The City of Palaces (12 page)

“May we sit for a moment, Miguel?” she asked.

“Of course,” he said. He led her to a marble bench and wiped it with his handkerchief. He pointed out that the bench was a gift of the undertaker Eusebio Gayosso.

“Ah,” she said. “I always wondered about the philanthropist who donated the benches to the park. Now I will never be able to look at them again without thinking of tombstones.”

“They were not here when I was a boy,” he said. “Nor the wrought iron gazebos and fences. The park was not so grand then.”

“Did you come here very often?” she asked, hoping to engage him in a rare discussion of his boyhood.

“When I was a school boy I spent many indolent afternoons here with my friends eating bags of sweets we bought at the Dulcería de Celaya,” he replied, his eyes softening with remembrance. “We would sit here and flirt with the girls.” He smiled, patting her hand. “By that I mean we would steal glances at them as they passed and hope against hope that one of them would look back.”

“I'm sure they did, for you.”

He was silent for a moment. “Back then, my schoolmates called me
güerito
for my green eyes and fair skin, or sometimes
el gachupín
. I didn't mind the first, but the second was a fighting word.”

She nodded. The word was the insult term for a Spaniard. “That was cruel.”

“Cruelty is like breath to boys,” he observed. “But being called that made me feel different, unpleasantly so. I not only looked unlike my friends, I didn't even sound like them. No doubt you have noticed.”

“Yes, your accent is that of a Spaniard.”

“I acquired it first from my father. He considers himself
puro mexicano
, but even after decades of living here in México he sounds as if he's just stepped off the boat from Cadiz. And, of course,” he went on, “living in Europe I was more likely to encounter Spaniards than Mexicans. Speaking to them only hardened my own accent. Even as a boy it was pronounced enough to be a source of amusement to my friends, who teased me about it.”

“I think your accent is charming,” she said.

“Thank you,” he said. “Most people find it grating. In any event, I felt like an outsider, but then I noticed that my appearance and accent also had their advantages when I was with my friends in the park. They could sometimes slow the step of the girls in the Alameda as they passed us and earn me a smile.” He took her hand and smiled. “Silly now to think of how I proud I was when that happened, but it was the first power I had ever known in a life lived in the shadow of my father's fame.”

“Did you tell him?”

“Yes,” he said, his smile fading. “He said, ‘You amuse yourself on the site of where the Inquisition burned the innocent for no other reason than that they refused to partake of the venality and ignorance of the church.' After that, my accomplishment in getting a girl to look at me seemed quite petty.”

“That seems rather unkind,” she ventured.

“He did not intend unkindness,” Miguel replied. “My father is a man who loves humanity but who has small use for actual human beings. That is simply his way. I think I may be the only person in the world he loves. Certainly, he is the only person in the world who knows me fully and, knowing me, accepts me.”

The shadow of his sadness fell between them like a cloud crossing the sun. She had not pressed him again about the source of his melancholy and he had not been any more forthcoming.

“Come,” he said. “This reminiscing has made me hungry for the sweets of my childhood. Let me take you to the Dulcería de Celaya for their
suspiros
and
camotes
.”

W
hen Miguel sent word his father had died, Alicia's first thought was,
Now he is alone with his secret
. She had immediately written a letter expressing her sympathy and asking if she might attend his father's funeral service. His return note thanked her and told her his father had requested no service. Ten days had passed. He had not called on her and her discreet inquiries revealed that he had not been to see his patients either. That morning she had written a second note, the one she held, expressing her concern for his well-being, but even as she wrote it she felt a growing sense of dread. She decided to deliver it herself.

La Niña was scandalized. “It is not customary for the woman to chase after her suitor because he fails to appear for tea.”

“I worry that his father's death has unsettled him.”

“Of course it has unsettled him, but if he is like most men, he grieves in the cantinas and the brothels and neither is any place for you. Leave it, Alicia. He will return.”

“He is not like most men,” Alicia replied.

