The Frozen Heart (94 page)

I’m simply parched
, Julio whispered to himself sarcastically as he watched them move towards the buffet table,
I’m simply parched
. It was the sort of pretentious expression he might expect to find in a cheap novel. Well, I’m not going to ask you to dance, Angélica, he promised himself, and he did not. She didn’t seem to notice.

Nineteen fifty-five was Angélica Otero Fernández’s year, not so much because of her growing popularity among the men who flocked around her, as for her skill in attaining the one prize she sought, the prize she had been thinking of since that spring afternoon in 1947 when she had entertained herself working out how old Julio Carrión González would be when she turned twenty. Gustavo Aguirre, whom she did not much like, was only the first of her suitors and did not even last until March. His successor, whose name was Emilio Alvar, and who had an important position at the Ministry for Public Works, proved much more effective.

‘Are you going to marry him?’ Julio asked one afternoon in May.

‘Why? Would it bother you?’

‘No.’ He rearranged the papers on his desk. ‘I’d just like some advance notice so that I can find a replacement. But . . .’ He looked at her and changed his tone. ‘You’re very young, Angélica, I’ve know you since you were a girl, and I’m not sure that a forty-year-old widower with two children is a good match for you.’

‘He’s just turned thirty-nine,’ she interrupted him, ‘and I’ve always liked older men.’

Julio, who was only six years younger than Alvar, fell silent; he felt a sudden urge to ask her to marry him. But he did not ask because he thought, and it was not the first time that the thought had occurred to him, that she would never accept. He was attracted to Angélica, he had always found her attractive, but she was not the sort of woman he was looking for, straightforward and un-problematic, and he was not much interested in exploring other variants of the feminine psyche.

‘He wants to get married,’ she said, as though she could read his mind, ‘but I’m not so sure because . . . I don’t know, he asks too many questions.’

‘About what?’

‘About you.’

She looked at him calmly, then turned and walked out of the office, leaving her boss to stew in his uncertainty for the rest of the afternoon.

‘What did you mean earlier?’ Julio tried to sound less curious than he felt.

Angélica looked at him with all the innocence she could muster: ‘Earlier? When?’

Julio balled his fists and took a deep breath.

‘Don’t play games with me, Angélica, it doesn’t suit you.’

Angélica simply laughed.

‘Oh, I get it . . . I don’t think it’s anything important.’ They had reached the front door; Angélica looked out and waved to someone outside. ‘Look, there he is, that red car over there.’ Julio saw him and waved, forcing himself to smile. ‘Well, it’s normal that he would want to ask me questions, isn’t it? I mean, he wants to marry me . . . He knows I’ve known you since I was a little girl and he’s interested, that’s all, about how we met and when and why, what made me think of asking you for a job . . .’ Emilio had begun to beep his horn. ‘I’m sorry, Julio, I have to go . . . We’ve got tickets for the theatre. I’ll see you tomorrow.’

That afternoon, she didn’t kiss him goodbye, she simply left, dashing across the road and slipping into the passenger seat of the red car, which, a moment later, merged into the traffic, leaving Julio alone on the pavement. It took him a moment to react, but he recognised the metallic taste that filled his mouth, the hollow sensation in his limbs, the old, dazzling brightness blinding him. Suddenly, almost treacherously after so many years, Julio Carrión González was scared.

That night, he had a date with a girl, but he did not even take the trouble to cancel it. He wandered the streets for a long time, trying to think. ‘Money, I could offer her money. No, I could fire her, I could talk to Emilio, tell him she’s a slut, tell him she’s seeing someone else, I don’t know, I can get witnesses, I can threaten her, I can say she stole from me, put a wad of notes in her handbag, threaten her with prison . . .’

Four months later, as he was walking with her down the Calle Marqués de Urquijo and realised that he was going to marry her, Julio Carrión González remembered all this, and he remembered what had happened on the morning after that dark night of fear, that long sleepless night that left him with his nerves on edge. When he ordered her into his office, he completely forgot what he had intended to say, the harsh tone he had planned to adopt.

