Free The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón Page B

you.”
    â€œDaniel Sempere, complete idiot. The pleasure is all mine.”
    â€œDon’t sell yourself short. On nights like this, everything looks worse than it is. You’d never guess it, but I’m a born optimist. I have no doubt at all that the present regime’s days are numbered. All intelligence points toward the Americans invading us any day now and setting Franco up with a peanut stand down in Melilla. Then my position, my reputation, and my lost honor will be restored.”
    â€œWhat did you work at?”
    â€œSecret service. High espionage,” said Fermín Romero de Torres. “Suffice it to say that I was President Maciá’s man in Havana.”
    I nodded. Another madman. At night Barcelona gathered them in by the handful. And idiots like me, too.
    â€œListen, that cut doesn’t look good to me. They’ve given you quite a tanning, eh?”
    I touched my mouth with my fingers. It was still bleeding.
    â€œWoman trouble?” he asked. “You could have saved yourself the effort. Women in this country—and I’ve seen a bit of the world—are a sanctimonious, frigid lot. Believe me. I remember a little mulatto girl I left behind in Cuba. No comparison, eh? No comparison. The Caribbean female draws up to you with that island swing of hers and whispers ‘ Ay, papito, gimme pleasure, gimme pleasure.’ And a real man, with blood in his veins…well, what can I say?”
    It seemed to me that Fermín Romero de Torres, or whatever his true name was, longed for lighthearted conversation almost as much as he longed for a hot bath, a plate of stew, and a clean change of clothes. I got him going for a while, as I waited for my pain to subside. It wasn’t very difficult, because all the man needed was a nod at the right moment and someone who appeared to be listening. The beggar was about to recount the details of a bizarre plan for kidnapping Franco’s wife when I saw that the rain had abated and the storm seemed to be slowly moving away toward the north.
    â€œIt’s getting late,” I mumbled, standing up.
    Fermín Romero de Torres nodded with a sad look and helped me get up, making as if he were dusting down my drenched clothes.
    â€œSome other day, then,” he said in a resigned tone. “I’m afraid talking is my undoing. Once I start…Listen, this business about the kidnapping, it should go no further, understand?”
    â€œDon’t worry. I’m as silent as a grave. And thanks for the wine.”
    I set off toward the Ramblas. I stopped by the entrance to the square and turned to look at the Barcelós’ apartment. The windows were still in darkness, weeping with rain. I wanted to hate Clara but was unable to. To truly hate is an art one learns with time.
    I swore to myself that I would never see her again, that I wouldn’t mention her name or remember the time I had wasted by her side. For some strange reason, I felt at peace. The anger that had driven me out of my home had gone. I was afraid it would return, and with renewed vigor, the following day. I was afraid that jealousy and shame would slowly consume me once all the pieces of my memory of that night fell into place. But dawn was still a few hours away, and there was one more thing I had to do before I could return home with a clean conscience.
    Â 
    C ALLE A RCO DEL T EATRO WAS THERE WAITING FOR ME. A STREAM OF black water converged in the center of the narrow street and made its way, like a funeral procession, toward the heart of the Raval quarter. I recognized the old wooden door and the baroque façade to which my father had brought me that morning at dawn, six years before. I went up the steps and took shelter from the rain under the arched doorway. It reeked of urine and rotten wood. More than ever, the Cemetery of Forgotten Books smelled of death. I didn’t recall that the door knocker was shaped as a demon’s face. I