The Rhythm of Memory

by Alyson Richman

  “Octavio pulled out one of the kitchen chairs and sat down, cupping his face in his palms.

  “ ‘How can I do that, my love?’ he said, now looking up at me. ‘How can I support someone who is capable of such brutality? Who can do what they did to you and to Allende. How can I do that?’

  “I remember that I just looked at him blankly. My bruises were beginning to deepen and I needed to get some ice. I was so shocked by his response. I couldn’t believe that he was still saying the same things even after I had been kidnapped!”

  “I can imagine,” Samuel said, nodding his head. “What did you say to him after that?”

  “I think I said something to the effect of, ‘You can do what you want, Octavio,’ but really I was angry. I was truly furious. I couldn’t believe that he wouldn’t take the necessary steps to protect us and make sure this never happened again. I mean, wouldn’t you think that a man would want to protect his family at any cost…even if that meant sacrificing his pride?”

  “Yes, I would. Unless he felt that he could control the situation.”

  “There was no way anyone could control what was happening in Chile. Everyone was at risk!”

  “You didn’t tell him that you felt that way, Salomé?” Samuel asked her.

  “No. I didn’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “I suppose I was in a state of disbelief. I thought it was his conscience, that he’d have to live with himself. I couldn’t force him to make the decision I wanted him to.”

  Samuel scribbled in his pad and then looked up. “Then what happened?”

  “He called after me. I went into the kitchen. I did not answer him. I didn’t want to be near him. I slept in the spare bedroom that night and did not rise until the next morning. I didn’t even get up to say good-bye to him when he left the house early that next morning.”

  Thirty-two

  VESTERÅS, SWEDEN

  FEBRUARY 1975

  “Three weeks after my first abduction, my husband and I were invited to a formal ball at a large villa to celebrate Chile’s de facto leader, General Pinochet. The star-studded event was planned to be nationally televised, to show the people of Chile all the famous faces that supported the new regime. Naturally, my husband refused to go.

  “I don’t blame my husband for his decision. Neither of us, looking back on it, thought that this would be the deciding factor in determining our family’s fate. Anyway, I was still weary from my abduction and I didn’t want to attend the event either. I truly thought they would come and ask him to make an appearance with the general once the palace was restored. I thought it would be a personal invitation with no more than two to three other guests, and at that point, I would have insisted that he go. A party? Who would have known?”

  “Do you think your husband would have gone if he had known what the consequences to you would be by not going?” Samuel asked.

  “I have to believe that, though I guess I’ll never know.”

  “So you believe he would have gone?”

  “I know my husband loved me. That he still does.” She paused and seemed to spend several minutes reflecting on the doctor’s question.

  “By the same token, supporting a dictator who had, in his mind, murdered his friend, a president elected by the people of Chile, would violate his conscience.”

  “Yes…”

  “I tell you, we decided as a couple not to go to this ball. I wanted to spend time with the children and work on restoring my relationship with Octavio. I remember that he wrote back on the response card in front of me that, ‘regretfully,’ we could not attend.

  “I tried to pretend life was normal for us now. But every night, I dreamt of being abducted. Some nights, as I lay dreaming, I could swear I was inhaling the scent of those soldiers, and I would awaken covered in a cold sweat.

  “Octavio stopped publicly denouncing Pinochet, and I believed we would be left alone.” Salomé paused. “Obviously, Dr. Rudin, I was very wrong.”

  Thirty-three

  SANTIAGO, CHILE

  JANUARY 1974

  Salomé went to the market a week after her first abduction, hoping to calm her nerves by busying herself with errands. The perfume of the local nisperos and ripening melons filled the air, and Salomé felt her senses awaken. She had felt so numbed over the past few days, incapable of eating very much, and was despondent with Octavio. But now, with the colors and bustle surrounding her, she felt grateful and incredibly alive.

  She inhaled the scent of crisp, green coriander and bushels of sharp garlic. She gazed at the pyramids of deep red tomatoes and small-clefted apricots. She filled her basket with bunches of grapes and peaches, bought two salamis, and bargained with the fishmonger for two kilos of machas. She decided that she would bake those for dinner that evening with a sprinkling of Parmesan cheese.

  In the sunlight, her pale green sheath looked dazzling, as though she were dressed in a silk that had been dyed in the juice of limes. Her black hair was thick and full around her shoulders, her lean brown legs tapered and strong.

  She had covered her bruised face with powder and a little bit of camouflage cream. At first glance, it was barely noticeable. But, upon closer inspection, one might glimpse a patch of blue beneath her cheekbone. As though a tiny plum had been trapped underneath a canvas of delicate skin. Occasionally, she lifted her hand when she spoke to a merchant, hoping to distract him from looking at her face too closely. She would pretend to smooth her eyebrow or brush off a fly, or sometimes she would just dip her head ever so slightly so that her hair would fall over her cheek.

  She had not expected to meet anyone, as it was nearly three o’clock and the market was busiest before noon. However, as she turned to inspect some gamberas, she heard a strangely familiar voice calling her from behind.

  “Salomé? Is that you?”

  She turned around and saw a vaguely familiar face staring back at her.

