It would be pointless to fake it, for Bertie and I despised each other, no doubt about it.) There she was in my mind’s eye. It was sometime in the early 1960s and we were all as stiff as the ace of
piques
—broke, that is. Mama was very pale, dressed completely in black, with no accessories whatsoever aside from her marvelous eyes, so dignified. Nobody understood her decision to return to her place of birth like a real lady to honor the dead Bertie, as if she hadn’t been forced to live the previous three years in a sad house in the
dix-septième
in Paris. All of this, of course, was long before we moved to London to fulfill our final and very dismal fate.
Had upper-class funerals in Madrid changed over the years? I wondered. Were they really as crazy as they appear in the magazines, where it looks like the importance of the dead person is measured not by the number of Mercedeses and BMWs at the door to the church but rather by the number of paparazzi, scavengers positioned at the door to the church, photographers
partout,
turning their backs to the sacraments so that they can hover by the pulpit to capture the painful expressions on the faces of the mourners? Was that what the scene had been like at the funeral of this woman’s husband? And, no, that was not the moment the little lightbulb went off in my head, sparking my interest in the young widow. After all, what did I care about that woman? For the moment, at least, she did not seem to be all that intriguing a character, although I
was
certainly intrigued by the very ostentatious bracelet on her left wrist. And she
did
remind me so very much of Mama.
In any case, that was how everything began, out of sheer boredom. The afternoon of October thirteenth went by with no contact at all among the guests beyond the officious nods that we exchanged each time we ran into one another in the corridors: “Good morning,” “Good afternoon,” etcetera.
Good Lord,
I remember thinking.
If only there was someone I could chat with, about nothing at all—just some simple company.
Maybe the rest of the guests were happily engrossed in their therapeutic mud treatments, but I was really running out of things to do. Any more of this and I was going to end up talking to myself, like a character out of some sad Chekhov story or exchanging witty repartee with my dog. Of course, I do adore animals—they have so much more common sense than human beings. But this isn’t the time to discuss animals. I don’t want to stray too far from the topic at hand. Anyway, as I was saying, more guests began to arrive. The first ones to show up were a group of Germans, but they were too young for me. Trying to snow-job twenty-year-olds is a bit of a drag; it makes one feel like such a
clochard.
This particular bunch was from very southern Bavaria, I believe, and magnificent-looking—the men, that is.
Que les femmes sont laides!
Not even the most miraculous muds of these hot springs could do much to save them. The men, on the other hand, with their frayed jeans, Calvin Klein T-shirts, and round tortoiseshell glasses, seemed both incredibly distinguished and also so, so . . . oh, how to describe them? So very
Thurn und Taxis.
That was it.
Unfleeceable, mon cher,
I said to myself. I knew it right away. Skimming money off these fresh-faced brats would be harder than drawing gold out of the rocks in this desert. A quick process of elimination led me to think I could perhaps try my luck with the widow,
alors.
It couldn’t be too hard to earn myself a little spending money off her, I said to myself.
And that is precisely what I set out to do. There was no artistry or skill about my decision. Had there been other, more approachable people around, I surely would never have gotten myself mixed up in the affairs and unspeakable secrets of the little Spanish widow. But that is how things always happen, in the most banal way imaginable. The facts were: She reminded me of Mama; my niece in Madrid had a
piques
—broke, that is. Mama was very pale, dressed completely in black, with no accessories whatsoever aside from her marvelous eyes, so dignified. Nobody understood her decision to return to her place of birth like a real lady to honor the dead Bertie, as if she hadn’t been forced to live the previous three years in a sad house in the
dix-septième
in Paris. All of this, of course, was long before we moved to London to fulfill our final and very dismal fate.
Had upper-class funerals in Madrid changed over the years? I wondered. Were they really as crazy as they appear in the magazines, where it looks like the importance of the dead person is measured not by the number of Mercedeses and BMWs at the door to the church but rather by the number of paparazzi, scavengers positioned at the door to the church, photographers
partout,
turning their backs to the sacraments so that they can hover by the pulpit to capture the painful expressions on the faces of the mourners? Was that what the scene had been like at the funeral of this woman’s husband? And, no, that was not the moment the little lightbulb went off in my head, sparking my interest in the young widow. After all, what did I care about that woman? For the moment, at least, she did not seem to be all that intriguing a character, although I
was
certainly intrigued by the very ostentatious bracelet on her left wrist. And she
did
remind me so very much of Mama.
In any case, that was how everything began, out of sheer boredom. The afternoon of October thirteenth went by with no contact at all among the guests beyond the officious nods that we exchanged each time we ran into one another in the corridors: “Good morning,” “Good afternoon,” etcetera.
Good Lord,
I remember thinking.
If only there was someone I could chat with, about nothing at all—just some simple company.
Maybe the rest of the guests were happily engrossed in their therapeutic mud treatments, but I was really running out of things to do. Any more of this and I was going to end up talking to myself, like a character out of some sad Chekhov story or exchanging witty repartee with my dog. Of course, I do adore animals—they have so much more common sense than human beings. But this isn’t the time to discuss animals. I don’t want to stray too far from the topic at hand. Anyway, as I was saying, more guests began to arrive. The first ones to show up were a group of Germans, but they were too young for me. Trying to snow-job twenty-year-olds is a bit of a drag; it makes one feel like such a
clochard.
This particular bunch was from very southern Bavaria, I believe, and magnificent-looking—the men, that is.
Que les femmes sont laides!
Not even the most miraculous muds of these hot springs could do much to save them. The men, on the other hand, with their frayed jeans, Calvin Klein T-shirts, and round tortoiseshell glasses, seemed both incredibly distinguished and also so, so . . . oh, how to describe them? So very
Thurn und Taxis.
That was it.
Unfleeceable, mon cher,
I said to myself. I knew it right away. Skimming money off these fresh-faced brats would be harder than drawing gold out of the rocks in this desert. A quick process of elimination led me to think I could perhaps try my luck with the widow,
alors.
It couldn’t be too hard to earn myself a little spending money off her, I said to myself.
And that is precisely what I set out to do. There was no artistry or skill about my decision. Had there been other, more approachable people around, I surely would never have gotten myself mixed up in the affairs and unspeakable secrets of the little Spanish widow. But that is how things always happen, in the most banal way imaginable. The facts were: She reminded me of Mama; my niece in Madrid had a
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