The Fencing Master

by Arturo P; #xE9;rez-Reverte

  Twice he opened his mouth to speak, but the words refused to come. He remained there, leaning on the edge of the table, watching the young woman approach until the circle of light was breast-high.

  "I've come alone, Don Jaime. Will you hear what I have to say?"

  Don Jaime's voice was a dull whisper. "I will."

  She moved softly, and the light from the oil lamp reached her chin, her mouth, the small scar at the corner of her mouth. "It's a long story."

  "Who was the dead woman?"

  There was a silence. The mouth and the chin withdrew from the circle of light. "Be patient, Don Jaime. All in good time." She was speaking in a very soft, sweet voice, with that slight hoarseness that once stirred such conflicting feelings in the fencing master. "We have all the time in the world."

  Don Jaime Astarloa swallowed again. He was afraid he might wake up from one moment to the next, close his eyes for an instant, and when he opened them again, find that Adela de Otero was not there. That she had never been there.

  One of her hands moved slowly in the light, her fingers outstretched, as if to indicate that she had nothing to hide. "In order for you to understand what I've come to tell you, Don Jaime, I must go back a long way—about ten years." Her voice was neutral now, distant. Don Jaime could not see her eyes, but he could imagine the absent look in them, fixed on some point in the infinite. Or perhaps, he thought later, she was watching, studying his face to see the reflection there of the feelings aroused by what she said.

  "At that time, a certain young woman was living a beautiful love story, a tale of eternal love." She fell silent for a moment, as if evaluating the words. "Eternal love," she repeated. "To simplify, I won't go into details that you might consider to be in bad taste. I'll just say that the beautiful love story ended six months later in a foreign land, one winter evening, in tears and in the most complete solitude, on the banks of a river from which a mist was rising. Those gray waters fascinated the woman. They fascinated her so much that she thought she might find in them what the poets call the sweet peace of oblivion. As you see the first part of my story sounds like a rather vulgar novel."

  Adela de Otero paused and gave a mirthless contralto laugh. Don Jaime had not moved an inch and continued listening in silence.

  "And just then," she went on, "just when the young woman was prepared to pass through her personal wall of mist, another man appeared in her life." She stopped for a moment; her voice had grown almost imperceptibly softer, and this was the only time she tempered the coldness of her narrative. "A man who, asking nothing in exchange and driven only by pity, took care of the woman lost on the banks of that gray river, healed her wounds, and gave her back her smile. He became for her the father she had never known, the brother she had never had, the husband she would never have. He was a man who, stretching his nobility to the limits, never attempted to impose on her any of the rights that might have been due to him as a husband. Do you understand what I'm saying, Don Jaime?"

  Don Jaime still could not see her eyes, but he knew that she was looking at him hard. "I'm beginning to."

  "I doubt that you can understand it completely," she said in such a low voice that Don Jaime guessed at rather than heard her words. There was a long silence, so long that he began to fear that she might not continue with her story, but after a moment, she spoke again. "For two years, that man devoted himself to creating a new woman, very different from the trembling young girl gazing into the river. And he still asked nothing in return."

  "He was an altruist."

  "Perhaps not, Don Jaime, perhaps not." She seemed to falter, as if thinking about the matter. "I imagine there was something more. In fact, his attitude was not entirely unselfish. Possibly he felt satisfaction at creating something of his own. The pride that came from a kind of possession that was never exercised but that was there nonetheless. 'You are the most beautiful thing I ever created,' he said once. Perhaps he was right, because he spared no effort in the task, no effort, no money, no patience. There were lovely clothes, dancing masters, riding, music ... fencing. Yes, Don Jaime. By some strange quirk of nature, the young woman was very gifted at fencing. One day, because of his work, the man was obliged to return to his country. He took the young woman by the shoulders, led her to a mirror, and made her look at herself for a long time. 'You are beautiful and you are free,' he said. 'Take a good look at yourself. That is my reward.' He was married, he had a family and obligations, but he was ready to continue watching over his creation even so Before leaving, he made her a present of a house where she could live in a suitable maimer And from a distance her benefactor continued to keep a careful watch so that she should lack for nothing And thus seven years passed "

  She stopped talking for a moment and then repeated "seven years" in a low voice. When she did so, she moved slightly, and the circle of light rose up her body and reached her violet eyes, which glinted in the flickering light. The scar at the corner of her mouth still marked it with that indelible, enigmatic smile.

