A new short story by Nicholas McLachlan
IT takes some time for Girado's eyes to adapt to the gloom in the stable below the house. The two mules shift about, rattling the wooden partition, nervous of the silhouette in the doorway. The sound of a guitar filters down. It drifts like a fine mist through the house only to seep through the earthen floor and condense in the cool air around him. A vaporous music whose damp notes beat out time on the stable floor.
He leads both mules out into the day and brings them around to the side of the house where the musician is playing. His brother swings the guitar off his lap with his left hand, dangles it for a moment and props it delicately against the wall beside him. He flexes his hands. "Whatever else," he says, "that's coming."
Girado looks at that petulant turn to his brother's lip and thinks, he knows how to infuriate me. Loves to state the obvious, make his position clear. What was that their father would say when either of his two boys began to bore him; fond of the sound of our own voice, are we? He wanted to say, leave your ego behind, instead he said: "Bring it if you like, it's your responsibility". He remembers their guitar lessons as a battle of wits. How it quickly became plain that Manolo was the more gifted of the two. He had fingers that moved up and down the fretboard with the ease and gentleness of a boy catching butterflies; fingers that did not belong in the field, fingers through which he could express his true nature.
And how he flaunted that nature; he grasped theory as effortlessly as if it were only a question of identifying the constellations in the night sky to understand the nature of the universe.
The fact that his younger brother had all the attributes of a natural musician; could play by ear, pick up a melody, distinguish between major and minor keys, only highlighted Girado's own clumsy inadequacies.
He remembered how his contorted and palsied hands struggled to shape chords, how for the life of him he could not distinguish tones from half tones and, above all, how he failed to appreciate the ordinary mathematical relationships at play in music. It was no wonder he came away from those weekly lessons with his self-esteem destroyed.
And it wasn't until much later that he realised you should leave music to those who play it as if it were no more than a whim, as if it were no more than a fawning lover at one's shoulder with whom to dally awhile.
With remorse he looked at his two hands, at what was missing. On one were fingers with only a trace of hard skin remaining, on the other nails that were once trimmed and manicured. It was of no significance now whether he ripped flesh from his fingers while bolting a door or not. Or whether he split a fingernail while snatching a log from the woodpile.
The fact that more and more he had to unhinge his right hand from the sickle's handle after a day harvesting was rapidly becoming irrelevant. He had to admit he had hands that were hard and callused, bruised from clearing rocks from the land and building walls.
Hands estranged from music.
When his master told him he was going where water was scarce, game hard to come by and people extinct, Girado figured it was a perfect opportunity to show his brother what he could do.
Of the two mules he reckons Columba has the most reliable temperament; age has bestowed a calm serenity upon her, but he thinks naming domestic and farm animals after past heroes is the cult of the personality gone mad. But he has to admit that despite this unenviable weight of history, the animal has acquired some of the more worthy attributes of leadership; decisiveness, physical courage, and a born and insatiable curiosity, which legend has it, the explorer had in abundance.
The other mule, Katerina, was born weak-blooded but her frame has filled out and now he wouldn't go anywhere without her.
In the early morning sun the brothers share out the supplies and load the mules. Girado throws a felt blanket onto Columba's back that will cushion her spine from the makeshift saddle and cone-shaped leather panniers.
The items he will not need until later in the expedition he places in the bottom of each leather holder, careful to maintain a balance on either side. He packs his water gourd, his bedding, a share of the food for both man and animal, and straw-filled hampers where the captured hawks will go.
His gauntlet, the rufter hoods, the jesses, swivels, leashes and bells he stores in a leather bag which he straps to the saddle.
"Let Katerina carry the cages," he says to his brother. "Hawks prefer live food. And she can take some extra hampers too. We might be lucky."
When the pack animals are loaded, Girado links a rope from one to the other and ties a quick release knot at Columba's end. "If Katerina goes over, untie that knot," he tells his brother. "We can't afford to lose both animals."
