Death of a Nationalist

by Rebecca Pawel

  “Yes.”

  “No names?”

  Gonzalo hesitated, and then nodded.

  “For two hundred pesetas?”

  Gonzalo nodded again.

  “Make it three hundred.”

  Gonzalo, who had five hundred pesetas in his breast pocket, opened his mouth to agree, and then remembered that seeming too eager might be a bad idea. “Two fifty,” he said.

  For form’s sake, Gonzalo allowed himself to be bargained up to two hundred and seventy-five. Báez seemed to be in a hurry, glancing at his watch frequently as they spoke.

  “All right,” he said quietly. “Paco got involved six months ago. He was brought in by someone else, as a messenger. I don’t know details. Now give me the money and beat it. I’ve got another appointment.”

  “Who recruited him?”

  “You said no names.”

  Gonzalo cursed mentally. “Three hundred pesetas,” he said aloud.

  One of Báez’s gloved hands went to the pocket of his coat and for a moment Gonzalo wished fervently for a weapon. Then the hand emerged again, gripping a pencil and a scrap of paper. “Here.” Báez bent over the marble slab, and leaned the paper against it to scribble something. “Call this number if you want more information.” He smiled suddenly. “Just ask for Paco’s boss. You’ll get him.”

  “Thanks.” Gonzalo took the scrap of paper and folded it with fingers made clumsy by the cold. He reached inside his coat and tucked the phone number into his breast pocket. Then he drew out the roll of bills. Báez watched avidly as Gon-zalo counted out the twenty peseta notes.

  “A pleasure doing business with you,” Báez said. He smiled again, as if something amused him. “Now, if you’ll allow me to say so, I don’t think graveyards are very healthy places.”

  “I couldn’t agree more.” The voice came from behind the two men.

  Gonzalo jumped, startled nearly out of his wits. Báez whirled around. A guardia civil was standing in back of the white marble slab behind them like a ghost newly risen from its grave. He was pointing a gun at the two men. “Don’t move,” he said, his voice conversational. “You’re covered from behind as well.”

  Gonzalo stood, paralyzed. So close, he thought, with a familiar crushing sense of hopelessness. So close. Then Juan’s last words came back to him with chilling clarity. If something does go wrong, try to hold out for twenty-four hours.

  Báez had already recovered. “Good afternoon, Señor Guardia.” To Gonzalo’s amazement, he took a few steps toward the man with the gun. “I think perhaps we haven’t met.” Báez was at the edge of the pathway now, and he stepped onto the narrow strip of earth separating the headstones, as if to make his way toward the guardia. He extended his hand. “My name is . . .”

  There was the brief report of a rifle, and then Báez fell between the graves. The guardia had not moved. “Good shot, Torres.” He barely raised his voice. Then, to Gonzalo, he added, “I’d advise you not to move, Señor . . .?”

  Gonzalo stood, mute. Would it be better, he wondered, to give his false name and passport, or would this only serve to implicate him further? Could he protect his mentors by giving his real name? But then, what about Carmen? He heard footsteps, and then felt someone grab him from behind. The guardias did have the graveyard surrounded, then. A trap, Gonzalo thought despairingly. But for me? Or for Juan and Isabel? Or maybe even Báez? But how did they know?

  “Señor Llorente, perhaps?” the guardia asked courteously.

  Gonzalo gasped. “How—” he began, and then swallowed his words, too late.

  A smile flickered across the guardia’s face. “A hypothesis. I overheard some of your conversation. I suspect you’ve been looking forward to our meeting for some time now. Though not, perhaps, under these circumstances. Search him,” he added, addressing the man who had handcuffed Gonzalo.

  The second guardia emptied Gonzalo’s pockets. Several white sepulchres gave the impression of gaping wider as more guardias appeared from their hiding places. One of them took the papers and money and handed them to the man who had spoken.

  “This is the money, sir. And there are some documents. Might be false. There are a couple of pieces of paper, too.”

  The officer passed hastily over the passport and bills and looked down at the scraps of paper. “Mike McCormick, 17 Plain View Terrace, Elizabeth, New Jersey, USA,” he read. “You have American friends, Señor Llorente?”