  “It’s me, Manuel. Manuel Chon-Vargas!”

  “Manuel?” Salomé grasped her free hand to her breast. “I can not believe it is you!” She put down her basket and embraced him.

  “It has been too long,” he lamented.

  “How are you? I haven’t seen you since those summers when we were children, and your parents visited mine at the hacienda. How are your sisters, your mother and father?”

  “They are all well, thank you. And yours?”

  “Fine, fine. You have a wife now, don’t you?”

  “She is well, though we have fallen on some difficult times, but that is a long story.” He paused. “And what about you? I heard you’re married to the famous actor Octavio Ribeiro.”

  Salomé blushed. “Well, I don’t know about famous, but we have three children, a son and two daughters.”

  “God has been good to you.” He gently brushed his hand against her cheek.

  She could sense that he’d noticed her bruise, though he said nothing to her about it. She quickly asked him something to distract him from it.

  “You should give me your telephone number and we should get together. It would be lovely for our spouses to have the opportunity to meet.”

  His smile seemed to grow tense. “That would indeed be wonderful, though Adelaida has been rather poor company lately, I’m afraid. Ever since our villa was confiscated, she has not been herself.”

  “Confiscated?” Salomé whispered with great disbelief. “What in heaven’s name happened?”

  “I can’t really go into detail,” he said in hushed tones. “But a band of soldiers came one evening and told us at gunpoint that we would have to leave.”

  “And you left?”

  “At gunpoint, Salomé, one has little choice.” He bowed his head. “You can imagine how awful this has been for my wife. The Villa Grimaldi was her ancestral home.”

  Salomé nodded her head. “Yes, I can only imagine how terrible this must be for you and your family.” She wondered if she should tell him of her own ordeal, but decided against it. Perhaps h
e already suspected. It was well-known that Octavio had been voicing anti-Pinochet remarks in the weeks before her abduction. The national papers had even slandered him.

  “The worst part of it all,” Manuel continued, his fingers shaking over his mouth, “is that I believe the secret police are now using the villa as some sort of detention center to interrogate and torture people whom they consider enemies of the state.”

  Salomé’s eyes widened. Immediately, she thought of the place she had been taken only a week before.

  “But isn’t it near the city? Could they do that in a place where people are so close by?” she asked coyly, hoping to gather information that would confirm her suspicion that she had, indeed, been taken to the same place.

  “Unfortunately, it would be the perfect place for such a thing. It’s located only a few kilometers away from the main city in a rural section of Santiago, not far from the mountains—no neighbors except for a few migrants in their temporary tents along the roads.” He sighed. “We had always believed it would be a perfect place to raise children. You know, it used to be an old vineyard back in the forties. But only the terra-cotta jugs lining the entranceway are left from those days.” He chuckled slightly, but the laughter was heavy with nostalgia and regret.

  “It must have been lovely,” Salomé said sympathetically.

  “Oh, it was! There was even a tower to play in,” he said regretfully, “and ancient gates to climb.” He shook his head again.

  Manuel now seemed completely lost in a dream as he stood there with his head bowed in front of her. As if he needed to recall that which had been taken from him.

  “It was a beautiful place, Salomé. When my mother-in-law was alive, the garden was in bloom with round, powder-pink peonies, African violets, and cinnamon trees whose branches swept low and perfumed the air. And the kitchen…what a sight that was! Three stoves, a vaulted ceiling covered in cerulean blue tiles imported from the south of Spain. Copper pots reflecting the midday sun.” He paused. “There was this beautiful cherimoya tree that grew outside the terrace. When we ate breakfast, we could see it framed in the pane of the center window. Those soldiers are such beasts, who knows what they are doing there. Certainly not observing beauty.”

  “Yes. Yes. It is such a shame.”

  Salomé had been listening to his vivid descriptions with great intensity. She would never forget that name: Villa Grimaldi. That must have been where she had been taken. She remembered seeing a gate and a tower, and the distance from Santiago seemed to be the same as well. She had seen the mountains from underneath her blindfold, as well as the poblaciónes callampas—the makeshift houses of the hobos along the way.

  “I am sorry to have heaped all of this on you, Salomé. Adelaida and I are living off of Recoleta Street. You are right, it would be wonderful to have the chance to catch up with you and meet the famed Octavio Ribeiro.”

  “Yes,” she told him again. “It would. Let’s do it soon.”

  He kissed her good-bye, and they agreed to call each other in the next couple of weeks.

  Salomé returned home and did not mention her encounter with Manuel in the market to Octavio. She thought it would only excite Octavio about another injustice of the new regime. However, she thought of it often when she was alone.

  She never believed she would need the information for herself and, instead, tucked it away neatly in her mind in case a friend or relative was kidnapped as she had been.

  But two weeks later there was another knock at her door. Octavio was sleeping in the garden, a newspaper spread over his face.

  Salomé opened the door to find three men with machine guns staring at her.

  “Salomé Herrera? We have come for you.” They reached out to pull her by the arm.

  “What do you want with me?” she pleaded. “I have nothing you need. You have asked me all the questions before.”

  “You are needed again,” the shorter man said sternly.