  "You, Don Jaime, already know who that man was."

  He blinked, surprised, and was about to express his confusion out loud. A sudden intuition counseled him, however, to refrain from making any comment, lest he cut the thread of her confidences.

  "On the day they said goodbye," she continued after a moment, "all the young woman could do was express to her benefactor the immensity of the debt she owed him in these words: 'If you ever need me, call me, even if I must go down into hell itself.' I'm sure, maestro, that if you had chanced to know that young woman's courage, you would not have found such words out of place on a woman's lips."

  "I would have been surprised if she had said anything else," said Don Jaime. She smiled again and nodded slightly, as if she had just been paid a compliment. Don Jaime touched his own forehead; it was cold as marble. The pieces were beginning slowly and painfully to fit together.

  "And so the day came," he added, "when he asked you to go down into hell."

  She looked at him, surprised. She raised her hands and put them together again slowly, offering him silent applause. "Well put, Don Jaime. Well put."

  "I merely repeat your words."

  "It is still well put." Her voice was heavy with irony. "To go down into hell. That is precisely what he asked her to do."

  "Was her debt so very great?"

  "It was immense."

  "Was the task to be undertaken so inevitable?"

  "Yes. The man had given the young woman everything she possessed, and, more important, everything that she was. Nothing she might do for him could compare with what he had done for her. But allow me to continue. The man we are speaking of occupied a high post in a large, important company. For reasons that you can easily guess, he became embroiled in a particular political game, a very dangerous game, Don Jaime. His commercial interests led him to become involved with Prim, and he made the mistake of financing one of Prim's coups, which ended in the most complete disaster. Unfortunately for him, he was discovered. That meant exile, ruin. However, his lofty position in society, along with certain other factors, enabled him to save himself." Adela de Otero paused; when she spoke again, there was metallic edge to her voice, which became harder, more impersonal. "Then he decided to work with Narváez."

  "And what did Prim do when he learned of this betrayal?"

  She bit her lower lip, considering the word. "Betrayal? Yes, I suppose you could call it that." She looked at him mischievously, like a child about to share a secret. "Prim never knew anything about it, of course. And he still doesn't."

  This time the fencing master was truly shocked. "Are you telling me that you have done all this for a man capable of betraying his own friends?"

  "You understand nothing of what I'm telling you." The violet eyes regarded him scornfully now. "You understand nothing at all. Do you still believe in good people and bad people, in just and unjust causes? What do I care about General Prim or anyone else? I came here tonight to tell you about the man to whom I owe e
verything I am. He was always good and loyal to me, wasn't he? He never betrayed me. Be so kind as to keep your quaint morality to yourself, sir. Who are you to judge?"

  Don Jaime let out a long breath. He was very tired, and he would gladly have lain down on the sofa. He longed to sleep, to remove himself, to reduce everything to a bad dream that would dissolve with the first light of dawn. He wasn't even sure now that he wanted to hear the rest of the story. "And what would happen if he was found out?" he asked.

  Adela de Otero made a dismissive gesture. "He never will be," she said. "He had dealings only with two people: the president of the Council of Ministers and the Minister of the Interior, with whom he was in direct communication. Luckily, both of them died ... of natural causes. There were now no further obstacles to prevent him from remaining in contact with Prim, as if nothing had happened. There were now no troublesome witnesses."

  "And now that Prim and his men are winning..."

  She smiled. "Yes, they are winning. And he is one of those financing the enterprise. Imagine the advantages that that could bring him."

  Don Jaime narrowed his eyes and nodded silently. Now everything was clear. "But there was one loose end," he murmured.

