This is what I have to tell you. I've never known a painter with more talent than you, German. You don't know it yet, nor can you understand it, but you possess that talent and my only merit has been to recognise it. I've learned more from you than you have from me, without you realising. I wish you could have had the teacher you deserve, someone who could have guided your talent better than this poor apprentice. Light speaks through you, German. The rest of us only listen. Don't ever forget this. From now on, your teacher will be your pupil and your best friend, always.

SALVAT.

A week later, fleeing from unbearable memories, German travelled to Paris. He had been offered a post as a teacher in an art school. He wasn't to set foot in Barcelona again for the next ten years.

In Paris German quickly earned himself some renown as a portraitist and discovered a pa.s.sion that would never abandon him: the opera. His paintings were beginning to sell, and an art dealer who knew him from his days with Salvat decided to take him on. Apart from his teaching salary, he made enough from his paintings to lead a simple but dignified life. By carefully managing his income, and with the help of the director of the art school, who seemed to have well-placed relatives all over Paris, German managed to obtain a seat at the Opera for the entire season. Nothing grand: dress circle, row six, a little to the left. Twenty per cent of the stage was not visible, but the music could be heard just as gloriously as from the highly priced stalls and boxes.

That is where he first saw her. She looked like a creature that had stepped out of one of Salvat's paintings, but not even her beauty could do justice to her voice. Her name was Kirsten Auermann, she was nineteen and, according to the programme, one of the most promising young talents in the opera world. That same evening German was introduced to her at a reception held by the opera company after the performance. German managed to sneak in saying he was the musical critic for Le Monde. When he shook her hand, he was lost for words.

'Considering you're a critic, you speak very little and that with a strong accent,' Kirsten joked.

German decided there and then that he was going to marry that woman, if it was the last thing he did in his life. He tried to conjure up all the arts of seduction he'd seen Salvat use over the years. But there was only one Salvat, and he had been in a cla.s.s of his own. A long game of cat and mouse ensued. It went on for six years and ended in a small chapel in Normandy one summer's afternoon in 1946. On his wedding day the spectre of the war still wafted in the air like the stench of hidden carrion.

Kirsten and German returned to Barcelona shortly afterwards and settled in Sarria. The house had become a ghostly museum during his years of absence. Kirsten's luminosity and three weeks of vigorous cleaning-up did the rest.

The old mansion now experienced an era of unprecedented splendour. German worked without pause, possessed by an energy even he couldn't understand. His works began to be prized among the well-to-do, and soon to own 'a Blau' became an essential requirement for those who aspired to join, or remain, in polite society. In yet another ironic twist of fate his long-estranged father saw his parental pride rekindled and took to praising German in public. 'I always believed in his talent and knew he would triumph,' 'It's in his blood, like all Blaus' and 'I'm the proudest father in the world' became his favourite phrases, and, by repeating them so often, he ended up believing them. Art dealers and gallery owners who years ago hadn't had the time of day for German were now bending over backwards to gain his attention. Yet for all the flatterers courting his favour and even though Vanity Fair was claiming him as one of its own, German never forgot what Salvat had taught him.

Kirsten's musical career was also moving along splendidly. In the days when the new 33 rpm long-play records were beginning to conquer the market, she was one of the first voices to immortalise her repertoire. Those were years of happiness and light in the Sarria villa, years when everything seemed possible and there was not a hint of a shadow on the horizon.

n.o.body thought anything of Kirsten's dizzy spells and fainting fits until it was too late. Success, travel, first-night nerves explained it all. The day Kirsten was seen by Dr Cabrils two bits of news changed her world for ever. The first: she was pregnant. The second: an irreversible illness in her blood was slowly stealing away her life. She had a year left. Two at most.

That same day, when she left the doctor's surgery, Kirsten ordered a watch from the General Relojera Suiza a venerable shop on Via Augusta with an inscription dedicated to German.

That watch would mark the hours they had left together.

Kirsten abandoned the stage and her career. The farewell gala took place at the Liceo in Barcelona, and featured Lakme, by Delibes, her favourite composer. n.o.body would ever again hear a voice like hers. During the months of her pregnancy German painted a series of portraits of his wife that surpa.s.sed any of his previous work. Despite receiving many an exorbitant offer, he refused to sell them.

On 24 September 1964 a baby girl with fair hair and ash-coloured eyes, identical to her mother's, was born in the Sarria house. She would be called Marina and her face would always bear her mother's image and radiance. Kirsten Auermann died six months later, in the same room where she'd given birth to her daughter and where she'd spent the happiest hours of her life with German. Her husband held her pale trembling hand in his. She was already cold when dawn took her away as quietly as a sigh.

A month after her death German went back to his studio in the attic of the family home. Little Marina played at his feet. German picked up his brush and tried to draw a line over the canvas. His eyes filled with tears and the brush fell from his hands. German Blau never painted again. The light inside him had gone out for ever.

CHAPTER 9.