  Gonzalo choked back an urge to laugh. It was the address Carmen had given him, in the impossible hope that the American volunteer would provide some sort of asylum. Let them focus on that, he told himself. The less I tell them . . . try to hold out for twenty-four hours. . . . Oh, shit. The officer had moved on to the other paper. “That was the one in the breast pocket, sir,” one of the guardias volunteered. “It’s a phone number.”

  Gonzalo, watching the guardia civil intently, saw the paper crinkle in his hand as his fingers tightened on it and knew that Mike McCormick would not be a diversion for long. He saw Tejada staring at the paper, reading and rereading the scribbled phone number, and saw his lips move. But Gonzalo was too far away to hear the sergeant’s astonished whisper. “Son of a bitch!”

  Chapter 21

  Tejada sat at his desk and stared at the phone number he had taken from Gonzalo Llorente an hour earlier. He felt as if he had spent most of the weekend staring stupidly at things and that he was not much the wiser for it.

  A fair amount of Friday evening and almost all of Saturday had been devoted to staring at the photograph of Ginger Rogers that Jiménez had identified so easily and wondering if it was simply an innocent remembrance of a shared fondness for movies or if Paco had meant the actress to be mistaken for Isabel. And if the photo was a deliberate blind, why had it been so important to keep Isabel’s identity a secret?

  After a few dumbstruck moments while Jiménez looked at him anxiously, the sergeant had remembered his goal and presented Alejandra with the cookies. He had then questioned her gently about the guardia civil she had seen pass by Paco’s body. “Was he a thin man?” he had asked. “With drooping shoulders, and a hunched back?”

  Aleja had been wary and hesitant, but when Jiménez had finally coaxed her to speak, she had disappointed Tejada. She had only seen the man’s legs. But they had looked like thick legs. Like a wrestler’s. Not thin or droopy. And the man had been humming. Tejada kept a grip on his temper and reminded himself that to a starving child even someone as thin as Rota might look “thick.” He had thanked Aleja, given her more cookies, and then taken her over to the Cuatro Caminos prison and returned her to her mother.

  Carmen and Alejandra had both seemed overjoyed at the reunion. But Tejada, watching the gaunt woman cradle the child’s bruised head, had felt a strange reluctance to abandon Aleja. The prison was clearly tremendously overcrowded. A number of the women in Carmen’s cell were sobbing and wailing, and from other cells he could hear curses and subversive songs. It did not seem like an appropriate environment for a child, especially an injured one.

  “Do you have family, Señora Llorente?” he had asked. And then, remembering that he had shot her sister, and that her brother was in hiding, had added, “I mean family who are alive and free?”

  The woman had shaken her head wordlessly. Tejada felt awkward. “Is there anyone you’d like to send your daughter to?” he asked. “I mean, this isn’t . . . a very pleasant place for her. I wouldn’t mind dropping her off with them. . . .”

  Carmen had shaken her head again, and Tejada had realized with a certain despair that she was probably afraid the question had an ulterior motive. “Well . . .,” he said awkwardly. “I hope Llorente is found soon then. I mean, I hope you’re released soon. I mean, I hope Alejandra recovers quickly. Good-bye, Aleja,” he had added, to the back of the child’s head. “Thank you for your help.”

  On his way back from the prison he had made one more effort to help Alejandra, somewhat against his better judgment. The streets looked very different in the day
time, but after some careful searching he had found what he thought was the building where he had dropped off Elena the evening before. He took a deep breath and knocked on the outer door, wondering if Elena would answer, what he would do if she did, and if it was even the right apartment building. No one responded to his knocking. He waited a few minutes and then knocked again, hesitantly. He was just turning to leave when a window on the second floor opened and a woman leaned out to look down at him.

  “Are you looking for someone, Señor Guardia?”

  Tejada turned back and hesitated, suddenly aware that Elena’s neighbors might misinterpret his reasons for wishing to speak to her. But having come this far he had to say something. “Is there a young lady named Fernández living here?” he asked awkwardly.

  A frown crossed the woman’s face. “She’s not in.”

