Bones of the Buried

by David Roberts

  Verity’s feelings for both men were confused, inchoate. Her instinctive affection for Edward and respect for what she recognised to be his innate decency went against all her political beliefs. She had committed herself to communism as the only political creed a self-respecting libertarian could subscribe to and the only effective opposition to Fascism. David was, in her eyes, the living example of this – Mr Valiant for Truth – though he sometimes frightened her with his seeming indifference to petty human emotions such as – well, such as love between a man and a woman. She told herself this was only to be expected of a knight in pursuit of his holy grail and, in principle, she approved of not letting trivial emotions get in the way of the important work they had to do, but in practice she knew herself to be someone who craved affection of which she had been starved as a child. Had she been silly in persuading Edward to come to Spain? He had been so reluctant; perhaps rightly. He had told her plainly he wasn’t going to be able to help and she was beginning to think he was right. But then, she had only turned to him as a last resort, when all other hopes had been dashed. Strangely enough it had been David himself who had suggested it.

  ‘You know, V,’ he had said, ‘the only man who could do me any good is your pet lord.’

  “Edward, you mean?’ she said in surprise.

  He held up his hands in surrender: ‘I was joking,’ he had said, but the idea lodged in her mind. She did not quite understand it herself but, despite Edward’s deplorable flippancy, she believed there was a vein of seriousness beneath it all which was worthy of respect – a firmness of purpose, to put it at its lowest, which she could recognise in herself. And he was intelligent: everyone admitted that and she had herself had evidence of it six months earlier when he had nosed out the truth behind General Craig’s murder. She just wished he wouldn’t make those soupy eyes at her.

  They strolled towards the white Hispano-Suiza standing haughtily at the edge of the airfield.

  ‘Don’t we have to show our passports to anyone?’ said Edward, bewildered by the ease with which they were entering a foreign country.

  ‘Sure, Ferdinando will take care of everything. That’s him over there.’ Hester pointed to a uniformed official who had appeared from behind a hangar and was bustling towards them. ‘Ferdy’s a pal of mine.’

  With much saluting on Ferdinando’s part, the formalities were quickly despatched and Hester threw herself into the driving seat of the Hispano-Suiza. ‘Get in, both of you. It’s a bit of a squeeze but I don’t suppose you mind and anyway there’s nothing to be done about it.’

  Edward, who had a passion for fast cars, stroked the green-painted bonnet lovingly.

  ‘Mmm, how on earth did you get hold of this? It’s an Alfonso, isn’t it? A bit of an antique but a real beauty.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Hester in her heavy drawl, ‘I guess it is something special. The man who sold it me said, when the King abdicated, he left behind thirty Hispanos and this was one of them.’

  ‘Is that why it’s called an Alfonso?’ asked Verity.

  ‘Yes, after the King,’ Edward said. ‘It was really the first sports car you could drive on the road.’

  ‘Well, for Christ’s sake, stop salivating and get in,’ Hester commanded them. ‘It’s after six and it will take us the best part of an hour to reach the city even with me at the wheel.’

  Edward’s assumption that Madrid would be warmer than London was naive. He had overlooked the fact that the city was two thousand feet above sea level on a vast, windswept plain. It was a bitterly cold evening to be speeding across the campagna in an open car and Verity was glad she was so tightly squeezed between Edward and Hester. It might be a grand car in its parentage but it was not designed for three and was such a tight fit Verity had almost to sit on Edward’s lap, but neither seemed to mind this much.

  They started with a violent jerk and Hester swore. ‘Fucking clutch.’ It was the first time Edward had heard a woman use a sexual swear word and he was shocked but rather excited. After all, he reminded himself, she was American. He had instinctively grabbed hold of Verity to stop her being thrown through the windscreen and now, instead of releasing her, he held her so tightly she complained.

