Confessions (8 page)

Someone approached along the steep path from Escaló, since the one from Estaron was impassable in wintertime. Finally. He got up, dusted off his habit and walked a few steps down the path, gripping the Sacred Chest. He stopped: perhaps he should open the doors for them as a sign of hospitality? Beyond the instructions of the father prior on his deathbed, he didn’t know how one closes up a cenobium with
so many years of history. The brothers from Gerri climbed slowly, with a weary air. Three monks. He turned, with tears in his eyes, to say goodbye to the monastery and started down the path to save the brothers from climbing the final stretch of the steep slope. Twenty-one years at Burgal, filled with memories, died with that gesture. Farewell, Sant Pere, farewell, ravines with the murmur of cold water. Farewell icy mountains that have brought me serenity. Farewell, cloistered brothers and centuries of chants and prayers.

‘Brothers, may peace be with you on this day of the birth of Our Lord.’

‘May the Lord’s peace be with you as well.’

‘We’ve already buried him.’

One of the brothers pulled back his hood. A noble forehead, surely of a professed father – perhaps the ecclesiastical administrator or the novice master – gave him a smile similar to the one the other Brother Julià had given him long ago. He didn’t wear a habit beneath his cape but a knight’s coat of mail. He was accompanied by Friar Mateu and Friar Maur from Gerri.

‘Who is the dead man?’ asked the knight.

‘The father prior. The deceased is the father prior. Didn’t they tell you that? …’

‘What is his name? What was his name?’

‘Josep de Sant Bartomeu.’

‘Praise the Lord. So you are Friar Miquel de Susqueda.’

‘Brother Julià is my name. I’m Brother Julià.’

‘Friar Miquel. The Dominican heretic.’

‘Supper is on the table.’

Little Lola had poked her head into the study. Father responded with a silent, peevish gesture as he continued to read aloud the articles of the founding charter, which were incomprehensible on the first reading. As if in response to Little Lola’s demand, ‘Now you read the rest.’

‘But the writing is so strange …’

‘Read,’ said Father, impatient and disappointed at having such a wishy-washy son. And Adrià began to read, in good mediaeval Latin, the words of Abbot Deligat, without
completely understanding them and still dreaming about the other story.

‘Well … The name Friar Miquel belongs to my other life. And the Order of Saint Dominic is very far from my thoughts. I’m a new man, different.’ He looked into his eyes, as the father prior had done. ‘What do you want, brother?’

The man with the noble forehead fell to the ground on his knees and gave thanks to God with a brief, silent prayer. When he crossed himself devoutly, the three monks followed suit respectfully. The man stood up.

‘It has taken me years to find you. A Holy Inquisitor ordered your execution for heresy.’

‘You are making a mistake.’

‘Gentlemen, brothers,’ said one of the monks accompanying him, possibly Friar Mateu, very alarmed. ‘We came to collect the key to Burgal and the monastery’s Sacred Chest and to escort Friar Julià to Gerri.’

Friar Julià, suddenly remembering it, handed him the Sacred Chest he was still clinging to.

‘It won’t be necessary to escort him,’ the man with the noble forehead said curtly. And then, addressing Brother Julià, ‘I’m not making a mistake: it is imperative that you know who has condemned you.’

‘My name is Julià de Sau and, as you can see, I am a Benedictine monk.’

‘Friar Nicolau Eimeric condemns you. He ordered me to tell you his name.’

‘You are confused.’

‘He has been dead for some time, Friar Nicolau. But I am still alive and can finally rest my ravaged soul. In God’s name.’

Before the horrified eyes of the two monks from Gerri, the last monk of Burgal, a new, different man, who had achieved spiritual serenity over years of effort, saw the dagger’s glimmer just before it was sunk into his chest in the increasingly uncertain clarity of the weak sun on that winter’s day. He had to swallow the old grudge in a single gulp. And, following the holy order, the noble knight, with the same dagger, cut off his tongue and put it inside an ivory box which was immediately
dyed red. And in a strong, decisive voice, as he cleaned the iron blade with dried walnut leaves, he addressed the two frightened monks:

‘This man has no right to sacred ground.’

He looked around him. Coldly. He pointed to the plot beyond the cloister.

‘There. And without a cross. It is the Lord’s will.’

Seeing that the two monks remained immobile, frozen with fear, the man with the noble forehead stood in front of them, practically stepping on Friar Julià’s inert body, and shouted contemptuously, ‘Bury this carrion!’

And Father, after reading Abbot Deligat’s signature, folded it up carefully and said touching a vellum like this makes you imagine the period. Don’t you think?

The inevitable consequence was me touching the parchment, now with five anxious fingers. Father’s hard smack to the back of my neck was painful and very humiliating. As I struggled not to release a single tear, Father, indifferent, put the loupe aside and stored the manuscript in the safe.