‘So?’ Angélica put her weight on one hip, held her chin a little too high, and looked down at him behind the desk. ‘You wanted to talk to me?’

‘Yes.’ That was all he managed to say before he got to his feet and strode over to her, gripped both of her hands in his left hand, and held her chin with his right, his fingers digging into her cheeks, forcing her mouth into the caricature of a kiss.

‘You’re a piece of shit, Angélica, do you hear me? That’s all you are, a piece of shit.’ She stared at him, but made no attempt to struggle free of his grasp. ‘You’re an insect, I can crush you any time I feel like it, do you understand me? You think you’re so clever, Angélica, but you don’t know who I am, you don’t know what kind of friends I have, you haven’t the slightest fucking idea of what could happen to you if I decided to pick up that phone, is that clear?’ He waited for her to nod, for her to weakly mumble ‘yes’, to see a flash of fear in her eyes, but she didn’t move. ‘Is that clear?’

And, at that moment, Angélica Otero Fernández brought her mouth close to the mouth that was raining abuse on her, and without knowing how, without knowing why, Julio Carrión González kissed her, and went on kissing her, he let go of her arms because he needed his to embrace her, needed his hands to touch her. He ran his hands over her body and felt a strange tingling in his fingertips as though he already knew this skin, this flesh he was tasting for the first time with growing passion, which she frustrated at just the right moment.

‘Enough.’ Angélica guided the uninvited hand from her bra and took a step back. She looked Julio Carrión in the eye, grasped the hands that had recently imprisoned her own and placed them on her waist. ‘I have to go . . . I’ve got a lot of work to do.’

‘Angélica . . .’ he whispered.

‘Yes?’ Her voice was serene, charming.

He could think of nothing to say and she opened the door to leave, but before she did so she looked at him, and her eyes bore that same look of triumph they used to have when he agreed to do the Russian trick.

‘I’ve split up with Emilio,’ she announced a week later. ‘That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?’

Julio simply smiled, but some time later he found her and invited her to dinner. She told him she couldn’t come. ‘I’m busy,’ she said, without elaborating, but she suggested another date. Over dinner, Julio Carrión confirmed what he already suspected: Angélica was not going to create any problems for him as long as he was prepared to resolve the main issue.

‘Let’s see if I’ve got this right, Julio . . .’ Angélica interrupted his long-winded explanations. ‘You’re suggesting I take the place of Rosi, and order two dozen roses - red roses, I think - for myself once in a while?’

‘No, that’s not it at all, Angélica.’ He found it difficult to stay calm, and had to resort to cliché to mask his true intentions. ‘You know perfectly well what kind of woman you are, and what kind of man I am.’

‘That’s exactly why I said it . . .’ As she spoke she shook her head from time to time. ‘It’s unbelievable, really! You’re a very intelligent man, Julio, but you never seem to understand anything.’

‘OK.’ The offended party fixed his eyes on the tablecloth. ‘Forget I said anything.’

But he knew what he had said, and Angélica - who flung her arms around his neck as they left the restaurant and kissed him with the wild abandon she had, until now, reserved for his office - also knew. All summer, things ebbed and flowed - from passion to indifference, bravado and more bravado, then indifference, then passion - until their relationship entered its most delicate stage in September, by which time they could swing from boiling point to tepid in a heartbeat. Angélica knew precisely the right moment to invite him for a drink on the terrace of the Café Rosales, where she launched into the carefully rehearsed speech that began ‘Listen, Julio, you may be rich, but you’re not respectable’.

‘Shall we get the bill?’ she said, when she tired of looking at herself in the mirror of his silence.

‘You get the bill. You invited me, remember?’

‘You’re right.’

He had said it only to make her blush and, having obtained this meagre satisfaction, he got up, found the waiter, paid the bill, then went back and took her in his arms.

‘Are you walking home?’ For the first time in months he was in complete control and he decided to use the situation to his advantage. ‘It’s such a beautiful night . . .’

‘Why are you asking me that?’

‘I was going to suggest I walk with you. If you don’t mind, that is.’

‘No, of course I don’t mind.’

