He couldn’t stop turning it over in his mind. If there was really something to what she was saying, the most convenient solution might be to offer her a tidy sum to cover her expenses and those of the newborn for a reasonable period of time. Where to get that money: that was another matter entirely. He’d have to ask his father, and for that he’d need to come up with a good excuse. He could find Rita a new situation. If only she’d settle for that and not make a fuss.
“. . . Two friends of the victim, who worked in the Montlleó factory, and had spent the best part of the night with him in the Sanlúcar tavern on Santa Madrona . . .” Twenty minutes. She’s been in there twenty minutes. That’s another one of her defects that drives me up the wall. I always have to wait, she’s never on time. Why should I have to wait for anyone, much less a goddamn seamstress . . . She’d be singing another song if I’d stood her up a few times. Then she wouldn’t take on airs or be so demanding. But I have to confess, I’m hooked on her. She’s a habit that’ll be hard to break. A damn shame, just when things were going so well. “. . . testified that Manuel Domínguez was inebriated and that he had spoken with some of the regular customers, including one named Paco . . .” What the hell’s she doing all this time in La Perla d’Orient? Chatting like a magpie with the salesgirl, I bet. She does it on purpose, just to annoy me. This girl’s trouble. “. . . with whom he’d started a violent argument, each of them insulting and threatening the other.” And if she won’t settle for the money and babbles about the whole thing, which I doubt, I can always deny it. Her word against mine, guess which of us they’d believe. Who’s going to take the word of a nobody named Rita against the word of an Aldabò? With my father’s influence, they’ll shut her up and put her in her place. Father would never let a snake like her ruin the life of his son, his only son. He dreams of marrying me off to a Carulla or an Andreu, or that snotty Marsini bitch. Besides, I’m in no rush. I’ve no desire to get married just yet. Not until I’m at least thirty. Marriage is too long as it is, so why make it eternal? “Manuel Domínguez, according to one of his companions, Olegario Riera, threatened to break a bottle over the head of his adversary, the abovementioned Paco.” At any rate, no matter how this turns out, I’m in for a good scolding. Father’s not going to like hearing about my escapades with a servant. He’s so damn strict! I’ll have to put up with the same shit he put me through the last time, when he caught me with that maid. Only this will be worse, because that one wasn’t pregnant. But Father raised hell when he had to buy her off, even though to him that was small change, less than a day’s profit. It didn’t help for Mother to say I was only having fun, that if a man doesn’t sow his wild oats while he’s single, he’ll sow them after he’s married . . . It was like preaching in the desert. I’m sure he’s never sowed any wild oats, so that stuff will make no impression on him. “Following this, the man known as Paco fled from the tavern in the direction of the docks chased by Manuel Domínguez.” The bells of Santa Anna just rang a quarter to eight. Closing time. If she doesn’t come out soon, I’ll split. I’ve been cooling my heels here more than half an hour. The joke’s gone on long enough.“The police are seeking information about the prime suspect, Francisco Cardona, alias Paco, who apparently has disappeared.”
Maurici checked his pocket watch. Twelve minutes to eight and Rita still hadn’t come out . . . And Rita never did.
* * *
Agitated and oblivious to what he’d read, he threw the newspaper on the ground. Despite his decision not to wait for her, he peered impatiently through the glass door. Inside the store there were no customers, just a woman collecting pieces of cloth behind the counter and a man sitting at the back. He shoved the door open and went in.
“Good evening. I’m waiting for a young lady who came in a while ago.”
“What young lady? We’ve had quite a few customers this afternoon.”
The saleswoman—in fact, she seemed to be the owner—was a handsome, middle-aged matron. As she spoke to Maurici she concentrated on gathering rolls of cloth scattered on the glass counter, which also served as a showcase. Inside were delicate camisoles with satin bows and corsets with metal ribs that looked like ancient instruments of torture.
“A blond girl, good looking. Fairly tall, wearing a hat with flowers, and a blue, striped dress.”
“No one dressed like that has come in.”
Maurici smiled. “You’re mistaken. She was with me and I saw her come in.”
“No, sir. I’m telling you, you’re the one who’s mistaken.”
“Perhaps someone else waited on her.”
“We’re the only ones here, Jaumet and I. There’s no one else in the store.”
Maurici couldn’t help noticing how smoothly the woman’s fingers handled the material. Without knowing why, this irritated him. “Are you sure she isn’t in the dressing room?”
Without looking up, the sphinx replied, “Look for yourself.”
Somewhat hesitantly and without conviction, Maurici walked through the store, long and narrow like a tunnel, until he reached the back where Jaumet was seated on a low chair. As he approached him he could see that the man, despite being well past forty, had the vacant look of those who live permanently in the age of innocence. Maurici muttered “Good evening,” and the man responded with a nod and a broad smile. Behind him hung the curtain of the dressing room. Maurici opened it and stood looking at a booth less than six feet square with a bench and a full-length mirror. The clothes rack, nailed to the wall, was empty.
