'I've got to go now, Papa,' I said. 'I'll pop in now and then, when I've got time. Do you want me to warn you? Shall I call before I drop by?'
My prolonged absence made me feel rather like an intruder and as if I needed to ask such a question, which was perhaps inappropriate in a son with respect to his father's home, a home that had for many years been mine too. I was still standing, still with my hand on his shoulder. He looked up at me, whether seeing me or guessing at my face or remembering me, I don't know. His gaze was, at any rate, very clear, surprised and slightly helpless, as if he had not quite grasped that I was leaving. His eyes were now very blue, bluer than they had ever been, perhaps because he no longer wore glasses.
'No, there's no need. As far as I'm concerned, you all still live here, even if you left a long time ago.' He fell silent, then added: 'Your mother too.'
I wasn't sure whether he meant that she still lived there as well or if he was reproaching her as well for having left, when she died, longer ago than anyone else. He probably meant both.
And I continued to waste no time. I didn't linger or delay or loiter or dally. I was longing to see my children again, not to mention Luisa and my sister, and, for the first time since my return, my brothers and a few friends, and to stroll around the city like a foreigner, but I felt I had something concrete and urgent to do, something to investigate and resolve and remedy. That was something I had learned from Tupra, at least in theory: Luisa was clearly in danger, and now I understood that sometimes one has no option but to do what has to be done and at once, without waiting or hesitating or delaying: I had to do this unthinkingly, like some very distracted, busy person, as if it were merely my job. Yes, there are occasions when one knows precisely what would happen in the world if no pressure or brake was imposed on what one perceives to be people's certain capabilities, and that if those capabilities were to remain undeployed, it was necessary for someone-me, for example, who else in this case?-to dissuade or impede them. In order for Tupra to adopt the punitive measures which he deemed necessary and appropriate, he simply had to convince himself of what would happen in each case if he or another sentinel-the authorities or the law, instinct, the moon, the storm, fear, the hovering sword, the invisible watchers-did not put a stop to it. 'It's the way of the world,' he would say, and he would say this about so many things and situations; he applied those words to betrayals and acts of loyalty, to anxieties and quickened pulses, to unexpected reversals and vertigo, to vacillations and torments and to the involuntary harm we cause, to the scratch and the pain and the fever and the festering wound, to griefs and the infinite steps we all take in the belief that we are being guided by our will, or that our will does at least play a part in them. To him all this seemed perfectly normal and even, sometimes, routine-prevention or punishment and never running too grave a risk-he knew too well that the Earth is full of passions and affections and of ill will and malice, and that sometimes individuals can avoid neither and, indeed, choose not to, because they are the fuse and the fuel for their own combustion, as well as their reason and their igniting spark. And they don't even require a motive or a goal for any of this, neither aim nor cause, gratitude nor insult, or at least not always, or as Wheeler said: 'they carry their probabilities in their veins, and so time, temptation and circumstance will lead them at last to their fulfilment.' And for Tupra this very radical and sometimes ruthless attitude-or perhaps it was simply a very practical one-was just another characteristic of the way of the world to which he conformed or adhered; and that unreflecting, inclement, resolute stance (or one based perhaps on a single thought, the first), also formed part of that way of the world which remained unchanged throughout time and regardless of space, and so there was, therefore, no reason to question it, just as there's no need to question wakefulness and sleep, or hearing and sight, or breathing and walking and speech, or any of the other things about which one knows 'that's how it is and always will be.'
I was feeling now as he did, that is, like someone who didn't bother to issue any prior warning, at least not always, someone who makes decisions at a distance and for barely identifiable reasons, or without the actions appearing to have any connection of cause and effect with those reasons, still less with the proof that such acts have been committed. Nor did I need proof of that arbitrary or justifiable occasion-who could tell which it was and what did it matter?-nor did I intend sending any warning or notice before unleashing my saber blow, I didn't even require any evidence of actions committed or proven, of events or deeds, or even certainty in order to set to and remove from Luisa's existence the man marring and threatening her life and, therefore, the lives of my children. First, I had to find out more about the man and then track him down. She wouldn't say a word to me about him, especially now that I had voiced my immediate suspicion that this as yet nameless, faceless man was the person responsible for her multicolored black eye. After my father's conjectures and his belief that my wife would be inclined to humor or encourage whoever she was attracted to or whoever she was focused on now ('Yes,' I thought, 'strictly speaking, she is still my wife. We're not divorced and neither of us seems in a hurry to get a divorce or has even suggested it,' and this confirmed me in my determination or in my first thought that admitted of no second thought), my next step was to go and see her sister or talk to her on the phone; and even though she and I had never got on particularly well or had much to do with each other and even though she led a very independent life with few family ties and saw myself and the children only infrequently, as mere extensions of Luisa, she did meet up with Luisa once or twice a month; Luisa would either go to her place without the kids and without me, her husband, or they would lunch together in a restaurant and tell each other about their respective lives, just how much I didn't know, but probably almost everything. If anyone knew what was going on, if anyone knew the identity of that man with violent tendencies, his face and name, that person was Cristina, Luisa's somewhat surly younger sister. And although her first loyalty was to Luisa and even though she considered me to be a mere dispensable appendage, I was sure that if something was worrying her-and if my deductions were correct, and even if they weren't, this guy was very worrying indeed-she would tell me and welcome hearing the views of someone who felt the same way about the matter.
I phoned her that evening, much to her surprise, for she didn't even know I was in Madrid, but then how could she unless she had spoken to Luisa during the day and Luisa had told her, she asked me how things were going in London, and I was amazed that she actually knew where I was currently living, 'Fine,' I said, without going into detail, after all, it was just a reflex question, and then I asked if we could meet up as soon as possible, 'No,' she said, 'impossible, I'm off on a trip tomorrow and I've got loads of things to do before I go,' 'How long are you away for?' 'A week,' 'It will be too late when you get back, I need to see you before you leave, I'm only here for two weeks, well, less than that now, what time are you leaving?' I asked, 'At lunchtime, but I'm really tied up until then, can't you tell me over the phone? Is it about Luisa?' Yes, it's about Luisa.' Then she fell silent for a few seconds and it seemed to me that she had sat herself down on a chair in readiness. 'What have you got to say, then? Come on, tell me,' 'What? Now?' 'Yes, now. If it's what I think it is, it won't take much time and I imagine we'll be pretty much in agreement on the subject. It's about Custardoy, isn't it?'