The Invisible Guardian

by Redondo, Dolores

  Ernesto filled ten five-kilo sacks and when it looked like enough he carried them to the boot of his car, which was parked by the entrance; then he put the rest in an industrial rubbish bag, which he tied and took to the rubbish bin. The lorry driver had almost finished already.

  ‘These are the last ones,’ he announced.

  ‘In that case don’t put them in the workshop, bring them here and I’ll pour them into the kneading trough,’ said Ernesto.

  Spring 1989

  They ate early in Rosario’s house, as soon as Juan got back from the workshop, and the girls often had to finish their homework after supper. While they were laying the table, Amaia turned to her father.

  ‘I need to pop round to Estitxu’s house; I didn’t write my homework down properly and I don’t know what page I need to study for tomorrow.’

  ‘OK, go, but don’t be long,’ answered her father, who was sitting on the sofa next to his wife.

  The little girl sang softly to herself on her way to the workshop, smiling and fingering the key under her jersey. She checked both sides of the street to reassure herself that nobody could tell her mother that they’d seen her go in. She put the key into the keyhole and breathed a sigh of relief when the lock turned with a click that seemed to echo around the warehouse. She went into the darkness and locked the door behind her without forgetting to put the bolt across; only then did she switch the light on. She looked around with the sense of urgency that always filled her when she came by herself, her heart was thumping so loudly that her inner ear was full of the loud beating of blood pumping through her veins. At the same time she savoured the privilege of the secret she shared with her father and the responsibility represented by having a key. She went towards the jars without delay and bent down to get the manila envelope hidden behind them.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ her mother’s voice thundered in the empty workshop.

  All her muscles tensed as if she had received an electric shock. Her hand, which had managed to brush against the envelope, sprang back as if all her tendons had snapped at once. The impulse made her lose her balance and she found herself sitting on the floor. She felt fear, a logical and reasoned fear, while she weighed up the fact that she had left her mother at home in a housecoat and slippers watching the television news and the certainty that she had been here, waiting in the dark, in spite of that fact. The flat, neutral tone of her mother’s voice transmitted more hostility and threat than Amaia had ever known before.

  ‘Aren’t you going to answer me?’

  Slowly, and without managing to get up from the floor, the little girl turned until she met her mother’s harsh gaze. She was wearing outdoor clothes, which she must have been wearing beneath her housecoat all along, and shoes with low heels instead of the slippers. Even at that point she felt a jolt of admiration for that proud woman who would never go out into the street in her housecoat or without smartening up.

  Her voice sounded suffocated.

  ‘I only came to look for something.’ She knew straight away that her excuse was poor and incriminatory.

  Her mother remained exactly where she was, merely tilting her head back slightly before speaking in the same tone.

  ‘There’s nothing of yours here.’

  ‘There is.’

  ‘Is there? Let me see.’

  Amaia retreated until she felt a column against her back and, without taking her eyes off her mother, she used it to help her stand up. Rosario took two steps, swept the heavy bin aside as if it were empty, picked up the envelope with her daughter’s name on it and tipped the contents into her hand.

  ‘Are you stealing from your own family?’ she said, slamming the money onto the kneading table with such force that a coin escaped, fell to the floor and rolled three or four metres to the workshop door, where it remained upright on its edge.

  ‘No, Ama, it’s mine,’ stammered Amaia, unable to take her eyes off the crumpled notes.

  ‘Impossible, it’s too much money. Where did you take it from?’

  ‘It’s from my birthday, Ama, I’ve saved it, I swear,’ she said, pressing her hands together.

  ‘If it’s yours, why don’t you keep it at home? And why do you have a key to the workshop?’

  ‘Aita … let me have it.’ As she spoke something broke inside her and she realised that she was betraying her father.

  Rosario remained silent for a few seconds and when she spoke her tone was that of a priest reprimanding a sinner.

