The Whispering City (21 page)

She went towards the records, getting on her knees to see them better. Thank you, wonderful alphabetical order! O, P, there was no Q, R, S. Strauss, Johann, Richard.
Der Rosenkavalier
. Mariona, enthralled, listening to the final tercet but, unlike the Marschallin, she didn’t have to renounce her young lover so he could go with someone younger. Mariona would listen to the tercet in triumph.

Ana also felt triumphant. There it was! The clipping of the advertisement was carefully placed between two of the records.

She heard the creak of the door to the terrace. She stuck the advert between the pages of her notebook before putting the record back. She wouldn’t have time to get up and move away from the record player, so she sat on the floor and pretended to be taking notes.

‘What are you doing on the floor?’

‘I didn’t want to sit on the chairs in case they still needed to dust for prints.’

The officer seemed convinced.

‘Have you taken the photos?’

‘Not yet. I only need to jot down one thing and then I’m ready.’

She photographed the room where the crime had taken place: the exact place where they had found Mariona’s body, her husband’s desk, also the skull, which was still missing an eye; someone had left it to one side.

‘What’s going to happen to the house?’

‘I think it will go to a nephew or a brother. I don’t know,’ replied Sevilla.

Then, as if he regretted having given her any information, no matter how insignificant, he asked in a surly tone, ‘Have you finished now?’

‘I have.’

They left the house.

In the car, Ana wondered if she had put the record back in the right place, or if she had mixed it up with those by Johann Strauss. She assessed Officer Sevilla out of the corner of her eye and relaxed. They weren’t going to notice if she had.

Reading the advertisement that had caught Mariona’s eye, Ana wavered between compassion and laughter, with a hint of embarrassment for the other woman in the mix: ‘A young heart, disillusioned by the fickleness of blossoming girls, unripe fruits who have filled him with remorse and darkness, seeks correspondence with an understanding lady leading to friendship. The Knight of the Rose.’

The target of his words was clear: the protective instinct of the mature woman, a little past her prime, who would be willing to heal the wounds of the Knight of the Rose. If the reader of the advert was an opera fan, the promise of possible romance was more than evident behind the ‘friendship’. It was the perfect bait for Mariona Sobrerroca.

For the first time she also voiced to herself a suspicion that she’d been turning over in her head since she had known about the advert. What if the ‘Knight of the Rose’ was a professional? Someone who specialised in extracting money and a lifestyle from older women? The idea made her feel a combination of aversion and sadness.

The piece of paper, just a few centimetres square, was neatly cut out; on the back of the advert there were three lines of an incoherent text, almost random words, few of them useful; the articles and prepositions weren’t much help. But the two imperatives ‘make’, and ‘then make a sa’. A what? A sack, a saddle, a sandwich? A sauce!

It was a recipe.

Recipes, friendship advertisements. She thought of a few publications that the clipping could have come from. She had to get copies of each of them.

Yet again, she hurried out of her flat. Just as she was congratulating herself for having avoided the doorkeeper’s usual commentary, she ran into her at the street door. Broom at the ready, like a brigadier, Teresina Sauret was keeping watch over the house. Her eyes swept the ten or twelve metres of pavement that she considered her territory, although the bustling pedestrians walking on it were oblivious to that fact. Ana uttered a brief greeting; too bad she didn’t wear a hat like men did, allowing them to resolve such matters with a simple touch of the brim. She heard Teresina’s reproving murmur and joined the flow of people to her right, heading towards the Ramblas.

She bought all the women’s magazines she could find, even some like
Medina
, the magazine of the Falange’s Women’s Section, where it was highly unlikely they would accept such advertisements. But an investigation was an investigation.

Back home, she started to search, with the advertisement she had found in Mariona’s house in front of her.
This I’ll save for later
, she told herself when she came across a feature story on Mario Cabré and Ava Gardner. It seemed they were having a romance. Some people have all the luck!

