Carlos Ruiz Zafon - The Shadow of the Wind

The SHADOW of the WIND

Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Translated by Lucia Graves

'A bit theatrical, if you ask me. But whoever he was, at least he had a sense of humour,' Isaac reckoned.

With the memory of that night's encounter still fresh in my mind, I could not see the humorous side of it, from any angle, but I saved my opinion for a more auspicious occasion.

'This person, Coubert, or whatever his name is - was his face burned, disfigured?'

Isaac looked at me with a smile that betrayed both enjoyment and concern. 'I haven't the foggiest. The person who told me all this never actually got to see him, and only knew because Cabestany's son told his secretary the following day. He didn't mention anything about burned faces. Are you sure you haven't got this out of some radio show?'

I threw my head back, as if to make light of the subject. 'How did the matter end? Did the publisher's son sell the books to Coubert?' I asked.

'The senseless dunce tried to be too clever by half. He asked for more money than Coubert was proposing, and Coubert withdrew his offer. A few days later, shortly after midnight, Cabestany's warehouse in Pueblo Nuevo burned down to its foundations. And for free.'

I sighed. 'What happened to Carax's books, then? Were they all destroyed?'

'Nearly all. Luckily, when Cabestany's secretary heard about the offer, she had a premonition. On her own initiative, she went to the warehouse and took a copy of each of the Carax titles. She was the one who had corresponded with Carax, and over the years they had formed a friendship of sorts. Her name was Nuria, and I think she was the only person in the publishing house, probably in all of Barcelona, who had read Carax's novels. Nuria has a fondness for lost causes. When she was little, she would take in small animals she picked up in the street. In time she went on to adopt failed authors, maybe because her father wanted to be one and never made it.'

'You seem to know her very well.'

Isaac wore his devilish smile. 'More than she thinks I do. She's my daughter.'

Silence and doubt gnawed at me. The more I heard of the story, the more confused I felt. 'Apparently, Carax returned to Barcelona in 1936.

Some say he died here. Did he have any relatives left here? Someone who might know about him?'

Isaac sighed. 'Goodness only knows. Carax's parents had been separated for some time, I believe. The mother had gone off to South America, where she remarried. I don't think he was on speaking terms with his father since he moved to Paris.'

'Why was that?'

'I don't know. People tend to complicate their own lives, as if living weren't already complicated enough.'

'Do you know whether Carax's father is still alive?'

'I hope so. He was younger than me, but I go out very little these days and I haven't read the obituary pages for years - acquaintances drop dead like flies, and, quite frankly, it puts the wind up you. By the way, Carax was his mother's surname. The father was called Fortuny. He had a hat shop on Ronda de San Antonio.'

'Is it possible, then, do you think, that when he returned to Barcelona, Carax may have felt tempted to visit your daughter, Nuria, if they were friends, since he wasn't on good terms with his father?'

Isaac laughed bitterly. I'm probably the last person who would know. After all, I'm her father. I know that once, in 1932 or 1933, Nuria went to Paris on business for Cabestany, and she stayed in Julian Carax's apartment for a couple of weeks. It was Cabestany who told me. According to my daughter, she stayed in a hotel. She was unmarried at the time, and I had an inkling that Carax was a bit smitten with her. My Nuria is the sort who breaks a man's heart just by walking into a shop.'

'Do you mean they were lovers?'

'You like melodrama, eh? Look, I've never interfered in Nuria's private life, because mine isn't picture perfect either. If you ever have a daughter - a blessing I wouldn't wish on anyone, because it's sod's law that sooner or later she will break your heart - anyhow, as I was saying, if you ever have a daughter, you'll begin, without realizing it, to divide men into two camps: those you suspect are sleeping with her and those you don't. Whoever says that's not true is lying through his teeth. I suspected that Carax was one of the first, so I didn't care whether he was a genius or a poor wretch. To me he was always a scoundrel.'

'Perhaps you were mistaken.'

'Don't be offended, but you're still very young and know as much about women as I do about baking marzipan pastries.'

'No contest there,' I agreed. 'What happened to the books your daughter took from the warehouse?'

'They're here.'

'Here?'

'Where do you think your book came from - the one you found on the day your father brought you to this place?'

'I don't understand.'

'It's very simple. One night, some days after the fire in Cabestany's warehouse, my daughter, Nuria, turned up here. She looked nervous. She said that someone had been following her and she was afraid it was the man called Coubert, who was trying to get hold of the books to destroy them. Nuria said she had come to hide Carax's books. She went into the large hall and hid them in the maze of bookshelves, like buried treasure. I didn't ask her where she'd put them, nor did she tell me. Before she left, she said that as soon as she managed to find Carax, she'd come back for them. It seemed to me that she was still in love with him, but I didn't say anything. I asked her whether she'd seen him recently, whether she'd had any news. She said she hadn't heard from him for months, practically since he'd sent her the final corrections for the manuscript of his last book. I can't say whether she was lying. What I do know is that after that day Nuria didn't hear from Carax again, and those books were left here, gathering dust.'