  ‘Edward, I can’t breathe!’ she laughed, and clung on to him as they bumped over some grass towards the airport gates. Clearly, the Alfonso’s suspension was not what it had once been. In a few moments they were bouncing merrily across bare, rust-brown earth. The mesa or plain across which they journeyed was something of a dream landscape, red rough scrub for the most part, and Edward thought fancifully that it was as if he had landed on Mars. The roar of the engine and the whistle of the wind, which seemed to sing through every crack and crevice of the car, made conversation difficult. Verity, who had a cat’s ability to doze whenever she had an opportunity, fell into a half-sleep, comforted by Edward’s arm around her. He hoped the drive would be a long one. He watched the landscape gradually change from barren countryside enlivened by clumps of straggly umbrella pines encircling little country houses to a richer, more fertile country. Hester asked for a cigarette and with difficulty he managed to extract one without waking Verity.

  ‘Be a honey and light it for me, would you,’ Hester said and it was true the road was rough enough and the car’s steering awkward enough to make it desirable she keep both hands on the wheel. With difficulty he dug out his lighter and then faced having to light the cigarette. In the end he had to put it in his own mouth before he could flick his lighter. When it was glowing he stretched across the sleeping girl and put it between Hester’s lips. Nothing was said but an erotic charge – like an electric current – passed between them and he immediately felt guilty of some small betrayal.

  At last, they found themselves driving past substantial estates – red-tiled houses set in large uncultivated gardens which in turn gave way, on the outskirts of the city, to groups of houses and then streets.

  ‘We’re on the Gran Vía and over there is the Plaza Mayor,’ said Hester, gesturing to the left. It was dark now and the car’s great gas headlamps probed the city, illuminating the occasional tram. There were very few automobiles, whether because of the hour or because they were rich men’s toys Edward did not know. Verity and Hester shared an apartment near the university and, instead of booking Edward into one of the smart hotels on the Gran Vía, they had found him a room in a small hotel, confusingly called The Palace, just around the corner from them.

  ‘Hester thought you would want to hole up somewhere swanky but I said that, though you were often insufferable, you didn’t like showing off in that particular way. Was I right?’

  ‘In every degree,’ said Edward, pleased that Verity had regained some of the combativeness which had made life so interesting a few months back but which seemed to have been lost in her gnawing fear that her lover would end up in front of a firing squad. In the foyer of the little hotel Edward was consigned into the care of the manager, a Napoleonic figure: rotund, black-garbed, with magnificent moustaches, he seemed to be rather in awe of Hester and half in love with Verity. ‘Felipe,’ said Verity, ‘look after our friend. He is a genuine English milord and don’t pretend you’ve met one before. But he’s quite decent, really.’

  ‘Si, señorita, welcome to my hotel, milor,’ the manager said, proudly displaying his grasp of English. ‘Thees is a very good place and I look after you well.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Edward said, nodding his head in response to Felipe’s bowing and scraping, ‘I’m sure I will be very happy here.’

  Hester looked unconvinced but managed a wintry smile. ‘We’ll come and collect you in an hour, if that’s all right. We’re going to meet some people at Chicote’s on the Gran Vía.’

  ‘Chicote’s?’ queried Edward, who did not feel in the least like going out. ‘I thought of going straight to bed.’

  ‘Oh pooh!’ said Verity. ‘Just because you had to get up a bit earlier than usual you can’t not go out on your first night in Spain. Anyway, I’m starving.’
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br />   Verity always had had a healthy appetite, Edward remembered, and he was glad to find that she had not lost it in her present anxieties. He hesitated but did not wish to look unenterprising to the two women who were staring at him, Verity accusingly, and Hester mockingly, a little smile playing about her lips.

  ‘You’re right. Of course, I would love to,’ he said.

  ‘That’s good,’ said Verity, sounding relieved that this English milord for whose presence she was responsible had not let her down. ‘It’s the best bar in Madrid. Everyone who’s anyone goes there.’

