Juan Marsé - The Calligraphy of Dreams

“Are you feeling alright, Vicky?” asks Señora Paquita, seeing her so distracted.

“Oh, yes. What were you saying?”

“It’s something you can’t even imagine!” She has finished rinsing the anchovies and lines them up carefully on small dishes. Glancing slyly at the adolescent pretending to read over by the widow, and wishing he weren’t so close, she says in a hollow voice: “Something you’re going to be pleased to hear …”

“Really?”

“He was here yesterday!”

“Who?”

“What d’you mean, who?” She lowers her voice still further: “Your man. He sat at that table at the back and didn’t say a word for quite a while. He looked really down.”

“You don’t say.” Señora Mir looks thoughtful: she has not yet decided whether to be impressed by the news or not. “He swore we would never see him again.”

“Well, he was here. It was a little after half past three in the afternoon. Agustín had gone for a nap and I was sorting out the refrigerator when I saw him come in through that door. And listen to me, Vicky: he didn’t look the same man. He was in such low spirits. He said hello, sat down, ordered his aperitif and a glass of water, then sat for more than half an hour head in hands. He really made me feel sorry for him. He asked me if I’d seen you go by, or if your daughter had been in, and I said no. He told me he had been knocking on the door of your apartment for an hour, but that you didn’t want to let him in.”

“That’s nothing but a lie. I haven’t been out all day and I didn’t hear a thing, so he’s lying. The thing is, he doesn’t dare show his face …”

“Yes, that’s probably it. Because I told him to try again, that you were bound to be home, but he didn’t even listen. He took a fountain pen out of his pocket and asked me if I had any writing paper and an envelope. I said I did, but that he might not like them, because they were pink. It’s the only little whim I allow myself, I told him when I saw him pull a face … Well, the thing is I went up to my room and came back down with half a dozen sheets of paper and an envelope. Then he goes and asks me if I would do him the favour of handing you the letter myself …”

Señora Mir betrays no emotion.

“Why on earth would he do that? And where is the letter?”

“Well, look, when he had almost finished writing a page — after stopping to think dozens of times — he picked it up, screwed it into a ball, and put it in his pocket. He struggled to write two more pages, then also crumpled them up and put them away. It was obvious that the letter wasn’t coming out as he wanted, because of his handwriting or whatever. I didn’t move from here, but I could see everything. He didn’t even taste the aperitif, maybe even forgot he’d ordered it, because in the end he came to the counter, asked for a brandy, and said to me I can’t do it, Paquita, I can’t do it, I’ll write it at home. I can’t find the words. He drank the brandy, and guess what he said before he left?”

“How am I supposed to know?”

“That he’d send someone with the letter, and could I do him the favour of handing it over personally.”

“He said that?”

“Yes, those were his exact words. I had to promise him I wouldn’t tell you a thing, not even that he’d been here. But there are no secrets between us two, are there, sweetheart?” Señora Mir nods with a complicit little smile. “After that he left, taking with him the envelope and the three or four remaining sheets …”

“Oh, yes? And who was the letter for?”

“You’re kidding me! For you, of course, you silly thing! Who else? Of course, I asked him, but there was no need for him to say a word. I think he said something like ‘the name will be on the envelope’. The rogue wanted it kept quiet, which is only normal, isn’t it? And by the way, the brandy he ordered is the one you like. He’s never asked for that brandy from the keg before!”

Señora Mir blinks. She is confused, and strokes the lobe of her ear.

“Yes, I think I remember he said something of the sort … After that dreadful row at home, when I asked him never to speak to me again, do you know what he said? Well, he said calm as you like that he was going far away but that one day he’d explain everything. At that moment I didn’t believe him.”

“Why not? Give him the chance to ask for forgiveness, sweetheart.”

“No man deserves to be forgiven for what he did.”

“And what was that exactly, Vicky?”

Wrapped up in her thoughts, looking at herself as always in a self-indulgent mirror, Señora Mir is not listening.

“Yes, now I remember … There was a huge argument, you see. I started shouting and my daughter shut herself in the bathroom with a towel wrapped around her head, she was so scared … I saw him put on his jacket and pick his things up from the dining-room table, his tobacco, sunglasses, his tube of Ephedrine for his asthma, the shirts and socks for his boys’ football team — we used to wash them and mend them each week, see how good we were to him … That was when he said: I’d better go, farewell, I’ll write to you. Yes, that’s what he said. I was in the middle of the corridor, so frightened I couldn’t even move, and I couldn’t breathe, and thought I was going to faint … So then I opened the door and ran down the stairs!”

“But what was the argument about? What did he do to you, Vicky?”

There is a gleam of curiosity in Señora Paquita’s big black eyes, but she waits in vain for a reply, while the boy lowers his own gaze with bored resignation, hearing without listening. He stares down at the imaginary keyboard and plays doh, mi and soh with his thumb, middle and little fingers, finding it hard to manage all three at once, because now in his mind’s eye he can see Señor Alonso’s dark, knotted hand fleetingly touching Señora Paquita’s bottom one rainy night the previous winter when the two of them were standing in the doorway. He was carrying the umbrella she had lent him so that he would not get wet crossing the road to Señora Mir’s place, and had opened it behind his back before saying goodbye, partly concealing them both, although not completely.

“What’s clear is that he did you a lot of harm,” Señora Paquita says. “You deserved something better, my girl.”

“Yes, of course,” Señora Mir sighs. “I deserved better luck, that’s for sure. But happiness is worth fighting for, Paqui, however much it costs … It was my fault, you know. I told him: the door’s over there. It was me who threw him out. It was my fault. I should never have allowed him to take such liberties in my home …”

“Can I ask you a question, dear? Don’t be angry, but I don’t quite get it. Who has to forgive who? You him, or him you?”

“Oh, Paqui, I would have forgiven him, I really would. May God forgive me, but if only he’d given me time … You have to believe me! I made a mistake, one of those great blunders of mine! What I need is for him to know that, and to pardon me for insulting him and slapping him like that!”

“You slapped his face? My, my, that must have been some scene!”

“Oh, yes, it was, it was!”

“That’s such terrible luck, sweetheart! And now it’s all over, what do you think now about what happened, Vicky?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“Well, I’ve just told you. I messed up. When I came home that day my back was crucifying me. I’d just had to deal with poor María Terol — you know, with her hundred and ten kilos, her cellulitis, and that bad temper of hers. Anyway, I was exhausted and I lost the plot. And then those damned tram tracks! Why on earth did they leave them there like that to confuse me still further! They should be dug up, and the cobblestones along with them!”