Mazurka for Two Dead Men

by Camilo José Cela

  The first sign of a bastard is thin hair, and Fabián Minguela was noted for his thin, lank hair.

  “What color was it?”

  “That depends, it varied from day to day.”

  The fourth and fifth of the Gamuzos—Celestino and Ceferino—are twins and both of them entered the priesthood, they studied at the seminary in Orense and even managed to come out pure, or so it is said. Celestino is called Sprig and he’s in the parish of San Miguel de Taboadela. Ceferino is known as Ferret and was in the parish of San Adrián de Zapeaus over in the Rairiz de Veiga area but now he’s been moved to Santa María de Carballeda, in Piñor de Cea, where he took over from the late Father Silvio.

  Yes, indeed; it does you good to watch the rain fall as ever; and it always rains, in winter and in summer, by day and by night, upon this earth and its wickedness, for the sake of men, women, and beasts.

  Nobody would have dared tackle Baldomero Lionheart for he was as fierce as a wolf: his brother Tanis the Demon can lift a man off the ground with his little finger: their brother Roque, the Cleric of Comesaña, is a source of embarrassment: the twins, Celestino the Sprig and Ceferino the Ferret, celebrate Mass, as you already know, and together they play dominoes fairly well. Sprig is a hunter (rabbits and woodpigeon) and Ferret is an angler (perch, mullet, and, with a bit of luck, the odd trout). That still leaves four more of the Gamuzos.

  Ádega is a cautious but generous woman, in her youth she must have been very hospitable and great fun, full of life and fond of a get-together.

  “They say that the dead man who killed Lionheart also killed my old man and maybe a dozen others to boot. Apparently the bastard—if you’ll pardon my French—grew trigger-happy: I can’t say for sure, but when they killed the dead man I lighted a candle before the crucifix in the church of Santa María la Real in Oseira. Some deaths bring sorrow but there are also those that bring great joy, would you not agree? Other deaths—such as drownings and plague deaths—inspire fear, whereas some deaths would make you laugh—like the sight of a hanged man swaying in the breeze. When I was a slip of a girl in Bouza da Fondo there was a hanged man so stone dead that the youngsters were able to swing to and fro from his feet; when the Civil Guard arrived they sent the children packing for the judge was a very strait-laced man from Castile, a most pernickety type called Don León who, as I well remember, couldn’t take a joke. But now all the old ways are disappearing and it’s all thanks to this business of air travel.”

  The memory of Lázaro Codesal still lingers on. Ádega isn’t the only one who knows these stories. One night when he was coming down la Cabreira (singing to let people know that he was out and about—Lázaro Codesal was always singing) a married man stopped him at the Chosco crossroads:

  “I’m all alone and you, too, are out looking for a fight.”

  “Step aside there! I’ve no wish to pick a quarrel! I’m going about my own business!”

  Events took a turn for the worse, the two men got involved in a scuffle, and soon the blows were flying in all directions. Lázaro Codesal gave his opponent a good hiding, put his hands behind his back, tied them to his prick, and sent him packing.

  “Now go home and let your wife untie you! And in future don’t seek to meddle with peaceable folk or you’ll feel the consequences!”

  At that time the line of the mountain could still be seen and if it hadn’t been for that treacherous Moor, it would never have been blotted out. Fig trees don’t thrive in these parts but, if I were rich, I would find a place where the fig trees grow strong and sturdy and I would buy a hundred fig trees in memory of Lázaro Codesal, the youngster who played the field better than anyone, and plant them so the birds could eat all the figs. It’s a pity not to be rich so as to do so many things: see the world, give presents to women, buy fig trees … If you can’t play the fiddle or the harmonica, then you spend the evenings in bed. Benicia is like an obedient sow, she never says no to anything. Benicia can neither read nor play the accordion but she is very young and she makes good blood puddings: she also knows how to give pleasure, in its place, and has big sweet nipples, as hard as chestnuts. Ádega picks up the story of the hanged men:

