Books Burn Badly

by Unknown

  Of course he never told his elaborate story if Ricardo Samos and Chelo Vidal were present. He felt great admiration for her, the painter. She had all the presence of a great lady with the charm of a young girl who’s come from Cuba and a slight touch, like eye shadow, of having had contact with Bohemian life in the Republican city. But she always put art first. Minded her own business. Her most revolutionary act, thought Dez, had been to wear that rayon suit and dazzle Samos, it wasn’t easy for a woman to quicken his heartbeat. Samos had confided in him. First he’d made that unusual declaration, ‘This cousin of mine is worthy of a crime!’ Then he’d affirmed, ‘She’ll be my wife.’ Dez, at the time, was already a Falangist, but Samos, the future judge, still moved in the world of ideas, fancied himself as an intellectual and contributed to the magazines Acción Española and Integralismo Lusitano, fostered by two monarchist, Catholic groups whose goal was a conservative Iberian league. Back then, Samos claimed the City of God went against the Falange’s ‘primitive aggression’, though he conceded a certain ‘barbaric charm’. So Dez made fun of him, ‘If it’s action you’re after, real action, then you know whom you have to talk to.’ But it was books, not Dez’s perseverance, which led Samos to become a Fascist and join the conspiracy against the Republic. The discovery of Carl Schmitt, that Don Carlos. When they walked through Mina Square, with the huge flag bearing a swastika hanging outside the German consulate, Dez would deliberately make the Roman salute, which bothered Samos to start with. He had that Catholic prejudice against the Nazis. But he got over this after reading Schmitt. This Don Carlos took him back to Donoso Cortés and Joseph de Maistre. A concoction that transformed Samos.

  Commander Dez stood up and went over to the record player. ‘La favorita’ had ended, but the record kept on turning. A fault that annoyed him, as did the disobedience of faulty machines in general. The listless, practically inaudible creak grew louder like the groan of an axle in the thick of night. He’d already told Luís Terranova to take it to be repaired.

  ‘It’s nothing.’

  ‘What do you mean, nothing?’

  ‘You just have to lift the arm and put it back on its rest.’

  ‘Why must you always contradict me?’

  ‘I’m not contradicting you. I just think differently.’

  It had been, he thought, an electrical attraction, an attraction of opposites. For him at least. What bothered him made Terranova laugh. It would always be a mystery. Simple and irresistible. A magnetic body. Electricity. Bodies went about their own business, ignored each other, played at distances or struggled to enter each other, to fit, curves and angles, bones, muscles, gaps, vents. A forging of symmetry. Ad libitum.

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘Ad libitum.’

  ‘You’re crazy, degenerate.’

  Degenerate. How he liked to be called that. It was one of the ‘official’ words he used daily in an attempt to classify what was unacceptable. Degenerate. With what pleasure he’d spoken of the degenerate artistic avant-garde as a symptom of social unrest and western decadence. He liked to adopt a virile tone in cultural meetings, especially in a lacklustre environment of schoolmistresses who’d secretly be reading God knows what by Pardo Bazán or Pérez Galdós and small-time artists with the informalist devil inside them, the dangerous look of hunger in those who dream of eating the world of forms. When the order came to close the magazine Atlántida, not long before, around the time Dionisio Ridruejo and others who’d gone soft in the head were disgraced in Madrid, he was one of those who informed the editorial board of the decision and how he enjoyed passing on the head censor’s anathema, ‘Existentialist claptrap!’ He did, however, make it clear this wasn’t his opinion. Sada was there, among others. Now he was a great painter, could even be described as painting itself, shame he didn’t do portraits, but fell into the sea, never to resurface. Someone else who didn’t know how to catapult themselves. And he’d been asked to paint the inside of Franco’s yacht, the Azor. Even so. There he was, catalogued under ‘existentialist claptrap’. When the alarm sounded, words came first. Standing firm, in line. He’d already warned them, after the last issue devoted to Valle-Inclán, that they were on the red line. No, these schoolmistresses and artists had no idea how much he enjoyed condemning ‘degenerate art’. He wore an expression of disgust, but inside he felt a tingling. The same tingling he felt when he heard about the ‘existentialist claptrap’ of Atlántida from head office. He chewed on these hostile words. Words he then poured with saliva, salted, leavened balls, into Terranova’s ear: degenerate, existentialist, unruly.

