The Winterlings (5 page)

In the morning, the procession formed by the two Winterlings, the cow, and the four sheep crossed the square in silence. They passed under some apple trees in blossom, past the priest's house, and then further on past the communal oven. Then they tramped through the flowerbeds, and into some fields that led on to the mountain.

The potholes and the stones on the road unbalanced them, but the Winterlings kept on walking straight, unshakable like the animals. ‘Look, there go the Winterlings and their cow with its swinging gait,' people said as they walked by.

The tall one and the not-so-tall one; the pretty one and the ugly one; the one who has coffee for breakfast and the other who has bread and wine; the one with teeth and the other who lost them all biting into bread made with stones. The one who is a virgin and the other who is God knows what …

The one who grumbles and the other who sings.

One woman, two women. Nothing else?

(Their feet remember,

so they let them walk.)

When they reached the top of the mountain, Dolores sat on some craggy rocks. The grasslands were covered in wild strawberries, and the mountain awoke to the first trills of the birds. Along with the bottle of anise, she brought up
Superstars of Cinema
, a magazine that she bought in Coruña and that came out every month with the latest news and rumours, the movie premieres, and photos of actors and actresses from Hollywood: Humphrey Bogart, Grace Kelly, Marlene Dietrich, Clark Gable. She talked about the latest releases, the weddings and divorces of the actors, and generally everything she read about in
Superstars
with the sheep and the cow. She'd ask them questions in one tone of voice, and answer them herself in another.

The Winterlings had acquired their taste for cinema in England. One afternoon, in the park where they would meet up after work, a man heard them speaking in Spanish. When he found out they had arrived in England as refugees, he told them he was in charge of a production company, and offered them a role in a documentary about the Spanish Civil War. It was to be called
Orphans of the Storm,
and was about the settling of Galician and Basque children in Great Britain. All the lights, the cameras, the make-up … it was an experience they'd never forget. And they even got paid!

After this, they became interested in seeing movies. In the town where they lived, there was a single dark cinema that smelt of stale popcorn and disinfectant, and on Sundays, after eating together, they went to the evening session to shake off the boredom and the damp. Even then, they showed films in their town that would take many years to arrive in Spain:
Rebecca, Citizen Kane, Red Dust, Gone With The Wind
…

‘And you've just got to see,' explained Dolores to the astonished sheep, ‘how Scarlett O'Hara pulled the curtains right off the windows to make a dress with them …'

And she herself replied:

‘Well of course, she had no other option!'

On the mountain, the Winterlings were alone, but they felt good. ‘We should have been born as sheep,' said one to the other. ‘Or as cows,' her sister replied. They broke into laughter.

In the evening, they came back down the mountain, happier and chattier, tipsy from the anise. Sometimes, they sang rhymes and little songs they had learnt in the camp at Eastleigh:
Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool?

And the other sister would sing:
Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full.

As well as their interest in movies, they had developed a unique proclivity for the lurid details of sicknesses, raped women, murders, burnt children, and all sorts of other grim fascinations. And they talked about these things while they came down the mountain, in the same slow and swinging trot as the cow.

‘Do you remember,' said one to the other, ‘when a pig bit the ear off that kid from that house up there?'

‘I remember, I remember … I mean, here in Tierra de Chá, the pigs are bigger than the cows; they terrify the lot of us! And do you remember when that man from Sanclás smashed into the wall, and every single one of his teeth fell out?'

‘You don't have any teeth either …'

The other one stayed silent.

‘And you?' said the other, breathing in sharply. ‘Do you really think you're the prettiest rose in the bunch? Your bottom is quite large.'

‘My arse, you mean?'

‘I said bottom.'

‘Scarecrow!'

‘Don't call me that, it's so ugly!'

They both lowered their heads.

‘Shut up,' murmured one of them.

‘Yes, shut up,' murmured the other. ‘Right now I think we should shut up.'

‘Put up and shut up!' they shouted in unison, just as they arrived back at the road.

In the evening they fed the chickens, chased off snakes, sewed, and prepared a vegetable soup. They ate dinner, listened to the radio, went to sleep, and were happy. On Tuesdays, they bathed, and so, instead of sewing, they went down to the river at dusk. On Sundays, they didn't leave the house for even a moment. They cleaned it thoroughly and changed the bed linen.

Sometimes when they came down from the mountain there would be men in the square, piling up the gorse to make manure, and then they'd walk on with great strides (one pulled the other along by the arm) ignoring the catcalling and taunting —
baby, hot stuff
— that was directed only towards Dolores.

When they arrived at the house, on the days that this had happened, Dolores would start making dinner or fetch water from the well. But Saladina would be burning up inside. The muscles in her face would tighten, and her lips, formerly pressed together, would burst open like a flower. She'd roll her eyes and shake with laughter, a waterfall of laughter, and dash into the shed to hide, as quick as lightning.

She would re-emerge with her gaze fixed on some distant point in the countryside, serious, with a ladder over her shoulder and a set of shears in her hands. The need to repress her feelings had forged the habit of pruning.

She pruned the fig tree with such vigour that sometimes she even pulled a few tiles from the roof. The branches, the figs,
click, click,
the leaves and the tiles would fly through the air, and the chickens would run for cover.

When she had finished, the ground in the orchard would be a mash of figs and foliage. Exhausted, she would go back into the house hunched over, her face covered in snot and tears, her eyes puffy from laughing and crying at the same time. Her sister would bring her the bottle of anise and a glass, and put her feet up. Then she would go out to sweep up the branches and the mangled figs.

