Cervantes Street (3 page)
During those years, I felt as though I were living in the future, in a city that had nothing to do with the rest of Spain. Pícaros from every corner of the world—false clerics, false scholars, impostors of every imaginable and unimaginable kind, pickpockets, swindlers, counterfeiters, sword swallowers, gamblers, assassins for hire, soldiers of fortune, murderers of every sort, whores, Don Juans (whose profession was to ruin the most beautiful and chaste maidens), Gypsies, fortune-tellers, fire-eaters, forgers, puppeteers, ruffians, bon vivants, and snake charmers—came to Sevilla and made the city their stage. Life there was dangerous and thrilling, as festive and bloody as a bullfight. Successful gamblers were as admired as the bullfighters or famous military heroes. It was common to hear a child say that when he grew up he wanted to be a gambler like Manolo Amor, who on one occasion had gambled away an entire fleet of galleons that was not his.
Sevilla was the place where I belonged. It was created for me and I wanted to be its historian. Sevilla was mine and it owned me.
Most Sevillanos stayed inside during the hottest hours, and went out only at night, when the evening breezes, sweeping up the Guadalquivir from the Mediterranean, cooled the city by a few degrees. Then it was as if a curtain rose, and the proscenium that was Sevilla became a magical stage for the theater of life. Lying there on my blanket in the outskirts of the city, I imagined I heard in the recesses of my brain the clacking sounds of castanets, coming from every street and plaza. The clacking was a reminder to strut with the arrogant elegance of a peacock displaying all its colors. People rushed out of their homes to sing on the plazas and dance the salacious zarabandas, which were forbidden by the church. In the plazas, illuminated by torches, beautiful and lascivious women dancers (young and old alike) wiggled their behinds with impudence and rapped their castanets with fury, turning the instruments into weapons that could seduce and then snuff the life out of you.
The dancers’ looks were an invitation to dream about the countless pleasures of the body; and the movements of their hands spoke intricate languages and summoned the spectators with seductive signs to caress the dancers’ amber-flushed cheeks. It was thrilling to see the male dancers leap high in the air, spinning in circles, as though to exorcize demons that were eating them from the inside out. Midair, these men seemed half-human, half-bird. From midnight until dawn, the loveliest señoritas were serenaded by their inflamed wooers. Brawls often broke out during these serenatas, and the corpses of unfortunate lovers were found in the mornings, beneath the balconies of their inamoratas, glued to puddles of coagulated blood.
Sevilla was a city of witches and enchanters. You had to be careful not to cross a woman, because any female, aristocratic or peasant, married or unmarried, old or young, beautiful or ugly, Christian or Moor, slave or free, could have satanic powers. Witches made red roses bloom in their homes in December. They could make or break marriages, could make grooms hang themselves or evaporate on the eve of the wedding, could make pregnant women give birth to litters of puppies.
Unlucky men who crossed the enchantresses were turned into donkeys. As husbands and lovers disappeared, new donkeys materialized and the women who owned these donkeys took delight in making them carry heavy loads. It was common to see a woman whose husband had vanished go around the city addressing every donkey she saw by her husband’s name. When an ass brayed in response, the woman would drop on her knees, cross herself, and give thanks to God that she had found her husband. If she wanted her man back, she had to buy the donkey from its owner. Then she would go back home, happy to have found her spouse, and spend the rest of her life trying to undo the enchantment. Or she might be just as happy to keep her husband in donkey form. It was said that some of the happiest marriages in Sevilla were between a woman and her ass.
The Holy Office whipped many women in public plazas for the extraordinary pleasures they boasted of receiving from their equine lovers. Debauched cries and crescendos of lust traveled to remote villages in the mountains where herds of wild asses brayed with envy. Gypsies took to bringing donkeys that brayed anytime a desperate woman addressed them. If a donkey became erect and tried to mount a young wife who called him by her husband’s name, or a donkey tried to kick an old, withered harpy who claimed him as her husband, or scurried away when an ugly one threw her arms around his neck, that, too, was considered proof of having found her husband. When a Sevillano allowed inflated notions to swell his head, he was told, “Remember, today you are a man, but tomorrow you may well be a donkey.”
