The Fencing Master

by Arturo Pérez-Reverte

  The encounter took place three days later, in the Bois de Vincennes between the fort and Nogent, before a large crowd gathered at a safe distance. The affair was public knowledge, indeed it had become something of a social event; even the newspapers had information about it. A group of curious onlookers congregated there, kept back by the police who had been sent to do just that. There were laws prohibiting duels, but since the reputation of the French Academy of Arms was at stake, the authorities had agreed to let the duel proceed. Someone criticized the fact that the defender chosen for such a worthy task was a Spaniard, but Jaime Astarloa was, after all, a member of the Paris Academy and had lived for a long time in France, and his mentor was the renowned Lucien de Montespan: a triple-pronged argument that soon convinced even the reluctant. Among the public and the seconds, who were solemn-faced and dressed in black were all the fencing masters of Paris as well as some who had traveled in from the provinces to witness the event Only Montespan was missing for his doctors had formally advised him not to go.

  Rolandi was dark and slightly built, with small, lively eyes. He was about forty years old and had sparse, curly hair. He knew the public did not favor him, and he would gladly not have been there. Events, however, had developed in such a way that he had no choice but to fight; if he did not fight, he would be made to look ridiculous, and that shame would pursue him throughout Europe. He had been refused the title of maître d'armes on three occasions, despite his skill with both the foil and the saber. Of Italian origin and a former soldier in the cavalry, he gave fencing lessons in a wretched little room in order to feed his wife and four children. While preparations "were under Rolandi kept casting nervous glances at Jaime, who remained calm and distant. Jaime was wearing close-fitting black trousers and a loose white shirt that only emphasized his thinness. One of the newspapers covering the event had called him "the young Quixote." He was at the peak of his profession, and knew that he had the support of the fraternity of the Academy maîtres d'armes, the grave, black-clad group of men waiting a few yards away aloof from the crowd, and sporting walking sticks, medals, and top hats.

  The public had expected a titanic struggle, but they were disappointed. The fight had barely started when Rolandi made the fatal mistake of lowering his hand a few inches while preparing a thrust with which to surprise his adversary. Jaime lunged forward with a thrust in 'time' into that tiny opening, and his foil slipped cleanly along and outside Rolandi's arm, entering unopposed beneath his armpit. The unfortunate man fell backward, dragging the foil with him in his fall, and as he writhed on the grass, a few inches of bloody steel could be seen protruding from his back. The doctor present could do nothing to save his life. From the ground, still impaled on the foil, Rolandi gave his killer a strange, dark look and died vomiting blood.

  When he received the news, Montespan merely murmured, "Good," without looking up from the logs crackling on the fire. He died two days later, before his pupil—who had left Paris in order to allow the fuss caused by the affair to die down—could see him again.

  On his return, Jaime learned from some friends that his old teacher had died. He listened in silence, with no sign of sorrow, and afterward went for a long walk along the banks of the Seine. He stopped by the Louvre, watching the dirty water slipping downstream. He stood there motionless, until he lost all sense of time. Night had already fallen when he came to again and began the walk back home. The following morning, he learned that in Montespan's will he had been left the only fortune his former teacher had possessed: his old weapons. He bought a bunch of flowers, hired a carriage, and asked to be driven to Pere-Lachaise Cemetery. There, on the anonymous gray gravestone beneath which lay his teacher's body, he placed the flowers and the foil with which he had killed Rolandi.

  ALL that had happened almost thirty years ago. Don Jaime looked at his reflection in the mirror in the fencing gallery. Bending down, he picked up the oil lamp and carefully studied his face, line by line. Montespan had died when he was fifty-nine, only three years older than Don Jaime was now, and the last memory he had of his teacher was of an old man huddled in front of a fire. He smoothed his white hair. He didn't regret having lived, having loved, and having killed; he had never done anything that would bring dishonor on the image he had of himself; he had enough memories stored up to justify his life, although they were his only legacy. His one regret was that he had no one to leave his weapons to when he died, as Lucien de Montespan had. With no one's arm to give them life, they would just be useless objects and end up in the dingy corner of some miserable antiques shop, covered with dust and rust, silenced forever as dead as their owner And there would be no one to place flowers on his grave.

