opportunity came.
“Peter, please, promise me you will be careful tomorrow. Stay with the
group wherever you go. Keep your eyes open and stay out of trouble! I love you,
my dear one. Come home to me safely.”
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He was nonchalant with her about his safety this time. Perhaps it was
because he was in a room full of people and taking considerable ribbing from
his English relatives about the thrashing that England was going to lay on
his team in tomorrow’s match. He seemed happy and confident that all would
work out for the best.
Peter told her that he loved her and mentioned the great shopping that
he intended to do for her before the tour departed for home. That was the last
conversation they would ever have.
The whole family sat glued to the television screen at Casa San Marco
the evening of the game. Wembley Stadium, the national shrine of football in
Great Britain, was full to its one hundred thousand capacity and basking in
glorious sunshine. The constant singing of the English fans all but drowned out
the Spanish-speaking television commentators, and the sea of Union Jack flags
made one feel that there was only one team contesting the match.
Television viewers in Argentina had to be content with the British
video feed of the game, consequently there were little or no shots of the small
Argentine faction that had been relegated to seats in one end zone corner, high
up under the roof.
The game was a disaster from the outset for the South Americans. The
British press had vilified the Argentines for their late tackling and cheap shots
after the whistle during their previous matches. The visitors from across the
Atlantic seemed to make a point of not letting anyone, the press, the fans, the
referee, or the English players, intimidate them!
Right from the opening whistle, their overzealous tackling sent a succession
of English players writhing to the green carpet. Warnings went unheeded,
and the West German referee kept up a constant dialogue with the Argentine
captain. Finally, in the thirty-sixth minute of play, having been pushed to his
limit, the referee showed the South American’s leader the red card, meaning
expulsion from the match!
Howls of glee could be heard rolling down from the giant terraces filled
with delighted Englishmen. The Argentine, however, refused to leave the pitch
and carried on an animated discussion with several English players, the referee,
and lastly, FIFA officials, who were forced to take to the field to escort him to
the showers. This incident served to fan the flames of contempt and hatred that
the British fans at Wembley harbored for their opponents, and the hostile mood
of the spectators could be felt right across the Atlantic Ocean.
The knot returned to Florencia’s stomach as she sat in stunned silence,
watching these events unfold. Her countrymen seemed incensed at their
captain’s ejection and became even more physical and hotheaded once play
resumed. The game remained scoreless through the seventy-eighth minute,
when a substitute destined for stardom, Geoff Hurst, glanced in a header from
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JAMES McCREATH
winger Martin Peters. Pandemonium erupted throughout Wembley Stadium,
and in the spacious living room of Casa San Marco several thousand miles away,
Florencia De Seta felt a sense of relief surge through her.
Please let the English win. Please let them win! Then my Peter will come home
to me safely. While she sat repeating her plea silently over and over, young
Lonfranco suddenly smashed his cola bottle on the marble floor.
“Goddamned English, they have no balls! They are just a bunch of
crybabies. They must have paid that referee off! If I were there, I’d show them.
Goddamned English!” With that, he stomped out into the garden before his
mother could say a word.
Lonnie was the least of Florencia’s worries at the moment. She called for
Oli, the housekeeper, to clean up the broken glass, and turned her attention
back to the last twelve minutes of the game.
As it turned out, her prayers were answered with a one to nil English
victory. Argentina was eliminated from the competition, and Peter would be
coming home. Now she would deal with Lonfranco!
Florencia waited anxiously for word from England that Peter was safe and
exactly when he would be returning to Buenos Aires. The telephone never rang
that entire evening.
She tried to remain calm, resisting the temptation to call his hotel in
London, perhaps because she dreaded the thought of not being able to reach
him. Señora Florencia De Seta passed yet another sleepless night, with the now
familiar knot ever-present in her stomach.
July twenty-fourth dawned clear and unusually humid for the time of
year, and Florencia had Oli serve breakfast on the patio for her and the two
boys. She hardly touched her coffee or toast, and as the boys kicked a soccer ball
around the garden, she sat contemplating her course of action if there continued
to be no word from Peter.
The persistent ring of the doorbell brought Oli running from the kitchen.
She opened the large, steel-plated door and was about to scold the person on
the opposite side for being so impatient. Bue she stopped after her first word,
inhaling deeply and standing with her mouth agape.
The elder of the two men, an aristocratic-looking man dressed in a finely
cut business suit, spoke immediately.
“I am Dr. Renaldo Las Heras, and this is his Holiness Monsignor Robitaille.
Where is Señora De Seta? We must see her at once!”
