The more I delve into Emilia’s life, the more I realise that from beginning to end it is an unbroken chain of losses, disappearances and senseless searches. She spent years chasing after nothing, after people who no longer existed, remembering things that had never happened. But aren’t we all like that? Don’t we all abuse history to leave some trace there of what we once were, a miserable smudge, a tiny flame when we know that even the deepest mark is a bird that will leave on a breath of wind? ‘One human being is more or less the same as another; perhaps we are all already dead without realising it, or not yet born and do not know it,’ I said to Emilia one of the last times I saw her. ‘We come into the world without knowing it, the result of a series of accidents, and we leave it to go who knows where, nowhere probably. If you hadn’t loved Simón you would have loved someone else. You would have done so joyfully, with no guilt, because you cannot love what you do not know.’ She didn’t like this idea because she could not conceive of a world without Simón and loving made sense only if it meant loving him. I don’t think I understood at all that afternoon. Now, I would say I was an optimist, that the mere fact of existing or loving is enough to give meaning to everything. This is not how Emilia feels, and she is right. I realise this when I find a map among the papers that she left: the map of a city that stretches out in time not in space, and maybe because of that, an impossible city. There are transparent edges with dates beneath which the city is always different. In the centre is a vast palace next to a lake or reservoir. Above the palace, in capital letters, is written the code word to her life, Simón. The map is torn, wet with drool and with tears. It has no edges, sectors, bearing, no scale, and I don’t think it is necessary to ask where they are.
I have already spent hours unearthing what is hidden in the folds and on the backs of the photographs and clippings given to me by Nancy Frears. Perhaps there is nothing worthwhile here, perhaps that part of Emilia’s life I do not know is a lunar desert or an insignificant outcrop like Kaffeklubben. I begin reading one of her notebooks. ‘I know D is a dressmaker and I’ve asked her to make me some dresses. ’ The cellphone I always carry with me rings and I set down the notebook. It is noon. Not many people know I have a cellphone and I don’t recognise the number calling. I answer, convinced someone has misdialled and prepared to listen to an apology.
‘It’s me. Emilia,’ says the voice. It’s her.
I’m startled. She has taken me so much by surprise that it takes a moment before I react. I don’t even remember where I thought she was hiding.
‘I’ve been looking for you all over,’ I tell her. ‘Nancy was out of her mind with worry — she called the police. You caused a terrible commotion. Where are you? Can I call you?’
‘A commotion,’ she says. Her voice sounds completely calm. ‘There’s no reason to be worried. I’m fine, I’m better than I’ve ever been.’
‘I’m glad,’ I say. ‘But if the police find you, they’ll pick you up.’
‘I didn’t do anything, I’m free to go wherever I like.’
‘Of course. It’s just that you left without telling anyone. At the police station they asked if you were suicidal, if you’d been depressed. One of the officers thought you might have been kidnapped, that you might even be dead. You took the Altima.’
‘What a waste of time. The people in this town have no idea how to fill the lives they don’t have.’
‘They’re looking for your car,’ I tell her. ‘Sooner or later they’re bound to find you. Can I see you?’
‘That’s why I’m calling, so we can meet up,’ she says.
‘Sure, just give me a place and a time. I’m free right now.’
‘Not now. Tonight, eight o’clock. At Toscana, the restaurant where we first met.’
‘Toscana doesn’t exist any more,’ I remind her.
‘It doesn’t matter. The best places are those that don’t exist, just like on maps. I won’t be coming alone.’
‘So where then?’ I insist. ‘I don’t want to miss you. Once I’ve seen you, I’ll need to let the police know. I hope you understand.’
‘I understand. Eight o’clock then, at Toscana.’
‘On the corner there,’ I repeat so there’s no mistake. ‘Who are you with, Emilia?’
‘With Simón. We’ll both come. Tonight you’ll get to meet him.’
I held onto the photos and the clippings for a long time. I don’t know what to think. Obviously I’ll be waiting for her at eight o’clock on the corner of George and Paterson. Toscana does not exist but there is a point in reality where it does not matter whether or not it exists. Who is this Simón with her? I know that Simón Cardoso is dead, several witnesses testified to that fact. Tortured, a bullet through his forehead: it is all there in the transcripts of the trial of the comandantes. Maybe the man I’m going to meet is an impostor, an illusion created by Orson Welles from beyond the grave. If it doesn’t matter to Emilia, I don’t see why it should matter to me.