Tell Me Who I Am

by Julia Navarro

  “For God’s sake!”

  “Yes, Amelia, everyone knows it’s true, that Hitler came to ask for help in the war, and Franco managed to get rid of him without saying yes and without saying no, just like a true Galician...”

  “And what help were we going to give? Who were we going to send? The country is in ruins! The men don’t have the strength to carry on fighting! It’s not that he didn’t want to help Hitler, but he didn’t have any way of helping, anything to offer. And even so, he’s sent the División Azul to Russia.”

  “Amelia, please, stop talking about politics. We’ve suffered too much because of politics, and you’ve paid a high price for your Communist ideas... Leave it, Amelia, we’ll be able to forge ahead with work and effort. And what I say to my children, I’ll say to you as well: I don’t want anyone else in this house getting involved in politics. It’s enough for people to know that we were on the Republican side. We shouldn’t draw people’s attention. Things aren’t going too badly,” Doña Elena insisted.

  Don Armando spoke with his niece about politics when his wife was not present. He didn’t want to upset her. He also knew that Doña Elena was worried that their neighbors would hear them criticizing Franco.

  “Your aunt is a good woman,” Don Armando said on her behalf.

  “I know, I know. And I love her very much and I’m extremely grateful for what she is doing for us and for Pablo, but I’m surprised that she’s accepting the new situation with such good grace.”

  “It is she who makes this house possible, and she has her feet firmly on the ground, unlike us. She doesn’t daydream that someone is going to come and save us, so she has decided to adapt herself to the new regime, she knows there’s no other option.”

  “And you, what about you? What do you think?” Amelia asked.

  “What do you think I’m going to think! Franco is a damned monster, but he won the war and there’s not a lot we can do about it. What can we use to fight with? We don’t have any weapons, or any money, or any hope. No one will help us, Amelia; France and England have abandoned us, and we will carry on alone. I’m sorry, but I don’t think that if Churchill wins the war then he will have strength to help us afterwards.”

  “Of course he’ll help us! Trust me, I know what I’m talking about,” Amelia insisted.

  Amelia’s physical deterioration was a mystery to all of us. For all that Doña Elena tried to find out what had caused it, Amelia kept quiet about the reasons she had lost her health.

  Laura was still her cousin’s confidante, and her best friend, but even so Amelia was not entirely sincere with her. One Sunday, a few weeks after her arrival, at siesta time, the two of them were in the sitting room while the rest of the family were sleeping. You know that August in Madrid is like an oven, so there’s nothing better to do than spend the first half of the afternoon asleep. I got up to go and get myself a glass of water, and heard their voices as I passed by the door to the sitting room. I was more curious then that I am now, so I stayed to listen.

  “Have you really left Albert forever?” Laura asked.

  “Yes, it’s better for him, I never loved him enough. Well, I did love him, but without being in love with him, or at least not enough.”

  “He’s such a good person... Why don’t you like good people?”

  “You think I only like bad men?” Amelia asked, surprised at her cousin’s question.

  “No, it’s not that, but... I suppose that you’d recognize that Santiago is a good person, and Albert as well, but you left them both.”

  “Although it hurts to admit it, I suppose that yes, Santiago is a good man, but I was not ready for marriage, and I doubt that he was, either.”

  “And what was it about Albert that you didn’t like?”

  “There wasn’t anything about him that I didn’t like, it’s just that... how to explain... I love him, yes, but I didn’t feel anything when I was with him.”

  “I know why.”

  “Really? Do tell.”

  “Because you like challenges, you like to conquer impossible odds, and both Santiago and Albert loved you and gave you everything, and so you didn’t feel any interest in them because of that. Tell me about this German.”

  “Max? There’s not much to say. He’s brave, and intelligent, and handsome.”

  “And married.”

  “Yes, Laura, yes, he’s married.”

  “Have you been with him all this time? Why don’t you tell me where you have been and what you have been doing?”

  Amelia stood up and nervously began walking round the room without answering her cousin.

  “Come on, don’t get upset, I just wanted to know what happened to you. You used to trust me.”

  “And you still are the person I trust most in the world, but I prefer not to get you mixed up in this. It’s better this way. I’ve told you that I’ve left Albert for Max, and nobody knows that apart from you.”

  “Mama would have a stroke if she knew that you had a lover who was married.”

  “And your father wouldn’t deal too well with the fact of his being German.”

  “My father loves you a lot, Amelia, and he would never judge you.”

  “But he would not understand, and that would cause him a great deal of pain. That’s why I prefer them not to know anything. And I don’t want to bother my poor sister with my affairs either.”

  “When will you see Max again?”

  “I don’t know, Laura, perhaps never. He is a soldier and we are at war.”

  “You don’t know where he is?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  We anxiously followed the progress of the war. The radio told us that Hitler was going from victory to victory, as was Mussolini, and the enthusiastic commentators told us that Franco was as “great” as the Führer or Il Duce.

  “The Allies are going to win,” Amelia said stubbornly.

  “I hope to God that’s true!” Don Armando said, although he was more skeptical than she was about the eventual outcome of the war.

