The Horseman's Song

by Ben Pastor

  Brissot ignored him. “If they re-stacked the stones, it means something. If they had just wanted to dump the body, they’d have done so.”

  “No.” Walton moved his head stiffly from side to side. The desolate incline and the stone crags, as secluded a place as he’d been able to think of, was not isolated enough, not safe enough. Until now, no culprit had been mentioned, but only because it was obvious to everyone, and the fact called for a reprisal.

  There was still a tremor in his hands, a small frantic motion he’d seen in old men. He must avoid thinking of the German if he wanted to keep his anger down enough to reason logically.

  Brissot crossed his bulky arms, frowning. “Let’s face it, Valentin is right. It must have happened between Monday evening at the earliest and Thursday night at the latest.”

  Walton glared at the grave. Clasping his left wrist, he was able to keep both hands from trembling, and the partial sense of control helped him. “Yes. Or much earlier than that.”

  RISCAL AMARGO

  There were no outward indications in Serrano’s behaviour that anything was amiss. The colonel arrived on Monday with news that the battle for the town of Brunete near Madrid was over and won.

  “Our tanks pursued them and crushed them,” he told the gathered men. “The enemy had to turn the machine guns against his own in order to slow down the rout. Colonel Barrón controls the field all the way to Villanueva.” With a gesture he prevented whatever show of enthusiasm the men might have in mind. “One does not cheer when Spaniards die, whichever side they fought on.” And he looked unkindly at Bora, who was the most unlikely to express his emotions.

  The temperature had abated after the rain; still, the sun on the ledge was dazzling and the men stood in it as if purblind. Briskly Serrano crossed that splendour to reach the post, ordering Bora to come inside as he did so.

  Unrequested, Alfonso’s dog limped ahead of Bora, who said, “Márchate, perro,” patiently dodging him. Serrano headed upstairs; there must be more to tell about the victory at Brunete, or some other matter entirely.

  “Open your trunk,” Serrano ordered as soon as they reached Bora’s room, gloved hands on his belt. Bora wondered why, but did as he was ordered. It all came back to him: army school inspections, and his boyish anxiety that he would be found inadequate.

  “Now empty it.”

  Again, Bora obeyed. He took out a set of colonials slightly less faded than the one he wore, and two pairs of riding breeches and tunics. He was beginning to suspect what this was really about, and how Serrano’s attendant – he couldn’t imagine Señora Serrano having done so – might have told the colonel about the bloodstain. Since returning to the sierra he’d washed the tunic in cold water and soap until the stain had gone, although that sleeve was now perceptibly more faded than the other.

  Serrano would not touch the clothes. He instructed Bora to hold the first tunic up for him to study it. “The other one,” he said afterwards. “And now the breeches.”

  When the inspection was over, Bora set the bundle of khaki cloth on his cot. Serrano continued to stare into the trunk, where the linen remained that his wife had given Bora. Bora went into a quiet fit of anxiety until he realized the colonel did not recognize the handiwork. All he wanted was for him to take his linen out and show him what was underneath.

  At the bottom were a small framed picture of Bora’s mother and a pebble he’d picked up on the street when he first entered Bilbao.

  Since the situation was anything but calm, Bora grew uneasy when he heard Serrano speak in a calm voice. “Yesterday a mounted army patrol was on duty along the Villaspesa–Castralvo cart road when the stench of carrion led them to a ditch in the neighbourhood of the Ermita de Santa Ana. There after a brief search they found the body of a man shot at close range, a bullet having entered his skull from behind. The decay and damage to the corpse’s face, plus the absence of documents, did not allow them to identify the man. Other than abandoned farms and sheepfolds, the sole residence in the area is the huerta Enebrales de Vargas, to which the soldiers removed themselves to interrogate the occupants.”

  Bora concentrated all his efforts on trying to understand what Serrano was saying, as if he spoke in an unknown tongue. Like a deaf man, he found himself nearly lip-reading the colonel.

