Duende

‘COME ON. TO work.’

Jesús came to pick me up, carless.

‘You must ask your friend to come in, Jason. He doesn’t always have to wait for you outside, you know,’ said Carlota. Expecting Jesús to sit and drink tea while fighting off vicious incontinent cats did not seem like a good idea. I looked at the clock: it was three in the morning.

‘Maybe another time,’ I said, stepping out the door. The end of the tour and returning to Madrid hadn’t slowed things down as I had hoped.

We started walking. It was a week night and the city was still half-deserted as people delayed their return home from holidays on the coast. A couple of Gypsies by the side of the road were furtively syphoning off petrol from a parked car, sucking the liquid into an old water-bottle into which it flowed, bright greeny-pink. For a moment I thought Jesús might greet them, but he passed as though they weren’t there. The sense of fraternity amongst Gypsies I had expected to come across was hard to find.

We passed out of my quarter, away from the grubby whores and pimps, onto the Gran Vía. I watched the traffic go by in a haze: bright buses filled with hot, frustrated passengers; three-wheeled tin vans put-putting back and forth; identical old couples walking arm in arm. I felt cut off from it all. The images were obstacles, things to avoid or go round. People, cars, trees, buildings: nothing had any reality. Just a dreamscape passing in front of me. Occasionally a luxury car would flash by – one that might interest Jesús – potential targets to be swooped upon.

‘No problem with that one. Piece of cake. He hasn’t even got an immobiliser. Switch the fuses and we’re there.’ The thoughts of a car-thief were racing inside me.

We carried on down to Cibeles and up the Castellana: Jesús’s preferred hunting ground. But this time he carried on further, pacing solidly up the boulevard towards the more modern part of the city, with its glistening tower blocks, expensive houses, and the possibility of even richer pickings. I followed reluctantly, yet obediently, in the oppressive night heat.

There was always a switch when the moment arrived – from simply walking, to hunting. Jesús’s body movements would change; one moment an ordinary man moving forwards, the next an animal, a leopard, shoulders hunched, head lowered, feet arched, stalking over the ground as though ready to pounce at any second. Anyone else watching might not have noticed anything beyond a look of menace in his eyes. But it was dark, there was no-one around, and it was my job to keep it that way.

He disappeared under the bonnet of a car, fiddling with the fuse wires, and with a muffled click, the central locking opened. Sitting in the driver’s seat, he brought out a steel hammer – one of the few tools he carried with him; he never had time for too much gadgetry – and smashed down on the freshly exposed steering lock, freeing the wheel. Then a simple connection of the right wires, and we were off on another drive, soaring through the sparkling night city like birds.

We raced down the Castellana – wide, open, tree-lined and free. Returning to it now was a sort of home-coming. The car we had picked up was a Mercedes soft-top, and taking down the roof, the air rushed over us like cool water, fresh on our damp, salty skin. I looked around. The car was plush and comfortable. I tried the seatbelt on for size.

Jesús had begun another monologue. The kick he got from driving was more important than the money. These were just going to end up as toys for rich Arabs, as far as he was concerned. There was just time for him to enjoy them briefly before they disappeared for good and became another unsolved case on the police records. And the high he got seemed to unlock something.

‘Bottom of that road’s the bullring. You like bullfighting? Olé! Toro! Toro!’ He took his hands from the steering wheel and, making two horns with his fingers, he jabbed at me, ducking his fingers down at my chest. We were driving very fast.

‘Bullfight – guy got gored. Lived, of course: stitched him up and he was all right, no problem. Bull wasn’t. Got it in the neck. Ended up on the bullfighter’s table that night. Ha! Fuckers. Serves ’em right. Live like kings. In the fields, lots of food, as many cows as they can handle. Until they end up in a fucking great ring. Go mad. Chalao. I shit on the mother who gave birth to her. Course, there’s the others, spiking it. You know . . . It doesn’t stop, just doesn’t stop, blood everywhere. Pain. And she’s waving the muleta, the red cape, at you, forcing you to run, can’t give up, no, you can’t, see, she’s got you hooked, there, in the ring. Nowhere else you can go. And you’re running at her, but you’re thinking, I should be running away from all this, not running into it. But there’s just nowhere to run to, so you keep running into her, and she keeps stabbing you, prodding you, waving that great red thing in your face, and like a fool you keep going. That’s the bull’s fault. Keeps going. Other animals would give up, but the bull keeps going, never gives up, until he runs himself onto the sword up there, and . . .’

