On Heroes and Tombs by Ernesto Sabato
“I’m certain of one thing, young feller: there were many fights in our family because of Rosas, and the separation of the two branches, especially in the family of Juan Batista Acevedo, goes back to those days.”
He coughed, appeared to be about to fall asleep, but suddenly spoke up again:
“Because people may say anything they like about Lavalle, son, but no man of good faith can deny his integrity, his honesty, his gentlemanliness, his unselfishness. Yessiree.”
I have fought in one hundred five battles for the freedom of this continent. I fought in the fields of Chile under the command of General San Martín. I then fought against the imperial forces in Brazilian territory. And then later, in those two years of misfortune, through the length and breadth of our poor country. I may have committed great errors, the greatest of them all the execution of Dorrego by firing squad. But who is master of the truth? I know nothing, except that this cruel land is my land and that it was here that I was obliged to fight and die. My body is rotting on my cavalry charger, but that is all I know.
“Yessiree,” the old man said, coughing and clearing his throat, as though lost in thought, with his teary eyes, repeating “yessiree” several times, moving his head as though nodding at an invisible conversational partner.
Lost in thought, with teary eyes. Looking toward reality, toward the only reality.
A reality organized in accordance with very strange laws.
“It was around ’32, the way my father told it, yes, ’32, that’s right. Because I can tell you one thing for sure: the business of improving cattle had its pros and its cons. It was Miller the Englishman who began. The gringo Miller, an excellent sort. A hard worker and thrifty like all Scots, it’s true. A tightwad, to put it more clearly (a little laugh and repeated coughs). Not like those of us who were born here in this country, who are too open-handed, and that’s why we’re where we are (coughs). Don Juan Miller had married Dolores Balbastro. A lady with lots of spunk—there was many a time that she took charge of the defense of the ranch against Indian bands, and she handled a rifle like a man. Like grandma, who was also mighty handy with fire-arms. They were tough women, my boy, and of course it was the hard life they had to lead that made them so, more or less. What was I talking about?”
“About Miller the Englishman.”
“About Miller the Englishman, that’s right. Everybody was talking about him and the famous Tarquino.”
He began laughing again and coughing, and daubed clumsily at his teary eyes with a handkerchief.
“What was I talking to you about?”
“About pedigreed bulls, sir.”
“Ah, yes, bulls.”
He coughed and nodded his head for a moment. Then he said:
“Evaristo’s family never forgave us. Never. Not even when the Mazorca beheaded my uncle. There’s no getting around it, our family was divided on account of the tyrant Rosas. I could tell you about a thousand things that happened around that time, in ’40 especially, when they beheaded a young man named Iranzuaga, the fiancé of one Isabelita Ortiz, who was a relative of ours on one side of her family. Nobody had a peaceful night’s sleep in those days. And you can imagine all the worries in my parents’ house, what with my mother being all alone after papa joined the Legion. And my grandfather, Don Patricio, had gone off too—did I tell you the story of Don Patricio?—and my great-uncle Bonifacio and Uncle Panchito. So the only one left on the estanciafn11 was Uncle Saturnino, who was the youngest one, just a lad. And all the rest were women. Every last one of them women.”
He wiped his teary eyes with the handkerchief again, coughed, nodded his head, and seemed to drop off to sleep. But suddenly he said:
“Sixty leagues. And with Oribe’s men close on their heels. And my father said the October sun was terribly hot. The general was rotting very fast, and nobody could stand the smell after two days’ gallop. And they still had forty leagues to go before they reached the border. Five days and forty leagues more. Just to save Lavalle’s bones and his head. For that one reason, son. Because they were doomed and there was nothing else left to do: no war against Rosas, nothing. They would cut the head off the corpse and send it to Rosas on the tip of a lance, in order to dishonor him. With a placard that said: ‘This is the head of the savage, of the filthy, of the loathsome Unitarist dog Lavalle.’ So they had to save the general’s body at all costs, by crossing the border into Bolivia, shooting their way out as they fled for seven days. Sixty leagues of frantic retreat, almost without stopping to rest.”