  “… Professor Augustín Vargas and his wife, confronted with the slippers removed from the body, recognized them at once as belonging to Francisco Heras Soler, architect, who had been visiting the huerta. They then proceeded to inform the soldiers that a Foreign Legion officer had last been seen with the victim on Monday 19 July.”

  From the sudden spasm under his ribcage, Bora knew he’d been holding his breath.

  “Without prompting from the non-commissioned officer leading the patrol, the Vargases provided a description of the legionnaire. The rest, Lieutenant, I would like to hear from you.”

  The rest. Bora remembered few times in his life when he had failed to answer a direct or indirect question. Soler’s death encompassed and entangled everything else. Bora felt the snare closing, and coming up with an answer for Serrano was far down his list of priorities.

  “Is that what you were doing during your last errand? Tramping around Castralvo?”

  Unwisely, Bora tasted just enough sarcasm in the colonel’s voice to rise to the bait. “I met Señor Soler at the Vargas place.”

  “Why? What business did you have with him?”

  This time Bora kept his mouth shut, as if he could ignore questions, orders and anything else coming from Serrano.

  “I asked you a question, Lieutenant.”

  “Although the colonel disputes the matter, I am under orders additional to his own, and am not obliged to report everything I do to the colonel.”

  “That may be, but I’m giving you a direct command.”

  “By the colonel’s leave, I’m disregarding it.”

  Serrano’s perfect silhouette seemed to sway under the impertinence. “I do not know what else you do in Spain or what activities you engage in when you leave this post, but I have reason to believe you killed a Spanish civilian, and demand to know the circumstances of the killing,” he said heatedly, further mispronouncing his accented German.

  “That’s preposterous.”

  “Not in the eyes of the Spanish army.”

  Bora felt the irresistible sentence fly out of his mouth. “The Spanish army! I think the Spanish army is deliberately obstructing the investigation of Lorca’s death.”

  Bora was staggered by the lightning speed at which Serrano’s hand rose and landed full force on his face.

  No adult had ever struck him before, neither his indulgent mother nor his disciplinarian but remote stepfather. Bora was so unprepared for the sanction that he lost all sense of judgement and place. “I also think you have no right to rummage through my books and blot out what you don’t like about my private readings, which are none of your military business.”

  The words fell into a void. In front of him, Serrano’s face was altered, frozen; contempt, regret and national hostility were all apparent in his gaunt features. Bora dreaded to think what his own posture expressed. A moment later he was apologizing; he didn’t know whether he spoke in German or Spanish, but it was a young officer’s grovelling formula of submission, none of which Serrano acknowledged.

  EL PALO DE LA VIRGEN

  Walton sent Valentin ahead via the shortcut, and with Brissot took the longer way back. He needed time to collect himself. For the first half of the descent from Muralla del Rojo he had wound down from rage, to brooding, to an indistinct attempt to choose the means of action. When they were about twenty minutes from camp, he said, “He’s bedding Remedios.”

  Brissot glanced at him, sunlight glittering through his eyeglasses. “What?”

  “She told me he is.”

  “Who? Who is? I don’t know what you mean.”

  Walton felt as though he’d just woken up: just back from Remedios’ house, just finished dreaming about
dark streets and the dirty yellow wall. The episode at the gravesite was like an intrusion, a dream within a dream, or the only thing that was a dream: because he had ridden buses through dark streets, after all, and had made love to Remedios until yesterday. He sensed a benign stupidity, as though he’d gone past the edge of consciousness into something like a pond of lukewarm water. In the middle of it lay a kernel of anger, black and ominous, harmless for now, but there was no telling what would come of it if he picked it up.

  “Felipe, what’s wrong?”

  Walton stopped walking. At this point, the incline grew rougher and steep, but he found a rock stable enough to sit on. “I’m going to kill the sonofabitch.” He clasped his arms tightly around himself. “The German, who else?” he said, feeling that Brissot was making no effort to understand. “The motherfucking German! He’s been to her, and she’s taught him things.”

  “‘Things’?”

  “Things, things! Lovemaking things. She taught them to him.”