It was swerving to avoid the other car that did it. He pulled hard on the wheel, braked, and we went into a spin, flying across the road, hitting the kerb, and smashing sideways into a lamppost.

The lamp went out, the other car sped away, and we were left alone in the deserted street.

I lifted my head. Everything was silent. I’d blacked out for a few moments and my face was half-buried in an air bag, sharp pains shooting across my chest where the seatbelt had cut in. The driver’s seat next to me was empty. Jesús had disappeared.

‘Jesús!’ I called. There was no answer. Bastard, I thought, as a fuzzy, crackling pain began wrapping itself around my skull. He’s probably run off and left me here.

I got out of the car shakily and checked myself. Everything seemed OK. Just dizzy, and a sense of being somewhere else, as though watching myself and everything around me on some faraway screen. The car was a mess, a great dent in the side where the lamppost had hit, glass scattered and glistening over the tyre-marks etched into the road. From somewhere came the urgent thought: weren’t you supposed to run away from smashed-up cars in case they suddenly blew up? That was what happened in films. For a moment I was gripped by the certainty that the car was about to explode, taking me with it. I ran and dived dramatically onto the grass, landing heavily on my bruised ribs. Scrambling along the ground, I kept as low as possible. The blast, I reasoned, might at least go over my head.

I didn’t get far. Only a few yards on, I stumbled across a body. It was Jesús, lying on his back. Pale, eyes closed.

‘Jesús! Fuck it! You all right?’

There was no reply. I felt around his neck, trying to find a pulse. He was breathing. There were no signs of any cuts or serious damage, but his eyes remained shut and he appeared to be in pain.

‘Jesús. Wake up.’ I slapped him around the face. Another tip from the cinema. Still he didn’t stir.

‘Come on. Wake up.’ I tried again. A bit harder this time. Nothing. I lifted my head. Two or three whining sirens in the distance were getting closer. Please, not the police. Not the police, dear God.

‘JESÚS!’ He was out cold.

I stood up to get a better view. It looked like an ambulance, but the police wouldn’t be far behind. I began calculating how far I would need to carry him to be safe. How far could I go without being spotted, though?

The ambulance pulled up as I was caught by a moment’s indecision, and the medics tumbled out to look for us. A man ran up with a blanket and hauled me away from Jesús.

‘Here, this way. You need to sit down. We’ll get you in the ambulance.’

I shook him off. ‘I’m staying here with him.’

‘You’re injured. Come on. Get in the ambulance.’

I stood still. The most important thing was taking care of Jesús. They already had a blanket around him and were fetching a stretcher. There was noise, people shouting. One of the medics went to get more blankets. The stretcher got caught on one of the bars in the ambulance and for a moment they struggled to get it out, shouting at one another angrily.

Come on, Jesús. Wake up, for God’s sake. We’ve got to get out of here.

But he was still unmoving, still unconscious.

Another medic shouted at me as he ran past.

‘You still here? Get inside the . . .’

‘Are the police coming?’

‘Of course. Be here any second.’

I had to do something, but racing around Madrid in an ambulance trying to escape from the police did not seem very practical. There would be the medics to deal with first, and there were three of them . . .

I stepped over towards Jesús as they were about to put him on the stretcher.

‘Wait!’ I leaned over his body and whispered in his ear.

‘Jesús,’ I said gently, ‘wake up now.’ He didn’t move. The ambulancemen moved to push me out of the way.

‘Wake up now, Jesús. They’re expecting the police.’

At the mention of the hated word, he opened his eyes, looked at me for a second and sat bolt upright.

‘Watch it, man,’ the medic said. ‘You’ve just had an accident. The ambulance is here, we’re going to take you to the hospital. You’ll be fine, but . . .’

Jesús was already on his feet.

‘No, I’m OK.’ He was leaning heavily on my arm.

The ambulanceman ignored him.

‘Right. If you just come over here, we’ll get you in the . . .’

‘No. I told you. I’m fine.’

