Books Burn Badly - Manuel Rivas [221]
‘Do you want me to arrest him and haul him up before a judge?’ asked Santos with the voice of a detective in films. It was a quick, spontaneous reaction. And made Catia accept the joke. Smile for a second.
‘Yes, I do,’ she said.
‘Then I’ll do my best.’
That was all the humour Catia could take.
‘What do you think of my uncle?’
‘He’s a great guy. An extraordinary intellect.’
‘He’s a wreck, isn’t he?’
‘No, I didn’t say that.’
‘I did. Did you know that Héctor Ríos, Dr Montevideo, was going to be a public prosecutor under the Republic?’
‘No. You can tell he knows about law, though.’
‘Actually he was a prosecutor when the war started. He’d passed all the exams. And was waiting to be posted. He passed with flying colours. He was passionate about literature and had a way of reading legal texts, even the dullest, most chaotic ones, as part of literature. As he says, literature with . . .’
‘Implications.’
‘Yes, implications,’ continued Catia. ‘Héctor Ríos wasn’t even in the war. When it started, he’d just arrived from Madrid. He’d come to spend his holidays after those exams to be a prosecutor. During the first days of the war, he kept low. He went from the beach, the sun of the beach, to a hole. He finally managed to escape through Portugal. Lots of fugitives were detained by Salazar’s police and returned to the border. He got to Lisbon and sailed for America. To start with, he was in Buenos Aires. He worked on a newspaper called Crítica. The owner’s name was Natalio Botana. Lots of the heroes in his western novels are called that, Botana. He mentions them both, Botana and his horse Romantic. When I was typing up his novels, I always thought Botana and his horse were two fictional characters. But then, not long ago, while typing up a chapter on exile in that book he’s so taken up with, A Dramatic History of Culture, I discovered that Botana and Romantic actually existed. They were responsible for saving the refugees on the Massilia. This boat, crowded with Spanish and Jewish fugitives, had left Bordeaux in October 1939. It reached Buenos Aires, but it wasn’t exactly a good time in Argentina either. The Massilia remained in port, full of hungry people, being treated like a phantom ship by the authorities. Natalio Botana’s horse, Romantic, had the courage to win the most important race at Buenos Aires’ racecourse and the first thing Botana did was declare that the prize money was for the refugees on board the Massilia. This immediately drew attention to the boat. Thanks to a horse, the boat became a symbol.’
‘That’s why it’s Romantic!’ exclaimed Santos.
‘Yes, he has these moments of optimism. He lived for years between Buenos Aires, Mar del Plata and Montevideo. He then had the idea of returning. Looked into it. There were no proceedings against him. No lawsuit. There was no reason not to return. Of course he couldn’t be a public prosecutor, but he’d be left alone so long as he stuck to private activities. This is what the Spanish diplomats told him. It was a lie. I’m talking about six years ago, in 1957. Everything was a lie. No sooner had he arrived than they were after him. Which is when this guy turned up, claiming to be a civil servant. He could get them off his back. There was a way: by paying money. How much? All he had. They knew what his savings were. They were very well informed. And before he could even think of denouncing them, the guy got there first, “You’re not going to denounce us, are you?” He showed him his own denunciation, one that he’d prepared against Héctor Ríos. My uncle was amazed. It contained everything. All his steps since a year before the Republic, since his participation in the Spanish University Federation.