  He thought of Adela de Otero and felt a pang. She had come into his life too late.

  III. Uncertain 'Time' on a False Attack

  Unless certain that a period of fencing 'time" has been gained, the fencer should be wary of counterattacking on an attack that may, or may not, be false.

  Half an hour before, he looked at himself in the mirror for the sixth time, and was pleased with what he saw. Few men of his acquaintance looked as he did at his age. From a distance he could have been taken for a young man, given his slenderness and agility, preserved through the continual exercise of his profession. He had shaved himself carefully with his old, ivory-handled English razor and had taken even more pains than usual over trimming his thin gray mustache. His white hair, slightly curled at the nape of his neck and at the sides, was combed sleekly back; his part, high on the left, was as straight as if he had drawn it with the aid of a ruler.

  He was in an excellent mood, as excited as a cadet wearing his uniform for the first time and on his way to his first assignation. Far from feeling awkward, he was reveling in that almost forgotten sensation. He picked up his one bottle of delicately perfumed cologne, sprinkled a few drops on his hands, then gently patted his cheeks. The lines around his gray eyes grew deeper as he smiled to himself.

  He was sure that nothing untoward would result from this particular meeting. He was too conscious of the reality of the situation to harbor any foolish illusions. However, there was no denying that there was something extremely piquant about it all. He had taken on a woman student for the first time in his life and, as Adela de Otero was the student in question, the situation had a quality that, without quite knowing why, he described to himself as aesthetic. The fact that his new client belonged to the opposite sex was something he had already come to terms with; once his initial resistance had been overcome, once he had swept his prejudices into a corner whence he could only just hear their feeble protests, their place had been taken by the pleasant feeling that something new was happening in his until then monotonous existence. He was happy to abandon himself to what he fancied was a harmless adventure in the autumn of his life, a subtle game involving newly recovered emotions one in which he would be the only real player.

  At a quarter to five, he made one last inspection of the house. Everything was in order in the studio that also served as a reception room. The caretaker, who cleaned the rooms three times a week, had carefully polished the mirrors in the fencing gallery where the heavy curtains and the open shutters created a pleasant atmosphere of golden shadows. At ten minutes to five, he took one last look in the mirror and made a few hurried adjustments to his clothes in order to correct what seemed to him some imperfection in his dress. He was wearing what he usually wore when he was working at home: a shirt, close-fitting fencing breeches, stockings, and soft leather shoes—all in immaculate white. For the occasion he had donned a rather old-fashioned dark-blue jacket, worn with use but comfortable and light, which he knew gave him an air of casual elegance. Around his neck he wore a fine white silk scarf.

  When the small wall clock was about to strike five, he went and sat down on the sofa in his living room, crossed his legs, and distractedly opened a book that was lying on the small table next to him, a shabby edition in quarto of the Mémoriale de Sainte-Hélène. He turned a few pages
without taking in what he was reading, then looked at the hands on the clock: seven minutes past five. He briefly pondered women's lack of punctuality, only to be gripped by the fear that she might have changed her mind. He was beginning to get worried when someone knocked at the door.

  Those violet eyes were looking at him again, amused and ironic.

  "Good afternoon, maestro."

  "Good afternoon, Señora de Otero."

  She turned to her maid, who was waiting on the landing. Don Jaime recognized the dark young woman who had opened the door to him on Calle Riaño.

  "It's all right, Lucia. Come back for me in an hour."

  The servant handed her mistress a small traveling bag, then curtsied and went back down to the street. Señora de Otero removed the long pin from her hat and placed the hat and her parasol in Don Jaime's solicitous hands. Then she took a few steps about the studio, stopping as she had before by the portrait on the wall.

  "He was a handsome man," she said.

  The fencing master had thought long and hard about how he should receive the lady, deciding in the end on an attitude of strict professionalism. He cleared his throat, indicating to her that he was not there to discuss his ancestor's physical features, and with a gesture that was intended to be both cool and courteous he invited her to go straight into the gallery. She gave him a brief look of amused surprise and then slowly nodded, like an obedient student. The tiny scar in the right-hand corner of her mouth retained the enigmatic smile that Don Jaime found so troubling.

