Tristana (5 page)

“Oh, how stupid. I certainly wouldn’t have any trouble getting started,” Tristana said, then added in a discouraged tone, “The problem is we’re stuck, tied down in a thousand ways. I’ve also thought that I could perhaps learn other languages. I’ve only got a smattering of French, which I learned at school, and I’m already forgetting that. But how wonderful to be able to speak English, German, Italian! It seems to me that I could, that I’d be a quick learner too. I have a sense—how can I put it?—I have a sense that I already know a little before I’ve even started studying, as if I had been English or German in another life and that had left a kind of linguistic trace in me.”

“Now languages,” said Saturna, looking at Tristana with maternal solicitude, “that’s something that would be worth learning, because you can earn quite a lot from teaching, and, besides, it would be good to be able to understand what foreigners were going on about. Perhaps the master could find you a good teacher.”

“Don’t mention your master to me. I expect nothing from him.” Then thoughtfully, staring at the light, she said, “I don’t know when or how this will end, but it will have to end somehow.”

She fell silent, plunged in somber thought. Pursued by the idea of escaping Don Lope’s house, she could hear in her mind the deep rumble of Madrid, she could see the dusting of lights shining in the distance, and she felt entranced by the idea of independence. Emerging from her meditations as if from a lethargy, she gave a long sigh. How lonely she would be in the world away from the house of her poor, aged gallant! She had no relatives, and the only two people she could call “relatives” were far, far away: her maternal uncle, Don Fernando, was in the Philippines, and her cousin Cuesta was in Majorca, and neither of them had ever shown the slightest desire to help her. She recalled too (while Saturna watched with sympathetic eyes) that the families who had been friends of her mother’s and used to visit them regularly, now regarded her coolly and with suspicion, the effect of the diabolical shadow cast by Don Lope. In response, Tristana took refuge in her pride, and despising those who insulted her gave her the kind of ardent feeling of satisfaction which, like alcohol, briefly fills one with courage, but in the long run destroys.

“Come on now, enough of these gloomy thoughts!” said Saturna, flapping her hand in front of her eyes, as if shooing away a fly.

“WHAT
do you expect me to think about? Happy things? Well, where are they?”

To lighten the mood, Saturna would change the subject to something jollier, regaling Tristana with anecdotes and gossip from the garrulous society around them. On some nights, they would amuse themselves by making fun of Don Lope, who, finding himself in such straitened circumstances, had rejected the splendid habits of a lifetime and become rather stingy. Squeezed by his growing penury, he had cut back on the already minimal household expenses and was educating himself—at last!—in the art of domestic economics, so at odds with his chivalric philosophy. Grown meticulous and fussy, he now intervened in matters he had once deemed incompatible with his lordly decorum, and his new scowling, curmudgeonly demeanor disfigured him far more than the deep lines on his face and his graying hair. The two women drew much amusement and diversion from the misfortunes and the belatedly banal preoccupations of this fallen Don Juan. The comical thing was that since Don Lope knew absolutely nothing about the economics of the home, the more he prided himself on being a financier and a good administrator, the more easily Saturna found it to deceive him, being a past mistress in the art of pilfering and in the other skills required of cooks and those who go to market.

