She looked away from the grey eyes and up at the video screen. A dog fight was in progress. The journalist, who seemed to be the heroine, was questioning the people at the fight, showing them the photo she had in her hand. Then the camera cut to a very thin young man, with a mean expression on his face, who was watching the woman.
“That’s the one who betrayed the other two. He was the traitor of the group and it was all a lie that story about him being wounded,” said the man, turning his head to the screen. “I saw the film once in a bar.”
“Well, I haven’t seen it before. That’s why I’d like to see it now,” she said, picking up the headphones. She had nearly finished her cigarette.
“On second thoughts, perhaps you should see it. After all, you’re a traitor too.”
For a moment she couldn’t speak.
“And you’re a complete and utter shit,” she said, leaning back.
“I’m sorry, Irene. I didn’t mean to say that,” said the man. As if instinctively, he held out his hand to her.
“I’ve finished my cigarette. Please go.”
She stubbed out the cigarette in the ashtray, so hard that the grains from the carbon filter stained her fingers.
“You can wipe your fingers on this,” said the man, offering her a paper serviette.
“Aren’t you going to keep your promise?”
She felt weak, as if the word — that dirty, wretched word — which, moments before, had come from her companion’s mouth, had left her breathless.
“No, I’m not. I can’t now. It would be a mistake,” said the man fiercely. There was a metallic glint in the depths of his grey eyes. “I don’t think you’re a traitor. Not at all. It’s your former admirers who think that, the many admirers you had before, because an admirer can never allow his idol to change. How many fans would Elvis Presley have now if he was still alive and living the life of a sensible family man? Very few, Irene, very few. Instead, he became a monster and died very young, and so his admirers go in their thousands to visit his grave. And the same thing would happen with you. Because, the fact is, and again forgive my frankness, Irene, your organization is basically a youthful phenomenon, it’s not a serious political movement …”
“Please, be quiet! You’re giving me a headache!” she broke in, clasping her head between her two hands.
“Then I’ll explain it to you very briefly. I want us to be friends — both on a personal level and in my capacity as a policeman. All I want is for you to see our point of view. If we don’t reach an agreement, fine, nothing more will be said. But, Irene, you must bear in mind …”
“Please, leave me alone!”
She clasped her head again. She felt a stab of pain in one temple.
“I’ll talk to you quietly, but I won’t be silent. Things are looking bad for you, Irene, and I can help you …”
He didn’t manage to finish his sentence that time either. A shout stopped him:
“For heaven’s sake, I can’t bear it a moment longer!”
Everyone on the lower deck stared in amazement at the nun with green eyes. She had got up out of her seat and was looking very annoyed.
“What kind of a policeman are you? I can’t believe what I’ve been hearing! Why don’t you just leave the young woman in peace! What right have you to pester her?”
She was standing right next to the man with the red tie now, but she was still shouting just as loudly.
“Leave me alone, nobody asked you for your opinion!” said the man. He seemed embarrassed and kept glancing over at the hostess and the passenger who looked like a boxer.
“It’s no good pulling faces, sir! And look at me when I’m talking to you!”
“You’ll be sorry for this!”
“You certainly will!”
“Oh, really,” said the man mockingly, but he was clearly intimidated.
The other nun, who was still in her seat, suddenly turned round, her face tense.
“Her brother is a general, a general, do you hear? An important general in the army!” she shrilled in her old lady’s voice.
“I really don’t give a shit who he is!” said the man, again glancing at the hostess and the passenger who looked like a boxer, but neither of them made a move to intervene.
“You’re a fool, you don’t know what you’re saying,” said the nun with green eyes. “But now, be a good Christian and leave this woman in peace. As for you, Irene, and forgive me being so direct, why don’t you go back upstairs? You’ll be better off up there. This man has no honour. He’s a serpent.”
“Good advice,” Irene said. She got up from her seat and started putting everything that was on the table back into her suitcase. Suddenly, she burst out laughing. The whole situation was a joke. It seemed totally absurd that a person like her should be rescued by two nuns, two members of the Spanish church. Except that, for once, absurdity was on her side.
“You’ll be better off upstairs,” said the nun with the green eyes as Irene put the last book in her suitcase and left the smokers’ section. The man in the red tie was sitting with arms folded, staring hard at some point on the carpet.
“Give my regards to your brother the general,” Irene said.
“I will.”
She felt light. The sense she had had a few moments before — that the poison was seeping into her soul, that she was losing ground to the policeman — had vanished completely. The nun’s intervention had broken the spell, and she could no longer hear the serpent’s whispers.
She walked past the hostess and the passenger who looked like a boxer and started going up the stairs, slowly, trying to keep her balance despite the swaying of the bus. She was just about to put her foot on the fifth step when she felt the presence of someone behind her.
“You filthy whore! Just you wait!” said a hoarse voice behind her.
She instinctively jumped onto the next step and reached the upper deck before she had even realized what had happened. It did not take long. It was not the voice of the policeman in the red tie. He wasn’t the one who had threatened her. It had been the other one, the passenger who looked like a boxer. She hesitated for a few moments, as if she couldn’t quite remember what she had to do, but in the end she started looking for her seat. Was it number thirty-two? She put her hand in her jacket pocket and took out the ticket. Yes, number thirty-two. It was right there, beside the stairs.
The upper deck was in near darkness. It looked like a cinema. Most of the passengers were watching the video.
“I got tired of being downstairs,” she said to the large woman by way of greeting. She got no reply. Despite her half-open eyes and the position of her head, erect and looking at one of the screens, she was fast asleep. Irene leaned her suitcase against the seat and sat down carefully so as not to wake her. She felt incapable of talking to anyone.
“Filthy whore!” she heard as soon as she closed her eyes. But this time it was her memory repeating it back to her. Something crumpled inside her, and her head filled with questions, memories, fragments of poems; questions, memories and fragments of poems that were like specks of dust, like foreign bodies floating in the air. Was there no way out? Was there no lasting happiness? Was there no rest? Was there no final link in the chain? After Larrea’s death, was everything hopeless? Was the poem right?
You stood and looked up at the sky and said:
If I had wings, I too would fly away
in search of other lands, I too would strike camp
on a coast planted with yellow banners;
so that time could better do its work,
so that I could forget more quickly
the walls and the people of this city.
“If I had”, “I would fly away”, “I would strike camp”, the hypothetical forms of the verb. The make-up with which language disguises the impossible. No, there was no way out, no hiding place.