  When they reached the gallery, the maestro drew back one of the curtains so that the light streamed in, multiplied by the large mirrors. The sun's rays fell directly on the young woman, framing her in a golden halo. She looked about her, clearly pleased with the atmosphere in the room: A violet gemstone glittered on her muslin dress. It occurred to the fencing master that Adela de Otero always wore something that matched her eyes, which she certainly knew how to show off to the best advantage.

  "It's fascinating," she said, with genuine admiration. Don Jaime in turn looked at the mirrors, the old swords, the wooden floor, and shrugged. "It's just a fencing gallery," he protested, secretly flattered.

  She shook her head and regarded her own image in the mirrors. "No, it's more than that. In this light and with the old weapons on the walls, with the curtains and everything..." Her eyes lingered too long on those of the fencing master, who, rather embarrassed, looked away. "It must be a pleasure to work here, Don Jaime. It's all so..."

  "Prehistoric?"

  She pursed her lips, missing the joke.

  "No, it's not that," she said in her slightly husky voice, fumbling for the right word. "It's so ... decadent." She repeated the word as if it gave her a special pleasure. "Yes, decadent in the most beautiful sense of the word, like a flower fading in a vase or a fine antique engraving. When I first met you, I imagined that your house would be something like this."

  Don Jaime shuffled his feet uneasily. The nearness of the young woman, her utter self-assurance that bordered almost on impudence, the vitality she seemed to exude, produced in him a strange confusion. He decided not to allow himself to fall under her spell and tried to get back to the reason that had brought them there. To this end, he expressed the hope that she had appropriate clothing with her. She reassured him by showing him her small traveling bag.

  "Where I change?"

  Don Jaime sensed a provocative note in her voice, but, annoyed with himself, he dismissed the idea. Perhaps he was beginning to get too drawn into the game, he thought, mentally preparing himself to reject with the utmost rigor the first sign of any old man's folly. He gravely showed the young woman the door of a small room set aside for such things, and suddenly developed an intense interest in testing out the firmness of one of the floorboards. When she walked past him toward the changing room, she looked at him out of the corner of her eye, and he thought he caught a faint smile. She pulled the door to but left it open about two inches. Don Jaime swallowed hard, trying to keep his mind a blank. The small crack drew his gaze like a magnet. He kept his eyes fixed on the toes of his shoes, struggling against that murky magnetism. He heard the rustle of petticoats, and, for a second, an image crossed his mind of dark skin in the warm shadows. He immediately banished the vision, feeling utterly despicable.

  "For the love of God—" The thought burst out in the form of a plea, although he wasn't quite sure to whom the plea was addressed. "She is, after all, a lady."

  Then he walked over to one of the windows, raised his face to the light, and tried to fill his mind with sun.

  SEÑORA DE OTERO had changed her muslin dress for a simple, light riding skirt in brown, short enough not to get in the way of her feet, and long enough for only a few inches of white-stockinged ankle to remain uncovered. She had put on flat fencing shoes that gave her movements a grace normally found only in ballerinas. To complete the outfit she wore a plain, round-necked, white linen blouse that buttoned at the back. It was close-fitting enough to emphasize her bust, which Don Jaime fancied was tantalizingly soft. When she walked, her low shoes gave her gait a lithe animal beauty, combining the masculine quality that Don Jaime had noticed in her before with a lightness of movement that was at once firm and supple. In those flat shoes, thought the fencing master, the young woman moved like a cat.

  She leveled her violet eyes at him, trying to gauge the effect of her appearance. Don Jaime did his best to remain inscrutable. "Which foil do you prefer?" he asked, half-closing his eyes, dazzled by the light that seemed to fold her in a voluptuous embrace. "French, Spanish, or Italian?"

  "French. I like to have my fingers free."

