The Heart Has Its Reasons (30 page)

Rachel was left speechless with her glass half an inch from her lips. Vivian paused in mid-puff. They both looked at him in astonishment.

“I volunteer. Willing to contribute with fifty percent of the required quota.”

As the caffeine kicked in, Loretta Harris finally understood what the two girls wanted: for her to convince her husband to mediate with someone in the area with clout so that a young American could get the necessary permission from certain obstinate parents to marry their daughter. It would be a win-win situation if it succeeded: the cream of the crop of the U.S. Navy contingent in Cartagena sharing church pews and meringue wedding cake with a who's who of the local community. They had nothing to lose and a lot to gain.

Captain Harris's wife didn't find it at all odd to be asked to intercede for a civilian. Wherever there was no embassy or consulate nearby, it was not uncommon for high-ranking military officers to act as informal diplomatic representatives of their country. Therefore she didn't find the request absurd but maintained a cautious silence. In her long, nomadic life caring for her five children in posts around the globe, she'd experienced much more complex situations between military personnel and the local citizens: inappropriate pregnancies, irresponsible paternities, fights, thefts, blackmail, and fraud. To mediate for the simple happiness of a pair of lovers seemed like a piece of cake. And if this enhanced the reputation of the U.S. Navy in the minds of the local population and offered a means of building bridges between the two nationalities, so much the better. Vivian and Rachel were not altogether mistaken: if they managed to pull this off in a satisfactory manner, the result would be most favorable. But first she would have to make some inquiries. And if she found nothing shady, they'd carefully plan the operation.

Naturally, she did not share this with her visitors. She simply refilled their cups, lit another cigarette, and proposed the first step. To personally meet the affected party, that was the initial condition. To obtain basic information and gauge the matter's complexity, she said. She was free that afternoon and her husband had an official engagement until evening. “Coffee is over, dears,” she announced, putting out her cigarette. “I want this Carter here at five o'clock.”

Modesto the desk clerk thought he was in the middle of one of his most torrid dreams when a jeep made a sudden stop before the pension's entrance and ejected two stunning American women squeezed into blue jeans. Without articulating a half-decent word in Spanish, they were able, however, to make themselves understood well enough for him to know who they were asking for.

“Ah, you are looking for Mr. Daniel! Mr. Daniel Carter, right?”

“Exactly,” Vivian confirmed, winking one of her green eyes at him.

“Mr. Daniel has gone out; he's already left,” he announced, pointing toward the street. He automatically regretted what he'd said. Damn it, he thought. If I'm not careful they'll just leave. “Although he may have come back and I didn't notice,” he immediately corrected himself. “Or maybe he'll come right back.”

“Well . . . perhaps we can leave a note for him.”

“Yes, ma'am, by all means. Whatever that little mouth of yours asks for, good-looking. To obey, that's what we're here for . . .” Modesto answered Rachel without taking his eyes from her cleavage, which was accentuated by a short lemon-colored sweater.

He provided them with a piece of paper whose reverse side was filled with household sums, and an old pencil with a chewed-up top. While they wrote a note summoning their new friend to the home of the base commander that very afternoon, Modesto's feverish eyes darted back and forth from one to the other. He broke into a sweat.

“Thank you very much,” they said in unison once they were done.

Before the eyes of the clerk shone the whitest teeth and the fullest lips he'd ever seen in his life. “Mother of God,” he whispered with a dry mouth.

He accompanied them out, surreptitiously trying to brush against them as he opened the door with purported gallantry. Then he watched them leave, cursing his rotten luck for lacking the communication ability to delay them for a little longer. “Fuck,” he said before spitting with fury on the sidewalk. Half a life reading those Westerns, only to be able to say “whiskey,” “sheriff,” and “saloon.”