They set off with Girado leading. The track takes them through the barrios where peasants who work on the estate live, and then begins to snake up the valley. They follow the river bed for two hours, with Columba dictating the pace, moving rhythmically, her foot placements considered and deliberate.
The boys alter their natural foot pattern, and shorten the length of their stride to match her pace. They can go all day at this rate.
The path goes up along the side of the hill. On the right of the gorge scree hangs suspended like a window blind half drawn, whose eventual slide into the valley will define eons as clearly as day defines night. They move through a vale of wild olive trees that puncture the earth at regular intervals.
They rest for a moment in the shade and, with his hands on his hips, Girado takes a deep and consoling breath. It is as if he has been afraid to expand his lungs, afraid to fill his frame with hot air, afraid he may trap the scorching sun inside.
When they begin again he sees tiny puffballs of red sandy dust rise up into the hot air whenever an animal puts her foot on the ground.
The further away from the village they travel the rougher the track becomes. When an animal steps up onto another level she grips the loose earth as best she can to secure her footing and jerks her hindquarters up after her.
Her load pitches forward and back and the pack rises up unexpectedly and is pulled through the inquisitive branches of the trees and shrubs which crowd the track.
He waits for Manolo to stray into his line of fire and without knowing why springs a branch back. Manolo's shriek echoes across the valley. There is something in it of the pure hatred that young brothers can have for each other, something that has not entirely faded. It brings him back to one of their last fights.
They rolled like tumbleweed in the red earth, tearing and clawing at each other. His adrenalin-soaked body absorbed the blows. A fist caught him on the top of the head but it had no more affect than if he had been caught by the arm of a rag doll. The blood roared around his body, obliterating all other sounds. He gouged at Manolo's cheek with his nails.
He can remember vividly how it felt to have his brother's neck in an arm lock. He can remember being pulled apart by his father, and the screaming voice of his mother. He can remember the tears running down his face.
Just the memory of it makes him shake still. He has never really forgiven his brother their fights and even though their confrontations may have lost their physical aspect, it seems one of them must have nimbler fingers, or keener eyes or a quicker intellect than the other. It feels like being under a never-ending siege.
His shallow breath holds a quiet tension, like the calm surface of a lake beneath which is a desperate battle for survival and supremacy. These are exhausting times. He would love to swallow enormous lungfulls of air, energise the blood in his veins, expel the poison between them, but he cannot see how this can be done.
He shouts at the mule to reassert his authority and lets out rope to allow the animal behind make whatever little leap forward is necessary. But he remains vigilant. The last thing he wants is to find himself between an animal and the edge of the ravine. It would be too easy to be shouldered off the precipice and onto the rocks below. It wouldn't take much.
THEIR shadows are shorter now. Sometimes as the animal train moves over the scrub a gecko is disturbed. These indolent creatures seem to have nothing better to do than raise their body temperatures and snatch at an occasional insect with their long sticky tongues.
Girado imagines his brother sunning himself like that in some bohemian quarter, in some distant city, girls at his beck and call. Thinks he shares some traits with those dull-coloured creatures, adhesive pads at the end of his fingers, the way he disappears when frightened. They watch the day wear on, not saying very much to each other, just continuing their slow climb.
When they come to a hamlet perched on an outcrop of rock there is a chance to break the tension. The presence of a third person might allow them to say things to each other they can't ordinarily do.
They tether the mules either side of a eucalyptus tree that tinkles in the breeze, and sit with a wizened old man on a wall outside his house. Despite the aridness of the country water gushes along irrigation channels at the base of the building. Girado rolls a cigarette and offers over the pouch.
"I see women in the fields but where are the men?" he asks, not knowing where the question might lead.
"Zaragoza, Barcelona - wherever there is work," the man replies, "there is nothing here for the young." By young he means men. He is implying that women have no choice but to stay. Or if they leave it is only that they are lucky enough to find a husband in a neighbouring village where nothing but the location differs. But Manolo has seen the direction the conversation is taking and heads it off.
"Not all go. Some have a choice. The eldest can stay to claim his birthright, or he can go. The youngest has no choice, he must go."