More blue lights were flashing in the street ahead. I squeezed Jesús’s wrist.

‘You’re not. You’ve had an accident. Now get inside the ambulance.’

‘We’ll be off,’ I said. The lights were getting closer. We turned to get away. The medic grabbed my shoulders and pulled me back with a jerk.

There was no choice.

‘Go!’ I shouted to Jesús. Mustering as much strength as I could, I spun on the ball of my foot and punched the medic in the stomach. He gave out a low, wounded groan and folded in half, falling to the floor like a deflated balloon. For a moment, I looked at him, surprised at my own strength. It felt terrible as he lay there, face screwed up with shock. But there was no time for sympathy: the other two were bearing down on me and the police were arriving. Turning, I ran as fast as I could. Jesús was sprinting ahead, all weakness and injury melting away as he cut off the main road and headed for one of the sidestreets that wound round the back of the Cortes, the parliament. I followed, the medics coming up behind; I just hoped they hadn’t had time to tell the police what was going on.

Carrying on up the slope, our legs began to tire. We had to be careful: just one street away, police and guards were stationed, watching over the parliament building, and they would be only too happy to intercede in the far more exciting job of pursuing a Gypsy car-thief and his mate.

Jesús, slowing at a junction to decide which way to go, turning right; me running behind him, feet barely touching the pavement, flying past streetlamps, parked cars, dirty doorways.

Think fast. We couldn’t get away just by running. Once the police at the crash site worked out what was going on they would radio out for help, meaning an ever increasing number of pursuers ringing us in like hounds. The streets were deserted and poorly lit, thank God, and the medics were only half-hearted in their attempts to catch us, happy to leave the job of hunting us down to the police. A pair of feet echoed in the streets behind us, pounding the paving-stones with heavy, awkward steps. The man called back to his colleagues to ask if they could see us. But he was alone: there was no reply, and his steps became slower and stiffer as he ran from junction to junction trying to see which way we’d gone. I was more worried about the police at the Cortes, though. With all the noise, one of them might come out and snoop around, just to see what was going on.

Jesús was panting and beginning to hobble. I should have been amazed he was even upright at all, but we were on the run, sweating heavily, our minds focused entirely on escape. Catching up with him, I placed his arm over my shoulder and helped him move faster, my eyes moving over the scene ahead for any way out. There were no walls to hide behind, no alleyways with fire-escapes to climb up and away, no gardens we could sneak into. For a moment I thought that Jesús could break into another car and we could just drive away, but we didn’t have the time, and he was weakening. And there was always the chance of getting stopped.

More shouting from behind. I didn’t dare look back. Jesús was leaning more and more on my arm. Ahead was another road. We swerved to the right, heading for the Alcalá, the main avenue leading to the Puerta del Sol and the heart of the city. If we were fast enough, and with a bit of luck . . . It was late, though. I must have been mad, but it was our only chance.

Out on the empty main road, a white car with a green light on its roof appeared a hundred yards away. I looked around; no police, but oh God it was moving so slowly. Come to us, come to us. That’s right. He’d seen us now, and was speeding up. Sticking my arm out, I let go of Jesús. For a second he staggered, then righted himself. One final effort.

The door closed, the light went out and the taxi gently pulled away. Hold on Jesús, hold on. Just till we get past Sol and away from here. The driver was already suspicious – Jesús a Gypsy and me a foreigner. It didn’t quite fit, somehow. I could see him trying to get a view of us in his mirror. That’s it, head down on the back of the seat, Jesús, sleep a little. Just a heavy night, that’s all. We’ll get you sorted. Away from here, away from them, away from all this. Away, and down the Calle Mayor, away from the centre, away from the boulevards and avenues and tight, narrow streets. No more. Not tonight. It’s finished. Gone.

* * *

‘Listen, son. This is the last opportunity you’ll have to see him. You can’t miss it.’

Eduardo had called from Alicante. We hadn’t spoken for months. He was coming up to Madrid for the weekend and wanted me to meet him at the bullring. It was a chance to see his favourite matador – the Alicantino, Jose-María Manzanares – in action.

‘He’s a great bloke. Gave me my first interview at the paper. Meet me at the main entrance at five.’

