In a clear voice Robín related in minute detail what all of us already knew and when he had finished he asked:
“Shall I tell you the name of the fellow who killed Baldomero and Cidrán?”
“Do.”
Robín glanced down at the floor.
“May God forgive me! It was that fellow called Fabián Minguela Abragán, known as Moucho Carroupo and with a patch of pockmarked skin on his forehead, you all know who he is and none of you, from this moment hence, should utter his name.”
The silence was broken by Evelio Wild Boar.
“It’s up to you, Camilo.”
Without uttering a word and with a solemn expression upon his face, Don Camilo also lowered his gaze to the floor. Although as anticipated, the decision sent a shiver down the spine of all present.
“Who is the order for?”
Still in silence, Don Camilo looked in the direction ofTanis the Demon who then stood up, took off his hat and crossed himself.
“May the Blessed Apostle St. James and our relation the Saintly Fernández assist me! Amen! When you hear a skyrocket go off, you’ll know that’s it.”
The meeting gradually broke up in an orderly fashion: the three Marvises from Briñidelo left on horseback without delay for they had a long way to go. Don Balthasar and Don Eduardo went off to sleep in Lalín in the house of their distant relative Freixido the priest, they went by car, it was a pig of a night—all the better for there’s not all the bother of requesting safe-conduct from the Civil Guard. Don Camilo left with Uncle Evelio Wild Boar, Camilo the gunner slept at the Casandulfe Raimundo’s house, and the other three Gamuzos from elsewhere were put up for the night at their brother Tanis’ house, it all worked out well and nobody said more than they ought to have, the only ones to stay in Miss Ramona’s house were Moncho Lazybones, who is missing one leg, and Marcos Albite, who is missing both legs, it was a rough night for lame folks to be out on the mountain. Catuxa Bainte slept curled up on the porch, and suddenly a deep and silent peace fell upon Miss Ramona’s house. Before departing, Don Camilo left an order for the priest Ceferino Gamuzo, Ferret the fisherman, St. Peter was a fisherman, too.
“He’s to say a Mass for the soul of I-won’t-say-who. Nor is he to ask any questions about what he should be able to guess, and let him sing dumb.”
“Yes, Don Camilo.”
Upon Miss Ramona’s house as well as upon men and women there descended a mist which gradually blotted out, one by one, the words that were spoken and which still wafted upon the air. Memory is no match for the mist, and so much the better.
“Shall we talk tomorrow?”
“Well, better the day after, tomorrow I have to go to Carballiño.”
“They say that St. Ramón Nonato is the patron saint of gamesters, gamblers, cardsharpers, and shady runs of luck.”
“Why so?”
“How would I know!”
Crazy Goat cannot be accused of having gone to bed with whoever, you know full well who sucked Crazy Goat’s tits but don’t let his name pass your lips, for everybody goes as far as they’re let, and that’s nobody else’s concern. This business of whether she went to bed with this one or that one makes no difference to anyone but herself. All women have the right to toss in the hay with whoever takes their fancy. You say he’s a bastard? Well, maybe you’re right, there’s many a bastard about, but that doesn’t matter.
“Do you think Crazy Goat would dare mess about with a wild boar?”
“What business is that of yours?”
“It has been raining without let up since the Feast of St. Ramón Nonato, who runs a gambling den in Carballiño, on the road to Ribadavia, the day when they least expected to be caught by the Civil Guard and all wind up behind bars.”
“Pardon me but the fellow that runs the gambling den on the Ribadavia road is not St. Ramón Nonato but St. Macario, there’s no call to mix them up.”
“Well, sure it’s all the same, they’re saints anyhow.”