‘Come on, supper time,’ he said, instead of sealing a pact with a son who knew how to read mediaeval Latin. Before reaching the dining room I had already had to wipe away two furtive tears.

B
eing born into that family had indeed been an unforgivable mistake. And the worst had yet to happen.

‘Well, I liked Herr Romeu.’

Thinking that I was asleep, they were speaking a bit too loudly.

‘You don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘Obviously. I’m useless. And a drudge!’

‘I’m the one who makes sacrifices for Adrià!’

‘And what do I do?’ Mother’s sarcastic, hurt voice, and then, lowering her tone, ‘And don’t shout.’

‘You’re the one shouting!’

‘Don’t I make sacrifices for the boy? Huh?’

Thick, solid silence. Father’s brain cells scrambling to think.

‘Of course, you do too.’

‘Well, thanks for admitting it.’

‘But that doesn’t mean that you’re right.’

I picked up Sheriff Carson because I sensed that I’d need some psychological support. I even called Black Eagle over just in case. And, without the slightest rustle, I opened the door to my room just a sliver. It wasn’t the moment to make a dangerous excursion to the kitchen for a glass. Now I could hear them much better. Black Eagle congratulated me on the idea. Sheriff Carson was silent and chewed on what I thought was gum but turned out to be tobacco.

‘Fine, he’ll study violin, fine.’

‘You make it sound like you’re doing me a huge favour.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Fine, he’ll study violin, fine.’ I’ll admit that my mother’s imitation of Father was quite an exaggeration. But I liked it.

‘Well, if you’re going to act like that, forget the violin and have him devote his time to serious things.’

‘If you take away the boy’s violin, you’ll hear it from me.’

‘Don’t threaten me.’

‘Don’t you, either.’

Silence. Carson spat on the floor and I made a mute gesture to scold him.

‘The boy has to study real things.’

‘And what are real things?’

‘Latin, Greek, history, German and French. To start with.’

‘The boy is only eleven years old, Fèlix!’

Eleven years old. I think that earlier I said eight or nine; time slips away from me in these pages too. Luckily Mother was keeping track. Do you know what happens? I don’t have the time or the desire to correct all this; I write hurriedly, like when I was young, when everything I wrote I wrote hurriedly. But my urgency now is very different. Which doesn’t mean I write quickly. And Mother repeated: ‘The boy is eleven years old and already studies French at school.’

‘“J’ai perdu la plume dans le jardin de ma tante” isn’t French.’

‘What is it? Hebrew?’

‘He has to be able to read Racine.’

‘My God.’

‘God doesn’t exist. And he could be much better at Latin. I mean, he’s studying with the Jesuits!’

That affected me more directly. Neither Black Eagle nor Sheriff Carson said a peep. They had never gone to the Jesuit school on Casp Street. I didn’t know if it was bad or good. But, according to Father, they weren’t teaching me Latin well. He was right: we were working on the second declension and it was a total bore, because the other children didn’t even understand the concept behind the genitive and the dative.

‘Oh, now you want to pull him out of there?’

‘What do you think about the French Lyceum?’

‘No: the boy will stay at Casp. Fèlix, he’s just a child! We can’t be moving him from place to place as if he were your brother’s livestock.’

‘OK, forget I mentioned it. We always end up doing what you say,’ lied Father.

‘And sport?’

‘None of that. They have plenty of playground breaks at the Jesuits’, don’t they?’

‘And music.’

‘Fine, fine. But the priorities come first. Adrià will be a great scholar and that’s that. And I will find a substitute for Casals.’

Who was the substitute for Herr Romeu and in five pathetic classes had also got bogged down in vague explanations of German’s elaborately complex syntax and couldn’t find his way out.

‘That’s not necessary. Let him have a break.’

Two days later, in his study, with Mother sitting on the sofa I’d established my espionage base behind, Father had me come over and stand by his chair and explained my future in detail and listen well, because I’m not going to repeat this: that I was a clever lad, who had to take advantage of my intellectual ability, that if the Einsteins at school don’t realise what I’m capable of, he would have to go in personally and explain it to them.

‘I’m surprised that you weren’t more insufferable,’ you told me one day.

‘Why? Because they told me I was intelligent? I already knew I was. Like when you’re tall, or fat, or have dark hair. I never really cared much one way or the other. Like the masses and the religious sermons I had to sit through patiently, though they did affect Bernat. And then Father pulled a rabbit out of his hat: And now your real private German lessons with a real teacher will start. None of these Romeus, Casals and the like.’

‘But I …’

‘And French tutoring.’

‘But, Father, I want …’

‘You don’t want anything. And I’m warning you,’ he pointed at me as if with a pistol, ‘you will learn Aramaic.’

I looked at Mother, searching for some sort of support, but she had her gaze lowered, as if she were very interested in the floor tiles. I had to defend myself all on my own and I shouted, ‘I don’t want to learn Aramaic!’ Which was a lie. But I was looking at an avalanche of homework.

