Mundaca: A Tale of Intrigue, Romance and Surfing in Franco's Spain

by Owen Hargreaves

  ‘I’ve heard about you.’

  She blushed. ‘A fellow artist?’

  ‘Commercial,’ Greg clarified. ‘This is for fun.’

  Maite leaned forward to look at his sketch. ‘Muy bien.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘She’s an art student,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, you told me.’ Greg smiled at her. ‘A few times.’

  Maite flushed. A hand appeared from the far side of the car, beckoning her.

  ‘I better go. And you should too. My cousin’s not the patient type.’

  We shook hands. ‘Thanks for the book,’ I said, her hand in mine.

  ‘Have you read it?’

  ‘Parts of it.’

  ‘Muy bien.’ Her grip tightened. ‘Read it all.’ Her voice took on a harder edge. ‘Then you will understand.’

  The car’s horn sounded in two sharp trills. Her grip dissolved, but she caught me with her eyes. ‘We’ll meet again.’

  ‘How will I contact you?’

  ‘Not here, please, you’ll get into trouble if you trespass again. I’ll come to Mundaca, to the bars, one Friday or Saturday night.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’ Her cousin stood, half out of the car. ‘Soon.’ She set off down the slope through the swirling sea of grass.

  We arrived back in Mundaca an hour before dark. The surf was good, but the tide was dropping fast. Jim and Dave had had their fill and were getting out via the port wall steps while we were entering the water near the cannon. The sun was sinking behind the hills and the light beginning to fade.

  ‘Do you think it’s a bit late?’ I asked, as we stroked across the port’s calm waters.

  ‘Come on, man. We handled it well the last time. A piece of cake.’

  ‘But the tide was coming in that day.’

  ‘I think we’ve got it wired. That session has given me wings. What would George do? And your brother?’

  I knew what George would do, and John. ‘Alright,’ I said, still on a high from seeing Maite. ‘But be careful.’

  We paddled out, the channel a torrent where the sea tried to empty itself from the river mouth. Before we knew it, we’d been carried out beyond the break and had to circle around, paddling furiously against the outgoing tide to reach the takeoff area. The wind had lightened, making the drop easier, and before long we’d both snared two silky long rides on glasssmooth waves.

  ‘One for the road,’ said Greg.

  We sat waiting for the next set, the sun well gone and darkness closing in.

  ‘Man, I can’t see a thing!’ Greg was squinting out to sea.

  ‘Mate, here comes a set.’

  ‘Hell!’

  Greg dropped late. His board shot up and disappeared. He resurfaced, yelled, ‘Shit, leg rope’s broken.’ He duck-dived under the second wave. I took the drop to the bottom and straightened out, abandoning the ride. I lay down, bouncing along, waiting for the wave’s power to dissipate, angling towards the channel, pushing hard and fast in towards the headland, now a black silhouette against the indigo sky.

  As luck would have it, Greg’s board was moving steadily in front of me on its way out to sea. I secured the trailing leg rope to mine and paddled hard. But where the hell was Greg?

  I spotted Jim on the headland. ‘Have you seen Greg?’ I yelled, paddling closer to shore. ‘I’ve found his surfboard, but not him!’

  ‘No!’ he yelled back, clearly distressed. ‘I saw him fall, but lost sight of him in the whitewater.’

  I cleared the channel and reached the still waters of the port. Save for the dull amber light cast by the port lamps over the swaying boats, it was pitch-dark. I paddled swiftly to the steps on the port wall where Jim was waiting.

  ‘Leave the boards here, mate!’

  We scampered along the seawall and ran as fast as we could around the edge of the port, up the street to Plaza Santa Catalina and along the narrow, walled-in dirt path to the other port wall. Bare-footed, the rocky path slowed me down. Jim, shoes on, arrived there first. ‘Greg!’ he screamed repeatedly towards the shadows of the rocky point. I joined in and we battled the crash and roar of the breaking waves. Our shouts grew more desperate.

  ‘Jesus!’ Jim screamed at me. ‘Where the hell is he?’

  ‘I don’t know. I think he’s been carried out to sea! What’ll we do?’

  ‘I don’t know! You lads are bloody idiots, why didn’t you come in earlier?’

  ‘We should have, but it got dark so quickly!’