A leisurely rain falls straight down upon the grass, the tiled roofs, and the windowpanes, it rains but it isn’t cold, I mean not really cold. If I could play the fiddle, I’d spend the afternoons playing the fiddle, if I could play the harmonica, I’d spend the mornings and afternoons playing the harmonica, if I could play the accordion, I’d spend the mornings, the afternoons and the evenings, indeed I’d spend my whole life playing the accordion. Gaudencio plays the accordion better than anybody, since I can play neither the fiddle, nor the harmonica, nor the accordion, since I can play nothing at all, I might as well have died as a child and saved them all the trouble of grieving over me, I spend the afternoons messing about with whoever I can, in the mornings and in the evenings I’m kept more entertained, at times I can’t mess about with anybody but that makes no difference, isn’t that why I’ve got two hands, men just have to accept how fate has ordered their lives because all that has been settled even before we came into this world. Don Samuel Iglesias Moure is the proprietor of a chandler’s in Father Feijoo Street, Don Samuel looks like he’s made of wax and his wife the same, folks call him Celestial, some evenings Don Samuel drops by Sprat’s place to let his hair down and listen to the accordion, only he’s seldom in luck with the tunes, for he’s very fond of a mazurka that Gaudencio seldom plays.
“Why don’t you play it the odd time?”
“What difference does that make to you?”
Celestial likes to go to bed with Portuguese Marta. He likes to spin her yarns.
“Since she’s big and buxom you get great relief and satisfaction out of her. Portuguese women are very considerate.”
“Yes, sir, that’s what everybody says. And very respectful, too.”
“That’s for sure.”
Don Servando goes in ahead of Don Samuel, Don Servando does not have to wait in line since he is a provincial deputy, Don Samuel takes Portuguese Marta a spiral candle as a gift.
“Shall we light it?”
“No, I’d rather take it new to the Holy Christ of the Sacred Blood. Hold on a minute while I get undressed and wash my privates down a bit, there’s time enough.”
Don Servando always threw his weight about with Eleuterio the Britches, whereas to Don Samuel he was most affable.
“They’re chalk and cheese, Don Samuel is a gentleman, a bit wheyfaced but a gentleman all the same, and his wife, Doña Dorita, is a real lady, Doña Dorita distributes clothes to the poor, they’re very good people, clean living, upright, and trustworthy people.
Don Isaac is Don Samuel’s brother, Don Isaac is a noodle seller, his Vesuvius brand macaroni is renowned throughout the whole of Galicia, Don Isaac turned out a pansy, but that’s a matter of birth and could happen to anybody, to you or me even, but he carries it off in a dignified manner, you’ll never catch him propositioning anybody, Don Isaac plays the harmonium in the church of St. Mary the Mother and other places too if he is called upon for some wedding or other, at home Don Isaac plays the lyre, an instrument from which he draws out beautiful, melodious arpeggios, presiding over Don Isaac’s house is a plaster of Paris bust of Pope Pius X colored crimson, gold, blue, flesh color etc. The Pope rests just above the lyre upon a whatnot draped with the Spanish flag.
“My brother is a real artist, a full-bodied artist and musically very gifted, to my mind he wound up a pansy from indulging his feelings.”
“Maybe, I don’t deny it, that sometimes happens.”
“Chances are Lucio Mouro the miller was killed by the same fellow as killed the other two.”
“Who?”
“Hold your tongue, you dope! Don’t you know who I mean?”
“Sorry, I wasn’t thinking.”
Lucio Mouro was shot in the back and again in the head, he was wearing a flower—a buttercup—stuck in the peak of his cap when he was killed.
“Catuxa, do you remember how good he was?”
“Why wouldn’t I remember?”
Rosicler was ten years old, maybe not even that, when she jacked off
Jeremiah the monkey for the first time.
“And what’s the point of that then?”
“I don’t know, but there’s no harm in knowing things.”
“Yes, indeed, that’s true.”
“Anyway they come into your head without warning.”
When she discovered that monkeys had willies just like men only smaller, Rosicler was delighted.
“I must tell Mona, though she probably knows already.”
Celestial the chandler, that’s Don Samuel Iglesias Moure, went into town one day on an errand and they came across him unawares rolling in the hay with the half-wit from Martiñá in the loft of Marcos Albite’s house.
“How could you let yourself, Catuxa, you trollop?”
“Well you see, I just came to wash out Señor Marcos’ pee can and Don Samuel gave me a peseta and took out his dick.”
“Just like that?”
“Yes, sir, just like that. I said to him: here, everything is doomed in the end, oh glorious apostle St. Jude Thaddeus, who wert the first king of Babylon, turn my sorrows into joy in answer to this prayer, and then he tossed me down in the hay.”