The interior of the store was painted a cream color that had darkened with time. Two crystal chandeliers hung down from the high ceiling. The wall behind the counter was lined with small drawers of the same color, with porcelain knobs and tiny labels. Maurici stupidly ran his gaze over them, as if Rita might pop out of one. Even at the risk of being rudely dismissed, he ventured, “Isn’t there another door?”
Without changing her expression or raising her eyes from the counter, the woman replied, “As you can see, there’s just the front door.”
“She came in to buy . . .” he tried to remember, “a strip of embroidery and something else . . . And, by the way, this isn’t the first time she’s been here. You must know her.”
“No, sir. I haven’t sold any embroidery strip to anyone this afternoon.”
Reluctant to leave, Maurici touched his hand against the rim of his hat and slowly headed for the door.
“Good evening,” said the woman tiredly and still gathering up rolls of cloth.
The situation was too absurd to be real. For just a moment he stopped to look at the passersby and thought that, knowing where Rita was hiding, they were laughing at him with the smugness of people who share a secret. Someone was pulling his leg. He had the feeling that he was floating, immersed in a world as elastic and dense as the world of dreams. Let’s take this step by step, he said to himself, clinging to reason as if it were an anchor. No matter how strange things seem, sooner or later there’s always an explanation. Rita can’t have just up and vanished. That’s physically impossible. She has to be somewhere. I saw her go in there: I’m sure of that. But I didn’t see her leave, which doesn’t mean she didn’t leave. While I was looking at the paper and preoccupied with my own worries, she might have sneaked out. That’s unlikely because I did keep an eye out for her, but not impossible. Besides, she had her reasons to pull a stunt like that. She was angry and sore at me, and so she decided to give me the slip. What a nerve! She’s got even more gall than I thought. What doesn’t jibe is that the owner denies having seen her. Why? That I don’t swallow for a second. That woman knows more than she’s telling. Why wouldn’t she simply say that Rita came in and then left? What possible reason could she have to lie to me?
He merged with the bustle of the street, stepping aside to avoid a gypsy woman selling flowers.
But then, again, I may be a stranger in La Perla d’Orient, but perhaps Rita isn’t. I’ve heard my mother send her there once or twice. What if Rita . .
. What if she asked the owner to play dumb if I came in asking for her? But why wouldn’t she tell me she’d left ten minutes ago? What would have been wrong with that? If what Rita wanted was to leave me standing there, she’d already done that. Perhaps she wanted to make sure I didn’t follow her to her boardinghouse. But how does she know I won’t go there looking for her now? She must have realized if it got late I’d go on home, she heard me say I planned to be back for dinner. It all sounds too complicated but she’s capable of that and more . . . She wants to keep stringing me along, I know her. Does she expect me to go to the boardinghouse and apologize? That’ll be the day!
Even so, an anxiety that resisted reason kept gnawing at him. What if something’s happened to her? But what could have happened to her in broad daylight in front of so many people? Nonsense! The fight with Rita and her dirty trick have ruined my afternoon. I don’t know why I’m still brooding about it. Do I have some sort of obligation to her? What sort of obligation? She’s just a dressmaker—“dressmaker” my foot: all she is a mere seamstress, a hick from the sticks trying to sell me a bill of goods. She made her play, and it didn’t work. Hey, she knew what she was getting into!
Suddenly he found comfort in a thought that hadn’t occurred to him before. Truth is, she’s given me the perfect excuse to break it off. Let’s wait and see if she shows up at the house next week. I bet she’s gone for good! And if she comes back, let her come back. That’s when I’ll put her in her place. Hello, goodbye, see you later. And if she has the gall to go to my father making demands, I’ll beat her at her own game. When it comes down to it, it’s better this way. Still, it’s sad to end on a sour note. I was planning to take her out to dinner, show her a good time, and give her a little something as a parting gift. Too bad, it’s her loss.
He raised his head, and when he looked at the sky he saw that the moon, keeping its immemorial appointment, had replaced the sun. As for the earth under his feet, the trolley tracks were still in place, and the pigeons, like every evening, fluttered up to their nests and made cooing sounds. It was perfectly clear. The incident with Rita had not altered the cosmic order in the slightest; by the same token, why should it alter the rhythm of his life?
That evening he barely tasted his dinner.
Chapter 2
When Maurici turned twenty-six, his parents did everything within their power to mark his birthday on the calendar of eternity. To that effect, Lídia Aldabò hired extra help to serve delicacies concocted by the elite chefs of Barcelona. The guests streamed in to the murmur of rustling silk. Shiny, leather boots stepped on the wine-colored carpet, between collections of fans and Limoges porcelain that lined the walls of the hallway. The display was illuminated by multicolored stained-glass windows that opened onto a large skylight. When the sun poured through, the glass panes glittered like gigantic jewels of every hue in the rainbow. Soon, circles of people formed in the parlor that featured mahogany furniture, a grand piano that had belonged to Lídia since she was a young girl, and a Japanese screen: a wedding gift from an errant uncle. Maurici’s grandmother and other elderly relatives sank in the plush, oriental-style sofas. The coup de grace struck when the sliding doors, paneled with mirrors, were finally opened. Beyond them, an endless table offered an anthology of temptations to the palate. The pièce de resistance was a marinated, boneless salmon some three feet in length, surrounded by lemon wedges and lying on a bed of lettuce in a silver platter. Nearby a pyramid of oysters rose above canapés of caviar, ham, and anchovies, as well as an assortment of cold meats trimmed with gelatin. The Aldabòs dreaded empty spaces, so between platter and platter they’d squeezed dishes of cheese, olives, and other hors d’oeuvres. This was the buffet: the light refreshments Lídia had announced to family and friends. And now they were ready to sample them along with wines from the region, but mostly from France, which Lídia favored and her husband tolerated.
