The Seville Communion

by Arturo Pérez-Reverte

  Bonafé shook his head, oblivious to the meaning of Gavira's smile. "Good God, no. I'm just letting you know how things stand." His puffy little eyes shone with greed. "I'm playing fair with you, Mr Gavira."

  "And why arc you doing that?"

  "Well... I don't know." Bonafé smoothed his crumpled jacket. "I suppose it's because you have a good public image. You know, 'Young Banker Imposes New Style', and so on. You look good in photos, you're popular with the ladies. In other words: you sell papers. You're in fashion, and my magazine can help make sure you stay in fashion. Think of it as a way of boosting your image. Now, your wife ..."

  "What about my wife?"

  Gavira spat out the words, but Bonafé didn't seem to notice the danger signs. "She looks good in photos too," he said, meeting Gavira's eye calmly. "Though I think that that bullfighter . . . But that's all over. Now, the priest from Rome . . . You know the one I mean, don't you?"

  Gavira thought fast. He needed only a week; after that, nothing would matter. "Yes, I sec," he said. "And how much might this boost to my image cost?"

  Bonafé lifted both hands, placing his fingers together as if in prayer. "Oh, well," he said, relaxed, pleased. "I thought maybe an in-depth interview about that church. An exchange of views. Beyond that, I don't know." He gave the banker a wink. "Maybe you'd like to invest in the press."

  Percgil passed again. Gavira noticed that his assistant looked more and more worried. The banker smiled. "I've been investing in the press for some time," he said. "But I haven't had to deal with someone like you before."

  The journalist looked smug, conspiratorial. And Gavira thought to himself that Honorato Bonafé was just the kind of oily little man who turned up dead in the movies.

  "What fascinates me about Europe," said Gris Marsala, "is its long history. You come to a place like this, look at a landscape, or lean against an old wall, and it's all there. Your past, your memories. You yourself."

  "Is that why you're obsessed with this church?" asked Quart. "Not just with this church."

  They were inside the portico, before the figure of Jesus with the real hair and dusty ex-votos hanging on the wall.

  "Maybe you have to be American to understand," said the nun after a while. "Over there you sometimes get the feeling that all this was built by strange, alien people. Then one day you come here and you understand that it's part of your own history. That, through your ancestors, you placed these stones one on top of the other. Maybe that's why many of my countrymen are so fascinated by Europe." She smiled at Quart. "You turn a corner, and suddenly you remember. You thought you were orphaned, but it turns out you're not. That's why I don't want to go back."

  She leaned against the wall, next to the stoup. As usual, her grey hair was plaited and she wore an old blue turtleneck that smelled slightly of sweat. She hooked her thumbs in the back pockets of her stained jeans.

  "I was orphaned several times," she said. "And being an orphan means being a slave. Memories give you some security; you know who you are and where you're going. Or where you're not going. Without them you're at the mercy of the first person who comes along and calls you daughter. Don't you agree?" She waited for him to nod, and he nodded. "To defend one's memories is to defend one's freedom. Only angels have the luxury of being spectators."

  Quart was thinking about die report on Gris Marsala that he'd received from Rome and that was now lying on his hotel desk, with certain paragraphs underlined in red. She had joined a religious order at eighteen. Studied architecture and fine art, at the University of California in Los Angeles, taking specialised courses in Seville, Madrid and Rome. A brilliant academic record. Seven years teaching art. Four years as director of a religious university college in Santa Barbara. A personal crisis, with health complications. Indefinite provisional dispensation from her order. Three years in Seville, where she earned her living teaching art students from the USA. Discreet, nothing special to report. She barely kept in contact with a local residence of the order to which she belonged. Living in private accommodadon. She hadn't requested to leave the order. The report didn't say whether she'd taken any computer courses.

  Quart looked at the nun. Outside, in the square, the light was growing more intense and it was getting hot. He was grateful for the cool of the church. "So it's your recovered memories that keep you here."