Oli was barely able to mumble the word ‘garden’ as she pointed to the rear
of the house. A fervent Catholic, the sight of the Monsignor at the door had
left her breathless. She crossed herself as the two men brushed passed her and
strode purposefully toward the rear of Casa San Marco.
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Florencia had put on her sunglasses to shield her sleepless eyes from the
bright rays. She couldn’t help but think that she might need them for another
reason today. The sight of the two men entering the patio confused her at first.
She suddenly became lightheaded, as if she were watching the scene unfold
from outside her own body. Her palms became covered in perspiration, and
she was unable to rise from her chair to greet them. The knot tightened in her
stomach.
Monsignor Robitaille was at her side before she could move, and as he
grasped her hand, looked down at her with large, sorrowful eyes. Once again,
it was Dr. Las Heras that spoke.
“Señora, please pardon this untimely interruption, but we have tragic news
from England. There has been an accident. Your husband, Peter, Señora. Oh,
sweet Jesus! Señora, I am afraid your husband is dead! It was a traffic accident,
but further details are still unclear. I have been in touch with the authorities
in London, and I have taken the liberty of making the arrangements to return
Peter to you in Buenos Aires. I loved that boy as if he were my own son, Señora.
It is such a tragedy, such a wa
ste! Please accept my heartfelt condolences. The
Monsignor will remain with you as long as you need him, and please, please
Señora, let me assist you in any way I can.”
Florencia had sat in silence as Dr. Las Heras spoke. She wasn’t taking in
his words, for she already knew what he had come to tell her. She had become
fixated on his appearance. So dapper and well turned out. He must be close to
eighty years old, she thought to herself. How good he looks for his age. It wasn’t until
he had finished talking and stood waiting for several seconds for a response that
she finally found the strength to reply.
“Peter? My Peter? Is dead? I, I knew something . . . Peter! Oh, my Peter!
No . . . not . . . Peter!”
Her voice rose audibly each time she pronounced his name, to the point
where she was literally shouting. Then suddenly, a deadly silence hung over the
beautiful garden, Florencia having collapsed back into her chair.
The boys, who had stopped their play to stare at the two strangers talking
to their mother, ran to her side.
“Mama, Mama, what’s wrong? What’s wrong? Where is father? What’s
the matter with my father?” Lonnie pleaded.
Lydia appeared on the patio at that moment, Florencia’s screams of Peter’s
name bringing her in full flight from the far end of Casa San Marco. She had
remained in her suite late that morning before venturing downstairs for a light
breakfast, preferring to write a few lines to her relatives in England, thanking
them for being so hospitable to her son during his trip.
“Florencia, what on earth has happened? Why were you calling Peter’s
name like that?” She ran to her daughter-in-law’s side. This time it was the
Monsignor who spoke.
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JAMES McCREATH
“Your son, Señora. I am terribly sorry. It seems that he was hit by a lorry
while leaving Wembly Stadium after the football match. Dr. Las Heras has
spoken directly to England. He was told that your son died instantly, painlessly!
I am at your disposal for as long as you need me, Señora.”
Lydia couldn’t help but notice the Monsignor’s large, sad eyes. She had
prayed at his masses many, many times. Both these men were longtime trusted
friends of the family. It was only fitting that news such as this be delivered by
men that shared the family’s grief and sorrow.
Dr. Las Heras drew a chair to Lydia’s side. She refused to sit. Instead, she
gathered the two scared, weeping boys in her arms and knelt down so she could
look directly into their confused, anxious eyes.
“My special boys, you will have to be strong now. Your father has had a
very bad accident in England. He will never be coming home again, but I am
certain the Monsignor here will tell you that he is sitting with Jesus right this
minute up in heaven. He is not alone. God and Jesus will look after your father
forever now! I bet he is looking down at us right this minute, and hoping that
we will all help each other to keep on going. We must all be strong, that is the
way your father would have wanted us to be!”
Lonnie pried himself free of his grandmother’s grasp and throwing the
soccer ball as hard as he could against the stucco garden wall, screamed at the
top of his lungs,
“I don’t want to be strong! I want my father back here now! It’s those
goddamned English. They did this to him! Your people, Gramma! Your people.
I hate them! I hate them! They killed my father. Don’t touch me! You’re one of
them. Those Goddamned English. I hate them all . . . even you!” With that, he
fled the patio, tears streaming down his cheeks.
The staff had gathered on the edge of the covered terrace, keeping a
respectful distance between themselves and their employers. There was not
a dry eye among them. Young Renaldo held his grandmother tightly. He
whispered in her ear after Lonnie had left.
