Confessions by Jaume Cabré

gleaming, said imagine, this violin has been through experiences we know nothing about, it has been played in halls and homes that we will never see, and it has lived all the joys and pains of the violinists who have played it. The conversations it has heard, the music it’s expressed … I am sure it could tell us many tender stories, he finally said, with an extraordinary dose of cynicism that at the time I was unable to capture.
    ‘Let me play it, Father.’
    ‘No. Not until you’ve finished your eighth year of violin study. Then it will be yours. Do you hear me? Yours.’
    I swear that the Storioni, upon hearing those words, throbbed more intensely for a moment. I couldn’t tell if it was out of joy or grief.
    ‘Look, it’s … how can I put it; look at it, it’s a living thing. It even has a proper name, like you and I.’
    Adrià looked at his father with a somewhat distant stance, as if calculating whether he was pulling his leg or not.
    ‘A proper name?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘And what’s it called?’
    ‘Vial.’
    ‘What does Vial mean?’
    ‘What does Adrià mean?’
    ‘Well … Hadrianus is the surname of a Roman family that came from Hadria, near the Adriatic.’
    ‘That’s not what I meant, for god’s sake.’
    ‘You asked me what my nam‘Yes, yes, yes … Well, the violin is just named Vial and that’s it.’
    ‘Why is it named Vial?’
    ‘Do you know what I’ve learned, Son?’
    Adrià looked at him with disappointment because he was avoiding the question, he didn’t know the answer or he didn’t want to admit it. He was human and he tried to cover it up.
    ‘What have you learned?’
    ‘That this violin doesn’t belong to me, but rather I belong to it. I am one of many who have owned it. Throughout its life, this Storioni has had various players at its service. And today it is mine, but I can only look at it. Which is why I wanted you to learn to play the violin, so you can continue the long chain in the life of this instrument. That is the only reason you must study the violin. That’s the only reason, Adrià. You don’t need to like music.’
    My father – such elegance – twisting the story and making it look as if it had been his idea I study violin and not Mother’s. What elegance my father had as he arranged others’ fates. But I was trembling with emotion at that point despite having understood his instructions, which ended with that blood-curdling you don’t need to like music.
    ‘What year was it made?’ I asked.
    Father had me look through the right f-hole. Laurentius Storioni Cremonensis me fecit 1764.
    ‘Let me hold it.’
    ‘No. You think about all the history this violin has. But no touching.’
    Jachiam Mureda let the two carts and the men follow him towards La Grassa, led by Blond of Cazilhac. He hid in a corner to relieve himself. A few moments of calm. Beyond the wooden carts that slowly headed off was the silhouette of the monastery and the wall destroyed by lightning. He had taken refuge in Carcassona three summers ago, fleeing the hatred of those in Moena, and fate was about to change the course of his life. He had got used to the sweet language of the Occitans. He had grown accustomed to not eating cheese every day; but what was hardest for him was not being surrounded by forestsand not having mountains nearby; there were some, but always so far, far away that they didn’t seem real. As he defecated he suddenly understood that it wasn’t that he missed the landscape of Pardàc, but that he missed his father, Mureda of Pardàc, and all the Muredas: Agno, Jenn, Max, Hermes, Josef, Theodor, Micurà, Ilse, Erica, Katharina, Matilde, Gretchen and little Bettina who gave me the medallion of Saint Maria dai Ciüf, the patron saint of Pardàc’s woodcutters, so I would never feel alone. And he began to cry with longing for his people and as he shat he took the medallion off his neck and looked at it: a proud Virgin Mary facing forward, holding a tiny baby and