Pig's Foot: A Novel Part 13

Obviously this doesn't change the fact that Machado was a bare-faced thief and Augusto was right when he said the man gave him the creeps. He already sensed something was amiss, but he had no idea how bad things would get.

One day, in 1929, Augusto showed up with a face like a slapped a.r.s.e and a copy of the newspaper. My grandparents asked what was wrong, but Augusto didn't say anything. El Judio took the paper from him and read aloud that Julio Antonio Mella had been a.s.sa.s.sinated in Mexico. Alfredo Lopez, leader of the Confederation of Cuban Workers, had also been murdered.

'And who's he?' asked El Judio.

'Julito was from round here. We should mourn him.'

They watched as Augusto walked out the door. That day on strict orders of the management, the laundry, did not open. Augusto did not go back to bed; he went off somewhere, into some dark corner, to pay his respects to the memory of his friend Julito.

The 1930s began with a significant event, the general strike which was joined by more than 200,000 workers all over the island. The strike, which was a great success, had been coordinated by Ruben Martinez Villena who was immediately sentenced to death and had to flee to the United States. But according to my grandparents, 1931 gave them reason to celebrate. Kid Chocolate, who had left in 1928 to continue his career as a boxer in the United States, became world champion for the first time, becoming the first world boxing champion in the history of Cuba.

On the day of his victory, my grandparents helped hang signs painted by El Judio above the laundry. 'That's our Kid Chocolate, Viva El Kid!' read one of them. Another read simply 'Kid Chocolate: World Champion'. Augusto insisted they take down the third sign which said 'Kid Chocolate is Jewish', something that deeply upset Judio Aleman.

At two o'clock in the afternoon, they closed the laundry and Augusto invited his friends to take a stroll through the centre of town. There were signs everywhere celebrating the Kid's victory; they hung from the windows of the houses, they were pasted in shop windows, everyone in Cuba was proud. Many people dressed in white and threw their hats in the air while the whoops of joy that echoed through the streets, joined by the blare of horns from a fleet of omnibuses, were a heartfelt addition to the jubilation. The Kid piled up the t.i.tles, junior lightweight, lightweight, featherweight, he fought a total of 152 matches, winning 136 fifty of them by KO losing only ten and drawing six which led him to be considered among the ten greatest featherweights of all time.

My grandparents were very impressed by the Capitolio, built in a record time of three years, its interiors adorned with fifty-eight different types of marble and precious woods like mahogany. To my grandparents it seemed like only yesterday they had arrived in Havana when there was nothing on this site but piles of sand, stone blocks and steel and now here was the monolithic building. It was a blue and breezeless day, boundless was the bustle of business in the city, the spark of hope to be seen in every face, all brought about by the Kid's boxing triumph. My grandparents used to describe Havana as sheer organised chaos. I figure it must have been a lot more organised than the chaos we have today.

'Look, Benicio, it's Melecio's building,' Geru commented as they pa.s.sed the Bacardi Building.

'It's not called the Melecio Building, it's called the Bacardi Building. The people who own it are Jewish.'

'Enough already, Judio,' said Augusto, spurring on the carthorse. 'Sometimes you really are insufferable.'

My grandparents said nothing.

Back at the house, Augusto took advantage of Gertrudis being in the bathroom to take Benicio out into the courtyard.

'I noticed that Gertrudis doesn't wear a wedding band,' he said.

'Why are you telling me this?'

'Because it's high time you made an honest woman of her, don't you think?'

'An honest woman?'

'You should marry her, lad. And don't hang about too long. I can tell you, by the time you get to sixty, you stop living.'

'You stop living at sixty?' Grandpa Benicio did not understand.

Augusto replied that this was one of life's great truths: after the age of sixty, you no longer lived, you survived.