Girado lets the man respond. "They all go at first, and it is true only one can ever hope to return. But that's the way, land is passed on, a man marries. Some are born more privileged than others. It's a matter of fact, a matter for God."
Manolo shakes his head and waves his hand across the valley. He wants to go when he is ready, make it his decision, nobody else's. He doesn't want people to say that he went because he was different, because people couldn't accommodate his difference. And for the moment he wants to retain a foot in both camps. "Why reward an accident of nature. There ought to be enough for all."
The eyes of the man are drawn to the baskets hanging from the saddle. He says: "Perhaps it is better to be free than to be caged."
When it's time to move on, the boys stand. Nothing is resolved. The man goes into the house and returns with a handful of edible nuts and a jug of water. The parting is slow and deliberate, ceremonious, as though they had known each other a lifetime. The man kisses each of them three times on the cheek; the right, left, then the right again. As Manolo goes for the mules, the man grips Girado: "Don't be too hard on him." On their ascent they can hear the voices of the women in the fields ascend with them, until at last only faint cries can be heard darting hither and thither on the warm air currents.
They camp for the night by a pool near the source of the river. Girado tends to the animals. He loops Columba's halter through Katerina's bridle and leads them both to the water. When they have drunk enough he tethers them on a long rope so they can graze on the grasses and shrubs roundabout.
"You don't trust me to do any of the important jobs," Manolo complains, when Girado drains warm water from the billy and mixes it with flour to make thin rounds of unleavened bread. He fries these on a pan with a little olive oil and they sit in silence dipping little pieces of the bread into honey.
The rest of the water is set back on the flames, and when it boils with a quiet hiss, he hooks the billy onto the ground with a twig and drops leaves into the water to make a kind of mate. After supper the boys lay their felt blankets on the ground beside the fire and stretch out.
He wakes in the morning to the sound of the guitar. Manolo is sitting cross-legged, the instrument in his lap. His left hand darts up and down the fretboard, seething and writhing on the sandalwood. Notes gather their forces and rumble in the air around the camp. His fingers tensed but alert in each new position, gripping the strings as if life itself depended on it.
Aware that Girado is watching he brings the music to a climax, strumming powerfully with his right hand. From time to time he slaps the strings to kill the sound to snatch the music back out of the communal air, to deny his brother its existence, to deny him its pleasure.
Each time he muffles the strings and releases the sound he is repeating this tantalising syncopation. The more the volume grows, the more the silence is accentuated. In the end he brings relief to them both and extinguishes the music, and there is no evidence it ever existed at all.
They break camp and within hours they are on a ridge looking out across at a vast corrugation of polka-dotted mountains and valleys. Here he can let the mules off their tethers and walk behind. Somewhere to the south-east is the coast, hidden under a haze of heat and cloud. To the north are the mountains of the Pyrenees, always distant and aloof, marking a border Girado has never crossed. For a short while they are on top of the world.
But it isn't long before they must drop down into another valley. On the descent they brace their tired limbs against gravity and Girado takes the animals in hand once again and leads them diagonally down the rocky slope.
They zig-zag back and forth across the hill, searching for the safest way down. The guitar comes loose on Katerina's saddle and hangs by its neck. Swinging back and forth across the animal's flank as it barrels down the slope, the instrument gives a soft tonal whump each time it strikes an edge of feltwork below the saddle. This metronome-like ticking is the voice of an instrument that even bound and gagged finds a way to make music.
Girado turns. "Tie it up, for God's sake."
"What's it to you."
"There's a time and a place. Let the whole world know, why don't you. How will scaring away game help us find hawk?"
By noon they reach the tree line again; there is a copse with signs of a spring and further up a dusty track a group of houses. They find the water has dried up or been plugged by rockslides underground, and follow the trail into the cobbled era. Wattle roofs splintered and exposed protrude like bones from flesh. The village is deserted. Girado kicks a wooden door and it lists from a single rusty hinge. He peers into the darkness.
"The country is littered with places like this where 10 or 12 families lived cheek by jowl. You put up with it only because you never know when you may have to ask your neighbour for help."