‘Of course you do,’ – in a low, cold, implacable voice.

‘No.’

‘Don’t talk back to me.’

‘I don’t want to learn Aramaic. Or anything else!’

Father brought a hand to his forehead and, as if he had an awful migraine, he said, looking at the desk, in a very quiet voice, look at the sacrifices I’m making so that you can be the most brilliant student Barcelona has ever seen and this is how you thank me? Exaggerated shouting. ‘With an “I don’t want to learn Aramaic”?’ And now shrieking, ‘Eh?’

‘I want to learn …’

Silence. Mother looked up, hopeful. Carson, in my pocket, stirred curiously. I didn’t know what I wanted to learn. I knew that I didn’t want them to fill my head with too much too early, weigh it down. There were a few anxious seconds of reflection: in the end, I had to improvise:

‘… Well, I want to be a doctor.’

Silence. Confused looks between my parents.

‘A doctor?’

For a few seconds Father visualised my future as a doctor. Mother did too, I think. I, who got dizzy just thinking about blood, thought I had blown it. Father, after a moment of indecision, brought his chair closer to the desk, preparing to return to his reading. ‘No: you won’t be a doctor and you won’t be a monk. You will be a great humanist and that’s that.’

‘Father.’

‘Come on, Son, I’ve got work to do. Go and make some noise with your violin.’

And Mother looking at the floor, still interested in the colourful tiles. Traitor.

L
awyer, doctor, architect, chemist, civil engineer, optical engineer, pharmacist, lawyer, manufacturer, textile engineer and banker were the foreseeable professions according to all the other parents of all the other children.

‘You said lawyer more than once.’

‘It’s the only major that you can do with humanities. But children are more likely to think of studying to be a
coal-merchant, painter, carpenter, lamplighter, bricklayer, aviator, shepherd, footballer, night watchman, mountain climber, gardener, train guard, parachute jumper, tram driver, fireman and the Pope in Rome.’

‘But no father has ever said, Son, when you grow up you will be a humanist.’

‘Never. I come from a very odd house. Yours was a bit like that too.’

‘Well, yeah …’ you said to me, like someone confessing an unforgivable defect who didn’t want to go into detail.

T
he days passed and Mother said nothing, as if she were crouched, waiting for her turn. Which is to say I started German lessons again, but with a third tutor, Herr Oliveres, a young man who worked at the Jesuits’ school but needed some extra money. I recognised Herr Oliveres right away, even though he taught the older children, because he always signed up, I suppose for the bit of money it brought, to watch over those in detention for tardiness on Thursday afternoons, and he spent the time reading. And he had a solid method of language instruction.

‘Eins.’

‘Ains.’

‘Zwei.’

‘Sbai.’

‘Drei.’

‘Drai.’

‘Vier.’

‘Fia.’

‘Fünf.’

‘Funf.’

‘Nein: fünf.’

‘Finf.’

‘Nein: füüüünf.’

‘Füüüünf.’

‘Sehr gut!’

I put the time I’d wasted with Herr Romeu and Herr Casals behind me and I soon got the gist of German. I was fascinated
by two things: that the vocabulary wasn’t Latinate, which was completely new for me and, above all, that it had declensions, like Latin. Herr Oliveres was amazed and couldn’t quite believe it. Soon I asked him for syntax homework and the man was flabbergasted, but I’ve always been interested in approaching languages through their intrinsic hard core. You can always ask for the time of day with a few gestures. And yes, I was enjoying learning another language.

‘How are the German classes going?’ Father asked me impatiently after the first lesson of the Oliveres period.

‘Aaaalso, eigentlich gut,’ I said, feigning disinterest. Out of the corner of my eye, not quite able to see him, I could tell that my father was smiling and I felt very proud of myself because I think that even though I never admitted it, at that age I lived to impress my father.

‘Something you rarely achieved.’

‘I didn’t have time.’

Herr Oliveres turned out to be a cultured, timid man who spoke in a soft voice, who was always badly shaven, who wrote poems in secret and who smoked smelly tobacco but he was able to explain the language from the inside out. And he started me on the schwache Verben in the second lesson. And in the fifth he showed me, very cautiously, like someone sharing a dirty photo, one of Hölderlin’s
Hymnen
. And Father wanted Herr Oliveres to give me a French test to see if I needed tutoring, and after the exam Monsieur Oliveres told Father I didn’t need French tutoring because I was doing fine with what they taught me at school, and then, there was that hour in between … How is your English, Mr Oliveres?

Yes, being born into that family was a mistake for many different reasons. What pained me about Father was that he only knew me as his son. He still hadn’t realised that I was a child. And my mother, looking down at the tiles, without acknowledging the contest Father and I were disputing. Or so I believed. Luckily I had Carson and Black Eagle. Those two almost always backed me up.