  "More or less." Gris Marsala smiled sadly, looking at the military medal tied to a wedding bouquet among the ex-votos, as if wondering who once held those flowers. "The Futurists," she said, "thought Venice should be blown up, in order to destroy the model. What seemed like a pretentious paradox then has now become a reality in architecture, literature . . . And in theology. Razing cities to the ground is an extreme example, a brutal way of hurrying things up. There are subtler methods."

  "You and the others can't win this battle," Quart said gently.

  "I and the others?" The nun was surprised. "We're not some kind of clan or sect. We're just people who have gathered around this church, each for their own personal reasons." She shook her head - it was obvious. "Take Father Oscar. He's young and has found a cause to fall in love with. It could just as easily have been a woman, or liberation theology. As for Don Priamo, he makes me think of that wonderful book, The Equinoctial Adventure of Lope de Aguirre by Ramon Sender, whom I heard lecture at the university. It's the story of a small, hard conquistador who limps from old wounds and is always in armour despite the heat because he trusts no one. Like him, Father Ferro is rebelling against an ungrateful, distant king and fighting his own personal battle. Isn't it amusing? Kings sent men like you to imprison or execute men like Aguirre." She sighed and was silent a moment. "I suppose it's inevitable."

  "Tell me about Macarena."

  On hearing the name, Gris Marsala looked closely at Quart. He bore her scrutiny. "Macarcna," she said, "is defending her own memories: a few mementoes, her great-aunt's trunk, and the books she read as a child that marked her deeply. She's struggling with what she herself, in moments of humour, calls the Buddenbrooks effect: the awareness of a dying world, the temptation to side with the parvenus in order to survive. The desperation of intelligence."

  "Please go on."

  "There's not much more to tell. It's all there for you to see." Gris Marsala pointed out of the door at the sun-filled square. "She inherited a world that no longer exists, that's all. She's another orphan clinging to the wreckage."

  "And what part do I play in all of this?" He regretted it as soon as he'd said it, but she didn't seem to find it odd.

  "I don't know," she said with a shrug. "You've become a witness." She thought a moment. "They're all so alone. I think they want you to understand, or, rather, they want those who sent you to understand. Just like Aguirre, who deep down wanted his king to understand him."

  "What about Macarena?"

  Gris Marsala considered the wounds on Quart's knuckles. "She likes you," she said simply. "As a man, I mean. I'm not surprised. I don't know if you're aware of it, but your presence in Seville gives everything a special quality. I imagine that she's trying to seduce you, in her own way." She smiled like a mischievous little boy. "I don't mean in the physical sense."

  "Does that bother you?"

  The nun glanced at him with curiosity. "Why should it? I'm not a lesbian, Father Quart. I say that in case you're concerned about the nature of my friendship with Macarena." She laughed. "As for men in general and good-looking priests in particular, I'm a virgin by vow and by choice."

  Embarrassed, Quart glanced out at the square beyond the woman's shoulder. "What's going on between Macarena and her husband?" he asked.

  "She loves him." She looked surprised, as if it was so obvious it needed no explanation. She smiled ironically at Quart. "Don't look like that, Father. It's obvious you don't spend much time in a confessional. You know nothing about women."

  Quart went outside and the sun fell on his shoulders like a heavy cloak. Gris Marsala followed, skirting round a pile of sand and gravel, and stop
ped by the cement mixer. The priest looked up at the belfry covered with scaffolding, and his gaze stopped at the headless Virgin above the door. "I'd like to see your apartment, Sister Marsala."

  "You surprise me." "I don't think so." There was a silence.

  "I hate being called Sister Marsala. Or is that a way of making your request sound official? After all, you are proposing to visit the apartment of a nun who lives alone. Aren't you worried about what people will say? Monsignor Corvo, for instance. Or your bosses in Rome. Although of course you keep your bosses in Rome informed."

  Quart didn't know whether to frown or laugh. In the end, he laughed. "It's only a suggestion," he said. "An idea. I'm trying to piece together the puzzle. Seeing how you live might help." He looked straight into her eyes. She realised that he meant it.

  "I see. You're looking for clues."

  "I am."

  "Computers connected to Rome. That sort of thing." "Yes."