Las Ventas is one of the finest, and, Madrileños like to think, the most prestigious bullrings in the world. It is a megalithic brick monument to neo-Moorish architecture, built shortly before the Civil War, and squats, as in many Roman towns, on the edge of the centre next to the modern equivalent of the city walls, the ring-road.

I was struck by its size, hazy and soft-edged in the late afternoon sun. The red horseshoe arches, row after row, storey after storey, reminded me of pictures I had seen of the mosque at Córdoba, hitting a forgotten, aesthetic nerve and something of the romance that had first drawn me to Spain.

The area around the entrance threw me into childhood fantasies of ancient Rome: hat-sellers, drink-sellers, roasted nuts, fans. And then more contemporary equivalents: plastic models of toreros and – I shuddered – flamenco dancers; or bullfighting posters on which tourists could have their name printed below those of some of the greats. Although how the sequence ‘Jesulín de Ubrique, El Cordobés y Richard Docker’ was supposed to sound authentic, I could never work out.

I milled about for a while, warmed by the friendly atmosphere. The only hat big enough for my head was a dull, brown straw thing with a black ribbon, more suited to a 60-year-old. I looked up at the unforgiving sun, then handed over the money. A small price to pay for not looking like a lobster.

Eduardo was by the ticket office.

‘Hombre!’ He greeted me warmly and embraced me with a kiss for each cheek. I winced with the pain of my bruised ribs.

‘Christ! Look how thin you are. They not feeding you properly here in the capital?’

He handed me a ticket.

‘Here. We’re sitting in sol – the sunny area. Where the men sit. Sombra, the shady area, is only for poofs. And aficionados.’

‘What about sol y sombra?’

‘That’s for people who still haven’t made up their minds.’ I laughed. It was good to see him again.

We passed through the towering gate and headed up the stairs to find our seats. Great, wide corridors circled the outside of the ring, and were occupied by their own army of drink-sellers, snacks-sellers, and men renting cushions to sit on.

‘Get yourself one of these,’ Eduardo said. ‘What with your head complaining about the sun, you don’t want your arse moaning about the hard stone.’

He handed me a cushion.

The corridors were shady and cool, and we stayed there for a few minutes, knocking back iced beers before facing the intense heat and light of the ring itself. Old men with flat, wide-brimmed hats walked arm in arm discussing past fights, manicured ladies in silk blouses, family groups, men with their sons, young lads in training shoes, a group of four middle-aged housewives. It was a gentle scene.

‘I have some good news for you, son. Your guitar teacher – your former guitar teacher – has left Alicante. Went soon after you did. No-one knows where, but he’s gone, and that’s the most important thing.’

I paused. It had been a long time since I had thought of Juan.

‘Did he . . .?’

‘Spill the beans? No, I don’t think so. At least, there’s no indication that he did. My sources tell me everything is still normal at the school. No major break-up, no rows in the broom cupboard.’

He laughed, and slapped me on the back.

‘It’s history, son. You can’t still be thinking about her. Thought you would have slept your way round half of Madrid by now.’

But I knew Lola. She was capable of hiding anything behind her school exterior.

We finished our drinks and headed towards the entrance. Four men stood idly in the shade, their heads crowned with the all-important cap, which, combined with the whistles hanging from their necks, marked them out as ‘officials’, and men to be reckoned with. We handed over our tickets and a short, deformed man with a high, baby-like voice and sunglasses that almost covered his face took us through a short tunnel and out into the ring.

The glare was fantastic, and it took a few seconds for my eyes to adjust. Only half the seats were taken and the arena was empty, except for two white framing circles. The size of the ring created a sense of awe, and despite the echoing chatter, there was a cathedral-like quality to it as the words lifted up and were blown away by the sun and wind. Even from up here I could smell the sand. But there was something else, too. A smell, not of death, but of the expectation of death, I thought: a momentary presentiment of the ghastly, tremendous events that were to come in the next two hours.

We were shown to our seats, opposite the white royal box.

‘So, tell me everything. I tried to call you a few weeks ago, but some mad woman on the other end of the phone said you’d gone on a world tour.’

I laughed. ‘Yes, that’s Carlota, my landlady. You probably caught her at the wrong moment.’

‘Well, what’s it all about?’

