Explanations - The Devil and The Cross

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TThe Devil and the Cross

                                    THE DEVIL AND THE CROSS

Nobody quite knows when the Devil came to La Cruz, nor who invited him, nor how he arrived, - but everyone knows that he opened a Funeral Parlour and installed a telephone.  That Satan should do both of these things openly, seemed logical enough to the people of the village. Only the Church or its eternal opponent the Devil, could perform miracles, and both of these things were a miracle. Moreover, hadn’t Father Olguín said,, with his soul-chilling logic, that there was no need to open a shop for the Dead, and even less need to ring them up. And wasn’t the funeral parlour right opposite the church on the other side of the square , right beside the  Municipality that hot-bed of radical atheism ?  And wasn’t the man who looked after it, - who incidentally had the most unlikely name of Pedro Rodriguez, - dark-skinned, with a black moustache and a filthy black soul to match ?  These questions, - rhetorical though they were, - caused much nodding of heads. Even the bank manager’s wife was known to be convinced.

So the faithful of La Cruz, both those who professed loudly their Catholicism and those who actually went to Mass, crossed themselves while walking past the funeral parlour, and Rodriguez, a very devil of a man, watched them, his black eyes mirroring his black soul, and kept his thoughts to himself. As the years passed the stories grew. Other telephones were installed, but they were not miracles. Father Olguín died, but Pedro Rodriguez went on living, - and while those who crossed themselves and nodded their heads grew older, Rodriguez seemed not to have aged one day.  Governments came and went, but the funeral parlour remained, and children were taught to walk carefully past it so that they could teach their children to do the same. Those who were seen entering or leaving were stared at and then left alone for a few hours, as though anything contagious would evaporate. 

But of course there were funerals. Then the relatives would huddle together outside the door, while the oldest male summoned up the courage to enter, shuffling through the dust and trying to avoid the black eyes that stared blankly and unblinkingly. Later the Devil would dress in a black uniform, high-buttoned to the neck, and crisp black leggings to drive the black car that carried the coffin. Not surprisingly, as many pointed out, he never entered the church but leaned against the hearse, arms and legs crossed with black indifference. The service over, he would drive to the cemetery, and it was only then that he showed any sign of emotion, smiling thinly with a tight pursed mouth, as though his white teeth were a disgrace to be hidden from sight.

‘’ What are you smiling at?”, a young widow once asked him.

‘’ Why shouldn’t I?” answered the Devil Rodriguez. “There goes one more, and I am still here!”

And apart from his daily trip to the village store, where his wants, sparingly spoken for, were hastily served, a funeral was the only occasion when he was seen outside the funeral parlour. In fact, as more years passed and the stories grew taller, the village became quite proud of him. Well, God might be everywhere but it was only in La Cruz that you could meet the Devil. Father Damian disapproved, but he lacked Father Olguín’s wit, and thus his influence.

“What do you do all day?”, someone once asked him.

“I wait’’, he answered, and the village which, by and large, thought that was a very fair answer, settled down to wait with him.

When Don Jose Olmedo de Gazán died, he did so with the simple style and dignity that had always marked him out as a perfect gentleman. Crushed against the wooden bar, he felt the pain stabbing through his ribs and arm just as he began his second drink. He was neither surprised nor afraid. He had smoked forty cigarettes a day since the age of ten, and had drunk at least two litres of wine a day since the age of twelve. Moreover he breakfasted regularly on salami.

“It’s the salami that will get me,” he had often said to Dona Clara, “ all that donkey can’t be good for a man !’’

Whatever it was that was getting to him just at that moment was, he knew, fatal and final, but a man, - at least a real man – always finished his drink. Good wine was not cheap and old habits die hard, - harder than old men he thought to himself, as he carefully put down his glass to catch the barman’s eye.

“Roberto, - open up two bottles of wine and pass them round !’’, he called, counting out the notes with painful concentration. The barman, an astute observer of the human scene if ever there was one, watched the deepening green of Don Jose’s face with undisguised interest, and did as he was told.  The old man husbanded his last resources, - there was much to be gained from a dignified death – and despite the searing pain, called for a toast.

“ Viva Perón!’’ , he shouted.

