None of those entering or leaving took any notice of poor Pulido; they were used to seeing him standing there, undaunted, at his post, his hand outstretched, as indifferent to snow as to suffocating heat, inadequately swathed in a threadbare cape of dark brown cloth, muttering a litany of sad words that froze upon his lips. On that particular day, the wind kept playing with the white hairs of his beard; they strayed up his nose and clung to his face, which was wet with the tears drawn from his dull eyes by the intense cold. It was nine o’clock and he had still received nothing. It was the worst day of the year. In fact, it had been a disastrous year from Epiphany onwards, for even on 20th January, the day of the patron saint, he’d made only twelve chicas, about half the amount of the previous year; and Candlemas and the novena of our blessed San Blas, which in other years had proved so profitable, this year had brought in a mere seven or even five chicas a day – hardly a fortune! “And it seems to me,” Pulido muttered into his rags, drinking his own tears and spitting out the hairs of his beard, “that our friend San José isn’t going to bring us any better luck either. Now the feast of San José in the first year of King Amadeo, that was a day to remember. But nowadays even the saints in heaven don’t behave as they should. Everything’s gone to the bad, Lord, even the ‘crumbs from the feast’, what some call ‘honest poverty’. It’s all those unscrup’lous men and their pulpit politics, not to mention that business about subscriptions for ‘victims’. If I was God, I’d order my angels to get rid of all those people who write in the papers, inventing all them ‘victims’ to plague us poor people. There is charity and there are good people, but what with the Liberals and the blooming Parley-ment on one side and on the other the ‘congrigations’, the ‘meetins’ and the ‘discursions’ and all this stuff in the newspapers, even the most Christian person can go off the idea. I reckon they want to do away with the poor altogether, and they’ll do it too, mark my words. But who’s going to get them out of Purgatory then, that’s what I’d like to know. Oh yes, all those gentlemanly souls will just lie there and rot, and Christians will simply forget about them, because, say what you like, a rich man’s prayers said on a full stomach, all snug and warm, do him no good at all, so help me God, no good at all.”
At this point in his meditations, he was approached by a short, plump man in a cloak so long it nearly swept the ground. He was about seventy years old and had a neat white beard. Although he was shabbily dressed, his eyes were kind. From a roll evidently containing the money intended for that day’s alms, he placed a coin in the blind man’s hand and said:
“I bet you weren’t expecting anything today, were you? Now tell the truth. Not on a day like today!”
“Yes I was, Don Carlos, sir,” replied the blind man, kissing the coin, “because today is your ‘universary’ and you wouldn’t miss that, not if it froze at zero in the ‘tremometers’.”
“True, true. I never fail. I manage to keep going, thank God, and that’s no mean feat with these frosts and that devil of a north wind. It’s so cold I’m surprised the statue in the Plaza Mayor hasn’t come down with pneumonia. Now you take care of yourself, Pulido. Why don’t you go inside?”
“I’m made of stern stuff, Don Carlos, sir. Not even Death will have me. I’d rather be out here in the cold, than inside hobnobbing with those old chatterboxes … bunch of peasants, the lot of them. What I always say is it’s education what counts, for without education there’s no charity. May the Lord reward you, Don Carlos, and give you glory!”
Before the old man had finished speaking, Don Carlos had flown off. I use the expression advisedly, for the mighty hurricane had simply seized hold of his great cloak and there he was, his head swathed in wool, tottering and turning like a bale of cloth or a piece of carpet caught up by the wind, until he was hurled at last against the door, which he entered with a clatter and a rush, untangling the cloak from about his head. “What a day, what a terrible day!” the good man was exclaiming, amid the press of beggars, who greeted him there with plaintive, high-pitched cries, while the feeble hands of the old women among them helped him to rearrange and smooth the cloak over his shoulders. He immediately began handing out coins, which he extracted one by one from the roll, rubbing them a little before handing them over, in case two got away from him at once. Then he took his leave of the beggar band with a short sermon which was delivered in nasal tones and exhorted them to patience and humility. At the door that opened on to Calle de Atocha, he put away the roll of money – which contained the coins intended for the beggars – and went into the church.
2
After taking holy water, Don Carlos Moreno Trujillo proceeded to the chapel of Our Lady de la Blanca. He was an extremely methodical man, who had reduced his entire life to an unchanging routine that governed all his acts, both moral and physical – from the most solemn down to the most insignificant, even to the way he moved and the way he breathed. A single example will demonstrate the power of this routine over this saintly man. For, while spending his declining years in a house in Calle de Atocha, he always entered the churchyard by the gate in Calle de San Sebastián, in other words, through the north door, for no other reason than that he used that entrance during the thirty-seven years he had lived in his celebrated commercial establishment in the Plaza del Angel. He invariably left by the door in Calle de Atocha, even if he was on his way to visit his daughter who lived in Calle de la Cruz.