  ‘Crazy fools!’

  We were close to giving up and running to raise the alarm when Greg, crab-like in the dim amber light, came clambering over the rocks beyond the foot of the port wall. Jim and I jumped up and down, hugging. Tears streamed down my face.

  ‘Greg! Are you okay, mate?’ I yelled.

  His reply was muffled by the breaking waves.

  We scampered down the narrow steps cut into the ocean side and helped him to the top of the port wall. He lay for a few minutes and sat up, gasping. ‘I got caught in the damn channel and was heading out to sea,’ he said between breaths. ‘I knew I couldn’t fight the current, so I swam towards the rocks and when I reached the passage, I managed to grab the last rock on the point and pull myself on to it. I thought I was a goner! I nearly missed it!’ He took a long slow breath. ‘I could see the port lights … but it’s dark out there. Those rocks are sharp, man!’

  His feet were a bloody mess and his hands not much better.

  ‘Could you hear us?’ asked Jim.

  ‘I couldn’t hear anything, man, except the surf. Once I hit land, I headed to the port lights. But I kept slipping over.’

  ‘We thought you’d drowned!’ I said, my voice hoarse. ‘I shouldn’t have rushed you into taking that wave.’

  ‘Not your fault, man. I should have made the drop.’

  We nursed him back to the piso and I went to collect the boards.

  ‘You found it!’ Greg was happy to see his beloved board again.

  ‘Yeah. It popped up in front of me.’

  But it was a minor detail. He’d had a brush with death.

  ‘Luck’s a fortune,’ I added, glancing at Jim, silent beside him, a stony look in his eye.

  In our own way, Jim and I had felt the grasping pull of the current, the stinging sharpness of the rocks with that last desperate lunge, the tenuous grip on life, straining to hold on, reeling one’s self in, the pounding of the surf on clambering shoreward, like a drum beat, a portent of our ultimate fate. For Jim and I it was in the all-too-real imagining, for Greg it was palpable. He’d felt the tentacles of death wrapped around his legs.

  Is that how soldiers felt — out of their depth, out of control, fearing death? Fighting the elements to survive made sense to me. Fighting other humans didn’t. What drove those soldiers to fight and kill? Did they have a choice, a real choice? Do any of us have a real choice in life?

  With the rising swell, vanloads of surfers snuck into Mundaca overnight and set up camp in the car park. They surfed with us across the morning, and the following days, until the swell died. Greg’s feet and hands were sore but he was determined to surf and, ignoring the pain, managed some of the best rides.

  Finally, we could experience the beautiful waves we had dreamt so long about. We surfed each day until we could paddle no more. One speeding ride after another, a blur of endless, silky pleasure. At night, sated, we floated around the bars with our surfing brethren, chatting, reliving the day, before collapsing into an unshakeable sleep.

  News among the surfers was that the Guardia Civil had killed two ETA militants, one in Madrid and one in Barcelona and an ETA militant had been sentenced to death for murdering a Guardia in Barcelona. The surfers were edgy talking about it, the news delivered in low voices away from the bars. And there was more. The day I’d seen Maite, the Spanish government had executed two ETA militants.

  When the weekend came, I looked for her in the bars, but she didn’t show. ‘Where the hell is
she? Why hasn’t she come?’ I muttered, while I dragged through the village laneways on one last round.

  The swell diminished substantially and then was gone. It was difficult to comprehend the rapid transition from towering waves to a tame, still ocean. With the lake-like serenity, began the exodus. One by one the surfers’ vans, entrails retracted, departed the car park. Jim and Dave headed north back to France and the UK, and others south to Morocco to escape the winter.

  Greg was the last to go. He planned to sell the car back to the same dealer in Biarritz, fly to Madrid, and on to California. My mate packed his belongings into the boot of our little Citroen. We stared at each other long and hard, embraced and shook hands.

  The motor spluttered, and died. He paused, head down, and took a big breath. The motor kicked alive and held. He edged away from the port wall and the window went down. He was grinning, all bravado. ‘Be seeing you, Owen! Adiós, mi amigo!’