With Tristana, he was always as generous as his ever-worsening financial circumstances would allow. The beginnings of their growing poverty were quite sad enough, but it was in the area of clothes that a painful reduction in expenditure made itself most keenly felt. Don Lope, however, sacrificed his own vanity to that of his slave, which was no small sacrifice for a man who was such a devoted admirer of himself. Then came the day when poverty revealed its bare skull in all its ugliness, and both Don Lope and Tristana found themselves wearing equally threadbare, antiquated outfits. Aided by Saturna, the poor girl would sit up late at night laboring over her few poor rags, finding a thousand ways to recast them, each one a marvel of skill and patience. In the brief period we might describe as happy or golden, Garrido occasionally used to take her to the theater, but necessity, with its heretic’s face, decreed, at last, the absolute suppression of all public spectacles. Her horizons closed in and grew ever darker, and that poor, disagreeable household, empty of all emotional warmth and devoid of any pleasing occupations, weighed heavy on her spirit. For the house, which still contained the remnants of certain luxurious furnishings, was becoming unimaginably ugly and sad; every object spoke of penury and decay; nothing that was broken or run down was mended or repaired. In the icy, plundered living room, among various hideous items of furniture, stood an ornate
bargueño
desk that had been much battered in various removals, and in which Don Lope kept the record of his love life. On the walls were the nails on which his displays of weapons had once hung. His study was crammed with things that cried out for more space, and in the dining room all that remained was the table and some rickety chairs whose leather upholstery was all dirty and torn. The sheer monumental bulk of Don Lope’s wooden bed, complete with columns and an elegant canopy, still impressed, but the blue damask curtains hung in tatters. Tristana’s room, next to her master’s, was the least marked by disaster, thanks to the exquisite care with which she defended the furnishings from disintegration and poverty.

And while the house declared, in the expressive way things do, the unstoppable decline of that knight sedentary, the gallant himself was rapidly becoming a painful image of the vain and fleeting nature of human glory. Dejection and sadness at his own ruination must have had much to do with the “fall” of that needy gentleman, deepening the lines on his forehead far more than the years or the rumbustious life he had led since he was in his twenties. His hair, which had started to gray when he was forty or so, had always remained strong and thick; now, however, it was beginning to fall out in clumps, which he would have restored to their rightful place had there been some appropriate alchemy available. His teeth were in good condition, at least those that were visible; but his hitherto admirable molars were beginning to rebel, refusing to chew his food properly or else breaking off, as if they were biting into each other. His soldierly features were gradually losing their firm lines, and it took an iron will to preserve his hitherto slender figure. At home, his will slackened, reserving its efforts for the street, for walks, and for the club.

Normally, if he found both women still awake when he came back at night, he would pause to chat with them, briefly with Saturna, whom he would then dispatch to bed, and at greater length with Tristana. There came a time, though, when he would nearly always enter silently and irritably and go straight to his room, where the poor captive Tristana would have to listen and put up with his complaints about his persistent cough, his rheumatism, or his difficulty in breathing. Don Lope would curse and swear, as if he believed that Nature had no right to make him suffer or as if he considered himself to be a favored mortal, immune to the miseries afflicting the rest of humanity. To make matters worse, he found himself obliged to sleep with his head wrapped in an ugly cloth, and his bedroom stank of the concoctions he used for his rheumatism and his catarrh.

But these trifles, which cut Don Lope’s pride to the quick, did not affect Tristana as much as the annoying obsessions that began to take hold of the poor gentleman, for along with his pitiful physical and moral collapse, he began to be pricked by jealousy. Sensing that he was now an old lion, he, who had never considered any other man his rival, was suddenly filled with anxieties and saw robbers and enemies hiding in his very shadow. Aware of his own decrepitude, he was devoured by egotism, like a kind of senile leprosy, and the idea that the poor young woman should compare him, even if only mentally, with imagined exemplars of youth and beauty, soured his life. His good judgment, it should be said, did not desert him entirely, and in his lucid moments, which usually occurred in the morning, he recognized the inappropriateness and irrationality of his behavior and tried to calm his captive with trusting, affectionate words.

These moments of calm did not last long, however, because when night fell, and the old man and the girl were alone, the former sank back into his atavistic egotism, submitting her to humiliating interrogations and, once, overwhelmed by the torment he felt at the alarming gap between his morbid frailty and Tristana’s vigor and freshness, he went so far as to say, “If I ever find out you’ve been deceiving me, I’ll kill you, believe me, I’ll kill you. I would prefer to end my life tragically than be a decrepit old cuckold. You had best commend your soul to God before you even think of being unfaithful. Because I know. There are no secrets for me. I possess an infinite knowledge of these things, as well as having a whole lifetime of experience and an infallible nose . . . you can’t fool me.”