  ‘Your father … Your father, always indulging you, always spoiling you. Until he manages to make you into a little whore. Of course it was him who gave you the money to buy all those bits of tat you were hiding in your satchel …’

  Amaia didn’t answer.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ her mother continued, ‘I threw them all in the bin as soon as you left the house. Did you think you were deceiving me? I’ve known about this for days, but not about the key, I didn’t know how you were getting in.’

  Without realising what she was doing, Amaia raised her hand to her chest and clutched the key beneath the fabric of her jersey. Tears filled her eyes, which were still fixed on the mound of notes that her mother was folding and tucking into her skirt pocket. Then she smiled, looked at her daughter, and, with feigned tenderness, said, ‘Don’t cry, Amaia, I’m doing all this for your own good, because I love you.’

  ‘No,’ she whispered.

  ‘What did you say?’ her mother was surprised.

  ‘No, you don’t love me.’

  ‘I don’t love you?’ Rosario’s voice was acquiring a dark, threatening twist.

  ‘No,’ said Amaia, speaking more loudly. ‘You don’t love me. You hate me.’

  ‘I don’t love you …’ her mother repeated, incredulously. Her anger was already obvious. Amaia shook her head, still crying. ‘I don’t love you, you say …’ moaned her mother before her hands shot out towards her daughter’s neck, groping with blind fury. Amaia took a step back and her mother’s fingers caught the cord with the key hanging from it, and locked around it like grappling irons, imprisoning it. The little girl tugged in confusion, twisting her neck and feeling how the cord slipped over her skin with a burning sensation. She felt a couple of strong yanks and she was sure that the cord would break, but her cauterised neck resisted the pulls, making her stumble like a puppet caught up in a tornado. She bumped against her mother’s chest and her mother hit her hard enough to knock her over. Amaia would have fallen were it not for the cord that held her up by the neck, digging even deeper into her skin.

  The little girl looked up, fixed her eyes on her mother’s and, her courage renewed by the adrenaline coursing through her veins, spat, ‘No, you don’t love me, you’ve never loved me.’ And with a powerful tug she broke free from Rosario’s hands. Her mother’s expression changed from one of surprise to one of absolute urgency as she ran through the workshop in a desperate search.

  Amaia was overwhelmed by a panic she had never experienced before and she knew, instinctively, that she needed to flee. She spun round, turning her back on her mother, and began to make her way towards the door in such frantic terror that she fell over; then everything started to look strange. Whenever she remembered that night she saw once again the tunnel into which the whole workshop had morphed; the corners became dark and the edges became rounded, bending reality until it became a wormhole full of cold and fog. At the end of the tunnel was the door, which seemed distant and radiant, as if a powerful light shone on the other side of it and the rays filtered round its edges and through the cracks in its frame, while everything grew darker around her and faded to black and white, as if she’d suddenly turned colourblind.

  Crazy with fear, she turned towards her mother in time to see the approach of the blow from the iron rolling pin her father used to roll out the puff pastry. She lifted a hand to protect herself in vain and she even felt her fingers break before the side of the cylinder slammed into her head. After that everything went dark.

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nbsp; Rosario leant against the doorjamb in the small sitting room and looked hard at her husband, who was smiling, engrossed in the sports on the television. She didn’t say anything, but her chest was heaving as she panted from the effort of running.

  ‘Rosario,’ he said, surprised. ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked, getting to his feet. ‘Do you feel ill?’

  ‘It’s Amaia …’ she answered. ‘Something’s happened …’

  With his pyjamas on beneath his dressing gown he ran through the streets that separated the house from the workshop. He felt his lungs burning and a stitch in his side that threatened to choke him, but he continued running, urged on by the throbbing pain deep inside him that told him something awful had happened. The certainty of what he already knew was sinking in, and it was only a strong desire not to accept it that pushed him to redouble his efforts, both in his running and in his desperate prayer: please, no, please.

  Juan noticed from some way off that there were no lights on in the workshop, which he would have been able to see through the cracks in the blinds and the narrow vent near the roof which was always open, summer and winter.

