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We dressed hurriedly in the dark. In a matter of seconds, we could see our breath forming puffs in the air. I picked up one of the candles from the floor and lit it again. A draft of cold air glided through the house, as if someone had opened doors and windows.
“You see? It’s the wind.”
Bea shook her head but kept silent. We made our way back toward the sitting room, shielding the flame with our hands. Bea followed close behind me, holding her breath.
“What are we looking for, Daniel?”
“It’ll only take a minute.”
“No, let’s leave right away.”
“All right.”
We turned to walk toward the exit, and it was then that I noticed. The large sculpted door at the end of a corridor, which I had tried unsuccessfully to open, was ajar.
“What’s the matter?” asked Bea.
“Wait for me here.”
“Daniel, please…”
I walked down the corridor, holding the candle that flickered in gusts of cold air. Bea sighed and followed me reluctantly. I stopped in front of the door. Marble steps were just visible, descending into the darkness. I started to go down them. Petrified, Bea stood at the entrance holding the candle.
“Please, Daniel, let’s go now….”
I descended, step by step, to the bottom of the staircase. The ghostly aura from the candle that was raised behind me seemed to scratch at the shape of a rectangular room, made of bare stone walls that were covered in crucifixes. The icy cold in that chamber took my breath away. Before me stood a marble slab, and on top of it I saw what looked like two similar white objects in different sizes, lined up one next to the other. They reflected the tremor of the candle with more intensity than the rest of the room, and I guessed they were made of lacquered wood. I took one more step forward, and only then did I understand. The two objects were white coffins. One of them was scarcely two feet long. I felt a shiver. It was a child’s sarcophagus. I was in a crypt.
Without realizing what I was doing, I got closer to the marble stone until I was near enough to stretch out my hand and touch it. I then noticed that on each coffin a cross and a name had been carved. A blanket of ash obscured them. I put my hand on one of the coffins, the larger one. Slowly, almost in a trance, without stopping to think what I was doing, I brushed off the ashes that covered the lid. I could barely read the words in the dim red candlelight.
†
PENÉLOPE ALDAYA
1902–1919
I froze. Something or somebody was moving about in the dark. I could feel the cold air sliding down my skin, and only then did I retreat a few steps.
“Get out of here,” murmured a voice in the shadows.
I recognized him immediately. Laín Coubert. The voice of the devil.
I charged up the stairs, and as soon as I reached the ground floor, I grabbed Bea by the arm and dragged her as fast as I could toward the exit. We had lost the candle and were running blindly. Bea was frightened and unabl
e to comprehend my sudden alarm. She hadn’t seen anything. She hadn’t heard anything. I didn’t pause to give her an explanation. I expected that at any moment something would jump out from the shadows and block our way, but the main door was waiting for us at the end of the corridor, forming a rectangle of light around the cracks in the doorframe.
“It’s locked,” Bea whispered.
I felt my pockets for the key. I turned my head for a fraction of a second and was sure that two shining points were slowly advancing toward us from the other end of the passageway. Eyes. My fingers found the key. I inserted it desperately into the lock, opened the door, and pushed Bea out roughly. Bea must have sensed the fear in me, because she rushed toward the gate in the garden and didn’t stop until we were both on the pavement of Avenida del Tibidabo, breathless and covered in cold sweat.
“What happened down there, Daniel? Was there someone there?”
“No.”
“You look pale.”
“I’ve always been pale. Come on. Let’s go.”
“What about the key?”