  ‘See you, mate.’ My voice sounded distant, strangled. ‘Take care, buddy.’ My smile died when he departed up the cobblestone street and out of Mundaca, back to France. I watched until he drove out of sight, an empty feeling in my chest. Another brother lost. My real brother seemed more mythical than real. Greg was the brother that loves you more, because they don’t have to. A knot tied in common thread. It seemed the thread was unravelling. No friends. No Maite.

  Perhaps my parents were right, and I should have stuck with the original plan.

  I missed them. Home. Louise’s ghost standing in front of the heater. A boat strained on its mooring behind me and a seagull angled on the breeze across the little port and flew off into the empty sky. I looked around. Nobody. Only the hard stone walls and cobbled streets.

  The sudden quiet of our room at Maria’s was depressing. Alone, I felt deflated, isolated, bereft. I tried to study Spanish with the well-thumbed text Greg had left behind but couldn’t concentrate. ‘Jesus!’ I picked up George’s book but couldn’t focus. ‘Bugger this!’

  My thoughts turned to John. Following him to Morocco was tempting, but Agadir was so far away. Chasing after him was a wild goose chase. What if I got there and he’d moved on? Too risky. And after Greg’s experience, I was even less tempted.

  The room felt suffocating. I had to get out and not just for a few hours. I had to find another place to stay, my own place, where I could spread out. Somewhere I might even invite Maite.

  Maria appeared from the kitchen when I neared the front door. ‘Where are you off to, muchacho?’

  ‘A long walk.’

  ‘Alone?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She studied me. ‘You look sad. Time you found a new friend … a girlfriend perhaps.’

  I frowned. ‘A girlfriend?’

  ‘Why not? Only, take care. A girl’s honour is important. To be shamed in a village like Mundaca is a lifelong curse. Not many girls would risk that.’

  ‘I guess not.’ I tried to smile and went out.

  I circled around the village and up the hill behind Mundaca. Near the summit I gazed back down on the village and the estuary. It seemed unbearably calm and quiet. I lay back in the grass and for a long while watched the clouds change shape as they drifted by.

  Carmen’s son-in-law nodded sleepily when I took up a stool at the far end of the wooden bar at Bar El Puerto. I couldn’t face returning to Maria and Adolfo’s piso. It was Friday night, but not yet dark. Maybe this would be the night Maite turned up.

  ‘Qué quieres? Vino?’ the bartender asked languidly, still rousing from his snooze.

  ‘Una cerveza.’

  I’d confined myself to beer since a horrible experience with the dregs of the giant wine flagon. I thumbed through El Correo, turning the newsprint pages slowly, perusing the articles, studying the photographs. A double-page article detailed an ETA car bombing from two years earlier, with photos of the burnt-out vehicle and several dead bodies. ETA suspects had been arrested near the French border; photos showed two bearded men and a slim woman, hands cuffed, being escorted by Guardia Civil into a police van. The men appeared sullen and resigned while they bent to get in, but the woman, gazing straight into the camera, appeared distraught, as if she didn’t belong there. Maite! But no, the girl in the newspaper was clearly older. Did Maite have a sister? If so, with ETA? Surely not.

  ‘Pepe!’

  The call stirred the bartender from his half-sleep. ‘Ah, Manolo!’

  Manolo took his place behind the bar, removed his boina, the Basque beret, to reveal thick brown hair tinged with grey at the temples, and rolled up the sleeves of his pressed white shirt. He saw my glass was empty and approached, tea towel in hand. ‘Otra cerveza, muchacho?’ His lively eyes were surprisingly blue and sat deep below the arches of his neat dark eyebrows. He had large ears, a large fleshy nose and a muscular neck, but you could see the resemblance to Carmen. ‘Another beer?’

  ‘Sí, gracías,’ I replied.

  ‘Speak English?’ he asked with an American accent.

  ‘Yes.’ I was taken aback by his brusque manner.

  ‘Australian!’ he said with a sudden spark in his eye. ‘Muchacho, I worked in Queensland cutting cane for a year.’ He smiled warmly, his broad shoulders relaxing when he leant on the bar. ‘Which part are you from?’

  ‘Melbourne.’

  ‘I never went there.’ He rubbed his strong hands together, the network of veins on the back of them prominent. ‘But I did visit Sydney. What a beautiful city! Magnífico! And what brings you to Mundaca?’

  ‘Well, I’m here by accident, really.’

