A Barcelona Heiress (25 page)

She looked into my eyes with a gaze that was tender yet firm.

“Don’t take what you have just seen so hard. This doesn’t change my feelings for you,” she declared as her farewell.

On my way back to Barcelona I struggled to control the feelings of disgust, loss, and emptiness which had overcome me.

* * *

It takes barely ten minutes to walk at a leisurely pace from the apartment where I live and work to the Barcelona Civil Government building, and my plan was to accompany Ángel Lacalle there on foot. But at nine thirty in the morning, when I had been reviewing some documents for a short while, my assistant Basilio burst into the office. He was all worked up.

“Boss, all hell’s broken loose!”

“What happened?” I asked.

“There was another attack last night. López Ballesteros just barely avoided being shot on his way back to the Civil Government building after the Marquess of Alfarrás’s party in Horta. The police have initiated a hunt and capture of all the city’s most disruptive elements, and it seems that there have already been several deaths.”

“Then Lacalle had better not show up around here.”

I called Isabel Enrich’s house. The countess had not yet returned. They told me that there was no way for me to reach her at her
masía
in San Martín de Provensals because there was no telephone there. After hanging up, I received a call. It was Beastegui.

“Have you heard about what happened?”

“Basilio was just telling me. How is the general?”

“Recovering from the scare. Fortunately it was too dark for the gunmen to find their target, and he only has a few scratches, but they could have pulled it off, and now we must employ every means at our disposal to keep this from ever happening again. As a precautionary measure we are going to detain every possible suspect. Have you managed to track down Lacalle?”

It was clear that Beastegui intended to arrest him as part of the indiscriminate manhunt he was undertaking. I was tempted to take revenge. What if I turned him in?

“Do you hear me, Vilar?” the impatient police chief boomed through the receiver.

“That man, Beastegui, is not a suspect.”

“What makes you say that?”

“I have good reasons. He represents the nonviolent wing of anarchism.”

“Lacalle is most certainly a suspect, and it would be unwise of you to protect him. Your obligation as a citizen is to inform me if you know of his whereabouts. Good day,” he barked at me.

“Good day, General.” I hung up and turned to my assistant.

“Basilio, let’s go.”

To reach my house from either the center or uptown there are two direct roads: Vía Layetana or La Rambla. Coming from San Martín de Provensals, the logical route for Isabel and
Lacalle’s car to take would be down the former. I placed Basilio at the intersection of this avenue and that of the port, while I stationed myself at Plaza de Medinaceli. To my surprise, two police officers soon appeared not far from where I was standing.

Almost an hour had passed when I saw my friend’s vehicle approaching. They had come down La Rambla. When the car slowed in front of me I spotted Lacalle in front next to the driver. I hurried up to the vehicle and shouted at them, “Don’t stop! Get out of here! Lacalle is in danger!”

The driver hit the gas and the car took off full speed toward Ciudadela Park. At that point the two officers, fuming, came running toward me.

* * *

When they released me from the police station I feared that my office was no longer a safe place to go. What could I do? I was torn by mixed emotions. Swallowing my bitterness, I flagged a taxi and made haste for Isabel Enrich’s mansion; the scent of the orange trees hit me as I got out. My friend was very agitated.

“What happened?” she asked as we sat down on the chaise longue.

I was succinct: “López Ballesteros and Beastegui are carrying out a sweep of the whole city, just as they had threatened to. The alleged attempt on the general’s life has given them the excuse they needed. The arrests are now indiscriminate, and I do hope I’m wrong, but I’m afraid this is going to lead to a few summary executions. Do you know where Lacalle is?”

“The driver called. Ángel realized they were coming for him and he’s gone into hiding. Will you help me to save him?”

“I’ve done too much already. Now it’s up to you and your lover to do something,” I spat, seizing the opportunity to make her pay for her duplicity.

At that moment I thought I saw tears welling up in her eyes. Her face had turned a burning crimson.

“My ‘lover.’ That’s going too far, Pablo. You know that I don’t like to belong to anyone. Such ties distress me. I can’t deny that I was captivated by Lacalle. The truth is that he’s irresistible, so upstanding and willful, yet so gentle at the same time. And with his romantic ideas about justice and the improvement of humanity …”

I grimaced.

