The Mapmaker's Opera

by Bea Gonzalez

  “For the señorita,” Diego says, handing Sofia a pair of opera glasses.

  Diego lays out a cotton blanket and invites the señorita to sit, to wait for the performance to begin.

  “Performance, Diego?” Sofia asks, eyebrows raised.

  “Yes, Sofia, an opera of the most sublime kind,” the young man responds as he takes a seat by her side.

  Two Lineated Woodpeckers begin to hack at a tree, with a loud and insistent sound that resembles a series of drum rolls.

  ‘Ah, the overture,” Diego whispers, “to this private performance of A Song with Wings.”

  Diego and Sofia pick up their opera glasses and prepare to take it all in.

  They sit there quietly, their eyes fixed on the sky and the trees. They watch the Cave Swallows dance their aerial ballet, admire the Rose-Throated Becard with its rosy-red throat and its blackish head. They listen to a duet sung by a pair of Green Jays, the birds’ brilliant plumage resplendent in the afternoon light. The first one sings a tune and then waits as the second jay repeats the song in a higher pitch.

  They admire the bearing of a Crane Hawk. “A bass, for sure,” Diego says, pointing out the bird’s long black tail, the narrow white band across the underwing, the assurance with which the bird stares at them from his perch.

  More music follows—from the deafening chaa of a Brown Jay to the buzzy and clear whistled syllables of the Tropical Mockingbird. Aria after aria, bird after bird, so many performances to admire, so many birds to hear and see.

  After some time, Diego puts down the field glasses and begins to speak, not of his feelings for her, not even of the birds that have serenaded them on this day, but of his past, his mother, Mónica, his father, Emilio, that fateful day when he had walked across Seville to be humiliated by the very man who had ruined his mother’s life. He speaks about the futility of that time, of the memories that have been torturing him of late as if he had left pieces of himself behind, the feeling he has suddenly that the ocean that separates him from his own history is no longer vast enough. It is time to go north, he tells her, to follow the birds along their migratory path and find consolation, nourishment under skies of a different sort.

  “Would you join me?” he asks. Mr. Nelson has offered him a position in Washington. They could travel there and begin working on other bird guides, embark on other projects, big and small. There is little he could offer her but this. He is a man of little means, of no wealth at all.

  “I have only my future to offer,” he says, “the promise Mr. Nelson has seen in the work I have done.”

  He tries then to put his love into words but finds that his mind will not comply. He thinks back to the advice Very Useful has offered on how to court the girl—praise her eyes, her smile, her fascinating mind—but such talk seems impossible now that the moment has arrived. Diego is no poet, has no facility with words, his talent is in his hands and they seem useless now, hanging awkwardly by his side.

  But there are, it turns out, no words needed, for Sofia is saying yes already, yes to the migration to the north, yes to him, Diego, yes to the life she has merely dreamed about until now. She takes his awkward hands into hers then and makes them come alive, all uncertainty, all fears banished for this one perfect moment in time.

  *

  Back in Mérida, as the duo trills and hums their love to each other outside of town, it does not take Doña Laura long to wrench the truth from little Bernardo, who is quickly made to confess to the fact that Sofia has left with Diego, their intended destination a mystery even to him.

  Nelson and Very Useful are immediately summoned to the house by an agitated Doña Laura, who sees in Sofia’s sudden absence all the portents of doom. In truth, it is not for Sofia that she fears but for the young woman’s reputation, already tattered and frail, about to be delivered the last death stroke by this sudden disappearance with a Spanish peón of no known name or wealth.

  “A wastrel!” Doña Laura raves. “A seducer of young girls!” she accuses, trying with the weight of her outrage to lay all of the blame at the young man’s feet. Even now it seems impossible for her to believe that Sofia has been foolish enough to agree to such a thing. Está loca, completamente loca. The girl has descended into madness, the old lady thinks to herself.

