That is as far as the manuscript pages by Pascual Duarte go. Whether he went to the garrote shortly after writing these pages, or whether he had time to write of further feats in other pages now lost, is something I was never able to clear up.
Don Benigno Bonilla, the pharmacist in whose shop in Almendralejo I found, as I said before, the pages here transcribed, lent me all manner of help in my search. I turned the pharmacy inside out, like a sock. I rummaged in the porcelain jars, searched behind the bottles, above and below the cupboards, sifted the bicarbonate of soda. I learned some lovely names—Unguent of the Son of Zachariah, Oxherd and Coachman’s Salve, Unguent of Rosin and Tar, of Pork Bread, of Laurel Leaves, of Charity, and Salve against Loose Bowels in Sheep. The mustard made me cough, the valerian made me retch, the ammonia made me cry, but try as I might, and in spite of all the Our Fathers I offered up to St. Anthony, patron of lost objects, I never found what I was looking for, most likely because it probably did not exist.
The total absence of any data concerning Pascual Duarte during his last years is a matter of no small frustration. It is not too difficult to calculate that he must have returned to Chinchilla—we can infer as much from his own words. And there he must have remained until the year 1935, or perhaps even ’36. In any case, it seems certain that he could not have been released from prison before the beginning of the Civil War. Since there is no human way of ascertaining the facts, we can add nothing about his activity during the fifteen days of revolutionary turmoil that swept over his village. Except for the killing of Don Jesús González de la Riva, Count of Torremejía—a deed of which our man was the confessed and convicted author—we know nothing, absolutely nothing, about Pascual Duarte in his later epoch; and even as regards this last crime we know only the stark irreparable fact, and nothing about his motives or the impulses which possessed him. For he was close-mouthed and talked only when the mood was upon him, which was seldom. Perhaps if his execution had been deferred, he might have reached that point in his memoirs and have gone into the event with some detail. But there was no stay of execution, and the only way we could fill the gap now would be to invent some fictional end, and that is something would ill befit the authenticity of this narrative.
Pascual Duarte’s letter to Don Joaquín Barrera which I have placed at the beginning, must have been written at the same time as the chapters or sections which would be numbered XII and XIII had I numbered them. For these are the only two sections where he used a purple ink identical to that used in his letter to that gentleman. All of which goes to prove that Pascual did not, as he said he did, definitively suspend his story, but that instead he deliberately composed the letter so that it would have the maximum effect at the desired moment. This procedure shows our author to be scarcely as forgetful and vague as he seemed at first sight. One thing that is perfectly clear, for it is vouched for by a corporal of the Civil Guard, Cesáreo Martín, who carried out the request made of him by the prisoner, is the manner in which the bundle of manuscript papers were transferred from the Badajoz jail to the house of Señor Barrera in Mérida.
Anxious to throw as much light as possible on the last moments of Pascual, I wrote a letter to Don Santiago Lurueña, former prison chaplain, and now parish priest at Magacela (province of Badajoz), and another to Don Cesáreo Martín, formerly a private in the Civil Guard stationed in the Badajoz penitentiary and now corporal in command of the post at La Vecilla (province of León). In the pursuance of their duties both men were at Pascual Duarte’s side when it came time for him to pay his debt to society.
Their letters to me follow.
Magacela (province of Badajoz)
9 January, 1942
MY DEAR AND HONORED SIR:
I am just now in receipt of your kind letter of the 18th of December last, together with the 359 pages of typescript of the memoirs of the unfortunate Duarte, which reaches me after an evident delay. The whole package was forwarded to me by Don David Freire Angulo, the present chaplain of the Badajoz Prison and a classmate of your servant in our early seminary years at Salamanca. I wish to comply with the demands of conscience by writing these few words of acknowledgement immediately upon opening the envelope, leaving for tomorrow, God willing, the continuation of my letter, after I have read, following your instructions and to satisfy my own curiosity, the pages in front of me.
10 January
I have just read at one sitting—though Herodotus avows it to be a poor method—the confessions of Pascual Duarte. You have no idea of the profound impression they have made on my spirit, of the deep trace, the lasting furrow drawn in my soul. Your servant, who gathered Duarte’s last words of repentance as joyfully as the farmer might garner a golden crop, could not help but be strongly moved by the written words of a man most people would consider a hyena (as I myself thought him when I was first summoned to his cell), though when the depths of his soul were probed it was easy to discover that he was more like a poor tame lamb, terrified and cornered by life.