  Had Tejada been less anxious to bring the encounter to a close, he would have noticed that the reply was too quick. He was too relieved by it to do anything more than say, “When she comes in, could you give her a message, please?”

  “Yes, sir.” The woman waited expectantly, and after a moment Tejada realized that there was no verbal message he could give that would not be impossibly complicated.

  “Do you have a pen?” he asked.

  The window closed with a rattle and a few moments later the woman reappeared at the door, with pen and paper. Tejada stepped into the shadow of the entry and leaned against the wall to write, uncomfortably aware of the last time he had stood there. He scribbled quickly, reflecting as he folded the note that it was stilted, but impossible to edit under the circumstances. After hasty thanks to the woman, he fled back to his office, to continue staring at the photograph again.

  He knew the inscription by heart. “Dearest, Here is your ‘souvenir of a happy time.’ Love, Isabel.” Who was Isabel? How had Paco met her? The preparations for the capture of Báez on Sunday had provided a brief diversion, but Tejada had no sooner taken his place behind the old grave than his mind went back to its favorite conundrum. Who was Isabel? Was she also involved somehow with the black market? Sergeant de Rota denied knowing her, Tejada thought. How does Rota fit in? And how can I prove that he fits in? Maybe Báez will implicate him. Who’s Isabel, if not the girl in the photo?

  Tejada might have been gratified to know that his own handwriting was haunting Elena much as Isabel’s handwriting was haunting him. After the door closed behind him, Señora Rodríguez had hurried up the stairs to the fourth-floor room that the young lady teacher rented, unfolding the sergeant’s note as she went. She would not normally have dreamed of reading someone else’s mail. Of course not. But teacher or no, Señorita Fernández was still young, and Señora Rodríguez felt a certain responsibility to keep her respectable. Besides, the Guardia were trouble. Señora Rodríguez liked the teacher, but if the note contained either proposals or threats, she would have to be told to move. No one could afford that kind of trouble now.

  The landlady was panting for breath and more than a little puzzled by the time she reached Elena’s room. She knocked once, for formality’s sake, and then pushed her way inside.

  Elena was on her knees beside the dresser, packing a suitcase. “A guardia civil was looking for you.” Señora Rodríguez spoke without preamble.

  Elena’s face, already grave, turned white. “Tell him I’m not here.”

  “I did. He left a note.”

  Señora Rodríguez held out the sheet of paper, which she had kindly refolded. Elena stretched out a hand for it automatically, without rising. The landlady made a discreet exit as her lodger unfolded the letter and began to read. Señora Rodríguez had already decided, to her relief, that nothing in the letter indicated that Elena was in moral or political trouble, but it had made very little sense to her. So she lingered on the landing. She was extremely surprised to hear what sounded like muffled sniffling, and reviewed the contents of the hastily read letter in her head.

  I’m sorry to trouble you, but I couldn’t think of anyone else. Alejandra Palomino is currently being held north of Cuatro Caminos, along with her mother. None of her family are able to care for her, and if you could take her until her mother is released it would be a kindness. The prison is overcrowded, and they won’t mind if you pick her up. Hopefully, it won’t be for a long time.—Carlos Tejada

  Elena’s first impulse on reading the letter had been to thoroughly damn its author for reasons that were somewhat unclear. Her second, more rational, thought was to go and pick up Aleja as the letter suggested. But she had been packing since the early morning, and her desire to flee the city and return to her parents’ home was not lessened by the uncomfortable reminder that Sergeant Tejada could easily find her if she stayed. Self-preservation warred with pity for Aleja and with an irrational desire to live up to the sergeant’s good opinion of her. Caring for the little girl would not be difficult, now that she herself had no job, but feeding her would be. If it’s just for a few days. . ., Elena thought. I could stay in the city that long. But he says ‘hopefully’ it won’t be for a long time . . . and who knows how long ‘long’ is, anyway? It would be cruelly irresponsible to take Aleja home to Salamanca with her if Carmen expected to find her daughter waiting upon her release from prison. But if the days stretched into weeks, or months, and she was forced to find food for Aleja as well as herself in Madrid. . . . He would help with that probably, Elena thought. In exchange for what? responded her most cynical self.