Tanis the Demon said to the Casandulfe Raimundo:
“Don Camilo’s orders shall be carried out, as sure as there’s a God in heaven, they’ll be carried out! I’ve thought it all out, now what I have to do now is let it seep into my bones until my conscience begins to niggle me, after that it’ll all be as easy as pie, it won’t be hard for he struts about like cock of the walk, maybe he thinks that it’s all over and done with now and that things will go on like this forever, but so much the better that he should believe that and go his way unperturbed.”
Tanis the Demon whets his two hunting knives on the grindstone, one of them has a hilt made from antler and the other from Peruvian silver and both of them bear his initials, Tanis Gamuzo’s knives have seen some years of service now but they’ve weathered well for they’re top quality and well maintained.
“They see precious little flesh for I don’t go out much now, and if a knife doesn’t get flesh it loses its edge.”
Policarpo la Bagañeira has lost the taste for watching the Santiago omnibus pass by, jolting along the road and spluttering like an asthmatic Portuguese, although he’s missing three fingers from his right hand, Policarpo la Bagañeira can still roll a neat cigarette, packets of tobacco are full of threads nowadays, the best thing is to dump it out on a newspaper and remove the threads, if you burn them in an ashtray they scent the air, perfume it with their aroma, on the Santiago omnibus there are always two or three priests nibbling dried figs and apricots, sweet things are proper to priests, comics have a sweet tooth too, Policarpo la Bagañeira claims he can train frogs but I don’t believe a word of it, frogs are difficult creatures to train for they’re part sly and part stupid, which is as bad as they come, you can train women by giving them vinegar to drink, the problem is they won’t let you, nowadays they’re a brazen, rebellious lot, Policarpo la Bagañeira chortles softly at his own jokes, he fancies Sweet Choniña, Méndez the confectioner’s wife, but Sweet Choniña wouldn’t give him a second look. Antón Guntimil, Fina Ramonde’s late husband, was crushed to death by a freight train in Orense station, well, not really crushed, more sliced in two, Antón Guntimil had a stutter and was something of a simpleton. His wife always used to say to him:
“The monk at evening mass has a whopper of a willy, a proper willy twice the size of yours, you idiot, for an idiot is what you are, are you not ashamed of yourself?”
“Not at all, woman, what can I do about it?”
When Aunt Lourdes was smitten by smallpox the French left her to die, say what you like, then to crown it all they tossed her body into a common grave along with Poles, gypsies, Moors, and chinks, as far as that’s concerned the French look out for themselves, nor do they care whose corns they tread on. Moncho, the cousin of Manuel Remeseiro Domínguez who had the name of a crow, or maybe it’s the other way round, died of whooping cough when he was about six or seven years of age.
“He didn’t last long.”
“No, indeed he didn’t, apparently he wasn’t up to much.”
Moncho the crow can whistle a few bars of Blind Gaudencio’s mazurka, although he doesn’t know the whole tune yet.
“Is it a fact that Manueliño Remeseiro had his own little tiffs with María Auxiliadora Porrás, the sweetheart who ran out on Adolfito because he didn’t look long for this world?”
“Stuff and nonsense! Who ever told you that?”
Miss Ramona had no luck with men, well, with future husbands that is, apparently she set her sights too high and, of course, missed her mark, in these matters, you have to eat humble pie for time and tide waits for no man. Miss Ramona always took it for granted that she could marry whoever took her fancy, that she could pick and choose, but she was wrong and now she’s well on the way to dying an old maid.
“Well, an old maid but not a virgin, of course, what would bother me more than anything else would be not to have lost my virginity in due course, it’d be a terrible slap in the face to reach the age of twenty-five still a virgin, the fact of the matter is it wouldn’t occur to anybody.”
Robín Lebozán writes poems in Galician, but what he won’t do is show them to anybody.
“No, as far as I’m concerned this business of reading your own poems aloud is an act of immodesty, anyway who could care less?”
The Casandulfe Raimundo hasn’t fully recovered yet, he’s still taciturn and surly, only his good manners save him.