  “The half-wit from Bidueiros, who was the bastard son of the priest in San Miguel de Buciños, did not hang himself but was hanged as a sort of trial run. The priest in San Miguel de Buciños is called Father Merexildo Agrexán Fenteira and is well-known for his proportions. May God forgive me, but when Father Merexildo has a hard on, it looks as though he has a pine tree beneath his cassock! ‘Where are you off to with that, Father?’ ‘To see if the parish can cool my ardor, you bastard!’ (or whore, if he is talking to a woman). You must excuse me! Look here, Don Camilo, I want to give you a bit of chorizo3 to taste, it’s the very best and nourishing, too. The reason that my old man had such strength is that he used to down whole chorizos at one go; mark my words, the dead man who killed him could only have killed him the way you’d kill a fox. Cidrán surely can’t have seen what was coming for, if he had, the dead man who killed him—and anyone else who was with him, for that matter—would still be running for his life.”

  “The priest in San Miguel de Buciños is always swarming with flies; maybe he tastes sweet.”

  “But don’t they bother him?”

  “Yes, but he puts up with them—not that he has much choice!”

  Joker is the sixth of the Gamuzos, his name is Matías and he knows a little about fortunetelling and juggling. Matías was at one time a kennel boy in the parish of Santa María la Madre in Orense but later on he pulled his socks up and got himself a job in Carballiño, in the Repose Coffin Factory where he now earns a decent crust. Joker is a real live wire and dances with a great sense of rhythm; he has a fine singing voice and makes some small change on the side playing billiards. Joker is a great one for pranks, and witty, into the bargain. He tells stories about Otto and Fritz in a heavy German accent. Joker is a widower; Puriña, his widow, died of consumption (in the end the witches caught up with her and cast their spell upon her). She was the sister of Loliña Moscoso, the wife of the eldest brother. The daughters in that family weren’t long for this world—they died even before their husbands had a chance to grow fed up with them.

  “Did they leave an almighty muddle behind them?”

  “No more than you’d expect.”

  Ádega fetches chorizo and more aguardiente. Ádega’s chorizo and aguardiente are as fine as they come and nourishing, too.

  “They tried it on with the half-wit from Bidueiros and with my old man, too, but in a different sort of way. There are always bad sorts knocking about but in those days—during the war years it was even worse. God will surely punish them for such things cannot be allowed to happen; many have already been called to account for their deeds and few died in the comfort of their own beds with the eldest son in attendance to close their eyes as God ordained. You see the end that the dead man that killed Lionheart and my old man met with. A terrible lot of bloodshed, and in the end he didn’t even get beyond Meixo Eiros hill with his life! He who lives by the sword, dies by the sword. You know better than I do, though you needn’t say so if you’d rather not, that the dead man who killed Lionheart and my old man was rounded up by your relative and he died in the das Bouzas do Gago spring, I need say no more. They call Rosalía Trasulfe the Crazy Goat because she is very brazen and always was. Rosalía Trasulfe undid her bodice, bared both breasts and told the dead man who was going about killing: ‘Come on—suck!—I don’t care! All I want is to go on living.’ And now she says: ‘The dead man sucked these breasts and explored other parts of my body, too, but I’m alive and kicking and, anyway, didn’t I give myself a thorough scrubbing down afterwards? Indeed I washed my breasts and even my privates …’ It’s great to hear her say it!”

  Each of the Gamuzos has a nickname. Julián Marvís Ventela, or Fernández—or Julián Gamuzo, rather, is called Wideawake because he is as quick as a flash of lightning and very witty, too. Wideawake has a watchmaker’s
shop in Chantada—well, his wife has. He went farther afield but did well for himself. Wideawake married a widowed watchmaker from Chantada: Pilar Moure Pernas, watchmaker—by a fluke. Pilar’s first husband, Urbano Dapena Escairón, the owner of the watchmaker’s shop, died of colic and their son Urbanito, who then inherited the business, died of anemia—he was always a sickly sort. That is the order of events and how Pilar came to inherit the shop. Wideawake and Pilar have five sons and three daughters, all of them hale and hearty and bright as buttons. It’s unlikely that Wideawake will ever inherit the watchmaker’s shop, that’s for sure, not that it bothers him one bit, he is happy to be Watchmaker Consort and see that his children have a square meal and the chance to pursue their studies.