'Before you reach sixty, you get pleasure from love, from the temptation to seduce women, from putting on a new suit of clothes, making an effort so that you can sw.a.n.k and later conquer them. But after sixty, love becomes just a commodity. The time for seduction is over, because you can't get it up any more, because the body's defects can no longer be hidden by clothes, however new, however fas.h.i.+onable. The truth is you've become an old man and no one now can save you. You simply survive, Benicio. Vicariously through your children, for example. For those who have them, that is.'

Augusto looked down. 'To put it simply, you feed on memories. I don't know about you but, to me, that's not living, that's surviving.'

'And why did you never marry?' asked Grandfather.

'I did marry. I married an angel, the most wonderful woman in all the world. Olga, her name was. We met at university in the glorious days of our youth. I thought she was too good for me, because, well, I was a depraved young man. There I was going from brothel to brothel while Olga was the purest creature I had ever met. She clearly deserved a better man than I. It was she who changed me the day I gave her a gift of a basket full of bread rolls from the bakery on the Esquina de Toyo. She tossed the basket on the ground and said that if I wanted her to go out with me, I should stop buying bread rolls and start to change my ways. So I changed. I gave up the wh.o.r.es, the gambling, all of my vices, and I devoted myself completely and entirely to her. Never in my life have I met a woman who completed me as she did, with that mane of blonde hair tumbling to her waist, those eyes green as the ocean, that statuesque figure. I knew from the moment I first kissed her that, for me, Olga was the beginning and the end. And so I wasted no time. We were engaged within a month of our first date, and a month after that we were married. I spent every penny I had so that the wedding would be worthy of her though to find something worthy of Olga was simply impossible. I proposed to her in the Gato Tuerto and then whisked her off to the Cabaret Nacional. It was the most wonderful day of my life. Two years later, Olga died of tuberculosis in my arms. She was only twenty-five. Since then, I have never loved another woman. And I never will.'

This gave Grandpa Benicio pause for thought. This was the first time in the three years since he had met Augusto that he had heard the man speak in such a manner, head bowed, tears in his eyes.

'That's how life is. When it decides to f.u.c.k you over, it f.u.c.ks you good and proper. At least I came through it. El Judio, now he really suffered. You see him all the time joking and laughing, anyone would think he's the happiest man in the world, but it's all an act to hide his grief. First his parents abandoned him. They came here from Europe intending to go to the United States, but when El Judio stood firm and refused to leave Cuba, they left him. Then he found himself a paramour, but before long she cheated on him with another man. Eventually he met the love of his life, the woman he married, the woman who divorced him and took what little he possessed, including his house. It was a disaster. Once he started bragging to me about how he didn't need money because he had friends. I'm rich in friends, he told me. I laughed in his face and told him straight out that no one in the world has more than two or three real friends and that if he wanted proof, he had only to come to my house at three a.m. that night.

'El Judio knocked on my door in the early hours. I took him to a little farm I used to own down Cotorro way. I took hold of one of my pigs, I slit its throat and I smeared him with blood from head to foot. He glared at me, his eyes like a dinosaur, roaring at me asking what the h.e.l.l I thought I was doing, but I went on smearing his clothes until he was nothing but a mess of pig's blood. "Who did you say your friends were?" I asked him. He said he had lots of friends, that he didn't know where to start. "Give me one name." "Esteban the cobbler," he said and without wasting a minute we went to Esteban's house near Cuatro Caminos. "I was in a fight and killed some guy. The cops are looking for me. Can I hide out in your place?" said El Judio with a look of terror on his face. His great friend Esteban made the sign of the cross three times and said no way, don't come bringing your troubles to my door. So we went and we knocked on the doors of all the supposed friends of our friend the beak. They all said the same: get the h.e.l.l out of here, sort out your own problems. Only Julio, who looked like a starving wretch and whose clothes were falling off him, had the decency to offer his friends.h.i.+p in time of need. As soon as he opened the door and saw El Judio covered in blood, the first thing he did was ask what he could do, how he could help. You need to come with me to Cotorro, said El Judio, and without a thought the guy pulled some clothes on and came with us. When we got to my farm, we told him it had all been a lie, that we had been trying to find out Judio's true friends. And this decent, loyal man was the only one of Judio's friends who ate the pig I killed that night.

