‘I’m sorry I’ve let you down once again, Don Pedro.’

Vidal sighed.

‘David, it’s not my fault if they’ve gone for you. It’s your fault. You were crying out for it. You’re quite old enough to know how these things work.’

‘You tell me.’

Vidal clicked his tongue, as if my naivety offended him.

‘What did you expect? You’re not one of them. You never will be. You haven’t wanted to be, and you think they’re going to forgive you. You lock yourself up in that great rambling house and you think you can survive without joining the church choir and putting on the uniform. Well you’re wrong, David. You’ve always been wrong. This isn’t how you play the game. If you want to play alone, pack your bags and go somewhere where you can be in charge of your own destiny, if such a place exists. But if you stay here, you’d better join some parish or other – any one will do. It’s that simple.’

‘Is that what you do, Don Pedro? Join the parish?’

‘I don’t have to, David. I feed them. That’s another thing you’ve never understood.’

‘You’d be surprised at how quickly I’m learning. But don’t worry, the reviews are the least of it. For better or for worse, tomorrow nobody will remember them, neither mine nor yours.’

‘What’s the problem, then?’

‘It doesn’t matter.’

‘Is it those two sons-of-bitches? Barrido and the corpse-robber?’

‘Forget it, Don Pedro. As you say, it’s my fault. Nobody else’s.’

The head waiter came over to the table with an enquiring look. I hadn’t laid eyes on the menu and wasn’t going to.

‘The usual, for both of us,’ Vidal told him.

The head waiter left with a bow. Vidal was observing me as if I were a dangerous animal locked in a cage.

‘Cristina was unable to come,’ he said. ‘I brought this, so you could sign it for her.’

He put on the table a copy of The Steps of Heaven wrapped in purple paper with the Sempere & Sons stamp on it, and pushed it towards me. I made no move to pick it up. Vidal had gone pale. After his forceful remarks and his defensive tone, his manner seemed to have changed. Here comes the final thrust, I thought.

‘Tell me once and for all whatever it is you want to say, Don Pedro. I won’t bite.’

Vidal downed his wine in one gulp.

‘There are two things I’ve been wanting to tell you. You’re not going to like them.’

‘I’m beginning to get used to that.’

‘One is to do with your father.’

The bitter smile left my lips.

‘I’ve wanted to tell you for years, but I thought it wouldn’t do you any good. You’re going to think I didn’t tell you out of cowardice, but I swear, I swear on anything you hold sacred, that-’

‘That what?’ I cut in.

Vidal sighed.

‘The night your father died-’

‘The night he was murdered,’ I corrected him icily.

‘It was a mistake. Your father’s death was a mistake.’

I looked at him, confused.

‘Those men were not out to get him. They made a mistake.’

I recalled the look in the three gunmen’s eyes, in the fog, the smell of gunpowder and my father’s dark blood pouring through my hands.

‘The person they wanted to kill was me,’ said Vidal almost inaudibly. ‘An old partner of my father’s discovered that his wife and I…’

I closed my eyes and listened to a morbid laughter rising up inside me. My father had been riddled with bullets because of one of the great Pedro Vidal’s bits of skirt.

‘Please say something,’ Vidal pleaded.

I opened my eyes.

‘What is the second thing you were going to tell me?’

I’d never seen Vidal look so frightened. It suited him.

‘I’ve asked Cristina to marry me.’

A long silence.

‘She said yes.’

Vidal looked down. One of the waiters came over with the starters. He left them on the table, wishing us bon appétit. Vidal did not dare look at me again. The starters were getting cold. After a while I took the copy of The Steps of Heaven and left.

That afternoon, after leaving La Maison Dorée, I found myself making my way down the Ramblas, carrying the copy of The Steps of Heaven. As I drew closer to the corner with Calle del Carmen my hands began to shake. I stopped by the window of the Bagués jewellery shop, pretending to be looking at some gold lockets in the shape of fairies and flowers, dotted with rubies. The baroque and ornate facade of El Indio was just a few metres away; anyone would have thought it was a grand bazaar full of wonders and extraordinary objects, not just a shop selling fabrics and linen. I approached the store slowly and stepped into the entrance hall that led to the main door. I knew she wouldn’t recognise me, that I might not recognise her, but even so I stood there for about five minutes before daring to go in. When I did, my heart was beating hard and my hands were sweating.

The walls were lined with shelves full of large rolls of fabric of all types. Shop assistants, armed with tape measures and special scissors tied to their belts, spread the beautiful textiles on the tables and displayed them as if they were precious jewels to well-bred ladies, who were accompanied by their maids and seamstresses.

‘Can I help you, sir?’

The words came from a heavily built man with a high-pitched voice, dressed in a flannel suit that looked as if it was about to burst at the seams and fill the shop with floating shreds of cloth. He observed me with a condescending air and a smile midway between forced and hostile.

‘No,’ I mumbled.

Then I saw her. My mother was coming down a stepladder holding a handful of remnants. She wore a white blouse and I recognised her instantly. Her figure had grown a little fuller and her face, less well-chiselled than it used to be, had that slightly defeated expression that comes with routine and disappointment. The shop assistant was annoyed and kept talking to me, but I hardly heard his voice. I only saw her drawing closer, then walking past me. She looked at me for a second, and when she saw that I was watching her, she smiled meekly, the way one smiles at a customer or at one’s boss, and then continued with her work. I had such a lump in my throat that I almost wasn’t able to open my mouth to silence the assistant and I hurried off towards the exit, my eyes full of tears. Once I was outside I crossed over the street and went into a café. I sat at a table by the window from which I could see the door of El Indio, and I waited.

Almost an hour and a half had gone by when I saw the shop assistant who had tried to serve me come out and lower the entrance shutter. Soon afterwards the lights started to go out and some of the staff emerged. I got up and went outside. A boy of about ten was sitting by the entrance to the next-door building, looking at me. I beckoned him to come closer, and when he did so, I showed him a coin. He gave me a huge smile – I noticed he was missing a number of teeth.

‘See this packet? I want you to give it to a lady who is about to come out right now. Tell her that a gentleman asked you to give it to her, but don’t tell her it was me. Understood?’

The boy nodded. I gave him the coin and the book.

‘Now we’ll wait.’

We didn’t have to wait long. Three minutes later I saw her coming out. She was heading for the Ramblas.

‘It’s that lady, see?’

My mother stopped for a moment by the portico of the church of Belén and I made a sign to the boy, who ran after her. I watched the scene from a short distance away, but could not hear her words. The boy handed her the packet and she gave it a puzzled look, not sure whether to accept it or not. The boy insisted and finally she took the parcel in her hands and watched the boy run away. Disconcerted, she turned to right and left, searching with her eyes. She weighed up the packet, examining the purple wrapping paper. Finally curiosity got the better of her and she opened it.