10

The most beautiful time of day in Tierra de Chá was when the sun hung motionless overhead, the river was calm, and the chickens clucked after laying their eggs.

Tuesday afternoon. Off with the clogs, off with the stockings. It was bath time. Off with the skirts, and the knickers too. Off with the doublets.

Holding hands, making energetic movements and singing loudly to ward off the cold, the Winterlings would go down to the river, hissing like cats. Once a week, if it was sunny, they lathered up from head to toe.

They scrubbed each other's waists, breasts with erect nipples, behinds like mandarin skins, and legs with abundant flesh.

One day, just as they were rinsing off their hair, pouring water over themselves with a ladle, a nauseating gust wafted over, a rancid stench like gasoline or a wet jumper.

Sniffing the air, one Winterling said:

‘It's the priest.'

Soon they heard what sounded like the creaking of an old cart. The other Winterling added:

‘He's come for the offering.'

They ducked down into the water at the same time, leaving only their heads above.

At first the priest didn't see them, and passed by, pulling his cart. But when he saw their clothes on a bush, he stopped and turned around.

‘Daughters of God!' he exclaimed, covering his eyes with his hands. ‘So there you are! In the water …'

He walked backwards, his eyes shut tightly, up to the riverbank to speak with them.

‘Don't get out!' he said, sensing the movement of bodies, then hiding himself behind a bush. ‘What are you doing in the river?'

The Winterlings explained that they were just having a bath. Water and soap. Was he suggesting that no one in Tierra de Chá ever had a wash? In England, you didn't need to go outside to wash yourself — you could bathe indoors. Every house had a bath.

The priest listened to them, perplexed.

‘And do they wash the animals in the bath as well?'

‘Is he a bit simple?' whispered one of the heads in the water.

‘You've come to collect the offering, haven't you?' yelled the other head. ‘Well, you should know you don't fool us; we don't have to pay it. We don't even go to church.'

Dolores got out of the water, and got dressed as quickly as she could. From the bush, Don Manuel looked without wanting to look. The first thing he noticed, when she came back fully dressed, was her hair. It was different to the hair of other women that he knew in the area. It wasn't curly, or straight, but slightly wavy. She had big eyes, almost green, with thick eyelashes, and her skin was slightly pink. A narrow waist, and wide hips. And her breasts — he couldn't quite take his eyes off them.

He came out of his hidey-hole. He said he wasn't coming to collect an offering but rather to settle a small matter that had been bugging him lately, that had to do with the old lady who lived over on Bocelo Mountain. He bent down to adjust the things in his cart, and stood there pensively. He couldn't keep it to himself a moment longer! The old woman was the devil incarnate. Making him go up every day to see her. And now she had it in her head to get back ‘the piece of paper'. He moved the sugar so it wouldn't spill from the paper cone it came in, and stole a glance at the cabbage that the baker's wife had given him. A cabbage?

Did the Winterlings remember the old lady?

On Bocelo Mountain, near Tierra de Chá, there was a
rueiro,
or tiny hamlet, with three or four very humble houses: simple, low to the ground huts in the form of a box, with thatched rooves and beaten-earth floors, inside which there was nothing more than a hearth with a fire always lit, and a few cavities in the wall, dark as a wolf's mouth, with straw mattresses and patchwork quilts that served as bedding.

In one of these houses — the Winterlings remembered, how could they not? — lived an old lady with a face like a root, very small and knotty, almost a dwarf, who smelt like smoke and old blankets. She was very sick, and so every day for the last few years, Don Manuel went up on horseback to comfort her, and, if things turned for the worse, to administer her last rites.

It could be pouring down with rain, the whole valley could be covered in the most insidious mist, but, early every morning, the good man rode up on his horse, zigzagging through the mountain passes, struggling with the inclines to arrive at the hut and administer holy oils, and whisper heavenly words in her ear. ‘Well, old girl, you're going to Our Lord.'

And then, trying her hardest to show her teeth, the old lady smiled in thanks. The few teeth she had left were a filthy yellow, like horse teeth.

That day, the day he encountered the Winterlings in the river, Don Manuel had had to bring his visit forward. First thing in the morning, while he sipped on freshly pressed grape must in the tavern, a fieldworker came in yelling that the old woman on the mountain was barely breathing, and that the priest had to go up and give the last rites. ‘Oh, so she's ready to die!' he yelled back from the corner of the bar. ‘I was there just yesterday.'

‘I'm telling you, Father, this time she's dying!'

And so Don Manuel had no other choice but to finish off his must, go by his house and put the holy oils in his satchel, and head once again towards the mountain.

The rain was bucketing down. Before he arrived — and because he thought it might be the last time he climbed the mountain — he couldn't help feeling a tiny tingle of pleasure in his heart.

When he got there, he found that, in truth, the old lady was in quite a bad way. She gave off a coarse rasping sound that was almost drowned out by the deluge outside. The priest reflected, with a certain degree of remorse, that the thoughts he had just had were hardly Christian.

‘Old lady, my little old lady.' Like every other day, he anointed her with oils on the eyes, the nose, and the feet, and told her that God already kept her in His glory.

Silence fell. It had stopped raining, and the sky had cleared. It was cut through with a superb rainbow. The priest saw this as a sign: God was thanking him for all his years of sacrifice.

After a while, the old lady suddenly opened her eyes. Her face was all shrunken and leathery, cracked up with tiny creases, particularly around her small dry eyes, and her nose was pointed like the beak of a bird. All she had left was one tuft of grey hair. She looked around her, and, seeing the light that filtered through the cracks in the hut, sighed. ‘Well, looks like I'm feeling a bit better.'