  Rosario caught up with him at the door and took the key out of her pocket.

  ‘But, is Amaia here?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then why is it dark?’

  His wife didn’t answer. She opened the door and they went inside; only when the door was closed again did she turn on the light. He couldn’t see a thing for a couple of seconds. He blinked, forcing his eyes to adapt to the intense light while his gaze searched frenetically for his daughter.

  ‘Where is she?’

  Rosario didn’t answer. She leant against the door and cast a sideways glance. A parody of a smile appeared on her face.

  ‘Amaia!’ her father yelled frantically. ‘Amaia!’

  He turned to look at his wife and the expression on her face made him turn pale. He advanced towards her.

  ‘Oh my God, Rosario! What have you done to her?’

  A step further and he discovered the slippery pool of blood beneath his feet. He stared at it, as it was already starting to take on a darker shade and, horrified, looked up at his wife again.

  ‘Where is the girl?’ he asked in a small voice.

  She didn’t answer, but her eyes opened wider and she began to bite her lower lip as if enjoying a sublime pleasure. He advanced, crazed by anger, fear, and horror, took her by the shoulders and shook her as if she had no bones; he leaned in close to his wife’s face and shouted, ‘Where is my daughter?’

  An expression of profound disdain shone in the woman’s eyes, her mouth became as thin as a knife blade. She stretched out a hand and pointed towards the kneading trough full of flour.

  This was similar to a marble drinking trough, with enough capacity for four hundred kilos, and the sacks were emptied into it before the flour was used in the workshop. He looked where Rosario was pointing and noticed two large drops of blood which had sunk into the flour, almost like crumbly biscuits on the surface of the trough. He turned to look at his wife again, but she had turned to face the wall, determined not to meet his eyes. He moved forwards, mesmerised by the blood, which he could smell, feeling all his senses become alert, listening, trying to discover what it was she knew that was escaping him. He noticed a small movement on the smooth, perfumed surface of the flour and gave a shout when he saw a small hand emerging from that snowy sea, convulsing with a violent tremor. He took the hand with his and pulled on his daughter’s body, which emerged from the flour like a drowned man from the waves. He placed her on the kneading table and, with the utmost care, began to remove the flour that blinded her eyes and blocked her mouth and nose, speaking to her all the while, aware of his tears falling onto his daughter’s face, drawing salty paths amongst those that were already visible on his little one’s skin.

  ‘Amaia, Amaia, my little girl …’

  The little girl was trembling as if attached to an intermittent electric current, convulsing her fragile little body in rough jolts.

  ‘Go and get the doctor,’ he ordered his wife.

  She didn’t move from where she stood; she had her thumb in her mouth and was sucking on it childishly.

  ‘Rosario,’ Juan shouted, about to lose his temper.

  ‘What?’ she shouted, turning round angrily.

  ‘Go and get the doctor right now.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What?’ He spun round, incredulous.

  ‘I can’t go,’ she replied calmly.

  ‘What are you trying to say? You need to bring the doctor here right now, the girl’s already in a very serious condition.’

  ‘I’ve already told you I can’t,’ she murmured, smiling timidly. ‘Why don’t you go and I’ll stay here with her.’

  Juan picked up the child, who was still trembling, and went over to his wife.

  ‘Look at me, Rosario, go to the doctor’s house right now and bring him here,’ he spoke to her as if she were a stubborn little girl. He opened the door of the workshop and pushed her outside. That was when he realised that his wife’s clothes were covered in flour and there was blood on the fingers she had been licking.

  ‘Rosario …’

  She turned and started running up the street.

  An hour later, the doctor was washing his hands in the sink and drying them on the towel Juan offered him.