  For the first time in eighteen years, it was happening. A tremor of muscles that he suppressed by clutching his wrists until the veins in the backs of his hands bulged like knots. Walton watched the black kernel of hate emerge from the calm pond. It made him atrociously angry and sad for all that had happened to him since the beginning of time, an explosion of blackness that he’d be killed by. All that had gone wrong in his life so far summed and multiplied into an immense blackness; he lost his vision for a moment, as when he’d passed out in Guadalajara, but but this time he simply folded inwards, his shoulders collapsing forwards.

  “What things?” Brissot insisted.

  “Don’t you get it? She taught him how to keep coming without letting his seed go.”

  “Well, that’s a good trick. It’ll make him popular with girls.” Brissot laughed unconvincingly. “Is that what this is all about? I thought it was about Lorca’s grave.”

  Walton did not react. Once he’d confessed what had been eating away at him, the kernel of anger was shrinking again, slippery and small like a tadpole, nearly impossible to hold. Weariness followed, as if he’d lifted a massive rock and now even the infinitesimal weight of that tadpole could break his wrists. He let his hands dangle at his sides. “I swear I’ll kill him.”

  “Maetzu would have done you the favour a week ago, if you’d let him.”

  RISCAL AMARGO

  Monday 26 July. Afternoon, at the post.

  Too ashamed to describe this morning’s run-in with Colonel Serrano. He left without speaking a word to me, and now I don’t know what to expect in terms of military sanctions. What is certain is that I would have never acted so unforgivably with a German officer. If Father ever found out! But it’s done now, and whatever comes, I’ll have to take my medicine, and like it too.

  Soler’s death is something else I can’t reconcile myself with. It’s bad enough that the army found out about my visit to the Vargases and that I was one of the last people to talk to Soler (not the last one, obviously). Aside from my imperfect Spanish, my height makes me recognizable, although I never gave Soler or the Vargases my name. I expect I could have denied being at the huerta that day, but I saw no reason to lie, and Colonel Serrano is not above taking me there to confront the old couple.

  Anyway, Soler’s murder resembles Lorca’s: but was it the same gun, the same hand? And why was Soler murdered? Someone other than the Vargases must have seen us together. Most likely the killer, because he was shot soon enough after my departure to make the Vargases suspect me.

  Was Soler killed because I interrogated him? Was someone afraid he might have said something incriminating? How does the tampering with the ledger fit into all this? I’m starting to have an uncomfortable feeling about it all. What I said to Serrano about the army obstructing justice, and his reaction to my comment, only weakens my position as an investigator. Poor Soler, who was so afraid of me!

  I don’t have enough to go on and doubt that I ever will, unless Lorca himself lends a hand from beyond the grave.

  Herr C. owes me some real pieces of information. No more stories about red and blue vases and vague intimations. I’m beyond “observational judgement”, and if I’m to get to the bottom of this I need access to Lorca’s file, to Soler’s file (if there is one), and an explanation of the events in Granada a year ago. That is, unless the colonel lands a blow on my other cheek.

  The double knock on the doorjamb was accompanied by Fuentes’ matter-of-fact voice.

  “Teniente, there’s a boy who wants to speak to you. Says the priest sent him.”

  Bora looked out of the window. Below, a twelve- or thirteen-year-old boy stood under the combined watch of Alfonso and his dog. “All right,” he said. “Have him wait there. I’ll come down to meet him.”

  It was the same twiggy, locust-like boy who had accompanied the priest on the day Bora had first heard Remedios’ name mentioned. Contrary to Fuentes’ report, he actually said nothing at all; he simply pulled out of his pocket a folded piece of paper, which he handed to Bora.

  Bora unfolded it at once. It was light, yellowed, with a thin red edge, the paper used for missals – probably an end leaf. The pencilled handwriting was unsigned, but clearly from the priest. Bora read quickly, skipping words to get the gist of the message:

  “… he demands that you meet him tomorrow at noon in the cemetery at Castellar. Since he will not employ an armed escort, he expects you to abide by the same rule. If your answer is ‘yes’, let the boy know.”

