The Second Son: A Novel (15 page)

Hoffner was still with the knife, propping up and examining the underside of the skin, when Gardenyes said, “You spent time north of here?”

“Yes,” said Hoffner. Even the bones had been eaten.

“And now you’ve lost your son.”

The smile remained on Gardenyes’s face even as Hoffner looked over. Hoffner said, “Not yet, I hope.”

“That’s a bit cold.”

“Why? It’s what you wanted to hear me say.” Hoffner set the knife down. “I can guarantee you my son isn’t dead, if that’s what you’re thinking. As for lost, that would mean he was mine to lose. He wasn’t.”

Gardenyes studied Hoffner’s face before looking past him to a man standing by the door to the kitchen. Gardenyes motioned for two more and Hoffner brought out his cigarettes. Gardenyes took one and Hoffner lit it.

Gardenyes said, “Not every day you get to light the cigarette of a dead man.”

“You’d be surprised,” said Hoffner.

Mueller set the bottle down, took hold of his glass, and said, “They’re not going to kill you, Josep.” He drank.

“Oh, yes, they will. And when they do, Gabriel and Aurelio will tell them I was a criminal, too dangerous, and they’ll save themselves.”

Hoffner said, “And here I thought it was your anarchists who were running things now.”

“You’re in Spain,” said Gardenyes. “There are anarchists and there are anarchists.”

Hoffner lit his own. “I imagine you’ll be up on a cross at the time, begging for water?”

Gardenyes gave into a quiet laugh. “Up on a cross. That’s good. I’ve heard He was a bit wild, too. And dangerous. Although you wouldn’t know it to see Him these days.”

“If anyone’s actually looking for Him.”

Smoke trailed from Gardenyes’s nose. “Oh, they’re looking for Him. Trust me. There’s probably half a dozen nuns and priests hiding in plain sight just the other side of the road.”

“I must have missed them.”

“You can tell them by the little gold chains underneath the neckerchiefs. Ragged trousers, white shirts, little berets, and always with the loudest
¡Viva la República!
as they pass you by. But it’s that chain they can’t quite bring themselves to tear off. They’ll lie through their teeth as long as little Jesus is still dangling close to their hearts. Such a short walk from anarchist to savior, not that they’d know it.”

“And yet you’re convinced your men will betray you.”

“Betray me?” A wry if uncertain smile crossed Gardenyes’s eyes. “I’m the one who’s told them to do it. No reason all three of us should be dead.”

“Very noble.”

Again Gardenyes studied Hoffner. “You don’t sound convinced.”

“No, I probably don’t.” Hoffner took a pull and caught sight of Mueller out of the corner of his eye. It was nice to see Toby this uncomfortable.

Luckily Gardenyes seemed to be enjoying it. “I was thinking your balls must be sore—riding all the way down from Montjuïc—but here they are, on display.”

The plates arrived. The man from the kitchen pulled two spoons from his apron and was gone as quickly as he had come. Mueller sniffed warily at his food; Hoffner set his cigarette in the ashtray.

“It used to be they called me a criminal—a common criminal—because it was easier for them,” Gardenyes said. “Toss me in prison, exact their revenge in the name of order. It gave their law, meaningless as it was, a sense of moral purpose. There’s your God again, even if He was being used to strip away anything human from the people He was sent to protect.”

Hoffner was wiping the spoon with his thumb. “Am I in for the full soapbox, or can we water it down a bit?”

Gardenyes’s smile, if not completely lacking in cruelty, was at least genuine. “And I didn’t even mention the word ‘bourgeois.’ ”

“Don’t worry,” said Hoffner, “you’ve got time.” He was leaning over the bowl, smelling the freshness off the steam. “Monkfish,” he said. “And hake. We never get them this nice.” He filled his spoon and blew on the broth, then winced as he swallowed.

Gardenyes said, “Pimm liked this stew. Same as you. Odd for a cop and a criminal to have such similar tastes.”

Hoffner winced through another sip. “And why is that?”

