Daughter of Catalonia

by Jane MacKenzie

  She looked again at her son, who wouldn’t meet her eye. ‘Don’t blame me, Daniel,’ she beseeched. ‘We hardly ever met, and I could number our actual encounters on the fingers of one hand. The last time he came was in February that year. I was pregnant already, but I didn’t know it. Soon after that I knew, of course, but there was no way I could tell Luis. I could maybe have sent a letter to Philippe to pass to him, but I just couldn’t. It seemed such a dreadful thing to do to him. I knew that at some time he would come back down to Vermeilla and then I would have to tell him. And I knew that at some time I would have to tell Jean-Pierre. But in the meantime I just carried on as if nothing had happened, and sometimes I could forget that I was pregnant and going to have a child who was not my husband’s. It was only three or four months of pretending, but it seemed longer.

  ‘And then came that weekend, when Jean-Pierre confronted me. I was six months pregnant by then, and women in the village could see clearly that I was expecting. There was some muttering, but not much. After all, no one else knew for sure that my husband and I couldn’t … that he couldn’t father a child. It was easy enough just to behave like any other pregnant woman and brazen things out. But not with Jean-Pierre. When he found out he simply exploded. He frightened me. For years he’d just been depressed and withdrawn and fearful, but there was something desperate about him when he realised that the whispers in the village were true. I suppose it confirmed everything that was worst in his life. He was impotent, I was running our lives and playing the man’s role, and finally now he was a cocu, a cuckold, and his wife had been deceiving him with a man who was a hero, a real man, and worse, that I was going to bring that man’s child into the world!

  ‘It was so terrible that that was the weekend that Daniel came to see us. I hadn’t seen you for months, my son, and I was so happy to know you were coming, but that whole weekend turned into a nightmare. I kept you downstairs as much as I could, “helping” me in the bar, but then he came down too, and started acting like the life and soul of the party with the customers. Customers!’ she spat. ‘They were all Nazi scum, but he buried himself with them and after a while it dawned on me what he was doing. It hadn’t occurred to me that he could be so bitter as to turn traitor just to get his revenge on Luis. Mon Dieu, I was so frantic. That’s when you must have heard, my son, because that night I could not keep quiet. I hoped you were sleeping, but I had to find out what he’d done. And he was so pleased with himself! Triumphant, even. As though he’d proved now who was the real man, who had the real power. I never hated him more.’

  Colette’s voice petered out, and she sat still. Only her hands kept moving, twisting round and round, crushing a customer’s bill she had brought up the stairs without thinking, and she cast another glance towards her husband’s room down the corridor.

  Philippe reached out and touched both her and Daniel, and then spoke almost meditatively to Daniel, who hadn’t lifted his eyes from the floor.

  ‘When you told us you were scared up there on the hill, when you were looking for Luis, was it just because you got lost, Daniel, or was there some other reason?’

  ‘Some other reason?’

  ‘Yes. Did you see something? Or hear something that frightened you? You know, you were up there on the afternoon when Luis was shot – when the German militia came. I think they saw you. They would be local militia from Amélie-les-Bains – they would know who you were. I think they used that to bait poor Enric in his jail.’

  ‘I didn’t see any Germans!’ Daniel’s denial was emphatic, inflamed.

  ‘But did you hear anything? Did you hear any shots?’

  ‘Shots? You mean the hunters?’

  ‘There wouldn’t have been any hunters, Daniel. Not at that time of year, and not during the occupation.’

  Daniel was thinking hard. Colette too was alert. The miseries were forgotten as Daniel tried to bring that afternoon back to his mind.

  ‘There were shots,’ he agreed. ‘I didn’t know what they were for or where they were coming from. They seemed to be coming from a long way off, kind of muffled. I suppose that was the effect of the trees. It’s funny – I’d forgotten. Completely forgotten. But now I remember I was frightened, a bit. I didn’t feel safe, so I decided to head back. My God, don’t tell me I heard Luis being killed?’

