Beyond the Ties of Blood (8 page)

“Well. Eugenia. We have a protocol we follow in all our interviews. I hope you don't mind, but I must summarize what I already said to you over the phone several months ago, as well as some of the material in the documents I sent you in the mail.” Ignacio cleared his throat again before proceeding. Then his voice took on an official, routine, almost sing-song quality.

“We need your help in the case of Manuel Bronstein Weisz, whose disappearance we believe to have been politically motivated. His mother, Sara Weisz, who now lives in Santiago, was the first person to come before the Commission when we began our interviews. She had been contacted by an ex-member of the secret police who said that you had arrived in Villa Gardenia with her son. As a founding member of the Committee of Relatives of the Detained and Disappeared, she used her contacts and tracked you to Boston. I am here in her name to request your help in confirming the abduction of Manuel Bronstein Weisz.

“And one more thing, if you'll permit me. The Commission has defined its work essentially as establishing and confirming, through reliable data and testimony, the human-rights abuses suffered by the executed and disappeared and their families. It is not our mission at this time to document the experiences of people like yourself, survivors of prison and torture. Personally, however, I feel you must have the opportunity to give testimony in as detailed a fashion as you wish, and will not stop you if you include your own experiences.”

When Ignacio finally stopped talking, a deep silence settled between them and their eyes locked. Eugenia realized that, ironically enough, his official, vaguely formulaic intonation had calmed her down. It suggested a larger, almost paternal authority, a newly empathetic government hovering over his shoulder that now wished to listen to its citizens. And she knew then that this was the way she could make a difference, not only for Manuel and his parents, but for herself and Laura. No matter how limited her understanding of his politics, she was the only one who'd been there and survived, the only one who could tell this story.

Ignacio took a small portable cassette recorder out of his pocket. When he pointed to it, Eugenia nodded. She began talking as soon as he pressed the
RECORD
button, raggedly at first, then slowly gaining resonance and power until her words were like a wave that, after spending many years on the high seas, suddenly rushed toward the shore.

“They caught us in our last apartment in Santiago, the tiny one we'd moved to after Manuel's last eviction. It was October 7, 1973. It was a clear and luminous morning, a bit chilly, a typical spring morning in Santiago. Like every day since the coup, I'd gone out as soon as the curfew lifted to buy food, coffee, and newspapers. It was amazing how soon after the coup the shops were full to bursting with exactly the items that had been impossible to find before. I remember thinking, over and over, how right people had been to accuse shopkeepers of hoarding. To this day I don't know whether I was followed that morning or not. I probably was, because they couldn't have arrived more than twenty minutes after I got back from the store.

“I imagine you must already know, more or less, what happened next. They burst in while we were having coffee. You know what that was like, don't you? They broke everything, threw us to the ground. They beat us for the mere pleasure of it, because once we realized what was happening we didn't put up any resistance. They put a blindfold over my eyes and tied my hands behind me. Then they shoved me into a car and threw me in the back, on the floor. I don't know for sure what they did with Manuel, but I imagine it was pretty much the same. They must have put each of us in a different vehicle.

“They kept me blindfolded for a long while. Perhaps they didn't want me to know where they were taking me, but for someone who'd grown up in Santiago it wasn't too hard to guess. There was a small uncovered place near the corner of my left eye, and every now and then I managed to make out something familiar. I could tell that we reached the outskirts of town, what I later understood was Villa Gardenia. But maybe the reason they blindfolded me was so I couldn't identify those who tortured me. Especially those who gave me the shocks. Because in the following weeks, torture—and the fear of torture—became my new world …”

Eugenia took the glass of mineral water in her hands, trying not to spill any even though she was shaking violently. After several large swallows she took a deep breath, put the glass back down on the coffee table, and continued.

“The last time I saw him, they brought him into the room where they'd been torturing me. At first all I noticed was that the electricity stopped. I felt tired, thirsty, relieved. I don't know. Truth is, I was so tired, so run down, everything hurt. At least now I don't remember exactly what I felt. It's even possible I didn't know it at the time.