  "And if I refuse, will you get in anyway, as you did with Don Priamo's quarters?" "How do you know about that?" "Father Oscar told me."

  There was too much information circulating, thought Quart, annoyed. They all told one another everything in that strange little club. The only person who had to struggle for information was he. With the sun beating down mercilessly, he suddenly felt very tired; he was tempted to loosen his dog collar and take off his jacket. But he didn't.

  Gris Marsala walked slowly round the cement mixer. "Why not?" she said at last with a thoughtful smile. "There hasn't been a man in my apartment in the three years I've lived there. It'll be interesting to see how it feels. I'll try not to throw myself at you the minute I shut the door. Will you defend yourself like Saint Maria Goretti, or will I have a chance with you? Although at my age I don't think I'd be much of a test of anyone's resolve. It's hard, you know, for any woman to realise that she's lost her looks for good." Her expression became harder now. "Especially for a nun."

  * * *

  "Make yourself comfortable," she said.

  The irony was thick. There was little of comfort in the small sitting room of her apartment, on the third floor. The narrow balcony looked out on to the Calle San Jose near the Puerta de la Carne. It took them only ten minutes to get there from Our Lady of the Tears. With the sun beating down, the streets were like furnaces and the whitewashed walls dazzled. Seville was all light. White walls and light in every variation, thought Quart as he had walked with Gris Marsala, zigzagging in search of shade. It reminded him of when he and Monsignor Pavelic ran from shelter to shelter down the streets of Sarajevo, avoiding the snipers.

  As he put his sunglasses away, he looked around the. room. Everything was immaculately clean and tidy. There was a sofa with crocheted antimacassars, a television, a small bookcase containing books and tapes, a desk with papers, folders and pots of pens. And a personal computer. Sensing Gris Marsala's eyes on him, he went to the PC: a 486 with a printer. Powerful enough to be Vespers', but it didn't have a modem, and the telephone was across the room. The telephone, also, had an old-fashioned fixed plug.

  He ran an eye over the books and tapes. She had mainly baroque music, but there was also quite a lot of flamenco, both classical and modern, and all of Camaron's albums. The books were treatises on art and restoration, and studies of Seville. Two of them, The Baroque Architecture of Seville by Sancho Corbacho and Guide to the Art of Seville and Surrounding Provinces, were full of slips of paper covered with notes. The only religious work was a worn, leather-bound bible. On the wall hung a framed reproduction of The Chess Game by Pieter Van Huys.

  "Guilty or innocent?" asked Gris Marsala.

  "Innocent, for the moment," he answered. "Due to lack of evidence."

  She laughed. As he turned to face her, smiling, he saw his reflection in a mirror on the wall opposite. With an old, beautiful frame of very dark wood, the mirror stood out in the modest apartment.

  The nun followed the direction of his gaze. "Do you like it?" she asked.

  "Very much."

  “I lived on sandwiches for several months to save up for it." She looked at herself in the mirror, then went to the kitchen for two glasses of water.

  "What's so special about it?" asked Quart when he'd drunk his water.

  "The mirror?" Gris Marsala hesitated. "You could say it's a kind of personal revenge. A symbol. It's the only luxury I've allowed myself here." She gave Quart a sardonic look. "That, and letting a man into my apartment, even if he is a priest. I haven't weakened too many times in three years, have I? We nuns are very strict." She made a theatrical sigh, and they both grinned. She gestured around the room. "From the beginning, as a novice, you're taught that in a nun's cell mirrors are dangerous," she said. "According to the rules, your image can be reflected only in the rosary and in the prayer book. You own nothing: you receive your habit, your underwear, even your sanitary towels from the hands of the community. If you're to save your soul, there must be no show of individuality or personal choice."

  She went over to the window and opened the blind a little. Sunlight flooded in, making Quart squint.