Maurici made a late entrance, judging it in bad taste to show up on time at a party given in his honor. In truth, he was never in a hurry. His figure—slim as a sword—his chiseled jaw and cheekbones, and a lock of black hair that would not be tamed by grease, stood out more vividly in slow motion. Even the smile didn’t break out at once; rather, the lips opened gradually like curtains to let in the light. His lanky, languid frame retained traces of adolescence that would likely be slow to disappear. On the subject of his personal charms there was unanimity among the women at the party: he was “a treat,” “a sweet boy,” “a delicious froufrou.” Pirula Camprodón—who wrote poetry, held soirées with literary pretensions at her home, and whose teeth stuck out like those of a rabbit—had proclaimed him “a dream of verticality.”
With the indolence he cultivated as the key to his allure, he sauntered amidst human and inanimate obstacles seeking the company of those who might bore but not inconvenience him—like Grandma or his cousins Flora and Albert. But before he could reach them he felt on his back—on the innermost spot of his waist, between his coat and his shirt—a steely hand like the hook of a pirate. As if his flesh had actually been pierced, his body arched in reaction. No need to turn around to identify it. It was the unmistakable grip of Mrs. Ramalleres. Previous to the affair with Rita, Mrs. Ramalleres had caught him by surprise in a weak moment and had made him lose his head. He was ashamed of the incident and had tried to forget it. At the time, a fling with a woman almost twice his age had seemed quite chic, but that geriatric prodigy turned out to be insatiable. Not even his twenty-five-year-old vigor sufficed to neutralize the lady’s predatory instincts. He turned around as calmly as one turns to face an inevitable disaster.
“Mrs. Ramalleres! How are you?”
The precaution not to call her by her first name was useless. She came up closer, breathing in his ear, “Where have you been hiding, you beast?”
Maurici, eyeing her claw search again for cover under his coat, cut the conversation short. “Excuse me! I’m being summoned from the parlor . . .”
Before he could reach his grandmother it was also necessary to avoid Mrs. Roura, although for different reasons. She was a stout woman with a habit, since he was a boy, of pinching his cheek with the strength of a vise and the ferocity of a cannibal. In spite of these annoyances, Maurici paid tribute to convention because it gave meaning to his life. He’d rather endure Mrs. Ramalleres’s assaults, his grandmother’s deafness that forced him to shout, or the soporific data his father’s accountant mercilessly fired at him, than engage in conversation with a friend or read in a quiet corner. He swam happily and effortlessly in those waters and couldn’t imagine a future that wasn’t a repetition of similar rituals. Stepping like a dancer—one step forward, one step backward—he made his way through the jungle of industrial vegetation in which the textile barons of Barcelona and Sabadell stood as the tallest trees. Kisses, hugs, handshakes, and jocular pats descended on him like puffs of incense.
Lídia Aldabò was dressed in black and wore the emerald set her husband had given her on their silver anniversary. Her eyes, rather than her lips, commanded the servants immediately to refill whatever was empty. Her husband had donned his customary dark colors and expression of intense concentration. With his head down, he listened to the explanations of another manufacturer whose name Maurici didn’t recall. The three children present hid under the table and now and then tugged at the tablecloth, threatening to bring the entire arrangement crashing down. Right before dessert, Pirula Camprodón recited a homemade, entirely forgettable ode. The sight of the cake, with its twenty-six golden flames, stirred a collective “ahh!” of anticipated delight. As every year, somebody prompted Maurici to make a silent wish—only he didn’t know what to wish for. Nothing was lacking in his life. It seemed perfect as it was.
A fleeting thought of Rita insinuated itself into his otherwise complete satisfaction. It had been a week since the incident at La Perla d’Orient, and Rita hadn’t come back. He hadn’t asked his parents, who might have found his interest in the absence of a seamstress strange.
Knowing at least where she’d gone would help bring the matter to a close. Wouldn’t it be something if an uppity seamstress cast a pall on his day? Facing the cake as if it were a flaming altar, this might be the moment to wish that Rita would go away forever, without a trace. He wished, then, that history undo itself so that he could redo it to his own liking. It wasn’t too much to ask. Without another thought, he blew out the candles. A minute later the cake melted in the mouths of guests while champagne flowed from an apparently inexhaustible source.
The Street of the Three Beds Page 2