He always genuflected first at the altar of Our Lady of Sorrows and then before the statue of San Lesmes, where he remained a good while in mystical contemplation. In unhurried progress, he visited each chapel and each shrine, in an order that never varied; he then heard two masses, always two, never more never less; he visited each altar once again, always ending up at the chapel of Christ of the Faith, and then went for a while into the sacristy, where he allowed himself a brief chat with the assistant priest or the sacristan about the weather, the “terrible state things are in” or why the water supply from Lozoya was coming through cloudy, and then left by the door in Calle de Atocha where he distributed the last coins in his purse. He was so organised that he rarely failed to bring the exact quantity for the beggars at the two doors: if by some unlikely chance, he was a coin short, the beggar he had missed knew that he would receive it on the following day, and if he had one over he would go straight to the Oratory in Calle del Olivar to find an unfortunate in whose hand he could place it.
On this particular day, as we have seen, Don Carlos went into the church by what we shall call the Door of San Sebastián’s Churchyard and the old women and the blind of both sexes who had just received his charity began to chatter and bicker, for with no one for them to pester on their way in or out, what else could these unfortunates do but while away their long, sad hours of idleness with talk. It is the only sustenance that costs nothing, and which, be it spicy or bitter, was always at hand to satisfy their need? Of this commodity they have as much as the rich. Perhaps they have that advantage over the latter, because when they talk they are not inhibited by the conversational conventions which, by inserting between thought and word a thick layer of etiquette and grammar, deaden the ineffable pleasures of gossip.
“Didn’t I tell you that Don Carlos would come today? And sure enough he did. Was I right or what?”
“I said the same thing. It’s the monthly anniversary, the 24th, the day his wife died. Don Carlos, good soul that he is, never fails to come on that day, even if it’s raining cats and dogs. There’s no more Christian man than he in the whole of Madrid … no offence to anyone else.”
“Well, I was afraid he wouldn’t come, because of the cold. I thought that since it was the special day on which he gives us a whole penny, he might cancel it.”
“He would have given it to us tomorrow, as you well know, Crescencia. Don Carlos is always correct and pays what he owes.”
“He would have given us today’s penny tomorrow, but we wouldn’t have got today’s penny at all! Do you think we can’t count? No offence m
eant, but I know that two and two makes four, and I know that Don Carlos, when he sees what he owes us mounting up, goes sick for a few days to save himself the money, and I wonder what his dead wife thinks of that?”
“Hold your tongue, you spiteful woman!”
“Me, spiteful! You know what? You’re a toady too!”
“Shut your evil mouth!”
The group chatting together in this way were three women sitting to the right of the entrance and apart from the others. One was blind or extremely short-sighted, the other two could see – they were all dressed in rags, over which they wore black or grey shawls. La Casiana, tall and bony, spoke with a certain arrogance, like someone who has or claims to have authority. Maybe she had, for wherever half a dozen human beings meet together, there is always one who tries to impose his or her will on the rest and, indeed, succeeds in doing so. The blind or near-sighted one was called Crescencia; she always sat hunched up in a ball with only her tiny face peeping out and from the parcel of her huddled body she held out a scrawny, wrinkled hand with long nails. The one employing the bold or insulting expressions in the above conversation was called Flora and nicknamed, for reasons unknown, La Burlada, the Jilted One. She was a tiny old woman, vivacious, bad-tempered and shrewish, who was continually setting the cat among these poor pigeons, making bad blood between them, for she always had something sharp and malevolent to say when the others were sharing out, and rich and poor alike were the butts of her acid strictures. Her shrewd, cat-like, tear-stained little eyes shone with suspicion and malice. Her nose was no more than a little red ball that moved up and down with her lips and tongue as she talked at breakneck speed. Her two remaining teeth seemed to run from one side of her mouth to the other, appearing sometimes in one place and sometimes in another, and when she finished her little speech with a gesture of utter scorn or biting sarcasm, her mouth would shut all of a sudden, and her lips would fold one over the other. But though her tongue was still, her red chin continued to express her thoughts, trembling with scorn.
La Casiana was quite the opposite of La Burlada: she was tall, thin and bony; it was hard to work out just how thin she was, since (according to the gossips) she wore layers of good clothing beneath her rags. Her face was so long it looked as if it were stretched every day on the rack, so that her cheeks disappeared altogether. It would be hard to imagine a more disagreeable or an uglier face, with its dull, expressionless eyes that bulged and stared, eyes that appeared blind but in fact were not, with its graceless, hooked nose and, a long way below it, a mouth with the thinnest of thin lips, and finally, the long, bony jaw. If human faces may be compared to those of animals and we were to describe La Burlada as resembling a cat that had lost its fur in a fight and then been ducked, then La Casiana would be an old horse, who, when she blindfolded one eye with a slanting bandage (leaving the other free to spy on her colleagues), resembled the horses in the bullring exactly. Just as every country in the world is divided into classes, even amongst the lowest stratum of society, there was no exact equality amongst the beggars either. The old women especially saw to it that the proper distinctions were observed. The old hands occupied the best places and were the only ones allowed to beg inside the church near the holy water stoup. Whenever the sacristan or the assistant priest tried to change this rule for the benefit of a newcomer, they knew what to do: they kicked up such a fuss that it had often proved necessary to call in the police. When alms or charity vouchers were distributed, the old hands claimed the right to distribute them, keeping any extra for themselves if the sum was not easily divisible into equal parts. As well as this, they enjoyed a moral superiority, a tacit authority won over the years, the invisible strength that authority always brings. The old hand is always strong, the novice always weak, except in certain cases where personality comes into play. La Casiana – hard, domineering, utterly selfish – was the oldest of the old hands; La Burlada – rebellious and unruly, quarrelsome and malignant – was the newest of the new, so it goes without saying that the most trifling event or the idlest of remarks acted like a detonator that easily ignited the spark of discord between them.
