María Dueñas - The Time in Between

At one corner of the counter, standing erect and proud, solicitously greeting her customers while simultaneously controlling the incessant movement of the waiters, I saw the woman I assumed to be the proprietress of the establishment, Margaret Taylor. Hillgarth hadn’t told me in what kind of way he collaborated with her, but I had no doubt that it was more than a simple exchange of favors between the owner of a watering hole and one of her regular customers. I watched her as she handed a bill to a Nazi officer in a black uniform, with a swastika armband and high boots that shone like mirrors. That foreign woman, who looked both austere and distinguished, who had to have been some years past forty already, was surely another piece in the secret mechanism that the British naval attaché had activated in Spain. I couldn’t tell whether she and Captain Hillgarth exchanged glances at any point, whether any kind of silent message passed between them. I looked at them again out of the corner of my eye before I left. She was in discreet conversation with a young white-jacketed waiter, to whom she seemed to be giving instructions. Captain Hillgarth was still at his table, listening with interest to what one of his friends was saying. The whole group around him seemed to be just as alert to the words of the young man, who looked more carefree than the rest. From my vantage point on the other side of the shop I could see his theatrical gesticulations, perhaps imitating somebody. When he’d finished they all burst into laughter, and I heard the naval attaché crowing delightedly. Maybe it was only my imagination teasing me, but for a fraction of a second I thought he’d focused his gaze on me and winked.

Madrid was entering autumn, while the number of my clients increased. I hadn’t yet received any flowers or candies, from Hillgarth or anyone else. Nor did I want any; I didn’t have time. Because if there was one thing that I was beginning to lack in those days, it was just that: time. The popularity of my new atelier spread quickly; word was getting around about the stunning fabrics to be found there. The number of orders increased daily, and I began to struggle to get them all done; I found myself having to deliver orders late and to postpone fittings. I was working hard, harder than ever before in my life. I went to bed very late, toiling through the small hours, and barely had any time to rest. There were days when the tape measure remained hanging around my neck from morning until the moment I got into bed. Money flowed constantly into my little safe box, but I was so uninterested that I didn’t even bother to stop and count it. Sometimes my memory—with a twinge of nostalgia—would return to those early days in Tetouan. The nights counting the banknotes one by one in my Sidi Mandri room, calculating anxiously how long it would be before I could clear my debt. Candelaria rushing back from the Jewish exchange houses with a roll of pounds sterling secreted in her cleavage. The almost childish delight the two of us took in dividing up the total: half for you, half for me, the Matutera would say, month after month, and may we never go without again, my precious. It felt as though there were centuries separating me from that other world, and yet only four years had passed. Four years like four eternities. Where was she now, that Sira who had had her hair cut by a little Moorish girl with the sewing scissors in the kitchen of the La Luneta boardinghouse? Where had they gone, the poses I’d practiced so many times in my friend’s cracked mirror? They’d been lost between the folds of time. Now I had my hair done in the best salon in Madrid, and those self-assured gestures were more mine than my own teeth.

My hard work earned me more money than I’d ever dreamed of; I charged high prices and was constantly receiving hundred-peseta bills bearing the face of Christopher Columbus, five hundreds with the face of Don John of Austria. Yes, I was earning a lot, but a moment came when I couldn’t give any more of myself, and I had to notify Hillgarth through the pattern for a shoulder. It was raining that Saturday over the Prado Museum. As I gazed in delight at the paintings of Velázquez and Zurbarán, the inoffensive cloakroom man received my portfolio and, within it, an envelope with eleven messages that—as ever—would reach the naval attaché without delay. Ten of them contained conventional information abbreviated in the agreed manner. “Dinner 14th, home Walter Bastian, Calle Serrano, Lazars attending. Bodemuellers travel San Sebastián next week. Lazar wife making negative comments about Arthur Dietrich, her husband’s adjutant. Gloria von Fürstenberg and Anka Frier visit German consul end October. Various young men arrived last week from Berlin, staying Ritz, Friedrich Knappe receives, trains them. Husband Frau Hahn dislikes Kutschmann. Himmler arrives Spain 21 October, government and Germans preparing large reception. Clara Stauffer gathering material for German soldiers, her house Calle de Galileo. Dinner Puerta de Hierro club, date not sure, Count and Countess Argillo to attend. Heberlein organizing lunch his house, Toledo, Serrano Suñer, and Marchioness Llanzol invited.” The final message was different, and transmitted something more personal. “Too much work. Not time for everything. Fewer clients or seek help. Please inform.”

The next day a beautiful bunch of white gladioli arrived at my door. They were delivered by a young man in a grey uniform whose cap bore the embroidered name of the florist: Bourguignon. I read the card first. “Always ready to fulfill your desires.” And a scribble by way of a signature. I laughed: I could never have imagined the cold-blooded Hillgarth writing that ridiculously soppy phrase. I moved the bouquet to the kitchen and undid the ribbon that was tying the flowers together; after asking Martina to get them into some water, I shut myself up in my room. The message leapt out of an interrupted line of short and long dashes: “Hire someone utterly trustworthy, no Red past or political affiliation.”

Order received. And uncertainty had come with it.

When she opened the door I didn’t say a word; I just looked at her, containing my desire to throw my arms around her. She looked at me confused, running her eyes over me. Then she tried to meet my eyes, but perhaps the voilette of my hat prevented her from seeing them.

“What can I do for you, señora?” she finally said.

She was thinner. The passage of the years was visible on her. As petite as ever, but thinner and older. I smiled. She still didn’t recognize me.

“I bring you greetings from my mother, Doña Manuela. She’s in Morocco, she’s gone back to sewing.”

She looked at me, surprised, not understanding. She was turned out with her usual care, but her hair hadn’t been dyed for a couple of months and the dark suit she was wearing had accumulated the shine of many winters.

“I’m Sira, Doña Manuela. Sirita, the daughter of Dolores, your employee.”

She looked at me again, up and down. I bent down to bring myself to her level and lifted the little piece of netting on my hat so she could see my face.

“It’s me, Doña Manuela, it’s Sira. Don’t you remember me?” I whispered.

“Holy Mother of God, Sira! My child, I’m so delighted to see you!” she said at last.

She hugged me and began to cry as I struggled not to let myself be set off, too.

“Come in, my child, come in, don’t just stand there in the doorway,” she said when she was finally able to get her emotions under control. “But how incredibly elegant you are, child, I wouldn’t have recognized you. Come in, come into the living room. Tell me, what are you doing in Madrid, how are things, how is your mother?”