The Prisoner of Heaven: A Novel (16 page)

3

The days dragged. Once a day, Armando stopped by the hut to ask after the dying man. The man’s fever made timid attempts at receding and the tangle of bruises, cuts and wounds covering his body seemed to be slowly healing beneath the ointments. He spent most of the day asleep or murmuring incomprehensible words between sleeplessness and slumber.

‘Will he live?’ Armando sometimes asked.

‘He hasn’t made up his mind yet,’ replied the old woman whom that poor soul had mistaken for his mother.

Days crystallised into weeks and it soon became evident that nobody was going to come and ask after the stranger: nobody asks for what they’d rather ignore. Normally the police and the Civil Guard didn’t enter the Somorrostro. A law of silence made it plain that the city and the world ended at the gates of the shanty town, and both sides were keen to maintain the invisible frontier. Armando knew that many on the other side secretly or openly prayed for a storm that would obliterate the city of the poor, but until that day came, they all preferred to look elsewhere, with their backs to the sea and to the people who barely survived between the water’s edge and the jungle of factories of Pueblo Nuevo. Even so, Armando had his doubts. The story he divined behind the outsider they had taken in could well lead to a breach of that law of silence.

A few weeks later, a couple of young policemen turned up asking whether anyone had seen a man who looked like the stranger. Armando remained vigilant for days, but when nobody else came by to look for the man he concluded that no one wanted to find him. Perhaps he had died and didn’t even know it.

A month and a half after his arrival, the wounds on his body began to heal. When the man opened his eyes and asked where he was, they helped him sit up to sip a bowl of broth, but they didn’t tell him anything.

‘You must rest.’

‘Am I alive?’ he asked.

Nobody confirmed whether he was or wasn’t. He spent much of the day asleep, or overcome by a weariness that never left him. Every time he closed his eyes and gave himself up to exhaustion, he travelled to the same place. In his dream, which recurred night after night, he scaled the walls of a bottomless mass grave strewn with corpses. When he reached the top and turned to look behind him, he saw the flood of ghostly bodies stirring like an eddy of eels. The dead bodies opened their eyes and climbed the walls, following him. They trailed him over the mountain and returned to the streets of Barcelona, looking for their old dwelling places, knocking on the doors of those they had once loved. Some went in search of their murderers and combed the city, thirsty for revenge, but most of them only wanted to return to their homes, to their beds, and embrace the children, wives and lovers they had left behind. Yet nobody would open the door to them. Nobody would hold their hands or wanted to kiss their lips. The dying man, bathed in sweat, woke up in the dark every night with the deafening cries of the dead in his soul.

A stranger often visited him. He smelled of tobacco and eau de cologne, two substances that were hard to come by in those days. He sat on a chair by his side, looking at him with impenetrable eyes. His hair was black as tar and his features sharp. When he noticed that the patient was awake, he smiled at him.

‘Are you God or the devil?’ the dying man once asked him.

The stranger shrugged and thought about it.

‘A bit of both,’ he answered at last.

‘In principle, I’m an atheist,’ the patient informed him. ‘Although in fact I have a lot of faith.’

‘Like so many. Rest now, my friend. Heaven can wait. And hell is too small for you.’

4

Between visits from the strange gentleman with the jet-black hair, the convalescent would let himself be fed, washed and dressed in clean clothes that proved too big for him. When he was finally able to stand up and take a few steps on his own, they led him down to the edge of the sea where he bathed his feet and felt the Mediterranean light caressing his skin. One day he spent the entire morning watching a group of ragged children with dirty faces playing in the sand, and he thought perhaps he would like to live, at least a little longer. As time went by, memories and anger began rising to the surface, and with them both the wish to return to the city and the fear of doing so.

Legs, arms, and other parts began to function more or less as he remembered. He recovered the rare pleasure of peeing into the wind with no burning sensations or shameful mishaps and told himself that a man who could urinate standing up and without help was a man in a fit state to face his responsibilities. That same night, in the early hours, he rose quietly and walked through the citadel’s narrow alleyways as far as the boundary marked by the railway tracks. On the other side stood the forest of chimneys and the cemetery’s skyline of angels and mausoleums. Further in the distance, in a tableau of lights that spread up the hillsides, lay Barcelona. He heard footsteps behind him and when he turned round he was met by the serene gaze of the man with the jet-black hair.