The morning also turned out to be fruitful for Daniel. First he'd decided to position himself on the Paseo de la Muralla, close enough
to observe the comings and goings of Aurora's house, but far enough away so that his presence would go unnoticed. Just as on the previous day, first he saw the father leave and, although he was unable to make out his face, from the cold greeting he gave the porter he gathered that he was not in the best of moods. A while later the mother and grandmother left the building, caught up in an irate discussion he was unable to overhear. The moment he made out the ladies' silhouettes at the doorway, he vanished swiftly behind a palm tree.

After they turned the corner, he came out of his hiding place and headed toward the doorway. When Abelardo the porter saw him, he tried to defend the fort with all the vigor expected of him, only too aware that the American had already sneaked through once. Abelardo could not afford to be reprimanded again.

“You cannot come in! You are forbidden to enter!”

A one-hundred-peseta bill—the most convincing of arguments, folded between two fingers like a safe-conduct pass—tore down the barricade. Abelardo didn't think it over twice: the bill went into his left pants pocket as quickly as the young man slipped into the building and again climbed the stairs three at a time. The porter sighed in relief. What difference did it make if he received another scolding by the stormy Señora Carranza if with that money he was practically able to buy his son's First Communion suit?

A kind-looking person of considerable age with a chignon at the nape of her neck opened the door, alarmed by the impetuous ringing that resounded all over the house. He didn't even greet her or announce the reason for his visit. Nor did he identify himself. As soon as the door opened and he realized he had free access to the apartment, he said only one word, repeated three times and shouted loudly: “Aurora!”

A fraction of a second was exactly what it took for a whirlwind in pajamas to appear from the end of the hallway. She hurled herself into Daniel's arms with a wildcat's leap, clutching his neck, his torso, and his legs, digging her nails into his back, caressing his neck, crying and laughing at the same time. He, for his part, was only able to whisper her name while holding her tightly with all his might, one hand on her
shoulder, the other on her slender waist, feeling her laughter in his ears and her tears on his face.

Two witnesses watched agape, not quite knowing if that embrace oozed pure shamelessness and sinful scandal or an overflowing tenderness that there was no longer any human means of containing. The first was Asuncion, the woman who had opened the door, who for more than forty years had devoted herself to the family and who, in light of the scene, was only able to let loose a hasty litany of “Blessed Virgin” and “Good heavens” that seemed to have no end. The other was Adelaida, the young domestic servant. Hidden behind an antique desk, she was bowled over at the sight of the couple and wondered why her boyfriend was not this romantic with her when on leave from the barracks.

Then Asuncion reacted, and her insistence on pulling Aurora from Daniel's arms was the only thing that brought them back to reality: “Girl, girl! GIRL!” Only then was he aware of being, for the first time, in the house where she'd been born; of stepping on the floor where she'd taken her first steps; of seeing for a fleeting moment everything that had surrounded Aurora throughout her life: the family photos in silver frames, the library inherited from the father's side of the family, the balconies looking onto the port, the portrait of a very young Nana smiling coquettishly at some anonymous painter . . .

Aurora, meanwhile, begged for the momentary relief from her suffering to be extended a little longer.

“Just awhile, Asuncion, please let him stay awhile . . .”

However, Asuncion was a hard nut to crack. She'd brought up Aurora, adored her, and for days had been suffering on her behalf. But before that she'd brought up the girl's mother, and knew full well the uproar she would raise if she were to find out that Asuncion had authorized the American's presence in the house.

“Out of the question: he must leave right now. For God's sake, girl, for God's sake, this cannot be!” the good woman repeated while she held the door open for Daniel to leave.

Aurora's eyes, while she tenaciously hung on to his arm, again filled with tears.

“I beg you, Asuncion, I beseech you, only for a little while and then he goes; I promise.”

In the middle of this give-and-take, Daniel made an effort to remain neutral. He longed to stay not only a while longer but an entire lifetime, but he was also aware that his boldness in sneaking into her house had already reached a feverish pitch and it was not in their best interest to strain matters further. Until he was no longer able to hold back.

