SHE HAD ALWAYS known that one day she would return to Barcelona. The fact that she was going to do this during her last job for Leandro added a layer of irony that could not have escaped her mentor. She imagined him pacing around his suite, pensive, his eyes on the telephone, tempted to pick up the receiver and call her again, order her to stay in Madrid. Leandro didn’t like it when his puppets tried to cut their strings. More than one of them had attempted it, only to discover that this was not a profession for lovers of happy endings. But Alicia had been different. She was his favourite. She was his masterpiece.
She poured herself another glass of white wine and lay down to wait for the call. The temptation to disconnect the phone crossed her mind. The last time she’d done that, two of his stooges had turned up at her doorstep to escort her as far as the hallway, where Leandro was waiting for her – a Leandro she had never seen before, devoid of his calm expression, consumed by anxiety. On that occasion he had looked at her with a mixture of suspicion and eagerness, as if he couldn’t quite decide whether to hug her or order his men to beat her to a pulp with their rifle butts then and there. “Don’t ever do anything like that to me again,” he’d said. It was two years since that night.
She waited for Leandro’s call until late that evening, but it never came. His need to find Valls and please the upper echelons of the regime must be great, she thought, if he was letting her out of her cage. Convinced that neither of them would get any sleep that night, Alicia decided to take refuge in the only place where she knew Leandro had never been able to reach her – the pages of a book. She picked up the black volume she’d found hidden in Valls’s office and opened it, ready to enter the mind of Víctor Mataix.
Before she reached the end of the first paragraph, she’d already forgotten that what she was holding in her hands was a piece of evidence in the investigation. She let herself be lulled by the perfume of the words and was soon lost among them, succumbing to the torrent of images and rhythms that oozed from the story of Ariadna’s adventures and her descent into the depths of that enchanted Barcelona. Every paragraph, every sentence, seemed written in a musical key. The narrative drew her eyes through a cadence of timbres and colours that sketched a theatre of shadows in her mind. She read without pause for two hours, relishing every sentence and dreading the moment she would reach the end. When, upon turning the last page, she came across the illustration of a curtain crashing down on a stage and making the text evaporate into shadowy dust, Alicia closed the book over her chest and lay down in the dark, her gaze still lost in the adventures of Ariadna in her labyrinth.
Bewitched by the magic of that story, she closed her eyes and tried to sleep. She imagined Valls in his office, hiding the book behind a drawer and turning the key in its lock. Of all the things he could have hidden, he’d chosen that book before disappearing. Slowly, exhaustion began to drip over her body. Throwing off the towel, she slipped naked under the sheets. She lay on one side, curled up into a ball, her hands linked between her thighs. It occurred to her that this was probably the last night she would ever sleep in that room, the room that had been her cell for years. She lay there, waiting, listening to the murmurings and groans of the building that was already sensing her absence.
She got up shortly before dawn, with barely enough time to pack a few essentials and leave the rest behind as a donation for the invisible hotel guests. She stared at her little city of books piled up against the walls and smiled sadly. Maura would know what to do with her friends.
Day was just breaking when she walked across the lobby, with no intention of bidding farewell to the lost souls of the Hispania. She had almost reached the door when she heard Maura’s voice behind her.
“So it was true,” said the concierge. “You’re leaving.”
Alicia stopped and turned around. Maura was observing her, leaning on a mop that sported as much mileage as he did. He smiled so as not to cry, his eyes betraying immense sadness.
“I’m going home, Maura.”
The concierge nodded repeatedly. “You’re doing the right thing.”
“I’ve left my books upstairs. They’re for you.”
“And the clothes. Do what you think best. Someone in the building might want them.”
“I’ll take them to the Red Cross. There are lots of creeps around here, and I wouldn’t like to find that smart aleck Valenzuela sniffing around where he has no business.”
Alicia went over to the little man and embraced him. “Thanks for everything, Maura,” she whispered in his ear. “I’m going to miss you.”
Maura dropped the mop handle and put his trembling arms around her. “Forget all about us as soon as you get home,” he said in a broken voice.
She was going to kiss him goodbye, but Maura, knight of the doleful countenance and old school, held out his hand. Alicia shook it.
“Someone called Vargas might call and ask for me.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll get him off your back. Go on, off you go.”
She got into a taxi that was waiting by the hotel entrance and asked the driver to take her to Atocha. A leaden blanket covered the city, and frost shrouded the car windows. The taxi driver looked as if he’d spent the night, or the entire week, at the wheel, barely clinging to the world with the cigarette butt hanging from his lips. He watched her through the rearview mirror. “Are you going or returning?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” replied Alicia.