He looks at the houses cut into the face of the hill; the derelict fields, the terraced walls that have burst out from neglect and collapsed into the parched earth, and says: "Leave it to the mosquitoes."
In the late afternoon they see their first hawk ringing in the air. They watch the spirals it makes as it rises. At this distance it is no more than a bluey-green shadow. A female, Girado reckons. It's looking for prey, casting its flight back and forth across the sky, its deep brown irises focused on the distant earth below. Girado shades his eyes from the sun with the flat of his hand and follows the flight.
"Wait for the stoop," he says. "When it comes it'll be sudden."
THE hawk's dive takes even him by surprise; one moment he has her in his sights the next she is gone. She has folded her wings and plunged into oblivion. It takes him a moment to locate her body as it arches through the air and even as he does the hawk is pulling out of her dive and rising again over the spot where her prey has sought cover.
"She's making her point," he says to Manolo. "I'll try to get nearer."
He leaves the animals with his brother and moves closer to the action. As the bird moves up through the air to find her pitch, he finds a slab of rock to clamber upon and stretches full length. The hawk waits on, the feathers of her barred underbelly shuttering in the sun. Girado watches the place where her prey has gone to ground.
When the small bird loses her nerve and breaks out from her woody fortress, skawling and chattering, the falcon comes skimming over the wilderness with her angled wing knuckles folding air and shudders into it before it has flown fifty yards.
Girado watches with admiration the falcon carry her prey off in her yellow talons. A fine hawk with a nest not far off. He leaves his brother with the animals and goes to scout around. He moves swiftly on his own and scours the earth for feathers, fur or bones. For signs of the hawk's regurgitated castings. He climbs higher, scrambling from rock to rock.
He is looking for a ledge where a hawk might bask, a rocky plinth with a butcher board, a lookout with views onto the valley below. Or the bird's mews, where the bird moults. Anything at all. If she's nesting, he'll find it; there'll be signs.
He pauses for a moment to look back down on the height he has left behind, crouches down on his knees to see things from the bird's perspective. He runs the palm of his hand across the ground, takes up a handful of earth and sieves it through his fingers. He cuts the back of it sweeping it through a bush and a thin line of blood appears.
Sets like beads. He turns rocks over only to reset them. When he finds an east-facing ledge he hauls himself up - these birds enjoy the early morning sun - and the bird's mutings are everywhere. In black and white embraces, baked by the sun. And pale-white stains scattered across the rock.
But not all of the shit is hard, there are some gooey rivulets, fresh evidence of the bird's routine. He listens; there is no birdsong, no twittering of small birds going about their business. The silence tells him all he needs to know. The silence might as well scream that the falcon's nest is near.
He's thinking now of how well she flew, how well she struck, of what a great footer she'll make. And he is thinking of her nestlings that will be getting ready to fly. A fine prize.
He stands up on the precipice, careful not to smudge the shit, to leave a sign. He will come back with the glove, the hampers, the rufter hood and the element of surprise.
The music hits him as he turns to go. It whirls in and out of the rockshafts, like a stone-wind section of a huge granite orchestra gone mad with exuberance. Chambers and crevasses deep in the earth seem to echo with a melody.
And above this, something is added, another layer of discordant music mewling and shrieking into his consciousness. It takes him a moment to recognise this new sound. The defiant pair has risen from the nest above his head not yards away.
He slithers from the ledge. Speed is everything. Trusting gravity, concerned for nothing, he tumbles down the slope, his bone-handled knife bumping his hip. In the clearing Manolo sets the guitar against a rock, steps forward a little, a puzzled look on his face. Girado stops a few feet away. The long blade flashes in the sun, Manolo's eyes drawn to it.
But he doesn't see it leave his brother's hand, feels nothing as it splits the air, hears only the briefest whistling before the impact; loud, cacophonous, collapsing. Only a chord turning in upon itself, sucking itself silent.
Then the splintering of wood. The knife embedded in the belly of the instrument, the nylon strings stiff and shivery.