‘You’ve been reborn,’ he said.

‘Well, let’s hope this time around things turn out better. I’ve had a pretty bad time so far …’

The man with the jet-black hair smiled.

‘Allow me to introduce myself. I’m Armando, the Gypsy.’

Fermín shook his hand.

‘Fermín Romero de Torres, not a Gypsy, but still of relatively good coinage.’

‘Fermín, my friend: I get the impression that you’re considering going back to those people.’

‘You can’t make a leopard change its spots,’ Fermín proclaimed. ‘I’ve left a few things unfinished.’

Armando nodded.

‘I understand. But not yet, dear friend,’ he said. ‘Have patience. Stay with us for a time.’

The fear of what awaited him on his return and the generosity of those people kept him there until one Sunday morning, when he borrowed a newspaper some children had found in the bin of a refreshment stall on La Barceloneta beach. It was hard to tell how long the newspaper had been lying among the rubbish, but it was dated three months after the night of his escape. He combed the pages searching for a hint, a sign or some mention, but there was nothing. That afternoon, when he’d already made up his mind to return to Barcelona at nightfall, Armando approached Fermín and told him that one of his men had gone over to the
pensión
where he used to live.

‘Fermín, you’d better not go round there to fetch your things.’

‘How did you know my address?’

Armando smiled, avoiding the question.

‘The police told them you’d died. A notice of your death appeared in the papers weeks ago. I didn’t say anything because I realise that to read about one’s own passing when one is convalescing doesn’t help.’

‘What did I die of?’

‘Natural causes. You fell down a ravine when you were trying to flee from the law.’

‘So, I’m dead?’

‘As dead as the polka.’

Fermín weighed up the implications of his new status.

‘And what do I do now? Where do I go? I can’t stay here for ever, taking advantage of your kindness and putting you all in danger.’

Armando sat down next to him and lit one of the cigarettes he himself rolled. It smelled of eucalyptus.

‘Fermín, you can do what you want, because you don’t exist. I’d almost suggest that you stay here, because you’re now one of us, people who have no name and are not documented anywhere. We’re ghosts. Invisible. But I know you must return and resolve whatever you’ve left behind out there. Unfortunately, once you leave this place I can’t offer you my protection.’

‘You’ve already done enough for me.’

Armando patted Fermín’s shoulder and handed him a folded sheet of paper he carried in his pocket.

‘Leave the city for a while. Let a year go by and, when you return, begin here,’ he said, moving away.

Fermín unfolded the sheet of paper and read:

FERNANDO BRIANS

LAWYER

Calle de Caspe, 12

Attic Floor, room 1

Barcelona. Telephone 564375

‘How can I repay you for everything you’ve done for me?’

‘One day, when you’ve sorted out your business, come by and ask for me. We’ll go and see Carmen Amaya dance and you can tell me how you managed to escape from up there. I’m curious,’ said Armando.

Fermín looked into those black eyes and nodded slowly.

‘What cell were you in, Armando?’

‘Cell thirteen.’

‘Were those crosses on the wall yours?’

‘Unlike you, Fermín, I
am
a believer, but I’ve lost my faith.’

That afternoon nobody said goodbye to Fermín or tried to stop him leaving. He set off, one more invisible person, towards the streets of a Barcelona that smelled of electricity. In the distance the towers of the Sagrada Familia seemed stranded in a blanket of red clouds that threatened a storm of biblical proportions, and he went on walking. His feet took him to the bus depot on Calle Trafalgar. There was some money in the pockets of the coat Armando had given him, and he bought a ticket for the longest trip available. He spent the night on the bus, driving through deserted roads under the rain. The following day he did the same, until, after three days on trains, on foot and on midnight buses, he reached a place where the streets had no name and the houses had no number and where nothing or no one could remember him.