“Will you allow me, please? We promise you, Asuncion, five minutes, no more. We give you our word of honor,” he said, bringing his hand ostentatiously to his heart.

“No,” the nanny reiterated.

“Wherever you please and, needless to say, with you present,” he then offered in a profusion of goodwill.

“No.”

“And if you agree, I promise we won't bother you anymore.”

Youth's courage and the appeal of courtesy finally defeated the gray hair. But Asuncion, still unwilling to be seduced by the ways and words of this fellow—who, she had to admit, was far from being the devil incarnate that she had imagined—imposed conditions and marked the territory with the zeal of a faithful watchdog: with a clock ticking, in her presence, and hands off or that was the end of it. Amen was all there was left for them to say.

She settled them in the kitchen, spacious, white, and square, with a great marble table in the middle. Where the girl had had her breakfast and had enjoyed bread and chocolate on returning from school. Where she'd done homework, read comics, and heard tales. Where there had been fights and secrets between siblings, hot milk on winter afternoons, and clandestine nips at the loaf of bread just before dinner. This was the territory that Asuncion had chosen for an urgent meeting about sentimental matters for someone who up until then had been the girl of the house. Daniel and Aurora sat facing each other, just like a visit to an inmate in prison. Asuncion, meanwhile, standing two steps away
with the sullen face of a Civil Guardsman, kept a constant eye on the proceedings.

“There is someone who might be able to help us,” Daniel finally said.

He informed Aurora of his incursion at the naval base and of the firm pledge he'd received from his compatriots.

“But what can they do?” she asked, covering her face in despair. “My parents know no Americans; they have no relations with those people.”

“Well, perhaps they may start having one now.”

That, of course, was nothing but pie in the sky, mere wishful thinking to inject a dose of optimism by offering a potential solution of which he was not too convinced himself. They shared a cigarette, passing it back and forth from one mouth to the other, from one hand to the other, brushing it against their lips on the same place, touching each other's fingers, and transmitting through their fleeting sense of touch a thousandth of that which their bodies would do if some mysterious force were to magically disintegrate Asuncion.

They'd just finished lighting their second Chesterfield when, with a watchmaker's precision, Asuncion announced that the meeting had come to its end.

“Come on, young man, or you'll ruin my life,” she said, pointing to the door. Then she sighed deeply. No matter how much Aurora and Daniel insisted, both knew they couldn't squeeze a minute more.

“When do you return to Madrid?” Aurora asked as they both rose from their chairs with the willingness of convicts on the way to their execution.

“I'm not going to go without you.”

“Don't say that, Daniel . . .” she whispered, bringing a hand to his face.

Asuncion checked the impulse.

“I said it was over.”

He had no other choice than to cross the threshold. Once outside, he turned around and looked at her one last time. There she was, in one of her brothers' blue-striped pajamas, with her straw-colored curls
askew, her eyes shiny from the welling tears that gave way to inconsolable weeping the moment he started down the stairs. Then, in spite of his good intentions, in spite of having resisted till the last second, he was no longer able to hold back. Knowing full well that he was contravening Asuncion's orders and risking losing her trust forever, he rushed back in and said good-bye to Aurora with the most grandiose kiss imaginable.

Chapter 28

N
ews that the wife of the naval base commander was willing to meet him at her house added another whiff of optimism to his day. He read the note over and over, memorizing the details. The desk clerk, meanwhile, didn't take his eye off him, curious to know what those two bombshells had written.

“Modesto, could you order another taxi for a quarter to five, please?”

“Consider it done, Mr. Daniel. Are you off to see your American friends?” he asked, unable to hold back any longer.

“Not for the time being. I've got other matters to take care of today.”

A taxi was waiting at the agreed-upon time at the front door of the pension. And a familiar figure was waiting next to it.

“I've found out we had a little visit this morning at home.”

“What are you doing here, Nana?”

This time she was dressed in gray, with a black veil covering her head.