  Bora had to be careful not to let out an irresponsible whoop. He glanced over his shoulder to see if Fuentes was around, but Fuentes was celebrating the victory at Brunete by having the men exercise in the murderous sun on the ledge.

  “Tell the priest ‘yes’,” he said.

  The boy didn’t move. “I’ve got to bring the letter back.”

  Bora noticed the postscript at the bottom of the note: “Please return this so that I may dispose of it.” He handed back the paper, which the boy drove into the pocket of his adult-sized trousers. He tackled the incline like a two-footed goat, bounding from rock to rock until he was out of sight.

  The American wants to meet me. To think how much I’ve been wanting to meet him these past two weeks! Bora felt his critical sense and common sense and every other militarily definable sense fall off like needless ballast, and derived a heady lightness from the process. With a few strides, he reached the well at the side of the house. He looked into it, even though this morning it had been as dry as ever. A round eye of unblinking blue reflected his shadow at the bottom of the deep shaft. From its hidden spring in the sierra, water had come at last and mirrored the sky, darkening it into a colour Bora had not yet seen in Spain: the colour of a winter sky. “Another sign,” he said out loud. He hauled up water to drink and wash his face, a flavour pure and cool after the stale water in the barrel and the silty spurt from the rock.

  There were contentious and practical reasons for a confrontation with the American. Bora had no doubt that the offer, however unexpected and dangerous, was Lorca’s way of reaching over from the other side to help.

  CASTELLAR

  Walton waited where he could clearly see the measly cypresses and cedars flanking the entrance to the cemetery. In the midday heat, the shrubs let out an embalmed odour; insects buzzed inside them. The German opened the gate, pausing as he opened it.

  “Down here!” Walton called out in English.

  The cemetery was no more than fifty yards across, and the newcomer approached him directly. “Hello,” he said, stopping two feet away. “You wanted to meet.”

  Feeling himself under scrutiny, Walton was quick to initiate his own appraisal. Six foot two (or more) to his six feet, well built, lean. Young. Bright eyes. Guapo, as the Widow Yarza had said. It was annoying and obvious why Remedios liked him, at least physically. Well, damn him. How had he asked her …? When and how often had he gone to see her? Sonofabitch, Walton said to himself. Remedios preferred this German sonofabitch to him. He
hadn’t given an army greeting, and Walton wasn’t about to give one either. “We’ve met before,” he said instead, in a wry voice.

  Bora ran his eyes over Walton’s mixture of civilian and army clothes. He was straight-backed and a little contemptuous. “Do you hold a military rank?”

  “I’m a major, Lieutenant.”

  A nod of acknowledgement from Bora was all Walton got – no other recognition of his higher rank. “I understand this meeting has nothing to do with military matters.”

  Again Walton noticed the way he pronounced the word militree, like the British. The scene by the brook came back to him in an irritating flash. “Right.” Try as he might, he couldn’t separate his assessment of him from the thought that Remedios had taught him things. Did the German know? He was also evaluating Walton, but smiling at the same time. Even if Walton hadn’t already known the other man wasn’t Spanish, he’d have guessed from his blonde body hair and the whiteness of his teeth; his front incisors were too close and overlapped slightly, a flaw that bordered on curiously charming. Had they been hounds, Walton thought, they’d be snarling and smelling each another. As it was, they simply stood face-to-face like adversaries waiting to catch the other off guard.

  Bora was the first to look away, sweeping an unaffected glance across the cemetery. “Well, Major, I’m here. They say you go by Felipe. Is that what you wish to be called?”

  “No. Walton’s my name.”

  “Bora is mine. Have you been in Spain long?”

  “Not long. And you?”

  “Not long.”

  Just then a distant shot startled them, and both demonstrated their unease by turning towards the sound in alarm. No volleys followed, and Walton noticed Bora was the first to relax.

  “Let’s walk, Lieutenant.” He started in a diagonal that led between the graves to the slope-roofed porch where tombs were stacked like headers in the wall. There were two such porches at the sides of the cemetery, and it was to the one left of the entrance that Walton went. As they walked past a cement cross, he brusquely came to the point. “You’ve been making inquiries on the sierra regarding a burial.”