“ Viva Perón !’’ , they answered in what was not so much a political statement, as the friendly repetition of a decent man’s known preferences. Then, softly - but quite audibly, - Don Jose added, “La puta madre!’’, and keeled over and died.

Later on, once the hubbub and excitement had died down, everyone admitted that he had made a grand exit, paying like a gentleman for what was, at least for him, a final round.

“Que buen muchacho!”, they said of him despite his sixty –eight years.

“A great man!” they said as they ambled off to get ready for the wake.

“May he rest with the Virgin and the Saints!’’ , said the village whore, who was sure his last words had been for her.

Nobody could really deny that Don Jose and Dona Clara had earned the respect and gratitude of their neighbours. The reasons were quite simple. For thirty years they had lived together in a state of unremitting warfare conducted in a highly civilised fashion. Social conventions, (like those of Geneva ), had brought a certain gentility to the more brutal clashes, but the struggle had been unrelenting and, for the neighbours, highly entertaining. Indeed, Don Jose’s breakfast salami, such a confirmed habit later on in life, had begun as a simple act of war. Of course, its original bellicose intentions had soon been replaced by growing addiction, but they had not been forgotten.

“Goat! Idiot!’’, Dona Clara would scream, when he complained about his garlic flavoured indigestion. “You put the muck in your stomach, so complain to yourself, and for the love of God, go and breathe somewhere else.’’

And Don Jose would belch loudly across the table, and then smile happily.

She on the other hand, used more subtle tactics. On Sundays and Holidays of Obligation, she would bustle to Mass, and pray loudly and convincingly for her husband. Then, with equally convincing tears, she would bewail the futility of her prayers.

“One must continue to pray”, she piously told her pew-neighbours, “even though miracles so very rarely happen!”

The village whore, a remarkably well-worn lady with the most staggering flatulence, occupied the pew behind Dona Clara and reported the context of these prayers to Don José during his Wednesday afternoon visits. His diminutive frame shook with indignation and rage, but not a word did he utter. He was a gentleman, and had gained the respect of the whole village. It is hard not to be grateful for thirty-three years of gossip, speculation, and - when all else fails, - pure invention, especially when both Dona Clara and her husband were so pleasant to everyone else. The wake was well attended.

But wakes too have their social conventions, and not even Dona Clara could deny Don Jose the attendant popularity of his death, nor ignore the niceties of the situation. Everyone deserves a good funeral, and to depart from this world in considerably better style than they have entered it.  And the wake, - in small village communities at least, - is a prelude to the grander social gathering of the funeral, only slightly muted by suppressed excitement. Friends, family, and neighbours have the chance to meet, discuss the nobility of death, gossip about the deceased’s life, and plan their individual roles in the far grander parade of the funeral. Some chose to display profound grief (often not really felt), others to recite the endless virtues ( often non-existent )  being interred in the coffin. It all needs careful planning, and, of course, it needs a coffin.

A woman of profound religious beliefs, Dona Clara nonetheless understood the necessity for accommodating both God and Mammon, and in doing so, the need to fulfil the social obligations of death. The bar for the wake was impressive. There were five different flagons of wine, and various bottles of more potent effect. A very handsome barbecue spread its aroma extensively around the house, and there was even a large bowl of salad. Don Jose was laid out on a pallet in the shed, - a stone-walled building which by, fortuitous chance, he had only finished white-washing the day before. Dona Clara had brushed the floor herself, and there were generally favourable comments on the artistic contrast of the white walls and the red pyjamas and still-green face of Don Jose.

“He looks like a little saint”, someone had said, but after thirty years of marriage, Dona Clara was well aware that saintliness was not one of her husband’s virtues. Indeed, she had carefully placed the bar and the barbecue at least fifty metres from the shed, partly to ensure no slackening of the tumultuous chant of the rosary, and partly to remove all final temptation from her dead husband, who was certainly capable of self-resurrection for a last drink.  In the shed itself, a bevy of elderly but formidable ladies knelt in prayer, maintaining the rise and swell of Our Fathers and Hail Maries. Dona Clara had no illusions. If anything was to be done for Don Jose in the next world, the Virgin Mary would have to exert all her considerable influence.