  "Exactly," she said. "And Luis de Ayala was that loose end. During his brief passage through public life, the marquis played an important role alongside his uncle, Vallespín, the Minister of the Interior who had the understanding with my friend. When Vallespín died, Ayala was able to gain access to his private files, and there he came across a series of documents that contained a good part of the story."

  "What I don't understand is what interest that could have had for the marquis. He always said he kept well out of politics."

  She raised her eyebrows. Don Jaime's remark seemed to amuse her greatly. "Ayala was bankrupt. His debts were mounting, and most of his property was heavily mortgaged. Gambling and women"—at that point her voice took on a note of infinite disdain—"were his two weaknesses, and both cost him a lot of money."

  That was too much for Don Jaime. "Are you insinuating that the marquis was a blackmailer?"

  She smiled sardonically. "I'm not insinuating, I'm stating. Luis de Ayala threatened to make those documents public, even to send them directly to Prim, if certain nonrecoverable loans were not paid off. Our dear marquis demanded a high price for his silence."

  "I can't believe it."

  "I really don't care whether you believe it or not. The fact is that the marquis's demands made the whole situation very delicate. My friend had no choice: he had to neutralize the danger, silence the marquis, and recover the documents. But the marquis was a cautious man..."

  Don Jaime rested his hands on the edge of the table and hung his head. "He was a cautious man," he repeated in a dull voice. "But he liked women."

  Adela de Otero gave him an indulgent smile. "And fencing, Don Jaime. That was where you and I came in."

  "Oh my God."

  "Don't take it like that. You had no way of knowing..."

  "Oh my God."

  She reached out a hand to him, to touch his arm, but stopped. Don Jaime had drawn back as if he had just seen a serpent.

  "My friend brought me here from Italy," she explained after a moment. "And you were the means for me to reach Ayala without arousing his suspicions. We never imagined that you would become part of the problem. How were we to know that Ayala would give you the documents for safekeeping?"

  "So his death was in vain."

  She looked at him with genuine surprise. "In vain? Not at all. Ayala had to die, with or without the documents. He was too dangerous, too intelligent. His attitude toward me changed, as if he was beginning to grow suspicious. We had to settle the matter once and for all."

  "Did you do it yourself?"

  Her eyes fixed him like a steel blade. "Of course." There was something so natural, so calm about her voice, that Don Jaime felt terrified. "Who else if not me? Things happened very quickly, and there wasn't much time. That night, we dined in the salon as usual. Alone. I remember that Ayala was being much too nice; he was clearly suspicious. That didn't worry me greatly, because I knew this would be the last time we would see each other. While he was uncorking a bottle of champagne, pretending a happiness that neither of us felt, I found him particularly handsome, with his thick mane of hair and those perfect white teeth, always smiling. I even regretted what fate had in store for him."

  She shrugged, making fate responsible. After a pause, she added: "My earlier attempts to get the secret out of him proved unsuccessful; I succeeded only in provoking his distrust. It didn't matter by then, so I decided to ask him straight out. I told him exactly what I wanted, making him the offer I had been authorized to make: a large sum of money in return for the documents."

  "He didn't accept," said Don Jaime.

  She looked at him oddly. "No, he didn't. The offer was in fact a trick to gain time, but Ayala had no way of knowing that. He laughed in my face. He said that the papers were in a safe place and that my friend would have to go on paying for them for the rest of his life if he didn't want to end up in Prim's hands. Oh, and he called me a whore."

  She stopped speaking, and her last word hung in the air. She had said it quite objectively, flatly, and Don Jaime knew that she had behaved exactly that way in the marquis's palace: no tantrums, no temperamental scenes, but with all the calculated coolness of someone who places efficiency above passion—that she had been as lucid and calm as when she was fencing.

  "But that wasn't why you killed him."