I am Major Alejandro Danel, son of Major Danel, of the Napoleonic Army. I can still remember when he returned with the Grande Armée, in the garden of the Tuileries or on the Champs-Elysées, on horseback. I can still see him followed by his escort of Mamelukes, with their legendary curved sabers. And later, when France was finally no longer the land of Liberty and I dreamed of fighting for oppressed peoples, I embarked for these territories, along with Bruiz, Viel, Bardel, Brandsen, and Rauch, who had fought at Napoleon’s side. Heaven preserve us—how much time has gone by, how many battles, how many victories and defeats, how many deaths, and how much bloodshed! That afternoon in 1825 when I met Lavalle and he seemed to me to be an imperial eagle, at the head of his regiment of cuirassiers. And then I marched off with him to the Brazilian war, and when he fell at Yerbal I picked him up and with my men brought him through eighty leagues of rivers and mountains, pursued by the enemy, as we are now … and I never once left his side …. And now, after eight hundred leagues of sadness, I am marching alongside his rotted body, toward nothingness ….
He seemed to wake up again and said:
“Some things I’ve seen myself, others I heard from papa, but above all from mama, because papa was a quiet man and seldom said much. So that when General Hornos or Colonel Ocampo came to drink maté and reminisce about the old days and the Legion, papa would just listen and say from time to time: ‘That’s something, isn’t it?’ or ‘That’s the way things are, old friend.’ ”
He nodded again and dozed off for a moment, but very soon awakened again and said:
“Some day I’ll tell you the curious story of my grandfather, whose name wasn’t Olmos but Elmtrees, who arrived in this country as a lieutenant in the English army at the time of the invasions. It’s a curious story, believe me” (laughing and coughing).
He nodded and suddenly began to snore.
Martín looked toward the door again, but there was not a sound to be heard. Where was Alejandra? What was she doing in her room? The thought also came to him that if he hadn’t left already it was so as not to leave the old man alone, though the latter couldn’t even hear him and perhaps didn’t even see him: the old man was merely going on with his mysterious subterranean existence, paying no attention to him or to anyone living at present, isolated as he was by the years, by deafness and bad eyesight, but above all by the memory of the past that interposed itself like a dark wall of dreams, living in the bottom of a well, remembering blacks, cavalcades, beheadings, and happenings in the Legion. No, that wasn’t true: he hadn’t stayed out of consideration for the old man, but rather because he was as though paralyzed by a sort of terror at traversing those regions of reality in which the grandfather, the madman, and even Alejandra herself seemed to live. A mysterious, mad territory, as absurd and tenuous as dreams, as frightening as dreams. Nonetheless he got up from the chair to which he seemed to have been nailed and with cautious footsteps began to move away from the old man, amid the jumble of furniture mindful of an auction house, with the watchful eyes of the ancestors on the walls staring down at him, his own eyes never leaving the box in the glass case. He finally managed to make his way over to the door and stood there in front of it, not daring to open it. He moved closer and put his ear to the crack: he had the impression that the madman was on the other side, waiting, clarinet in hand, for him to come out. He thought he could even hear him breathing. Then in terror he slowly made his way back to his chair and sat down again.
Yes, there are thirty-five leagues left to go. Three days’ journey at full gallop through the great valley, with the swollen corpse that stinks for yards around, distilling the horrible liquids of putrefaction. On and on, with a few sharpshooters in the rear guard. From Jujuy to Huacalera, twenty-four leagues. Only thirty-five leagues more, they say, so as to keep up their courage. Only four, perhaps five days’ journey more, if they are lucky.
In the silent night the hoofbeats of the phantom cavalry can be heard. Heading ever northward.
“Because in the valley the sun beats down, young feller, because this is very high country and the air is very pure. So that after two days’ journey the body had swelled up and you could smell the stink for yards around, my father said, and on the third day they had to strip the flesh off it, that’s what.”