  It was half-past nine when Verity and Hester came to collect him. Edward was feeling better. The bath at the end of the passage, which he shared with the other guests on his floor, was inadequate and the water tepid but still he had been able to shave and wash himself. He thought longingly of his clawed monster in his rooms in Albany. He had been uncertain what to wear for the evening’s entertainment but the small bag Fenton had packed for him did not allow much choice. In the end, in his clean white shirt, Cherrypickers’ tie and tweed jacket, he looked what he was: English to the core.

  Hester was looking statuesque in the sort of overcoat he imagined Napoleon might have worn in his Russian campaign but of course she was twice as tall as the Emperor and wide in the shoulders. Her hair had been tidied beneath a wide-brimmed black hat which emphasised what he could see of her face – her black eyes, Roman nose and firm chin. He thought she looked magnificent. Verity, on the other hand, looked almost Spanish, except for the fox jacket which Edward remembered her wearing back in London. She looked a charming, innocent but determined child. Her Mediterranean colouring helped but it was, Edward thought, the black bandanna she wore over the top of her head which made her look ‘foreign’.

  ‘It’s to keep my ears warm,’ she said, seeing Edward eyeing her.

  ‘Very attractive,’ replied Edward vaguely. He knew if he said anything more effusive she would think he was patronising her. It came to him that he always thought twice before paying Verity a compliment. He was a little frightened of her finding him a conventional English male and he had had occasion in the past to smart from her biting retort to inanities other girls would have professed to find delightful.

  ‘Well,’ said Hester, perhaps a little irritated that Edward seemed to have no eyes for her, ‘we’d better get moving. They eat late here but I’m hungry as a stallion.’ She marched them through the swing doors into the street. There were some street lights under which their breaths smoked in the cold but for the most part they walked in pools of darkness.

  ‘Hungry as a horse,’ Verity corrected. ‘Hester has some problem remembering clichés,’ she said apologetically to Edward, taking hold of his arm.

  Edward thought Dr Freud might have something to say about her seeing herself as a stallion but was wise enough to keep his mouth shut. He looked at Verity intently. Whether it was tiredness or anxiety, she was exhibiting a desperate gaiety which he knew was near to tears. ‘You’re sure you don’t want to go to bed? You have had an exhausting day,’ he said to her in an undertone.

  ‘Oh, what can you mean?’ said Verity archly, gripping his arm more tightly, and again, Edward thought she wasn’t behaving normally. She obviously regretted what she had just said because she corrected herself fiercely. ‘I couldn’t sleep. I’m too wound up. Anyway, I want you to meet our friends. They are our friends, aren’t they, Hester?’

  ‘They have to pass for friends. Beggars can’t be rich men.’

  ‘She means,’ said Verity fondly, ‘that we foreigners have to stick together.’

  ‘You don’t mix with the Spanish, then?’ said Edward ironically.

  ‘As much as we can but it’s difficult. There’s a saying, foreigners in Spain should give the men tobacco and leave the women alone, but seriously, the Spanish are so taken up with their own affairs they don’t have much time for outsiders. They want us to know what is happening – they want the outside world to help but they are not very good at getting us the information we need. You’ve no idea how complicated Spanish politics is. Take the new Popular Front government. It’s made up of five main groupings each with its own idea of how to govern this ungovernable country. I mean, can you imagine the communists and the socialists agreeing on anything for long and as for the Catalan Separatists . . . I ask you!’

  ‘It’s a ragbag of everything from anarchists to communists and they all hate each other,’ Hester agreed.

  ‘If there are communists in the pudding, my guess is they will rise to the top,’ said Edward mischievously.

  Verity looked at him reproachfully. ‘We are good organisers and we know what we want. Is that bad?’

  Edward was spared from having to answer. ‘Yup, they sure do need help,’ Hester said thoughtfully.

  ‘Help? Who?’ Edward asked. It was bitterly cold and he pulled his coat more closely around him as he walked.

  ‘Economically. The Republic is flat broke,’ Hester explained. ‘The ordinary worker here in Madrid – the janitor in our apartment building, say – earns less than a dollar a week.’

  ‘Not when you take into account the riches Hester pours over his head,’ Verity said. ‘She’s always giving the family clothes and food.’