During Holy Week people did penance for all the sins they indulged the rest of the year. Then alone would Sevillanos fast and drag themselves on their knees to the cathedral. But Sevilla’s cathedral was not oppressive. Instead, it was filled with light, color, ostentatious displays of gold and jewels, illuminated as much by its oil lamps and its candles as by the iridescent light that poured in through stained-glass windows. It was a place where we went to experience the splendors of the world, not a glum building where we expiated our sins. It seemed to me, as a young man, that God had to be more receptive to our prayers in a place like this, where everybody knew that hope, joy, and beauty were part of His covenant with us. I used to walk out of Sevilla’s cathedral content, as if I had just eaten a mariscada and washed it down with wine.
Often, in those days, I escorted my mother on her visits to the cathedral. Our enjoyment of the place was a secret between the two of us that excluded the rest of the family and gave us respite from our dingy house, with its worn-out, secondhand furnishings and leaks in the ceiling of every room. The cathedral’s sumptuous altars seemed to relieve Mother, momentarily, of the pain caused by Father’s impecuniousness. She loved music above all things. It’s true Father played the vihuela at home, but nothing he did gratified her. Only in the cathedral could she listen to music. Her face glowed, her eyes gleamed as the sounds of the clavichord or spinet swelled. Singing made Mother happy. Her untrained voice was clear, and it could hit many of the high notes. I’d only heard it when she sang romances in the kitchen, as she went about her chores, on those occasions when my father left to visit relatives in Córdoba. In the cathedral she would let her voice spill out and rise, with the same abandon and ecstasy I heard in the lament of the singers in Andalusia.
After church, she would hook my arm in hers, and we would stroll along the banks of the Guadalquivir and stop to gaze at the foreign ships and glorious armada galleons. One evening, grabbing my hand by the wrist, she implored me, “Don’t stay in Spain, Miguel. Go far away from here to someplace where you can a make a fortune for yourself. In the Indies you will have a brilliant future awaiting you, my son.”
She did not mention my father’s name, yet I sensed she was pushing me to look for a life completely different from his. Because I was a dreamer, like my father, she feared that, like him, I would become a ne’er-do-well. She had begun to see me as another unrealistic Cervantes male: I would live surrounded by criminals, constantly borrowing reales from my friends and relatives, incapable of understanding how to put food on the table. But if I let my imagination flow, the wide waters of the Guadalquivir would eventually lead me to the Indies in the West, or to Italy in the East, or to burning Africa in the South, or to the Orient, beyond Constantinople, to the splendors and mysteries of Arabia, and perhaps even to the fabled court of the emperor of China.
Those dreams of my youth had been pulverized by my immediate reality. The next day, Maese Pedro returned from Sevilla with the news that the bailiff was looking for me and there was a reward for my capture. I said goodbye to my dream of going to the New World. “Miguel,” he said, “I think your best chance of escaping lies with asking the help of my friend Ricardo, El Cuchillo. He is the chief of a caravan of Gypsies leaving for the Carpathians tomorrow; every year they pass through Italy on their way home. Get ready and I’ll take you to him as soon as it gets dark. And remember, don’t haggle over the price he charges you and you’ll get to Italy safely.”
The Gypsies had set up an encampment in the woods west of Sevilla, on the bank of a stream. Maese Pedro pointed at a man sitting by a bonfire who wore a hat that resembled a crow spreading huge wings over his head. Children surrounded him, listening raptly to what he was saying. We dismounted and walked toward him.
When he recognized his visitor, El Cuchillo clapped loudly, and the children scampered squealing into the darkness. The men embraced with the affection of old friends. Maese Pedro spoke first: “Ricardo, I’ve never asked a favor from you before today. I’ve known Miguel,” he said, throwing an arm around my shoulders, “since he was a boy.” He proceeded to explain the gravity of my circumstances.
El Cuchillo listened, pulling gently at his pointy beard with bony, weathered fingers. His fingernails bulged with dirt. The wrinkles on his face were pronounced, as if his face had been sliced horizontally with a blade, leaving it runneled and channeled—hence his nickname. The Gypsy removed his hat, shook his head to let down a thicket of silvery hair, and replied, “I want to be paid the full amount in advance. But I warn you, Don Miguel, if you do anything foolish, I’m not risking my balls for your culo. Is that understood?”