Colonel Pedernera orders them to halt and confers with his comrades: the body is decomposing, the stench is frightful. They will strip the flesh off it and keep the bones. And the heart too, someone says. But above all the head: Oribe will never have the head, he will never be able to dishonor the general.
Who is willing to do the deed? Who is able to do it?
Colonel Alejandro Danel will do it.
They then take the general’s stinking body down from the horse. They place it on the bank of the Huacalera River, as the Colonel kneels alongside it and takes out his field knife. He contemplates the naked, deformed body of his leader through his tears. The battle-hardened men standing about in a circle also look at it, stolid and pensive, their eyes too dimmed by tears.
Then he slowly sinks the knife into the rotten flesh.
He nodded his head and said:
“Later on he was mayor, until the Federalists came to power. What was I talking to you about?”
“About his leaving the mayoralty, sir.” (Who?)
“That’s right, the mayoralty. He left it when the Federalists came to power, that’s right. And he used to say to whoever would listen to him, perhaps so that his words would reach Don Juan Manuel, that what with cows and Indians he had more than enough trouble on his hands and didn’t have time for politics (a little laugh). But the Restorer, who was no dummy—nosiree!—never believed that (little laughs). He wasn’t fooled for a minute, because my grandfather found out that Don Juan Manuel was sending letters to the mayor of La Horqueta telling him not to take his eyes off the Englishman Olmos (laughs and coughs) because he’d had word that he was conspiring with other landowners of Salto and Pergamino. That crafty devil wasn’t taken in one bit, how could he have been, a lynx like him! Because grandfather had in fact been going around palavering with the others, as everybody could plainly see when General Lavalle disembarked in San Pedro, in August of ’40. Grandfather presented himself there with his cavalry and his two oldest sons: Celedonio, my father, who was eighteen then, and Uncle Panchito, who was a year older. A disastrous campaign, that one in ’forty! Grandfather held out in Quebracho Herrado till they were down to the last cannon ball, covering Lavalle’s retreat. He could have saved his skin and gotten out, but he didn’t. And when all was lost, he shot the very last cannon ball he had left and surrendered to Oribe’s troops. When he was told of the death of Panchito, the son he loved the best, all he said was: ‘At least the general was saved.’ And that was how my grandfather Don Patricio Olmos ended his life in this country.”
The old man nodded, murmuring “Armistron, that’s right, Armistron,” and then suddenly fell into a deep sleep.
13
Martín waited, time went by, and the old man did not wake up. He thought he’d really fallen asleep now, and so, little by little, trying not to make noise, he got up and began walking toward the door that Alejandra had left by. He was terrified, because dawn had broken already and the first light of day was already illuminating Don Pancho’s room. He thought that he might run into Uncle Bebe, or that old Justina, the servant, might be up. And if so, what would he say to them?
“I came last night with Alejandra,” he would tell them.
Then the thought occurred to him that in this house nothing could possibly attract people’s attention, and that therefore he had no reason to fear that there would be some unpleasant scene. Except, perhaps, if he bumped into the madman, Uncle Bebe.
He heard, or thought he heard, a creaking noise, the sound of footsteps, in the hallway outside the door. With his hand on the doorknob and his heart pounding, he waited in silence. A train whistled far off in the distance. He put his ear to the door and listened anxiously: there wasn’t a sound. He was about to open the door when again he heard a faint creaking noise, unmistakable this time: footsteps, cautious ones with pauses in between them, as though someone were slowly creeping closer and closer to that same door on the other side of it.
“The madman,” Martín thought in a panic, and for a moment he withdrew his ear from the door, fearing that it might suddenly be jerked open from the other side and he’d be discovered in that compromising position.
He stood there a long time, unable to make up his mind what to do: on the one hand he was afraid to open the door since he might then find himself face to face with the madman; on the other hand, as he looked back across the room to where Don Pancho was sleeping, he feared the old man would wake up and seek him out.