'It was then that El Judio realised that when you laugh the whole world laughs with you; cry, and you cry alone. That's why he's my friend, because we are bound by the memories of the miserable lives we've had to live. So when you see him tomorrow morning, drink a shot of rum in his honour, because his life is well and truly f.u.c.ked up.'

After Augusto had finished his confession, the two men stood in silence for a long time. Grandpa Benicio felt he had to change the subject, so he went back to talking about marriage, explaining that he knew without a doubt that Gertrudis was the love of his life, it was simply that back in Pata de Puerco people were not in the habit of getting married.

'What do I do after I buy the ring?' asked Grandfather.

'I'll tell you. We all go to a church, you get married and we throw a big party.'

'Marry in a church? We don't believe in G.o.d, Gertrudis and me.'

'Neither do I, chico,' said Augusto, 'but that's just how it's done.'

That same day, Grandfather began saving money so that he could buy my grandmother a ring. In the laundry, El Judio, who heard about what he was planning from Augusto, constantly teased him, falling on his knees, his Bolshevik hat clutched to his chest, simpering, 'Of course I'll marry you, sweetie-pie.' One time my grandma nearly walked in on them. El Judio, acting the fool, started pretending to play the guitar and my grandmother looked at him suspiciously. 'He does it to hide his grief,' thought Grandpa Benicio. In that moment he realised that Judio's pain was truly terrible since he was constantly play-acting, and Benicio stood looking at him sadly.

Something else I just realised about my grandparents: they were incurable romantics. Not like me, I'm a cynic about most things in life, though even I have my Mr Darcy moments. The love between my grandparents was one of those glorious lovey-dovey relations.h.i.+ps with flowers and fine words and great respect. I never heard them say a harsh word to each other, or even heard them argue the way couples usually do, because there are times when you just want to tell your other half to f.u.c.k off. Like I did one day with Elena. She was really lovely, she was funny and all that, but sometimes she'd just push my b.u.t.tons and I'd wind up exploding. Once she started on at me about how I never held her hand and never kissed her in public, about how a bunch of her girlfriends had said I was boorish, that I had no romance.

'Tell your girlfriends to go f.u.c.k themselves and stop messing with my head, Elena, unless you want a kick up the a.r.s.e,' I said. I regretted it afterwards. Truth is, I really loved the b.i.t.c.h.

Anyway, to get back to my grandparents, now they were as sweet as a slab of sticky toffee. That's why I was surprised when Grandpa Benicio told me all the stuff he told me, all that stuff about Pata de Puerco, about saying that Gertrudis was ridiculous, that she was punis.h.i.+ng herself. Grandpa wasn't like that. In Lawton, everyone knew him as someone who was polite to dogs, even the vicious mutts. So I wasn't surprised when Grandpa Benicio told me how he proposed to Grandma Gertrudis.

Augusto had suggested that he hide the ring in one of the sweet buns they sold at the bakery on the Esquina de Toyo, wrap it up in a box and present it to her at El Floridita.

'But what if she swallows it?' said Grandfather. Then they thought it might be simpler and more sensible to tie the ring to the leg of one of Judio's carrier pigeons, for example, and release it while Benicio and his future wife were out walking near the Lawton parish church. The dove would come and land on Gertrudis's shoulder and she would immediately notice the ring attached to the bird's foot.

El Judio, for his part, thought this a barbaric idea; if Benicio planned to propose to Gertrudis, he should do so like a Jewish gentleman, save up his money little by little until he had enough to pay Jose Matamoros and his Band to come and play at the laundry. 'Pack it in, Judio,' said Augusto, 'this is no time for jokes.'