“Your faith in his virtue is touching,” her mother said dryly.

“It's not his virtue that concerns me,” she said, “but his sorrow. His father was his only family. He must feel completely alone now. I only want to assure him that he is not.”

“Really, Alicia, you sound like a lovelorn child,” La Niña said. “Do you want to repel him? Let him be.”

H
er mother's words gnawed at her as the dirt roads gave way to the cobblestone streets of an old middle-class enclave in the impoverished
colonia
. Her inexperience with the ways of courtship often left her doubtful about the nature of their relations. His visits were relaxed and they spoke comfortably of his work and her charities, but the very amicability of their meetings seemed to imply friendship only. She asked her sisters whether she should behave differently toward him now that he was her suitor.

“Well, sister,” Nilda told her, “your face is not really suited to the virgin's blushes is it? I suppose you could try some business with a fan, although at your age it might just look as if you were swatting at flies. I always told my own daughters to let the man do all the talking, but mother says you blabber away when he comes to visit, so it's too late for that. Next time he comes, put on your best jewels, dear, and try to talk less.”

Leticia suggested she take him into the garden and strike poses among the rose bushes and the lavender. “Let him imagine you as a flower,” she said. “You might want to start wearing a veil when he visits.”

“You could play the piano for him. You do that beautifully,” Eulalia suggested. “If that fails, low lights and stronger drink than tea might inspire him.”

She dismissed these stratagems as absurd because each required her to pretend she was someone other than she was and, more relevantly, someone other than Miguel knew her to be. In the end, she applied perhaps slightly more perfume and sat away from the harshest light. She reminded herself that friendship was also a precious form of affection and took pleasure in looking at his strong body and handsome face.

T
he carriage came to a stop before a two-story building painted a faded rose. The driver, Alfredo, climbed down and helped her out. In the past, when she had come for Miguel to take him with her on her charitable rounds, he had awaited her outside. She, of course, had never entered his apartment, but Alfredo, who had delivered her first note of condolence to him, knew where he lived.

“His habitation is on the second floor,” Alfredo said. “I will take you there.”

She followed him through an iron door that led into a small whitewashed foyer and up a tiled staircase bordered with a wrought iron railing. On each step was a clay pot of red geraniums, which received light from an opening in the ceiling.

They came to a door just off the staircase. The driver banged his fist on it and called, “Señor Doctor, it is Alfredo from the house of the Gaviláns. I have come with Doña Alicia. She wishes to speak to you. Please, sir, out of courtesy to the gracious lady, open the door.”

Decisive footsteps crossed the floor within and then Miguel stood before her in a collarless shirt and dark trousers. She smelled alcohol on his breath, but his green eyes were clear and alert. He was freshly shaved and his thick chestnut hair was perfectly groomed except for a stray lock that fell on his forehead. He had never looked so handsome, she thought. But he was also very pale and beneath his eyes were the dark circles of sleeplessness.

“Alicia,” he said thickly. “What are you doing here?”

Her heart sank—her mother had been right. He had merely been grieving in the solitary way of men. She felt like a fool.

“I was concerned for you,” she said. “I'm sorry to have disturbed you.” She touched Alfredo's arm. “We will go now.”

“No,” Sarmiento said. “Please. Won't you come in?”

The driver tried to enter before her, but she placed her hand on his shoulder and said, “Wait in the carriage.”

Alfredo, aghast, said, “Doña Alicia, you are an unmarried woman. You cannot be alone with this gentleman in his habitation.”

“The gentleman is my friend,” she answered, “and he has suffered the loss of his father. What we have to say to each other must be said privately.”

“But La Niña, what will she say?”

“I will deal with my mother,” Alicia replied.

“Sir?” the driver beseeched Sarmiento.

“I will leave the door partly open and you can wait here. If you hear anything that seems even slightly amiss, you have my permission to enter.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Miguel stepped aside. “Doña, my humble house is your house and I am at your service.”