* * *
So in Gypsy rags, with a black kerchief tied around my forehead, and golden hoops dangling from my ears, I left Spain. The City of the Caesars was my final destination. Relieved as I was to leave
la madre patria
before my right hand was lopped off, I was anxious about traveling with people who dwelled in caves and wild forests and who most Christians regarded as sorcerers and cannibals. When Gypsies camped near a town, parents would keep their children indoors and sleep in the same bed with them at night. Gypsies were infamous for kidnapping children and selling them in Berber lands to the Moors. It was also said that they fattened stolen infants, roasted them during their festivities, cut them up, and tossed the tender pieces of flesh into their pucheros, a soup made with dry horsemeat, chickpeas, mushrooms, and purslane.
The Gypsy women who practiced palmistry were feared and despised even more than the men. Their powers were said to be as formidable as the devil’s. If a Gypsy palm reader approached you, her eyes shining with seduction, and you refused to hear your fortune told, she would—without forewarning—turn into a frightful Fury, spitting out bone-chilling curses.
As a boy in Sevilla, I saw a man refuse to have his palm read. The tumorous-faced harpy started screaming: “You son of a whoring bitch! May the devil’s curse fall on you for turning a deaf ear on an old woman in need!” When the man walked away, a big, smoking black rock plunged from the sky and thumped his head with such force that it was severed and rolled—wailing—down the street, as the body stumbled around looking for it. From that moment on, I made a point of never crossing a Gypsy woman. It was because of their devilish powers that even the forces of the king left them alone as much as possible.
From the moment we were on the road, I kept hearing the words Maese Pedro had whispered to me as we said our goodbyes: “Miguel, always keep an eye on your purse. Make sure the Gypsies don’t leave you the way you came into the world. After you shake hands with a Gypsy, remember to count your fingers. Roma people, as you know, are the biggest thieves and rascals in the world. Other than that, they are no worse than the rest of humanity.”
The Stain
Luis
Knowing it would be hard for Miguel’s parents to obtain funds overnight, I decided to help my friend finance his flight. I lived on the generous allowance my father gave me to attend the university in Alcalá de Henares, so I could not go to him to ask for a large sum of money. Like any good Castilian, he was thrifty. My grandfather, Carlos Lara, was my only hope; Papá Carlos always indulged me. Appreciative of his generosity, I never imposed on him.
He was not in his bedroom. I looked for him in the library, and he wasn’t there either. Next I looked for him in the family chapel, where he went twice a day for his devotions. Through the keyhole, I saw him on his knees, hands clasped, head bowed, lost in prayer. While I waited outside the door, I feared that one of my parents would find me standing by the chapel’s entrance and I would have to explain the situation. I shifted from one foot to the other to make time fly faster. As Papá Carlos exited the chapel, serene after the absorption of his morning prayers, I accosted him without any preamble. “Papá Carlos, I need money to help a friend in grave danger.”
“Is it for Miguel Cervantes?” he asked, without the slightest surprise.
I nodded. From the start, Papá Carlos had frowned upon my growing intimacy with Miguel.
“I knew the boy’s grandfather well when our monarchs held court in Valladolid,” Papá Carlos said. “Mark my words: like grandfather, like grandson. Juan Cervantes was a spendthrift—slaves, horses, and clothes fit for a nobleman. He was a clothmaker, a commoner with pretensions, who looked down on his Jewish brethren and sought to befriend the rich, the powerful, the Christian nobility.” He shook his head and narrowed his eyes. “It’s true he ended his life respected and prosperous. One hates to think how he achieved a high station in life.” My grandfather emphasized every word, the way he did when he wanted to teach me a lesson. “He was a true member of his nationless, Semitic race. Luis, it behooves us Christians not to get too close to people with the stain.” He rested a hand on my shoulder, and looked me directly in the eye. “Never forget this: even when a Jew swears to be a devout Christian—centuries after their so-called conversion—at heart he always remains a Jew.”
I had nothing against the Jews who had converted. What’s more, the conversos’ secretive life held a fascination for me. Besides, from the very beginning, Miguel and I had shared so many joyous moments that I would have disobeyed my parents—whom I otherwise respected and heeded, as was my duty—if they had forbidden our friendship.