When she arrived at the station, she saw that Leandro had gotten there ahead of her. He was waiting at a table in one of the cafés next to the ticket offices, reading a newspaper and playing with his coffee spoon. Two of his heavies were posted against columns a few metres away. When he saw her, Leandro folded the newspaper and smiled paternally.
“Getting up early won’t make the sun rise any sooner,” said Alicia.
“Reciting proverbs doesn’t suit you, Alicia. Sit down. Have you had breakfast?”
She shook her head and sat down at the table. The last thing she wanted was to annoy Leandro just when she was about to put six hundred kilometres between them.
“There are some common habits among normal people, like eating breakfast or having friends. They would do you good, Alicia.”
“Do you have many friends, Leandro?”
Alicia noticed the steely glimmer in her boss’s eyes, a hint of warning, and she looked down. She dutifully accepted the cup of coffee and the pastry served by the waiter at Leandro’s request and took a few sips under his watchful eye.
He pulled an envelope out of his coat and handed it to her. “I’ve reserved a first-class compartment just for you. I hope you don’t mind. There’s also some money there. Today I’ll put the rest into the Hispano account. If you need any more, let me know.”
“Thank you.”
Alicia nibbled the pastry. It was dry and rough, and she found it hard to swallow. Leandro didn’t take his eyes off her. She sneaked a look at the clock hanging high up on the wall.
“You still have ten minutes,” said her mentor. “Relax.”
Groups of passengers were beginning to walk past on their way to the platform. Alicia curled her hands around the cup just for something to do with them. The silence between them was painful.
“Thanks for coming to say goodbye,” she ventured.
“Is that what we’re doing? Saying goodbye?”
Alicia shook her head. They continued sitting there, mutely, for a couple of minutes. At last, when Alicia was beginning to think the cup would shatter into a thousand pieces under the pressure of her grip, Leandro stood up, buttoned up his coat and calmly tied his scarf. He put on his leather gloves and, smiling benevolently, leaned over to kiss Alicia on the cheek. His lips were cold, and his breath smelled of mint. Alicia sat there, motionless, barely daring to breathe.
“I want you to call me every day. Without fail. Starting tonight, as soon as you arrive, so I know that all is well.”
She didn’t say anything.
“Alicia?”
“Every day, without fail,” she recited.
“No need for the singsong.”
“Sorry.”
“How are you managing the pain?”
Leandro pulled a pill bottle out of his coat pocket and handed it to her. “I know you don’t like to take anything, but you’ll be grateful for this. It’s not as strong as the injectable sort. One pill, no more. Don’t take it on an empty stomach, and especially not with alcohol.”
Alicia accepted the bottle and put it into her handbag. She wasn’t going to start an argument now. “Thanks.”
Leandro nodded and made his way towards the exit, escorted by his men.
The train was waiting beneath the station’s vaulted ceiling. On the platform, a very young-looking porter asked to see her ticket. He led her to the first-class carriage, which was standing empty at the head of the train. Noticing that she was limping slightly, he helped her up the steps and accompanied her to her compartment, where he lifted the suitcase into the luggage rack and raised the window curtain. The glass was misted up, and he wiped it with his jacket sleeve. A troupe of passengers glided along the platform, which shone like a mirror in the humid early-morning air. Alicia offered the porter a tip: he bowed before leaving and closed the compartment door.
She collapsed into her seat and looked absently at the station lights. Soon the train began to crawl, and Alicia abandoned herself to the gentle swaying of the carriage while she imagined the sun rising over Madrid, anchored in mist. And then she saw him. Vargas was racing down the platform, trying in vain to catch the train. He very nearly touched the carriage with his fingers, and even met Alicia’s impenetrable eyes as she observed him impassively through the window. At last Vargas gave up, his hands on his knees and a bitter, breathless laugh on his lips.
As the city receded into the distance, the train entered a plain with no visible horizon, stretching endlessly. Behind that wall of darkness, Alicia felt, Barcelona had already scented her trail in the wind. She imagined the city opening like a black rose and for a moment was filled with the calm of inevitability that comforts the accursed – or perhaps, she told herself, it was just tiredness. Little did it matter now. She closed her eyes and surrendered to sleep while the train, clearing the shadows, slowly hastened towards the labyrinth of the spirits.