The Map

by T. S. Learner

  Disguising myself as a Christian, I sought apprenticeship with a medic in Gazteiz-Vitoria – a city I calculated to be far enough from my hometown to be safe. For ten long years I worked hard for this doctor and learned his craft magnificently. Then one day I returned from a trip collecting the herbs and flora required for his practice to find him in his house murdered most brutally. Terrified I myself would be found guilty of this heinous crime and my true identity revealed, I was forced to flee again. This time I chose to go to Logroño, a town of little consequence, a place where I was convinced I would be safe. Indeed, I found employment with an apothecary and within a year I hath both loved and married a Basque woman who heralded from a small fishing village, Cabo Ogoño.

  The sound of the telephone cutting through the air startled him. August swung around, his fingers still resting on the embossed cover of the chronicle. He was convinced it was Cecily, but to his surprise found himself not wanting to answer it, knowing that to do so would be to reignite the seesaw dependency that had been the nature of their relationship. If he truly loved her, he would release her – the thought was a painful epiphany. He let the telephone ring until it stopped.

  It wasn’t easy. Afterwards he heard the echo ringing in his head, with her whispering her name under it. He waited until it faded, his fingers blindly tracing the Lauburu, the Basque symbol. Was the chronicle a doorway back? Had someone deliberately given him a reason to face the past, find what he’d lost in that country and make himself whole again? It felt like it.

  My wife’s name was Uxue. She was wise to the old ways of her people and worshipped their ancient female deity Mari – goddess of the sky and mountains. Many sought my wife for her services. She could cure the curse of the evil eye, make sure of a good harvest and make a man love a woman he’d never seen – these were only some of her talents. And so it was, our dwelling became famous. People from other villages and town would come to visit us – my wife for her ‘magick’, myself for my physic skills. Soon we were both profitable and happy, then the Terror came upon the town and all was changed. I knew then it was time to turn back to my secret inheritance.

  August studied the tiny hand-drawn map on the page opposite. Under the drawing was the cryptic title written in Spanish: ‘The first sacred location, as described in Arabic by the great physic Elazar ibn Yehuda.’

  He picked up a magnifying glass he used in his research and ran it slowly across the illustration. It was a topographical sketch of a region he recognised from the rugged outline of the coast, situated between Bilbao and San Sebastián. The mouth and river that ran down to Bilbao and created a natural border for that corner of northern Spain were clearly marked, as was Mungia and Gernika. Further up, on the coast, sat the fishing town of Bermeo. To the right of this he could see the mouth of the Urdaibai and beyond that Elantxobe, a fishing town near Cabo Ogoño, the home village of Shimon Ruiz de Luna’s wife Uxue, which was marked no doubt for this very reason. But here the map changed. It became noticeably more detailed inland from Elantxobe. August ran his eyes down the page beyond Gernika, which he could only imagine as the smouldering ruin the German bombing had left it in 1935, past Durango. To the left of a village named Mañaria, there was a far more detailed sketch of a valley. In the centre of that valley was a village called Irumendi – ‘the village of the three mountains’ – a reference August assumed to the three mountains that ringed it. A cross depicting a church was visible, as well as a narrow river running through it. Written in Latin were the words ‘Hic primus locorum Elazar ibn Yehudae sacrorum inter betulam argenteam quercumque atque iuxta divae antrum’ – ‘The first of Elazar ibn Yehuda’s sacred locations lays here between the silver birch and oak near the Goddess’s cave.’

  August wrote down the name of the village in a small notebook then made a sketch of the original map. He pulled out a roadmap of Spain he had kept from his Civil War days. The edges were frayed and worn, and there were pencil crosses over it where he had marked the places he fought and the friends who had died. He hadn’t opened it in years, and when he unfolded the sheet it was like he’d released the scent of burning grass, of orange groves and the distant thudding of aerial bombing all at once. Roger, Juan, Xavier, Helmut, your names are still with me, is this the only afterlife? To live on in the memory of the living? Or do we all evaporate into time, forgotten, like air itself? He paused for a moment, his eyes shut, willing away the faces. Steeling himself, he studied the roads and rivers.

