘Idiota, Felisa! He has money. He can buy his own.’
‘But I wouldn’t know where to find it,’ Luke said. Camilo was not a tactful man.
She began again but softer this time. ‘Tonight you heard the same words that all Gaitán’s council repeat so that the pueblo won’t forget, but if you hear Gaitán himself speak, well, that’s different.’ She refastened a piece of hair which had come loose: ‘Liberty, freedom, workers’ rights. You’ll find it all in Jornada if you’re serious.’
‘She’s in love with him,’ Camilo said.
‘So the talks themselves are meaningless without him?’ Luke asked, ignoring him and leaning in closer.
Felisa moved closer too. ‘No. People need reminding that things can change. Without that, there’s just tomorrow, and the day after that, and so on, with nothing to make your life any different from the rest.’
The waitress came between them with hot coffee. For a moment he thought he was back inside La Casa de la Risa.
‘There are good and bad ways to bring change,’ Luke said. ‘Do you know La Casa de la Risa? It’s a cantina…’
‘The socialists meet there,’ Camilo said. ‘It’s known for that.’
‘And here?’ Luke asked.
‘Liberalism reigns!’ Camilo rose. ‘Excuse me, please.’
Luke watched him cross the café and disappear behind a narrow curtain. Felisa fell silent. It surprised Luke how shy she could become so quickly.
‘Actually,’ Felisa said, her tone measured, ‘I can draw.’
10
It had been two weeks since that meeting in the café. Luke hadn’t seen anything of Camilo since then, but he knew now that the journalist kept his own schedule. He had a habit of reappearing only when there was a reason to do so and the next time, Luke suspected, would signal the publication of the article. Camilo had sent notes, tidying up the details, but that was all. In his replies, Luke hadn’t told him about Felisa coming to work for him. They’d worked it all out while they were alone together in the café. Felisa had said she wanted to break the good news to Camilo herself. In fact, Luke hadn’t told anyone. Alfonso Blanco had turned up for work one morning to find the young draughtswoman sitting in the tiny office he already shared with the foreman. Luke had wanted it that way, so that word would get back to the elder Osorio, hot-tongued and angry. In future, Gabriel Osorio should leave the detail to him.
In the days that followed, Luke set about putting Felisa to work on the more intricate designs that Blanco laboured over, such as the carvings for the plasterwork set above the door frames. These were needed quickly, so that they could be worked up into moulds and the casts set in place for painting. She sat in his office and listened to what was needed, performing quick sketches, which she would complete in more detail later. In the afternoons, these would find their way back up to him for sign-off. In the pile of forgettable outlines that Blanco delivered, there was skill in Felisa’s hand. She had natural talent, going beyond the brief to deliver imaginative coats of arms interlaced with alien flora he could only assume she had seen in magazines. Blanco, who saw himself as every bit her superior, was a thorn in Luke’s side and hers too, he imagined, sometimes listening out for proof of his whining drifting up from the floorboards below.
There was a knock at his office door. When he didn’t answer immediately, it crept slowly open. Felisa stood in the frame.
‘Excuse me, Señor Vosey, she’s gone out,’ she said, signalling Telma’s empty desk in the hall.
‘Would you like to come in?’
Felisa slipped into the room and closed the door behind her.
‘He’s left for the day too. Señor Blanco, that is,’ she said.
Luke offered her a chair, but instead, she went over to the window. She wore her hair long, he noticed. It fell in dark waves, trailing to her waist. As black as her eyes, he thought.
‘Are you happy with my work?’ she asked, turning.
‘Has Señor Blanco said otherwise?’
‘All the time,’ she said, sighing. ‘I haven’t studied like him. That’s what he says and it’s true.’
‘Being taught something doesn’t mean you’ll ever understand it.’
‘I agree.’ Felisa walked over to the chair opposite his and sat down. ‘I wasn’t sure, you see. Because I haven’t been paid and the others have.’
‘I see,’ Luke said, feeling the temperature in the room go up a notch. ‘I’ll speak to Telma about that.’
‘She doesn’t like me.’
‘It’s her nephew. She wanted him here first, and then Blanco came. But it’s no excuse.’