  “The dead man who killed Lionheart and my old man—and maybe a dozen others to boot—sucked the breasts of Crazy Goat but the bastard is dead now though not buried, Don Camilo, for a woman (and one day I’ll say who it is—hold your tongue, you, for I’m the one who’s talking!) stole his remains from the graveyard and did with them what shall never be known for I cannot bring myself to say it. In this world you’ve got to keep your feet on the ground, better ground than water. Crazy Goat has all her wits about her and she’s still living—with her daughter Edelmira, I believe, who married a guard in Sarria. She is my age, or maybe a year or two older, and we were always close friends. From time to time somebody or other will feel the breasts of all us women—isn’t that what we’re for? and nobody can take the taste for it from us, the main thing is to have a good wash down afterwards: a lad in the hayloft, another in the stable, the priest in the sacristy, a peddler in the kitchen, the miller in his mill, a stranger on the mountain, and the husband whenever the fancy takes him … As I say, the main thing is to have a good wash down afterwards. When I was rearing my daughter Benicia and these were proper breasts—big and firm and full of milk—the serpent suckled at them but my old man split its head open with a hoe and killed it, now there are only dead men around here and the hungry wind soughing in the oak trees.”

  It rains down upon the Piñor crossroads and the Albarona waterfall where the wolves keep watch as the oxcart from Roquiño goes by with its axle creaking to frighten them off. The slugs turn to water for the winter and sleep tucked away in the half-hidden roots of the sweet wild strawberries. Souls in purgatory also drink at the Miangueiro spring, like the lepers, and when they grow weary they wander with the holy company along the banks of the river. Benito Gamuzo is called Scorpion and he’s as clumsy as a scorpion although he has no sting. Scorpion is a deaf-mute but smart enough; he’s good at running errands and can plane wood, breed rabbits, and make blood puddings almost as well as Benicia. Scorpion is a bachelor and lives in Carballiño with his brother Matías. He works in the coffin factory, too, and earns enough to scrape by. Once a month Scorpion goes with prostitutes in the city and that leaves him short for the rest of the month. Another brother, Salustio, also lives with Joker and Scorpion. He is a simple soul and feeble, too. Between one thing and another he scrapes by and doesn’t give them any trouble. Joker has no thought of marrying again for he doesn’t know what would become of his brothers if he did.

  “I’m just as well off as I am and they are my brothers.”

  The ninth and last Marvís is called Shrill because he is forever whining in that little cricket’s voice of his, maybe he has a pain somewhere deep inside and isn’t able to say so.

  Ádega wants to see the sea before she dies.

  “The worst is not dying but knowing that you are going to die, the worst is the mirth it gives folks who live on after you; I could content myself with living one day longer than the dead man and I’ve already lived a lot longer than that. The man who killed my old man is well and truly dead and I’m still alive and kicking, seeing others die off is what counts. What I want now is to see the sea before I die, it must be very beautiful. Crazy Goat once told me that it is at least as big as the whole province of Orense—maybe even bigger. The man who killed Lionheart, and my old man as well, is dead now and that gives great comfort. You’ve got to stick close to the water and better water than air. Crazy Goat is a dab hand at training birds and small animals, she is as good at it as Policarpo la Bagañeira: owls, ravens (owls are slower to cotton on than ravens), toads, goats (they’re very smart), pine-martens, bats, anything at all. Crazy Goat can also mesmerise hens, castrate snakes, and make foxes dance a merry jig—she rubs their asses with a hot pepper sliced in two, the best are the ones from her home town. What a laugh! Crazy Goat is far better than a whole lot of men put together! All us women have at some time or another got up to mischief with a dog—that’s only normal, when you’re young anything goes, or even with a half-wit if there’s one handy and it’s not too cold, or he starts to blubber; men go for a suckling nanny goat and hold her firmly by the horns for a more satisfying screw, it’s all perfectly natural. Well, what the rest of us got up to with dogs, Crazy Goat did with wolves; nobody believes a word of it but it’s true—I’ve seen it with my own two eyes. All wild animals obey Crazy Goat because she was conceived on the back of a galloping horse during the San Lourenciño storm which comes every year and kills a Castilian, a gypsy, a black, or a seminary student. It’s a merciless, raging storm, full of bitterness. Crazy Goat plays a flute she has to warn the small defenseless animals that the storm is on its way: the mole beneath the ground, the centipede in the woods, the spider in the sweet pea, the snail in the turnip field, and others besides.”