She found a couple more articles she wanted to read ‘later’, and got lost for a few seconds gazing into Tyrone Power’s eyes, but she kept up her search. Until she found it, in
Mujer Actual
. The classified section had the same typography.
Mujer Actual
, a magazine with fashion, recipes, some practical tips for the home and feature stories on the entertainment world. Another one. Maybe the difference lay in what there wasn’t: she didn’t find any articles that touched on religion or morality, at least not explicitly. The classifieds filled an entire page. She was in luck; the magazine was produced in Barcelona.

Ana had never been much of a planner. At least not in her writing – her best ideas always came to her while she was working. On the way to the newspaper office she had come up with the idea of taking photos in Mariona’s house. She would have to write some copy to accompany the photos, or she’d have to do some explaining to both Sanvisens and Castro. She would do that ‘later’, too. First, trusting that the strategy would come to her in a similar way, she decided to go to the magazine’s headquarters.

She found herself on the Vía Augusta. She took the bus. On the way she tried to think how she could obtain the address where the replies to the ‘Knight of the Rose’ were being sent, but without knowing what the place was like or what kind of people she would find there, she felt unable to come up with a plan.

The magazine’s offices were on the main floor of a stately building with a reception area.

She went in. The receptionist looked up with his eyes but didn’t lift his head. The little novel he was reading seemed to have him completely captivated.

‘If you’re here about the job, you’re too late.’

‘What job?’

‘Doesn’t matter; even if you knew, it’s already taken.’

‘Well, all right. I’m visiting the magazine
Mujer Actual
.’

‘On the main floor. But the job’s taken.’

‘Fine, I understand.’

‘I don’t want them getting angry with me later for having sent another one up.’

‘Another what?’

‘Another one looking for work. It’s taken.’

‘I’m not looking for work. Can I go up?’

‘Nobody’s stopping you.’

He said all this without looking at her, his eyes glued to the book
Merciless Duel in Carson City
. What a title!

She went up to the first floor. A small bronze plaque screwed to a heavy dark door announced the offices of
Mujer Actual
. Nothing that could help her with a plan,
the
plan.

Perhaps another less conspicuous, handwritten sign taped beside the doorbell would be helpful.
During office hours, enter without ringing
. She did.

She entered a wide vestibule with an empty counter behind which there was a table with a typewriter, some pigeonholes for correspondence and issues of the magazine in neat piles. There was a sheet of paper in the typewriter. So the post had only been temporarily abandoned.

To one side of the door she saw a rack where men’s and women’s coats hung. She heard voices and the sound of typewriters from behind the closed doors. From a hallway to the left, footsteps approached. They belonged to a man of about fifty, who greeted her with an angry expression.

‘That Cesáreo has a brain like a sieve! Another one! Didn’t he tell you that the cleaning lady job is taken? That guy lives on the moon, I’m going to have to talk to the owner…’

‘Yes, he did tell me,’ interrupted Ana.

‘Then what are you doing here? Aren’t you a cleaner?’

‘No. I’m a journalist, from
La Vanguardia
.’

‘Excuse me, pardon the confusion.’ The man was visibly embarrassed. ‘How can I help you?’

A bad conscience is one of the most powerful motors behind human actions
. She would think that later, on the bus home, seated beside a woman who was sniffling noisily, though she didn’t dare to offer her a handkerchief so as not to draw attention to it. That maxim clearly explained her strategy.

But at the moment the man realised his mistake, Ana’s reaction was instinctive rather than planned: ‘A very delicate matter has come to our attention.’

The man indicated that it would be better if they went into his office. His name was Joaquín Muñárriz, and he was the magazine’s director. When Ana entered his office the first thing she saw were the portraits of José Antonio and Franco hanging on the wall flanking a large wooden cross. The usual. But it was the first time she’d come across an exhibition of framed photos such as the one she saw on the right-hand wall. Muñárriz must already have been aware of the surprising effect it had because, although he offered her a seat, he escorted her towards the wall and gave her time to look, one by one, at the images that completely covered it. All of the photos were dedicated, from the ones of Lola Flores, Celia Gámez and Luis Miguel Dominguín, to those of Gary Cooper, ‘for my friend Joaquín’; Charles Boyer and Ava Gardner, ‘Kisses, kisses, kisses for Joaquín’. Ana’s eyes leapt from Antonio Machín to Cary Grant.