FOR THE REST OF THAT AUTUMN MY VISITS TO German and Marina's house turned into a daily ritual. I counted the hours as I daydreamed in the cla.s.sroom, waiting for the moment when I could escape to that secret alleyway. My new friends were waiting for me there, except of course on Mondays, when Marina took German to the hospital for his treatment. We drank coffee and chatted in the sombre rooms. German agreed to teach me the rudiments of chess. Despite his lessons, Marina always checkmated me within five or six minutes, but I didn't lose hope.

Bit by bit, almost without my noticing it, the world of German and Marina became my world. Their house, the memories that seemed to haunt those walls, became mine. I discovered that Marina didn't go to school, so she could care for her father and didn't leave him alone. She told me that German had taught her to read, write and think.

'All the geography, trigonometry and arithmetic in the world are useless unless you learn to think for yourself,' Marina would argue. 'No school teaches you that. It's not on the curriculum.'

German had opened her mind to the world of art, literature, history and science. The vast library in their house had become her universe. Each one of its books was a door into new worlds and new ideas. One afternoon towards the end of October we sat on a windowsill on the second floor and gazed at the faraway lights on Mount Tibidabo. Marina confided in me that her dream was to become a writer. She had a trunk full of stories she'd been writing since she was nine. When I asked her to show me one of them, she looked at me as if I were drunk and refused point-blank. 'This is like chess,' I thought. 'Just give it time.'

Often, when they weren't aware of it, I'd watch German and Marina bantering playfully, reading or facing one another silently across the chessboard. To feel the invisible bond that joined them, the self-contained world they had built far from everything and everyone, was like being under a magical spell. An enchantment that sometimes I feared might break with my presence. There were days when, as I walked back to the school, I felt like the happiest person in the world simply being able to share it.

Without quite knowing why, I kept the friendship hidden. I hadn't told anyone about them, not even my friend JF. In just a few weeks German and Marina had become my secret life and in all honesty the only life I wished to live. I remember the time when German went to bed early, excusing himself as usual with the impeccable manners of an old-fashioned gentleman. I was left alone with Marina in the room with the portraits. She smiled enigmatically and told me she was writing something on me. I found the very idea terrifying.

'On me? What do you mean writing something on me?'

'I mean about you, not on top of you as if you were a desk.'

'That much I'd understood.'

Marina was enjoying my sudden nervousness.

'Well then?' she asked. 'Do you have such a low opinion of yourself that you don't think there's any point in writing about you?'

I couldn't think of a good answer to that question. I decided to change my strategy and go on the offensive. It was something German had taught me in his chess lessons. Basic strategy: when you're caught with your trousers down, start screaming and attack.

'Well, if that's the case, you have no choice you'll have to show it to me,' I remarked.

Marina looked hesitant. She raised an eyebrow.

'I have a right to know what is being written about me,' I added.

'You might not like it.'

'Perhaps. Perhaps I will.'

'I'll think about it.'

'I'll be waiting.'

That winter the cold weather struck Barcelona in its usual fashion: like a meteorite. In barely twenty-four hours thermometers began to plunge. Armies of coats were released from their wardrobes, replacing the light autumn raincoats. Leaden skies and lashing winds that bit one's ears took possession of the streets. German and Marina surprised me by giving me a wool cap that must have cost them a fortune.

'It'll keep your ideas warm, my friend,' said German. 'We don't want your brain to go into hibernation.'

Halfway through November Marina announced that she and German had to travel to Madrid for a week. A doctor at La Paz Hospital, a leading authority in his field, had agreed to put German on a treatment that was still in an experimental phase and had only been used a couple of times in all of Europe.

'They say this doctor can perform miracles. We'll see . . .' said Marina.

The thought of spending a week without them fell on me like a stone slab. All my efforts to hide it were in vain. Marina, who by then could see inside my head as if I were transparent, patted my hand.

'It's just a week, OK? Then we'll see each other again.'

I nodded but found no consolation in her words.

'I spoke to German yesterday about the possibility that you might keep an eye on Kafka and the house while we're away,' Marina proposed.

'Of course. I'll do whatever is needed.'

Her face lit up.

'I hope this doctor is as good as they say,' I said.

Marina looked at me for a long while. Behind her smile those ash-coloured eyes radiated a sadness that disarmed me.

'I hope so too,' she said.

The train to Madrid departed from the Estacion de Francia at nine o'clock in the morning. I'd slipped out at daybreak. After an appraisal of my meagre savings proved them to be insufficient, I'd arranged a loan from my friend and occasional lender JF, who knew better than to ask me what I needed the money for 'I only hope it's for something our dear Jesuit fathers wouldn't approve of,' he remarked. Freshly funded, I'd booked a taxi to collect German and Marina and take them to the station. That Sunday morning came wrapped in bluish streaks of mist that slowly faded in the amber of dawn. We spent a good part of the taxi ride in silence. The meter of the old Seat 1500 clicked away like a metronome, relentlessly increasing my princ.i.p.al and interest.

'You shouldn't have bothered, dear Oscar,' German said.

'It's no bother,' I replied. 'It's freezing cold and we don't want your spirits to ice over, eh?'