  They shared a fascination for music. It was something that moved him, he had to confess. Arriving to find Luís Terranova listening to Schubert’s lieder, Die Forelle, that song about the trout, his eyes wide open, without eyelids, like a fish watching sounds in the flooded house. Absorbed, motionless, breathing music through his skin. And then there was his voice. His voice drove him crazy. And Dez was demanding, very demanding. He knew a real voice when he heard one. Some time ago, when Terranova came to live with him, he found him two good teachers, one for music theory and another for singing. The two of them were agreed. He had what it took, voice and talent, to triumph. But, deep down, Terranova made fun of bel canto. He always had that glint in his eyes. He lacked ambition. Wasn’t up to the task. Dez should have realised sooner. Perhaps it had been absurd to lead him in that direction. He’d got him some performances. Christmas charity concerts and the like. He could have got him more if he’d been more determined. But it wasn’t an unmitigated disaster. No one could accuse him of doing the same as the tycoon Kane with his beloved, of trying to turn that pipsqueak into an opera star. Luís Terranova was good. People liked him. Dez shuddered just to see him walk out on stage in that bow-tie. He particularly enjoyed his performances at private functions in hotels or expensive villas. He shared the applause. Was congratulated on his protégé. He wasn’t interested in rumours any more. He never bothered to clarify Terranova’s move from assistant to ward or nephew and finally to artistic protégé. He was proud. Luís Terranova was popular with both men and women. But he belonged to Dez. That much was clear. Dez would allow flirting, small seductive adventures, adulterous games at those glamorous parties. Terranova was sweet, kind and attractive, a perfect target for bored rich people during crazy nights. The censor didn’t mind such games. He took an irate pleasure in the thorns of jealousy, savoured them as the prelude to what he called training sessions, sessions of taming and conquest.

  The years went by. Both leading a double life, but Dez felt sure he was in control of the situation. Terranova was used to the role he’d been given. And there was something very important, which almost no one knew, a closely guarded secret. Terranova had been taken as a slave. Terrible to say, but it was true. Terranova knew he had no life beyond Dez’s reach. And like a frightened sheep, he was being strangled by his own halter.

  ‘Houses have a tendency not to fall,’ says a humorous aphorism he’d used in patriotic discussions after the United Nations had condemned the regime. He was now reminded of it. Paradoxically. Because his house, his building, was in a state of collapse. Terranova had come to his office one day, looked him in the eye and told him he wanted to lead his own life. Dez wasn’t sure how to react. Luís was wearing his blue bow-tie with the silver filaments. ‘You shouldn’t wear that during the day, it loses its charm,’ he replied. ‘My own life. Starting with work. I’m not doing any more of those ulcerous performances. No more bel canto, Tomás. I’m going to sing at dances.’ Yes. What he wanted was to sing at open-air dances, for his friend, the singer Pucho Boedo, to invite him on stage, for people to ask who that guy was and for someone to say, ‘One with a voice like Pucho Boedo.’ That for him was to triumph. To be compared to Pucho Boedo. To triumph in dance halls or in the open air. To excel at a tango one Sunday evening at Chaparrita over in Ponte da Pasaxe. He’d got it into his head he was going to enter and win that radio competition, ‘Parade of Stars’, which wa
s so popular.

  ‘You’re so childish! What are you going to do in “Parade of Stars”?’

  ‘Don’t worry. I won’t sing Violetta’s cabaletta.’

  He may have overreacted. It was just a punch. The trouble is Luís was fragile. He had a glass nose and it spewed blood. He was doing it for him. So that he’d lose some of his coarseness and aim a little higher. He also overdid it the day Luís came home with that friend of his, the cowboy photographer, Papagaio’s Hercules.

  ‘I don’t want to see that hick here again.’

  A house has a tendency not to fall. He’d turned up elegantly dressed in his office. His first visit since the time Dez had summoned him to expound his delicate situation. Years had gone by. He’d achieved his objective. He’d taken possession of him. He governed his life and enjoyed his body. Without losing face, power or position. Why’d he come? To tell him his house was in ruins?

  ‘What a wretch you are. I’ll crush you like a worm. You’ll end up in a prison for queens or with a bullet up your arse.’

  ‘I just want to lead my own life. Follow my own path.’

  ‘A goat always heads for the mountain, right?’

  Tomás Dez went over to the window. The roofs of the Old City seemed to be squeaking like mice in the storm. The wind drove the clouds, torn from the sea’s straw mattress, to cover the first cracks of dawn.