She entered. The apartment was a single room divided by an arch. In the front was a sofa and matching chair upholstered in horsehair; between the couch and chair was a lacquered black Chinese trunk inlaid with mother-of-pearl. Along one wall was a long table covered with carefully arranged stacks of books, journals, notebooks, medical apparatus, and a brass microscope. The walls were hung with anatomical charts of parts of the body. Through the arch she saw a narrow bed, a large plain pine armoire, and a stand with a brass basin and pitcher set. Everything in the apartment was immaculately clean and orderly. It was like looking into his mind, she thought, and then, on the Chinese trunk, she noticed a bottle of brandy, a glass, and a revolver.

“Would you like some tea?” he asked. “Or a glass of Jerez? There is a bottle somewhere.”

“No, thank you,” she said, removing her hat. “May I sit?”

“Of course,” he said, leading her to the couch. He remained standing, looking uncertain. “I apologize for my dwelling. I live plainly, a habit from my student days.”

“Your rooms are charming,” she said. Indicating the brandy and the revolver, she added, “I feel that I have interrupted you.”

He sat beside her and picked up the revolver. “This was my father's gun. He carried it with him when he accompanied Don Benito Juárez in the war against the French invaders. I found it beneath his pillow when I discovered his … his body. An old soldier's habit, I suppose, although he was no soldier, really. He was a scientist, a healer, a democrat.” He paused to collect himself. “In every way, thoroughly admirable. I will never be even half the man he was.” Without asking her permission, he poured brandy into the glass and drank it.

“You told me once he was the only person who knew you fully and that you were the only person he loved.”

Miguel sighed. “Yes. It is strange to feel orphaned at my age, and yet I do. No one will ever know me as my father did.”

“We are all known completely to the one who created us, Miguel,” she said. “I am often comforted by the words of the psalm that say, ‘Even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as day, for darkness is as light with you.'”

“I am an atheist, Alicia, as you know. My darkness is not illuminated by a supernatural light.” He swallowed some brandy. “That is why I have decided.” He faltered, then drew a deep breath. “I have decided I can never marry. I cannot bring my darkness into your life.”

“Is that why you have not been to see me?” she asked softly. “Because you wish to break things off between us?”

“I do not wish it,” he said. “I have no choice.”

They sat for a moment and then she placed her hand on his. “I will accede to your decision, but not without knowing why. This darkness of yours, tell me its cause and let me understand so we can part as friends.”

He finished the brandy. He sighed convulsively, as if he were about to sob, grasped her hand, and said, “When I finish, you will not wish even to be my friend. Nonetheless, I will tell you so that you will know you are blameless.”

He stood up and paced the floor as he spoke. “My youth was not a credit to my family. I was heedless and self-indulgent, a disappointment to my father in my studies and in my deportment. I was expelled from the medical school for drinking and gambling, but even that disgrace was not enough to change my ways. I persisted in dishonoring my father's name.” He paused for a moment and when he continued, his voice was filled with shame. “There was a girl, Paquita, employed as a maid in my father's house. I led her to believe that I was in love with her to lure her into my bed. After I had taken her virginity, I turned my back on her. A sordid story,” he said, glancing at her, “but not an uncommon one for men of my class. In this case, however, she became pregnant with my child. When she told me, I panicked. I persuaded her it was best for both of us that the child not be born. I believed that my medical training would be sufficient to—” He stopped in his tracks. He looked at her. “I have never told this to anyone. Only my father knew.”

Unsteadily, she said, “Please, continue.”

“I promised her if she let me abort the child I would marry her. I took her to a room at a filthy inn to perform the procedure. But I had vastly overestimated my ability. She began … to bleed. She bled and bled. I could not stop the hemorrhaging.”

“Oh, the poor child!”

“I ran through the streets covered with her blood to my father's house. I told him everything and begged him to come and save her life. He came, but too late. She and the child—I could see it would have been a boy—were dead.”