  Policarpo la Bagañeira’s surname is not Obenza but Portomourisco: his grandmother—a forceful, bossy woman—was surnamed Obenza.

  The Carroupos have a pigskin pockmark on their foreheads, they all have it, it’s like a factory stamp, or a birthmark upon the damned. Moucho has Carroupo blood in his veins and is neither to be relied upon nor trusted. The Carroupos don’t even know where they are from, they’re certainly not from around here. They may have come from la Maragatería, beyond Ponferrada, fleeing famine or the law, who can tell? Fabián Minguela—Moucho—is always sharpening and polishing a knife, one day it will get its own back on him. The Carroupos neither till the land nor raise livestock, the Carroupos are cobblers: that’s what folks about these parts call shoemakers, tailors, apothecaries’ assistants, barbers, clerks, and other jobs which require neither physical strength nor land. The second sign of the bastard is a jutting forehead. Have you noticed Fabián Minguela’s? Well, something along those lines.

  Moncho Requeixo Casbolado, who is known as Moncho Lazybones because he never wants to do a hand’s turn save wandering about and watching the world go by, was in the war in Melilla4 with Lázaro Codesal Grovas (maybe I didn’t mention the second surname before) but he helped free the land from the Moors and lived to tell the tale, though with one leg less. Moncho Lazybones has been right around the world, he always served on Dutch ships: Guayaquil was the place he liked best.

  “Believe it or not, life is not too bad with a wooden leg, provided it is properly adjusted, of course. Among the natives of New Titanic—an island in the Pacific which the English shelled and sank because the natives wanted to introduce the metric decimal system—a wooden leg was regarded as a sign of distinction. They wanted to make me prime minister but I refused because I’d rather return to my native land.”

  Moncho Lazybones is cast in the mold of the old-style explorer: he’s a liar, a womaniser, a storyteller, an idler, and as stubborn as a mule. According to Moncho Lazybones, he found a very rare tree, the ombiel, on Bastianiño beach whose leaves, overcome by sadness, tumble to the ground in fall, wrinkling softly like the flesh of a snail, and then turn into eyeless bats with a reddish skull painted on their wings. If the wind blows, it lifts them, breathes life into them, and sends them flying: if not, you have to leave them clinging to the ground until they wilt and die of starvation, because it’s bad luck to kill them. But if they are left clinging to the ground no harm will come of it and the world continues upon its merry round.

  Ádega is a clo
se friend of Moncho Lazybones, at one time they were even sweethearts of a sort but it’s years now since they have seen one another.

  “Look here, Don Camilo, quit your teasing, at times I wonder if you do anything but tease! The best you can do is to hold out a while longer and die after folks who are dead and buried, after folks who are condemned to die, with death stamped in their eyes, upon their foreheads and in their hearts, folks that everybody wishes dead. Yes, indeed, that’s God’s law: he who lives by the sword, dies by the sword. Besides, there is no escape for all the doors in the world are barred against them. You’ve got to stick close to the air and better air than death. Folks grew sick and tired of those ashen creatures stalking about sowing death and when the hour of vengeance came—which comes when the Good Lord chooseth but come it must for each and every ashen creature, those who had mourned but were still alive planted a hazel tree to keep a reckoning and also to keep the wild boars happy. ‘There are lots of hazel trees planted hereabouts!’ said those ashen creatures to those for whom the hour of reckoning had not yet come, ‘We’re going to have to teach them a lesson.’ ‘No, sir,’ would come the reply, ‘those hazel trees mark the boundaries; they sprout of their own accord so that the wild boars have fresh hazelnuts to eat.’”

  Ádega spoke these last words in a hoarse voice. Then she swallowed spittle and smiled.

  “Pardon me. Shall I play the Fanfinette polka on the accordion for you? I’m getting long in the tooth now but you’ll see I can still play it fairly well.”

  Ádega still played the accordion with great style and skill.

  “You play very well.”

  “Not at all. Ever since my old man was killed I can find no peace inside my head and there’s not a soul can play the accordion, or anything else for that matter, in a state like that, I’ve no heart in it, I play like a pianola … Do you mind if I cry a bit? I won’t be long.”