TRISTANA
felt vaguely frightened, but not terrified, nor did she quite believe her master’s fierce threats, sensing that his boasts about his infallible nose and his powers of divination were a trap he laid to control her. Her easy conscience armed her with courage against the tyrant, and she didn’t even bother to obey his many prohibitions. He had ordered her not to go out with Saturna, but she escaped almost every afternoon, not to Madrid proper but to Cuatro Caminos, Partidor, Canalillo, or toward the hills above the Hippodrome; a walk in the country, usually with a picnic, moments of healthy relaxation. These were the only times in her life when the poor slave could set aside her sadness and enjoy herself with childlike abandon, allowing herself to run and jump and play tag with the innkeeper’s daughter, who used to go with her, or some other friend from the neighborhood. On Sundays, the walk was of an entirely different nature. Saturna had placed her son in the local hospice and, along with all the other mothers who found themselves in the same situation, she would go and see him when the boys were allowed out.

Usually, when the throng of boys reached an agreed spot among the new streets of Chamberí, the order was given to break ranks and then they were free to play. Waiting for them were their mothers, grandmothers, and aunts (those who had them), who came bearing small bundles containing oranges, peanuts, hazelnuts, cakes, or crusts of bread. Some of the boys would run about playing games with sticks; others joined the groups of women. Some begged coins off passersby, and almost all of them milled around the vendors of barley sugar, hazelnuts, and pine nuts. Tristana always enjoyed watching them, and when the weather was fine, she never missed a chance to share with her servant the pleasant task of spoiling the young boarder, who was called Saturno after his mother, and was stocky and knock-kneed, although his chubby red cheeks were a testament to the healthy diet at the hospice. The rough cloth uniform he wore didn’t really allow for elegance of movement, and his braided cap was too small for his large head, which was covered with a stiff brush of hair. His mother and Tristana found him most amusing, but it has to be said that he hadn’t an ounce of wit in him; he was, rather, docile, good-hearted, and hardworking, with a taste for mock bullfights. Tristana would always bring him a gift of an orange and a penny so that he could buy himself some sweets; and however much his mother urged him to save, suggesting that he put away the money he was given, she could never check his extravagance, and any coin acquired was a coin immediately put back into circulation. Thus commerce prospered thanks to the paper windmills he bought, as well as the banderillas for his bullfights and bags of toasted chickpeas and acorns.

After a long period of importunate and annoying rain, October brought a tranquil two weeks, with warm sun, clear skies, and windless days; and although Madrid still woke up to mornings shrouded in mist, and the night chill considerably cooled the earth, the afternoons, from two until five, were a delight. On Sundays, not a living soul stayed at home, and every street in Chamberí, the Altos de Maudes, the avenues leading up to the Hippodrome, and the hills of Amaniel were all thronged with people. There was a constant hurrying stream of picnickers heading for Tetuán. On one such glorious October Sunday, Saturna and Tristana went to wait for the boys in Calle de Ríos Rosas, which joins Santa Engracia and Paseo de la Castellana, and on that lovely, broad, straight, sunny road, which looks out over a vast expanse of countryside, two lines of little prisoners were given their freedom. Some clung to their mothers, who had been following at a distance, while others immediately began staging one of their bullfights complete with bare-horned young bulls, a president of the bullring, a bull pen, inner and outer barriers, the separating out of good bulls from bad, as well as music from the hospice and other traditional touches. On that occasion, they were joined by a group of children in blue overcoats and braided caps; they were from the local school for deaf, dumb, and blind children, each deaf-mute child being paired with a blind child. The eyes of the dumb child meant that the blind child could walk without stumbling, and they communicated by means of furious touches and taps, amazing to watch. Thanks to the accuracy of that language, the blind children soon realized that the children from the hospice were there too, while the dumb children, all eyes, longed to take their turn performing a few passes with the “bulls,” as if they needed the gift of speech to do so! The system of gestures used among the deaf-mutes was often incredibly subtle and quick, as agile and flexible as the human voice. Their bright faces, their eyes alive with language, were in marked contrast to the bored, dead, horribly pockmarked faces of the blind children, whose eyes were either empty and closed beneath a fringe of rough lashes or open but oblivious to light, their pupils like curdled glass.