“I’m sorry,” she said, changing her tone. “I’ll spare you from singing his praises. There was a strong mutual attraction. But he’s a leader, a soldier of his cause, and not the person destined to make me happy. My lifestyle and fortune, in addition, make him uncomfortable. These past weeks living with such luxuries only disquieted him. Sometimes I think that we came together only because we both knew that a future as a couple was an impossibility. Do you remember Flaubert’s words in
Sentimental Education
? ‘There are people who are like bridges. One crosses them and keeps going.’ I’m afraid that it’s my destiny to be little more than that for him.”

“Or him for you, right? Not to mention myself. I see that you have become a real opportunist. I had thought you more principled.”

“You’re also very important to me, though in a different way,” she whispered. “You always have been, and I shouldn’t like to lose you. I’ve been honest with you, I didn’t deceive you, and I gave myself to you, which makes you one of the most important people in my entire life, but I never wanted to take our relationship down a dead-end street.”

“You gave yourself to me while you were with another man.”

“That’s why I asked you not to ask me for things that I couldn’t give you. And that’s why I’m asking you to continue to help me. I want to find Lacalle before they kill him, and assist him. We might need to get him out of the city.”

I mumbled a reluctant “very well,” and asked her if she had any idea of where he might be.

“He asked to be dropped off in Plaza de Cataluña, and gave Manolo a note that I don’t understand.”

She handed it to me and I studied it carefully: “
Vi trovos min sur la montojovo.
”

“I think I know who can translate this. Can you lend me a car?”

I asked Manolo to stop the Daimler in front of the laundry on Muntaner Street. Inside, amid the vapor, was Floreal Gambús, in his usual state of feigned drowsiness. Stunned to see me, the seasoned anarchist jumped up.

“Vilar! What a pleasant surprise!”

“Floreal, the situation is critical. I need you to translate this for me.”

“
Vi trovos min sur la montojovo.
It’s in Esperanto.”

“What does it mean?”

“‘You will find me on the mountain path.’ What mountain do you think he’s talking about?”

* * *

Isabel’s driver sped up Montjuïc at a reckless speed. We took the Port Highway until we reached a spot where I asked him to stop.

“Follow me,” I instructed Isabel. “The driver should come too, just in case. And have him bring a lamp.”

“Manolo, grab it, and the revolver too—we might need it,” she ordered.

The three of us began our ascent on the narrow and dusty path winding through the bushes which I had walked through with Lacalle months before until we reached the half-hidden mouth of the Morrot cave. We stopped there.

“Hello?!” I shouted. “Anybody there?” In response came the barrel of a rifle, aimed right at me.

“You just go back the way you came.”

“Capitán? Do you remember me? I came with Lacalle. We got to talking.”

The man looked me up and down. By his side appeared another figure, even more menacing than the first.

“Aha. Yes. The writer. What do you want?”

“We know that Ángel is with you and we want to take him with us. They’re looking for him and he’s in danger here.”

“You’ll have to wait. Paco, keep an eye on them.”

A few minutes later he resurfaced and told us to follow him. He led the way as we wound through the maze of passages, grottos, and, from time to time, larger chambers in the caverns. It smelled of acid. Every few yards we came across individuals, each more unsavory than the last, wandering about or lying on cots. But this time I saw no children or old men. It looked like they had cleared the place out, leaving only the most dangerous elements to inhabit it. Finally we
came to a larger cave, lit with oil lamps and furnished with chairs, tables, and a rudimentary bed. And there was Lacalle.

“As you can see, my friends,” he said to us, “the hospitality shown to me by my esteemed captain of thieves is worthy of anything to be found at the city’s finest establishments.”

“Angel, General López Ballesteros has launched a draconian sweep of the city. You have got to flee Barcelona,” Isabel said.

I could sense a tension between them reflecting more than the situation in which we found ourselves, probably due to their paths crossing again in a place different from that sole space in which the two lovers had always dwelled.