  ‘Oh, not really, but when little Francisco looks at me with those liquid brown eyes . . .’

  ‘He’s the child,’ Verity explained.

  ‘He’s so cute. It almost makes me want to have one of my own.’

  ‘Really!’ said Verity. ‘After all you said against marriage and men.’

  ‘I know, but we can’t be consistent – not all the time,’ Hester said, confused by Verity’s vehemence.

  ‘But, I say, I still don’t understand. How can Spain be broke? Look at all this.’ They were walking down the Gran Vía and the buildings on either side were larger and smarter than in London’s Park Lane. ‘This is all so modern and . . . and fashionable . . .’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Verity said squeezing his arm. ‘You wait till you see the shops in the Carrera de San Jerónimo. There are rich people here, very rich – the ex-King’s cronies for example – but you have to go away from Madrid, into the countryside, to see the meaning of poverty. The hovels in which the peasants live are . . . well, they just don’t bear looking at. And that’s the trouble; the dukes and marquises maybe own a castle, a palace, a house here in Madrid and another in Monte Carlo, two aeroplanes and six Rolls-Royces. While they may have an income of 25,000 pesetas a day all the year round, the braceros – that’s the landless peasants – if they’re lucky earn two pesetas a day for about five months of the year and nothing for the rest.’

  This was the old Verity, Edward was happy to see, indignant at social injustice and angry at the indifference most well-fed men, like him, exhibited.

  ‘What has the Republic done then to improve things?’ he inquired.

  ‘They are trying to modernise. They are trying to introduce real democracy and they have renounced war . . . but they can’t do much while the army and the Church oppose them.’

  ‘Yes, but what are they doing about filling the stomachs of the starving?’ said Edward drily.

  ‘I think this new government will do something,’ said Hester. ‘They are pledged to redistribute wealth but of course it’s not going to be easy. They want to cut the size of the army and they are taking over education from the Church and making it open to all, paid for by the state.’

  ‘I can see that being unpopular in some quarters,’ Edward said.

  ‘Yes,’ Verity agreed, ‘and David says there are no arms, nothing to stop a military coup. In fact, that was what he was doing before he was arrested.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Buying arms – but that’s a secret,’ she added hurriedly. ‘I don’t think David would want me to have told you.’

  ‘I can’t help if I don’t know the facts,’ Edward said sententiously.

  ‘Yes, but you have to make David tell you what he and Tilney were doing in the mo
untains.’

  ‘It’s a mighty queer place to buy arms, out in the country,’ Hester said. ‘That usually happens in offices or hotel rooms – at least, I guess so; that’s what I’ve always imagined.’

  Edward was silent; so this was what Griffiths-Jones was up to: buying arms for a bankrupt government which had renounced war. There might be a few people keen to interfere with that, he thought. He shivered. ‘Damn it, I thought Madrid – Spain anyway – was supposed to be hot,’ he said. ‘When do we get to this place?’

  ‘We’re here,’ said Verity, pushing through big wooden doors.

  4

  Chicote’s was an oasis of warmth and light in Madrid’s freezing cold night. There was no hint here of poverty, political unrest or anything disagreeable. At a piano in the corner by a large pot of evergreens, an effete young man in white tie and tails was employed reducing Irving Berlin’s ‘Cheek To Cheek’ to pap. Every table seemed to be occupied. Waiters dodged between them quieting imperious commands with ‘Si señor, momento señor,’ which seemed to be the night-time version of ‘mañana, mañana’.

  ‘Over here, over here!’

  Edward turned in response to the clear, almost actorish tones of the English in foreign parts.

  ‘Maurice!’ Verity responded. ‘It’s Maurice Tate,’ she murmured to Edward. She switched on a smile and weaved her way between the tables towards the man who had called to her, Hester and Edward following more slowly. ‘Hello, Maurice,’ she said, when they had gained their objective. ‘This is Edward Corinth who I’ve told you about. Edward, Maurice runs the British Council here. If you aren’t careful, he’ll make you give a lecture.’