  Out loud, the old lady insists on an entirely different thing instead. “She is a decent girl who would never behave in such a way unless wickedly misled.” She stares hard at Nelson, who is standing there stiffly holding his hat in his hands, his spectacles cloudy from the oppressive humidity of the day, watching silently as the old woman vents her considerable rage.

  “Even if Sofia did consent to such a meeting—” (and deep in her heart, buried beneath her outrage, Doña Laura knows that Sofia did—after all, had she herself not witnessed a disquieting moment between the two? But she dismisses this thought immediately, no use revealing this to the others just yet.) “Even if the girl did consent,” she says again, resuming her tirade, “I do not believe she could have known what that scoundrel had in mind.”

  ‘A walk in the forest, I believe,” Very Useful now says, tired of this woman’s vituperation, the exaggerated accusations that have silenced Don Roberto, that have reduced Aunt Marta to tears, that have Bernardo cowering in a corner and that have left even the usually voluble Gabriela bereft of words.

  “A walk in the forest?” the old woman spits out, incredulity stamped across her face.

  “Yes, Doña Laura, I believe they were going to be looking at some birds,” Very Useful replies in his most respectful tone, his eyes expressionless, his mouth turgid and white.

  “Birds? They were going to look at birds in a forest?” The old woman cannot believe her ears. She raises her hands to the sky, harrumphs loudly and brings her arms crashing back onto her lap.

  “Edward,” Don Roberto now says, ignoring his mother’s theatrics as he attempts to make sense of the afternoon’s events, “were you aware of the outing Diego had planned?”

  “No, Roberto, I most certainly was not,” a tired Nelson replies. All eyes now turn to Very Useful, who is still standing there rigidly, proudly, eyes staring straight ahead, chin held high.

  Mercifully, Very Useful is spared, for it is just at this moment that the two lovers arrive, their joy instantly banished once they see the group that is waiting for them inside the courtyard of the house.

  “Sofia!” Aunt Marta cries out, running to the girl as if she has just returned from the arms of death itself, enveloping her in a fierce embrace, worried more for what the girl is about to face than whatever ill she may have encountered until now.

  Diego and Sofia walk up to the group, determination in their eyes. They have expected this scene, have anticipated the reactions during their long trip back. They are determined to announce their love, determined to declare their intention to be wed. Still, when Diego meets the eyes of his patrón he cannot but feel ashamed. He has failed him, he sees that now; there is a weariness in Mr. Nelson’s gaze that Diego has never seen before.

  “Scoundrel!” the old lady accuses as she gets up from the bench, hobbling over to them with her forefinger pointed in the air. The finger of God, Sofia thinks, her heart harder than stone, attempting to push me into the infierno itself.

  But no, to that she will not consent. Twenty-two years have been purgatory enough. Sofia steps forward, lifts her own chin in the air, shields Diego from her grandmother, who is looking menacingly his way.

  “No, not a scoundrel, Abuela. He is the man whom I have pledged to marry and will marry with your approval or not.”

  “Marry? Marry?” the old woman screeches out. “And what makes you think, Señorita, that this marriage will be allowed?”

  “It will be allowed because I wish it to be so,” the young girl replies, her voice firm, and now grandmother and grandchild are standing facing each other, in the same position they assumed the day Sofia’s friend Rosita died.

  The charged silence that follows is broken suddenly by the so
und of the slap that strikes Sofia hard across the face.

  “No!” Diego cries out. He has been transported in time, finds himself suddenly back inside Don Ricardo’s house. The young man grabs Sofia, moves her gently to one side.

  ‘And what is wrong with her marrying me, Señora?” he asks, his voice trembling, rage in his eyes.

  “Sofia, marry you?” the old lady replies, mouth opened wide. “Por favor! A man with no name, no wealth to offer, nothing but a pair of dirty boots, not even a proper Castilian accent to speak his mother tongue with. A nobody from Andalucía, attempting to sully a decent girl’s name.”

  “Señora, with all due respect,” Diego answers, “do not speak to me about a name. My father was Don Ricardo Medina, a member of one of the most distinguished families in Seville, a marqués, in fact, and a distant relative of none other than the Duke of Medina Sidonia himself. Clemente was my mother’s name.”