  The cheapest way he could get there was to catch a train from Calais to Bordeaux, then get a local train down to the small coastal village of Saint Jean de Luc. He would have to rely on his old Basque contacts from Operation Comet. He only hoped some of them had survived. He still knew of one man in Saint Jean de Luc who might be able to help, codename Marcos. August suspected he might still be involved in smuggling Basque Nationalists, money and information for the freedom fighters back into Franco’s Spain.

  Once over the border August planned to get a train from San Sebastián to Durango, but from there he would have to hitch a ride or hire a car. Irumendi itself wasn’t marked – probably too obscure and remote – but he recognised the three mountains and the valley. On the contemporary map the mountains had names: Alluitz, Urkiola and Anboto.

  The doorbell rang, jolting him out of his study. He paused, waiting to see whether it was for him. Outside in the entrance hall he could hear a door creak open and the shuffle of slippers – the old widower who lived in the studio apartment opposite his room had answered it. There came the murmur of voices but August couldn’t quite hear the conversation. He relaxed; the old man had a sister, a retired nurse, who would visit him late. A minute later there was loud banging on his door. He stumbled up – the chronicle, decoded pages and maps were all still spread out on the table.

  ‘Hold on!’ August shouted, but the banging continued. Was it possible she had come back?

  ‘Cecily, is that you?’ He grabbed the chronicle and slipped it into a desk drawer.

  ‘It’s the police, sir, open up,’ came the deep voice from behind the door.

  ‘Just a minute, I’m not decent,’ August replied, buying time.

  He swept up his notes and decoded papers and slipped them under the topmost of a pile of books by the window. Just then the Mauser pistol sitting benignly on the windowsill caught his eye. Cursing, he pushed it down the back of the couch then finally turned to open the door.

  A policeman and what August assumed to be a detective stood grim-faced in the doorway. For one horrible moment the thought that Cecily might have committed suicide occurred to him. You’re being absurd.

  ‘It’s not Cecily, is it?’

  The men exchanged glances, then without asking permission stepped into the room.

  ‘Chilly in here,’ the detective said, calmly, arranging himself in front of the low gas flame. The smaller and rounder of the two men, he wore his superiority in rank with a sullen aggression. In contrast, his lanky uniformed companion exuded an air of faint embarrassment. August closed the front door and turned to face them, resigned to the visit.

  ‘Constable Jones and this is Detective Superintendent Duckett, sorry for calling at such a late hour, sir, but we ’ad no choice, see, there’s been a fatality.’ The policeman waved his hands around apologetically.

  August’s heart leaped. Had Cecily done something stupid?

  ‘A fatality?’

  ‘A fatality,’ the detective elaborated, grimly, ‘your name has been linked to. Mr Winthrop, isn’t it?’

  ‘August E. Winthrop. Just tell me it isn’t Cecily.’

  The policeman looked confused, and turned to his companion.

  ‘Who’s Cecily?’

  ‘How would I know, Jones?’ the detective snapped, then swung back to August, who was both relieved it wasn’t Cecily and secretly ashamed that he could be so narcissistic to think she would kill herself over him. He reached for his cigarettes.

  ‘The dead person is a Professor Julian Copps. His
housekeeper claims you were the last person to see him alive,’ the detective continued.

  ‘The professor’s been murdered?’ Incredulous, August stared at the officers. As far as he knew Copps was well liked and his activities extremely innocuous – the only furore Copps had ever caused was because of an article he once published questioning the infamous Peace of Callias – a legendary peace treaty between the Greeks and the Persians, the existence of which had always been presumed but not proven. The idea that he might have outraged a fellow academic to the point of murder was patently absurd. No, it had to be something more arbitrary like a robbery gone horribly wrong, August concluded.

