‘I still don’t think you should take it so seriously,’ insisted the censor. ‘You have to be above all this.’ It seemed like a good way of both calming and complimenting the judge. ‘We’re talking here about western novels, trashy literature. Even if the author meant it, who’s going to connect you with the Judge of Oklahoma? Who reads it, Ricardo? Ask at a bookstall and you’ll see. Sailors from the Great Sole, unemployed youths, prisoners. .’
He stopped because this seemed to worry the judge. He could see what he was thinking: Prisoners? So they read John Black Eye too?
‘You may think I’m exaggerating, Dez,’ said Samos after a pause, ‘but I have my reasons. I want a muzzle on that mouth.’
He opened the drawer, put The Yoke Collector inside and locked it.
‘Bring me that Black Eye’s head on a platter!’
The Supplier of Bibles
19 August 1957
BIBLES WERE THE library’s main attraction. Copies from different periods and in different languages. They filled the central shelves in the Italian room where Samos had his study. This collection of various editions of Scripture was the most obvious reason the judge’s office had been given the name the Crypt. The room, with its alcove, had the air of a reserved space. And time was disciplined and acted in accordance with this designation, placing religious objects, hunting trophies, photographs and prints in silver frames in gaps between books or on the mantelpiece. As for the library itself, it contained the collection of Bibles, which was always growing, and books the judge would consult in matters of law, together with reference works concerning history and thought. The alcove was the home of classical literature and, to use the judge’s expression, ‘a resting-place for all sorts of flotsam’ he’d picked up along the way in his foremost bibliographical search for copies of the Old and New Testaments. The alcove was altered slightly when it was decided Gabriel might use it, not that he was forced to do so, rather he was the one who took it over as a study, to the great surprise of his parents, especially Chelo, his mother. ‘It’s a good place for bats,’ she said to Gabriel. This is partly why he liked it. Because it was dark and secret, like a lair, in such a luminous house, a kind of bell-jar facing the bay. On the other side of the street, there were no houses. On the other side was the sea. Boats. The docks. Into the recess, into his cave, Gabriel carried his cabinet of curiosities.
He wasn’t very outgoing. He was almost always silent, bad-tempered, thought Gabriel, but then he decided it was something permanent, nothing to do with his mood, since when he laughed he looked bad-tempered as well. His body seethed slowly. It was one of those large bodies which want to offload things, starting with his suit. Perhaps it was because of his physique, thought Gabriel, that he couldn’t help being brusque in his movements and speech. He was brusque when he expressed his opinion in conversations in the Crypt, those meetings that were held in the judge’s office almost every Thursday evening. He had a tendency to exclaim and come out with short, cutting sentences. His manner of speaking caught Gabriel’s attention at a time he was having his own struggle with language. Whenever he greeted Chelo, he tried to change attitude completely. He was brusque in this too. He did so with such exaggerated politeness his body seemed on the verge of violence.
Such was Ren. Inspector Ren.
They were utterly different. But Gabriel soon realised there was a strong link between Ren and the judge. He was one of his suppliers of Bibles. Of old books. Whenever he came to make a delivery, they met alone.
One afternoon, inside the alcove, Gabriel was privileged enough to witness an act of transfer performed by Ren and the judge with certain ceremony. Ren, who was usually very abrupt, on this occasion moved in a measured way, very cautiously. He placed a large leather and suede travelling bag on the desk and unfastened the zip in slow motion. He then very carefully pulled out six volumes. The judge leafed through them with reverence. His hands verified. And took possession.
‘A jewel, your honour. Look at the prints.’
‘Gabriel, come here! La Sainte Bible published by the Garnier brothers, Paris, 1867. Observe the quality of the illustrations, the perfection that came off steel plates.’
Gabriel, however, really was observing the illustrations, what was in them. All the prints showed women, female Biblical figures. There was the Queen of Sheba with her bowl of pearls. Rahab, waiting at the window. The Pharaoh’s daughter. Judith with her curved sword, next to the bed where Holofernes lies. Sarah, Tobias’ wife, with gaudy earrings and a bracelet. Eve. He’d never seen such a beautiful Eve. It was in fact the first time he’d wondered what she looked like.
‘You like it, right? One day, I’ll tell you about all the Bibles in here. It’s still too soon, but you’ll have to add to this treasure in the future.’
Gabriel was taken with the figures. This would be his favourite Bible for a long time. He’d love them all. Even Judith with her curved sword. The Garnier brothers’ Sainte Bible was one of his best erotic books, together with those he found in the section of charred remains, such as Le Nu de Rabelais. Opening each volume was like opening one of the six gates in a feminine city.
But today the judge would only allow him to touch. He was the one who opened the gates.
‘Chelo will be fascinated,’ he said.
She’d be late today. Gabriel was already in bed. He’d like to have seen her fingers on this new Bible’s illustrations. For him, they were his mother’s most peculiar feature. The shape of her hands, the length of her fingers. He thought, even though he was a man, his would never reach that size. Her toes were in proportion. She looked after and painted the nails of both her hands and her feet. The latter, visible when she wore sandals or could step on the grass or sand, distinguished her from other women. At home, she went barefoot whenever she was painting, which was most of the time. Occasionally she’d receive a call from Fine Arts to take some special visitors on a tour. She spoke French well and got by in English. But most of all she could read the book of the city. She understood its art, architecture and history. Today she was with two French women writing their doctoral theses on Emilia Pardo Bazán. They were also going to visit one of Rosalía de Castro’s daughters, her only surviving descendant, named Gala. Rosalía had been born of unknown parents, so it said on her baptism certificate, though it was well known her father was a priest. She married the librarian and historian Manuel Murguía and they had five children. Gala, who is eighty-six, explains she’s not only the last surviving daughter, but the end of the line. She suddenly falls quiet. The expression on her face is of horror more than pain. Chelo had visited her before, acting as ambassador, but had never seen her like this. Josette and Nelly, the two French women, exchange anxious glances. Their courtesy call is turning into something else. Gala then tells them something she claims never to have told before. Her twin brother, Ovidio Murguía, a painter, had a sweetheart in Madrid, a young woman by the name of Visitación Oliva. Ovidio became ill with tuberculosis, the biggest killer of youth in those days, and returned to Coruña to recover. In fact, he came to die. But what Gala is telling them is that she burnt the love letters that arrived from Madrid for her sick brother. She burnt them one by one. Including the letter with the happy news that Visitación Oliva was with child. This gesture of dropping the letter into the fire somehow put an end to their line. Ovidio Murguía died, thinking he’d been totally forgotten. Why? Why did she do this? Why is she telling them now? This is what their looks say, but no one asks questions. No one says anything. Gala murmurs, ‘I’m sorry for what happened.’ In the night, in the brazier, in a corner of the room, Chelo watches words burning.