“I don’t think so, my friend. I’ve been in hiding for too long. Now that I’ve come out I think it’s time to go downtown and face them,” Lacalle declared.

“An admirable position,” I remarked, “but not at all practical. If you do that there’s a very good chance that you will be carried out feetfirst. Be reasonable and pay attention to Isabel … What’s happening?”

Shots rang out from the entrance, and the lamps suddenly went out. I realized that we must have been followed. I grabbed Isabel by the arm.

“Let’s go, fast,” I said, and then turned to the anarchist. “Ángel, the car is on Casa Antúnez Road. Let’s meet there.”

“All right.”

Unable to see almost anything, the four of us started back, feeling our way along the walls, bumping into people running away from the shots and toward us. Even in the widest of the tunnels we struggled to stick to the walls, lest we became easy targets for any bullets shot our way. When we reached the exit we ran into two figures in the dark.

“Stop, police!” they shouted at us.

“Run!” I yelled.

But Ángel was already engaged in a fistfight with one of them as the other rushed to his partner’s aid. I held him back while Manolo, the driver, jumped in to help Ángel fend off his assailant. A shot echoed through the narrow passageway.

“Let’s go! Let’s go!” Ángel shouted as he kicked one of the officers in the stomach and Manolo knocked the other over the head with the lantern.

As fast as we could, tripping and thrashing our way through the brush, we bolted down to the road. Covered with scratches, bumps, and bruises, we dove into the car as Manolo got it started.

“Oh my God,” Isabel sighed, pointing to a large red stain on Ángel’s side. The anarchist’s face was colorless and his eyes were closing.

* * *

Crying babies and small children were making a racket. In the operating room on the third floor of his clinic Dr. Vidal Solares was extracting the bullet fired by one of the officers into Ángel Lacalle’s side. Isabel Enrich and I waited outside for the doctor to come out and, when he did, we gathered round him, pleading for information.

“I only take these kinds of risks for you, Countess.”

“And I appreciate it, Doctor. If we had taken this man to a public hospital, it would have been crawling with police informants, and he wouldn’t have stood a chance.”

“You can relax. He’ll live. His wounds aren’t critical. I hope that my involvement will serve to promote peace, and not just the contrary.”

“You can count on that.”

The doctor excused himself, stating that he was needed in his consulting room, which he had abandoned at once when he’d received word that Isabel had arrived with a wounded man and was asking for him. Isabel gazed at me fixedly while the nurses took Lacalle to his room.

“I’ll stay by his bedside. You understand, don’t you?”

“Of course, Isabel. Of course.”

“You must be tired,” she said, with something akin to affection. “My driver will take you home.”

“All right.”

I walked out onto the street where Manolo, who had still not fully dusted himself off after our adventure on Montjuïc, was waiting. He moved to open the rear door for me, but I stopped him.

“I’ll sit next to you.”

As we rumbled down the road toward Plaza de Medinaceli, the late afternoon wind had a reinvigorating effect on me, as if my mind were emerging from a fog.

“You really let those cops have it in the cave, eh Manolo?”

“Yes, but, were they cops, sir?”

“Don’t tell me you didn’t realize that.”

“Someone in my position, sir, does not fight the authorities—at least in any way that can be documented. It’s entirely different if, in the privacy of my room, or in the dark of the night, I
say or do certain things. But even then I do so following the maxim from the Gospels: ‘Let not thy right hand know what thy left hand doeth.’”

“I see that you have learned a thing or two from your employer, Manolo. I congratulate you for your actions.”

“Thank you very much, sir.”

“You were great, Manolo.”

“Very good, sir.”

Just then a motorcycle equipped with a sidecar pulled up alongside us. Without warning, the man in the rolling extension drew a pistol and began to fire. The first bullet blew off part of Manolo’s forehead, spattering blood and brains everywhere. The windshield shattered and the car began to weave, out of control. I felt a terrible pain in my shoulder before I passed out.

A voice roused me from my stupor in the darkness of an unknown room.

“Smile, my friend, smile!”

Rocabert. Barcelona society’s quintessential man about town was sitting on my bed trying to wake me, and I didn’t know why.