I hesitated, not sure where to begin, trying to relate my current life to a past one. I was hungry for conversation, real conversation, a chance simply to tell someone what I was doing. And so I began: the tour, Carlos, La Andonda, Juanito, the donkey. I told him about the endless gigs, the night in Benidorm, my new guitar, and knife-throwing. And he sat patiently, quietly absorbing this deluge of scattered stories, thoughts and feelings.

The brass band – three old men with trumpets and drums – announced the opening parade had begun: men on horseback in black costumes with white scarves; thick-set men dressed in red holding wooden sticks; portly picadores with pointed spears in leather armour on tank-like horses. Then, the toreros themselves: subalternos, banderilleros and the stars of the spectacle, the three matadores, in their trajes de luces, ‘suits of light’, that were red, blue, gold and white, with shiny studs and tassels. The most experienced torero entered on the left, the second oldest on the right, and the youngest in the middle. They bowed to the president of the fight, sitting at his balcony in a sombre suit like a little dictator, then trooped out into the circle surrounding the sand, protected by thick wooden barricades – the burladeros.

The first part of the fight – the tercio de varas – began, and the bull came racing out of its stall: over half a tonne of thrashing flesh concentrated into two, fine, lethal points rising from its head. There was a gasp from the crowd as it rushed out into the sand, the pain of the rosette pinned on its shoulders already producing the initial rage necessary for a good fight. The subalternos waved their purple and yellow capes at it as it charged wildly around the arena, and the onlookers assessed its capabilities.

‘Not a good bull,’ Eduardo said. It looked fairly impressive to me.

‘Why do you say that?’

‘He’s running too hard, too soon. He’ll tire himself out.’

The others in the crowd seemed to agree, and whistling had already begun. Soon it was filling the entire bullring, nothing like the music and carnival atmosphere I had expected.

‘You’ve got to understand, son, this is Las Ventas,’ Eduardo shouted above the din. ‘Not like any other bullring. You go anywhere else and people want to have a good time. Here, everyone takes pride in being the most exacting audience in the world. If they don’t like what they see . . .’ and he made a ‘thumbs down’ motion.

‘So why are they whistling?’ The noise was piercing.

‘They want the president to change the bull for another one.’

‘Will he?’

‘Doubt it. It would have to be really bad. Too much money, honour, at stake, that sort of thing.’ He grinned. ‘It’s a racket. Besides, this is Las Ventas. They always whistle. It’s part of the spectacle.’

But the complaining had only just begun. The picadores appeared on their heavily padded horses. Two of them came striding out and sat, waiting for the bull to charge at them. They then thrust their long pikes into its shoulders to create a deep, bloody wound. And the whistling began again, almost as soon as they had started.

‘What’s the problem now?’

‘They want the president to declare this section over, so they don’t wound the bull too much, so it doesn’t get too weak for when the matador comes on.’

‘I see,’ I said, confused. ‘Why have this section at all, then?’

‘Tradition,’ he said.

Blood was pouring down the bull’s back from the growing wound in its shoulders.

‘Course, because they’re such a critical lot round here, the greatest accolade a matador can have is to be hailed as a triumph in Las Ventas.’

‘What happens then?’

‘They lift him up on their shoulders and take him out by the gate as a hero.’

‘No whistling?’

‘None.’

‘Thank God for that.’

The banderilleros came on, with their brightly coloured, harpoon-pointed sticks – banderillas – to ram into the bull’s back. It was the most Minoan part of the show, with great acrobatic skill required to run at the animal, plant the sticks elegantly, and with a single, dart-like movement, into its flesh, then escape unharmed. The first attempt failed, both banderillas falling to the ground. The crowd remained silent, not even deigning to whistle; it was still early and there was a sense that things had yet to warm up. The second attempt was more successful, one of the fighters passing within inches of the horns to land home his red and yellow spear. The atmosphere changed at once and the applause rang out just as quickly as the whistles had filled the air only moments before. Great shouts of ‘olé’ came from the people around us. The stress came on the second syllable, I noticed, unlike flamenco.

With the wave of the president’s handkerchief and a blast from the band, the arena emptied and the steaming bull was left alone, panting, its tongue hanging carelessly from its mouth. Manzanares, the star performer, came striding out, sword and red cape tucked neatly under one arm, his hat – montera – raised in salute to the applauding crowd. Then he casually tossed it into the air behind him, and it landed face down.