  It will take Diego a moment to acknowledge what has just escaped from his lips. Has he just admitted Don Ricardo as his father, dear God? Ah, but we are all sinners in the end, he hears his Uncle Alfonso say, all guilty of vanity and conceit, going straight to the Devil once our appointment with death comes up.

  “Oh, and where is your father now?” the old lady asks, hope rising in her chest. Could it be, could it possibly be that her granddaughter has landed a much bigger catch?

  “Dead,” Diego responds flatly. “He died impoverished many years ago.”

  The hope that had swelled briefly in Doña Laura’s chest now collapses like a house of cards. “A distinguished lineage will not feed my granddaughter, Señorito,” she spits out. Nor, more importantly, save this family from its ruinous debt, she adds to herself.

  It is now Don Roberto who steps forward, who takes Sofia by the hand. “Let us put this matter to rest for the moment. Take some time to collect ourselves. Can we agree to meet back here four days hence to allow us some time to think things through more carefully?” He looks to Sofia and then to Diego, waits for them to give their consent with nods of the head, silences his mother with a stare.

  The group disperses then, Sofia walking with her father into his office, Diego, Very Useful and Nelson taking leave of the house after issuing a quick bow Gabriela’s way.

  The three men cross the street in silence, oblivious to the merriment that surrounds them as they walk. In the background on the edge of the Plaza Mayor a mariachi band is singing of lost love. Night is falling and Mérida looks especially beautiful now in the half-light of dusk, in that moment just before the electric lights are lit and everything has an otherworldly look.

  They walk to the square, Nelson ahead, Diego and Very Useful following quietly two steps behind.

  Once there, Nelson instructs his assistants to take a seat by his side. There is much to discuss, he says to them and his usual gentle manner has been replaced by an exhaustion, a weariness that has seeped into his face and that even in that beautiful half-light makes him appear much older than his years.

  “My work here is done,” he says flatly after a pause.

  “Done, patrón?” Very Useful asks, alarm in his voice. “Surely not. There are more birds to study, infinite birds to draw.”

  “Birds that can be studied and easily drawn by Diego, Sofia and Don Roberto—with your help of course, Very Useful.”

  “No, no, patrón, forgive me but they cannot. Diego here is an amateur at most and besides, Doña Laura will string him up by the toes if he tries to get near the girl again.”

  “I will speak to Don Roberto myself. Make him see that Diego would make the perfect husband for the girl. His love of birds, his knowledge of books—I am sure my old friend will see it is for the best.”

  Nelson turns to Diego now, who is sitting next to him silently, looking down at his feet.

  “And what do you think?”

  “That I am sorry to have created a rift between you and an old friend, Mr. Nelson,” the young man says, genuinely perturbed by what has occurred back at Sofia’s house.

  “Do not worry, my boy, do not worry one bit. The whole thing was worth it. How else would I have seen Doña Laura riled up to such a degree?”

  “Ah, do not joke, patrón,” Very Useful says, a shiver running down his spine. “That woman is the very Devil herself. A Medusa, a crazed witch. Why, I was certain for a moment that she was going to rip out my liver and chop my head into bits. No, no love in the world, señores, would persuade this man to marry into that viper’s nest.”

  “Don Ricardo Medina was not my father,” Diego says quietly after a pause.

  “Eh?” Very Useful cries out. “Not your father! What a quick thinker you are, Diego, inventing a marqués to provide you with some societal heft! Brilliant, utterly brilliant, my friend.” Very Useful laughs, pats Diego heartily on the back.

  But it is not brilliant, it is devastating, Diego thinks. He has spoken that despised name so as to quiet an old woman with pretensions to royalty herself. He has forsaken Emilio, the father who had raised him with all the love in the world, and he has managed, despite all of his patróns assurances to the contrary, to fail Mr. Nelson once again.