They considered the idea of a drive into the city to the Bodeguita del Medio so that Benicio could propose either on the Malecon as they walked along the seafront, or on the majestic steps leading up to the University of Habana. Eventually, Grandfather told them not to worry about it, he would think of something.

A year later, Grandpa had finally saved enough money to buy an eighteen-carat gold ring for my grandmother. That August of 1933, Havana was in the grip of a sweltering heatwave, the sun beat down on the flagstones and by mid-morning clothes were sodden from the humidity. Grandfather asked Augusto if he might have the day off and his friend hugged him hard and wished him luck. 'Cross and hook, Choco!' called Judio and my grandfather watched as they left the house and headed for the laundry.

Gertrudis and Benicio walked along the Calzada Dolores and then turned and headed down the Calzada del Diez de Octubre, stopping to stare in the shop windows. Every time Grandma pointed out something, Grandpa dashed into the shop to buy it for her. 'You're going to bankrupt us, mi amor,' said Gertrudis anxiously, but Benicio simply said it was only for today. After that, Grandma stopped pointing out toys and clothes in the shop windows.

They ate spaghetti a la Napolitana at a pizzeria near the Esquina de Toyo. Then, since it was Tuesday, the day when women were admitted free to cinemas in Havana, Grandfather took her to the Cine Valentino on the Esquina de Tejas which was showing One Good Turn with Laurel and Hardy. They enjoyed the film. At around five p.m., they began to stroll back up the Calzada del Diez de Octubre.

Stopping at a florist, Grandfather bought her a beautiful bouquet of flowers and Gertrudis told him they were beautiful and covered him with kisses. Someone in a pa.s.sing car shouted, 'Vaya Negro fino!' while pa.s.sers-by stopped and applauded, saying, 'Well done. That's the way to do it!' Benicio slipped an arm around Gertrudis's shoulders and they walked on up the hill. They turned and headed to the Lawton church which was just off the main street.

'Where are you taking me, Benicio?' In front of the church was a glorious, towering flame tree. 'I'm taking you to the only flame tree I could find. The only one in the barrio.' Gertrudis rushed over, hugged the tree and sighed. 'It's beautiful. Just like the flame tree in Pata de Puerco, remember? I wonder how everyone is back home? I wonder if . . . ?'

'Forget all that, Gertrudis,' said Grandfather. They stood in silence. Grandma Gertrudis asked what was going on. Grandpa sat down on a bench next to the flame tree and buried his head in his hands, as though he were tired or feeling ill. An old woman coming out of the confessional stopped and stared at the two strangers as a younger woman went in to confess her sins.

'Are you feeling all right, Benicio?'

'Listen, Gertrudis,' my grandfather was trembling, 'I brought you here to say that I can't compose poetry like Melecio. I don't know how to read or write. But there is one thing I do know, something I knew from the day I first opened my eyes: that you are the love of my life, Gertrudis. I would like to marry you. Would you do me that honour?'

Grandmother was pale. Grandfather slipped a hand into his pocket, went down on one knee and, still staring at the ground, he held up the ring. Gertrudis lunged for it and the ring flew into the air, then rolled down the street. They raced after it, finally catching up just as it was about to fall down a drain. Grandma gave a little laugh and then slipped the ring on to her finger.

'Why are you shaking?' said Gertrudis. 'Your hands are all sweaty. Don't tell me you were nervous.'

'I was scared,' said Grandfather.

'You're such a fool, Benicio. Were you really afraid I would say no?'

'No. I was afraid that having blown all my savings, the cursed ring was going to roll down the drain.'

They laughed again. Then they kissed beneath the flame tree that brought back so many happy memories. The faint glow of the gathering dusk illuminated them. Suddenly, a soft breeze blew up and they felt a wave of joy surge through them. And that was all. No carrier pigeons, no sweet buns, no Matamoros and his Band. Not everyone realises that magic lies in simplicity. It's something I have come to know only too well.

