The Second Son

The man arrived and Gardenyes said, “We’ll have some bread. Butter, if there is any.”

The man moved off and Hoffner set down the spoon. He needed a drink. He poured himself a glass and drank.

He said, “They won’t have the butter, will they?”

“No. They won’t.”

Hoffner was done playing. “I imagine you were something of a hero in those old days. Pulling bankers from cars. The noble bandit. Defender of the defenseless. It has such a familiar ring. Fu

It was the first moment of hesitation in Gardenyes’s eyes, long enough to feel the venom behind them. Gardenyes said, “You have a strange way of asking for help.”

“Help from a dead man. Now that would be something, wouldn’t it?”

It might have been a sudden pushing back of a chair or the waving of a pistol in the face, but Gardenyes remained perfectly still: whatever violence he felt lived in the silence. He took a last pull, tossed his cigarette to the ground, and leaned forward.

“You have no idea.” For the first time his voice had no interest in masking its bitterness. The stare was almost hypnotic.

“And yet you’ll help me find my son,” said Hoffner. There was nothing in his tone. “For old time’s sake.”

Gardenyes’s stare became a half grin, then something far more u

“Incontrolats,” Gardenyes said. It was as if the word carried no weight. “You know what these are? No-I don’t think you do.” He rocked his chair on its hind legs, and his head rested against the wall. There was an unwelcome easiness in the way he leaned back and looked over at Hoffner. “Uncontrollables,” he said, his voice too calm, its menace too refined. “Men beyond hope. Men beyond the revolution. Anarchists calling their own such a thing. Can you imagine it?”

It was everything Hoffner could do to keep his gaze fixed on Gardenyes’s.

“You see, I thought the whole point was to tear down the control, keep tearing it down. But now, of course, they have it. They won’t admit it, these anarchist friends of mine. They say, ‘Look at us. Look at the revolutionaries who told the socialists, No, we don’t want a part of your government, even if you hand it to us-even if you beg us to take it. We’ve given you the state, freed you from the fascists, but no, we want nothing that tastes of leadership or popular fronts or control.’ ” Gardenyes’s head turned slightly and his eyes drifted: it left the small table feeling unbearably exposed. “I’ll give them that,” he said quietly. “They did say no.”

He looked back at Hoffner, the eyes now too focused.

“The trouble is, you let yourself be seduced by your own order, your control, and everything goes on its head. Now they say, ‘Don’t go too far, don’t embarrass us, don’t commit acts that are’ ”-he stared into Hoffner’s eyes as if the words were somewhere behind them-“what was it?… ‘contrary to the anarchist spirit,’ counter to the ‘revolutionary order.’ ” The eyes flashed momentarily and he came forward, the chair landing on the stone with an unexpected force. “Revolutionary order?” He leaned into Hoffner, and Hoffner let him lean. “What exactly is that supposed to mean?”

Hoffner had been holding the spoon against his thigh, and a small oval of liquid had seeped into the cloth. He felt the tackiness underneath, on his skin. Gardenyes slowly pulled himself back and Hoffner smelled the Spaniard’s breath still between them.

“I have some names,” Hoffner said. “You can see if they mean anything to you. And you can tell me where they’re keeping the injured Germans.”

Gardenyes picked up his glass. It took him a moment to realize it was empty before he set it back down. He continued to stare at the table. “The fascists don’t have such problems,” he said. “One mind, one body with them. Makes it so much easier.” He looked over at Hoffner. “Maybe soon enough I won’t be the only dead anarchist in Barcelona.”

The bread arrived with a wedge of butter on a plate.

Gardenyes put out his hand. “I’ll see those names now. For old time’s sake.”

Mueller opted out. He had done his bit, getting Hoffner to Gardenyes. If Gardenyes hadn’t killed him by now, Hoffner would probably be fine on his own.

“I said probably.” Mueller was resting his gimp foot on the car’s ru

The Modelo 10 was a recent addition for Gardenyes, a four-seater out of Ford’s Barcelona plant that, up until the July fighting, had been churning out cars at an unusually healthy clip. It was unlikely that any of the driving enthusiasts who had bought the Modelo 10s or 8s had realized that they were sporting around on a German-made chassis and brakes and any number of other German components. Back in January, Ford London had sent down the word that Herr Hitler wanted better results out of his Ford Deutschland plants. So, to appease the Fuhrer, Ford Iberica had been told it was suddenly in the market for large stocks of automotive parts coming from Dagenham and Koln. This, in turn, had kept the London office happy, which had kept the American office happy, which was doing everything it could to keep the German office happy. So much happiness churning out of so few moving parts. It seemed to bode well for the future of international detente.

As it happened, this particular Modelo 10 had belonged to a rather successful dentist who had had the very good sense to send his wife, two small children, household staff, dental assistant, and mistress ahead to northern Italy on the night before all the trouble began. He had gotten wind that something was brewing from his brother-in-law, who was married to an older sister living in Morocco, and who was involved with something to do with the export of large metal tubing (he had been in Granada before that, but there had been talk of an incident with a woman co

He had been pulled from his car on the nineteenth while trying to find the coast road. His driver had abandoned him at the first sound of shots, and the dentist, always at sixes and sevens when it came to navigating the roads in and around the city, had gotten lost. Two women and a rough man had beaten and then shot him. The dentist had lain very still for nearly an hour before the loss of blood had finally killed him. One of the women had given the car to Gardenyes in exchange for five completely useless Russian rifles, while the other had cursed her friend for being so stupid. In the meantime, both wife and mistress continued to wait patiently, certain that they would soon be resuming their previously well-balanced lives, albeit with a vaguely Venetian flair.

Hoffner was examining a stack of rubber-banded wooden tongue depressors he had found in the pocket next to the backseat when Gabriel turned on the engine. Aurelio was in the seat next to Gabriel, Gardenyes still in the toilet.

Hoffner said, “He doesn’t use any of these, does he, when things go south? I’m thinking he’s more of a bullet-to-the-head sort of man.”