Juan Marsé - The Calligraphy of Dreams

The screams of some of the women in the congregation could be heard as far away as the Tibidabo. There were more than enough reasons to suspect that our friend was losing his marbles, but the good people who had just washed themselves of their sins preferred to look discreetly the other way, and neither the district council nor the local Falangist headquarters, which Señor Mir often visited due to the position he held, seemed to want to know either. He was already a bit strange when he came back from Russia, his wife later declared: after he cut back his moustache still further he launched himself into everything he did with extraordinary vehemence and determination, and yet, the Rat-catcher would argue, we have seen and continue to see every day far more extravagant and extraordinary behaviour from members of that battle-hardened militia, because that is the way they are, my friends, that is how these blue scoundrels behave, that is what these days of infamy and sacristies are like. He even thought it probable that the convent authorities, as well as the congregation, would see this display by the dapper ex-combatant as a manly, martial offering in times of peace, a rite or military custom possibly inspired by a pious vow, a secret desire for expiation. This man is paying for a sin, some of them must have thought. And possibly that was why he shaved his moustache.

Whatever the truth, somebody considered his conduct both inappropriate and offensive, and reported him. So Comrade Ramón Mir Altamirano was summoned to the local Falange delegation in Plaza Lesseps to explain himself to the chief, who was a friend of his. In the Falange office, he merely shrugged his shoulders, clutched the front of his trousers in both hands, and, face to the sun, swore that it was a question of honour, a personal act of homage to a brave female friend who was risking her life for a good cause. Now is no longer the time for epic struggle, comrades, it’s a time for intimate expiation, it is said he said. That was his style and he had no intention of saying sorry and anyway, damn it all, comrades, he was as loyal as ever to the cause, and was not going to add anything more. What damned expiation was he talking about? The devil only knows! He was given a serious reprimand and warned not to go around in public wearing his uniform and scaring people. If he did not comply, the next time he would have to report to the movement’s provincial headquarters, and could be expelled from the party and stripped of his position as neighbourhood councillor.

Despite all this, the spectacular pantomime was repeated the very next Sunday, with an explosive variation that took everyone by surprise. Pale-faced and solemn as before, Altamirano left the church at the start of the collective mea culpa . Once outside, he descended the staircase again, and stood to attention at the bottom. Those who from the porch saw him standing there in his funereal uniform, straight-backed, wild-eyed, his jutting chin raised in defiance like a black, imperturbable herald announcing leaden years devoted to an urgent, inescapable cause, said that he remained motionless for at least half an hour while the Mass was being said. And that for one brief instant — so brief that very few of those present managed to see it — he fell to his knees and prayed so fervently and trembled so violently that he looked like someone kneeling in the snowy wastes of the Russian steppe; they could have sworn that at that moment, as he was entrusting himself to God and the Fatherland, he thought that the snow of Novgorod was crunching beneath his knees. A short while later, somebody asked him if he felt ill. He asked politely: would you mind repeating the question, kyrsji ? Then almost at once, seeing the congregation leaving Mass and coming down the stairs, he drew the pistol with his left hand, shouted Viva Cristo Rey ! placed the barrel to the side of his head, and pulled the trigger. This time, however, he had no chance to exclaim bang! The word got stuck in his throat as his head jerked violently to one side, because this time the gun fired a real bullet.

The rest of the story is an anti-climax, concludes the Rat-catcher. They sent for his wife, but do you know who came on her behalf to take care of that blue dummy who had blown off his own ear and part of his brains? The fellow she was seeing, that lame guy, a prickly sort. He went with him in the ambulance. Mir’s skin was saved after I don’t know how many operations on his nut, but when he came out of hospital he had less brains than a cockroach. The bullet shot away the left lobe of his brain, and left him gaga. He talked drivel, went round drunk all day, and kept falling down in the street. His mother, a war widow who lives on her own in Badalona and never forgave him for joining the Falange, refused even to see him. Perhaps he himself went in search of that bullet; perhaps it was always in the chamber, waiting for him, even when he used the butt to hammer in the Sacred Heart plaque on his door. Whatever the case, I bet that blue riffraff are asking themselves questions now … Was it his hand that loaded the bullet into the chamber? It’s always said that’s the Devil’s work, but Holy Mother of God! Does he also load the weapons of our heroic crusaders? Does the Evil One also load our guns, blessed by the bishops?

“It wasn’t his service revolver,” adds the Rat-catcher. “It was a 6.35mm Walther he brought back from Germany. But the finger that squeezed the trigger was not his, it was ours.”

“Now you’re talking complete nonsense,” Alberta the light of my life protests as she serves more rice to the youngest member of the brigade. “Just eat and pay him no attention, Manuel.”

“I don’t know, when it comes to comrade Altamirano …”

“The most neatly combed Falangist you’ve ever seen, nano !”

“Uncle Luis says that somebody told him that Altamirano was in Málaga during the war and took part in the reprisals with General Queipo’s Falange troops.”

“Anything is possible where he’s concerned,” says Manuel. He recalls the arrogant figure with his puffed-out chest, black, oiled hair and jutting chin. By now he had shaved off his moustache, but when he spoke, and above all when he shouted, it was as if he still had one. “I haven’t seen that bastard since I ran into him on the street about a year ago. He was with a spectacular-looking woman, a Chinese girl. They were about to go into the police station on Travesera Dalt, and the woman stopped on the pavement to put some lipstick on. That annoyed him so much he grabbed the lipstick from her and almost made her swallow it …”

“That woman you’re talking about,” cut in the Rat-catcher, “is about as Chinese as Columbus. She’s a whore who works with the police. I’ve already told you about her — she’s dangerous.”

“Yes, we know,” says Uncle Luis. Then he adds slyly: “But what about the snake? Didn’t you tell us you went to the church because a snake had slipped in and scared the life out of an old biddy? I seem to remember there are gardens and a pond beside that convent …”

“It was a plaster snake. Just plaster painted green. But it looked real, the son of a bitch. It was behind the confessional. It had fallen off an image of the Immaculate Conception, a relic so old it was falling to pieces. It was only a lump of plaster — you know, the snake curled up beneath the feet of the Virgin. When I saw it on the floor it was just lying there, curled up and still, with the Virgin’s big toe on one of its coils. That’s what the whole fuss was about: a piece of broken plaster on the floor. The nuns thought they might be able to stick it back on, but no chance … Pass me the wine, will you? Don’t you want some dessert? Go on, try this peach. Cut it into slices and put them in your glass. The best desserts are those that allow you to go on drinking, the rest are a load of rubbish. Shit, you really need to learn how to eat properly!”