The Frozen Heart (113 page)

‘You don’t know the first thing. This is all just fantasy ...’

‘No,’ I cut him off, ‘I’m telling the truth. There are still people in Torrelodones who remember her — Encarnita, who runs the chemist shop, for example. You remember her, she came to Papá’s funeral. I went to see her and she told me about Grandma Teresa — “she was a dyed-in-the-wool Red, but she was a good woman”, that’s what she said. She knew her quite well, she went to the school Teresa taught in and she was great friends with Teresita. They were the same age.’

‘Teresita?’ My brother’s composure deserted him again.

‘Oh, shit! Of course, that’s something else you don’t know ... I paused to savour the moment. ’You see, Papá wasn’t an only child. He had a younger sister, Teresa Carrion González, born in 1925. I’ve got a copy of her birth certificate, if you’re interested, I got it from the register office in Torrelodones. And I have a photo of the two of them together, her and Grandma and the other kids from the school in Torrelodones. Encarnita has kept it all these years, her daughter made three copies for me, Teresita would have been ... I don’t know, about twelve at the time. There’s no mention of her in Papá’s papers, no photographs, no letters, nothing. I don’t know whether she died during the war or afterwards, she might even still be alive. But Papá certainly never tried to track her down, nor did his father. He doesn’t even mention her name in the letters he wrote home from Russia ...’

‘But...’ Angelica was now completely lost. ‘That can’t be right, because that little girl ... well, she must have lived with him, mustn’t she? I mean, she was ...’

‘... part of his family?’ My sister looked at me and nodded. ‘Of course. They lived under the same roof until Grandma Teresa left her husband in June 1937. Teresita went with her, but Papá didn’t. Encarnita said she never really understood why, because Papá was very fond of Manuel, that was the name of Grandma Teresa’s lover, the man she went off with. He was a teacher too, a socialist and an amateur magician. He was the one who taught Papá to do magic tricks.’

‘So ...’ Rafa smiled, ‘as well as being a teacher, a socialist and a republican, Grandma Teresa was a slut?’

‘No more than your sister,’ I smiled too, ‘who’s sitting right here.’

‘Can you stop talking about that, Alvaro?’ My sister did not see the funny side. ‘Anyway, it’s not the same.’

Rafa came to her rescue. ‘Things were different back then. There must have been a terrible scandal. I mean, imagine it, a married woman committing adultery, abandoning her son ... It must have been humiliating! I’m not surprised Papá didn’t want to have anything more to do with her.’

‘I am. Because she didn’t abandon him, he was the one who chose not to go with her ...’

I forced myself to stop, because my brother’s little smiles were beginning to infuriate me and I didn’t want to get angry until I was ready. ‘Back then, what Grandma Teresa did was no more or less serious than it is nowadays. Even then, divorce existed in Spain, Rafa, and so did civil marriage. Divorced women were entitled to live on their own or even remarry without losing custody of their children ...’ I turned to my sister. ‘That’s why I compared it to your situation, Angelica. I wasn’t trying to criticise you, honestly, I mean, how could I given the position I’m in right now ...’ I paused again, turned back to Rafa and stared at him. ‘It’s not like things changed with the republic. And I’m sure Grandpa Benigno was thrilled that Franco won, because he was a complete fascist and a sanctimonious prig. You only have to read the letters he wrote when Papá was in Russia. He couldn’t get enough of the executions or religious processions, and maybe, as far as he was concerned, his wife was nothing but a slut and a communist, maybe he thought he was well rid of her ... But it couldn’t have been just that, I mean, he wasn’t like that with his son ...’ Fuck you, Rafa, I thought, before saying, ‘Because Papá enrolled in the Socialist Youth Movement a month and a half after his mother walked out.’

‘That’s a lie!’ Rafa got to his feet and came towards me, his hands quivering with rage like those of a bad actor playing a Spanish nobleman of the Golden Age whose honour has been besmirched. ‘You’re a liar, Alvaro! I don’t believe you.’

‘Come on, Rafa, sit down. It’s not a lie, it’s the truth. I know because I found his membership card. I’ll make a colour photocopy for you. One side is red with a five-pointed star and JSU in capital letters, and on the other side there’s a photo of Papá when he was fifteen, his full name, date of birth, all the usual stuff ...’

My brother did not move. He had never been a nice person but now, ridiculous as it seemed, I pitied him.

‘What exactly was the JSU?’ Angelica saved the situation, her voice sounding like a frightened puppy.

‘It was an amalgamation of the Socialist Party and Communist Party youth groups. They merged shortly before the war.’

