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“Can we count on the secrecy of the confessional?”
“This is a garden, not a confessional.”
“It will be enough if you grant us your ecclesiastic discretion.”
“You have it.”
Fermín heaved a deep sigh and looked at me with a melancholy expression. “Daniel, we can’t go on lying to this saintly soldier of Christ.”
“Of course not…” I corroborated, completely lost.
Fermín went up to the priest and murmured in a confidential tone, “Father, we have most solid grounds to suspect that our friend Daniel here is none other than the secret son of the deceased Julián Carax. Hence our interest in reconstructing his past and recovering the memory of an illustrious person, whom the Fates tore away from the side of a poor child.”
Father Fernando fixed his astounded eyes on me. “Is this true?”
I nodded. Fermín patted my back, his face full of sorrow.
“Look at him, poor lad, searching for a lost father in the mist of memory. What could be sadder than this? Tell me, Your Most Saintly Grace.”
“Have you any proof to uphold your assertions?”
Fermín grabbed my chin and offered up my face as payment. “What further proof would the clergyman require than this little face, silent, irrefutable witness of the paternal fact in question?”
The priest seemed to hesitate.
“Will you help me, Father?” I implored cunningly. “Please…”
Father Fernando sighed uncomfortably. “I don’t suppose there’s any harm in it,” he said at last. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything,” said Fermín.
·25·
WE WENT INTO FATHER FERNANDO’S OFFICE, WHERE THE priest summoned up his memories, adopting the tone of a sermon. He sculpted his sentences neatly, measuring them out with a cadence that seemed to promise an ultimate moral that never emerged. Years of teaching had left him with that firm and didactic tone of someone used to being heard, but not certain of being listened to.
“If I remember correctly, Julián Carax started at San Gabriel’s in 1914. I got along with him right away, because we both belonged to the small group of pupils who did not come from wealthy families. They called us “The Starving Gang,” and each one of us had his own special story. I’d managed to get a scholarship place thanks to my father, who worked in the kitchens of this school for twenty-five years. Julián had been accepted thanks to the intercession of Mr. Aldaya, who was a customer of the Fortuny hat shop, owned by Julián’s father. Those were different times, of course, and during those days power was still concentrated within families and dynasties. That world has vanished—the last few remains were swept away with the fall of the Republic, for the better, I suppose. All that is left of it are the names on the letterheads of companies, banks, and faceless consortiums. Like all old cities, Barcelona is a sum of its ruins. The great glories so many people are proud of—palaces, factories, and monuments, the emblems with which we identify—are nothing more than relics of an extinguished civilization.”
Having reached this point, Father Fernando allowed for a solemn pause in which he seemed to be waiting for the congregation to answer with some empty Latin phrase or a response from the missal.
“Say amen, reverend Father. What great truth lies in those wise words,” offered Fermín to fill the awkward silence.
“You were telling us about my father’s first year at the school,” I put in gently.
Father Fernando nodded. “In those days he already called himself Carax, although his paternal surname was Fortuny. At first some of the boys teased him for that, and for being one of The Starving Gang, of course. They also laughed at me because I was the cook’s son. You know what kids are like. Deep down, God has filled them with goodness, but they repeat what they hear at home.”
“Little angels,” punctuated Fermín.
“What do you remember about my father?”
“Well, it’s such a long time ago…. Your father’s best friend at that time was not Jorge Aldaya but a boy called Miquel Moliner. Miquel’s family was almost as wealthy as the Aldayas, and I dare say he was the most extravagant pupil this school has ever seen. The headmaster thought he was possessed by the devil because he recited Marx in German during mass.”
“A clear sign of possession,” Fermín agreed.
“Miquel and Julián got on really well. Sometimes we three would get together during the lunch break and Julián would tell us stories. Other times he would tell us about his family and the Aldayas….”
The priest seemed to hesitate.
“Even after leaving school, Miquel and I stayed in touch for a time. Julián had already gone to Paris by then. I know that Miquel missed him. He often spoke about him, remembering secrets Julián had once confided in him. Later, when I entered the seminary, Miquel told me I’d gone over to the enemy. It was meant as a joke, but the fact is that we drifted apart.”
