Watcher in the Pine (8 page)

Elena thought a moment. “It depends a little on how easily my husband can borrow a truck.”

Marta Santos spoke up from her place by the stove. “It would have to be a cart. The only trucks in the valley are government vehicles.”

Elena sighed. Sailing under false colors any longer would be unwise as well as difficult. “Actually, my husband is the lieutenant of the Guardia Civil post in Potes.”

There was a little space of silence around her words. Then Quico Álvarez said in a slightly overly hearty tone, “That will likely be no problem then.”

Elena nodded, looking at the ground. It had been so pleasant to talk to people without the invisible barrier that enclosed her in Potes. “No.” She stood up reluctantly. It was time to go. “Thank you for—thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Álvarez stood also, to shake hands with her.

Elena dawdled putting on her coat, unwilling to step out into the cold loneliness of the afternoon again, even though her hosts’ hospitality had given way to wariness. The baby kicked, and she was inspired to say suddenly, “Señora Santos, I wonder if you—if you know of a midwife? Since we’ve just arrived, I don’t know anyone and . . . ” Her voice trailed off. She looked more as if she was pleading than she realized.

“This is your first?” The carpenter’s wife thawed slightly, speaking with the faintly approving condescension of the experienced mother.

“Yes.”

“There aren’t midwives here, the way you’d get in the city. Mostly the neighbors come and help. After all, once a woman’s been through the whole thing a few times she knows how it works.” Marta’s voice was sympathetic as she added, “I don’t suppose the guardias’ wives . . . ?”

“They’re unmarried.” Elena paused, and then added, “We’re staying at the Casa Montalbán. I know Señora Nuñez mentioned she’d had children. Maybe . . .

“ Marta shook her head. “I don’t think Bárbara’s a good choice.”

“She . . . she seems a little hard to get to know,” Elena admitted, unwilling to ask for help outright, and hoping that it would be offered.

“You can’t really blame her.” Señora Santos took pity on her guest. “Bárbara’s had troubles with the Guardia.”

“Marta.” Señor Álvarez’s voice held the same note of quiet warning he had used with his daughters.

She glanced at him and shook her head. “It’s no secret, Quico.” To Elena, she added, “The younger Montalbán boy was killed on the orders of the old lieutenant.”

Elena bowed her head. “I’d heard that after the town fell there were some reprisals.”

Because her eyes were lowered, Elena missed the quick look that passed between the carpenter and his wife as she said, “after the town
fell
,” so she was both gratified and intrigued when Señora Santos added, with some bitterness, “This had nothing to do with the war. Jesulín Montalbán was going with a girl Lieutenant Calero had his eye on. Everyone knew they’d quarreled about her. But when the soldiers came and the lieutenant said Jesulín was a Red, who could argue with him?”

Elena met Marta Santos’s eyes, horrified. “And the girl?”

“Poor Señorita Laura,” Marta sighed. “She wouldn’t give Calero the time of day until he threatened that the soldiers would come for her brother as well.”

“He deserved what happened to him!” Elena’s voice was trembling with rage.

Quico Álvarez nodded, almost unconsciously, but stopped himself from agreeing in words. A nod could always be denied later. “It broke Anselmo’s heart,” he said quietly. “Jesulín always was his favorite.”

Elena leaned on the table, trying to control her sudden nausea. She remembered Bárbara Nuñez saying tightly, “My sons were taken four years ago.” And then, with sickening clarity, she heard her husband’s voice saying, “It’s likely her husband’s a murderer.” “I’m sorry,” she said, knowing the words were both true and meaningless, and wanting to make some reparation. “I . . . I won’t ask Señora Nuñez.”

Marta nodded, accepting the words and the intention for what they were worth. “Bárbara’s had troubles,” she repeated. “Don’t be too hard on her.”

Elena desperately looked for something to say that would prolong her visit to the warm room, among people who did not seem to hate her. Something to put off the return to the
fonda
where she would have to face Bárbara Nuñez with her new knowledge. She took a deep breath and met Marta Santos’s eyes. “M-may I come see you again?” she stammered. “I don’t have very much to do in Potes, and I-I might be able to help Simón with geometry or something.”

“You’ve studied geometry?” Simón interjected hopefully.

“I used to be a teacher,” Elena explained. “Only of younger children, of course. But I might remember a little math.”

Simón considered the offer. “Could I show you how to draw a line from an equation?” he offered. “If Papa lets me?”

Elena smiled. “I’d like that. It’s been a long time since I’ve calculated slope.”

Simón’s eyes were sparkling. “Can I, Papa? Please?”

The carpenter looked amused. “I don’t think you know what you’ve let yourself in for, Señora.”

“I don’t mind,” Elena reassured him. “That is . . . if it won’t be taking Simón away from his chores?”

Quico Álvarez shook his head. “I can manage without him for a day.”

“Thank you!” Simón was quivering with impatience. “When can we start?”

Elena hesitated. Simón’s parents had not issued an invitation, and she was unwilling to push further. Simón’s mother spoke first. “You’re welcome to stay for a little while now,” she said, accurately reading the desires of both her son and her unexpected guest. “The girls have been in a foul mood all day, and it will give me a chance to deal with them.”

“I’ll get my slate.” Simón made a rapid exit.

“If you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.” Álvarez stood up. Laugh lines deepened around his eyes as he said, “I was going to ask in what order you’d like me to make the furniture, but seeing how well you get along with the boy, I’m guessing you’ll want the bookshelves first.”

