Marina. Part 16

'Would you be able to shoot me in cold blood?' she asked.

I didn't answer. I didn't know the answer. The only things occupying my mind were the image of Marina in Kolvenik's claws and the few minutes remaining before the flames finally opened the doors of h.e.l.l in the Gran Teatro Real.

'Your friend must mean a lot to you.'

I nodded, and it seemed to me that the woman was smiling the saddest smile of her life.

'Does she know?' she asked.

'I don't know,' I said without thinking.

She nodded slowly and I saw her pull out the emerald bottle.

'You and I are the same, Oscar. We're alone, condemned to love someone without hope . . .'

She handed me the bottle and I lowered my weapon. I put the gun on the floor and took the bottle in my hands. While I examined it I felt as if a load had been taken off my shoulders. I was going to thank her, but Eva Irinova was no longer there. Nor was the revolver.

When I reached the top floor the entire building seemed about to crumble under my feet. I ran to the end of the gallery, searching for an entrance to the area above the stage. Suddenly one of the doors burst off its frame wrapped in flames. A river of fire flooded the gallery. I was trapped. I looked desperately around me and saw only one way out. The windows onto the street. I drew closer to the smoke-filled windowpanes and noticed a narrow ledge on the other side. The fire was coming towards me. The windowpanes splintered as if touched by an infernal breath. My clothes were smoking; I could feel the heat of the flames on my skin and I was suffocating. I jumped onto the ledge. The cold night air hit me and I could see the streets of Barcelona spreading out many metres below. It was an overwhelming sight: the fire had completely enveloped the Gran Teatro Real and the outside scaffolding had collapsed, burned to cinders. The old facade rose like a cathedral of flames in the middle of the Raval quarter. Fire-engine sirens howled in the distance as if bewailing their own impotence. Near the metal spire, where the dome's network of steel nerves came together, Kolvenik was holding Marina.

'Marina!' I screamed.

I took a step forward and instinctively grabbed a metal arch so as not to fall. It was scorching. I shrieked with pain and pulled my hand away. Smoke rose from my blackened palm. At that very moment a new tremor ran through the structure and I guessed what was about to happen. With a deafening blast the theatre collapsed, leaving only the naked metal skeleton intact, a spider's web of aluminium stretching over an inferno. In its centre stood Kolvenik. I could see Marina's face. She was alive. So I did the only thing that could save her.

I took the bottle and raised it so that Kolvenik could see it. He pushed Marina aside, moving her close to the edge of the precipice. I heard her scream. Then he extended an open claw into the void. The message was clear. In front of me a beam stretched towards him like a bridge. I stepped forward.

'Oscar no!' Marina begged.

I fixed my eyes on the narrow gangway and risked it. I could feel the soles of my shoes melting with every step I took. A suffocating wind rising from the fire roared all around me as I moved forward step by step, keeping my eyes on the beam like a tightrope walker. When I looked up I discovered a terrified Marina. She was alone! I was about to put my arms around her when, suddenly, Kolvenik rose behind her. He grabbed her again and held her out over the chasm. I pulled out the bottle, and did the same with it, letting him know I would throw it into the flames if he didn't put Marina down. I remembered Eva Irinova's words: 'He'll kill both of you.' So I opened the bottle and threw a couple of drops into the void. Kolvenik flung Marina against a bronze statue and lunged at me. I jumped to one side to dodge him and the bottle slipped through my fingers.

The serum evaporated as it touched the red-hot metal. Kolvenik's claw caught the flask when there were only a few drops left inside. He closed his metal fist over it and crushed it to bits. A few emerald drops slid through his fingers. The flames illuminated his face, a well of irrepressible hatred and anger. Then he started to move towards us. Marina clutched my hands and pressed them hard. She closed her eyes and I did the same. I could smell the rotten stench of Kolvenik a few centimetres away and braced myself for the impact.

The first shot whistled through the blaze. I opened my eyes and saw Eva Irinova's silhouette advancing as I had done, along the beam. She held the revolver up high. A rose of black blood spread over Kolvenik's chest. The second shot, much closer, destroyed one of his hands. The third one hit him in the shoulder. I pulled Marina away. Kolvenik staggered and turned towards Eva. The lady in black was advancing slowly, coldly aiming her weapon at him. I heard Kolvenik groan. The fourth shot opened a hole in his stomach. The fifth and last left a black hole between his eyes. A second later Kolvenik collapsed on his knees. Eva Irinova dropped the gun and ran to his side.

She took him in her arms and cradled him. Their eyes met and I could see her caress that monstrous face. She was crying.

'Take your friend away from here,' she said without looking at me.