The wake had begun thirty minutes after Don Jose’s arrival home. His wife had known immediately that something untoward had occurred. Her husband had said that he would be home at seven o’clock, and not only had he arrived home on time, but had done so sprawled out in the back of his own dog-cart. Had he been sprawled out in the back of neighbour’s dog-cart, she might have assumed that he was merely drunk, but such an arrival presaged a more sombre fate. The neighbour who brought him back was sufficiently well-on in years to have experienced death in all its shapes and forms, and had kindly stopped at the Doctor’s house on the way home and collected the Death Certificate. Thus the obvious became official, and Dona Clara was a widow. She had sniffed a few times for appearance’s sake, and changed into the mourning black which, on turning sixty, she had kept in readiness for relatives less healthy than herself. She was not unduly upset. It was, she thought philosophically, better to attend your husband’s funeral than to attend your own, and she found herself looking forward to a few years of peace and quiet, and, of course, to the funeral itself. She had found herself quite ready to assume the state of widowhood.

This, in itself, had to be done discreetly, for the village was a man’s world in which the men made all the arrangements, even though they did little of the work. Already Don Jose’s elder brother and her own brother were huddled together in conversation near the barbecue, and sensing the moment she moved towards them. Behind them the rosary began its sixteenth cycle. The Virgin Mary must have had her hands firmly clasped over her ears.

“José will need a decent coffin and a decent car. We can afford them”, she said without any further preliminaries.

“Now, Clara, you just leave the arrangements to Hilberto and I, and don’t you worry about a thing”, said her brother.

“I shan’t worry about it”,  she said staring fixedly at him, “ and you two can make all the arrangements you want – as long as José has a decent funeral. Just remember that as I’ll be paying for it, I shall have my say.” And she wheeled round sharply on her way to investigate both the bar and the rosary, leaving the two men to stare sadly at her receding back.  César, her brother, took a long swig of wine, and as a reflexive form of mopping up, he noisily sucked both ends of his moustache.

“Grief has made her stubborn, Hilberto, - grief has made her stubborn !” , he said poetically, for the wine was quite strong. Hilbert was more pragmatic. “Grief has nothing to do with it. She always was a stubborn bitch. That’s why Jose took to the bottle. She has a man’s ways.”

“Still, - she is paying. And it’s a decent thought. Not like that whore’s daughter, Alicia, - you know – the fat spotty cow who took up with the Doctor’s gardener.”

Hilberto nodded. Like most of the men in the village he recalled Alicia vividly.

“When he died”, Cesar continued, “ .. the gardener, I mean, - the Doctor is still with us unfortunately after what he did to my poor mother ..”

“ ... And my young sister ?” , Hilberto interrupted.

“Ah yes, I remember ….. well, when the gardener died, she was round to the Municipality for a free coffin. Got no money, she said, and after all she taken off her man.  Well, she being a Peronista, they wouldn’t give her one, would they? So, what does she do, the bitch? She ups and throws the poor bastard on the Municipal tip. That’s what she does. Poor sod got his coffin though !”

There was long silence while they ruminated on this.

“You don’t think she’d do something like that, do you ?  Like toss poor Jose on the tip if she didn’t get her own way?”

The rosary began again, and over by the barbecue someone began to sing emotionally but quite out of tune. A few new arrivals stood by the shed admiring Don Jose, and Dona Clara used a long hard finger to see if the salad was still quite fresh. There was another silence before César answered.

“No, I don’t  think she’d do that. But she is certainly capable of telling the whole village how mean we were with her money, - unless we do exactly what she wants.”

Hilberto sighed heavily. The thought of such a scandal was too much for him.

“Then we had best get a fine coffin and an even better car. Don’t you agree?”

They finished their drinks and left.

When they arrived at the village square, it seemed much darker and colder after the conviviality of the wake. They sat for a moment hunched up in the dog-cart, two old men, grave, dignified and slightly tipsy. The only movement came from the wind chasing bits of paper and dust across the square, and the meanderings of a dog nosing around the children’s swings. The church, the municipality, and the bank were all closed, and every single house and shop was barred up against the dark and the cold. At the other end of the square, one street light still worked, its feeble bulb swinging monotonously from its cable in the wind, unaccompanied except for the one yellow bulb outside the funeral parlour which illuminated the words ‘Ring for Night Service’.  Slowly Hilberto tied the reins to his seat, and equally slowly he and César got down from the cart. With the clumsy carefulness of one glass too many, César rang the bell. Much to his surprise nothing happened. He rang again while Hilberto joined him in front of the brown wooden door. Then, as they were both standing there wondering what next to do, the door open slightly and a toneless voice said, “Yes. Has there been a death?”