  ‘At the moment, sir, whether it was a natural or unnatural death is open for debate. I would venture to say it was suspicious, however. Can you tell us your whereabouts at …’ The detective glanced over at the policeman, who flicked open a small notepad.

  ‘… between four and five o’clock yesterday afternoon,’ the young policeman read from his notes.

  ‘Thank you, Jones. Mr Winthrop, the victim was discovered in his dwelling by his housekeeper, a Mrs O’Brien. The state of the corpse gave the poor woman a horrible shock, horrible. So, your whereabouts?’ Both men were now staring intently at August. Stalling for time, he reached for an ashtray, thinking rapidly – he had returned directly from Professor Copps’s apartment to Kensington, but the very fact that he had been alone and no one could verify his movements made him a suspect. Yet to suggest otherwise would only lead to further complications.

  ‘I came directly home after seeing Professor Copps.’

  ‘And what time was that?’

  ‘I left the professor’s apartment around three in the afternoon. I was back here by four.’

  ‘Alone?’

  ‘As you can see, I live by myself.’

  ‘In other words you have no way of proving your whereabouts on Thursday afternoon between the hours of four and ten.’

  ‘I guess not.’

  ‘Write that down, Jones, suspect says, “I guess not.”’ The detective mimicked August’s accent.

  ‘Hold on, why am I a suspect if it isn’t necessarily murder?’ August sank into the leather armchair, now aware of a growing disconnect between what felt like reality and what was reality. The detective stepped forward; despite his small stature he was an intimidating man. Instinctively, August stood up again, towering over him.

  ‘We’ll know nothing until the results of the autopsy come through, which should be by the end of tomorrow. In the meanwhile, we are investigating all possibilities.’ The detective strolled further into the room, his aggressive manner made August edgy; a reaction the detective was no doubt calculating on. He sat down on the couch. Immediately, August tensed, horribly aware of the Mauser hidden between the seat and the back cushion.

  ‘The leather armchair’s more comfortable,’ August suggested, trying to sound as casual as possible. Don’t move, don’t move. The detective’s back was about six inches from the concealed gun. If he shifted down the couch, he would discover it.

  ‘Is it now?’ The detective’s voice was laced with suspicion. He glanced around the studio apartment, as if seeing it for the first time, taking in the threadbare rug, the old beaded curtain that barely hid the sleeping area from the rest of the room, the flickering gas flame.

  ‘In some economic strife, sir, that’s unusual, isn’t it, for an American?’ He almost spat the last word out, and August’s heart sank – he was in for a long night and God help him if they found the gun.

  ‘A temporary situation.’

  The detective studied him, then shifted unknowingly a few inches closer to the pistol. ‘You seem nervous. Do you have any reason to be nervous?’

  ‘I’m just shocked, the professor was a close friend.’

  ‘A close friend you hadn’t seen for over a decade, then when you do he suddenly dies a mysterious death.’

  ‘You can’t seriously think I’m a suspect?’

  The detective ignored him. August noticed he was busy scanning the titles of the book spines resting against the wall. The policeman interjected.

  ‘This is simply a preliminary questioning, you see, sir.’

  August watched dismayed as the detective’s gaze settled on one particular book: Maize Dolls and Their Uses in Haitian Voodoo. He looked back up at August, his eyes gleaming with a new intelligence.

  ‘One scenario is that the victim was frightened to death,’ the detective said, with ghoulish relish.

  ‘Is that possible?’ August asked, knowing it was – he’d seen it happen in the prison cells of the fascists.

  ‘Judging by the way the professor fell and the expression on his face, something came through that front door that terrified the life out of him – literally.’

  ‘But you can’t actually prove that it was murder?’ August was trying to piece together the scene – Julian Copps’s body sprawled out across his Persian rug, his thin white hair spread around his glazed eyes like a wispy halo, poignantly vulnerable. How did you die and what was the last thing you saw?