  With a slight bow, he congratulated her on her choice. He too preferred the French foil, with no crossbar, with the grip unimpeded as far as the guard. He went over to one of the racks of weapons on the wall and studied them thoughtfully. Estimating the young woman's height and the length of her arms, he chose the appropriate foil, an excellent weapon with a blade made of Toledo steel, as flexible as a reed. Señora de Otero took the weapon and studied it attentively; she closed her right hand about the grip, appreciatively weighed the foil in her hand, and then, turning to the wall, she tried the blade against it, pressing it so that it curved until the point was about twenty inches from the guard. Satisfied with the quality of the steel, she turned to Don Jaime. With the frank admiration of someone who knows how to appreciate the quality of such a weapon, she stroked the well-tempered metal with her fingers.

  He handed her a padded plastron and solicitously helped her to put it on, fastening the hooks at the back. As he did so, he accidentally brushed the fine fabric of her blouse with the tips of his fingers, and smelled the sweet scent of rose water. He completed his task rather hurriedly, disturbed by the proximity of that beautiful bent neck, of the smooth skin offering itself up to him in all its warm nakedness beneath her hair gathered by a mother-of-pearl comb. As he fastened the final hook, he noticed with dismay that his hands were shaking. To hide this, he immediately occupied himself in unbuttoning his own jacket and made some banal comment : about the usefulness of the plastron in fencing bouts. Señora de Otero, who was drawing on her leather gloves, looked at him rather oddly, bemused by this sudden, uncalled-for loquacity.

  "Don't you ever use one, maestro?"

  Don Jaime smoothed his mustache and smiled benignly. "Sometimes," he replied. Then, removing his jacket and scarf, he went over to the rack and chose a French foil with a square grip, slightly inclined in quarte. With the foil under his arm, he went and stood opposite the young woman, who was waiting for him on the piste, very erect and with the point of her weapon resting on the floor by her feet, which were at right angles, the heel of her right foot facing the ankle of her left, impeccably positioned to place herself on guard. Don Jaime studied her for a few moments, regretting that he could not fault her position. He nodded approvingly, put on his gloves, and indicated the masks lined up on a shelf. She shook her head disdainfully.

  "I thi
nk you should cover your face, Señora de Otero. As you know, in fencing..."

  "Perhaps later."

  "That would be running a needless risk," insisted Don Jaime, taken aback by his new client's coolness. She doubtless knew that a careless stroke, delivered too high, could mark her face irrevocably.

  She seemed to guess his thoughts: she smiled, or perhaps it was the little scar that smiled. "I commend myself to your skill, maestro, not to be disfigured."

  "I'm honored by your confidence in me, madam, but I would feel happier if..."

  There were flecks of gold in the young woman's eyes now, and they glinted strangely. "We'll fight our first bout with our faces uncovered," she said, as if introducing the extra risk made it all the more attractive to her. "Just this once, I promise."

  He could not get over his surprise; the young woman was devilishly stubborn and extremely proud. "Madam, I accept no responsibility. I would hate it if—"

  "Please."

  Don Jaime sighed. He had lost that first skirmish. It was time to pass on to the foils. "We'll say no more."

  They saluted, preparing themselves for the bout. Señora de Otero covered herself with absolute correctness; she held the foil with just the right degree of firmness, her thumb on the grip, her ring finger and little finger close together, keeping the guard at chest height and the point of the foil slightly higher than the wrist. She stood in the orthodox Italian fashion, offering the fencing master only her right profile, the foil, arm, shoulder, thigh, and foot all in one line, her knees slightly bent, her left arm raised with the wrist apparently limp. Don Jaime admired the graceful picture that the young woman presented, ready for attack like a cat about to pounce. Her eyes were narrowed, almost feverishly bright; her jaw was set. Her lips, beautiful despite the scar, were now just a thin line. Her whole body seemed to be tensed, like a spring about to be released. Don Jaime, taking all this in with one professional glance, realized with some disquiet that for Señora de Otero this was much more than a capricious, eccentric pastime. Merely placing a weapon in the hands of this beautiful young woman turned her into an aggressive opponent. Accustomed to understanding the human condition precisely through aggression, Don Jaime sensed that this mysterious woman was the guardian of some fascinating secret. That is why, when he held out his foil and stood on guard before her, he did so with the same calculated care that he would have taken when facing an opponent with an unprotected foil. He sensed that danger was lurking somewhere and that this game was far from being an innocent diversion. His professional instinct never deceived him.