Your Face Tomorrow 3: Poison, Shadow and Farewell

stops, that is its life's breath.' Luisa had held in that breath and said only: 'They're not going out, but I am,' without even adding the minimal excuses usual in such cases, 'It's an appointment I can't break, I made it weeks ago,' or 'It's too late to cancel,' or 'I can't postpone it because the people I'm meeting are visiting Madrid and they're leaving tomorrow' Nor had she expressed polite regret at the clash, even if that regret was false (it still gives some small consolation to the jilted person and makes him feel better): 'Oh, how annoying, what bad luck, what a shame, I would love to have seen the children's reaction when they saw it was you. If only I'd known about it beforehand. Are you sure you can't wait until tomorrow? It's been such a long time.' She had kept her mouth shut, just as if she didn't know who her date was or where she was going, more as if she had just made it up than as if she wanted to keep it secret. That was my suspicion, an occupational hazard perhaps, acquired in England. She must have somewhere to go, somewhere to spend a few hours, the hours I would spend in her apartment. She was sure by now to have a boyfriend, a lover, however transient. It would just be a matter of finding him, or probably not even that if he'd already given her the keys to his place. 'It's as if she doesn't want to see me,' I thought in the taxi. 'But she's going to, that's for sure. I didn't come here to spend yet another day without seeing her, without once more seeing her face.'

The children were hugely surprised. At first, Marina gave me a hard, distrustful stare, then she got used to me, but more in the way that small children get used to strangers-it takes only a matter of minutes if the adult in question has a way with kids- than as if she really remembered me clearly and in detail. It also helped that her brother filled her in right from the start ('It's Papa, silly, don't you see?'). The presents helped to ease matters too, and the babysitter's approving, almost beatific smile, she was a very able young woman who came to open the door to me: I didn't dare try my key in the lock, in case it had been changed, I rang the bell like any other visitor. Marina asked me absurd questions ('Where do you live?' 'Have you got a dog?' 'Does it always rain there?' 'Are there any bears?'), while Guillermo was in charge of asking questions of a more reproachful kind ('Why don't we ever see you?' 'Do you like it better there than here?' 'Have you met any English children?') as well as of the bookish- adventure film variety, he read quite a lot and watched films all the time ('Have you visited Harry Potter's school?' 'And what about Sherlock Holmes' house?' 'Aren't you afraid to go out at night with all that fog and with Jack the Rippers about, or aren't there any Jack the Rippers in London now?' 'Is it true that if the real person stands next to his wax figure at Madame Tussaud's, you can't tell which is which?') I hadn't visited Harry Potter's school, but I had been to 221B Baker Street, because I lived nearby and often popped in; and in York, I had discovered the dark, neglected grave of Dick Turpin, the highwayman in the red jacket, mask, three-cornered hat and thigh-high boots, and next to him was buried his faithful horse, or rather mare, Black Bess, and I had seen the place where, still elegantly dressed, he had been hanged at the Tyburn, just outside York. One night, a white dog had followed me, tis tis tis, through the streets and squares and parks to my house, he was all alone in the heavy rain, for children it would be much more mysterious if I didn't mention his mistress; I let him dry himself and sleep in my apartment, and yes, I would have kept him, but he left the following morning when I took him out for a walk, and I've never seen him since, perhaps he didn't like my human food, well, I didn't have any dog food. On another night, I saw a man take out a sword in a disco, a two-edged sword, he produced it from inside his coat and threatened people, who drew back in terror; he sliced through several things with great skill and mastery, a table, a couple of chairs, some curtains, he shattered a few bottles and ripped the skirts of two women without causing them the slightest harm, he judged things perfectly, he was a real artist; then he put the sword back in the sheath inside his long coat, put the coat on-this made him walk very stiffly, like a ghost-and he left just like that, and no one dared to stop him; I didn't either, what do you mean, are you mad, he would have made mincemeat of me in seconds, he was so fast with that sword (like thunderless lightning that kills silently). I was about to tell them that I had spent a third night at the house of Wendy, Peter Pan's girlfriend, but I held back: Marina was young enough to believe it, but not Guillermo, and I didn't want to recall the videos I had been shown there, in fact, I didn't want ever to remember them and yet I thought of them constantly ('The wind moves the sea and the boats withdraw, with hurrying oars and full sails. Amongst the sound of the waves the rifle shots rang out… Cursed be the noble heart that puts its trust in evil men!… Aboard the boats, all the sailors were crying, and the most beautiful women, all in black and distraught, walk, crying, through the lemon groves.' That poem about Torrijos would always be associated in my mind with that string of evil scenes). And I realized-I had forgotten, it was such a long time since I'd spoken to Guillermo and Marina-that almost everything that happens to one, can, with very few changes, easily be converted into a story for children. Intriguing or sinister tales, the kind that protect and prepare them and make them resourceful.