“Yes, and we need a coffin, - a good one mind – and a car for tomorrow.” Hilberto spoke towards the pale light flickering through the door. Cesar, leaning forwards, nodded his agreement. The door opened wider, and the voice, now complemented by a dark brown hand, said “Do come in. I have a fine selection of coffins.” They stumbled through the ochre light and across the brick floor, and seated themselves on two quite ordinary plastic- covered chairs at a quite ordinary metal desk. The Devil Rodriguez sat down opposite them. A small smile hovered around the corners of his mouth, and quite suddenly he switched on a desk-lamp, which had the eerie effect of illuminating only the bottom half of his face, leaving the top half and the desk in total darkness.

“Are you afraid ?”, he asked them.

“ No”, answered Cesar quite truthfully, “ we came from necessity not choice.”

“Quite” , said the Devil Rodriguez.

Hilberto had to satisfy his curiosity. Leaning forward he asked, “They call you the Devil. Are you?”

“Not the Devil, no. I’m certainly not that important.”

The two men looked around them, carefully examining the bare brick walls of the little office. There was a calendar with no pictures and a sign requesting customers not to spit on the floor. Outside the wind rattled the door with a little more urgency, but the human silence was too much for Hilberto.

“My brother is dead”, he announced abruptly. “We need a good coffin and we shall need the black car to take him to the cemetery.”

“Of course”,  exclaimed the Devil, “I imagine that you would want a coffin.”

There was no hint of sarcasm in his voice. He took out a sheaf of papers from the desk drawer.

“ Name?” , he asked.

“ Mine or the deceased’s ?”  asked Cesar.

“ Whichever you prefer, but it would be quicker and easier if we started with the deceased’s.”

“Jose Olmedo de Gazan.”

The Devil consulted his lists. “Was he a bad man ?”

“A bad man ?”, Cesár wondered out loud. “I really don’t know. He drank a lot. He used to visit the village whore on Wednesdays, - oh, and he never went to church. César continued to look puzzled, and then added again, “I really don’t know.”

“No ........, I mean a bad man. A really bad man, - not a conventionally bad man. Did he hurt anybody? Did he hate anybody?”

The two old men stared at each other in amazement. Then Hilberto said rather weakly, “Well, I think he hated his wife .”

“And did she hate him ?” , the Devil asked.

“Oh yes !”

The Devil frowned. “Then I should think one cancelled the other out.” He looked down at his lists again, sucking hard on his teeth, and scratching the invisible top of his head. Suddenly he pulled out another sheet and perused it thoughtfully before saying, “ I don’t think he was a truly bad man. Anyway, he’s not on my list, nor on the supplementary one. No he appears to have been at least a moderately good person. I’m sorry,gentlemen, but you have wasted your time. I can’t help you.”

“Can’t help us!  Can’t help us! What do you mean ?”, Hilberto asked sharply. The Devil Rodriguez threw open his hands, and shrugged his shoulders.

“ I mean I can’t help you. All our good coffins are reserved for our … our …our, how shall I say it? … our members.” He used the Spanish word ‘afiliados’.

“Afiliados ?”, echoed Hilberto crossly. “I didn’t know you had to join a scheme ! Shit and damnation! You can’t even die these days without being a member of something !  Why don’t you people ever tell anybody until it’s too late ?” 

Hilberto was really annoyed, but César had been thinking. Whatever the regulation might be, there’s always a way round it.

“Couldn’t we just pay a couple of instalments now and join tonight ? Then we could drop round tomorrow and get the coffin out !”

“You can join whenever you like, but it isn’t a question of paying.”, said the Devil with a languid smile.

“But don’t you have anything at all to offer us ?”, broke in César urgently.

“Only some rather cheap coffins, and of course, you can rent the car, - at a price !  But good coffins, and the free use of the car, are – I regret to say – strictly for members only!”

“Are there many ‘afiliados’ in the village?”, asked César.