  Stricken with fear, Salomé knew she had to get word to Octavio, to tell him where they were probably taking her. Thinking quickly, Salomé looked back behind her and saw seven-year-old Rafael standing there with his eyes transfixed.

  “At least, let me say good-bye to my son.”

  The senior soldier nodded.

  She knelt down and whispered in Rafael’s ear, speaking as slowly and clearly as she could: “Tell your father I have been taken. Tell him these words, if you can remember no others.” The little boy nodded. She whispered in his ear something he would never forget: “Villa Grimaldi.”

  PART II

  Thirty-four

  SANTIAGO, CHILE

  JANUARY 1974

  Seconds after the dark van sped from the driveway, Rafael rushed through the house to find his father. He discovered him on the patio, his chest rising and falling with sleep.

  “Papa,” the little boy uttered to him, flicking the daily paper that covered Octavio’s eyes. “Mama’s gone.”

  “Where has she gone, Rafaelito?” he asked as he drowsily readjusted himself in his chair.

  “Three men…they…they took her.”

  “What?” Octavio cried, nearly leaping from his chair. “What men?”

  “The men who came to our door.”

  “When, Rafael? When did they come?”

  “Just now, Papa.”

  Octavio ran through the garden and into the house. Rafael followed him, crying out, “Villa Grimaldi, Papa! Villa Grimaldi!”

  But Octavio was not listening to the boy now. He was searching the house, hoping that his son was mistaken and that Salomé was busying herself in one of its many rooms.

  “This can’t be!” Octavio cried, his fist clutched to his mouth. “Why would they take her again?” He was in shock. His face was red, his black hair wild and high. They had taken her while he lay napping.

  “Papa,” Rafael softly said again. He stood next to his father. His trousers were rolled above his knees and his red T-shirt was soiled from his having spent the afternoon playing in the garden. “Mama told me to tell you something…” He paused and scrunched his face in concentration. “Villa Grimaldi.”

  “What?”

  “Yes, Papa. She whispered it to me right before she left.”

  “But what does that mean? Are you sure, Rafael?”

  “Yes, I’m sure. She told me not to forget.”

  Rafael stood in front of him, his voice shaking, as he clearly saw that the words that his mother had last spoken to him caused his father great concern and worry.

  “Papa, what is it?” he asked as his boyish eyebrows wiggled like two soft caterpillars. “Will Mommy be all right?”

  Octavio tried to mask his fear for his young son, but the shock of awakening to find his wife abducted was too much for even an accomplished actor to hide.

  “Go and get your father a glass of water,” he ordered his son.

  As the boy ran back into the house, Octavio raised his fists to his face. “Bastards!” he cried, his eyes pink with anger. He was sitting on the edge of the lounge chair, his back curved with despair, when Rafael returned. Holding a glass of water in his trembling hand, he overheard his father mumbling to himself, his head bowed to his knees, “I was the one they should have taken. They should have taken me!”

  Octavio prayed each of the first few nights after Salomé was abducted, hoping that she might be returned. He lay in their canopied bed and extended his arm to the side where his wife always slept. The empty space brought tears to his eyes.

  “What have I done to my family?” he said aloud, knotting his knuckles into his temples. The reality of his wife’s kidnapping weighed so heavily on him that his once smooth skin disappeared, replaced by a furrowed forehead and twisted brows. He felt as though he had failed in his role as father and protector. He had let everyone down.

  The children had been asking for their mother for days, but he had no answers for them. Salomé’s parents too had come in search of their daughter, and he could not lie to them either. />
  “They’ve taken her,” he told them, his voice nearly collapsing from his despair. “They came to the house and seized her while I was asleep in the garden.”

  “You were asleep?” his father in-law asked with disbelief.

  “Yes.”

  “He was asleep in the garden! Did you hear that, Olivia? Our son-in-law was asleep in the garden while our daughter was abducted by the military police!”

  Doña Olivia shook her head. She withdrew a linen kerchief and dabbed her eyes.

  “Octavio,” she said gently. “What can we do?”

  “Do! Do!” Don Fernando roared. “They have already taken her! Olivia, you have heard stories like this! The city is full of them. Parents whose children have disappeared. They vanish without a trace. They’re impossible to find.” The old man was yelling now, and the children began to approach from their activities in the garden. He lowered his voice. “The military are experts at making people disappear.”

  “I will find her,” Octavio said quietly. “Salomé left me a clue.”

  “A clue?” Fernando asked incredulously. He was looking at his son-in-law with the same disdain he had when he’d first laid eyes on him some ten years before.

  “Yes. She whispered in Rafael’s ear, just before she was taken, the words Villa Grimaldi.”

  “Why would she have said that?”

  “I’m not sure. But it obviously meant something. She explicitly told Rafael to tell me.”

  “I think that’s the ancestral home of the Grimaldi family. Fernando, didn’t the Chon-Vargas boy marry into that family?”

  “Yes.” Dr. Herrera nodded. “I think the villa is located a few kilometers outside the main city.”

  “But why have they taken Salomé there?” Doña Olivia’s silk sleeves rustled as she fidgeted in her seat. “What has she done to deserve this?”