  “And what do we care which side wins?” Doña Elena said, worrying that the greed of the Germans or the desire of the British to re-establish the Republic would lead to another war in Spain.

  She had suffered so much that the only thing Doña Elena wanted was to survive, and she dreamed of a return to how things had been in the past, when she had been a wealthy member of the bourgeoisie, and the house had shone with silver plate and fine crystal.

  In the middle of September, Jesús and I started the new school year. We were studying with a scholarship at a Salesian school. Laura went back to work with the monks, and Antonietta started to teach the Falangist children again. Amelia was the only one who was not working, and this frustrated her greatly. One day she went to her aunt and insisted that she help her find a job.

  “You’re still not well, you’re still very thin and the doctor says you need to rest.”

  “But I can’t stand being a burden on you.”

  “The best help you can be is to get better, and I don’t want to hear you say ever again that you’re a burden. You are another daughter to us, like Antonietta, another daughter. Be patient and wait until you are better, and then you can work.”

  But Amelia didn’t listen to her, and started looking for a job in secret, without telling anyone at home. One day she surprised us all by saying that she had found one, not very far from the house, as a shop assistant in a haberdasher’s.

  “But good heavens, you can’t work there!” Doña Elena said.

  “Why not, it’s a good honest job.”

  “But we’ve shopped there all our lives and... No... I don’t want you to work there, they’ll talk about us behind our backs.”

  “And why should we care what other people say? You spend all your time telling us to adapt ourselves to the new situation. Well, we don’t have money and we’re going to have to work. I don’t see any problem in working at the haberdasher’s.”

  “The owner is a real wit
ch. She never liked me. Everyone knows that she used to be on the stage, but she was very bad at it as well, poor thing; well, she was good enough to capture her manager. She got pregnant by him and because he was married he had no option but to look after the pair of them, her and the child. So they came to the agreement that he would set her up in the shop if she wouldn’t cause a fuss.”

  “We’ve always bought from that shop,” Laura said, in support of Amelia.

  “They always have good stock, the best lace and ribbons... But that woman is what she is,” Doña Elena insisted.

  “Well, I’m grateful that she has given me a job. Her daughter is married to a lieutenant who is stationed in Ceuta, they have four children, so she can’t help her mother with anything, and she’s old and needs help. It will only be a few hours in the morning, but at least I’ll earn some money,” Amelia argued.

  “But what will they say about us in the neighborhood?” Doña Elena whimpered.

  “Are they feeding us? If not, why should we worry what the neighbors say?” Amelia replied.

  She would not allow them to change her mind, and in spite of Doña Elena’s entreaties and Don Armando’s worries, Amelia started to go to the haberdasher’s every morning.

  “Doña Rosa is very nice,” Amelia said.

  “Doña Rosa? When did we start calling her Doña Rosa? We’ve always known her as Rosita,” Doña Elena complained.

  “Yes, but it’s not nice to speak disrespectfully to a woman who is old enough to be my grandmother. I have decide to be polite to her, and she’s pleased that I do so.”

  “I’m not surprised! A well-brought-up-lady like you showing respect to a showgirl, as if she were a fine lady. I don’t approve, it upsets me.”

  “Don’t be so hard on her, Aunt. What do we know about her life? I think she’s a pleasant enough woman who has done what she has needed to do in order to make a life for her daughter.”

  “Thanks to the shop where her lover set her up,” Doña Elena insisted.

  “Well, that only goes to show that she’s clever,” Laura said. “Us women normally get taken for a ride, used and then thrown away like old shoes.”

  “The things you say! If your father heard you talking like that, he’d be shocked, I tell you. How can you justify that woman going with that man and... and... well, having a child with him being married? Is that decent? Is that what I’ve taught you?”

  “What do we know about her circumstances? Nothing. I’m with Amelia, we shouldn’t judge her,” Laura insisted.

  “What do you think they say about me?” Amelia asked.

  “About you? Why should they talk about you? You’re a young woman from a good family and you can hold your head high because of it.”

  “Yes, but I got married and then I left my husband and my child to run away with another man. Do you think I’m better than Doña Rosa?”

  “Don’t compare yourself to that woman!” Doña Elena said, offended.

  “You know that your friends, whenever they see me, murmur to themselves and treat me condescendingly. It’s offensive. They think I’m a fallen woman.”

  “Don’t say that! I won’t let anyone refuse to show you the proper amount of respect.”

  “Come on, don’t get upset, just accept that I’m working in the shop. Doña Rosa has promised to pay me thirty pesetas a month.”

  The money was a great help to the family finances. Don Armando earned four hundred pesetas working fourteen hours a day, and Antonietta’s piano lessons, and Laura’s lessons and sewing meant that the family barely made six hundred pesetas per month. We were lucky, I suppose, and weren’t at the level of some families, whose food consisted of stewed chestnuts or carob gruel. But I have never eaten as much rice or potatoes as I did then. Doña Elena made rice with garlic and laurel and put paprika, and the same old laurel, on the potatoes to give them a little more flavor.