  ‘I think so, Daniel, and I think that it’s a very good thing that you missed the turning to Luis’s camp. You didn’t know that the Germans were already on their way, close behind you. If you had found the camp, I think you too could have been killed.’

  ‘Or my arrival could have put Luis on his guard!’ Daniel’s voice was bitter. ‘If only I’d had enough sense to find the way. How could they find their way so easily, when I missed that track even though I was looking for it?’

  ‘Because Jean-Pierre told them, that’s why.’ Colette was still twisting her hands around the tiny ball of paper. ‘You overheard Luis telling me that the camp was up that path from the road. Well, he didn’t tell Jean-Pierre. All he did was describe the clearing where the camp was, surrounded by earth walls, and how they’d had trouble getting wood up the little sidetrack through the trees. He didn’t say how to get there! It was at dinner here one evening. But Jean-Pierre knew it! Imagine, some bare old clearing that no one even thought about, but my husband had to know it, from the days when he used to go hunting, before his accident. He didn’t even say so to Luis, though I don’t know why. He kept it for later and crowed to me that he knew where the Maquis camp was. He said there were three or four possible clearings, but that there was one in particular which fitted the bill exactly. The way he spoke worried me, but at the time I didn’t have any reason to think he would ever use the knowledge.’

  Philippe reached over again and placed his hand on her shoulder. ‘I think Luis always made him feel inferior,’ he said. ‘I don’t suppose he knew what was happening between you two, but he could see how friendly you were. At the time he would just have liked knowing something that Luis didn’t want him to know.’

  Madeleine hadn’t spoken since she first blurted out the Germans’ accusations against Daniel. She watched them all like actors on a stage. She thought they had forgotten she was there, caught up in their own scene of disclosure and discovery. There was an explanation for everything, it seemed. Jean-Pierre was less wicked than pitiful and tortured, Daniel was an innocent caught up in an adult tragedy, Colette was a lonely woman who had found herself pregnant.

  Which left Luis. Luis who had taken easy comfort in France while his wife stood up for him against all the forces of her disapproving parents, and nurtured her children’s love for him far away in England, and hoped and planned for their reunion. Luis who had spoken frivolously about his camp and betrayed his fellow Maquis. Luis who had never known that he had another son. Another son! The so-called hero who had died leaving his wife to shrivel away in England, his children to grow up struggling for his memory, and his best friend to raise his remaining Catalan child as closely as he could in his image. The hero who was responsible for all the raw unhappiness being exposed before her.

  All at once Madeleine felt sick, physically sick. She desperately wanted to leave, to be on her own. But she couldn’t leave, could she? She had started this. Philippe had called the meeting, knowing a lot of what she was going to hear, but she had pushed and pushed for answers. At least, she thought, I can get some air. She rose to her feet, muttered ‘Excuse me’ and stepped out onto the balcony. There she stood with her hands glued to the railings, taking deep gulps of air, looking down into the narrow gap between the houses, down to the cobbles below where normal people were moving around doing ordinary things.

  Nobody followed her. She could hear her head pounding, her pulse beating a rock and roll rhythm, and above her eyes a nerve kept twitching. The May evening felt cold in the deep shade of the alleyway. Cold. How could she be so cold? She ran her hands up and down her arms, and then a shawl was thrown around her shoulders. She didn’t turn. She didn’t
want to see anyone, to engage with anyone. She might have to be part of their tears and emotion if she did.

  ‘I called him Martin.’ It was Colette’s voice. ‘I made a bargain with my husband that I would stay with him and not tell what he had done if he would accept Martin as his son. I didn’t dare call him after Luis. I had to call him Martin, because it was Jean-Pierre’s father’s name. It was the only thing I could do to throw the wool in front of people’s eyes and persuade them the child was really Jean-Pierre’s. But it didn’t matter what his name was – to me he was Luis, and when I sang to him I saw your father.’

  Madeleine didn’t move. She wanted to close her ears. She gripped the railing so hard it hurt her fingers, and willed this woman to disappear. But Colette kept talking.