  Elena glared at the piece of paper, wishing that the innocuous-sounding phrases gave some clue to the sergeant’s real intentions and almost sorry that she had not met him in person so that she could better judge him. Finally, after much deliberation and a few tears, she finished packing her bags and went to the post office to send a letter of her own: “Dear Mama, I hope everything is fine in Salamanca. Things are a bit difficult here. I want to come home. Please wire Burgos currency for a train ticket, as quickly as possible. I hope everyone is well. Love, Elena.” Then she had returned to her room, to wait for money that could not come too quickly. Since most of her time was spent indoors, sleeping or fasting, she had little to do over Easter except think about how she had failed Alejandra and reread Tejada’s note. Saturday morning it had seemed to mock her with its arrogant confidence. Saturday evening it reproached her with its mute dependence on her altruism.

  On Easter morning, at around the time Tejada himself was wondering who Isabel was and why she had given Paco a photograph of Ginger Rogers, Elena was wondering if it might not be a good idea to contact him about Alejandra after all. By the time Tejada had actually confronted Aleja’s uncle, Elena had already given up the notion as useless and probably foolish. But while Elena’s miserable preoccupation with the sergeant’s note and her inability to respond as she would have liked lasted several more days, Tejada was given the advantage of more immediate distraction from his puzzlement over Isabel.

  Báez had strolled into the graveyard around noon, just as the prisoner had said he would. Tejada had been about to give the signal to close in on him when the smuggler was accosted by another man. Curious and faintly uneasy, Tejada had delayed making an arrest and tried to listen to the conversation between the two men. It had been interesting but not enlightening. The sergeant felt a swift and well-controlled flash of fury when Corporal Torres shot down Báez. It was typical of Torres, Tejada thought, to show off his stupid skills as a marksman without thinking whether the man might have useful information. However, the other man might have information. The sergeant, narrowly inspecting the man, traced a resemblance to Carmen Llorente and made an inspired guess.

  His satisfaction at guessing correctly evaporated when he saw the phone number Báez had given Llorente. This must be wrong, he thought, staring at the scrap of paper. There’s a mistake. Or I haven’t understood something. It must be Rota, trying to be clever again. . . . this can’t be right. But he had no time to think where the error might lie. He gave orders to return to the post, bringing Llorente along.

/>   “Do you want to question him, Sergeant?” Torres asked when they reached the post, gesturing toward the sullen Gonzalo.

  Tejada nodded absently. “Stick him in solitary. I’ll be right there.”

  “Should I send for Guardia Meléndez, sir?”

  Tejada’s mind, which had been stuck on puzzling out the meaning of the phone number on the scrap of paper, focused on the present again. If he’s tough, he thought, Meléndez won’t break him. And if he cracks easily, then he’ll say anything. And I don’t just want Rota’s name now. I want to know what the hell this really means. He shook his head. “No,” he said. “No one talks to him before I do.” The phone number intruded on his thoughts again, and he added, “That’s an order. Jiménez, you stand guard outside his cell. No one besides me goes in or out, got it?”

  Jiménez noticed an odd tone in the sergeant’s voice. “What about Lieutenant Ramos, sir?” he asked, not because he thought that the lieutenant would actually interfere, but because Tejada had stressed no one with surprising vehemence.

  Tejada flashed him a brief, mirthless smile. “Guardia, if His Excellency Generalíssimo Franco comes to that cell door and asks to play dominoes with the prisoner you tell him that the sergeant’s orders are that no one goes in or out. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes, sir,” Jiménez gulped. So did the prisoner, but probably for a different reason.

  Jiménez must be wondering what was keeping him now, Tejada thought. With a sigh, he folded the scrap of paper, thrust it into the depths of one pocket, and went to meet Gonzalo Llorente.

  The miliciano had the slightly rumpled appearance typical of all prisoners, but he did not seem to have been manhandled. Sitting with his hands bound, he closely resembled his sister Carmen, with her square shoulders and lank chestnut hair. Viviana, Tejada thought, had been slimmer and much darker than her siblings. Perhaps she had been a half-sister. Llorente said nothing as the sergeant sat opposite him, and the cell door swung shut.