When we reached the station, German sat down in a cafe while Marina and I went to the ticket office to collect the pre-booked tickets. When it was time to leave, German hugged me so tightly I nearly burst into tears. A porter helped him into the train and he left me alone to say goodbye to Marina. The echo of a thousand voices and whistles swirled around the monumental vault. We looked at one another quietly, barely daring to meet each other's eyes.

'Well . . .' I said.

'Don't forget to warm up the milk, because-'

'Kafka hates cold milk, especially after a murder spree, I know. He'll be in seventh heaven, don't worry.'

The stationmaster was about to wave his flag to signal the departure.

'German is really proud of you,' she said.

'I can't see why.'

'We're going to miss you.'

'That's what you think. Go on, off you go.'

All of a sudden Marina bent over and let her lips touch mine. Before I could even blink she'd climbed into the carriage. I stood there, watching the train move off into the gaping mouth of the mist. When the rumble of the engine faded, I set off towards the exit. As I did so I realised I'd never got round to telling Marina about the strange vision I'd witnessed that stormy night in her house. Some time had pa.s.sed and I'd decided to forget it. I'd even ended up convincing myself that I'd imagined it all. Just then, as I was walking into the entrance hall, a porter came rushing up to me.

'This . . . Here, I was given this for you.'

He handed me an ochre-coloured envelope.

'I think you're mistaken,' I said.

'No, no. That lady told me to give it to you,' the porter insisted.

'What lady?'

The porter turned to point at the covered entrance facing Paseo Colon. Plumes of mist swept across the entrance steps. There was n.o.body there. The porter simply shrugged and walked away.

Mystified, I hastened towards the exit and went out into the street just in time to spot her. The lady in black we'd seen in the Sarria graveyard was climbing into an old-fashioned horse-driven carriage. She turned to look at me for a second. Her face was hidden under a dark veil, like a steel spider's web. A second later the carriage door closed and the coachman, wrapped in a grey coat that covered him completely, whipped the horses. The carriage set off at great speed through the traffic of Paseo Colon, heading towards the Ramblas, until it was out of sight.

I was so disconcerted I forgot that I was still holding the envelope the porter had handed me. When I saw it, I opened it. Inside was an old visiting card, with an address written on it: MIJAIL KOLVENIK.

Calle Princesa 33, 4th floor, door 2

I turned the card over. On the back the printer had reproduced the symbol stamped on the nameless grave in the cemetery and on the abandoned greenhouse. A black b.u.t.terfly with open wings.

CHAPTER 10.

ON MY WAY TO CALLE PRINCESA I REALISED I WAS starving. I still had a few coins left in my pocket, courtesy of JF's financial services, so I decided to stop at a bakery opposite the basilica of Santa Maria del Mar and treat myself to a creamy hot pastry that tasted deliciously sinful. There was a lazy Sunday morning feeling as the aroma of sweet bread filled the air and the church bells rang. Calle Princesa climbed through the old quarter forming a narrow valley of shadows. I walked past old palaces and buildings that seemed as ancient as the city itself until I glimpsed the number 33, barely visible on one of those facades, and stepped into an entrance hall that made me think of a cloister in an abandoned chapel. A set of rusty faded letter boxes hung on a wall of cracked enamel paint. I was trying in vain to find the name Mijail Kolvenik when I heard heavy breathing behind me.

I turned around with a start and saw the wrinkled face of an old woman. She was sitting in the porter's lodge and looked like the wax figure of a widow dressed in mourning. A ray of light touched her face. Her eyes were as white as marble. They had no pupils. She was blind.

'Who are you looking for?' she asked in a broken voice.

'Mijail Kolvenik, ma'am.'

The empty white eyes blinked a couple of times. The old woman shook her head.

'I've been given this address,' I said. 'Mijail Kolvenik. Fourth floor, door two . . .'

The old woman shook her head again and returned to her motionless state. As she did so, I noticed something moving on the table inside the lodge: a black spider was crawling over her wrinkled hands. Her white eyes stared into s.p.a.ce. I edged away towards the stairs.

The gloom inside the building was so thick you could almost cut through it. I could have bet all the money I owed JF that n.o.body had changed a light bulb in that staircase for at least thirty years. The steps were chipped and slippery. The landings were wells of darkness and silence. A tremulous light peeped through a skylight in the attic where a trapped pigeon was flapping about. The second apartment on the fourth floor had a carved wooden door with a knocker that looked like something out of a railway carriage. I rang the bell a couple of times and heard it echoing inside the flat. A few minutes went by. I rang again. Two more minutes. I began to think that I'd come to a tomb. One of hundreds of ghost buildings that haunted the heart of Barcelona.

Suddenly the grid in the spyhole slid open. Threads of light cut through the darkness. The voice I heard seemed to be made of sand. A voice that hadn't spoken in weeks, perhaps months.

'Who's there?'

'Senor Kolvenik? Mijail Kolvenik?' I asked. 'Could I speak to you for a moment please?'

The spyhole slammed shut. Silence. I was about to ring the bell again when the door of the flat opened.

A figure was silhouetted against the doorway. The sound of a dripping tap in a sink could be heard inside the apartment.

'What do you want, son?'

'Senor Kolvenik?'