Once they had gone to bed, I was sure for the first time in many months that they were safe and sound; time again condensed or concertinaed, and for a few seconds I felt as if I had never left their side and never known Tupra or Perez Nuix, Mulryan or Rendel; when, shortly afterwards, I tiptoed into their respective rooms, to turn out the lights and to check if they were all right, the Tintin book the boy must have been reading just before he fell asleep had slipped to the floor without waking him, and the girl was embracing a little bear destined once more to be smothered by the diminutive arm of her simple dreams. Almost nothing had changed in my absence. Only Luisa, who wasn't there, and although I was, I still hadn't seen her. In her place was a discreet babysitter, and she had kept out of the way, hadn't interfered in the reunion at all, she had merely helped with the children when it was time for supper and bed. She said her name was Mercedes, even though she was Polish: perhaps it was an adopted name, to hispanicize herself more quickly. She spoke good Spanish, she had learned it during the three years she had been there, before that, she hadn't known a word, she said, but her boyfriend was from Madrid, and she was thinking of getting married and settling there (I noticed she wore a little crucifix around her neck), she told me all this while I was playing for time. 'Don't wait up for me,' Luisa had warned, well, it had sounded to me rather like a warning. She was perfectly within her rights not to want me there while she was not, I might have started snooping, looking for anything that might have changed and poking around in her mail, opening her wardrobes and sniffing her clothes, going into her bathroom and smelling her shampoo and her cologne, checking to see if she still kept a photo of me in her bedroom (unlikely), although in the living room there were still a few family snapshots in which I appeared, the four of us together, she wouldn't want the children to forget me completely, at least not my face.

'Do you often come here?' I asked Mercedes. 'The children seem to know you well and they do as they're told.' This wasn't an entirely innocent question.

'Yes, sometimes, but not that often. Luisa doesn't go out much at night. Although she has gone out more lately, usually in the evening.' And then she betrayed Luisa, although she certainly didn't intend to, but she did, without lingering or delaying- people just have to start speaking in order to tell too much, even when they don't seem to be telling anything; they supply the listener with information as soon as they open their mouth, without being asked and without realizing that it is information, and so they give someone away without intending to, or they betray themselves, and no sooner are the words out than it's too late: 'Oh, I didn't realize, how stupid of me, I didn't mean to'-'She was lucky to find me in. She doesn't normally leave it so late to call me, she always phones at least the day before. I might have been booked somewhere else, because I babysit for four different families. Four, excluding Luisa.'

'She was lucky then. How much notice did she give you?'

'None. Just enough time for me to get here. I normally have to catch a bus and a metro, but tonight she said she'd pay for my taxi. The thing is, there aren't that many taxis where I live, which is why it took me so long. 'Come as soon as you can,' she said, 'something urgent's cropped up.' She told me about your visit and that I should let you in. But I would have looked through the peephole and let you in anyway, because I know you from the photographs. 'And she gestured shyly towards them, as if she were embarrassed to have noticed.

So my suspicions had been right, perhaps all that practice in the office with no name had not been in vain. Luisa hadn't intended to go out, she'd done so in order not to see me. She hadn't dared make me postpone my meeting with the kids, she would have found it far harder to come up with a credible excuse ('That long,' she had said, aware that it really was a long time). Where would she have gone, it isn't easy to spend hours away from home if you've nothing planned, when evening starts to come on, at twilight. She could have gone to the movies, any film would do, or gone shopping downtown, although she really hated that; she could have sought refuge with her lover, or gone to see a friend or her sister. She would have to kill an awful lot of time until I left, until she reckoned that I would have left the apartment and the coast would be clear, and she would know, too, how hard I'd find it to drag myself away, I felt very comfortable there, almost nothing had changed.

It was past eleven o'clock, which was the very latest the children were allowed to stay up on special occasions, we'd had a very entertaining few hours, but I could see they were tired too, it hadn't been particularly hard to