He had a hundred jobs and no friends. He made money, which he spent. He read books that spoke of a world in which he no longer believed. He started to write a letter that he never knew how to end, battling with reminiscences and remorse. More than once he walked up to a bridge or a precipice and gazed calmly at the chasm below. At the last moment the memory of that promise would always return, and the look in the eyes of the Prisoner of Heaven. After a year, Fermín left the room he had rented above a café and, with no baggage other than a copy of
City of the Damned
he’d found in a flea market – possibly the only book of Martín’s that hadn’t been burned and which Fermín had read a dozen times – he walked two kilometres to the train station and bought the ticket that had been waiting for him all those months.

‘One way to Barcelona, please.’

The ticket-office clerk issued the ticket and gave it to him with a disdainful look.

‘Rather you than me,’ he said. ‘With all those goddam Catalan dogs.’

5

Barcelona, 1941

It was starting to get dark when Fermín stepped off the train in the Estación de Francia. A cloud of steam and soot belched out by the engine stole along the platform, masking the passengers’ feet as they descended after the long journey. Fermín joined the silent procession towards the exit, among people in threadbare clothes, dragging suitcases held together with straps, people aged well before their time carrying all their belongings in a bundle, children with empty eyes and emptier pockets.

A pair of Civil Guards patrolled the entrance. Fermín saw how they followed the passengers with their eyes and stopped some of them at random to ask for documentation. He kept walking in a straight line towards one of them. When he was only about a dozen metres away, he noticed that the Civil Guard was watching him. In Martín’s novel, the book that had kept Fermín company all those months, one of the characters swore that the best way of disarming the authorities was to speak to them first before they addressed you. So before the officer was able to point him out, Fermín walked straight up to the man and said in a calm voice:

‘Good evening, chief. Would you be so kind as to tell me where I can find the Hotel Porvenir? I believe it’s in Plaza Palacio, but I hardly know the city.’

The Civil Guard examined him silently, somewhat disconcerted. His colleague had moved closer, covering his right side.

‘You’ll have to ask someone when you get out,’ he said in a rather unfriendly tone.

Fermín nodded politely.

‘That’s what I’ll do. I’m sorry to have bothered you.’

He was about to continue walking towards the entrance hall when the other officer took hold of his arm.

‘Plaza Palacio is on the left as you go out. Opposite the Military Headquarters.’

‘Most obliged. Have a good evening.’

The Civil Guard let go of him and Fermín walked away slowly, pacing himself, until he reached the entrance hall and then the street.

A scarlet sky curved over Barcelona. The city looked dark, entwined with sharp, black silhouettes. A half-empty tram hauled itself along, shedding a flickering light on the cobblestones. Fermín waited for it to go by before crossing to the other side. As he stepped over the shining rails he gazed into the distance, where the sides of Paseo Colón seemed to converge and the hill and castle of Montjuïc loomed above the city. He looked down again and set off up Calle Comercio towards the Borne market. The streets were deserted and a cold breeze blew though the alleyways. He had nowhere to go.

He remembered Martín telling him that years ago he’d lived in that area, in a large old house buried in the shadowy canyon of Calle Flassaders, next to the old Mauri chocolate factory. Fermín headed off in that direction but when he arrived he realised that the building in question had been shelled during the war. The authorities hadn’t bothered to remove the rubble, so the neighbours had piled it up out of the way, presumably to make room for them to walk along the street, which was narrower than the corridors of some homes in the smarter parts of town.

Fermín looked around him. A dim glow of bulbs and candles drifted down from the balconies. He moved further into the ruins, jumping over debris, broken gargoyles and beams twisted into improbable knots, looking for a space among the wreckage. At last he lay down under a stone that still had number 30 engraved on it, David Martín’s former address. Covering himself with his coat and the old newspapers he wore under his clothes, he curled up into a ball, closed his eyes and tried to get to sleep.

Half an hour went by and the chill was starting to seep into his bones. A humid wind licked the ruins, searching for holes and cracks. Fermín opened his eyes and stood up. He was trying to find a more sheltered place when he noticed a figure watching him from the street. Fermín froze. The figure took a few steps towards him.