‘And Papá was a member?’ She sounded as though she was no longer sure of anything.

‘Yes. He was also a member of the Falange Española de las JONS. There was another identity card, issued in 1941. Late June, to be precise, he obviously liked joining things in the summer ...’ I smiled, but my brother and sister were stony faced. ‘Papá became a Falangist when he joined the Blue Division. They obviously knew nothing about his past, I suppose the JSU must have burned their archives to protect their members before the fascists marched into Madrid. There’s something else you didn’t know.’

‘I didn’t,’ Angelica said

‘Neither did I.’ Rafa walked back to his chair, but the confidence was gone from his voice. ‘I suppose it’s not really that strange. Papá just changed his mind, that’s all.’

‘Of course he did, that was something else he was really good at. He was so attached to having more than one opinion that he never gave up on any of them, he just shifted from one to the other, careful never to get rid of his membership cards in case they would prove useful in the future. He kept them both all his life. I found them in a little velvet pouch. They were with his mother’s letter and a photo of Papá taken in Paris in 1947 with a beautiful woman, Paloma Fernández Muñoz, another relative, she was Grandma Mariana’s second cousin and the great-aunt of the woman I’m seeing, because I’m sure Julio has told you that the woman I’m having a relationship with is our cousin.’

‘But ...’ Rafa was still worried about what I’d said first, ‘Papá never spent any time in ...’

‘... in Paris? Of course he spent time in Paris. He lived there for over two years, from late 1944 until April 1947. When he realised the Germans were going to lose the war, he deserted and, instead of coming back to Spain, he stayed in France. He thought the Allies would invade Spain, topple Franco and restore democracy, everyone thought so at the time. It seemed logical, it was what should have happened. So Papá dusted off his old JSU card, that way he could fit in with the Spanish exiles and go back with them in triumph.’

I stopped and looked from Rafa to Angelica; both were pale and struck dumb.

‘That’s how he met the Fernández family. They were from Madrid, and before the war they spent their summers in Torrelodones. The only surviving son in the family was a communist, but his brother and his brother-in-law - who were both shot near here, at the Cementerio del Este — had both been socialists and had been friends with Grandma Teresa. Ignacio Fernández had known her too, and one night in Paris, he recognised Papá in a café. He brought him home, and the family protected him, fed him, helped him get a job. When Papá decided to go back to Spain in 1947, they asked him whether he would oversee the sale of their lands and properties, because back in Spain they had been rich, but they had had to leave everything behind, when they crossed the border into France. So he agreed to help them, the way they had helped him, and he came back to Spain with powers of attorney signed by them. Then he robbed them of everything they had. Everything.’ I stared at my brother and he held my gaze. ‘They were difficult times, I grant you, but I think we are allowed to judge, Rafa, I think we do have the right to an opinion even if we didn’t live through those times.’

‘Shut up.’ The first time he said it, it was barely a whisper.

‘I don’t feel like shutting up,’ I said, ‘and I don’t think it would be good for you if I did, because there are a lot of things you need to know, and there are things I need to know too. For example, what did Papá tell you about the day Ignacio Fernández came round to our house in May 1977, with his granddaughter Raquel. And how do you think Papá met Grandma Mariana, and Mamá?’

‘Well ...’

‘Shut up, Angelica!’

‘I won’t shut up, Rafa.’ My sister staunchly met his gaze, then turned back to me. ‘Why do you ask? He didn’t really say much about it. He told us he met Grandma Mariana in Torrelodones because she used to spend the summer there, he said he helped her to sell off some of her property that belonged to her family and they split the profits. Then, later on, when she was older, Mamá went to him for help. Grandma Mariana wanted her to stay at home but she wanted a job, and he hired her as his secretary, they started going out together and ... But you know all this, don’t you?’ She was right, I did know this. ‘That’s what he told us. He said that when her family went to France, they left everything to Grandma Mariana, and now they wanted it all back, but they had no right...’

‘Of course,’ I murmured, ‘of course.’

I paused again, and for a moment I wondered whether all this was worth it, whether it would do any good. I was tired and I felt disgusted with myself, sickened by my father, his life, my family, everything. A lot of time had passed, and I had not even known these people. I was about to stop, to get up and say that none of it mattered. I needed to get out of this office, to breathe something other than this stifling air, to go back to Raquel and be with her. And I might have done it if I hadn’t seen my brother’s face, seen the way he was looking at me.

I went on, now, dispassionately.

