The Winterlings (9 page)

When he returned to Tierra de Chá and delivered the letter, he began his new life. While his former comrades joined the underground resistance, stealing through the mountains of Galicia with their rifles and daggers, he set about putting together the set of teeth he had been keeping in a glass of milk. He never told anyone where he got the teeth. In the meantime, he observed people's mouths, and learnt all he could about chewing and swallowing.

At the Festival of the Virgin, Tenderlove and Saladina had spoken at length. As soon as he saw her he noticed that she used false teeth, and while he didn't make any direct comments, to avoid hurting her pride, he did tell her that in his house he had some teeth that were as white as pearls from Japan — teeth he'd made himself, he clarified — so that he could make a set of false teeth on his own at any time.

To start with, the idea of getting new dentures seemed frivolous to Saladina. Then, after she'd thought on it for a while, she realised that plenty of other people in Tierra de Chá had done it. Mr Tenderlove's reputation for skill was such that it was almost fashionable in the village and its surrounds to have your real teeth pulled and dentures put in.

‘New teeth like pearls from Japan,' she explained to her sister, her eyes wide and shining. ‘New teeth, Dolores. Don't you think it's a good idea? What do you say?'

Dolores stared at her. It had been quite some time since she'd seen her sister so engaged. Little by little, life had snatched her dreams away from her, and since they had returned from England, she barely enjoyed anything. Her eyes lit up with irony.

‘Get them,' said Dolores.

‘You really think so?'

Dolores had always understood that her sister's dissatisfaction stemmed from this absence, from the shame of having lost her teeth when she was little more than a child.

‘Don't hold back.'

16

When Saladina walked into the clinic the next day, she found the dental mechanic with a magnifying glass in his left hand and a file in his right. The task of filing down teeth so that they fit snugly took the concentration and patience of a Benedictine monk, and for this reason he didn't hear her.

He didn't sense her presence either until she touched his arm.

Tenderlove dropped one of the callipers onto the floor.

‘Winterling!' he said. ‘I wasn't expecting you so soon.'

Saladina stood there mutely.

‘I knew you'd come along in the end, everyone eventually does, but — so soon!'

She nodded timidly. By the light of day, Tenderlove was much more attractive than when she had seen him at the festival. He wasn't too tall, he was well turned out, had a tanned complexion, a muscly build, and curly hair. He used brilliantine in his hair and parted it to one side, plastering it to his skull. He smelt faintly of jasmine, or was it roses? His shirt was partly unbuttoned, showing his chest. There was something deeply brooding and mysterious about him that caused Saladina to step back a little and wait for him to give instructions of some sort.

‘Don't worry, young lady. I already told you that nearly everyone in the village has my teeth. That bread they made with stones during the war caused a lot of grief. Take a seat.'

He sat her down in the revolving chair.

‘I was already picking out the teeth for you. Open your mouth.'

Saladina opened her mouth.

‘Take those dentures out.'

Saladina closed her mouth.

‘I can't,' she said. ‘I'm ashamed to be seen without them. I look like a toad.'

Taking advantage of her open mouth, Tenderlove stuck in the pliers as she spoke, yanking the dentures right out. He held them up to his eyes and inspected them carefully. She instinctively clutched her sore cheek.

‘How poorly they make them around here. They think that just putting them in white is the whole job,' he said. ‘They have no respect at all for the bone. That's what it all comes down to: the bone. The bone is the beginning of all things, it is love, it is the essence of life. You must scrape and scrape until you get to the bone …'

Saladina listened, captivated.

‘Where did you buy it? They say you two were in England … Never mind. I'll fix your mouth up like God intended. You'll have to come for thirty-two days, that's the number of pieces we have to install, sixteen in each jawbone. Eight incisors to cut through food, four canines which are used for tearing food, eight premolars for chewing, and twelve molars for grinding …'

The Winterling nodded her head.

‘It's laborious because I have to put them in tooth by tooth, but it's worth the trouble. You know, there have been people who already had a set of dentures in good condition who decided to change theirs for mine.'

‘I heard that,' said the Winterling suddenly. ‘To be honest, it's strange that a man like you, who knows how to make these marvels, still has the same set of teeth you were born with …'

‘Well, there's a lot we could say about that. But back to the point: it's clear you need new teeth. Tomorrow you can—'

‘My sister was asking' — she interrupted again — ‘what the teeth are made of?'

Mr Tenderlove had an answer ready for her; in fact, it was the same one he had given to all those he had made dentures for previously.

‘A friend of mine brings me the material — it's titanium. It never rusts. It never breaks. It's extracted from sand at the beach. Here in Galicia, there is plenty of titanium.'

‘Ah …'

The dental mechanic wound up her visit and went on with his task of filing down the teeth. Just as Saladina went out the door, he called to her:

‘I remember when you were a little girl. You were very … shy. You were very pretty.' He raised a hand and brushed a brilliantined lock from his forehead. ‘And you still are. I always believed that behind your shyness there was something, something that made you special and different from the other girls.'

Saladina gave a start. There was nothing in her sweaty face or bony disposition that indicated that his comment had affected her, but she was boiling inside. She felt deliciously wild. Her — Saladina the Boring — what was happening to her? For the first time in her life, someone had discovered the truth,
her truth.

But then, straight away, she thought that perhaps the dental mechanic had confused her with her sister …

She couldn't open her mouth. The words were there, but her mouth wouldn't open.

