"Yes. Before your lecture, a woman said that you were giving her back what had been hers. What did she mean?"
"Oh, that's nothing."
"But it's important to me. I don't know anything about your life; I'm even surprised to see so many people here."
He just laughed, and then he started to turn away to answer other people's questions.
"Wait," I said, grabbing his arm. "You didn't answer me."
"I don't think it would interest you, Pilar."
"I want to know anyway."
Taking a deep breath, he led me to a corner of the room. "All of the great religions--including Judaism, Catholicism, and Islam--are masculine. Men are in charge of the dogmas, men make the laws, and usually all the priests are men."
"Is that what the woman meant?"
He hesitated before he answered. "Yes. I have a different view of things: I believe in the feminine side of God."
I sighed with relief. The woman was mistaken; he couldn't be a seminarian because seminarians don't have such different views of things.
"You've explained it very well," I said.
THE GIRL WHO HAD winked at me was waiting at the door.
"I know that we belong to the same tradition," she said. "My name is Brida."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Of course you do," she laughed.
She took my arm and led me out of the building before I could say anything more. It was a cold night, and I wasn't sure what I was going to do until we left for Bilbao the next morning.
"Where are we going?" I asked.
"To the statue of the Goddess."
"But...I need to find an inexpensive hotel where I can stay for the night."
"I'll show you one later."
/> I wanted to go to some warm cafe where I could talk to her for a bit and learn as much as I could about him. But I didn't want to argue. While she guided me across the Paseo de Castellana, I looked around at Madrid; I hadn't been there in years.
In the middle of the avenue, she stopped and pointed to the sky. "There She is."
The moon shone brilliantly through the bare branches of the trees on either side of the road.
"Isn't that beautiful!" I exclaimed.
But she wasn't listening. She spread her arms in the form of a cross, turning her palms upward, and just stood there contemplating the moon.
What have I gotten myself into? I thought. I came here to attend a conference, and now I wind up in the Paseo de Castellana with this crazy girl. And tomorrow I'm going to Bilbao!
"O mirror of the Earth Goddess," Brida was saying, her eyes closed. "Teach us about our power and make men understand us. Rising, gleaming, waning, and reviving in the heavens, you show us the cycle of the seed and the fruit."
She stretched her arms toward the night sky and held this position for some time. Several passersby looked at her and laughed, but she paid no attention; I was the one who was dying of embarrassment, standing there beside her.
"I needed to do that," she said, after her long adoration of the moon, "so that the Goddess would protect us."