It took me a few seconds to understand what he was suggesting. Isaac pulled an old penknife out of his pocket and handed it to me.
“Make a mark on every corner, a notch only you will recognize. It’s old wood and so full of scratches and grooves that nobody will notice it, unless the person knows what he’s looking for….”
I followed his advice and once more penetrated the heart of the structure. Every time I changed direction, I stopped to mark the shelves with a C and an X on the side of the passage that I was intending to take. Twenty minutes later I had lost myself in the depths of the tower, and then, quite by chance, the place where I was going to bury the novel was revealed to me. To my right I noticed a row of volumes on the disentailment of church property penned by the distinguished Jovellanos. To my adolescent eyes, such a camouflage would have dissuaded even the craftiest mind. I took out a few tomes and inspected the second row that was concealed behind those walls of marble prose. Among little clouds of dust, various plays by Moratín and a brand-newCurial e Güelfa stood side by side with Spinoza’sTractatus Theologico-Politicus. As a coup de grâce, I resolved to confine the Carax book between the 1901 yearbook of judicial minutiae from the civil courts of Gerona and a collection of novels by Juan Valera. In order to make space, I decided to remove and take with me the book of Golden Age poetry that separated them, and in its place I slipped inThe Shadowof the Wind . I took my leave of the novel with a wink and put the Jovellanos anthology back in its place, walling in the back row.
Without further ado I left the place, finding my route by the marks I had made on the way in. As I walked in the dark through the tunnels and tunnels of books, I could not help being overcome by a sense of sadness. I couldn’t help thinking that if I, by pure chance, had found a whole universe in a single unknown book, buried in that endless necropolis, tens of thousands more would remain unexplored, forgotten forever. I felt myself surrounded by millions of abandoned pages, by worlds and souls without an owner sinking in an ocean of darkness, while the world that throbbed outside the library seemed to be losing its memory, day after day, unknowingly, feeling all the wiser the more it forgot.
DAWN WAS BREAKING WHEN I RETURNED TO THE APARTMENT ON CALLE Santa Ana. Opening the door quietly, I slipped in without switching on the light. From the entrance hall, I could see the dining room at the end of the corridor, the table still decked out for the party. The cake was there, untouched, and the dinner service still waited for the meal. I could make out the motionless silhouette of my father in the armchair, as he observed the scene from the window. He was awake and still wearing his best suit. Wreaths of smoke rose lazily from a cigarette he held between his index and ring fingers, as if it were a pen. I hadn’t seen my father smoke for years.
“Good morning,” he murmured, putting out the cigarette in an ashtray that was full of half-smoked butts.
I looked at him without knowing what to say. The light from behind him concealed his eyes.
“Clara phoned a few times last night, a couple of hours after you left,” he said. “She sounded very worried. She left a message for you to call her, no matter what time it was.”
“I don’t intend to see or speak to Clara again,” I said.
My father nodded but didn’t reply. I fell into one of the dining-room chairs and stared at the floor.
“Aren’t you going to tell me where you’ve been?”
“Just around.”
“You’ve given me one hell of a fright.”
There was no anger in his voice and hardly any reproach, just tiredness.
“I know. And I’m sorry,” I answered.
“What have you done to your face?”
“I slipped in the rain and fell.”
“That rain must have a good right hook. Put something on it.”
“It’s nothing. I don’t even notice it,” I lied. “What I need is to get some sleep. I can barely stand up.”
“At least open your present before you go to bed,” said my father.
He pointed to the packet wrapped in cellophane, which he had placed the night before on the coffee table. I hesitated for a moment. My father nodded. I took the packet and felt its weight. I handed it to my father without opening it.
“You’d better return it. I don’t deserve any presents.”
“Presents are made for the pleasure of who gives them, not for the merits of who receives them,” said my father. “Besides, it can’t be returned. Open it.”
I undid the carefully wrapped package in the dim light of dawn. It contained a shiny carved wooden box, edged with gold rivets. Even before opening it, I was smiling. The sound of the clasp when it unlocked was exquisite, like the ticking of a watch. Inside, the case was lined with dark blue velvet. Victor Hugo’s fabulous Montblanc Meinsterstück rested in the center. It was a dazzling sight. I took it and gazed at it by the light of the balcony. The gold clip of the pen top had an inscription.
DANIEL SEMPERE, 1950
I stared at my father, dumbfounded. I don’t think I had ever seen him look as happy as he seemed to me at that moment. Without saying anything, he got up from his armchair and held me
tight. I felt a lump in my throat and, lost for words, fell utterly silent.
True to Character
1951–1953
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