Albert Sanchez Pinol - Victus - The Fall of Barcelona

She took up the sheets of paper. “And this?” she asked in amusement and surprise.

“A book of poems. Though there is only one that is worth anything, which is the one I completed yesterday and which won me my fourth Point.”

“Poems? But these are drawings.”

“And?” I said, offended. “The Ducroix brother school me in design, not versifying. But they are poems.” I drew closer to her. “They’re fortress designs. Are they to your liking?”

She didn’t dare make a show of her incomprehension, which was nonetheless plain to see. I laid the sheets out on the straw and went on. “My last blueprint is the best. Can you guess which it is? If you look closely, you’ll see it’s different from the others.”

Her eyes skipped between them.

“Give it a proper look!” I said. “You’re Vauban’s daughter. If you can’t understand it, who will?”

She looked at one of the sheets for a few moments. Then put it aside. Another and another. The rain continued to fall. As she was deciding between the drawings, my mind turned to the rain. It struck me that in wet countries, the rain could be used as a weapon against the besieging army. .

“This one,” she said finally. “Yes, this is the one.” She’d gotten it right. Her face resembled that of a child who had just learned to read. “This one is different from the others. They look like identical drawings but are not. It has something extra.” She looked at me. “What makes it different?”

“In this one,” I said, prodding the sheet of paper, “I created a fortress with the thought of you asleep in the middle of the city. And I defended you.”

Of the extensive Vauban family, the one who paid the fewest visits to the castle was Jeanne’s husband. It is my understanding that theirs was something of an arranged marriage, and the truth is, I did not find his presence unsettling.

It wasn’t out of any particular grievance that he kept far from Bazoches. He had simply turned his back on his wife, whom he paid no mind, but not in a hostile or abusive manner. Protocol stated that they had to sit side by side when eating at the great table. He paid considerably more attention to the saltcellar than to his wife (one of his numerous obsessions was a constant fear of running out of salt). When he passed by me, I could almost see the thoughts spilling from his head like sawdust.

Unless his family was supervising him, the man never washed. When he stayed in Paris for extended periods, not under their control, his nails would grow longer than a wolf’s. And his very fine clothing was always in tatters. The moment he arrived in Bazoches, he would have to be hurried out of sight and washed and clothed, for if the marquis saw him in that state, he was quite capable of expelling him. But, this much is true, he was extremely happy, perhaps the happiest man I have ever laid eyes upon. His particular mania was the philosopher’s stone. He was constantly on the verge of discovering the final piece in the puzzle. And is any man so happy as he who finds himself on the verge of a scientific revolution? Whichever track he was on would inevitably come to naught, and he’d be depressed for several days. But come the third day, he was back to his carefree, lively, and joyous self again, for he had uncovered another secret formula in some dusty tome.

As is so often the way, the cuckold became very friendly with his partner’s lover (unfortunately, but what to do?). I do not think he ever knew about Jeanne and me, and if he did know, he cared not a pepper. Much as I tried to avoid him, it was inevitable that sooner or later, he would collar me in some corner of Bazoches.

“My dear Zuviría!” I heard him exclaim one day before he approached and embraced me.

On this occasion he had been at the castle a whole week, an extraordinarily extended stay, bearing in mind the suddenness of his comings and goings. This was due to an old woman, a spirit medium in the town of Bazoches, to whom he was paying daily visits.

“I believe I have finally alighted on the definitive path that will lead us to the philosopher’s stone,” he went on. “The path was not in this but in the next world! Thanks to that old witch, I am able to converse with superior souls who give me guidance. Yesterday I set off alongside none other than Michel de Nostradame and Charlemagne.”

His liking for my company made a certain sense. His family had made up their minds about him already and sent him away whenever they could, while the servants were not at his level. With me, on the other hand, he could hammer on all he liked; as a student, I was somewhere between the two social extremes. For my part, it would have been highly indecorous of me to send a member of the Vauban family off to fry asparagus. So I had to bear his happy tirades, his mental raspberries, on the subject of the philosopher’s stone. Looked at with a little leniency, nor was it the heaviest load to bear. My obligations were limited to opening my eyes wide, every now and then letting out a “Can that be?” a “ How interesting!” or even a “The world will shake with delight!” when my thoughts were: Enough now, fruitcake, I want to go and lie down with your wife.

The true philosopher’s stone was Bazoches. Ah, yes, Bazoches, pleasant Bazoches. The best days of my life; the most tender and full of hope. Joyous. And bear in mind that it is a life of ninety-eight years of which I speak, ninety-eight times around the sun. Though, during that time, something somewhat ominous also occurred.

Jeanne and I didn’t spend all our time together in secret dalliances. We were on occasion visited by an infantry captain, Don Antoine Bardonenche. I do not remember what the relation was between him and the marquis, but he was free to come and go at Bazoches as he pleased. A young man, supreme with the sword, he was stocky, with a jaw like an anvil and a very candid manner. His ideal was that of the knights errant, though in place of the tragic aspect, Bardonenche had an uproarious laugh. With his perfect manly deportment, he was one of the most handsome men I’ve ever seen. Charlotte, Jeanne’s older sister, was hopelessly in love with him. Sometimes on a Sunday, the four of us, Jeanne and I, Bardonenche and Charlotte, would go for picnics in the meadows surrounding the castle. The two of them would engage in pretend swordfights, armed with sticks, laughing and tumbling innocently around for hours on end. I turned my Bazoches eyes on Bardonenche, to examine him, to ascertain what was hidden beneath that soldier skin of his, at once so boyishly voluptuous. Nothing — there was nothing. All his life was taken up in passion for weaponry and serving Louis XIV of France, whom the laypeople called the Sun King and his enemies called the Beast of Europe or, simply, the Beast.

One day when the marquis was abroad and — what news! — the Ducroix brothers were as well, we two couples made a carnival of the castle. We were still children, in spite of my studies, in spite of Jeanne’s marriage, in spite of the infantry captain’s uniform worn by Bardonenche. We played blind hen. When the blindfold was put on me, I followed the others without any difficulty. Thanks to my training in the Spherical Room, it was so easy to find them that I hardly needed eyes. I could smell their laughter, hear their smells. But, pretending I couldn’t, I let them get away for a little while. Suddenly, my hands were pushing on a hidden door behind a drape. I didn’t know why the door might be hidden like that, but with the blindfold on, it felt like less of an aberration to go ahead and enter.

Behind this door was a thin passageway. My hands felt along some wall brackets. Certain curious figures stood on these. I took off the blindfold; before me were reproductions, to scale, of the fortifications of every one of the cities and citadels of Europe.