Part 32 (1/2)

'Excuse me. I don't know whether it's listening to the rain all day, but suddenly it seems there's something of an emergency building down there, and when nature calls 'But of course,' I said, making way for him. 'It's all yours.'

'Much obliged.'

The policeman, who, in the light of the bare bulb, reminded me of a small weasel, looked me up and down. His rat like eyes paused on the missal I held in my hands.

'If I don't have something to read, I just can't go,' I explained.

'It's the same for me. And people say Spaniards don't read. May I borrow it?'

'On top of the cistern, you'll find the latest Critics' Prize,' I said, cutting him short. 'It's infallible.'

I walked away without losing my composure and joined my father, who was pouring me a cup of white coffee.

'What's he doing here?' I asked.

'He swore on his mother's grave that he was on the verge of wetting himself. What was I supposed to do?'

'Leave him in the street and let him warm up that way?'

My father frowned.

'If you don't mind, I'm going up to the apartment.'

'Of course I don't mind. And put on some dry clothes. You're going to catch your death.'

The apartment was cold and silent. I went into my bedroom and peeped out of the window. The second sentinel was still there, by the door of the Church of Santa Ana. I took off my soaking clothes and put on some thick pyjamas and a dressing gown that had belonged to my grandfather. I lay down on the bed without bothering to turn on the light and abandoned myself to the darkness and the sound of the rain on the windowpanes. I closed my eyes and tried to conjure up the image of Bea, her touch and smell. The night before I hadn't slept at all, and soon I was overcome by exhaustion. In my dreams the hooded figure of Death rode over Barcelona, a ghostly apparition that hovered above the towers and roofs, trailing black ropes that held hundreds of small white coffins. The coffins left behind them their own trail of black flowers, on whose petals, written in blood, was the name Nuria Monfort.

I awoke at the break of a grey dawn. The windows were steamed up. I dressed for the cold weather and put on some calf-length boots, then went out into the corridor and groped my way through the apartment. I slipped out through the door and went down to the street. The newsstands in the Ramblas were already lighting up in the distance. I steered a course towards the one that was anch.o.r.ed at the mouth of Calle Tallers and bought the first edition of the day's paper, which still smelled of warm ink. I rushed through the pages until I found the obituary section. Nuria Monfort's name lay under a printed cross, and I couldn't bring myself to look at it. I walked away with the newspaper folded under my arm. The funeral was that afternoon, in Montjuic Cemetery. After walking round the block, I returned home. My father was still asleep, so I went back into my room. I sat at my desk and took the Meisterstuck pen out of its case, then took a blank sheet of paper and hoped the nib would guide me. In my hands the pen had nothing to say. In vain I tried to conjure up the words I wanted to offer Nuria Monfort, but I was incapable of writing or feeling anything except the terror of her absence, of knowing she was lost, wrenched away. I knew that one day she would return to me, in the months or years to come, and that I would always relive her memory in the touch of a stranger, in the recollection of images that no longer belonged to me.

43.

Shortly before three o'clock, I got on a bus in Paseo de Colon that would take me to the cemetery on Montjuic. Through the window I could see the forest of masts and fluttering pennants in the docks. The bus, which was almost empty, circled Montjuic mountain and started up the road to the eastern gates of the boundless cemetery. I was the last pa.s.senger to get off.

'What time does the last bus leave?' I asked the driver.

'At half past four.'

The driver left me by the cemetery gates. An avenue of cypress trees rose in the mist. Even from there, at the foot of the mountain, you could already begin to see the vast city of the dead that scaled the slope to the very top: avenues of tombs, walks lined with gravestones and alleyways of mausoleums, towers crowned by fiery angels and whole forests of sepulchres that seemed to grow into one another. The city of the dead was a vast abyss guarded by an army of rotting stone statues sinking into the mud. J took a deep breath and entered the labyrinth. My mother lay buried only a hundred yards from the path along which I walked. With every step I took, I could feel the cold, the emptiness, and the fury of that place; the horror of its silence, of the faces trapped in old photographs abandoned to the company of candles and dead flowers. After a while I caught the distant glimpse of gas lamps around a grave, the shapes of half a dozen people lined up against an ashen sky. I quickened my pace and stopped where I could hear the words of the priest.

The coffin, an unpolished pine box, rested on the mud. Two gravediggers guarded it, leaning on spades. I scanned those present. Old Isaac, the keeper of the Cemetery of Forgotten Books, had not attended his daughter's funeral. I recognized the neighbour who lived opposite. She shook her head, sobbing, while a man stroked her back with a resigned air. Her husband, I imagined. Next to them was a woman of about forty, dressed in grey and carrying a bunch of flowers. She cried quietly, looking away from the grave with tight lips. I had never seen her before. Separated from the group, clad in a dark raincoat and holding his hat behind his back, was the policeman who had saved my life the day before. Palacios. He raised his eyes and observed me for a few seconds without blinking. The blind, senseless words of the priest were all that separated us from the terrible silence. I stared at the mud-splattered coffin. I imagined Nuria lying inside it, and I didn't realize I was crying until the woman in grey came up to me and offered me one of the flowers from her bunch. I remained there until the group had dispersed. At a sign from the priest, the gravediggers got ready to do their work. I kept the flower in my coat pocket and walked away, unable to express my final farewell.

It was beginning to get dark by the time I reached the cemetery gates, and I a.s.sumed I'd missed the last bus. I was about to start a long walk, under the shadow of the necropolis, following the road that skirted the port back to Barcelona. A black car was parked about twenty yards ahead of me, its lights on. Inside, a figure smoked a cigarette. As I drew near, Palacios opened the pa.s.senger door.

'Get in. I'll take you home. You won't find any buses or taxis around here at this time of day.'

I hesitated for a moment. 'I'd rather walk.'

'Don't be silly. Get in.'

He spoke in the steely tone of someone used to giving orders and being obeyed instantly. 'Please,' he added.

I got into the car, and the policeman started the engine.

'Enrique Palacios,' he said, holding his hand out to me.

I didn't shake it. 'If you leave me in Colon, that's fine.'

The car sped off. We joined the traffic on the main road and travelled a good stretch without uttering a single word.

'I want you to know I'm very sorry about Senora Monfort.'

Coming from him, the words seemed obscene, an insult.

'I'm grateful to you for saving my life the other day, but I must tell you I don't give a s.h.i.+t what you feel, Senor Enrique Palacios.'

'I'm not what you think, Daniel. I'd like to help you.'

'If you expect me to tell you where Fermin is, you can leave me right here.'

'I don't give a d.a.m.n where your friend is. I'm not on duty now.'

I didn't reply.

'You don't trust me, and I don't blame you. But at least listen to me. This has already gone too far. There was no reason why this woman should have died. I beg you to let this matter drop and put this man, Carax, out of your mind forever.'

'You speak as if I'm in control of what's happening. I'm only a spectator. The whole show has been staged by you and your boss.'

'I'm tired of funerals, Daniel. I don't want to have to go to yours.'

'All the better, because you're not invited.'

'I'm serious.'

'Me, too. Please stop and let me out'

'We'll be in Colon in two minutes.'

'I don't care. This car smells of death, like you. Let me out.'

Palacios slowed down and stopped on the hard shoulder. I got out of the car and banged the door shut, eluding Palacios's eyes. I waited for him to leave, but the police officer didn't seem to be going anywhere. I turned around and saw him lowering the car window. I thought I read honesty, even pain, in his face, but I refused to believe it.

'Nuria Monfort died in my arms, Daniel,' he said. 'I think her last words were a message for you.'

'What did she say?' I asked, my voice gripped by an icy cold. 'Did she mention my name?'