‘If it lands the other way, it’s bad luck for the matador,’ Eduardo filled me in. ‘They say some of them weigh it down specially, like a gambler’s dice, so that the hat always lands as they want it to.’

I wanted to ask him if Manzanares himself did this, but there was no time. The cheering turned into concentrated silence as the matador went through the first passes. He stood firm on the ground, chest pushed out, chin hooked in, his bottom lip contorted downwards in a vicious frown, tempting the bull with flicks of the cape, drawing it in like a cat might play with a mouse.

There were gasps, cheers, whistling, applause from the crowd. I couldn’t understand why one minute he had their approval and the next, derision.

‘Sometimes it’s the bull they’re complaining about, sometimes it’s him. If he draws the cape too low, the bull will run itself into the ground. Too high, and the animal loses momentum by charging upwards. Sometimes it’s a mixture of things. And sometimes . . .’ he shrugged his shoulders, all the time his eyes fixed like a falcon on the drama below. ‘But just look at the man – grace, passion. He’s a genius.’

It was time for the kill. The matador was handed his estoque – sword – from behind the barricade and stood over the exhausted bull ready to strike, enticing it to lower its head once more, opening up the vertebrae for the entry of the blade straight into its lungs. Manzanares waited. The bull didn’t move, saliva now dripping from its mouth uncontrollably. A solitary whistle came from the stands, then bull and man both charged simultaneously, and the sword was plunged two feet into the black mass in a single thrust.

The crowd leapt to its feet. The bull fell onto its hind legs, still thrashing with his horns at the toreros as they gathered around waving their cloaks in its face, until a man with a dagger finished it off with an unceremonious stab in the back of the neck.

Manzanares stood over the dead animal majestically, then saluted the crowd. With another cheer, the place turned white as people pulled out handkerchiefs and waved them frantically at the president, while the stocky men in red appeared with horses and dragged the bull’s corpse away, leaving a thick, red streak in the sand. Manzanares picked up his montera and saluted the crowd once more. But the whistling had begun again: the president was taking his time, and the audience wanted to see their hero honoured.

‘He may get one,’ Eduardo said. ‘But no more, I think. Not today.’

The handkerchiefs fluttered on, and the whistling and abuse soared into the sky.

‘Come on, you son of a whore!’ a man with a rasping voice called from behind us.

The president finally conceded, lifting his own handkerchief once to grant one ear to the matador. The handkerchief waving stopped, the ear was severed and handed to the matador, who then paraded it around the arena as a trophy of the kill.

‘He killed it well. That’s why he got the ear,’ Eduardo said. ‘Course, if he’d done really well, he would have got the other one as well. And even the tail.’ He lifted his eyebrows. ‘Makes excellent soup.’

Two uneventful fights later, we passed back into the cool of the corridor for the interval, and drank more beer. I had an odd sense of elation.

‘There’s a lot of drugs knocking about with this lot as well,’ I said hurriedly.

‘I can tell. You don’t get that thin from dieting.’

I looked down at the clothes hanging from my body.

‘Cocaine, mostly.’

‘Goes with the territory.’

‘Yes, I suppose it does.

We ordered two more beers.

I still hadn’t mentioned Jesús. I simply didn’t know how to describe him. If he was a friend, he was like no other I had ever had.

It was time to go back into the arena. A man with a bucket and a voice like a lawnmower was pacing up and down trying to attract custom.

‘Coca, cerveza, Fanta Limón! Coca, cerveza, Fanta Limón!’

The fourth bull came on: Manzanares’ second. This time, the passes went better. There was a greater sensuality, a feeling that the matador was caressing the animal, like a lover. The way he moved over it, with the energy of the crowd concentrated on him, and his struggle – the inevitability of death – seemed to meet a profound need in us all. But the kill went wrong, the sword failed to enter the bull properly the first time, and he had to repeat, clumsily finishing it off with a spike. Nonetheless, the applause was energetic, and the great Manzanares received a standing ovation as he left, this time earless.

‘He’s a master,’ Eduardo enthused. ‘If he were a flamenco, I’d say he had duende.’

