“Wait. My husband has answered with the truth, but not all his answers are correct. I’m not sure if he’s lying or simply doesn’t know…” She paused. “Frida Eidinger came to our apartment.”
“Gabriela!” Don Agustín almost shouted.
“Frida Eidinger died here, señor Ericourt.” Gabriela was speaking with her eyes closed. “It’s better to confess it all.”
“Gabriela, you’re mad! I won’t let you go on.” Señor Iñarra seemed very agitated for the first time and spoke in a commanding tone.
“You’ll have to let me, Agustín. I’ve had enough. You’re not going to frighten me now like you’ve always done. Now you can’t do away with me like you wanted to. It would be too obvious.”
“By God, Gabriela! What are you saying? When have I wanted to do away with you?”
The tension of the scene had made Betty turn so red it seemed she might lose control of herself. Iñarra, ensconced in his chair, hunched his shoulders to bear the weight of all the hatred his wife was spitting at him in the midst of her incoherent declaration.
“You wanted to do away with me because you knew that sooner or later you’d lose me. I’d discovered the secret of your eagerness to make me absolutely dependent on you. You made me feel I was irredeemably tied to a past I’d forgotten long ago, because while I was still afraid I wouldn’t have left your side, right?”
Iñarra shook his head.
“Poor Gabriela,” he muttered sadly.
“Poor Gabriela!” she repeated almost simultaneously. “Poor me. I was stupid to think this home would give me back the status I lost as a result of an unfortunate passion. How much you’ve needed me, Agustín! Only now do I realize what this farce has meant to you.
“What would have come of your cold, loveless life if I hadn’t been here at your side, supporting you and giving you the opportunity to think yourself important by saving a poor woman with your selflessness?”
Don Agustín’s face revealed a deep concentration. He suddenly seemed to remember that the others were there and with visible effort shook off the entrancement caused by his wife’s words.
Gabriela spoke to Ericourt, now extraordinarily sure of herself.
“Frida Eidinger died here, as I said. She had asked to see me that evening to talk about something that was of interest to both of us. I received her because I had no option. She went as far as to threaten me with scandal.”
“Why?”
“These people suffer from psychosis of the past,” thought Blasi, “you can smell it in here.”
Gabriela was shaking her head.
“I’d like you to consider how it was for me to have to bow day and night to the hand held out to me. I needed to live with something real rather than empty words.”
Of course, everyone tries to justify themselves when they must admit to something like that, but it is often much simpler than they think and their mitigating circumstances never amount to much.
“It didn’t make me happier,” she went on, without clarifying what she was referring to. “My soul was as sick as his.” She pointed to her husband. “I’ve felt terribly guilty towards Betty and him, they depend on me. And what’s more,” she paused and bit her lips, “he’s just the same as us. He couldn’t help me.”
Don Agustín sank his head pitifully between his shoulders.
“Who do you mean?” asked Ericourt.
“Dr Luchter.”
“Gabriela, I forbid you to mix other people up in your lies.” Iñarra jerked his head up as if he had been stung.
“Leave her, Dad,” pleaded Betty gently, “there’s no point now.”
“But I won’t allow it. Dr Luchter is a friend.”
“Friend? When have you ever had a real friend, Agustín? You’ve always looked for people you could help so as to tie them more firmly to you. You did that with Luchter, you protected him, advised him, and he eventually noticed me because I was different, because I didn’t believe your lies.”
Ericourt did not seem to be as pressed for time as Lahore, who was fidgeting nervously. He listened with his eyes downcast, as blurry a figure in the midst of the family drama as those clouds racing across the window frame.
“Dr Luchter has been my lover.” Gabriela spoke these words fiercely. “If it makes you happy, Agustín, I want you to know I’ve tormented myself with all the remorse a person can feel. Every night I went to bed wanting to wake up and find it had all been a bad dream. I wanted to feel clean and innocent again.
“Lord, I’ve been so stupid!”
An instinctive horror paralysed Lahore. Like an inexperienced surgeon who sees diseased flesh and would like to tear the forceps from the wound and cover it back up under the falsely intact appearance of skin and muscle.
Gabriela continued in her clear voice:
“I’d been Luchter’s lover for two years when Frida Eidinger arrived in the country. They’d had a relationship in Germany many years ago and met again here.
“I had no idea Frida Eidinger existed until the night she came to our apartment unannounced. I opened the door myself because our maid had gone to bed early, as had my husband. Betty was out and when she got back she went up to Boris Czerbó’s apartment to talk to him. Czerbó had found out about my relationship with Luchter, I don’t know how, and was threatening to reveal our secret if I didn’t give him money.
“When I saw I was lost, I turned to Betty, who agreed to help me with her own money in order to avoid upsetting her father. That night, after Agustín went to bed, I sat in the living room to wait for Betty. Agustín knew I stayed up late and always made me a glass of whisky and soda. One, no more, so I wouldn’t overdo it. He’s like that. He keeps the bottle locked in his room. He says he has to look after me because I’m incapable of controlling my desires.”
“It’s true, Gabriela, don’t hold it against me.”
The words sounded like a pitiful plea. Gabriela ignored him, smiling disdainfully.
“The bell rang and I went to open the door. I found myself face to face with a woman I didn’t know, who threatened to make a scene if I didn’t let her in.
“Agustín’s room, as you can see, is the last bedroom. There was little chance he would hear our conversation from there. Agustín never gets out of bed without my help. I agreed to the woman’s request.
“Frida Eidinger came into my home like a woman determined to carry out a plan. She sat opposite me and told me her name. I’ll repeat that it was the first time I’d heard it.
“She didn’t beat about the bush in telling me what she wanted. She belonged to that class of person who knows no bounds when it comes to ensuring they have the upper hand.”
“Or who assumes those bounds don’t exist,” interrupted Blasi, pleased to see Betty’s childlike face free from any pretence.
A look from Lahore was enough to make him doubt how wise it was to make personal comments, but Gabriela was by this point so wrapped up in her own narrative that nothing would have cut her off.
“She told me Luchter was the only man she’d loved and for that reason she was prepared to win him back. She had weapons at her disposal and wouldn’t hesitate to use them. According to her, I was in a worse position because I was jeopardizing a position that gave me the means to survive.”
“What did you say to this?” intervened Ericourt.
Iñarra and Betty listened to the difficult confession like two stern figures on a tomb, their eyes trained on the floor. Gabriela with her calm, pained voice seemed to grow before their eyes, filling the scene previously occupied by the skittish ghost of her temperament.
On hearing Ericourt’s question she shrugged her shoulders.
“I don’t know.”
“How can you have forgotten, madam?” Lahore protested crossly. “The words you exchanged that night must have been of the greatest importance to you.”