But then he thought that perhaps it would be best if the old man were to wake up, because then if the madman came into the room the old man could explain. Or perhaps one didn’t have to give the madman any sort of explanation.
He remembered that Alejandra had told him that he was a peaceable madman, who did nothing but play the clarinet: eternally repeating, rather, a sort of tootle. But did they let him wander about loose in the house? Or was he shut up in one of the rooms, the way Escolástica had been, this being the custom in these old family mansions?
He spent some time absorbed in these thoughts, still listening.
As he heard nothing more, he put his ear to the door again, calmer this time, listening intently so as to make out the slightest sound or the slightest suspicious creaking noise: but he couldn’t hear a thing now.
He began to turn the doorknob very slowly: it was just above one of those huge old-fashioned locks with keys a good half a foot long. The doorknob seemed to make a terrible noise as it turned. And the thought came to him that if the madman were anywhere about he couldn’t help but hear it and be on his guard. But what else was there to do at this point? Since opening the door was now practically a fait accompli, he screwed up his courage and flung it wide open.
He very nearly screamed.
Standing there, hieratically, in front of him was the madman: a man past forty, with a beard many days old and disheveled hair, dressed in threadbare clothes, without a tie. He was wearing a sports coat that at one time had been navy blue and gray flannel trousers. His shirt was unbuttoned and his whole attire was wrinkled and dirty. His right hand was hanging down along his side, and in it was the famous clarinet. His face was the self-absorbed, emaciated countenance with staring, hallucinated eyes so common in those who are mad; it was a pinched, angular face with the gray green eyes of the Olmoses and a pronounced aquiline nose, but his head was enormous and elongated like a dirigible.
Paralyzed with fear, Martín was unable to get a single word out.
The madman stood there staring at him for some time in silence and then turned around without a word, his body waggling slightly, in a way reminiscent of the slow contortions of youngsters in a street band, but barely perceptible, and walked off down the passageway toward the inside of the house, doubtless heading for his room.
Martín made off in the opposite direction almost at a run, toward the courtyard that was now flooded with the light of the dawning day.
An aged Indian woman was doing laundry in a stone basin. “Justina,” Martín thought, giving another start.
“Good morning,” he said, doing his best to appear cool and collected,
The old woman answered not a word. “Perhaps she’s deaf, like Don Pancho,” Martín thought.
Her mysterious, inscrutable Indian gaze nonetheless followed him for several seconds that seemed endless to Martín. Then she went on with her washing.
Martín, who had halted in his tracks in a moment of indecision, realized that he ought to act as though nothing were out of the ordinary, so he headed as casually as possible for the winding staircase leading up to the Mirador.
He reached the door at the top of the stairs and knocked.
After a few moments, not having received any answer, he knocked again. There was no response this time either. Then putting his mouth to the crack between the door and the doorframe, he called out “Alejandra!” in a loud voice. But time went by and there was no answer.
He decided then that the best thing to do would be to leave. But instead he found himself walking toward the window of the Mirador. When he reached it he saw that the curtains had not been drawn. He looked inside and tried to spy Alejandra in the semi-darkness. But when his eyes had adjusted to the dim light there inside, he discovered, to his surprise, that she was not in the room.
For a moment he couldn’t move or think a coherent thought. Then he headed for the stairway and began to make his way carefully down it, as he tried to set his thoughts in order.
He crossed the back patio, went around the old house by way of the abandoned side garden, and finally found himself out on the street.
He walked hesitantly down the sidewalk toward Montes de Oca, intending to take the bus there. But after walking along for a moment, he stopped and looked back toward the Olmoses’ house. He was still all confused and unable to decide exactly what he should do.
He took a few steps back toward the house and then halted again. He looked toward the rusty iron gate as though he were expecting something. What? In the light of day the house looked even more ridiculous than by night, as a ghost is more absurd in broad daylight, for with its cracked and peeling walls, the weeds overrunning the garden, its rusted iron grille at the entrance and its front door practically falling off, it stood out in even more violent contrast to the factories and smokestacks looming up behind it.