I led Marina along the walkway until we reached the ledge outside the building. From there we managed to climb onto the roof of the annexe building and get safely away from the inferno. Before losing sight of Eva, we turned round. The lady in black was embracing Mijail Kolvenik. Their figures were silhouetted against the flames until the fire enveloped them completely. I thought I could see their ashes scattering in the wind, floating over the city, until dawn took them away for ever.

The following morning the papers spoke about the greatest fire in the history of Barcelona; about the old Gran Teatro Real and how its disappearance had silenced the last echoes of a long-gone age. The ashes had spread a blanket over the waters of the port and would continue to fall over the city until evening. Photographs taken from the hill of Montjuic revealed the horrific scene of an infernal pyre rising heavenwards. The tragedy took a new turn when the police disclosed their suspicions that the building had been occupied by homeless beggars and that a number of them had become trapped amid the debris. Nothing was known about the ident.i.ty of the two charred bodies that had been found, locked in an embrace, at the top of the dome. The truth, as Eva Irinova had predicted, was safe from people.

No newspaper mentioned the old story of Eva Irinova and Mijail Kolvenik. It no longer interested anyone. I remember standing with Marina that morning in front of one of the newspaper stands in the Ramblas. The front page of La Vanguardia bore the headline, spread over five columns: BARCELONA BURNS!

Early risers and the merely curious hurried to buy the first edition, wondering who had painted the sky with garlands of amber and grey. Slowly we walked away towards Plaza Cataluna while the ashes continued to fall all around us like dead snowflakes.

CHAPTER 25.

IN THE DAYS THAT FOLLOWED THE FIRE AT THE Gran Teatro Real a cold spell struck Barcelona. For the first time in many years a blanket of snow covered the city from the port to the top of Mount Tibidabo. Marina and I, together with German, spent a Christmas filled with long silences, our eyes rarely meeting. Marina barely mentioned what had happened and I began to notice that she avoided my company and preferred to retire to her room to write. I killed time playing endless games of chess with German in the large sitting room, by the fireside. I watched the snow fall and waited for the moment when I'd be alone with Marina. A moment that never came.

German pretended not to notice what was going on and tried to cheer me up by making conversation.

'Marina tells me you want to be an architect, Oscar.'

I would nod, not really knowing what I wanted any more. I spent my nights awake, piecing together the story we had lived through. I tried to keep the phantoms of Kolvenik and Eva Irinova out of my mind. More than once I thought of visiting old Dr Sh.e.l.ley to let him know what had happened. But I lacked the courage to face him and to explain how I'd witnessed the death of the woman he had brought up as his daughter or how I'd seen his best friend burn to death.

On the last day of the year the fountain in the garden froze. I feared that my days with Marina were about to end. Soon I would have to return to the boarding school. We spent New Year's Eve in candlelight, listening to the distant bells of the church in Plaza Sarria. Outside it was still snowing: it looked as if the stars had tumbled out of the sky without warning. At midnight we murmured a toast. I wanted to catch Marina's eye, but she hid her face in the shadows. That night I tried to understand what I'd done or said to deserve such treatment. I could feel Marina's presence in the next room, like an island floating away in the current. I imagined her awake. I rapped on the wall. I called her name in vain. There was no reply.

I packed my belongings and wrote a note in which I said my farewells to German and Marina and thanked them for their hospitality. Something had broken though I couldn't explain what and I felt that I was in the way. At daybreak I left the note on the kitchen table and set off towards the school. As I walked away I was sure Marina was watching me from her window. I waved goodbye, hoping she'd be looking. My footsteps left a trail through the snow in the deserted streets.

There were still a few days to go before the rest of the boarders were due to arrive. The rooms on the fourth floor were pools of loneliness. While I unpacked, Father Segui paid me a visit. I greeted him politely and continued putting away my clothes.

'Funny people, the Swiss,' he said. 'While the rest of us hide our sins, they stuff theirs with liqueur, wrap them in silver paper, add a ribbon and sell them at the price of gold. The prefect has just sent me a huge box of chocolates from Zurich and there's n.o.body around to share it with. Someone is going to have to lend me a hand before Dona Paula discovers them . . .'

'You can count on me,' I offered half-heartedly.

Segui walked over to the window and gazed at the city, which spread out like a mirage at our feet. Then he turned and observed me as if he could read my thoughts.

'A good friend once told me that problems are like c.o.c.kroaches,' he said in the joking tone he used when he wanted to say something serious. 'If you bring them out into the light, they get scared and leave.'

'He must have been a wise friend,' I said.

'Not quite,' Segui replied. 'But he was a good man. Happy New Year, Oscar.'

