“Of course you know.”
Vidal patted me on the back as he walked toward the door.
“There are seven hours left to midnight,” he said. “You might like to have a nap and gather your strength.”
I looked out the window and saw him approach the car. Manuel opened the door and Vidal flopped onto the backseat. I heard the engine of the Hispano-Suiza deploy its symphony of pistons. At that moment Cristina looked up toward my window. I smiled at her but realized that she didn’t remember who I was. A moment later she looked away and Vidal’s grand carriage sped off toward its own world.
3
In those days, the streetlamps and illuminated signs of Calle Nou de la Rambla projected a corridor of light through the shadows of the Raval quarter. On either pavement, cabarets, dance halls, and other ill-defined venues jostled cheek by jowl with all-night establishments that specialized in arcane remedies for venereal diseases, condoms, and douches, while a motley crew, from gentlemen of some cachet to sailors from ships docked in the port, mixed with all sorts of extravagant characters who lived only for the night. On both sides of the street narrow, misty alleyways housed a string of brothels of ever-decreasing quality.
El Ensueño occupied the top story of a building. On the ground floor was a music hall with large posters depicting a dancer clad in a diaphanous toga that did nothing to hide her charms, holding in her arms a black snake whose forked tongue seemed to be kissing her lips.
“Eva Montenegro and the Tango of Death,” the poster announced in bold letters. “The Queen of the Night, for six evenings only—no further performances. With the guest appearance of Mesmero, the mind reader who will reveal your most intimate secrets.”
Next to the main entrance was a narrow door behind which rose a long staircase with walls painted red. I went up the stairs and stood in front of a large carved oak door adorned with a brass knocker in the shape of a nymph wearing a modest clover leaf over her pubis. I knocked a couple of times and waited, shying away from my reflection in the tinted mirror that covered most of the adjoining wall. I was debating the possibility of hotfooting it out of the place when the door opened and a middle-aged woman, her hair completely white and tied neatly in a bun, smiled at me calmly.
“You must be Señor David Martín.”
Nobody had ever called me “señor” in all my life, and the formality caught me by surprise.
“That’s me.”
“Please be kind enough to follow me.”
I followed her down a short corridor that led into a spacious round room, the walls of which were covered in red velvet dimly lit by lamps. The ceiling was formed of an enameled crystal dome from which hung a glass chandelier. Under the chandelier stood a mahogany table holding an enormous gramophone that whispered an operatic aria.
“Would you like anything to drink, sir?”
“A glass of water would be very nice, thank you.”
The lady with the white hair smiled without blinking, her kindly countenance unperturbed.
“Perhaps the gentleman would rather a glass of champagne? Or a fine sherry?”
My palate did not go beyond the subtleties of the different vintages of tap water, so I shrugged my shoulders.
“You choose.”
The lady nodded without losing her smile and pointed to one of the sumptuous armchairs that were dotted round the room.
“If you’d care to sit down, sir. Chloé will be with you presently.”
I thought I was going to choke.
“Chloé?”
Ignoring my perplexity, the lady with the white hair disappeared behind a door that I could just make out through a black bead curtain, leaving me alone with my nerves and unmentionable desires. I wandered around the room to cast out the trembling that had taken hold of me. Apart from the faint music and the heartbeat throbbing in my temples, the place was silent. Six corridors led out of the sitting room, each one flanked by openings that were covered with blue curtains and each corridor leading to a closed white double door. I fell into one of the armchairs, one of those pieces of furniture designed to cradle the backsides of princes and generalissimos with a predilection for coups d’état. Soon the lady with the white hair returned carrying a glass of champagne on a silver tray. I accepted it and saw her disappear once again through the same door. I gulped down the champagne and loosened my shirt collar. I was starting to suspect that perhaps all this was just a joke devised by Vidal to make fun of me. At that moment I noticed a figure advancing toward me down one of the corridors. It looked like a little girl. She was walking with her head down, so that I couldn’t see her eyes. I stood up.
…
The girl made a respectful curtsy and beckoned me to follow her. Only then did I realize that one of her hands was fake, like the hand of a mannequin. The girl led me to the end of the corridor, opened the door with a key that hung round her neck, and showed me in. The room was in almost complete darkness. I took a few steps, straining my eyes. Then I heard the door closing behind me and when I turned round, the girl had vanished. Hearing the key turn, I knew I had been locked in. For almost a minute I stood there without moving. My eyes slowly grew used to the darkness and the outline of the room materialized around me. It was lined from floor to ceiling with black cloth. On one side I could just about make out a number of strange contraptions—I couldn’t decide whether they looked sinister or tempting. A large round bed rested beneath a headboard that looked to me like a huge spider’s web from which hung two candleholders with two black candles burning, giving off that waxy perfume that nests in chapels and at wakes. On one side of the bed stood a latticework screen with a sinuous design. I shuddered. The place was identical to the fictional bedroom I had created for my heroine, Chloé, in her adventures in The Mysteries of Barcelona. I was about to try to force the door open when I saw that I was not alone. I froze. I could see a silhouette through the screen. Two shining eyes were watching me and long white fingers with nails painted black peeped through the holes in the latticework.
“Chloé?” I whispered.
It was her. My Chloé. The incomparable operatic femme fatale of my stories made flesh—and lingerie. She had the palest skin I had ever seen and her short hair was sharply angled, framing her face. Her lips were the color of fresh blood and her green eyes were surrounded by a halo of dark shadow. She moved like a cat, as if her body, hugged by a corset that shone like scales, were made of water and had learned to defy gravity. Her slender, endless neck was circled by a scarlet velvet ribbon from which hung an upside-down crucifix. I watched, unable to breathe, as she slowly approached, my eyes glued to those lusciously shaped legs in sil
k stockings that probably cost more than I earned in a year and shoes, pointed like daggers, that tied round her ankles with silk ribbons. I had never seen anything as beautiful—or as frightening.