by Maria Duenas
He spun around in consternation.
“What he never found out was that the night before that great day, my cousins, my sister, and I forced open the tabernacle and each of us ate four or five of the holy wafers. Delighted to meet you at last, Señor Larrea. Welcome to Jerez.”
Her face was delicate and her whole appearance harmonious. Her big brown eyes were brimming with curiosity.
“Sol Claydon,” she said, extending a gloved hand. “Although for part of my life I was also Soledad Montalvo. And this was my home.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Mauro Larrea was slow to react, searching for words that would not betray his feeling of being the intruder in the mansion.
She spoke before he could recover.
“I understand you are the new owner.”
“Forgive me for not returning your visit, madam. I received your card yesterday, and . . .”
She raised her chin slightly, and that was enough to make any further excuses unnecessary. No need, she seemed to be saying.
“I had things to attend to in Cádiz; I simply wanted to pay my respects.”
His mind was in turmoil. My God, what the devil do you say to a woman in her position? A woman with blood ties to what you now possess thanks to a few diabolical games of billiards? Someone who peers so intently inside you to find out who you are and what on earth you are doing somewhere where you have no right to be.
At a loss for words, he resorted to gestures, straightening his broad shoulders and sweeping his hat over his heart. And a nod of the head, a fleeting but unmistakable gesture of thanks to this beautiful being who had just made her appearance in his troubled noonday. Where did you come from, and what are you after? he would have liked to ask. What do you want from me?
She was wearing a short light-gray cloak. Underneath was a turquoise morning dress. Forty splendid years old, give or take a year, he calculated. A pair of kid gloves and hazel-colored hair drawn up in a neat chignon. A small hat with two elegant pheasant feathers artfully attached to one side. No jewelry that he could see.
“I hear you’ve come from the Americas.”‘
“You’ve been well informed.”
“And apparently it was my first cousin Gustavo Zayas who transferred these properties into your name.”
“They came to me through him, indeed.”
They were now closer to one another, he having left the chapel, and she having finished climbing the stairs. The unwelcoming gallery, which in its days of former glory had seen the comings and goings of the Montalvo family, their friends, belongings, servants, and loved ones, was now the backdrop for this unlikely conversation between the new owner and the descendant of the previous ones.
“At a reasonable price?”
“Let’s just say at one that was advantageous to my interests.”
Sol Claydon allowed several seconds to go by, continuing to look straight at this man with his impressive frame and well-defined features who was standing before her in an attitude that was a mixture of respect and arrogance. He waited without reacting, struggling to ensure that beneath his apparent calm appearance she would not notice the profound uneasiness nagging at him.
“What about Luis?” she went on. “Did you also meet my cousin Luis?”
“Never,” he replied as firmly as possible, so that she would not be in the slightest doubt that he had ever had anything to do with that man’s journey to Cuba or his sad destiny there. He added: “His death occurred before I arrived in Havana, and so I can’t offer any further details. I’m sorry.”
At this, she turned her eyes from him and looked around her, at the peeling walls, the dirt, the desolation.
“What a shame you did not have the chance to see this in another time.”
She gave a slight smile, a hint of bitter nostalgia apparent at the corners of her mouth.
“Ever since receiving the news the day before yesterday that a prosperous gentleman from the New World was the new owner of our estate, I’ve been unable to stop reflecting on what my role ought to be in this unexpected turn of events.”
“We have only just finished going through all the documents; they are all legal and aboveboard,” he said defensively. He sounded brusque, and was immediately sorry for it. He made an attempt to be more neutral: “If you wish, you can verify everything at Don Senén Blanco’s office.”
Now there was a hint of subtle irony to her half smile.
“Naturally, I have already done so.”
Naturally. Or what were you thinking, you fool: that you were going to fleece her family and she was going to accept it on your say-so?
“What I was hoping,” she went on, “was to find a way to add to this transfer, as one might call it, some kind of ceremonial note, however slight. And, if you like, to add a touch of humanity.”
He had not the slightest idea of what she meant by this, but he nodded.
“Whatever you wish, madam, of course.”
With a look steeped in melancholy she gazed once more at the dreadful state of what had once been her home. He took advantage to take a good look at her. Her grace, her poise, her equanimity.
“I’m not here to hold you to account, Señor Larrea. As you can imagine, this situation is far from pleasant for me, but I understand that it is perfectly legal and as such I must accept it.”
He dipped his head again in recognition of her consideration.
“That being the case, and making the best of it that I can, as the last descendant of the unfortunate line of the Montalvos in Jerez, and before all memory of us is erased forever, I am here simply to symbolically lower our colors and to wish you all the best for the future.”
“Thank you for your kindness, Señora Claydon. But you might possibly be interested to know that I have no intention of keeping these properties. I am only in Spain temporarily, in order to arrange their sale and then to leave once more.”
“That is of no matter. However brief your stay may be, I don’t think it would go amiss for you to learn something about those of us who lived under these roofs before darkness fell on us. Would you care to come with me?”