'Happy New Year, Father.'

I spent those days, until the start of the school term, barely leaving my room. I tried to read, but the words flew off the page. I would spend hours at the window, gazing at German and Marina's rambling old house in the distance. A thousand times I thought of returning and more than once I ventured as far as the alleyway that led to their front gate. I no longer heard German's gramophone through the trees, only the wind through the naked branches. At night I'd relive, over and over again, the events of the last few weeks until I collapsed into a restless, feverish, suffocating sleep.

Lessons began a week later. Those were leaden days, with steamed-up windows and radiators dripping in the dark rooms. My old friends and their conversations felt alien to me. They chatted about presents, parties and memories that I couldn't and didn't want to share. The words of my teachers washed over me. I couldn't make out the importance of Hume's solemn p.r.o.nouncements or see how derived equations could help turn back the clock and change the fate of Mijail Kolvenik and Eva Irinova. Or my own fate.

The memory of Marina and of the terrifying events we had shared prevented me from thinking, eating or holding a coherent conversation. She was the only person with whom I could share my anguish, and the need for her presence began to cause me physical pain. I was burning inside. Nothing and n.o.body could ease the pain. I became a grey figure in the corridors. My shadow merged with the walls. Days fell off the calendar like dead leaves. I kept hoping for a note from Marina, a sign to let me know she wanted to see me again; a simple excuse to run to her side and put an end to the distance separating us, a distance that seemed to grow day by day. But the note never came. I whiled away the days by returning to the places where I'd been with Marina. I would sit on the benches in the square, hoping to see her walk by . . .

At the end of January Father Segui called me to his study. Looking serious, with a penetrating gaze, he asked me what was the matter.

'I don't know,' I answered.

'Perhaps if we talk about it we might find out what it is,' he suggested.

'I don't think so,' I said, so brusquely I was immediately sorry.

'You spent a week away over Christmas. May I ask where?'

'With my family.'

A shadow fell over my tutor's eyes.

'If you're going to lie to me, we might as well not continue this conversation, Oscar.'

'It's the truth,' I said. 'I've been with my family.'

February brought the sun with it. The winter light melted the layers of ice and frost that had masked the city. That cheered me, and one Sat.u.r.day I turned up at Marina's house. A chain secured the gates. Beyond the trees the old mansion looked more abandoned than ever. For a moment I thought I was losing my mind. Had I imagined it all? The inhabitants of that ghostly mansion, the story of Kolvenik and the lady in black, Inspector Florian, Lluis Claret, the creatures brought back to life . . . characters whom the black hand of fate had eliminated one by one . . . Had I dreamed up Marina and her enchanted beach?

'We only remember what never really happened . . .'

That night I woke up screaming, bathed in cold sweat, not knowing where I was. In my dreams I'd returned to Kolvenik's tunnels. I was following Marina without being able to reach her until I found her covered in a mantle of black b.u.t.terflies; but when they flew off, only emptiness remained. Inexplicable. Cold. The destructive devil that obsessed Kolvenik. The nothingness behind the last darkness.

When Father Segui and my friend JF heard my screams and ran into my room, it took me a few seconds to recognise them. Segui felt my pulse while JF looked at me in dismay, convinced that his friend had lost his mind altogether. They didn't leave my side until I fell asleep again.

The following day, after two months without seeing Marina, I decided to return to the old house in Sarria. I wasn't going to give up until I'd found an explanation.

CHAPTER 26.

IT WAS A MISTY SUNDAY. THE SHADOWS OF THE TREES with their dry branches conjured up skeletal shapes. The church bells rang in time to my footsteps. I stopped in front of the gate that barred my way. I noticed tyre marks on the fallen leaves and wondered whether German had taken his old Tucker out of the garage again. I slipped in like a thief by jumping over the gate and walked into the garden.

The mansion's silhouette loomed in utter silence, darker and more desolate than ever. I noticed Marina's bike lying abandoned among the weeds. The chain was rusty, the handlebars blackened by damp. As I stared at the scene I felt I was standing before a ruin inhabited only by old bits of furniture and invisible echoes.

'Marina?' I called.

The wind carried my voice away. I walked around the house towards the back door that led to the kitchen. It was open. An empty table, covered with a layer of dust. I walked into the rooms. Silence. I reached the large hall with the paintings. Marina's mother looked at me from them all, but for me those were the eyes of Marina . . . It was then that I heard someone crying behind me.

German was curled up in one of the armchairs, still as a statue. Only his tears were moving. I had never seen a man of his age cry like that. It froze my blood. His eyes were lost in the portraits and he looked pale, haggard. He'd aged since the last time I'd seen him. He was wearing one of the formal suits I remembered, but it was creased and dirty. I wondered how many days he'd been like this. How many days he'd spent in that armchair.