“Most people in the village are members.”

“Men and women?”

“Oh yes. There seems to be very little difference between the sexes in certain things.”

“And children as well ?”

“Teenagers mostly, ....you know, once they get to fifteen or sixteen, they begin to …. Begin to ….” The Devil seemed rather at a loss for words.

“Well”, said Hilberto rather crossly, “ at least we can have a look at the cheaper coffins while we are here. Perhaps we’ll find something suitable.”

“ Perhaps”,said the Devil doubtfully, “ why don’t you come this way?”

 They pushed their way through a tattered brown curtain, and entered a large windowless deposit. One every side there were coffins, some piled on top of others, some lined up against the walls. The effect was not in the least sinister. The different sizes and colours, and the almost calculated disorder gave the coffins a comfortable benign order rather like a giant set of children’s building blocks, and the two bare bulbs that illuminated the deposit only added to the effect. Both men, by now quite sober, were able to admire much of the workmanship they saw before them. It was the carpentry that most caught their attention. The Devil Rodriguez, watching them, nodded his head.

“You cannot deny the quality of the craftsmanship, can you ?” he said in self-satisfied tones. “Look, this one is made of cedar wood. Look at the finish! And look at the inner lining! The very best silk!”  He ran his hand gently around the rim, while the two men nodded agreement. “And take a look at these handles. No cheap metal here. Good solid brass!”

Hilberto put his arms behind his back, and pursed his lips approvingly.

“It’s excellent”, he said, “really excellent. Would you mind if I asked you how much it cost?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you”, said the Devil.

“A thousand pesos ?”, insisted Hilberto, never able to leave a topic alone.

“Oh much more than that ! Much, much more than that. The man for whom this coffin is reserved has paid thousands for it, - in a manner of speaking.”

“Reserved?”, queried César.“Who has reserved it?”

“It’s for the Mayor. Don Pascual.”

“Don Pascual?”. The two men were incredulous.

“When did he die? Shit! I saw him only this morning!” César’s voice was sharp and unbelieving.

“Oh, he’s not dead yet. He still has another eight years, three months and eleven days to go.”

“Do you mean to tell us that Don Pasual knows exactly when he is going to die, and has already chosen his coffin ?”

Hilberto crossed himself rapidly as the Devil watched with obvious irritation.

“Don’t do that in here, please. It gives me migraine.” Then he went on more calmly. “No, I don’t suppose that he knows any such thing. At any rate, he gives no sign at present of any concern for the future. And he certainly hasn’t chosen anything. I chose it for him. I believe in looking after my ‘afiliados’, and getting them only the best.”

“And all these?”, Hilberto asked gesturing wildly about him, “all these are reserved ? You have chosen all these ?”

“Yes, most of them, at least. I do keep a few extras. There are always a few surprises. People one knows,- or thinks, -will become last minute members.”

The two men looked at each other cautiously, the first fingers of fear stabbing at them.Then Hilberto said, “So you can’t help us.”  It was a statement rather than a question, - the first step towards the door.

“Well you know, I’ve been thinking,” said the Devil Rodriguez, “and something has just occurred to me. Perhaps I can help you after all. Tell me, how tall was your brother?”

“About one metre seventy.Why ?”

“And his weight?”

“About eighty kilos.”

“Perfect !”, said the Devil as he turned towards César.  “I’ll tell you what we’ll do. We’ll give him your sister’s.”

Twenty minutes later, the two old men carefully fixed their load onto the back of the dog-cart. The coffin was magnificent with beautifully polished teak, a lining of full deep crimson, and handles and latches that shone like burnished gold. They had signed the papers, and the big car would arrive at eleven the next morning. It only remained to contact the priest. Carefully they turned the horse, both feeling tired and old. The wind, a little stronger now, mockingly slapped their faces as the horse began its weary plod through the dust, and the moon tipped its first light over the mountain tops. It was some time before either of them could speak.

It was César who first broke the silence.“So that is what happened to our mother.”

“And to the inheritance money”, added Hilberto. There was another long silence.

“I’ll kill her”, said César, “I’ll kill the bitch !”

“And I’ll help you”, said Hilberto. Then he added, “It’s the only way you and I will get decent coffins.”