Jaume Cabré - Confessions

‘Come on, supper time,’ he said, instead of sealing a pact with a son who knew how to read mediaeval Latin. Before reaching the dining room I had already had to wipe away two furtive tears.

Being born into that family had indeed been an unforgivable mistake. And the worst had yet to happen.

‘Well, I liked Herr Romeu.’

Thinking that I was asleep, they were speaking a bit too loudly.

‘You don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘Obviously. I’m useless. And a drudge!’

‘I’m the one who makes sacrifices for Adrià!’

‘And what do I do?’ Mother’s sarcastic, hurt voice, and then, lowering her tone, ‘And don’t shout.’

‘You’re the one shouting!’

‘Don’t I make sacrifices for the boy? Huh?’

Thick, solid silence. Father’s brain cells scrambling to think.

‘Of course, you do too.’

‘Well, thanks for admitting it.’

‘But that doesn’t mean that you’re right.’

I picked up Sheriff Carson because I sensed that I’d need some psychological support. I even called Black Eagle over just in case. And, without the slightest rustle, I opened the door to my room just a sliver. It wasn’t the moment to make a dangerous excursion to the kitchen for a glass. Now I could hear them much better. Black Eagle congratulated me on the idea. Sheriff Carson was silent and chewed on what I thought was gum but turned out to be tobacco.

‘Fine, he’ll study violin, fine.’

‘You make it sound like you’re doing me a huge favour.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Fine, he’ll study violin, fine.’ I’ll admit that my mother’s imitation of Father was quite an exaggeration. But I liked it.

‘Well, if you’re going to act like that, forget the violin and have him devote his time to serious things.’

‘If you take away the boy’s violin, you’ll hear it from me.’

‘Don’t threaten me.’

‘Don’t you, either.’

Silence. Carson spat on the floor and I made a mute gesture to scold him.

‘The boy has to study real things.’

‘And what are real things?’

‘Latin, Greek, history, German and French. To start with.’

‘The boy is only eleven years old, Fèlix!’

Eleven years old. I think that earlier I said eight or nine; time slips away from me in these pages too. Luckily Mother was keeping track. Do you know what happens? I don’t have the time or the desire to correct all this; I write hurriedly, like when I was young, when everything I wrote I wrote hurriedly. But my urgency now is very different. Which doesn’t mean I write quickly. And Mother repeated: ‘The boy is eleven years old and already studies French at school.’

‘“J’ai perdu la plume dans le jardin de ma tante” isn’t French.’

‘What is it? Hebrew?’

‘He has to be able to read Racine.’

‘My God.’

‘God doesn’t exist. And he could be much better at Latin. I mean, he’s studying with the Jesuits!’

That affected me more directly. Neither Black Eagle nor Sheriff Carson said a peep. They had never gone to the Jesuit school on Casp Street. I didn’t know if it was bad or good. But, according to Father, they weren’t teaching me Latin well. He was right: we were working on the second declension and it was a total bore, because the other children didn’t even understand the concept behind the genitive and the dative.

‘Oh, now you want to pull him out of there?’

‘What do you think about the French Lyceum?’

‘No: the boy will stay at Casp. Fèlix, he’s just a child! We can’t be moving him from place to place as if he were your brother’s livestock.’

‘OK, forget I mentioned it. We always end up doing what you say,’ lied Father.

‘And sport?’

‘None of that. They have plenty of playground breaks at the Jesuits’, don’t they?’

‘And music.’

‘Fine, fine. But the priorities come first. Adrià will be a great scholar and that’s that. And I will find a substitute for Casals.’

Who was the substitute for Herr Romeu and in five pathetic classes had also got bogged down in vague explanations of German’s elaborately complex syntax and couldn’t find his way out.

‘That’s not necessary. Let him have a break.’

Two days later, in his study, with Mother sitting on the sofa I’d established my espionage base behind, Father had me come over and stand by his chair and explained my future in detail and listen well, because I’m not going to repeat this: that I was a clever lad, who had to take advantage of my intellectual ability, that if the Einsteins at school don’t realise what I’m capable of, he would have to go in personally and explain it to them.

‘I’m surprised that you weren’t more insufferable,’ you told me one day.

‘Why? Because they told me I was intelligent? I already knew I was. Like when you’re tall, or fat, or have dark hair. I never really cared much one way or the other. Like the masses and the religious sermons I had to sit through patiently, though they did affect Bernat. And then Father pulled a rabbit out of his hat: And now your real private German lessons with a real teacher will start. None of these Romeus, Casals and the like.’

‘But I …’

‘And French tutoring.’

‘But, Father, I want …’

‘You don’t want anything. And I’m warning you,’ he pointed at me as if with a pistol, ‘you will learn Aramaic.’

I looked at Mother, searching for some sort of support, but she had her gaze lowered, as if she were very interested in the floor tiles. I had to defend myself all on my own and I shouted, ‘I don’t want to learn Aramaic!’ Which was a lie. But I was looking at an avalanche of homework.

‘Of course you do,’ — in a low, cold, implacable voice.

‘No.’

‘Don’t talk back to me.’

‘I don’t want to learn Aramaic. Or anything else!’

Father brought a hand to his forehead and, as if he had an awful migraine, he said, looking at the desk, in a very quiet voice, look at the sacrifices I’m making so that you can be the most brilliant student Barcelona has ever seen and this is how you thank me? Exaggerated shouting. ‘With an “I don’t want to learn Aramaic”?’ And now shrieking, ‘Eh?’

‘I want to learn …’

Silence. Mother looked up, hopeful. Carson, in my pocket, stirred curiously. I didn’t know what I wanted to learn. I knew that I didn’t want them to fill my head with too much too early, weigh it down. There were a few anxious seconds of reflection: in the end, I had to improvise:

‘… Well, I want to be a doctor.’

Silence. Confused looks between my parents.

‘A doctor?’

For a few seconds Father visualised my future as a doctor. Mother did too, I think. I, who got dizzy just thinking about blood, thought I had blown it. Father, after a moment of indecision, brought his chair closer to the desk, preparing to return to his reading. ‘No: you won’t be a doctor and you won’t be a monk. You will be a great humanist and that’s that.’

‘Father.’

‘Come on, Son, I’ve got work to do. Go and make some noise with your violin.’

And Mother looking at the floor, still interested in the colourful tiles. Traitor.

Lawyer, doctor, architect, chemist, civil engineer, optical engineer, pharmacist, lawyer, manufacturer, textile engineer and banker were the foreseeable professions according to all the other parents of all the other children.

‘You said lawyer more than once.’

‘It’s the only major that you can do with humanities. But children are more likely to think of studying to be a coal-merchant, painter, carpenter, lamplighter, bricklayer, aviator, shepherd, footballer, night watchman, mountain climber, gardener, train guard, parachute jumper, tram driver, fireman and the Pope in Rome.’