  ‘I loved your father, Madeleine, but he didn’t love me. He loved Elise with so much passion that I ached with jealousy. It was a passion such as I have never known. But they shared something I could never share with him either. Your mother was cultured, sensitive, educated. They had conversations I didn’t understand, and he said things about her which made no sense to me, although I remember every word he said – that she was floral, that she could smell people, intuit them, and that she had always known who he was, and where he lived in his head. He called it “affinity”.’

  There was a doggedness in Colette’s voice, as though she had waited a long time to say these things, and now was determined to finish. It came out almost mechanically, expressionless, addressing Madeleine’s rigid back as though she was in a court room.

  ‘I was happy afterwards that Luis never got my letter. How complicated it would have been for him to learn he was to have a son. You see our relationship just wasn’t like that. I wasn’t his mistress. We were just friends who went to bed together because we were lonely, because there were so many gaps in our lives. Two weak people who brought about a tragedy. Because it was us. We did it. Not my husband, or Daniel, or anyone else.’

  ‘Whose tragedy?’ Madeleine spoke at last.

  ‘A lot of people. We always knew here that the greatest tragedy was your mother’s. That is why Philippe wrote to her again and again, trying to make contact. He loved your mother, you know, but he loved your father even more. And that was Philippe’s tragedy. I’ve watched him since the war. If he could have worn your father’s shirts he would have.’

  ‘Jordi’s father was tortured for days.’ Madeleine muttered. ‘He died an alcoholic.’

  ‘Another one, then, whom we damaged. There’s a long list. Don’t think I don’t feel it,’ Colette sighed. ‘And there are all the children. You and your brother, and Jordi, and now my Daniel it seems. It was a high price to pay. But what you have to understand is that we weren’t bad, Madeleine. Your father saved so many people, helped so many, fed so many, freed so many. And I was just weak enough to love him.’

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Two hours later Madeleine was sitting in the passenger seat of Philippe’s little car as it drew into the centre of Collioure. The walls of the medieval castle loomed to her right, and to the left was a sort of man-made gully which led down to the shore, and which Philippe told her was designed to take floodwaters away to the sea. Beyond it was the old town, with a network of streets similar to but larger than Vermeilla.

  Philippe led Madeleine down by the side of the gully to the quayside, holding her hand and almost dragging her along with him as his long legs strode forward, heedless of his sore back. He had pressed for this trip, back in Colette’s apartment, as Madeleine stood shaking and insisting she wanted to leave.

  ‘You haven’t come this far to go and hide in your hotel room,’ he told her. ‘You’ll eat with me tonight, and we’ll see what we talk about. We’ll go to Collioure and eat anchovies, as simple as you like.’

  The idea of food made her feel sick again, but she had acquiesced passively in all Philippe’s plans, and stood now on Collioure’s quayside, trying to focus on the outstanding beauty of the place. To her left was the bell tower immortalised on canvas by Matisse and so many other artists. To her right the bay swept round in a wide curve, encompassing two beaches, and two distinct parts of the little town on either side of the castle. It was Vermeilla made more dramatic and spectacular, with the same colours and charm but an added touch of elegance.

  Philippe led her to a restaurant terrace and pulled out a chair for her with a view across the bay. He ordered drinks and she found herself drinking a glass of something sparkly which might have been champagne. It slid down surprisingly easily, and the light, chilled liquid soothed her aching throat and seemed to settle her stomach.

  Philippe raised his glass across the table. ‘To your very good health, ma petite, and to all the good days to come,’ he said.

  Madeleine took another long sip of the bubbly, and felt it trickle down her throat. That trickle was like cool silver balm, but her hand was shaking, so she put the glass down.

  ‘I don’t see the good days to come, Tonton Philippe’ she replied. ‘But if we must drink, let’s drink to you. Whatever you did, you did with the best intentions, and you never stop trying to help.’

  ‘And how do you feel now about your father?’

  The cold, hard lump twisted again, deep inside Madeleine’s stomach. She wanted to shout How could he, how could he? but instead she replied with a question of her own.

  ‘Did you know, during those months before he died, that Papa was having an affair with Colette?’

