Page 141 of The Moon Sister
‘Maybe we can find a cheaper hotel, perhaps an apartment for us all . . .’ murmured José.
‘Papá, stop your worrying. Yesterday, we could have been thrown in jail by the hotel for taking rooms we have no money to pay for. Tonight we were cheered by hundreds. And word will spread, I promise you.’ Lucía went to her father and hugged him. ‘Another brandy, Papá?’
‘You can celebrate, but I’m off to bed.’ Meñique walked over to Lucía and kissed her on the top of her sleek dark hair.
*
It seemed that Lucía’s confidence in winning a place in the hearts of the Portuguese had not been misplaced. Week after week, the crowds outside the Café Arcadio grew, with hundreds clamouring to enter and see the phenomenon that was La Candela. It was almost as if, faced with a new challenge, Lucía doubled the ferocity and passion of her performance. This, as well as the pathos of watching the very essence of the great neighbouring country being brought to its knees by civil war, only fuelled the fervour of the public for flamenco. Yet, as Lucía’s public persona reached the great heights she longed for here, her private self became more and more desolate. Every morning, as she lay in bed in the suite, she would have Meñique read out the news from Spain and make him tell her what he heard whispered in the bars of Lisbon.
‘They have murdered Lorca – our greatest poet – in Granada,’ Meñique said bitterly. ‘They will stop at nothing to destroy our country.’
‘¡Dios mío!They have reached Granada! What will become of Mamá? My brothers?! As I sit here like a queen, maybe they are starving, or even dead! Perhaps I should contact Bernardo, ask him to drive me on his bus back to Granada . . .’
‘Lucía, Spain is in chaos. You cannot return,’ Meñique told her for the hundredth time.
‘But I can’t just leave them there! My mother sacrificed everything for her children! Maybe things are different in Pamplona, but in Sacromonte, family is everything.’
‘Surely your mother is not your responsibility,pequeña? She is your father’s.’
‘You know as well as I do that Papá worships only money and the neck of a brandy bottle. He never took responsibility for Mamá, or for me or my brothers. What can we do for them?’ Lucía wrung her sensitive hands as tears appeared in her eyes. ‘You have manypayofriends in high places.’
‘Theywerein high places, Lucía, but who knows how far they have fallen by now?’
‘Surely you could write to them? Find out how we get papers for my family to travel here? Please, I need your help. And if you won’t give it, then I must return to Spain and help them myself.’
‘No, it is too dangerous,pequeña.Salazar has been supporting Franco in Spain, and there are Nationalist spies everywhere here. If we were even to be caught whispering—’
‘Who is this Salazar? How dare he spy on us!’ Lucía cried.
‘He is the Prime Minister of Portugal, Lucía. Do you not listen to anything I say?’
‘Only if it is accompanied by your guitar,mi amor,’ she replied honestly.
*
The following Sunday, with no performance that evening to rush back for, and worn down by Lucía’s pleading, Meñique borrowed Manuel Matos’s car and drove back towards the Spanish border. It had been over a month since he’d arrived in Portugal, and he only hoped he could remember the location of the farmhouse where they had taken refuge on the night they had crossed from Spain. Before Bernardo and Fernanda had left Lisbon, Bernardo had told him they would not be returning to Spain. Instead, they would sit out the war with their relatives at the farm, who – from what Bernardo had intimated – were his long-time smuggling partners during the Great War.
‘Tell him that whatever it costs him to go and to bribe the necessary officials, we will pay,’ Lucía had told him.
Some hours later, and after a number of aborted trips down potholed tracks, Meñique arrived in front of a small farmhouse. To his relief, he recognised it.
‘Now, I must pray that they are still here,’ he said to himself as he stepped out of the car and went to knock on the door. A familiar figure opened it.
‘Fernanda! Thank God!’ Meñique breathed.
‘What is wrong? Is Lucía ill?’
‘No, no, it’s nothing like that. Is Bernardo at home?’
‘Yes, and we are eating cake. Come, señor.’
Meñique sat and listened as Bernardo and his cousin told him of the grim news they had heard from travellers crossing into Portugal from their war-torn homeland.
‘It is chaos there. I have not been back since the Nationalists took the border at Badajoz. It is simply too dangerous.’
‘Then you may not be able to help us.’
‘What is it you need?’ Fernanda nudged Bernardo with her elbow. ‘Remember, it is only due to our friends from the theatre that we escaped in time.’
