The Marquis of Bolibar (25 page)

I do not know how it came about, that mysterious phenomenon, but I no longer saw myself as I stood gazing into the mirror: I saw a strange old man with white hair. And then, in some weird and inexplicable way, I felt his thoughts awaken within me. His prowess, his determination, his resolve came alive and took possession of me. I experienced a fierce thrill of elation. It was as if the soul of the murdered man had got to grips with my own, the soul of his murderer, and was striving to oust it. The Marquis of Bolibar, great and terrible man that he was, had invaded my body. I tried to fight him off, tried to repossess myself, tried to conjure up the faces of my dead comrades, forced myself to think of them — of Donop, Eglofstein and Brockendorf — but they refused to emerge from the darkness. I had forgotten the sound of their voices, and when my own inner voice tried to call their names aloud the words that rose to my lips were those of a stranger: Saracho's cruel words had become mine.

"Braggarts and gluttons, drunkards and despoilers of churches," cried the voice within me. "God is just and his retribution well-merited."

And I felt as if the regiments' destruction had been my own desire from the first — as if I had willed it on behalf of a great and noble cause. A tempest shook me, my heart pounded, my temples throbbed, and I swayed, overwhelmed by the grandeur of the moment.

Saracho expected me to speak, from the look on his face, but I remained silent.

"Let me tell you something, Señor Marques," he began. "I know that you despise war and think little of the glory won in battle by a gallant soldier. The humble peasant who innocently tills his field is far more glorious than any general or marshal - wasn't that how you put it? Well, I pondered on all manner of things last night, being unable to sleep for pain. A shell splinter gashed my arm, and if gangrene sets in ..." He shrugged. "But that's by the by. My point is that we soldiers are martyrs quite as much as St James, or St Cyriac, or St Marcellinus — martyrs of God or the Devil, who knows? What do we fight for? What do we bleed for? For God's sake? Being blind, earth-bound moles, one and all, we cannot know God's true purpose. To fill our own pockets? Señor Marques, we soldiers are like Noah's carpenters, who built the Ark for all living things and were afterward drowned themselves. For the welfare of our country? This soil, Señor Marques, has drunk a deal of blood in the last thousand years, and who cares today about a battle fought a hundred years ago? So why all the fighting, the marching, the hardships, the hunger, the danger, the wounds? What remains of all those things? I'll tell you, Señor Marques: what remains is glory! I walk through the streets of a strange town and men whisper my name behind my back, mothers hold their children aloft, townsfolk run out of their houses and faces are pressed to windows. And one day, when I am old and weary and crawl on all fours into some monastery, the glory associated with my name will still endure. I'm one of the Devil's own, God help me!"

He fell silent. A hideous old hag had entered the room bearing a bowl of warm water and a piece of rag. The British captain took his plumed shako from the table and made off as soon as he saw her.

"You fool, you booby, you good-for-nothing!" she snarled as she proceeded to bathe Saracho's wounded arm. "Look at you sitting there, groaning! Other men go in quest of gold; two ounces of lead is all you ever bring home!"

"Gently, woman!" groaned the victim of her ministrations. "Leave me in peace — I've just won a famous victory."

"A famous victory?" the old woman squawked, brandishing her piece of rag. "To what purpose? None, save that the same king, and not some other, should levy fresh taxes on bread and dripping and cheese and eggs in the years to come!"

"Silence!" cried Saracho. "Wield your broom and stop meddling in my business! Don't you recognize His Excellency the Señor Marques?"

"Excellency and eminence and reverence and pestilence! Why must you always be in the thick of things? If the Turks set about the Tatars,
you
would insist on being there."

"Ah me," Saracho groaned, "I've had this millstone around my neck for seventeen long years. She grows worse every day. Her bile is only to be measured by the bucketful!"

"The whole town knows you for an idler," snapped the harridan. "You roam the countryside and think it would soil your hands to do some honest work for once."

"Lord," Saracho sighed, long and mournfully, "deliver me from all evil!"

I could still hear the guerrilla colonel's plaintive voice and his wife's vituperations when I left the room and made my way downstairs. Some rebel officers were sitting under a fig tree outside the house, devouring roast mutton. They silently rose to their feet as I passed.

The streets teemed with brisk, bustling figures. The townsfolk were eagerly going about their business, and there was no outward sign that the town had, only hours before, witnessed the death-throes of two regiments. Chestnut-sellers sat on their corkwood chairs, stall-keepers set out their wares, small carts laden with charcoal rattled through the streets, muleteers trotted their beasts to and fro for the benefit of would-be purchasers, barbers offered their services, a Carmelite friar distributed scapulars and holy pictures, and the cries of peasant women selling divers kinds of merchandise rang out on all sides:

"Milk! Goats' milk! Warm milk! Who'll buy?"

"Onions from Murcia! Nuts from Vizcaya! Garlic! Beans! Olives from Seville!"

"Wine! Red wine! Wine from Val de Penas!"

"Sausages of every kind.
Salchichônes!
Longanizas
!
Chorizos!
Genuine sausages from Estremadura!"

And, wherever I went, the noise and bustle died away. Hurrying townsfolk paused and stood aside to let me pass before staring after me with awe, amazement and mute admiration writ large on their faces.

It was the Marquis of Bolibar who walked the streets of his town, not I. I caught a distant glimpse of vineyards and fields, and a triumphant voice within me cried, "My land,
my
native soil! It is for me that those fields turn green and those vines bear fruit. All that this sky encompasses is mine!" — I was a man transformed — I was heir to this alien land for the space of an hour. And so, with my heart aglow and my head filled with dreams, I made my way slowly out of La Bisbal.

A detachment of guerrillas was drawn up beside the town wall. One of them flung open the gates and saluted me with eyes downcast.

"
Ave Maria purissima!"
he cried, and the unfamiliar words that issued from my lips were uttered in a dead man's voice:

"Amen! She conceived without sin."