A Long Petal of the Sea(70)

Carme had said on more than one occasion that if she died in Chile she wished to be buried in Spain, where her husband and son Guillem were laid to rest, but if she died in Spain she wanted to be buried in Chile, to be near the rest of her family. Why? Well just to cause trouble, she would say with a laugh. And yet it wasn’t simply a joke, it was the anguish of divided love, separation, of living and dying far from one’s loved ones.

Marcel was able to fly to Santiago the next day. They kept vigil over the grandmother in the house where she had lived with Jordi Moline for nineteen years. There was no religious ceremony, because the last time Carme had set foot in church was as a little girl, before she fell in love with Marcel Lluis Dalmau. However, without being asked, two Maryknoll priests who lived nearby turned up. In the past, Carme had traded serrano ham and manchego cheese Jordi obtained illegally for cigarettes the priests had been sent from New York. The two improvised a funeral service with a guitar and singing that would have pleased Carme.

The only inconsolable member of the family was her grandson, Marcel, who had enjoyed the closest relationship with àvia. He drank two glasses of pisco and sat and wept for all he hadn’t managed to say to her, for the lost tenderness he had been ashamed of showing her, for having refused to talk to her in Catalan, for having made fun of her disastrous cooking, for not having answered every single one of her letters. He was the one closest to the heart of that rebellious, bossy grandmother who had written him a daily letter after he left for Colorado until the day before she died. From then on, the only thing that went with Marcel wherever he happened to live was the shoe box tied up with string that contained the three hundred and fifty-nine letters from his àvia. Quiet and sad, Victor sat down next to Marcel, reflecting that his small family had lost the cornerstone that held it up. Much later that night, he said as much to Roser when they were alone in their bedroom. “You’re the cornerstone that’s always held us up,” Roser told him.



Among the mourners at the wake were neighbors, former colleagues, and students from the school where Carme had taught for years, friends from the days when she accompanied Jordi to the Winnipeg tavern, and friends of Victor and Roser. At eight o’clock that night the police arrived on motorcycles and blocked off the whole street to allow three blue Fiats to enter. One of them contained the president, who had come to offer his condolences to his chess-playing friend.

Victor bought a plot in the cemetery big enough to accommodate not only his mother, but Jordi and possibly his father’s remains, if in the future they succeeded in bringing them from Spain. He realized that from this moment on he belonged definitively to Chile. “Our homeland is where our dead are buried,” Carme always used to insist.

The police meanwhile were searching for Jordi Moline. The old man had no family, and his friends were the same as Carme’s. None of them had seen him. Thinking that due to his slight dementia he might have gotten lost, the Dalmaus put up his photograph on posters in local shops, and left the door to his house unlocked in case he returned. Roser thought he must have left in pajamas and slippers, because it seemed to her all his clothes were still in his wardrobe, but she couldn’t be sure. This was confirmed the following summer, when the level of the Mapocho River dropped and they finally found what was left of the old man caught in some reeds. The only items of clothing recovered were shreds of his pajamas. A whole month went by before he was definitely identified and handed over to the Dalmau family for burial beside Carme.



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DESPITE PROBLEMS OF EVERY kind, galloping inflation, and the catastrophic news spread by the press, the Allende government still had popular support. This was demonstrated in the parliamentary elections, when its share of the vote grew unexpectedly, making it plain that the economic crisis and the hate campaign would not be enough to get rid of Allende.

“The right wing is arming itself, Doctor,” Victor was warned by the patient who brought him toilet paper. “I know, because in my factory there are rooms locked with metal bars and padlocks. Nobody can enter.”

“That doesn’t prove anything.”

“Some comrades take turns to be on guard day and night because of possible sabotage. They’ve seen crates being unloaded from trucks. Since they looked different from the usual loads, they decided to investigate. They’re certain they were full of weapons. There’s going to be a bloodbath here, Doctor, because the youth in the revolutionary movement are armed as well.”

That night Victor commented on this to Allende. They were finishing a game they had postponed for several days. The house, purchased by the government as a presidential residence, was Spanish-style, with arched windows, red tiles, a mosaic with the national coat of arms over the entrance, and two tall palm trees visible from the street. The guards knew Victor, and no one was surprised he should turn up late at night. He and Allende played chess in the living room, where there was always a board set up, surrounded by books and works of art.

Allende was not surprised by what Victor had to say. He was already aware of the situation, but legally it was impossible to raid either that factory or any others where doubtless the same thing was occurring. “Don’t worry, Victor. As long as the armed forces remain loyal to the government, there’s nothing to fear. I trust the commander in chief, he’s an honorable man.” He added that the vociferous left-wing extremists who were demanding a Cuban-style revolution were just as dangerous; those hotheads did as much harm to the government as the right wing.