A moment later, they heard the celebrations. People came pouring into the streets with pa.s.sionate excitement, singing, screaming, turning their music up full blast. From where my grandparents stood, they heard something like the sound of a baseball bat hitting a column. It could easily be somebody's spinal column, my grandparents thought, or the six-foot column of a house. And then more screams. When they asked people in the street what the celebrations were about, they were told Machado had been toppled. He had fled the country for Na.s.sau.

The festivities continued with their friends back at the laundry until the small hours. My grandparents' engagement and the fall of Machado, two good reasons to celebrate. My grandparents were married a month later at Lawton church in the presence of their loyal friends Augusto Garcia and Judio Aleman. The laundry didn't close that night either.

The Homecoming.

Time, as it does, went on pa.s.sing. By now Machado was dead and the Jackal of Oriente had hanged the forty-four peasants in Santiago. The Pentarchy of 1933 had been dissolved, Batista had mounted the coup d'etat that overthrew Grau San Martin and construction of the art deco Lopez Serrano Building had been completed. The Hotel Riviera had crowned itself the first hotel in the world with centralised air conditioning and work had begun on the FOCSA Building which, for a time, would be the tallest reinforced-concrete building in the world.

I know I've just leapfrogged the rest of the 1930s, the whole of the 1940s and landed slap bang in the middle of the 1950s, but to be honest nothing that happened during that period is relevant to the story. Besides, I'm the narrator and I don't feel like talking about it, and anyone who doesn't like it can f.u.c.k off. f.u.c.k 1940 and its 'progressive const.i.tution'. I don't want to argue about whether chicharrones are meat or espadrilles are shoes. I'm sorry? Did you say something? I already told you, I don't want to talk about Carlos Mendieta, Miguel Mariano and that bunch of old duffers, so stop being such a drag or I'll kick your a.s.s out of here too.

Bueno, we've just skipped from the part where Ernesto Lecuona was nominated for an Oscar, to Perez Prado's song 'Patricia' topping the American hit parade for fifteen consecutive weeks, a record unmatched even by Elvis Presley or The Beatles. All that stuff had happened when my grandparents decided to go see a doctor to find out why Grandma Gertrudis couldn't get pregnant. They had been trying for a baby for a while by then. They tried during fertile periods when Grandma was ovulating, they tried at the full moon, but nothing worked. There came a moment when Benicio began to think it was his fault.

'My milk is no good,' he said sadly.

The blood that flowed through his veins, the blood of his father, was a curse, he said. My grandma said that if anyone was to blame it was her, that every time after they had s.e.x, she would go to the bathroom to pee to stop Benicio's sperm getting any farther. Benicio said she was crazy, insisting that he was to blame. Grandma insisted that she was. So they concluded there was only one way to find out.

The doctor first examined Benicio. He told him to m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e and e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.e into a little cup. Then he examined Gertrudis, touching and palpating her, something that infuriated Benicio who waved his arms, demanding to know what the h.e.l.l he was doing; Gertrudis was his wife.

'And I am her doctor, so if you could stand aside and let me do my job.'

Gertrudis begged Benicio to calm down and stop being so jealous.

Two weeks later, my grandparents received the sad news: they could never have children. Grandma Gertrudis had an obstruction in her Fallopian tubes, there was nothing to be done. This was followed by long weeks of grief and tears when Grandma locked herself in the bathroom and would not open the door, not even to G.o.d Himself. Benicio talked to his friends about his wife's condition, about how worried he was. He asked their advice.

'Love and affection,' Augusto recommended. 'Be loving and affectionate towards her, Benicio.'

But all his love, all his affection, were not enough to comfort my grandmother. Gertrudis felt that it was not worth carrying on. Her reason for living had died the moment the doctor gave his diagnosis. Her appet.i.te and her s.e.x drive dwindled. She forgot how to eat and how to f.u.c.k. For my grandparents, food and s.e.x became something else, something unattainable, ineffable, something beyond action, beyond words. Simply undressing to put on fresh clothes was like flaying my grandmother alive. Grandma Gertrudis was really ill.