  Doña Elena accepted that Amelia should work in Doña Rosa’s shop, but she was reluctant about it, and never went there again herself.

  One night while we were listening to the radio we heard news of violent combat taking place around Stalingrad. In spite of the reporter’s boasts that Germany would not leave a single Bolshevik alive, that was not what was happening on the Russian front.

  Amelia seemed very worried. I never knew why. Jesús said that it was because she had run off with a Communist and therefore felt sympathy for the Russians, and was worried that the Germans might win.

  One day Laura came home and said that they were going to raise her wages at the school.

  “The mother superior said that she was very happy with my work.”

  Doña Elena decided to celebrate by making a potato pie with a little bit of the butter that she kept as if it were a treasure. Melita had brought it from Burgos. Melita didn’t come to see us often, but she had wanted to see her cousin Amelia and introduce her to her husband and her little daughter Isabel.

  The two cousins had not seen each other for many years, and Amelia was surprised at the change that had taken place in Melita; she had become domesticated, subordinate in all things to her husband. It’s not that Rodrigo Losada was not a good man: He was, and he loved his wife, but he had very clear ideas about the role that wives, especially his own, should fill. Melita did everything he said, and his opinions were her own. For his part, Rodrigo seemed doubtful about Amelia, the black sheep of the family, who had run away and abandoned her husband and her son, and who appeared and disappeared without telling anyone where she was going, just as if she were a man.

  Rodrigo Losada was friendly and polite with Amelia, but he could not hide his mistrust of her. Some of the few arguments he had with his wife arose when she supported her cousin, saying that she had always been special, and that she was a good woman. But he would not admit the rightness of what she said, which made her sad.

  I must admit that Jesús and I looked forward to the visits of Melita and Rodrigo, not just because we liked them, but because they always brought a lot of food.

  Whenever we went to pick them up at the station, we would bet how many baskets they would bring. Rodrigo’s parents were well-off before the civil war and, without being millionaires, they lived much better than we did; Rodrigo’s mother was from Cantabria and owned a farm with some land and animals, so they were never hungry.

  Melita used to bring chorizo in oil, butter, ribs, and marinated pork loin. She also brought chickpeas and jars of honey and plum jam, and sweets that her mother had made. This was a feast for postwar Madrid.

  Melita was pregnant again, and Rodrigo said that this time he was sure that it would be a boy. As for little Isabella, she was a plump and calm little girl whom Doña Elena and Don Armando spoiled whenever they could, given how little they saw their granddaughter.

  Doña Elena, like all the mothers of that time, worried about the future for her children. She was happy with Melita’s marriage, but she was on the lookout for husbands for her daughter Laura and her niece Antonietta; she would take care of Jesús and me later, because we were still too young.

  The good woman, unaware of her husband’s suffering, tried to get to know the wives of several important figures in the regime who were our neighbors. From time to time she would invite them to come and take tea with her, and would insist that Laura and Antonietta were there so that they could be seen and so that the women would take them into account when choosing partners for their offspring.

  These occasions put Laura in a bad mood and she would argue with her mother.

  “But what’s wrong with you! Do you think I’m some kind of fairground attraction? I refuse to let your friends examine me whenever they come to our house. I hate them! You would never have invited them before the war.”

  “Do you want to stay single the whole of your life? These women are well-positioned and have children your age; if you carry on like this, then you and Antonietta will miss the boat.”

  “But I don’t want to get married!” Laura replied.

&n
bsp; “What are you saying? Of course you’ll get married! Do you want to become an old maid? I won’t allow it.”

  Antonietta appeared to be more docile, more accepting of her aunt’s wishes. I saw her at these tea parties, and she was suffering, but she never said anything, and tried to behave well, as she had been brought up to do.

  Doña Elena showed her friends Antonietta’s cross-stitch, and assured them that the cake they were eating had been made by Laura herself.

  One night, she announced at dinnertime that we were to go, that Saturday, to a tea-dance organized by one of these neighbors.

  “The husband of Señora de García de Vigo is the right-hand man of the undersecretary for agriculture, and she had assured me that lots of interesting young men will be there, some of them well-connected in the Falange, others from good families, I think that there is one who is the son of a count or a marquis or something. The De García de Vigo family has a daughter, Maruchi, who is a little long in the tooth; she’s twenty-seven, and she’s going through the same torments as you, she hasn’t yet found a husband.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of going,” Laura said.

  “Of course you will go! You and Antonietta and Amelia, we will all go. Your father will go with us, it’s a good opportunity for him to meet Señor de García de Vigo.”

  “What do you expect me to do at this dance? I am married, after all,” Amelia said, trying to get out of this annoying social engagement.

  “You will be with me, I have told Señora de García de Vigo that I will be with her to keep an eye on the festivities. You will accompany us.”

  “I don’t think that this is a good idea, You know what these women think of me, they see me as a fallen woman, I don’t think that my presence there would help Antonietta or Laura,” Amelia argued.

  “What are you saying! You are my niece and no one will say a word out of place, they are very polite to you when they come here.”