  He walks back to their house in silence, the splendid afternoon spent with Sofia forgotten momentarily as he castigates himself for his unguarded tongue, for the little loyalty he had demonstrated to the one person he had loved most in the world.

  *

  Back inside Don Roberto’s house, father and daughter have retreated to his office to discuss the day’s events far from Doña Laura’s prying eyes.

  “Hija,” an exhausted Don Roberto tells Sofia, disappointment in his voice, “this is not how things are done. You have made matters very difficult for me. I cannot see how I can now easily patch things up.”

  Sofia is aggrieved by her father’s obvious displeasure, the exhaustion she hears flowing through his words. She notices for the first time the lines that have etched themselves on his face, the sudden droopiness in his gait. How has this happened, she asks herself, when did my father suddenly succumb to the ravages of old age? She would like to rise up and erase each of those lines with the tips of her fingers, but she sits there immobilized by her shame. Still, she has taken a decisive step, knows there can be no turning back. She has tasted the first breath of freedom; renouncing a future with Diego is simply not in the cards, even in the light of her father’s dis-appointment, the futility that has come to mask his face.

  “And what is wrong with Diego?” she asks him quietly after a pause. “Have you not always praised him, commended him for his talent, lauded his sense of responsibility, his quick mind?”

  “Hija, this is not about the qualities the young man may or may not possess. This is about comportment, about how one is expected to behave.”

  Even to himself, his words sound hollow, barren of any of the truths he holds deep in his heart: for has the boy not indeed impressed him with his discerning eye, his knack for spotting the tiniest of birds that fly in and out of sight? Has he not often marvelled at Diego’s abilities, how he can depict a bird so majestically that it seems to be caught in mid-flight? Has he not sworn those drawings could deceive him, make him believe, even, that he could hear the bird’s call, the sound the wings made as they soar into the sky? And is he not hiding now behind convention, is he not cowering behind the very customs he has always claimed to despise? And what are the reasons for it, he asks himself, this disappointment that seems wedged in his bones—of course he believes his daughter’s words, does not doubt her account of how things had unfolded earlier on, does not have reason to think that their venture into the field had not been prompted by the desire to rejoice in something he himself loves—the birds, as always, the birds.

  Later he will suffer the indignity of having these very questions put to him by his dear friend Edward Nelson, who will arrive soaked to the bones from the torrential downpour that falls on Mérida all that evening, looking as if the weight of the world has fallen upon his shoulders too, as if he
has cause to feel more exhaustion than Roberto. Not only does Roberto face the prospect of a looming battle with the women of the house but also the burden of his own uneasiness and why am I so uneasy? he asks himself again. He will be forced to listen as his friend expounds on the many virtues possessed by young Diego, the same virtues Roberto has enumerated silently to himself during the long afternoon, and he will have no choice but to agree that there is nothing deficient in the young man’s character, that he is indeed as noble and as refined as they come.

  And yet. There is no getting rid of that feeling, no way to fully unearth the objection that lingers just beneath his breath.

  And now before him is his daughter, face tear-stained but an unshakeable conviction keeping her head erect, the conviction she has possessed since she was a child and which he has so admired, whether it applied to birds, to books, to the plight of the hacienda’s labouring children or to the importance, now, of love—it is all the same, it is her strength he admires, that erect spine, that raised chin.

  And yet, he tells himself again. And yet.

  Sofia’s eyes have been fixed on the ground all this time, though her head is indeed held high. After all, she has done nothing wrong except to defend her right to choose whom she loves, to carve a future for herself with a man who understands her need to express herself as he himself does, who will allow her the freedom to indulge in her heart’s desires—field glasses and drawing pencil in hand, and the birds, yes, as always, the birds.

  Later she will be forced to suffer a visit from her distraught grandmother, who will come to her room not with the battle axe raised high, but armed with a more potent weapon yet, her grief, her tears, the desperation that has been eating away at her flesh for years now, years of watching her son sink deeper and deeper into debt. What will become of us? she will ask her granddaughter. What will happen if you squander our one opportunity, our one chance at being saved from the claws of ruin?