  He grinned. ‘Life is like that, muchacho. The unexpected adventures are always the best! So what will you do?’

  ‘I’m going to surf!’ I said, almost defensively.

  ‘Ah, of course, the surfing!’ he said. ‘I saw them in Queensland, on the Gold Coast, beautiful to watch! Never tried it myself. I didn’t have time, in the end. I had to go back to the States to sort out my divorce.’

  ‘Shame,’ I said. With his physique, he would have made a good surfer.

  ‘Do you know jai alai?’

  ‘Yes.’ I’d seen the Basque game jai alai on TV at the casino. I patted the newspaper. ‘There are photos in here of yesterday’s game. So fast.’ Much faster than the pelota I’d watched at the fiesta, because the players used a wicker hurling device called a cesta inside a walled court.

  ‘It’s a big gambling sport in parts of America. A lot of Basques emigrated there. South America too, especially Chile. Anyway, I played professionally over there for a few years. I did okay, but I got injured. Because it’s incredibly fast, you need to be fit!’ He surveyed his hands and forearms, and shook his head. ‘Sometimes you have to re-invent yourself, muchacho! These days I teach history to university students. Not much older than you.’ He picked up the tea towel. ‘But today I’m here, helping out. My nephew Pepe, the sleepy one, works the bar with my sister. He and his wife Rosa have a new baby and they’re exhausted. Carmen’s there now, minding the grand-daughter.’

  That explained his less than professional beer pouring skills.

  ‘I love it here in Spain,’ I said, gazing out the window across the port to the river mouth.

  He lowered his voice. ‘Not Spain, muchacho. This is the Basque country! We are not Spanish.’ He shook his upraised finger in the way many locals did, signifying, no, no, no! ‘Look, muchacho.’ He leaned across the bar. ‘Basque people are proud. You must understand their situation.’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I said. ‘I know a little. I’ve been reading about the Civil War and talking to others.’

  ‘Civil War?’ He checked to see if anyone had come into the bar unnoticed. ‘What about it? Be careful who you talk to about these things. It might be history, but it’s also political, and you best not get mixed up in politics around here. It’s ruthless. And there are spies.’

  ‘Really?’

  He frowned. ‘Franco has his ways. He rules with an iron fist. He’s repressed all potential threats to his regi
me.’

  ‘And to his vision of Spain?’

  ‘Yes, fascism, that’s what it is!’

  ‘He called it National Socialism.’

  ‘So did Hitler.’

  ‘Franco didn’t kill Jews though, did he?’ I said.

  ‘No. He wasn’t mad. More cunning, calculated.’

  ‘And staunchly Catholic, isn’t he?’

  Manolo snorted. ‘We all were. Well, most of us. Even the anarchists, who said they weren’t. Catholics, deep down.’

  ‘The Catholic Church sided with the fascists during the Civil War. True?’

  ‘They did!’ He made as if to spit, but thought better of it. ‘They deserted us.’ He took a deep breath and exhaled through his nostrils. ‘Officially, we aren’t allowed to speak Basque, you know.’ He swivelled around again, as if someone might be listening. ‘ETA wants an independent Basque state based on Marxism.’ He threw his hands up. ‘Most people want democracy. Who will accept a communist state?’

  I shrugged.

  ‘Not many.’ He leaned towards me again. ‘But because they’re Basque and against Franco, they’ve had support.’ His thick black eyebrows arched upward. ‘You might be surprised, but across the border in France, our Basque brothers have helped ETA too. Many activists have taken refuge there.’

  ‘I heard that.’

  ‘The border is easy to cross in certain parts and Franco can’t control it. He even asked the French government to help catch the ETA activists.’ Manolo smiled wryly and wagged his finger. ‘But the French have never been a friend of Franco and, despite the rhetoric, they’ve been content to do nothing.’

  ‘Sounds like Franco will do anything to stop Basque independence and ETA will do anything to achieve it.’

  His eyes narrowed. ‘That’s right. It’s a kind of war. The Basque Provinces have always been prosperous. We have natural resources, industries and commerce.’

  I shook my head. ‘Franco could never let them go.’

  ‘No. Unthinkable from his point of view. It would devastate the Spanish economy.’

  ‘And if the Basques were allowed independence, what about the Catalans and other regions?’