An hour later, we passed out through the main gate. The spectators mingled and slowly dispersed in a cloud of cigar smoke, the evening sun cooling after the intensity of the arena. The feeling of elation was still with me, like a great tension had been removed from my body. Limbs supple, head cleared. The others felt it too – people were smiling, with open faces, as though the blood ritual had somehow emptied us of our own need for violence, and we were free to be human again.

We walked up the Alcalá, found a bar and ordered brandies.

‘Anything else you want to tell me about this lot?’ Eduardo asked.

I said nothing. It was better he didn’t know. I could guess what he would say, anyway. What any ‘sensible’ person would want to tell me. But he was sharp, and could tell there was more to the story than I had let on.

‘Listen son, you’ve got to realise that flamenco is yours, it’s mine. It belongs to everyone.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean you have to decide what it means for you, Jason. You can’t just keep on taking it off the shelf, already prepared by other people. You have to discover your own flamenco.’

It was Friday night when I headed over to Carlos’s flat for what was to be the last time. I realised immediately that something was wrong. The children were not there, no games on the stairwell, no shouting from women in clattering kitchens. Only muffled sounds.

María-José greeted me with tears at the door.

‘What is it?’

She wouldn’t say, but pushed me through into the main room, where I saw Carlos sitting in the middle of the floor, his back against a chair, eyes swollen, face pale. The rest of the room was crowded with half-hidden eyes, hands brought up to ward off the pain, cigarette smoke circling the bodies like a protecting veil. And the sound of women wailing.

Carlos looked up.

‘Hello, my friend,’ he choked. And he beckoned me to join him. I knelt at his side.

‘Carlos, what’s up?’

He stared at me through thick, hairy eyebrows. ‘Jesús,’ he said. ‘Jesús.’

I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was Juanito. In the corner there was screaming, and the sound of someone hitting something slowly, rhythmically. I looked up. La Andonda was beating her head against the wall.

I stood up, shaky on my feet, and turned to Juanito.

‘There’s nothing left of poor Jesús,’ he said. ‘He left us this morning.’

I stumbled past him, unhearing, heading for the balcony. I wanted air.

‘How did it happen?’ I said weakly, to no-one, to everyone. There was no reply.

‘For God’s sake, how did it happen?’ I began shouting uncontrollably. ‘How did it happen? How did it . . .’

I was caught in the arms of Javier.

‘Come with me,’ he said as I sobbed. And he led me out onto the balcony.

‘We’ve lost him,’ he said, stroking my hair. ‘We’ve lost our beautiful Jesús.’

I couldn’t say anything. The wailing from inside was getting louder.

‘How . . .’

‘He had an accident. A car accident, at the Plaza de Lima, just outside the Bernabeu. It was quick. He didn’t suffer, you know. He didn’t suffer.’

Jesús and I hadn’t been out together since the night we escaped in a taxi a couple of weeks before. I had the impression Jesús was beginning to see me as bad luck. But it could have been me in that car.

I don’t know how long I was there, my face on Javier’s chest, his hand on my head, swaying gently from side to side as the tears fell and fell. The time was punctuated by the rise and fall of the screams from inside, like waves of grief overcoming us and then ebbing away. In my mind, I was driving with him, driving down boulevards, country roads, car-lined streets, the lights flashing over his tied-back hair, his close-set eyes, the slightly flattened nose. But there was no sound from him.

‘Our beautiful Jesús, our beautiful Jesús.’

‘More beautiful than even you know, Jason,’ Javier said. ‘It’s his mother . . . his mother. I don’t know what she’ll do. She relied on him for money.’ And I felt his own tears splash down onto mine.

A fog of grief seemed to have overtaken us all. The banging had stopped, but no-one was moving. It seemed only now, now that he was dead, that I could begin to feel something of what Jesús had meant to me. Not an ordinary friend. He was both more and less than that.

It was black, and Javier’s hand moved rhythmically on my head. Yet at the back of my mind, something was nagging me. Something we had to remember, the main reason why I had come round that night.

I stood up straight.

‘Oh Christ! The gig!’

We were due to be playing that night. I pulled away from Javier and ran inside.

‘Carlos! The gig! We’re supposed to be there.’

He looked up at me uncomprehending, still slouched on the floor against the chair.