  The young woman looked intently at Don Jaime, as if surprised by the accuracy of his remark. "You're right, that wasn't why I killed him. I killed him because it had already been decided that he must die. I went to the gallery and calmly chose a foil without a button on the tip; he seemed to treat it as a joke. He was very sure of himself, looking at me with his arms folded, as if waiting to see where it would all lead. 'I'm going to kill you, Luis,' I said. 'You may wish to defend yourself.' He laughed, accepting what seemed to him an exciting game, and he chose another foil. I imagine that afterward he intended taking me to his bedroom and making love to me. He came toward me wearing that brilliant, cynical smile of his; he looked handsome in his shirtsleeves, a fine figure of a man and he crossed his sword with mine at the same time blowing me a kiss with his left hand. Then I looked him in the eyes, made a feint, and stuck the foil in his throat, just like that: a short thrust and a flick of the wrist. Even the most purist of fencing masters could have raised no objection, nor did Ayala. He looked at me in astonishment and he was dead before he hit the floor."

  Adela de Otero faced Don Jaime, as defiantly as if she had merely reported a piece of mischief. He couldn't take his eyes off hers, fascinated by her expression; there was no hatred in it, no remorse, no passion at all, just blind loyalty to an idea, to a man. There was something simultaneously hypnotic and terrifying about her awful beauty, as though she were the embodiment of the Angel of Death. Perhaps guessing his thoughts, the young woman withdrew from the circle of light projected by the oil lamp.

  "Then I searched the place thoroughly, although without much hope of finding anything." Her faceless voice emerged once more from the shadows, and Don Jaime could not decide which was more disquieting, her voice or her facelessness. "I found nothing, although I stayed there nearly until dawn. The revolt in Cádiz meant that Ayala had to die anyway, whether we got the documents or not. There was no other solution. All I could do was hope that, if the papers really were that well hidden, no one else would find them. I left. The next step was to vanish without trace from Madrid." She seemed to hesitate, looking for the right words. "I had to return to the obscurity out of which I came Adela de Otero was leaving the scene for good. That too was part of the plan."

  Don Jaime could no longer remain standing. He felt his legs give way beneath him, and his heart beat feebly. He let himself drop slowly into his chair, fearing that he might faint. When he spoke, his voice was a fearful whisper, because he kn
ew what the terrible reply would be. "What happened to Lucía, your maid?" He looked up at the shadow standing before him. "She was the same height, more or less the same age as you, and with the same color hair. What happened to her?"

  This time there was a long silence. Finally Adela de Otero said in a neutral, unemotional voice, "You don't understand, Don Jaime."

  Don Jaime raised a tremulous hand and pointed at the shadow. A blind doll floating in a pond; that is what had happened. "You're wrong," he said. This time he felt hatred in his voice, and he knew that she felt it too, with perfect clarity. "I understand everything. Too late, it's true, but I understand. That is precisely why you chose her, isn't it? Because she looked like you. Everything, down to the last horrible detail, was planned from the first moment."

  "I see we were wrong to underestimate you." There was a touch of irritation in her voice. "You are a perceptive man, after all."

  He smiled a bitter smile. "Did you take care of her as well?" he asked, spitting out the question with infinite scorn.

  "No, we contracted two men to do it, who know almost nothing of the story. A couple of common thugs. The same ones you met in your friend's house."

  "The swine!"

  "They did perhaps go a bit far."

  "I doubt it. I'm sure they were merely scrupulously carrying out the instructions given them by you and your worthy companion."

  "If it's any consolation to you, I should tell you that the girl was dead when they did all that to her. She didn't suffer much."

  Don Jaime looked at her openmouthed, as if he could not believe what he was hearing. "That was most considerate of you, Adela de Otero. Assuming that that is your real name. Most considerate. You tell me that the poor woman didn't suffer much. That does honor to your feminine instincts."

  "I'm glad to see you've recovered your sense of irony, maestro."

  "Don't call me 'maestro,' please. You may have noticed that I am not calling you 'Señora.'"

  This time she laughed out loud. "Touché, Don Jaime, touché. Do you want me to go on, or do you already know the rest and would prefer me to stop?"