The little quarrel reported above was cut short by the coming in or going out of worshippers. But La Burlada could not keep her grudges to herself and, at the first opportunity, seeing that La Casiana and the blind man Almudena (of whom more anon) were getting more in the way of alms that day than everyone else, she again directed her insults at the old hand, saying: “God you’re a creep, do you think I don’t know you’re rich, do you think I don’t know you’ve got a house in Cuatro Caminos and loads of hens and doves, not to mention rabbits? We know all about it.”
“Hold your tongue,” said La Casiana, “or I’ll tell Don Senén about you, and let him teach you some manners.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Be quiet, can’t you hear the bell for the elevation of the Host?”
“Ladies, for God’s sake,” said a cripple who was standing nearest the church, “they’re elevating the Blessed Sacrament.”
“It’s her fault, the spiteful bitch,” said La Casiana.
“It’s hers, for bossing us all around,” said La Burlada. “You may be the Boss around here, my girl, but don’t pull the strings too tight: us newcomers deserve to get our share of the cash as well, we’re God’s children too, you know.”
“Be quiet, I tell you!”
“Hark at her. Who d’you think you are, the Prime Minister?”
3
Further in, about half-way along the passageway on the left-hand side, there was another group, consisting of a blind man, seated, a woman, also seated with two baby girls, and next to her, standing silent and motionless, an old woman in a black dress and mantle. A few steps further on, very close to the church interior, Eliseo Martinez, one-legged and one-armed, was leaning against the wall, all his weight on his crutches. He enjoyed the privilege of selling The Catholic Week, and was, after La Casiana, the one who wielded most authority over the band of beggars.
Seven venerable beggars in all, whose portraits I hope are here clearly drawn, with the proper distinctions of face, voice and characters. Now to continue.
The woman dressed in black, prematurely aged rather than old, was, as well as a newcomer, a casual, because she begged only occasionally, for varying lengths of time, only to disappear doubtless having found a good job or some charitable souls who had come to her aid. She answered to the name of Señá Benina (from which it may be inferred that her name was Benigna) and she was the quietest and humblest member of the community – if one may use such a word); she appeared to be well brought up, well-mannered and completely submissive to God’s will. She never pestered the parishioners as they came in or out; however unfair the share-outs she uttered no word of protest, nor did she give the least support to La Burlada’s disorderly mob. To everyone, man or woman, she spoke gently and courteously; she treated La Casiana politely and the cripple respectfully; she only allowed herself some familiarity, though still never overstepping the mark, with the blind man, Almudena, about whom for the moment I shall say no more other than that he was an Arab, from Sus, three days journey from Marrakesh: mark this well.
Benina had a soft voice and a certain gentility in her manner. Her dark-skinned features had been interesting and still had a certain charm, though, now withered by age, they had faded until they were almost unrecognisable. She had kept more than half her teeth. Her large, dark eyes were only faintly ringed with red from old age and cold mornings. Her nose was less inclined to drip than her colleagues’, and her hands, though wrinkled and swollen-jointed, did not end in nails like talons. Her hands were those of a washerwoman and she had taken care of them. She wore a tight black band around her head and over it a black scarf; her dress and mantle were black and rather more carefully mended than those of the other old women. With this appearance and the soulful, sweet expression on her still handsome face, she looked like a Santa Rita of Casia walking the world as a penance. Only the crucifix and
the wound on her brow were missing, but she had a round wart in the middle of her brow, bluish in colour and the size of a chickpea, which could be taken as a substitute for the latter.
At about ten o’clock, La Casiana went out into the courtyard to visit the sacristy, where as an old hand, she had great influence, to speak to Don Senén about some matter unknown to her companions and one which consequently caused much comment. No sooner had the Corporal left, than La Burlada ran off to the other group, looking like a parcel rolling along the passageway. She sat down between a woman called Demetria with the two baby girls and the blind Moroccan, and her tongue – sharper and more lethal even than the ten talons on her black snapping fingers – began to wag.
“Well, don’t you believe me?” she began, “The Corporal is rich, really rich, and no mistake about it. Everything she gets here is stolen from the real genuine poor ones like us, who have nothing in the world but what we stand up in.”
“Doesn’t she live over there, by the river bank with the Paules?” asked Crescencia.
Misericordia (Dedalus European Classics) Page 2