  ‘We’ve been very lucky, Juan, the little girl is OK. The little finger and ring finger on her right hand are fractured, although what worries me most is the cut on her head. The flour acted as a natural compress, soaking up the blood and forming a scab that stopped the bleeding almost immediately. The convulsions are normal for someone who’s suffered a serious head trauma …’

  ‘It was my fault,’ Juan interrupted him. ‘I gave her a key so that she could get into the workshop whenever she wanted and, well … I didn’t imagine that a little girl could hurt herself in here on her own …’

  ‘Come on now, Juan,’ said the doctor, turning to face him in an attempt to see his expression. ‘There’s something more. She had flour in her ears, her nose, her mouth … In fact, your daughter was completely covered in flour …’

  ‘I suppose she slipped on some butter or oil, banged her head and fell into the kneading trough.’

  ‘She could have fallen forwards or backwards, but she was completely covered in it, Juan.’

  Amaia’s father looked at his hands as if they held the answer.

  ‘Perhaps she fell in forwards and turned over when it felt like she was drowning.’

  ‘Yes, perhaps,’ the doctor conceded. ‘Your daughter’s not that tall, Juan. If she collided with the edge of one of the tables it’s unlikely that her weight would have tipped her into the kneading trough, it’s more likely she would have crumpled to the floor. Furthermore,’ he looked down, ‘look where the pool of blood is.’

  Juan covered his face with his hands and started to cry.

  ‘Manuel, I …’

  ‘Who found her?’

  ‘My wife,’ he groaned desolately.

  The doctor sighed, letting the air out noisily.

  ‘Juan, is Rosario taking the medication I prescribed for her? You know perfectly well that she can’t stop taking it for any reason.’

  ‘Yes … I don’t know … What are you insinuating, Manuel?’

  ‘Juan, you know we’re friends, you know that I respect you. What I’m going to say to you is between you and me, I’m speaking to you as a friend, not a doctor. Get the little one out of your house; keep her away from your wife. Patients with the kind of disorder she suffers from sometimes turn on someone close to them, making them the object of their anger; that someone, as you well know, is your daughter, and I think we both suspect that this isn’t the first time it’s happened. Amaia’s presence changes her and makes her angry; if you keep her away your wife will calm down, but, most of all you have to do it for the little one, because the next time she might kill her. What happened today is very seriou
s, very, very serious. As a doctor I ought to submit a report about what I’ve seen tonight, but as a doctor I also know that if Rosario takes her medication she’ll be fine and I know what a report could do to your family. Now, as both a friend and a doctor, I have to ask you to get the little girl out of your house, because she’s in serious danger. If you don’t do as I ask, I’ll be obliged to file that report. I beg you to understand.’

  Juan leant against the table without taking his eyes off the pool of coagulating blood that was shining in the light like a dirty mirror.

  ‘Is there no possibility that it could have been an accident? Perhaps the little girl hurt herself and Rosario didn’t react very well when she saw the blood, perhaps she put her on top of the kneading trough while she came to find me.’ His own words suddenly seemed to him like a convincing argument. ‘She came to find me, doesn’t that mean anything?’

  ‘She wanted an accomplice. She went to tell you because she trusted you, because she knew that you would believe her, that you would make every effort to believe her and deny the truth, and in fact that’s what you’re doing, it’s what you’ve been doing for all these years since Amaia was born, or do I have to remind you what happened. She’s a sick woman, she’s got a mental disorder that we can treat with medication. But if she carries on like this, you’ll have to take more drastic measures.’

  ‘But …’ he groaned.

  ‘Juan, there’s a recently washed iron rolling pin in the sink, and, in addition to the cut on the top of her head, Amaia’s got another injury above her right ear; she has two fractured fingers which are clearly a defensive injury from trying to stop the first blow like this,’ he said, raising his hand like an upturned sunshade. ‘She must have lost consciousness and the second blow didn’t cause a cut because it was flatter. There’s no blood, but since her hair’s so short even you can see that your daughter has a considerable bump and a more sunken area where she was hit. It’s the second blow that worries me, the one she struck when Amaia was already unconscious. Her intention was to make sure she had really killed her.’