‘You are a man of the world. That makes it a bit easier for me to explain the situation to you,’ began Ana with her eyes still on Burt Lancaster’s clear gaze.

The actor’s mocking half-smile approved of her deception.

‘Tell me.’

They moved away from the photos and sat face to face at Muñárriz’s desk.

‘A few days ago a woman got in touch with us. She told us she had been deceived by a man she met through one of your friendship advertisements. The man, after asking for her hand in marriage, had carnal contact with her, and…’

‘She’s pregnant.’

‘That’s it. How did you know?’

‘Why else would she be looking for him?’

‘That’s true. I wanted to ask for some information about this individual: his name, his address…’

‘She doesn’t know his name?’

‘She knows the name he gave her, but who knows if it’s real, seeing that he’s disappeared? He said his name was Octavian.’

‘And did he use some sort of code name? That’s usually the case.’

‘The Knight of the Rose.’

‘Miss, what did you say your name was?’

‘I didn’t, but I’m Ana María Martí.’

‘Look, Señorita Martí, as you yourself said, I am a man who’s seen something of the world, even though I’ve ended up here. Don’t think you can fool me.’

Ana shot an alarmed glance to the right. The eyes of Bette Davis, beneath high, thin brows, interrogated her in return.

‘You write for the society pages, don’t you? And you aren’t here as a journalist for
La Vanguardia
, are you? This is a private matter and, correct me if I’m wrong, the person you are talking about, if it’s not you, is someone very close to you. Or am I wrong?’

The sigh that Ana couldn’t contain was understood by the director of
Mujer Actual
as an expression of relief at finally being able to tell the truth.

‘You’re right. It’s my sister. I’m sorry to have to resort to that trick, but she’s desperate.’

‘Not another word! We journalists have to stick together. What was his name?’

‘The Knight of the Rose.’

Muñárriz got up and left. He seemed to have grown several centimetres. When he returned a few minutes later, he still seemed tall but he’d lost some of his heroic height.

‘Here it is, but unfortunately I can only give you the number of a post office box.’

‘Here in Barcelona?’

‘In Martorell.’

‘Well, it’s something, at least.’

She thanked him. Muñárriz accompanied her to the door. The secretary, an older woman with an old-fashioned updo, a style called the ‘Arriba España’, stopped writing when she saw them come out. Before saying goodbye, Muñárriz told her, ‘If you are ever looking for work, I want you to know that our doors are always open for someone as honourable as you.’

‘Thank you very much.’

She suddenly felt mean. She decided to leave the doors to
Mujer Actual
closed
behind her.

She went downstairs. The receptionist was still absorbed in his
Merciless Duel in Carson City
.

25

The ringing of the telephone echoed in the flat and the silent Sunday afternoon shattered like a crystal goblet hitting the floor. Beatriz put down her fountain pen and picked up the receiver. She heard a crackling and her cousin’s lively voice.

‘You were right.’

She needed a moment to remember what she was referring to.

‘And I’ve found out more things,’ she heard from the other end of the line.

‘Really?’

She heard herself and thought she sounded like Mercè, one of her aunts, in some never-ending cocktail conversation: ‘Really? So he has a lover and keeps her in a flat on the Diagonal?’
Really? The novel is the hit of the season?
Her Aunt Mercè always seemed friendly and interested, but an hour later she didn’t even remember what the conversation had been about.

‘Beatriz, are you still there?’

‘Of course.’

There was a brief silence at the other end of the line.

‘Do you have some time this evening?’

The truth was that she didn’t have time. On her desk was a half-written article in which the ideas were just starting to come together. On the other hand, she wanted to know what Ana had found out.