Gardenyes shook his head easily. “I don’t know. You just don’t think they should. Easier if it’s all”—he thought for a moment—“what’s the German,
Ordnung
? Neat and clean.”

“And you like neat and clean?”

“Not at all.”

“So you knew Pimm?”

“Of course I knew Pimm. Now Radek. And one day it’ll be Little Franz taking over. The Berlin syndicates have always been so well organized, perfectly filed.
Ordnung
.”

“Not the Spanish way.”

“Not the anarchist way,” Gardenyes corrected. “For Pimm, crime was crime. Profit. Power. He made good money here in Spain. For us, it’s always been a tool of politics. A way to create something new. The crime—if in fact it’s crime at all—is just the means.”

“Like pulling a banker from his car.” Hoffner was sifting his spoon through the liquid.

“Exactly.” Gardenyes nodded at Hoffner’s bowl. “The clam,” he said. “Always start with the clam. Underneath.” Hoffner flipped everything on its end, and Gardenyes said, “Pimm thought I was a common criminal. I let him believe it. Radek probably thinks the same, although maybe he sees things differently, now that it’s an actual war.” Gardenyes looked over at Mueller. “What do you say, Toby? Is this different from the old days—stealing from a payroll, knifing a factory boss? Is it permitted now because we have rifles and wear uniforms? Or is crime still just crime with you Germans, whatever its purpose?”

Hoffner had the clam resting on the back of his tongue. It was smoky and soaked in garlic, its texture perfectly soft. It seemed unfair to swallow. He took a drink and set his spoon after a prawn. “You’re going to tell me there’s no such thing as good and bad people. Only people who are good and bad at different times.” He found the prawn. “If it’s going to be the entire manifesto, I’ll take some bread with it.”

Gardenyes waited and motioned to the man by the kitchen. He then tapped his ash to the floor. “Pimm said you saw crime differently, criminals differently. It’s why he liked you. I think he said it made you incorruptible.” Gardenyes took a pull. “Is that right? Are you incorruptible?”

Hoffner separated the prawn from the rest of the stew. It was fat and pink, and he ran the edge of his spoon through the meatiest part of it. The metal clanked on the bowl. “The clam was good,” he said. “Nice and soft.” He brought the wedge of the prawn to his mouth, smelled the brandy and salt on it, and slipped it in.

Gardenyes said, “Am I a criminal?”

“Not for me to say.”

“Was Pimm?”

Hoffner took another sip of the broth. “Of course.”

“And yet—”

“And yet nothing. He was a pimp and a thief. He supplied narcotics, he killed men—”

“And he was the only friend you had.”

Hoffner hated Pimm for this moment. Not that anything Gardenyes was saying was less than the truth, but such truths weren’t meant for a man like Gardenyes. Hoffner set the spoon in the bowl and took his cigarette.

Gardenyes said, “I don’t think he meant you were incorruptible in the noble sort of way.”

“No, he wouldn’t have.”

“But there was something—what did he say?—something you saw that was bigger than the crime, bigger than the idea of order itself. Something that was worth protecting.”

Hoffner took a pull and then crushed the cigarette in the ashtray. “Imagine Pimm saying that.”

“Well, maybe not exactly that.”

“Maybe not.”

“Still, one wonders what it was that had a cop seeing beyond crime and order. What it was that could be worth so much to him. That he’d willingly sacrifice so much for.”

Hoffner picked up the spoon. It was all he could do to keep his focus on the bowl.

“I’ve never been to Berlin,” said Gardenyes, his cruelty now effortless. “Never seen its streets, heard its crowds, smelled its air. Is it really as remarkable as people say?”

Hoffner clutched at the spoon as he stared into the bowl. “It was. Once.”

“How terribly sad that must make you.”

This was why the anarchists had taken the city so quickly, thought Hoffner. Men like this. Men who could conceive of nothing beyond Barcelona’s streets and her hills and the taste of her too bitter water. Hoffner wondered if Gardenyes would meet his own despair with the same resilience should his city ever cease to be what he needed her to be. Hoffner wondered this of himself.

