Albert Sanchez Pinol - Victus - The Fall of Barcelona

If only the Red Pelts had been like Jimmy! Rather than backing Don Antonio, they spent all their time pestering him and having tantrums. Within the city, a small, divided force; without, Jimmy, an iron fist inside an iron glove.

“I’ve called them in. To expand on their plans. Of course, I’ll have the final say. You know more than I do when it comes to trenches. You can advise me.”

“What an honor!” I said. “Little me, judging such esteemed engineers. Dupuy is one of your staff officers. You sent him ahead to design an Attack Trench for you. Why wouldn’t you just go with his and be done with it?”

“I brought old Dupuy along because he’s the greatest living engineer. But if there are two offers on the table, why put down money for the horse without hearing about the second?”

He ceased his boyish informalities when the time came to hear the “two peacocks” (as he called them). It was as though he had stepped into a monarch’s guise. “We’ll hear what they have to say. And remember: You’ll be the critic who hides behind the king on the balcony and whispers in his ear. Really, without knowing it, they’ll be addressing you. I’ll ask your advice when they leave.”

He sent me into the room adjacent, the wall so thin that I’d be able to hear, without being seen. There was also a crevice at eye level for me to peep through.

In they came. Jimmy made them sit facing each other and asked them to go through the strong points of their respective plans. Dupuy first, then Verboom. This they did, but inevitably, disagreements arose. The Antwerp butcher was the first to be interrupted.

“Saint Clara?” scoffed Dupuy. “Attack the Saint Clara bastion? A travesty to all ideas of siege warfare!”

“A travesty?” said Verboom. “I’ve been working on this trench for years. You show up, cobble something together, and dare to say it’s better!”

Dupuy turned to Jimmy. “Marshal, please. This city has been besieged on three occasions in recent times. Three! And each time the trenches aimed for the same area — and it was not Saint Clara! Are we to suppose that every one of our illustrious forebears got it so wrong?”

“I may hail from Antwerp,” bellowed Verboom, “but I am, have been, and always will be loyal to Philip! God save him! I’ve suffered captivity for him, and never will I err in my loyalty.”

This was an extremely poor line of argument for him to choose. Jimmy could still remember the way Verboom had criticized him before Almansa on the basis of where he came from. Verboom was in for a tongue-lashing now.

“My dear Verboom,” said Jimmy. “We’re not here to discuss our places of birth. Roots, roots, roots. . Men are not vegetables. Would you suggest I lead an English army against His Majesty Philip V of Spain?”

Verboom imagined plots where there were none. “I see! This meeting is nothing but a formality. I’m an engineer, I was raised by engineers. But evidently, my stock pales in comparison to that of the great Vauban.” He got to his feet, fists clenched on the table. “The king of Spain will hear of this! How his true subjects are being overlooked in favor of the French!”

Now Dupuy had taken umbrage; though every inch the gentleman, he also had a volcanic temper. Overly volcanic, really. “Enough, you whore, flaunting your stones and your angles!” he spat, getting up from his seat. “Everyone knows the way you operate, claiming discrimination where there is none, gaining privileges that way. You don’t serve any king — you use them one and all.”

Jimmy found the slanging match deeply uninteresting and did nothing to hide the fact. I remember the way he gazed at the ceiling, fanning his face with a hand. Lord, it’s warm , he seemed to be saying, and how insufferable all this fervor is. Then a messenger came to the door. The message must have been pressing, to interrupt one of Marshal Berwick’s counsels. Jimmy read the letter, utterly uninterested in the cockfight going on in the room.

“Silence, gentlemen!” he said, looking up from the piece of paper. “I have a story for you. The month of July takes its name from Julius Caesar, August from Octavian Augustus. Augustus was succeeded as emperor by a certain Tiberius. The bootlickers in the Roman senate said would he like September to be named after him instead. Tiberius, less of a tyrant than he seemed, derided them: ‘What will you do,’ he said, ‘when you run out of months but still have emperors?’ ”

Verboom and Dupuy fell quiet, trying to work out the meaning of the Caesarian tale. The room remained silent. Jimmy sent them out with a waft of the hand. Each, a little disoriented, bowed and left the room.

“What did you mean by the parable?” I asked, stepping out from my hiding place.

Jimmy was deep in thought. “Oh, that? No idea. They were about to come to blows, I thought, so why not send them off with something else to think about. Men would rather say nothing and be thought fools than speak and confirm it.” He tossed the message to the ground, looking angry. “You won’t believe what it says.”

It had Philip V’s seal on the paper.

“That’s right, him, the madman crowned out of sheer luck!” he exclaimed. “He writes to offer me the position of commander in chief of all the armies in Spain. Me, a marshal of Louis XIV of France! What kind of offer is this? For me to abandon Louis? In favor of an unshod army of beggars? Why not name me king of the gypsy armies of Hungary?” He screwed up the paper, enraged. “For the love of God! If a person has Homer, why would he choose Virgil?” He began pacing the room, brooding, with the piece of paper in his hand. He had quite enough problems as it was, and whichever way you looked at it, this put him in a tricky position: Saying no to a king is always dangerous.

“And what have you decided about the trenches?” I asked. “Verboom’s or Dupuy’s?”

He continued to think and pace, eyes downcast. My heart began to pound. If ever I have prayed — to God or to le Mystère —it was then: Please, please, choose my trench, my trench, mine.

Jimmy suddenly halted. Eyes still fixed on the floor, he lifted a forefinger toward the ceiling. “Verboom’s. We’ll go with Verboom’s trench. . I’ll reject Philip’s offer, of course,” he said, and with truly regal generosity, elucidating, “which will be a snub, and no mistake. If that comes with word that I’ve also marginalized Verboom, he’ll take it even worse. We’ll begin work as soon as we have all the matériel. Let’s get to it; the sooner we finish with this insane Catalan rabble, the better.”

My dear vile Waltraud has told me to stop — she wants to know about Anfán and Amelis. Fatty Waltraud is concerned: Was I really ready to abandon my nearest and dearest? Was I lying to Jimmy? My answer: No, I wasn’t lying.

Now for something that, on the face of it, will seem incongruous: The highest love is shown by denying that selfsame love. Jimmy was Jimmy — it would have been impossible to lie to him, he’d have picked up on it in a heartbeat. The only way I could hide my feelings from him was simply not to feel them.

If I truly loved them, I was going to have to postpone that love, supplant my feelings. Fleetingly but believably, to be a different person, transfigured. Overlaying one love with another was the only option. And I assure you, it was as difficult, if not more so, than designing my dissembling Attack Trench. Yes, I’ll say it: For a period of forty-eight hours, I surrendered myself. The amount of time needed to dissipate Jimmy’s suspicions. Come the third day, he gave me the gift of a French captain’s uniform.

Everyone knows the old sailors’ saying: A single drop of tar and the whole barrel is corrupt. In the vast Bourbon encampment, I set myself to be that drop. It’s amazing the damage that one man, one single man, can do if he sets his mind to it.