She let go of my hand and I felt a pang of abandonment. She looked down at the ground for a while and then, without lifting her eyes, she explained that she had taken three badly wounded soldiers to a field hospital at the army’s rearguard so they could die in peace. They were young like you, with as much desire to live as you have. See that Red Cross truck by the shrubs? There’s a cross on the sides and on the roof of the truck. See the red of the cross? When I was little my father killed a cat, I don’t know what it had done to him; I witnessed it and it broke my heart. I buried it in the early morning by the bridge where I told you to wait for me. Remember, the day we met? I made a cross of red flowers on top of it. And some evenings, when the setting sun is ringed by clouds and sends fanlike rays of light to Earth, I see myself climbing upward along the ribs of the fan, the cat by my side, glancing at me from time to time. . and. . what’s that?
She noticed the cord I had around my neck and tugged on it. You’re wearing religious medallions? She laughed. She pushed her cap back and it fell to the ground. She wore her hair shorter than I did when I was a young boy. It’s Our Lady of the Angels, I said. She studied the medallions for a while. She’s so ugly. . it would give me the creeps to wear such an ugly Virgin Mary around my neck. I said: A wise man gave them to me and told me that as long as I wore them no bullet could kill me. She laughed again and, before standing, she leaned toward me and kissed the birthmark on my forehead. Want to come? I shook my head. Soon I heard a truck engine. In the waning light I glanced at the embroidered Mother of God. The dresses, lilies and leaves all had lovely colors, but I didn’t want to look at the medallions because the Virgin bore the face of that hideous old woman. I removed them from around my neck and put them in my pocket; but first I superimposed Eva’s face over the old woman’s hideousness. Want to come? No. I said no to please her. Had I not seen the crushed grass where Eva had sat, I would have believed that Eva and Eva’s kiss had just been one of those dreams from which you never wish to awaken.
XIII THE FARMHOUSE
A GIRL A LITTLE OLDER THAN THE GIRL WITH THE SWISS CHARD emerged from a bakery carrying a round loaf of bread with a dark brown crust. She started skipping and the bread tumbled to the ground and ended up almost at my feet. Without giving it a thought I grabbed it and ran. I didn’t even turn around when I heard the girl shouting. That bread never again saw the light of day. At the first fountain I drank my fill of water. Soon I was bloated. As I sat on the ground, my hands holding my aching belly, several trucks carrying soldiers passed by, followed by three wagons pulled by mules. The fighting was close-at-hand. My heart told me to make my way to the road, my head told me to flee. I didn’t feel like moving but I had to go somewhere. Perhaps as I roamed from village to village the war would end and when it was over. . A pair of espadrilles was drying on a windowsill. Mine had lost part of the soles. I crouched down and crept over to the window. I put on the espadrilles behind a hedge, they were just my size. I walked on calmly. Soon a farmhouse with three haystacks by the threshing floor came into view. On one side there were only fields, on the other, rows and rows of olive trees. Pink carnations hung from the middle balcony of the house. I heard shouting and threw myself on the ground. You vile thing! Miserable rascal! A short, fat man was beating a whimpering dog that cowered beneath him. When the man tired of striking the dog, he turned and left it there without even a glance, grumbling as he went. The mangled dog dragged itself over to me, its tail tucked between its legs, snout trailing along the ground, and licked my hand. It was a large black dog, with blond fur on its underside. It lay down beside me with a sad sigh. If he dies tonight, I thought, I’ll bury him.
It had turned dark. From the farmhouse came the smell of rich soup. I crept closer, lured by the smell, until I was standing in the middle of the portal in a stupor, begrudging them the food. The farm woman noticed me right away. She opened her mouth, but no shout emerged from it. The farmer turned his head: His face was the color of the earth, and he had a dark beard and hair cut so short it resembled a brush. Staring at me like a pair of owls, two twin girls with spoonfuls of soup halfway to their mouths were fighting back laughter, as if amused that I was so filthy and that my always-empty stomach was flatter than a carpet beater. With a thunderous voice, the farmer ordered me to come in; he had me tell him where I was from and what my name was. I explained I was lost, I had been separated from the other soldiers by clouds of smoke after a series of explosions. He told his wife to serve me a bowl of soup. The dish was deep, glazed, its rim decorated with painted flowers, which I kept my eyes on as I ate, seated on the stone hearth because the farmer had not asked me to sit at the table. I could have eaten seven whole pots of that rich, warm soup. They gave me two slices of bread larger than my feet, and I kept dipping them in the soup. I saw that the farmer had a wooden leg, which I hadn’t noticed when he was whipping the dog. He asked me what I planned to do. Rejoin the soldiers, I said. There’s time for that. Around here we have more work than we can manage. So, not feeling inclined to start roaming again from place to place, I stayed. They had me wash the dishes and showed me where I would be sleeping: a tiny alcove with a cot and a stool, just beside the hearth. You entered through a small door that didn’t shut well and had a crack in the middle, so if you put your eye to it from the outside, you could see the cot. I pushed the cot against the wall that had the hearth on the other side. The family slept upstairs. I was still working in the kitchen when they went up and left me alone. After I washed the soup pot, I hid the bones in it and then dumped them in a bucket under a pile of potato skins and cabbage leaves.
The night was sweet, blue-black, yet lighter around the edges of the moon. Bucket in hand, I went in search of the dog. I had trouble finding him. He was lying against a low drywall on the edge of a field, his breathing belabored. Without touching him I set the bones down near him, and I saw his eyes gleaming.
After a fortnight at the farmhouse, I had recovered to such an extent that when I studied my image in the goose pond I scarcely recognized myself. I ate mountains of potatoes, heaps of rice, bowls and bowls of pork and vegetable stew. One day the farm woman — her name was Fermina, pale skinned, with moist, sleepy eyes like the dog that was beaten — told me that her two sons, Miquel and Llorenç, had died in the war, after all the effort it had taken to bring them up. Why did they have to die? And who did they die for? She had watched the boys go. She could still see them: two shadows silhouetted against the glory of the sun. Every evening since that day she would stand in the doorway, gazing at the mountains, waiting and waiting, sick with yearning. With tears in her eyes she confessed that I and her youngest son, Miquel — who was an angel — were like two drops of water from the same fountain, so much did we resemble each another.
I had to work hard. I couldn’t handle it alclass="underline" pulling up potatoes, tilling the vegetable garden and watering it. . You’re doing a good job. I told them about our field of carnations. I had to carry the baskets of laundry to the clotheslines, clean the stable, henhouses, pigeon coop, and rabbit cages, and provide fodder to the old horse with a sore on its left hip that was always covered with flies. I had to wash the dishes, kill hens and chickens, chop wood and pile it up all neat for when the great cold arrived. The only chore the farm woman did not task me with was collecting eggs, because, as she made plain to me, she was afraid I would drink them raw the way Miquelet did; he would suck as many as he could in one sitting, and if the family wanted to have an omelet they had to go buy eggs at the next farmhouse, and each omelet cost them forty eggs. The farmer spent most of his time in the village, glued to a bench in the tavern playing cards. . Little by little the dog began coming closer to the farmhouse; if he caught sight of the farmer, who never even looked at him, the dog bared his teeth and the hair on his back stood up. I always left food for him by the same wall as that first time, and he always waited for me there. After he had eaten, he would sit next to me and the two of us would look at the moon. He was always right there behind me, never leaving my side. He was my greatest companion; we loved each other.