His death was exemplary in its spiritual preparation. At the last moment, unfortunately, he lost his presence of mind. His will failed him and he was somewhat perturbed, with the results that the poor man suffered mental torture, where he might have saved himself this embarrassment had he possessed a whit more courage.
He disposed of his soul’s business beforehand with an aplomb and serenity that left me astonished. In the presence of all and when the moment came to be led out into the yard he exclaimed: “May the Lord’s will be done!” We were all amazed by his edifying humility. It was a shame that the Enemy should have robbed him of the glory of his last moments. Otherwise his death would certainly have been considered holy. But nevertheless he set an example for all who witnessed his end (until he lost control, as I said). Yet what I saw was fortunate in its consequences for me personally in my sweet ministry to afflicted souls. May the Lord have taken him into His holy bosom!
Believe me, sir, in the offer of the most sincere friendship of your humble
S. LUEREÑA, PRESBYTER
P.S. I regret I cannot oblige you in the matter of a photograph, nor do I know how to advise you to set about finding one.
That is the first letter, and here is the other.
La Vecilla (Province of León),
1/12/42
MY DEAR SIR:
I hereby acknowledge receipt of your letter of December 18, and hope that the present communication finds you in the same good health you enjoyed when you wrote it. For my part I am well—thanks be to God—though stiffer than a board in this climate, which is not something to wish upon the greatest criminal. And now I will proceed to tell you about what you wish to know, for I see nothing to prevent me in the service regulations, though if there were anything against it, you would have to forgive me, since I would certainly not utter a single word. As for Pascual Duarte, the man you speak of, I certainly do remember him, for he was the most notorious prisoner that we guarded in many a day. I would not be able to vouch for the soundness of his mind, however, though you were to offer me the mines of Eldorado, for he did such things as clearly attested to his infirmity. Everything was all right until he once confessed. But the first time he did confess, apparently he was suddenly flooded with all kinds of remorse and scruples, and he decided to purge himself fully. In any case, the upshot was that on Mondays, because his mother or someone else was killed on that day, and on Tuesdays, because on Tuesday he had killed the Count of Torremejía, and on Wednesdays, because he had killed I don’t know who, the unhappy wretch went half the week without a bite of food, on a fast of his own making. In no time he had lost so much weight that I began to wonder wouldn’t the executioner have an easy job making the two screws meet over his windpipe. The poor devil spent all his days writing, as if he were in a fever. But since he didn’t bother anyone, and since the warden was a kind-hearted man and had directed us to bring him anything he needed in the way of writing supplies, we let him alone and the fellow went at it with a will and never let up. He trusted us, and one day he called me and showed me a letter in an unsealed envelope (so I could read it myself, if I wanted to, he told me), addressed to Don Joaquín Barrera López, in Mérida, and he said to me in such a way that I could never tell whether he was pleading with me or giving me an order:
“When they come to take me away, you put this letter in your pocket, fix up this pile of papers here, and give everything to this gentleman. Do you understand?” And then he said, looking into my eyes with such an air of mystery I was really surprised:
“God will find a way to reward you … for I will ask Him myself!”
I did what he wanted of me, for I saw nothing wrong in it and because I have always been one to respect the wishes of the dead.
As for his manner of dying, I will only tell you that it was altogether undistinguished, a miserable death, and though at first he strutted and declared in front of everyone “The Lord’s will be done!” which surprised us all considerably, he soon forgot his bearing. At the sight of the scaffold he passed out cold. When he came to again, he began to carry on so about not wanting to die and its being a terrible thing to do what they were doing to him, that he had to be dragged along and put down on the stool by force. Finally he kissed a crucifix held before him by Father Santiago, who was the prison chaplain and a saint of a man. But he ended his days spitting and stamping, with no thought for the persons around him, in the most abject and the vilest way a man can die, letting everyone see his fear of death.
If at all possible, I should like to ask you to send me two copies of the book, rather than one, when it is printed. The other one is for the lieutenant of this sector, who tells me he will refund the price of the book by mail, if that is all right with you.
Trusting I have been of service to you, I remain, your humble servant,
CESÁREO MARTÍN
Your letter took some time to reach me, which is the reason for the delay between the two dates of our letters. It was forwarded to me from Badajoz, and I received it here on Saturday, the 10th, that is, the day before yesterday. Farewell.
What more can I add to the words of these two gentlemen?
Madrid, January, 1942