As they walked along the Calle Marqués de Urquijo, Julio already knew that he would marry her. It had nothing to do with Angélica’s impeccably marshalled arguments. He had already known he would marry her sooner or later, and why not sooner? These were the rules of the game, and he had already rebuffed too many pushy mothers, too many daddy’s girls. Romualdo, who was a lecher and had already fathered three children, had warned him that people were starting to talk. There were gossips who insinuated that he was homosexual, or had some incurable social disease, that his tastes ran to the perverse. Weddings bring peace, his father had always said. Angélica still wanted to marry him, she had always wanted to marry him, and her boldness in saying it to his face was not only admirable, it also cleared up of a number of obstacles. If he chose Angélica, he would be spared the trouble of a courtship. If he chose Angélica, he would be marrying into the aristocracy - the family might be destitute and full of undesirable elements, but it was unarguably aristocratic. No one would raise the slightest objection to the marriage, and he found Angélica attractive, had always found her attractive, he had always understood her and she was a lot like him. He knew that now.

By the time they arrived at the Calle Princesa, he had already decided to marry her, but he did not tell her until they reached the Glorieta de San Bernardo. As they stood, waiting for the traffic lights to change, he gently put his hand on her shoulder and asked:

‘What will your mother say?’

Angélica gave him a wary, uncertain look.

‘What will my mother say about what?’

‘What will she say when she finds out you’re marrying me?’

She smiled, a smile that blossomed slowly into something so exquisite that it was overpowering.

‘Oh,’ she said, ‘are we getting married ?’

‘Of course,’ Julio smiled, ‘I thought you knew that.’

‘No. You haven’t even asked me.’

Pedestrians had begun to cross the street, but neither of them moved. ‘Angélica, will you marry me?’

‘Yes.’ The traffic light had changed to amber, to red, then to green again by the time they had stopped kissing. ‘I expect my mother will pretend to be happy. You’re a good catch.’

On 5 May 1956, Don Julio Carrión González married Señorita Angélica Otero Fernández at the church of Santa Bárbara in Madrid; Doña Mariana Fernández Viu was maid of honour. Neither then, nor at any time later, did she dare say a word about this wedding, every detail of which was planned, arranged and controlled by the bride, who not only chose a wild silk dress designed by Cristóbal Balenciaga, but also chose the date, the flowers, the music, the guests, the menu for the reception, the bridegroom’s suit, her own engagement ring and, of course, the conditions of the marriage contract.

‘Maybe we should go back to my place for a siesta,’ Julio would suggest from time to time, after they had lunched with Eugenio, or in Torrelodones with his father. He had already introduced her to the wives of a number of government ministers, and, having seen the diamond on the fourth finger of Angélica’s right hand, everyone at Carrión Construction knew they were engaged.

‘Absolutely not, Julio!’ She shook her head. ‘We couldn’t possibly! You go and have a nap at your place and I’ll go to mine. You know it’s for your own good. Can’t you wait four little months?’

‘No, I can’t wait . . .’ In the taxi, he would fondle her, squeeze her, paw her, and she would let him, right up until the moment when she would stop, always perfectly calculating the time, the risks and the benefits.

He could not wait, but he waited all the same. What he needed was to marry a pretty little virgin from a good family and that was precisely what awaited him at the altar. It would also be good for him to give her two or three children, but Angélica knew what was good for her, and waited almost a year before she got pregnant. By the time she told him the news, she had become something of an expert in the contraceptive properties of certain sins that are never confessed and her husband, who had by now spent almost twelve months far from his subterranean pleasures, smiled when she asked him whether it had been worth the wait. At the time, the only thing beyond Angélica’s control was the reason for that smile, because she could never have imagined that what Julio loved most about her in bed was precisely what he loved most about her anywhere else in the house. Through his long, steep, dangerous ascent to glory, Julio Carrión González had considered everything except whether he had someone to love him. It was when he realised how much his wife loved him that he appreciated that fact. And he grew accustomed to Angélica’s love, her passionate, unconditional devotion. Her love became vital to him, later it would be indispensable, until he missed it in every woman with whom he cheated on her, while he, in turn, learned to love her after his fashion.