  "I've followed the rules all my life," she said. "And I've continued to do so here in Seville, despite this minor infringement of my vow of poverty. I had a problem. Macarena said she told you. A disease of the spirit more than of the flesh. I was the director of a university college for girls. I never exchanged a word with the archbishop of my diocese about anything but professional matters. Yet I fell in love with him, or thought I did, which is the same thing . . . And the day I found myself, aged forty, applying makeup in front of the mirror because he was coming, I realised what had happened." She showed the scar on her wrist to Quart. "It wasn't attempted suicide, as my colleagues suspected, but a fit of rage. Of desperation. When I came out of hospital and asked my superiors for advice, all they recommended was prayer, discipline and the example of our sister Saint Therese of Lisieux."

  She was silent a moment, rubbing her wrist as if trying to erase the scar. "Do you remember Saint Therese, Father?" she asked. The priest nodded. "She had tuberculosis and slept in a freezing cell but never complained and never asked for a blanket. The good Lord rewarded her for her suffering by taking her unto Him at the age of twenty-four!"

  She laughed quietly, wrinkling up her eyes. She must have been attractive once, thought Quart. In a way she still was. He wondered how many members of a religious order, male or female, could have done what she did.

  Gris Marsala took a seat in the armchair while Quart remained standing. She smiled at him bitterly. "Have you ever visited a nuns' cemetery, Father Quart? Rows of small, identical headstones. And engraved on them, their adopted names, not the ones they were baptised with. They were members of an order; nothing else counts before God. They're the saddest tombs you'll ever see. Like a war cemetery with thousands of crosses with the inscription 'unknown'. They are so unbearably lonely, and seem to ask, what was it all for?"

  Quart spoke cautiously, a hunter trying not to scare his prey.' "Those are the rules. You knew them when you took your vows."

  "When I took my vows, I didn't know the meaning of words like 'repression', 'intolerance', and 'ignorance'. Those are the true rules. It's like Orwell's 1984: Big Sister's watching you. And the younger and more attractive you are, the worse it is. The gossiping, the cliques, best friends, envy, jealousy . . . You know the old saying: they come together without knowing one another, they live without loving one another, they die without mourning one another ... If I ever stop believing in God, I hope at least I'll go on believing in the Last Judgement. I'd love to find some of my fellow nuns and all my superiors there!"

  "Why did you become a nun?"

  "This is turning into a confession. I didn't bring you here to unload my conscience. Why did you become a priest? Was it the usual story: a repressive father and over-affectionate mother?"

  Quart shook his head. This wasn't the way he wanted the conversation to go. "My father died when I was very young," he said.

  "Ri
ght. Another case of oedipal transference, as dirty old Freud would have said."

  "I don't think so. I also considered joining the army."

  "How literary. The scarlet and black." She played with the antimacassar. "My father was a jealous, domineering man. I was afraid of disappointing him. If you take a close look at many women's vocations, especially those of pretty girls, you'll often find long-term anxiety caused by the continual warnings of their fathers: all men want only one thing, and so on. From childhood lots of nuns are taught, as I was, to be careful with men and not lose control in front of them. You'd be surprised how many nuns' sexual fantasies involve beauty and the beast."

  They regarded each other in silence for some time. Quart felt there was now fellow feeling between them based on awareness that they were in the same job. The strange and painful solidarity that arose between clerics in a difficult world.

  "What can a nun do when she realises, at the age of forty, that she's still that little girl dominated by her father?" Gris Marsala went on. "A child who, out of the intense desire not to displease him, not to commit any sin, has committed the even greater sin of not really living her own life. Is it wise, or is it stupid and irresponsible, at eighteen, to renounce worldly love, and with it trust, surrender, sex? What is a woman to do when these feelings come too late?"

  "I don't know," Quart said. He was friendly, sincere now. "I'm only a low-ranking priest. I don't have many answers." He considered the room, the modest furniture and the computer. "Break a mirror, perhaps, and then buy another. That takes courage."

  "Perhaps," replied Gris Marsala. "But the woman in the mirror isn't the same." There was pain in her eyes when she looked up at Quart. "There are few things in life as tragic as awakening to the truth too late."

  They were waiting for him at the Casa Cuesta Bar, punctual as always, sitting at a table under the sign for the Seville-Sanlucar-Coast steam train, around a bottle of La Ina sherry.