  ‘No, Madalena. Remember that I didn’t come down to Vermeilla for well over a year. I was out on a limb in Amélie-les-Bains, and the only news I had of home was what Luis brought me. Luis himself only came to the coast a handful of times between the end of 1942 and when he died – a handful of times in more than eighteen months. I think to call his relationship with Colette an affair is an exaggeration.’

  ‘So when did you find out?’

  ‘When I read the letter, on the evening of Luis’s death. When they brought me his body I knew that something in the letter had gone badly wrong, so I opened it and read it.’

  ‘And what did you think?’

  ‘So many questions! To be honest, Madeleine, I was too stunned and desolate to think too much. What I didn’t do was judge. It would have been a presumption to judge, when so much unhappiness and trouble was involved.’

  Something erupted in Madeleine, an anger which burnt her throat, her face, her eyes. She almost spat at Philippe. ‘I might have known you would defend everyone! Whatever anyone does, you’re always going to find an excuse for them. Didn’t it occur to you that two people’s philandering had put a whole team of Maquis in danger? Had caused the arrest of Enric, with all the inevitable consequences?’

  ‘People were under enormous pressure, Madeleine.’

  ‘But people didn’t do it! My father did!’

  ‘Yes, but not many people lived life with as much passion as your father. It was his strength, and also maybe his weakness.’ Philippe spread his hands almost in supplication as he continued. ‘You want your heroes perfect? Well in that case you should stick to novels. Your father wasn’t perfect, but he was still extraordinary, and you need to accept that to be able to get his memory back in focus.’

  Madeleine thought of Colette’s words, ‘Two weak people who brought about a tragedy’. But Colette wasn’t a weak person – far from it. She’d had moments of weakness, but picturing her in her café, forced to serve the occupying forces, all her neighbours gone, with a damaged husband upstairs, and her son many kilometres away, Madeleine could imagine what a delight and comfort Luis’s rare visits must have been. She was like a beast of burden, Colette, passively enduring, quietly bearing more than her fair share. But Luis? Where was his excuse?

  Bitter bile rose in her throat, and she gazed out to the darkening waters of the bay, inhaling deeply and fighting back tears she didn’t want to shed. She was aware of Philippe beside her, waiting for her response, but there was nothing to say, was there? What did he want of her? That sh
e should forgive everything, smile and pretend everything was fine?

  ‘My mother had to live with this too, you know,’ she threw at him, and when he looked at her in surprise, she felt almost jubilant for a moment. But it didn’t last.

  ‘He wrote to her,’ she said, her voice flat as a pancake. ‘I found the letters in the jewellery box, just as you thought. His last letter told her he’d been through a dark tunnel, and pretty much admitted he’d been unfaithful. He was happy again because liberation was in sight, and said he’d found her again. He said she would understand!’

  ‘And so she would!’ was Philippe’s almost inevitable reply.

  She was too exhausted to try to justify herself, to fight Philippe’s determined assault in defence of her father. He hadn’t seen her mother after the war, the destroyed ghost of Elise. But there was no point in replying. She wanted to be on her own, but he wouldn’t let her rest. Couldn’t he see how tired she was?

  She spoke more to satisfy him than anything else. ‘If I accept what you say, where does that leave us? Where do we go from here?’

  ‘Well, you can walk away, of course, and go back to your old life,’ answered Philippe immediately, as if he had hoped for this question.

  ‘Or?’

  ‘Or you help me support Colette now as she decides what to tell Martin. And you help me with Daniel. I couldn’t get him to speak this afternoon about his own feelings. You’ve just discovered a shocking truth as an adult young woman, but Daniel has been carrying the same knowledge as a secret since he was nine years old – heavy baggage for a sensitive child. And now it’s all out, and he can talk, if he will. I’m hoping he may talk to you more easily than to me.’

  Daniel and Martin. Martin and Daniel. A half-brother and his half-brother. Her brain quite simply reeled.

  ‘I want Robert to come!’ she wailed. ‘I’ll do what I can, but I want my brother here. My real brother.’