Without waiting for a reply, she set off determinedly for the main salon. He had no choice but to follow.
It must have been hard for the Runt to match his physique with that of a good-looking family like the Montalvos. That was what the notary had told him while they were eating at the Victoria Inn a couple of days earlier. This was confirmed by this attractive woman with her easy step and fine bones who moved so freely past the torn wall hangings. Mauro Larrea, the supposedly powerful and rich returned emigrant, found himself robbed of all ability to respond, and so simply listened in silence.
“It was here that the big parties, dances, and receptions were organized. Our grandparents’ name days, the end of the wine harvest, our baptisms . . . There were carpets from Brussels and damask curtains, with a huge chandelier of crystal and bronze suspended from the ceiling. On that wall hung a Flemish tapestry with an extraordinary hunting scene, and there, between the window balconies, were some divine Venetian mirrors that my parents brought back from their honeymoon in Italy. They multiplied the light from the candles a hundredfold.”
She walked around the dark salon without looking at him. Her voice was bewitching, an Andalusian cadence somewhat tempered by her frequent use of English. She went over to the fireplace, glancing down at the dead pigeon that was still there on the floor. Then she moved on to the dining room.
“When we were ten, we were allowed to sit at table with the adults. It was a great occasion, a kind of coming out in society for children. At this table the best vintages from our winery were drunk, and French wine, too, lots of champagne. At Christmas, Paca, the cook, would kill three turkeys, and after dinner Uncle Luis and my father would bring in some Gypsies with their guitars, tambourines, and castanets. They would s
ing carols for us and dance, and afterward they took away what was left from our feast.”
She lifted the dust sheet from one of the few remaining chairs, then another, and a third, but could not find what she was looking for. She made a slight sound of annoyance.
“I wanted to show you our grandparents’ chairs: I’d forgotten they’d gone, too. The arms were carved like a lion’s claws: when I was really young they scared me stiff, but as I grew they began to fascinate me. During our wedding lunch, our grandparents let Edward and me sit in them. That was the only occasion they did not occupy their customary seats.”
The name of her husband was what least interested Mauro about her at that moment, and so it quickly slipped his mind. Instead he was taking in all the scraps and images of a bygone age that she evoked as they went from room to room. She dismissed the bedrooms and the smaller rooms with a few insignificant remarks, until they came back to the part of the gallery where they had first met. She went into the last room. It was completely bare and gave no clue as to what it had once been.
“And this was the game room. Our favorite place. Señor Larrea, do you have a game room in your house in . . . ?”
There were three seconds of silence before he completed the sentence.
“In Mexico. My home is in Mexico City. And, yes, it might be said that I have a game room there, too.”
At least I did, he thought. Now it is teetering on the brink, and however incredible it might seem, it depends on this house of yours whether I keep or lose it.
“And what games do you play there?” she asked pleasantly.
“A bit of everything.”
“Billiards, for example?”
He hid his suspicions beneath a false casualness.
“Yes, madam. We also play billiards.”
“In here we used to have a magnificent mahogany table,” she said, standing in the center of the room and stretching out her slender silk-swathed arms. “My father and my uncles used to play superb games that often lasted all night. My grandmother was like a harpy when she saw his friends coming downstairs in the early morning, disheveled after a night’s entertainment.”
Long journeys to Italy, celebrations with Gypsies and guitars, games of billiards with friends until the early hours. Larrea was beginning to understand old Don Matías’s determination to keep his descendants on a tight rein after his death.
“As we became a little older,” Soledad went on, “grandfather took on a billiard teacher for my cousins. He was a rather eccentric Frenchman who was a real master. My sister Inés and I would slip in to watch them: it was far more interesting than sitting and doing embroidery for the orphans in the foundling hospital, as they used to try to make us do.”
So that’s where your skill came from, Zayas, Larrea thought, recalling the way his opponent had played: the complicated shots, the subtle ricochets. And under the scrutiny of this pair of eyes trying to penetrate his armor as a solid, wealthy miner from far away, he found it impossible to say nothing.
“I had the occasion to play your cousin Gustavo at billiards in Havana.”
As a dark, leaden cloud obscures the sun, Soledad Montalvo’s eyes suddenly seemed to darken.
“Is that so?” she said, her voice icy.
“One night. Two games.”
She took several steps toward the door, as though she had not heard him or wished to put an end to this particular conversation. All of a sudden she stopped and turned to face him.
“He was always the best player of all. I don’t know if he told you, but he never lived permanently in Jerez. When they married, his parents—my uncle and aunt—set up house in Seville, but he spent long periods here with us: Christmas, Easter, the wine harvest. He always dreamt of coming here: to him, this was paradise. Then he left for good, and I haven’t heard anything of him for the past two decades.”
She paused a few moments before asking: “How is he?”