‘What's more,' continued the dental mechanic, ‘I believe that your grandfather was an exceptional person, an intelligent man who just wanted to learn. On many afternoons, he would bring me figs and stay chatting … How good those figs tasted! Do you still have the fig tree?' Tenderlove shook his head gently. ‘No, he didn't deserve what happened to him …'

Saladina didn't understand.

‘My grandfather?' she spluttered. ‘What happened?'

‘He was a good man …'

Tenderlove leant over the table, and got down to filing a little tooth.

Then Saladina explained very excitedly everything that the old lady on the mountain had told them.

‘She says that my grandfather kept staring at her and finally said “Old lady, you've got a brain like the Santiago Cathedral.” And then afterwards, he made an offer that she gladly accepted: to buy her brain. He would buy it for his research, and she just had to give it up when she died. The old lady accepted. They set a price and the old lady made her mark on a piece of paper. My grandfather paid her, and she committed to hand over her brain for his investigations when she died.

‘What do you make of that?'

Mr Tenderlove kept filing down the tooth.

‘Did you already know that story?' asked Saladina.

‘It's a story that lives on in this village,' answered the dental mechanic after a while. ‘Everyone has heard it told — minding the cows in the meadow, baking the bread in the oven, in the tavern, at the entrance to the cemetery or by the stone cross — and everyone tells it too. They say the contracts are in a wooden box. The whole story could've been forgotten by now or left floating in someone's house if it weren't for that old lady who just won't die. Take no notice of her!'

The dental mechanic suddenly went silent.

‘I have to get back to work now,' he said. ‘Tomorrow morning at ten. I'll be waiting to put in your first tooth.'

Saladina nodded, confused.

‘Winterling, I forgot to tell you … For your next visit …'

Saladina smoothed her skirt and ran her hands through her hair.

‘Yes?'

For a few seconds, all that could be heard was the sound of the file. While she awaited his response, the Winterling's gaze dropped slowly to the floor. Then she noticed that from the cuff of the dental mechanic's pants, the tip of a shoe was pointing out. A red, woman's shoe.

‘Don't eat any garlic or onions.'

17

Dolores was resting her temple against the cow's flank and staring off into the distant countryside when she saw her sister arrive, looming large then small as she advanced through the cornfields.

Saladina entered the house like a flash of lightning, showing all the signs of great excitement. Dolores finished milking, and followed her with the pail.

‘It's true!' said Saladina.

Dolores left the milk in the kitchen and hurried to attend to her sister. She Saladina was radiant, her cheeks burning from the journey. She took her bag, removed her shawl, helped her put on her robe, and knelt down to put on her slippers. She accompanied her into the kitchen.

‘What's true, woman?'

‘All that business about our grandfather. He bought brains, it's a story everyone knows. Not just that old lady from Bocelo; the whole village sold him their brains.'

Dolores started up the Singer sewing machine. While she sewed, she listened carefully, both perplexed and doubtful.

‘The contracts are in a wooden box. The dentist told me.' Saladina began to look about wildly from side to side, her hands in the air. ‘Let's look for them!'

Dolores said that they'd already searched, and that the story about the brains was outrageous, nonsense from a crazy old lady. The priest himself had said so.

‘But the priest sold his brain too!' Her sister was screeching and stamping her feet. ‘It was the most expensive one!'

Saladina was already searching. She looked in the kitchen, in the living room, and in the cowshed. Then she went up to the attic and started pulling at the locked drawer that they still hadn't managed to open. From inside the drawer came a knocking sound:
plonk, plonk.

Dolores the Winterling kept on sewing downstairs.
Clack, clack.

Plonk, plonk.

Finally, Dolores got up and offered to help Saladina.

They turned the house upside down without finding a single thing.

In the evening, sitting in front of the Singer, they began to doubt Tenderlove's words. It wasn't unusual for people in small villages to make things up, or get confused …

The next day, Saladina returned to the clinic to have the first tooth inserted. That day she had risen early, even before Greta the cow began to moo in the cowshed. Sitting at the kitchen table with pencil and paper, the tip of her tongue poking out, she set out to make a list of all the names of the teeth that she could remember Mr Tenderlove mentioning. On one side, in the left column, was the name of the tooth, and in the right-hand column, its function: incisor-
cut
, canine-
tear
, premolar-
grind
.

Next, she climbed the ladder to gather some figs. The sweetest ones were very high up, and she had to stretch from the top rung to reach them. Dolores watched her from below, while she scattered the feed for the chickens. Saladina stumbled and was left hanging from a branch. Dolores let the plate with the chicken feed fall to the ground, and eventually climbed up the ladder and rescued her sister.

‘Look, all the feed is spilt on the ground,' she said once she had got back down again. ‘One of these days you'll be the end of me. And just so you can take some figs to this dentist-quack of yours …'

But Saladina's visits to Mr Tenderlove's clinic weren't the only new thing. As the days went by, the Winterlings began to abandon their stifling routine and take on new habits. They began by cheerfully greeting anyone who stopped them on their way to the mountain.

‘So, what are you up to? Heading to the mountain?'

And they would always reply:

‘We're heading up there, yes, and why wouldn't we?'

They soon learned as well that each village has its own foibles, its moods and rules for belonging, and that company has its price: they had to bend to the customs of the community and all that entailed. Visiting certain places meant
always
visiting those certain places, or they'd remain alone.