Manuel Rivas - All Is Silence

WELL, LOOK WHO’S coming. Look who’s just come in. I’m not surprised the bats are bothered. They’ve been hanging there for months, chewing on the shade, and now they’ve woken. Hear, I don’t think they have any problem hearing, and anyway Malpica has forgotten where to put his feet. Who’d have thought he’d end up looking so ugly? He knocks against all the geographical features. We’re all right. I’m a local. My nest is made. The blind mannequin and the one-armed skeleton no longer surprise me. Or the desiccated crane. How well they did those eyes. Those little dots that look everywhere at once. Wherever I am, they can see me. They’re watching out for me. I found my place. My hideaway. Even the pendulum has calmed down. And in this little corner, this screened cubbyhole with its slats of disarranged books, there’s a scent of coves, as if the sea itself came up here one night, to the map of wood, and left all these cracks and beads. The box with its glass lid and sign that says ‘Malacology’, whoever thought of that name, full of all kinds of shells and periwinkles, which I took out of the grid and put somewhere else. There were also collections of butterflies, beetles and spiders imported from America, some of them as big as your fist. I have respect for spiders. I once squashed one, a little one, on my best shirt. It was a white shirt and the bug kept climbing up, so in the end I squashed it. Never squash a spider on your shirt. You wouldn’t believe the amount of blood a bug like that can hold. A whole life’s worth. The same as a hit. The gentle pulling of the piston once you’ve found the vein. The colour of blood, the initial colour, can handle everything. The same with the amber liquid. And then you pump blood of your own blood. A blood pump. In three movements. I like to pump in three movements.

The point is, several years ago, when I was more hung up than ever, they saved my life. I gathered and sold the zoological troop, the ranked creepy-crawlies, spiders, silver-plated beetles, American butterflies. I said to the guy, ‘I’ve brought you the whole of Genesis, this lot is worth a fortune.’ So he went and gave me a ball of smack, ‘Here’s your globe, so you can stuff it up your arm.’ That’s why there are species, so I can get a fix. But not the collection of malacology. He didn’t want to see it. It must have been because of the name. Or because we’re sick of shells around here. Not me. I get genuinely sentimental whenever I set eyes on anything remotely shelly. Like the conch of a hermit. Now that’s what I call architecture. That is art. Like sea urchins. That is beauty, their spines. If I was standing face to face with one of those famous artists, I’d stick a sea urchin in his hands and say, ‘Go on then, do it, if you’ve got the balls!’ There has to be a mysterious mystery for such symmetries to grow in the sea. Now they’re uninhabited, the crabs have gone to hell, but the shells are good company, they adorn the ruins on this side of the School of Indians. The hermit crabs will be hiding behind some geographical feature, I suppose. I’m not quite sure what part of the world I’m in. It feels like the Antarctic on account of the cold. But everything went well. Everything was going well. The spoon secure, stuck between two volumes of Civilisation . Don Pelegrín Casabó y Pagés. Chronicles can be extremely useful. Thank God for Civilisation . At the height of his work, my hands are free to warm the smack in the water. To see the amber colour of smelting. And so on until you pump the geographical feature in three movements.

I didn’t forget that bit about the geographical features. ‘The eagle now is hunting flies. Tell me, Balboa, the names of some geographical features.’ It’s funny what stays and what doesn’t. That teacher, Lame, Exile, always used to say, ‘We are what we remember.’ What do I know? We are what we remember. We are what we forget. Whenever I forget something, I stick my tongue where my tooth is missing. Where all the things I forget go. I’ve a hiding place there that is a bottomless well. Exile also said, ‘Nothing is heavy for someone with wings. You have wings, don’t you?’ Of course I have wings, Don Basilio. Like Belvís. He wasn’t a bad guy, Don Basilio, though he looked tired of children and was always playing around in the clouds or out gathering words. That’s what he was like, always on the trail of other sayings, in the same way we used to search for grapes left over from the harvest. When he came down, he did so very carefully. One day he asked what we wanted to be when we were older, and I went and said, ‘A smuggler!’ He replied, ‘Better to say “entrepreneur”, child. “Entrepreneur”!’

That catechist with the cropped white hair told us we all had an angel. A guardian angel, we all knew that. But she gave details. She wasn’t fooling around. There were angels whose task was to watch over and care for God’s throne, organise the celestial rehearsals. I could understand that. It all seemed reasonable enough. God’s not going to keep tabs on everything, on whether they move his chair this way or that, what time the sun is going to rise, whether there’s a flood over here and a drought over there. And then there are the guardian angels, those who side with us, with the flock we are. I really liked the explanation about why they aren’t visible, why they don’t have a shadow, so to speak. Because they’re a profession, not matter. They come and go, do their work, this is good, that isn’t, but they don’t inspect you, don’t pop the bill in the post or pester you. They work and let others work without getting in the way. If it wasn’t like that, it would hardly be life. For you or for them. ‘Where you going?’ ‘I dunno, for a walk.’ ‘What you using that for?’ ‘I like it.’ ‘It ain’t good, you know it ain’t good.’ ‘If I like it, it can be good, so stop bugging me.’ ‘What you want a weapon for?’ ‘What weapon?’ ‘That pipe.’ ‘What pipe?’ Blasted angel, digging around where he’s not wanted, his feathers on fire. But on the other hand, you know your Guardian A. is there for you, to give you a message and bugger off. That’s what I would call a transparent profession. Then we’ll get the Last Judgement. Sounds reasonable enough. ‘Proceedings were instituted, here you have the report on so-and-so.’ ‘Mr Xosé Luís Balboa, also known as Chelín, we understand from your Guardian Angel that you were in possession of a firearm. What was it for?’ ‘For lining dogs up against the wall, Mr St Michael.’ ‘Very well, let us proceed to weigh your soul.’ At which point St Michael gets out the scales for weighing human souls, which are remarkably like the scales used by a refined dealer who supplied me in a villa on the outskirts of Coruña. Shame that catechist never came back. That girl I met once in the disco Xornes. With the cropped hair. She looked younger than she really was. Had a man’s hoarse voice. She must have been an angel. Because there’s a third class of angels, or so I understand. Errant angels like her. For whom sky and earth are closed.

And in he comes, Ugly Mug, digging around. I’d just got my fix, the flash had gone by and I was coming down slowly. I was back in the Antarctic, next to Malacology, and thinking of giving Don Pelegrín a go. You can’t read very well in the semi-darkness of the Antarctic, but I’ve read plenty of saints in here. I’ve a soft spot for Lord Byron. You what? Lord Byron contemplating the freedom of Greece. And in he comes, stepping on the geographical features. Sticking his nose in where it’s not wanted. Both matter and profession. He could be an eagle, I suppose. While he’s up north, he won’t spot me. All the same, I’d better put the tools in the shed of Civilisation , stay still as the crane, between the planks of wood. He’ll be reminiscing about Johnnie Walker. He sits down at the teacher’s desk. Pokes around inside the typewriter. Removes bits of fallen tiles. Blows away the fluff and dust. Pulls a handkerchief out of his pocket. Wipes the keys, bars, carriage, platen. Starts typing with his eyes closed. Mission nostalgia, Malpica!