‘That’s not how it was. Grandma Mariana kept everything for herself because she was the only one of the Fernández family who didn’t leave. When the war started, she was living in an apartment in Arguelles, but the building was destroyed in an explosion. Her uncle suggested she come and live with them near the Glorieta de Bilbao, and she stayed there even after they left. She kept a low profile, made sure that no one tried to take the place from her. A few months before Franco’s troops marched into Madrid, Carlos, her cousin Paloma’s husband, showed up around midnight. He was twenty-eight and a lieutenant in the Republican Army. He walked with a limp, and his right arm was paralysed, he’d been badly injured at the front in late 1936. All he wanted was somewhere to stay, somewhere he could get some sleep, have something to eat. He wasn’t armed, and there was no one else he could turn to, so he asked Mariana if he could stay the night. The next morning, she turned him in. The Falangists showed up and found him in bed, they dragged him out in his pyjamas, and put him in prison. He was charged with military insurrection, sentenced to death and executed — that way Grandma Mariana managed to ingratiate herself with the fascists, so that no one would bother her, and she could keep all these things that had never belonged to her.’ I turned to my sister. ‘So you see, it wasn’t Grandma Teresa who informed on people, it was Grandma Mariana. She thought she was so clever. But she hadn’t reckoned on Papá, Julio Carrion González, who was on his way to becoming a self-made man.’

‘Don’t say things like that, Alvaro ...’ Angelica clicked her tongue irritably. ‘The way you tell the story, you make it sound ... OK, the republicans had property confiscated, but it wasn’t theft, there were laws, judges, courts ... it was ... Well, it was one of the consequences of the war, the circumstances were exceptional. I mean, they weren’t there, they’d left everything behind, they’d given up their property ...’

‘No, Angelica, they hadn’t abandoned their property, they ran for their lives — and they were right to go. The only two men in the family who stayed were put up against a wall and shot.’

‘OK, but ... You can’t just talk as if it happened yesterday ...’ Her expression changed, as though she had finally found the line of reasoning she had been seeking. ‘If what you’ve said is true, what Grandma Mariana did was horrible, that poor man ... But what Papá did was different. He wasn’t a thief, Alvaro, everything he did was legal.’

‘Legal?’

I should have left as soon as I said this, because all the blood in my body had rushed to my face, I felt my ears burning, my throat was dry, my tongue was parched, and everything seemed tinged with orange — this office, the furniture, my brother, my sister, the whole world was on fire.

‘This whole fucking country was illegal, Angelica! Every single thing about it was unlawful, don’t you get that? The laws, the judges, the courts, the whole fucking thing.’

I felt a sudden blow to my back. I turned and saw Rafa, saw in his eyes the flames that were devouring me. ‘Shut up!’ He grabbed the collar of my shirt and I could feel his spittle on my face, his face pressed so close to me that it was as if he was going to kiss me. ‘Shut up, shut up, you fucking bastard, shut up right now.’

‘Get your hands off me.’ I struggled free of him and, perhaps unconsciously, I realised that, although he was bigger than me, I was stronger than him.

He stepped back, but he was still too close, and I could still feel this nameless heat, the flames dazzling now, they seemed to envelop everything, flaring higher, reaching an intensity I could not have imagined.

‘I’m sick of you,’ Rafa went on screaming insults flecked with spittle, ‘I’ve had it up to the back teeth with the spoiled little boy, the brains of the family, Mamá’s little fucking scientist. What the fuck do you know about the real world, Alvarito? What would you know about the price of anything? Fuck all, that’s what. You’re like a parasite, forever sponging off Papá, you were happy to spend his money, and now you come here with all this shit ...’ He paused for a moment and gave a bitter laugh, his face a rictus of contempt. ‘And the worst of it is he did more for you than he did for any of us, you were always his favourite, Papá’s little boy. “Álvaro is the brains of the family,” he used to say, “Álvaro is the best of you, he’s the only one like me.” You ungrateful bastard! Don’t you get it? Papá didn’t want you to suffer the things he suffered ... He didn’t want you to have to grow up penniless, and Jesus Christ, he knew what it was to be poor. You have no idea, Alvaro ... Did you ever wonder how much rent Papá shelled out for your apartment in Boston? I was the one who had to go to the bank to set up the standing order you got every month. Because poor little Alvaro couldn’t get a job like everyone else after university, oh no, he had to do a doctoral thesis, and then another one, because he got a grant so it was really important. Only proper scientists get to go there. But he couldn’t live in halls like everyone else. Oh no, poor Alvarito had to have his own apartment, and Papá had to pay for it...’