  If only he hadn’t been so inconsiderate, so wild, so . . . He finally found the word a silent part of his mind had been searching for during his vigil. So ungrateful. He repeated it in a fairly loud voice to make amends to himself. So ungrateful! What was he doing awake all night, being martyred, while that pimp was out and about? Martyrdom, martyrdom, martyrdom, that was the word. From then on, his passage through the house, at the slow pace of a procession, turned into a summary trial. His walk regained its measure, his body its figure. Every step he took was a new charge laid against Luís Terranova. He finally felt well. The boss had taken over that weak, crude, unruly body. He felt well all right. As when he took the stage, alerted the audience, silenced the rustling of Sunday poems and brought not emotion, but fear to the literary festival organised by the group Amanecer. It was a spring festival and everything was going like spring. The atmosphere was relaxed, even joky. One of the participants read a poem with a questioning refrain, ‘Where’s the key?’ Until someone in the audience shouted out, ‘Here, between my balls!’ The organisation was linked to the regime, but clearly the time for ardent patriotic hymns had passed. He was nervous, he also had some ‘spring’ sheets in his hand. He’d been invited by a childhood acquaintance, a simple woman turned poet who one day had been naive enough to declare herself ‘pregnant with poetry’, having been possessed on an evening stroll in Bárbaras Square by the ghost of Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer. The point is she’d agreed to act as messenger and invite him to the festival. She said, ‘Ah, Dez! Censor and poet. How thrilling!’ Yes, she found everything thrilling. But he’d see fear on her face too. Because, when he was announced, as a poet, of course, not as censor, someone inside him forgot his ‘spring’ sheets and deadened his nerves. The boss had taken over. His voice thundered like a cannon. Put an end to smiles and rustling.

  My mind has become exact, defined, sure,

  from the mist of vague reality far removed.

  The War is hard and pure,

  as hard and pure is truth.

  It was the Poem of the Beast and the Angel, José María Pemán’s contribution to the ‘holy war’ against the satanic Republic. A poem belonging to them, to the victors filling the auditorium. But they were still confused. Confused in spring. Stunned. Unsure whether to clap or not. How he enjoyed that lyrical upheaval.

  He made some coffee. He felt well all right. The verdict was clear. That bastard would remember Tomás Dez for ever. He’d stuff night down his throat. He just had to make a call. Ren answered immediately. He must still sleep like that. As he said, next to both his bugs. The telephone and the pistol. Yes, it was a service, a favour after so many years. Yes, with the car. And a blanket for the upholstery. He then went to get dressed. At least his shoes were shiny. He smiled as if looking in the mirror. ‘No, no, no,’ he told his shoes, ‘don’t come to me asking for mercy!’ His walk now was martial. He felt well, stepping firmly. He looked around. The whole house was under Terranova’s charm and he’d have to reconquer it. Luís had weaved his spell on things. It was obvious. He spent more time with them. Tolerated their faults. Now, at daybreak, they were sleepless and wary. Distant. They’d be waiting for him to leave so that they could start having some fun. No doubt Terranova was thinking the same. That he’d leave early. Have his coffee and read the papers in the Oriental Café or Alcázar, next to the censor’s office. Well, no. He wasn’t going to leave.

  He heard the lock muffle its own mechanism. They were in cahoots. He’d have found it impossible to open the door so quietly.

  Luís Terranova was carrying a sailor’s canvas bag. Empty. He saw Dez standing erect, with his arms crossed, on the brink of dawn. Funny, he thought. In the dark, the first thing he made out were his black shoes. The shoes he’d polished. Good work. He did it almost as well as the shoeshiner in Cantón Bar.

  He decided to go to his room and do what he’d planned. Take his things and leave. His belongings would easily fit in the canvas bag. He wouldn’t take any presents, not even a cravat. He could have not come back. Now that he thought about it, saw the ghost of Dez like a skeleton next to the hat-stand, it might have been better. But he wanted to show that he was leaving. As I came, I went.

  ‘Where are you off to? To sing in the street?’

  ‘Goodbye, Dez. I’m not your assistant any more. Or your ward. Or your housekeeper’s son. Or your nephew. Or your protégé. No more being a slave. No more second clown Toni. I’ve paid back the favour by now.’

  Dez seized his shoulder.

  ‘Slavery? Hardly a sublime farewell, Terranova. After all these years, a castrato’s song at least.’

  Luís was two feet away from the door. He wheeled around suddenly and hit him with the canvas bag. Not enough to stop Dez’s well-oiled machinery. Dez grabbed his hair just as he was about to leave.

  ‘I told you you should cut your hair as men do. Remember what I taught you? The pulmonary strength of a man for a child’s voice. You know how to imitate them. Do Gaetano Caffarelli in the Sistine Chapel!’

  The pressure on his head and neck forced him on to his knees. Dez slammed the door shut. The first punch was aimed at disfigurement. Luís heard his nose crack as if part of a collapse in which the roof caved in. Perhaps all that blood was from the splintering beams. It spattered the lapels of his light-coloured jacket.

  ‘Now you won’t be able to do the castrato number. Give us something local. What was that song, Terranova? The one you sang to make me jealous. Don’t look at me like that. You’re far too ugly.’