Felisa bit her top lip. ‘Jobs aren’t easy to come by. If the junior role was her nephew’s, he should have had it.’
‘I decide who works here, not my secretary.’
She looked up and their eyes met.
‘I know jobs are scarce,’ he said.
‘Do you?’ She raised a hand to her mouth. ‘I shouldn’t have said that.’
‘It’s all right, perhaps I don’t. Camilo talks of real struggles, violence outside of the city. It makes sense that with everyone pouring in, there’d be less work to go around.’
She nodded and he could see her relaxing slightly, wondering just how much she should. He wished she would. Luke watched her eyes fall first on her hands and then move up to the desk between them. It was a solid reminder of his role there, as her employer. Felisa spoke first.
‘Where I’m from, south of here, there isn’t much chance to leave – to escape from that life.’
‘Is it so very bad?’
‘Now it is. Have you ever seen real poverty? It does terrible things to people, that and fear.’
‘I’ve seen what rationing does, but not real poverty first-hand. Fear, I know something about. It goes hand in hand with ignorance.’
Luke thought back, remembering the latter days of his posting during the war. He’d been sent to some backward, out-of-the-way place then. Shame was another emotion, he recalled, but no need to speak of that now.
‘But you escaped the south?’ he asked.
‘I was given a chance to study when I was very young. In part, Camilo was to blame for that.’
‘Blame?’
‘Perhaps it isn’t the right word.’
‘The two of you are close, then?’
Close. That wasn’t the right word either.
Felisa shrugged. ‘I’m not sure why he helped me later on, but he did. I only know that as soon as I could read in English, I got hold of every book I could. I wanted to know everything.’ She smiled. ‘I was a better student than him, even if I wasn’t sent to any college. He was, and he let the chance he’d been given fly away.’
‘He tells me he’s fighting the life that’s been chosen for him.’
‘That’s good. Dear Camilo,’ she said, smiling. ‘I suppose he is.’
Luke rose and went over to his jacket. He drew out his wallet and removed a handful of notes; enough, he hoped, for the weeks she was due with a little extra besides. Telma he would deal with later.
‘Here,’ he said, holding it out to her.
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘It should be official.’
‘It’s yours.’
Luke stood there, feeling ridiculous holding the money out in front of him, with something of the same awkwardness he supposed she felt in not taking it.
‘Perhaps if you wrote it down,’ she suggested, ‘as proof.’
He looked around the desk for paper, pulling open the drawers in search of something to write on. He found his diary and tore a sheet from the front. On the bac
k of the clean page he wrote: Felisa Mejía, paid two weeks’ wages by Luke Vosey, followed by the date. He signed it.
‘There,’ he said, handing it over.
Felisa took the sheet and studied it.
‘Will it pass?’ he asked.
She nodded and he handed her the money.
‘You’ll be paid along with everyone else next time.’
‘Thank you.’ She turned to leave. ‘Actually, there is something else.’
Luke waited.
‘A rally. Not like the one before, a little more secretive.’
‘I’ll come,’ he said.
‘But you don’t know what I’m going to say!’
‘A guess,’ Luke said. ‘An assumption you hadn’t given up on my political education.’
‘Now you’re teasing me.’
‘When is it?’ he asked. They could go together.
‘Later this week. I’ll explain tomorrow.’
After she’d left, Luke recalled that he’d been the same at her age, brave and afraid together. If he was younger it would be easier to start again. The past seemed so far away now, and he a different person in it. Catherine had been brave, in her way. Look where it had got her. Stuck behind enemy lines and he powerless to do anything about it.
Out in the hall, the phone on Telma’s desk rang. He crossed the room but by the time he’d answered it, he only got the operator. He heard voices on the street outside. He thought everyone had left. Luke went back into his office and over to the window. Opposite the building he saw Camilo. He looked up once in his direction, but Luke knew he couldn’t see him through the glaze. There was a second figure. Felisa, her coat pulled around her shoulders. She was running across the new street to join him.
*
The next afternoon, Camilo returned to collect her again. Luke was out on site, inspecting the last of the buildings to go up, a turreted red brick mansion that owed nothing to its surroundings.
‘She’s doing well, yes?’ Camilo said, coming up alongside Luke.