“There came a moment when I realized that there were more people in the room than before, and they had removed my hood. I looked up. There he was. I think they'd broken his right arm, because it was sort of hanging at this weird angle. His face was so swollen, Ignacio, that the only way I recognized him was by his long, curly red hair. The left side of his face was more than double its normal size. His beard was caked with blood, and the pieces of his face you could see, you can't imagine the color, between red, purple, green, blue …

“When I first noticed him, he was sitting with his head hanging down, as if his neck didn't have the strength to hold it up. At the precise moment I looked up at him, his guard hit him with his rifle butt. ‘There's your whore,' he growled. Manuel looked up then and saw me. That's when I saw the blood caked all over his face. One of his eyes was swollen shut.

“I think I actually felt, more than saw, him look at me. Something passed between us, as if he were trying to talk to me. I tried to talk to him the same way, without words, to tell him not to worry about me, that I was hurting too, but that I could stand it, and that I loved him. To this day I'm convinced he understood me. His head went back down, almost with relief, it seemed. And I'm glad. I'm happy that I saw him then, that we could look at each other and speak without words. Because what happened afterward … of course I couldn't know for sure until later, until I got out. When I reached Mexico, in fact, that's when they told me he'd disappeared. That he'd never said a word, even under the worst torture. In the eyes of his organization, this made him a hero. But I knew when I saw him, that it was right before … why else would they bring us together, and mock us that way? That's what has haunted me all these years, given me nightmares, pulled my hair out by the roots …”

With that, Eugenia lost control. She began to sob, deeply, with her head between her hands. After turning off the tape recorder, Ignacio hesitated for a moment. Then he walked over to her, to the large armchair where she was sitting, and put his arms around her. Sitting on the arm rest and cradling her head under his jaw, he rocked gently back and forth and let her cry a long time on the shoulder of his previously well-pressed summer suit.

He must have dozed off for a moment. As he startled awake, the pain was a rusty knife gouging through the top of his right shoulder. He tried to move away from it, but then it started down his right side, into his hip. He found that if he lay quietly, as still as he could, it returned to his shoulder and seemed to calm down just a bit.

As always happened in the dank, windowless cell, Manuel felt the sun begin to rise, a slight warming of the air around him. He thought back—had it been yesterday?—to the moment they brought him into the room where Eugenia was, where he managed to look at her with his one good eye. Her face was purple and swollen, dirty tear tracks down her cheeks, and she sat bent over, trying not to put weight on any sore part of her body. The beatings hadn't left her much chance of finding a comfortable position. And what else had they done to her?

How stupid he'd been, and how arrogant. She'd never been much of an activist. When did he expect to inform the soldiers she wasn't involved? Before they beat him senseless? After they shocked him unconscious with bolts of electricity? They would release her then, of course. We apologize for the confusion, we only meant to torture your boyfriend.

But still he managed to look at her, somehow to will her eyes to meet his one open one. And with all his remaining strength he tried to talk through his pain and hers, brain to brain, blood to blood. I'm sorry, he shouted inside his head. Whatever they've done to you, whatever happens, I'll always love you. The uselessness of his words had echoed through his heart. Now, in the early dawn, in the dark closeness of his cell, the echoes returned.

When had his ideals turned into this?

Temuco, 1963

The late-model Oldsmobile sedan gleamed navy blue in the mid-afternoon sun. Manuel circled the back end of the car on his way to the driver's side. The driver's door swung open just before he reached it and a tall man stood at attention before him. The chauffeur must have been tracking him in the rearview mirror.

“
Niño
Manuel,” he said, “please step back on the curb. I'll open the back door for you.”

Manuel stepped back onto the sidewalk. After the chauffeur opened the back door of the car, he waited politely for a minute or so, then spoke again in a carefully burnished baritone.

“You can get in now,
niño
Manuel.”

“No, Francisco, that won't be necessary. I'm going to my grandparents' shop again. In fact, you can tell Papa I won't be needing the car at all this week.”

Nodding politely, no change of expression on his face, Francisco walked around to his own side and got in, started the car, and pulled away from the curb. Manuel watched him disappear around the corner.

