María Dueñas - The Time in Between

“But they’ll connect me to you,” I said, trying to cling to anything that might prevent me from being swept away by this lunatic plan.

“Not at all. No one has any reason to. The Germans in Madrid have mostly just arrived and they have no contact with the ones in Morocco; no one has to suspect that you and I know each other. Though naturally your experience of sewing for their compatriots in Tetouan will be a great help to you: you know their tastes, you know how to handle them and how to behave with them.”

As she was speaking, I closed my eyes and just shook my head from side to side. For a few seconds my mind went back to my early months in Tetouan, to the night Candelaria showed me the pistols and proposed that we sell them to open the atelier. The feeling of panic was just the same, and the scenario was similar: two women hidden away in a dark little room, one laying out a dangerous, fully thought out plan, and the other, terrified, refusing to accept it. But there were certain differences—big differences. The plan Rosalinda was proposing to me was on quite another scale.

Her voice brought me back from the past, made me abandon the wretched bedroom in the La Luneta boardinghouse and reposition myself in the reality of the little storeroom at the back of Dean’s Bar.

“We’ll give you a reputation, we have ways of doing that. I’m well connected in the circles that are of interest to us in Madrid; we’ll get word of mouth going so that people hear about you without ever connecting you to me. The SOE will cover all the initial costs: they’ll pay for the rental of the place, the setup of the workshop, and the initial investment in fabric and equipment. Juan Luis will take care of the paperwork for customs and get you the permits you need to move the merchandise from Tangiers to Spain; it’ll have to be a considerable supply, because once he’s out of the ministry these things will be much harder to arrange. You’ll take all the profit from the business. All you have to do is what you’re doing in Morocco, but paying greater attention to what you hear from your German clients, as well as any Spanish women connected to the structures of power and to the Nazis. The German women are utterly idle and they have more money than they need. Your atelier could become a place for them to meet. You’ll hear about where their husbands are going, the people they meet, the plans they have, and the visitors they’re receiving from Germany.”

“I barely speak any German.”

“You can communicate well enough to make them feel comfortable with you.”

“I don’t know much more than numbers, greetings, colors, the days of the week, and a handful of random phrases,” I insisted.

“It doesn’t matter; we’ve already thought about that. We’ve got someone who can help you. All you’ll have to do is assemble the bits of information and then get them to their destination.”

“How?”

She shrugged.

“That’s something Hillgarth will have to tell you if you accept. I don’t know how these operations work; I imagine they’ll design something especially for you.”

I shook my head again, this time more emphatically.

“I’m not going to accept, Rosalinda.”

She lit another cigarette and inhaled deeply.

“Why not?” she asked through the smoke.

“Because I won’t,” I said bluntly. I had a thousand reasons not to embark on that nonsense, but I preferred to pile them all up into a single refusal. No. No, I wouldn’t do it. Decisively no. I took another slug of whiskey from the bottle; it tasted horrible.

“Why not, querida? Because you’re afraid, no?” She was speaking quietly now, confidently. The music had come to an end; the only sound was the needle scratching over the surface of the record and a few voices and some laughter coming from the other side of the curtain. “We’re all afraid, we’re all utterly terrified,” she murmured. “But that’s not a good enough reason. We have to get involved, Sira. We have to help. You, me, all of us, each in whatever way we can. We have to contribute our grain of sand to make sure this madness doesn’t go any further.”

“Besides, I can’t go to Madrid. I have unfinished business to deal with. You know what I’m referring to.”

The matter of the fraud charges from Ramiro’s time still hadn’t been resolved. Since the end of the civil war I’d talked to Commissioner Vázquez about it a couple of times. He’d tried to find out what the situation was in Madrid, but he hadn’t gotten anywhere. Everything’s still very chaotic, we’ll let some time go by, wait for things to calm down, he’d say to me. And having no intention of going back, I’d waited. Rosalinda knew the situation; I’d told her about it myself.

“We’ve thought about that, too. About that, and about the fact that you have to be covered, you have to be protected from any eventuality. Our embassy couldn’t be responsible for you if there were to be any problem, and the way things are it’s risky for a Spanish citizen. But Juan Luis has had an idea.”

I wanted to ask her what it was, but I couldn’t find my voice. Nor did I need to say anything; she set it all out for me right away.

“He can get you a Moroccan passport.”

“A fake passport,” I countered.

“No, querida, a real one. He’s still got very good friends in Morocco. You could be a Moroccan citizen within a few hours. With of course a different name.”

I got up and noticed I was finding it hard to keep my balance. In my brain—amid the pool of whiskey and gin—all those alien words were splashing messily around. Secret service, agents, operatives. False names, Moroccan passports. I leaned against the wall and tried to recover my composure.

“Rosalinda—no. Please, don’t go on. I can’t agree.”

“You don’t have to make a decision right now. Think about it.”

“There’s nothing to think about. What time is it?”

She looked at her watch; I tried to do the same with mine but the numbers seemed to dissolve before my eyes.

“A quarter to ten.”

“I have to get back to Tetouan.”

“I’ve arranged for a car to come and collect you at ten, but I don’t think you’re in any state to go anywhere. Stay the night in Tangiers. I’ll get them to give you a room in the El Minzah and to let your mother know.”

A bed to sleep in and forget that whole dark conversation seemed the most tempting of offers. A big bed with white sheets, in a beautiful room in which I’d wake up the following day to find that this meeting with Rosalinda had just been a nightmare. A wild nightmare out of nowhere. Suddenly some lucidity sparked up from a distant corner of my brain.

“They can’t let my mother know. We don’t have a telephone, you know that.”

“I’ll get someone to call Félix Aranda and he’ll tell her. I’ll also arrange for someone to pick you up and take you to Tetouan tomorrow morning.”

“And where are you staying?”

“At the home of some English friends on the Rue de Hollande. I don’t want anyone to know I’m in Tangiers. A car brought me straight here from their house; I haven’t even set foot on the street.”

She fell silent for a few seconds and then started speaking again, her voice lower. Lower and more ominous.

“Things are looking really bad for Juan Luis and me, Sira. We’re being permanently watched.”

“Who?” I asked, hoarse.

She gave a sad half smile.

“Everyone. The police. The Gestapo. The Falange.”

My fear burst out of me in a question, my voice a thick whisper. “And what about me? Will they be watching me, too?”

“I don’t know, querida, I don’t know.”

She smiled again but this time didn’t manage to conceal the trace of anxiety that lingered on her lips.