Havana Blue by Leonardo Padura Page B

termites, and an opaque, unidentified record was turning on the deck. “It’s a copy, idiot, of course it’s not got a label,” said Juan Antonio as bad-temperedly as ever, and he also sat on the floor because nobody wanted to speak, not even the women. Then Tomy moved the arm and placed it lovingly on the record, and the song began; he understood nothing, the Beatles didn’t sing as well as they did on real records, but the big lads hummed the words, as if they knew them, and all he knew was that “field” was park, “centerfield” was centre of the park, he concluded, but that would come later. He felt as if he were experiencing a unique act of magic, and when the song finished he asked, go on, play it again, Tomy. And he started singing again and didn’t know why: he didn’t
want to accept that that melody was flagging up his nostalgia for a past when everything was perfect and straightforward, and although he now knew what the lyrics meant, he preferred to repeat them unthinkingly and just feel as if he were walking through that field of strawberries he’d never seen, the one his memories were so familiar with, to be alone with that music. “Strawberry Fields” always came like that, out of nowhere, and pushed everything else out. He sang along, picked up on any phrase and felt better; he no longer saw the dark or gloomily overcast sky or the image of Rafael Morín speechifying on the podium at school. He didn’t want to smoke and listen to Manolo recounting his latest amorous conquest, as he drove him to Tamara’s house, “Strawberry fields forever, tum, tum, tum . . .”
    Â 
    Â 
    â€œThe book was right there.”
    Time is an illusion; nothing had changed in the library: the complete set of the Espasa-Calpe Encyclopaedia , the one most packed with knowledge, its dark blue spines and gilt letters still shiny despite the years that had gone by; Tamara’s father’s Doctor in Law certificate still fearlessly enjoying its privileged position, even above Victor Manuel’s two pen-and-ink drawings he’d always coveted so much. The dark tome of Father Brown stories, with the leather covers that his fingers caressed, brought on another bout of melancholy; old Doctor Valdemira recommended them to him so many years ago when the Count could never have imagined he’d become a colleague of Chesterton’s little priest. And the mahogany desk was immortal, broad as a desert and beautiful like a woman. A handsome writing desk. Only the leather on the swivel chair seemed
rather tired, it was over thirty years old and genuine bison; that was the place occupied by the person responsible for night-time revision before an exam, the privilege of the one who knew most. The day Mario Conde first entered that room, he had felt small, helpless and terribly uncultured, and his memory could still recreate that painful sensation of intellectual inadequacy he’d yet to cure himself of.
    â€œI’ve often dreamed of this place. But in my dreams I never remembered your father having a telephone here, or did he?”
    â€œNo, never. Daddy hated two things to the point of sickness: one was the telephone and the other television, and that shows how very sensitive he was,” she recalled as she flopped down into one of the armchairs in front of the desk.
    â€œAnd do those two phobias relate to this redbrick fireplace in a Havana library?” he asked as he bent down over the small hearth and played with one of the tongs.
    â€œIt had logs and everything. It’s pretty, isn’t it?”
    â€œSorry to sound rude . . . Given it never snows in Cuba, pray what is the point?”
    She smiled sadly.
    â€œIt was the cover to a safe. I found that out when I was twenty. Daddy was a real character. An eccentric.”
    He put the tongs down and sat in the other armchair next to Tamara. The library’s only source of light was from a