  ‘Possibly,’ the detective exclaimed, then, to August’s relief, stood and began pacing the room. ‘We have other circumstantial evidence that substantiates our conclusion. The questions are, who’d want to murder him and who would have access to an object that might be frightening enough to an educated man like the professor to have such a horrendous effect. And you see, that’s why you, a prize pupil of his, someone who might be aware of his vulnerabilities, some secret beliefs, someone who has an educated understanding of the darker arts …’

  ‘Oh for God’s sake, Detective, I’m a classicist who specialises in the ritual uses of plants and herbs, I’m not an occultist. In fact I am most emphatically an atheist.’

  ‘Funny, we heard Communist.’ The policeman suddenly sounded a lot less apologetic. A flash of anger shot through August: old wounds, old accusations. He glanced sharply across at Constable Jones. They must have contacted MI5; that meant he was a suspect.

  ‘Once. I’m not so sure now.’ He reached into his pocket for a cigarette. ‘Mind if I smoke?’

  ‘Oh, we don’t mind, do we, Jones?’

  Ignoring the sarcasm, August lit up, the blue-grey fingers of the tobacco instantly relaxing him.

  ‘As far as I know, Professor Copps didn’t have any enemies. He’s been retired for over ten years and was well respected and well liked within the classicist world. And us students worshipped him. He was the best mentor you could wish for, acutely intelligent, funny, with an ability to enthuse, but most of all he always believed in his students, even when some of us stopped believing in ourselves. I dare say he saved a few lives as well as initiated a few great careers.’

  ‘Sounds very saint-like,’ the young constable ventured.

  ‘A saint who was frightened to death. Ironic, that is,’ the detective growled then glanced over at the map of Europe still open on August’s desk. ‘Thinking of travelling, sir?’

  ‘I was just doing some geographical research, that’s all.’ August was now struggling to keep his temper.

  ‘Good, because we wouldn’t want you to leave the country until we get the results of the autopsy,’ Jones clarified. ‘Your sudden disappearance would not help your cause, given you have no one to verify your whereabouts during the time of the possible murder. You do understand how such an action might look somewhat suspicious, sir.’

  ‘Of course, currently I have no intention to travel,’ August retorted, maintaining the steady gaze of a consummate liar. ‘But what I don’t understand is what on earth could have frightened a man like Professor Copps to death?’

  The two policemen exchanged glances, then the detective reached into his pocket and pulled out a small object wrapped in tissue. He walked over to the desk.

  ‘We tried dusting it for fingerprints but there was nothing. Absolutely nothing. That in itself is decidedly odd.’ He unwrapped the object and laid it out on the wooden surface. It stared up at August – the
straw head was instantly recognisable to him; Professor Copps’s expression of wry amusement. For a minute he thought he was going to be sick.

  ‘It looks like a voodoo doll to me and Jones agrees, don’t you, Jones?’ The detective studied August’s reaction.

  ‘I do. Ugly little thing, gave me a hell of a shock when I found it.’

  ‘Where did you find it?’ August said.

  ‘Pushed into the mouth of the victim, then left for us to find.’

  ‘Like a warning?’ August volunteered.

  The detective smiled, warming to the subject. ‘Now you’re getting the picture, only we’d call it a calling card.’

  The three men stared down at the doll. It appeared to be made of some kind of white paste – like clay – that had been baked. The body was clearly that of an older man, thin-legged, sagging at the knees, sunken-chested and with a vulnerable bulging stomach. It even had genitals. The sculpting of the torso, face, hands and feet was curiously detailed, yet other parts were clumsy and vague, as if constructed from someone’s memory, and of less significance. It was grotesque in a primordial way. August shivered. Although only about seven inches in length, it was uncannily realistic in its resemblance to the professor. For one horrible moment he wondered whether it wasn’t the work of an ex-lover, such was the detail. The head had strands of white hair baked clumsily into the top, framing the face that was remarkably lifelike except for the eyes. They were long pins tipped with glass black orbs that were staring back at them now. But the most terrifying detail of all was the cluster of pins that had been thrust into the heart of the doll.