‘The concert. Tonight.’

The understanding came slowly back into his eyes.

‘Fuck! Churumbel, you’re right.’ He crawled onto his knees then lifted himself up onto his feet. He was confused for a second, unsure what to do. Was he Carlos grieving for his lost friend, or Carlos the head of this group? He looked at a clock on the wall, then decided.

‘Venga! Come on!’ He clapped his hands. The wailing stuttered for a moment, then stopped.

‘In honour of our dear compare, we are all going to Restaurante Alegrías, now. ALL OF US!’

Like a slow, unruly army, everyone began picking themselves up, the sound of chairs pushed back, coughing, a nose being blown. The order was unquestioned, quietly conceded as the best thing, the only thing, to do.

We left the flat: Juanito, La Andonda, Javier, Antonio, María-José, her two daughters and their friends, a couple of neighbours, all led by Carlos. We squeezed into a couple of cars, and headed over the ring-road into the centre of the city.

It was late, and the bar was already emptying. A group of Japanese businessmen in suits were standing in the doorway on their way out.

‘Good job they’re going,’ Carlos said. ‘Don’t want any Chinkies around tonight.’

We trooped in, pushing the Orientals aside, and passed into the main area. The stage was empty – the last group had finished some time ago, and the manager was waiting for us, furious.

‘Just where the hell have you . . .?’

Carlos swept past him with a flick of the hand, and we took the direct route to the stage, walking through the tables and chairs where the audience were sitting rather than passing down the side. A fat German tourist proved difficult to push past, obstinately refusing to pull his chair in any further, until Carlos bent down and with both hands lifted the edge of the man’s seat and sent him flying to the floor. He then walked over the man’s glasses where they had fallen from his face. We all followed in a line as the German sprawled about like a fly on its back, unable to right itself.

The house lights went down as we clambered up onto the platform, and just three spotlights focused on the area where we stood. Carlos called over to Antonio and spoke lightly in his ear, then we all pushed back to the edge in a semi-circle, facing the audience, leaving Carlos alone in the centre.

Antonio began to play. We all knew at once. It was a Taranta – slow, mournful, painful. Antonio played the first chords, stroking gently on the strings, then finished, and Carlos was left to sing on his own:

Carretera, carretera,

llévame por caría

a las minas del Romero,

que acaban de asesinar

al hermanico que mas quiero.

For pity’s sake, road,

show me the way to the Romero mines,

for they have just killed

the brother I loved most.

We stood still around him, motionless, the song entering us and holding us down like a thick, heavy blanket of sorrow. His voice became a piercing, bloody scream, tears flowing from his eyes onto the floor. This time the expression on his face was real. My skin tingled. La Andonda was holding my hand tightly, leaning on me every few seconds as she swayed, unable to support her own weight with the grief. The audience was silent and still. Even the German had stopped his muttering. All minds were concentrated on Carlos, and the pain echoing from inside him. And it was not simply to marvel at how well he expressed his feelings – it was because he brought the same grief, the same sorrow out in every person there. His pain was their pain. And our pain.

We left after one song. There was nothing more to be done. The manager quietly handed over the fee. I wondered if anyone had told him, but it hardly seemed necessary. He would have been able to tell anyway.

We gathered outside for a moment in the black street, no-one knowing quite what to do. La Andonda was still holding on to me, as though ready to collapse. Carlos came over and spoke softly in my ear.

‘Listen, churumbel. It’s over. We’re leaving here, going to Barcelona. I’ve got a cousin there.’

He gave me a handful of notes.

‘Take this. You’ll need it. But I tell you: get out of Madrid. This is a bad city, a bad city, I tell you.’

He pressed my hand and placed his thick, hairy arm around my shoulders with a resigned grin.

‘It’s for the best.’

He took La Andonda’s hand and led her away to the cars.

‘Wait!’ I pulled out the knife from my pocket and handed it to her. She took it, kissed me and then handed it back.

‘Keep it,’ she said.

The others followed behind, dragging their feet on the tarmac. I didn’t know if they realised I was no longer amongst them, but there were no goodbyes.

And they drove off, leaving me alone, standing in the street with my guitar, waving blindly at the red tail-lights, before I turned away and headed home.