Ruined. Tormented. Unhappy, without a doubt. Tied to a ghastly woman he doesn’t love. And I’ve done my bit to push him even further under. Larrea could have said all this to her, but instead he bit his tongue.
“Well, I suppose,” he lied instead. “We did not meet very often, except on social occasions. We only played billiards together once. After that . . . after that we were involved in a few business matters, and for a variety of reasons we ended up carrying out the operation that led to these properties passing into my hands.”
He had tried to be as vague as possible without sounding false; convincing without giving anything away. Since he had been so imprecise, he was expecting her to come back with the awkward questions for which he had no answer. About one cousin or the other, possibly even about the woman with whom they had formed a triangle in Luis’s final days.
However, Sol Claydon’s curiosity led her in another direction.
“And who won those games?”
Even though he was trying with all his might to keep it silent, he finally heard inside his head the voice he had not wanted to hear. Don’t be such a fool! Keep your mouth shut! Change the conversation right now; don’t go there, Mauro, don’t go there. And silently he replied: Be quiet, Elias, let me share with this woman the only wretched triumph I’ve had in a very long time. Can’t you see that, despite her polite attention, to her I’m nothing more than an upstart, a usurper? Let me show her a little pride, brother. It’s all I have left; don’t make me swallow that as well.
“I did.”
He tried to protect himself. So that Soledad Montalvo would not continue trying to find out about his unfortunate rival, he immediately asked another question.
“Was your cousin Luis also a billiards enthusiast?”
Her face took on a nostalgic look.
“It was impossible for him. He was always a small, weak child, a tiny little thing. And from about the age of eleven or twelve, he ceased to grow altogether. He was seen by doctors all over Spain; they even took him to Berlin to be examined by a supposedly miracle-working specialist. They tortured the poor child: iron calipers, leather thongs to hang him by his feet. But no one could find the cause or the cure.”
She ended in almost a whisper: “I can still hardly believe that Little Runt is dead.”
Little Runt, she called him, the vivid popular expression from the region contrasting with her usual cosmopolitan sophistication. When she mentioned Luis, all the coldness she had shown when talking about Gustavo suddenly became tenderness, as if the two cousins represented opposite poles in her affections.
“According to what I heard from the notary,” said Larrea, “nobody knew he was in Cuba. Or that he had passed away.”
She smiled once more, again with that hint of irony on her lips.
“Those who needed to know did.”
She fell silent, staring straight at him as though weighing up if it was worth continuing to satisfy the curiosity of a stranger.
“The only people who knew were his doctor and I,” she finally conceded. “We heard the news of his death a few weeks ago, when Dr. Ysasi received a letter from Gustavo. We were still waiting to receive the death certificate to announce his passing and to organize the funeral.”
“I’m sorry to have been the one to bring everything to a head so quickly.”
She shrugged graciously, as if to say, What can one do?
Don’t go any further, you idiot. Don’t even think it. These peremptory warnings whipped through his brain, but he quickly sidestepped them.
“Or perhaps your cousin was intending to come to Jerez to bring the news himself.”
Sol Claydon’s brown eyes opened as big as saucers. She asked incredulously: “Was that truly his intention?”
“I believe he was considering it, although in the end he rejected the idea.”
What emerged from her throat was almost a sob.
“Gustavo back in Jer
ez, my goodness . . .”
There was noise from down below. Santos Huesos had just returned. With that sixth sense of his that led him to detect any tense situation from leagues away, he immediately realized his master was not alone and stole away again.
By then, however, Sol Claydon had recovered her aplomb.
“Well, these are unfortunate family questions I won’t bore you with any further, Señor Larrea,” she said. The friendly tone had returned to her voice. “I think I’ve taken up far too much of your time; as I said when I arrived, my only wish was to welcome you here. And possibly, deep down, to renew my acquaintance with my past in this house before bidding it a final good-bye.”
She hesitated, as if unsure whether or not to continue.
“Do you know that for years we thought my daughters would be Luis’s heirs? That was what was in his original will.”
So he changed his will at the last moment, did he? Damn and blast him. Why? An unexpected change that favored Gustavo Zayas and Carola Gorostiza. And, by extension, him. A cold sweat trickled down his back. Cut loose, my friend. Step away; keep out of it. That crazy sister of your son’s future father-in-law has already got you into enough trouble.
Trying to disguise his confusion, Larrea replied in all sincerity: “I hadn’t the faintest idea.”
“Well, I’m afraid that is how it is.”
Had Sol Claydon been a different kind of woman, she might possibly have aroused at least a hint of compassion amid his wariness. But the last of the Montalvos was not the sort to provoke pity. That was why she gave him no time to react.
“I have four of them, you know. The eldest is nineteen, the youngest has just turned eleven. They’re half-English, half-Spanish.”
This was followed by a brief pause, and then another question that, like most of the others, caught him off guard.
“Do you have children, Mauro?”
She had called him by his first name, and something stirred inside him. It had been a long time since any woman had penetrated his intimate world in this way. Far too long.
He swallowed.