I knelt down in front of him and patted his hand.

'German . . .'

His hand was so cold it scared me. Suddenly the painter put his arms around me and hugged me, trembling like a child. I felt my mouth dry up. I hugged him back and held him while he wept on my shoulder. I was afraid the doctors had given him bad news, that he'd lost all the hope of the past few months, so I let him weep while I wondered where Marina was, why she wasn't there with German . . .

Then the old man raised his head. One look into his eyes was enough for me to understand the truth. I understood it with the brutal clarity with which dreams vanish. Like a cold poisoned dagger that plunges without mercy into your soul.

'Where's Marina?' I stammered.

German was unable to utter a single word. There was no need. From the look in his eyes I knew that German's visits to Sant Pau Hospital had never happened. I knew that the doctor at La Paz Hospital had never treated the painter. I knew that German's joy and hope when they returned from Madrid had nothing to do with him. Marina had fooled me from the start.

'The illness that took her mother away . . .' German murmured, 'is taking her away, Oscar, my friend. It's taking my Marina away . . .'

I felt my eyelids closing like slabs of stone as the world around me slowly disappeared. German hugged me again, and there, in that desolate room of the old house, I cried like a poor fool while the rain began to fall over Barcelona.

From the taxi Sant Pau Hospital looked to me like an enchanted citadel floating on clouds, with its maze of pointed turrets and extravagant domes. German had put on a clean suit and sat next to me without speaking. I held a parcel wrapped in the shiniest paper I'd been able to find. When we arrived, the doctor who took care of Marina, one Damian Rojas, looked me up and down and gave me a list of instructions. I must not tire Marina. I must appear positive and optimistic. She was the one who needed my help, and not the other way round. I wasn't there to weep or complain. I was there to help her. If I was unable to follow those rules, I'd better not bother coming back. Damian Rojas was a young doctor and his white coat still had a whiff of medical school. He had a stern, impatient tone, and spared very little politeness on me. In other circ.u.mstances I would have taken him for an arrogant individual, but something in his manner told me that he hadn't yet learned to isolate himself from his patients' pain, and this was his way of dealing with it.

We walked up to the fourth floor and then down a seemingly endless corridor. It smelled of hospital, a mixture of illness, disinfectant and air freshener. The moment I set foot in that part of the building I let out a sigh and lost what little courage I had left in me. When we reached the room, German went in first. He asked me to wait outside while he announced my visit to Marina. I sensed that Marina would have preferred I didn't see her there.

'Let me speak to her first, Oscar . . .'

I waited. The corridor was an endless gallery of doors and lost voices. Faces burdened with pain and loss pa.s.sed one another in silence. Again and again I repeated Dr Rojas's instructions to myself. I was there to help. Finally German peered round the door and nodded at me. I swallowed hard and went in. German stayed outside.

The room was a long rectangle where light seemed to evaporate before it touched the floor. From the large window Avenida Gaudi stretched towards infinity. The towers of the Sagrada Familia sliced the sky in two. There were four beds separated by coa.r.s.e curtains. Through them you could see the silhouettes of other visitors, like watching a shadow play. Marina's bed was the last on the right, next to the window.

The hardest thing during those first few seconds was to hold her gaze. They had cut her hair like a boy's. Without her long hair Marina seemed humiliated, naked. I bit my tongue hard, trying to ward off the tears that rose from my soul.

'They had to cut it,' she said, guessing. 'Because of the tests.'

I noticed marks on her throat and on the nape of her neck. Just looking at them was painful. I tried to smile and handed her the parcel.

'I like it,' I said as a greeting.

She accepted the parcel and set it on her lap. I drew closer and sat down next to her, silently. She took my hand and pressed it hard. She had lost weight. Her ribs showed through the white hospital nightdress and there were dark circles under her eyes. Her lips were two thin parched lines. Her ash-coloured eyes no longer shone. With shaky hands she opened the parcel and pulled the book out. She leafed through it and looked up, intrigued.

'All the pages are blank . . .'

'For the time being,' I replied. 'We have a good story to tell, and I'm only good at bricks and mortar.'

She pressed the book against her chest.

'How is German doing?' she asked me.

'Fine,' I lied. 'Tired but fine.'

'And you, how are you?'

'Me?'

'No, me, who do you think I mean?'

'I'm fine.'

'Sure, especially after Sergeant Rojas's lecture . . .'

I raised my eyebrows as if I didn't have a clue what she was talking about.

'I've missed you,' she said.

'Me too.'