Juan Marsé - The Calligraphy of Dreams

“Don’t tell me you weren’t the tiniest bit curious …” he paused as Ringo gestured impatiently. “What’s wrong? Was there some problem?”

“No problem, no,” Ringo retorted. Why on earth does this fellow want to rake up that ghastly business again now? “Look, don’t get me wrong, but I wasn’t in the least bit interested in your love affairs … besides, it wasn’t hard to guess what the message was, it was predictable.”

“Oh, it was, was it?” Señor Alonso’s eyes searched his face. “You mean to say you knew beforehand who the letter was for?”

“Of course I did,” said Ringo, picking up his jacket and putting it on again. “Time had gone by, and you had no wish to see her again, so the message was clear …”

“What are you doing? Leaving already?”

“It’s late.”

“Hang on a moment, will you? There’s something I wanted to explain …”

Señor Alonso hesitated. His head sank between his shoulders in a sudden gesture of contrition. Ringo sat down again to listen to his stammered, confused excuses. He made so many false starts, coughs, and clearings of the throat that he sounded just like the engine of a Biscuter scooter. He admitted it had been a mistake, and beyond that a crazy move, I must have been mad, he said, just think, a desperate plea from someone who doesn’t even dare show his face, a cry for help that had to pass through the hands of a fifteen-year-old boy, and then those of an old maid running a bar … It was crucial Señora Paqui didn’t discover where he was living, he added, not her or anyone else, so the details of the rendezvous were inside the envelope, together with the insane proposal. That they should run away together, no less! It had been the greatest, most unforgivable mistake he had ever made, and it had taken him less than two days to regret taking advantage of such a level-headed and reliable boy like him, and he had felt really bad, because he couldn’t shake off his crazy passion for that young girl. He had tried to forget her, spending a lot of time and effort to do so without success, and anyway in the end he never got any reply from her, and had not heard anything more about it. He never knew if she hadn’t wanted to respond to his call, or if she’d been prevented from doing so, and besides, it was all for the best … Yes indeed, because when a man plays such a dirty trick as he had, he didn’t deserve anything more than scorn and to be forgotten. He recalled Victoria’s generous hospitality, and its unfortunate consequences, the coming into close contact with that strangest of creatures, someone so unhappy, so withdrawn and sullen, and yet at the same time so full of life, with a furtive sensuality that was so intense it could have led them both to perdition …

“I bet she laughed at me and tore the letter up,” Señor Alonso concluded, puffing out his cheeks. “So much the better. She really was unbelievable. The last time I saw her she pretended she had fallen in the bathroom, just to keep me from leaving.”

“But …”

At first, Ringo had been only half-listening to this tortuous outpouring of guilt, regrets, and self-justification, until the old man’s dark voice began to trail off. Doubts had already been growing in his mind, but at that moment the truth struck home in both his heart and his brain. He sat staring at him like somebody who has seen a ghost but still can’t quite believe what he is seeing. He got to his feet slowly without knowing why, staring into space as though trying to interpret the flood of images overwhelming him.

“What are you saying?” he murmured, collapsing back onto the bench.

“Believe me, I was desperate to avoid it.”

“That’s impossible. Señora Paquita was expecting a letter for Señora Mir. Right from the start she said it was for her … the letter was for Señora Mir!”

“I never told her anything of the sort. No way. What a gossip she was! I can understand she must have been really surprised when she got the letter, but naturally … Are you listening?”

But naturally, he explained, he couldn’t tell Señora Paquita who the letter was for, because she would have gone straight round to inform Violeta’s mother, and then there would have been hell to pay; all he could ask her to do was to be patient and discreet.

“But you …” Ringo could not get the words out. “You knew what great friends Señora Mir and Señora Paquita were, you knew they liked to gossip, to fantasise …”

“Yes, that’s true too,” Señor Alonso admitted, a light-hearted note stealing into his voice. “They were as alike as two peas. Well, I made so many mistakes … What can I say, I was bedazzled, I had no idea what was going on, I could only think of one thing … Anyway, you shouldn’t have paid any attention to the ramblings of an old goat like her, should you? That woman was all talk. Well, none of that matters now.”

Ringo could not get over his astonishment. Among the many dismal questions whirling round his brain, what was uppermost was the feeling that he had been caught in a trap. The mouse finally took the cheese.

“So that’s it. It was pretty disgusting of you, wasn’t it? She was little more than a child …”

Señor Alonso wagged his forefinger to deny this. He smiled vaguely and said:

“No, it was her mother who was the child. Oh yes, she really was, I can tell you. She really was,” he said, closing his eyes. Then almost at once, sensing Ringo’s reaction, he opened them again. “What’s wrong, are you leaving already?”

“Goodbye, Señor Alonso.”

Ringo had got to his feet once more, and this time seemed determined to leave. The other man stood up as well.

“Well, I hope to see you again … it would be good if you joined the club. Membership is twenty-five pesetas a month. Cheap, isn’t it? You could ask your girlfriend to come along …” He decided to offer him his hand, with an imperceptible knowing wink, a timid plea for him to understand and forget. “I wish you all the best, my lad.”

Ringo accepted his outstretched hand coldly, as though mortally offended. An adolescent’s natural disposition towards pretence and imposture that years earlier had created a gratifying to-and-fro between truth and lies, and which now was starting to weave invention and memory together in his attempts to write (but as yet without any feelings of guilt), led him to utter a few conventional words of farewell, then he headed for the stairs leading down to the foyer. As he descended the first steps he could still feel the old faun’s affable, condescending gaze on the back of his neck, and before he reached the exit, when the hubbub of voices and cries from the pool began to die down, he began to reflect on good intentions and how useless they were. It was true he had nothing to reproach himself for, but in that case, why did the sense of disquiet persist?

Stepping outside, the harsh August light flooding the streets of Gràcia blinded him momentarily. Abel Alonso’s description was still ringing in his ears, although by now it had acquired an appropriately sarcastic overtone:

Such an observant, polite and responsible lad.

JUAN MARSÉ, born in Barcelona in 1933, is a Spanish novelist and screen-writer. Following the publication of his first novel in 1960, he has gone on to become one of the most respected living authors in Spain. He has been honoured with many literary awards, including the European Literature Prize and the Cervantes Prize.

NICK CAISTOR is a translator, journalist and author. He has translated more than forty books from Spanish and Portuguese, including works by Paulo Coelho and Eduardo Mendoza. He has twice been awarded the Premio Valle-Inclán for Spanish translation.