In the morning, she would refuse to go to work at the laundry. She would drink her coffee then lock herself in the bathroom. Benicio had run out of ideas. Then El Judio said, 'Leave it to me,' and he too disappeared from the laundry for several weeks. Augusto and Benicio now began to worry about the Jew as well. n.o.body had heard from him. n.o.body had seen him leave his apartment. One day, my grandfather went to his house. He lived in a rented apartment on the Calle Armas, in a dilapidated, ramshackle building. Grandfather peered through a c.h.i.n.k in the blinds. El Judio was performing some sort of ritual. It was not exactly santeria, though in the middle of the room there was an Elegua altar on which lay the b.l.o.o.d.y carca.s.s of a chicken; strewn on the floor and in the shrine were candles and sweets. There was also a large, thick tome lying in a corner of the room with the inscription embossed in gilt on the cover. El Judio, dressed in black and white, was holding a candelabra.

He did not look like El Judio, but like some demon.

'The devil has taken possession of El Judio,' thought Grandpa and ran to tell Augusto. El Judio never meddled in such things, Augusto said; in all the years they had known each other, this was the first time he had performed a Jodio-Cubano ritual.

'Jodio-Cubano?' asked Benicio.

This, Augusto explained, was the correct term for a freakish f.u.c.ked-up cod-Jewish part-Cuban ritual but asked Benicio not to use the phrase since it would only anger El Judio.

'He is doing it because he loves you both. Even though we all know that a dead chicken and a few prayers from some old book will not change anything.'

Grandfather stared at the ground. Augusto came over and patted him on the shoulder.

'Chin up,' he said, and offered the sage opinion that life is s.h.i.+t. Then he turned back to his work.

A month later El Judio reappeared at the laundry. Grandpa Benicio and Augusto hugged him and told him he looked terrible. He had lost a lot of weight, his sleepless nights had left him with dark circles around his eyes which were further magnified by his spectacles. El Judio said that he had done all he could and that there was nothing to do now but wait.

'Wait for what?' asked Benicio.

'For a sign,' said El Judio.

A month pa.s.sed.

'Is Gertrudis pregnant yet?' asked El Judio.

'No,' said my grandfather.

A second month pa.s.sed.

'Still nothing, Benicio?'

'Nothing.'

'That's strange,' said El Judio.

The truth was that neither my grandfather nor Augusto took El Judio seriously, and they were certainly not waiting for a sign or indeed anything to come as a result of his cunning ritual.

And yet, in the third month, something did happen. For years my grandparents had been sending letters to Pata de Puerco telling Betina about their new life. They had never had a reply. Nor did they expect one. And so they were extremely surprised when one morning a telegram arrived.

'Come quickly,' was Betina's message. 'I don't have much time.' My grandparents packed up a few things and caught the first train heading for Santiago.

When they arrived in Pata de Puerco, the village was exactly as they had left it, with the same communal well, the same flame tree, the same cemetery though this last had increased in size to cope with the small thicket of wooden crosses planted in the earth. Having lived so long in the greyness of Lawton, the green of the trees seemed deeper, more intense. More than ever, the sun seemed to hurl its golden daggers. The sky was a dazzling, almost metallic blue, but for the most part little had changed since they left, except that now there was not a single familiar face.

To my grandparents' surprise, people came out to greet them as though meeting with a living legend. At first no one recognised them. The villagers a.s.sumed they were travellers who had lost their way. Then someone shouted, 'It's Benicio Benicio and Gertrudis!' and suddenly children and adults began to pour from the houses and the shacks that still smelled of coal and kerosene. The villagers hugged them warmly, as though they were long-lost friends. Some were so moved, they had tears in their eyes.

'Where is Ester the midwife?' asked Benicio.

'She died years ago,' they told him.

'And Juanita?'

'Dead too.'