“Don’t worry, Gramma, I know Lonnie didn’t mean those awful things.
He loves you very much, just like I do. Don’t worry. If father is with Jesus, he
will be just fine. Will he write us some letters though?”
“No, my dear boy. You can’t write letters from heaven. But when we say
our prayers at night and when we go to mass, I know that he will hear every
word we say to him.”
The Monsignor helped Florencia upstairs to her room. Doctor Las Heras
then administered a sedative to the new widow and put her to bed. Lydia stayed
with Renaldo and tried her best to make him understand all the things that
would be happening next.
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RENALDO
They talked about what a funeral was and how his father’s body would
be put inside a large metal box and laid to rest beside Renaldo’s Grandfather
Lonfranco. The boy was full of questions, and yet, seemingly calm and under
control. He was, in truth, Lydia’s strength in this dark hour. The grandmother
understood death well, having been touched by its hand so often in the past.
She would grieve for her only child, but she would do it on her own terms,
behind closed doors. The matriarch must be the pillar of the family! She must
teach the boys, and their mother, life’s cruelest lesson. But above all, she must
show them, by example, that life does go on.
Dealing with Lonnie over the following days was agonizing for everyone.
He locked himself in his room, and when a pass key was used to open the door,
Oli found that it still would not budge. Lydia suggested that her grandson had
probably barricaded all the furniture in the room against it. All entreaties to
either come out or let someone in failed for two days. Finally, in the early hours
of the third morning, Olarti, the long-serving chauffeur-handyman, placed an
extension ladder against Lonnie’s window and was able to force an opening
large enough to gain entry.
The sleeping boy didn’t stir until morning. Olarti had sat calmly in an
easy chair, waiting for him to awaken. The two had been fast friends for years.
Olarti sometimes let Lonnie drive the servant’s old pickup truck on the quiet
side streets when no one was around. Of all the people at Casa San Marco,
Olarti had the best chance of helping Lonnie come to grips with his father’s
death.
The grieving child awoke startled and angry. He ordered Olarti out of
his room, but the sly servant had pushed the ladder away from the building
and down onto the lawn. The only way for him to leave, he told Lonnie, was
through the bedroom door. They spent the entire day alone, talking, and in the
end, a ravenous Lonnie De Seta finally emerged from his sanctuary to confront
the cruel world.
He was a changed youth, however, and no one felt the sting of his bitterness
more than Lydia. He would not be in the same room with her unless it was
absolutely necessary, and at that, he would not look at or talk to her. Lydia, for
her part, was as gracious and understanding of the boy’s feelings as any human
could possibly be. Again it was Olarti that finally got through to Lonnie about
how he was hurting his grandmother for something in which she had no part.
He used a personal example t
o drive home the message.
“Oli and I have worked for your family for many, many years now, Señor
Lonnie, just as my mother worked for the famous general that built this casa.
You know that we are native Indians from the Pampas region. Well, General
San Marco, your grandfather’s best friend, was a great man. A brilliant soldier!
But it was his job in the army to drive all the Indians from our homelands so
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JAMES McCREATH
that the railways and cattlemen could use the land. My parents were driven
from our home when I was just your age. It was very hard for them. My father
was a proud man who would not leave what he felt was rightfully his. So he
fought the soldiers, and they killed him! My mother, sister, and I had nowhere
to go.
“By chance, we happened to come across General San Marco as he was
taking possession of Buenos Recuerdos. He was in need of servants and laborers
to work on the estate in his absence. My mother could speak fluent Spanish and
was a hard worker. She was able to get employment not only for herself, but also
for my sister and me. Now, it would have been easy for us to hate the general for
what his soldiers had done to my father, but he was a fair and benevolent man. I
could not hate all the soldiers for the acts of a few who were following orders.
“It is the same with your feelings for your grandmother. Your father’s
death was an accident. There was no English plot to kill him. Only one
Englishman was involved in his death, the one that was driving the truck that
hit him. Your grandmother was not driving that truck. She loved your father
very much, and now you are breaking her heart. You must see that this whole
tragedy has nothing to do with her. Go to her and tell her that you love her,
for there is nothing so pure in this world as the love of a grandmother for her
grandchildren.”
Olarti’s talk had the desired effect on Lonnie. He was able to mend his
relationship with Lydia and carry on with his life. He was, however, prone
to fits of violence that were extremely unpredictable. He became a patient of
one of the leading psychiatrists in Buenos Aires, who recommended sports,
specifically rugby football, as an outlet for his emotional and physical demons.
The Newton Academy happened to have an excellent rugby program, and
the sport became Lonnie’s passion. While he struggled academically, always
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