“I guess so.” Elena laughed.

The carpenter let himself out, and Simón returned with his slate. Elena spent a happy hour dredging her memory for half-forgotten facts and watching with amazement as Simón drank them in like a thirsty sponge. The boy flitted cheerfully from the Pythagorean theorem to what Father Bernardo had told him about classical architecture to how he had heard that if you dammed the Quiviesa all of Santander could have electric lights for practically nothing, and back to the aqueducts of the Romans, practically without pausing for breath.

Simón was, he admitted, going to be twelve in June, although his reproachful look at this eminently conventional and irrelevant question told Elena that she had sunk in his esteem for asking it. He submitted to her questions and to her idiotic comment that it was a shame that he could not go to school regularly in return for information on more interesting topics. Was it true that everyone had telephones in Salamanca? And indoor bathrooms? Where did the water come from? Was it like in the Roman aqueducts? How fast did trains travel generally? Where did the coal go in the locomotive?

Elena, faced with a host of questions that she was having some difficulty answering, was grateful for the interruption of Simón’s younger sisters. He introduced them as “the brats” and their mother presented them somewhat more formally as Teresa and Ramonita. The girls had overcome their shyness and wanted a chance to look at the visitor they had ignored earlier. To Simón’s annoyance, Elena politely asked their ages as well.

Teresa appointed herself spokesperson. “I’m almost eight.

And she’s only six.”

“And do you study with Father Bernardo too?”

“I know how to read already.” Teresa was complacent. “But Father Bernardo says I have to keep coming for catechism until I’m confirmed.”

Elena smiled, trying to stifle her wave of sadness. It was criminal that this child thought that learning her letters and catechism was the beginning and end of schooling. And Simón was a bright boy. He would have been at the head of his class if a school had been available. “What about you, Ramonita? Are you learning to read too?”

The child nodded but said nothing. Simón made an impatient noise. “They know enough already,” he said, tired of attention being diverted into social matters. “They’re just girls.”

“So what?” Elena retorted.

Simón struggled with this concept for a moment. “If Father Bernardo wasted all his time trying to teach girls, he wouldn’t have time to show
me
anything,” he offered finally.

Faced with this perfectly unhypocritical logic, Elena was forced to laugh. “Maybe Father Bernardo could use some help,” she suggested. “That way everyone could learn more.”

“That would be something to take up with him, Señora.” To Simón’s surprise, his mother entered the conversation. “I know he’s spoken of a school before.”

“Really?” Elena made a mental note to track down the priest.

Teresa took a deep breath. “Señora?”

“Yes?”

“How—?” The girl gathered her courage in both hands. “How old were you when you stopped playing with dolls?”

Elena had enough experience to guess the reason for the question. “I don’t remember exactly,” she said gravely. “I played with them less by the time I was Simón’s age. But I know that I still had my favorite doll when I went to university.”

“See!” Teresa muttered to her sister.

“I’m sure you’re not too old to play with them,” Elena said encouragingly, suddenly enlightened as to the cause of the fight she had witnessed earlier. “Has someone been telling you that?”

“No.” Teresa raised her head. “But Nita ruined my Victoria.”

“She’s not ruined the least littlest bit!” Ramonita protested.

“She
kidnapped
her,” Teresa continued implacably. “And then she
broke
her arm.”

The smaller girl began to sniffle. “It was an accident!”

“Well, people break their arms sometimes,” Elena pointed out reasonably. “Maybe Victoria’s arm could be set. You could play you were at a hospital.”

Teresa looked suddenly hopeful. “Simón, do you think Papa has glue?”

“He won’t let
you
use it,” Simón said firmly. “But he might let me fix it for you.”

“Would you? You’re good at fixing things.” Teresa looked appealingly at her older brother.

“I’ll get it.” Simón slid out of his chair and hurried down the stairs.

Teresa disappeared briefly and returned, carrying a beautifully carved wooden doll in one arm and a snapped-off forearm in her free hand. “This is Victoria.” She made a face at her cowering little sister and added in a whisper, “Kidnapper!”

Elena had taught in wartime, and wounds and amputations had been grim realities for too many of her students. During recess periods her classroom had at times been filled with “wounded” dolls, some of them actually broken for verisimilitude by their frightened and enraged owners. She was an expert at supervising doll hospitals. By the time Simón returned with glue, Victoria had been laid out on a rag bed, and Teresa was vigorously persuading her to swallow imaginary morphine. Forgetting his disdain for girlish matters, Simón was persuaded to act as a surgeon. The operation was successful, and the hospital administrator was smothered in thanks, not only from the three children but from Marta Santos. “I don’t know what I’d have done if Teresa and Nita had stayed at each other’s throats,” she added in an undertone. “I imagine their father would have fixed Victoria eventually, but they’re happy this way. I hate it when it’s too cold for them to play out-of-doors properly.”

Elena modestly disclaimed thanks, and silently thought that she would have to actively pursue the unknown Father Bernardo about starting a school. She remained, playing with the children and chatting with their mother, until striking church bells made her start up. “I should go,” she said regretfully. “I’ve taken up far too much of your afternoon. And my husband will be wondering where I am.”

Marta politely said that she had not noticed the time at all, and the children unanimously agreed that her visit had been a pleasure. The carpenter’s wife saw her to the door. “It was nice to meet you, Señora Fernández,” she said, holding out her hand. “Come again.”