“I’m longing to hear the skyrocket go off, tomorrow I’m to visit Uncle Evelio to perk my spirits up, isn’t it a crying shame, an old man consoling a younger one! Uncle Evelio’s orders must be carried out, I know, orders are orders, after all, but I’m dying to hear the skyrocket go off, a death is settled only by another one and it’s not a matter of personal choice, we should all wear a buttercup or a gorse flower in our hats, Noriega Varela used to wear gorse blossom from the graveyard every Sunday and on days of obligation.”
“In mourning for whom?”
“Nobody in particular, Don Antonio’s gorse blossom was in remembrance of the dead, all the dead are God’s own, the dead are very fond of flowers, notice that the most beautiful flowers always grow in graveyards, the souls of the dead escape through the flowers growing on the graves, if you place a stone on top of them the souls can’t breathe.”
Despondent and withdrawn, the Casandulfe Raimundo treads the paths of grief.
“The dead through whose veins coursed the very same blood as mine passed by here singing, they were just like me, indeed maybe it was me unbeknownst to myself, when their blood was spilled upon the ground, when their blood was shed, the wolves ran off howling and yowling, there are men who should never have been born, I’m just longing to hear the skyrocket go off, Tanis holds Uncle Camilo in high esteem, he calls the shots, well, all of us hold Uncle Camilo in high esteem, when Tanis lights the fuse of the skyrocket he’ll heave a sigh of relief, may God preserve us all, peace should spread like lightning when the law is carried out, the same law has governed these mountains for years now and all the family dead demand that the law be fulfilled, some men spring from one blood line and others from another, it’s not just a matter of chance.”
The Casandulfe Raimundo plays chess with Robín Lebozán, he always beats him.
“Your mind is wandering.”
“No, that’s just the way I am, I’m no good at this sort of thing, you know.”
Pepiño Pousada Coires, Plastered Pepiño, is an electrician, well, an electrician’s assistant in the Repose Coffin Factory, there are a lot of coffin factories around here, they make them in black and white, for babes in arms, the luxury ones are made of oak and imitation mahogany, you don’t see red, green, or yellow coffins, Plastered Pepiño wanders about with his mouth hanging open, Plastered Pepiño likes groping little boys or cherubs rather, Plastered Pepiño married Concha the Clam, folks do many a thing from habit, and he had
two feebleminded daughters that died shortly afterwards, Concha the Clam ran off on him, apparently she got fed up, Concha the Clam was a cheerful soul and skilled at playing the castanets, she spent all her time playing the castanets and singing music-hall tunes, one day they came across Plastered Pepiño with the deaf-mute Little Simon the Lamb, six or seven years of age and very thin and puny, you could see the fright on his face, you needed only a glimpse, it would even make you laugh, Plastered Pepiño was laying into him from behind and had him by the throat, he had nearly strangled him, Plastered Pepiño was sent first to jail and then to the nut-house.
“In the nut-house they give you an even worse hiding than in jail, clearly beating up nuts is more fun.”
“More than likely.”
Plastered Pepiño was released in return for allowing himself to be castrated, truth to tell, it didn’t do him much good, when the war broke out Plastered Pepiño took to going to Mass every morning to intercede for his fellow man and entreat for mercy, charity, clemency as well as other favors that have fallen out of use, scorpions and toads have to be set free, you have to let them run away, it’s the same with men and tame animals: mice, snails, crickets, and wild animals too: genets, lynxes, badgers, you stretch an alder bough across the river of the border of death and scare them off with holy water, not with gunshots.
“Why is mankind such a restless, unsettled creature? It must be the influence of the Devil.”
Robín Lebozán was over the moon when he found the seashell his mother had given him, it was behind some books and hadn’t been seen for over ten years, if you hold it to your ear you can hear the sound of the sea, you can also hear the skirl of Blind Gaudencio’s mazurka, I mean the one he will hardly ever play, the forbidden mazurka, well, not quite forbidden but the closest thing to it.
“Shall we play another game of chess?”
“If you like.”
Robín Lebozán takes a while to get to sleep, this has been going on for some time now, sometimes he wakens up at two or three in the morning, he lies awake and takes a long time to nod off, there are days when he sees dawn break.
Mazurka for Two Dead Men Page 26