The man arrived and Gardenyes said, “We’ll have some bread. Butter, if there is any.”

The man moved off and Hoffner set down the spoon. He needed a drink. He poured himself a glass and drank.

He said, “They won’t have the butter, will they?”

“No. They won’t.”

Hoffner was done playing. “I imagine you were something of a hero in those old days. Pulling bankers from cars. The noble bandit. Defender of the defenseless. It has such a familiar ring. Funny, but I don’t remember Pimm ever mentioning you, so I’m guessing you’re right. He probably thought of you as—what?—a good knife, a petty thief, someone smart to have on the payroll. He did have you on the payroll, didn’t he?”

It was the first moment of hesitation in Gardenyes’s eyes, long enough to feel the venom behind them. Gardenyes said, “You have a strange way of asking for help.”

“Help from a dead man. Now that would be something, wouldn’t it?”

It might have been a sudden pushing back of a chair or the waving of a pistol in the face, but Gardenyes remained perfectly still: whatever violence he felt lived in the silence. He took a last pull, tossed his cigarette to the ground, and leaned forward.

“You have no idea.” For the first time his voice had no interest in masking its bitterness. The stare was almost hypnotic.

“And yet you’ll help me find my son,” said Hoffner. There was nothing in his tone. “For old time’s sake.”

Gardenyes’s stare became a half grin, then something far more unnerving. The smile was completely empty of thought.

“
Incontrolats
,”
Gardenyes said. It was as if the word carried no weight. “You know what these are? No—I don’t think you do.” He rocked his chair on its hind legs, and his head rested against the wall. There was an unwelcome easiness in the way he leaned back and looked over at Hoffner. “Uncontrollables,” he said, his voice too calm, its menace too refined. “Men beyond hope. Men beyond the revolution. Anarchists calling their own such a thing. Can you imagine it?”

It was everything Hoffner could do to keep his gaze fixed on Gardenyes’s.

“You see, I thought the whole point was to tear down the control, keep tearing it down. But now, of course, they have it. They won’t admit it, these anarchist friends of mine. They say, ‘Look at us. Look at the revolutionaries who told the socialists, No, we don’t want a part of your government, even if you hand it to us—even if you
beg
us to take it. We’ve given you the state, freed you from the fascists, but no, we want nothing that tastes of leadership or popular fronts or control.’ ” Gardenyes’s head turned slightly and his eyes drifted: it left the small table feeling unbearably exposed. “I’ll give them that,” he said quietly. “They did say no.”

He looked back at Hoffner, the eyes now too focused.

“The trouble is, you let yourself be seduced by your own order,
your
control, and everything goes on its head. Now they say, ‘Don’t go too far, don’t embarrass us, don’t commit acts that are’ ”—he stared into Hoffner’s eyes as if the words were somewhere behind them—“what was it?… ‘contrary to the anarchist spirit,’ counter to the ‘revolutionary order.’ ” The eyes flashed momentarily and he came forward, the chair landing on the stone with an unexpected force. “Revolutionary
order
?” He leaned into Hoffner, and Hoffner let him lean. “What exactly is that supposed to mean?”

Hoffner had been holding the spoon against his thigh, and a small oval of liquid had seeped into the cloth. He felt the tackiness underneath, on his skin. Gardenyes slowly pulled himself back and Hoffner smelled the Spaniard’s breath still between them.

“I have some names,” Hoffner said. “You can see if they mean anything to you. And you can tell me where they’re keeping the injured Germans.”

Gardenyes picked up his glass. It took him a moment to realize it was empty before he set it back down. He continued to stare at the table. “The fascists don’t have such problems,” he said. “One mind, one body with them. Makes it so much easier.” He looked over at Hoffner. “Maybe soon enough I won’t be the only dead anarchist in Barcelona.”

The bread arrived with a wedge of butter on a plate.

Gardenyes put out his hand. “I’ll see those names now. For old time’s sake.”

HANSHEN

Mueller opted out. He had done his bit, getting Hoffner to Gardenyes. If Gardenyes hadn’t killed him by now, Hoffner would probably be fine on his own.