He turned and walked a block in the opposite direction, past the intricate wrought-iron gate that framed the tasteful entrance to his school, past the queue of chauffeur-driven cars waiting to pick up his schoolmates, past the sugar-sweet aromas that emanated from the rose garden hidden behind the school wall. As he turned left at the corner and began the five-block hike to the city's main avenue, he recalled yet again how dramatically his life had changed since they'd moved to their new house.

He'd spent the first decade of his life on a tiny street a block long that ran diagonally between two small parks, right off the main boulevard in Temuco's oldest immigrant neighborhood. The chubby, ruddy-faced woman who cleaned, washed, and cooked for them during the day would go home when his mama came back for tea. Mama would read him stories or trot behind him in the park as he learned to ride a tricycle, then a bicycle, by himself. Papa was even busier at his bakeries on weekends, so when it was sunny Mama would take him to the park that overlooked the city and they'd have lunch in the small sandwich shop and she'd buy him an apricot ice cream for dessert. On rainy weekends they'd visit her parents at their tailor shop, but Mama and Grandma Myriam would usually get into a fight. Almost always it was about the same thing, why didn't his papa come over too, why didn't he spend time with his family, why was he always at the bakery. When Grandma made some comment about how making money wasn't the most important thing in the world, the visit would end suddenly as his mother took him by the arm, putting his wet overcoat back on, the drops of rain from the umbrellas pelting him on the nose as she opened them back up on the way out the door.

One day, about a month short of his tenth birthday, Manuel was out in the park when his mama came home. He ran up to her, his brand-new friend in tow. “Mama,” he asked, “can Marcelo have tea with us?” Mama had looked the other boy up and down, her glance lingering over his scuffed shoes, the hole in his sweater right below the left elbow, the old dirt and snot stains on his cheeks.

“Not today, Manuelito,” she'd said after a short silence. “Maybe another day.”

There'd never been another day. He'd asked her about it a couple of times, but her answer was always vague, and she always managed to change the subject. When he'd wanted to invite Marcelo to his birthday party, Mama had murmured something about “keeping it in the family.” They celebrated with Mama and Papa, Grandma Myriam and Grandpa David. Several weeks later, he'd come home from the park to find both parents at home, a special teatime snack ready, their faces shining with anticipation. His mama gave him a hug, and Papa beamed encouragement from his place at the head of the table.

“Manuelito dear, we have some wonderful news,” she began. “We've found a wonderful new house, it's at least three times bigger than this one, you'll have your own room, study and bathroom, almost like your own apartment. The yard is huge, you won't even have to go out to the park to ride your bike.”

“Yes,” his papa chimed in, the remnants of his childhood German still echoing in his accent, “the yard, it is so large, you can invite all the children in the neighborhood over, they all fit to play soccer, we build the goal posts if you want.”

“And Manuelito,” his mother added, “we'll be so near that wonderful new school I've been wanting for you, and they give preference to people in the neighborhood, so yesterday when I went by and explained about our new house the headmistress went right ahead and signed your acceptance papers, and …” She petered off in mid-sentence as she got a glimpse of his shocked face. “What's the matter,
niñito
?”

“But I don't want to move. I'm happy here—” His papa had cut him off.

“It is better in the new house. Many children live on the street, from families more like us. In school, too. You'll be happier there.” Manuel knew that Papa meant it as a promise, but it had sounded like an order.

And so Manuel had begun attending Temuco's newest and most expensive private school, with a reputation for progressive learning methods. It was so different from his other school, a public one that welcomed all the children who had lived nearby, no matter how much money their parents made. The children of all the best families, the ones whose parents had the largest farms and the biggest lumber mills, went to this new school. They all lived in the same neighborhood, too, the one with streets named after European countries. Like all the other mothers in her new social circle, Sara Weisz de Bronstein was now too busy with her charity work and her Tuesday canasta games to pick her son up from school or take him to the park; but unlike the other children, he refused to be picked up by his father's new chauffeur-driven car.