Rising in confusion, Manuel took two steps toward the aisle, about to bolt. He stopped short. His initial feeling of stupidity gave way to indignation.
“I am part of the family. If they don’t mix with others, that’s their choice. The man in that coffin is my husband, and unless I’m mistaken, as of now this pew belongs to me. It’s my property. Tell them they can choose to sit here or elsewhere in the church. I’m not moving.”
Gri?án turned pale. Manuel sat down again in the same place, so furious he had to clench his hands together to hide their shaking. He heard whispers in the hushed silence that had installed itself among those attending and then the sound of steps resuming their course. To the first pew on the left.
He didn’t look at them once during the ceremony.
It lasted almost two hours. The funeral mass, a service for a single departed person, was officiated by a priest about forty years old who seemed to know the family well. Manuel assumed from the priest’s apparently real chagrin that he’d actually known álvaro. The officiant was assisted by an unusually large number of other priests. Manuel counted nine of them, all elderly and remote. In curious ritual fashion they hovered at a respectful distance in a semicircle behind the altar, assisting the younger priest.
Manuel remained seated throughout, indifferent to the priest’s promptings, drained by the effects of his rage and the disorienting emotional intensity of those behind him. He heard moaning. Rise, sit down, up again, sit down . . . He looked up for a moment and found that the women lined up in the aisle for their turns at communion were peering at him. He withdrew into his shell, looking down, fighting to contain his increasing distress, and resisting the urgent desire simply to get up and leave.
Once the service was over, a pallbearer team of men with calloused hands and ironed handkerchiefs lifted the coffin and carried it to the cemetery. Manuel was grateful to find the breeze had moderated in the course of the morning. The sun had found its way out between the low clouds massed above.
“I’ve already informed the marquis of your decision,” Gri?án whispered as they exited the church.
Manuel limited himself to a nod, wondering when Gri?án could have done so. It must have been in the course of the funeral ceremony. After all, as Gri?án had told him, the Mu?iz de Dávila account was one of the most important of those he managed. Mindful of that, the executor had probably been quick to put himself forward in the expectation of continuing the arrangement with the new owners.
Manuel hung back and let the others go ahead. They gathered in a circle around the grave. He watched them from the edge of the cemetery, unwilling to come any closer. The energy expended in the dispute over the church pew had left him drained and unwilling to chance another confrontation.
In contrast to the never-ending funeral service the burial went quickly. The prayer for the dead, that was all. Because of the massed crowd, he didn’t witness the lowering of the coffin. The crowd began to disperse. The priests dutifully greeted the family and then walked toward the side entrance to the church, certainly to disrobe in the sacristy.
He felt a small hand slip into his. He looked down and discovered the family’s little boy. Manuel leaned down to speak to him, and the tiny one threw his arms around his neck and kissed his cheek. The child ran off toward his mother, who was waiting at a distance, and turned to smile before they took the path back toward the manor house.
“Se?or Ortigosa.”
He turned to find that Santiago, the new marquis, was standing before him.
Some distance behind the marquis, Gri?án gave Manuel an encouraging gesture as he walked away in the company of the women.
“I am Santiago Mu?iz de Dávila. álvaro was my brother,” he said and held out a right hand partly covered by a cast.
Taken aback by this, Manuel just looked at him.
“Don’t worry, it’s not serious. Just an accident while riding. A broken finger and a few scratches.”
Manuel cautiously took the man’s hand, feeling the rigid shape of plaster under the binding.
“Se?or Gri?án informed me of your decision, and the least I can do is to offer you my thanks and those of my family. I want to apologize if we’ve seemed cold or impolite. We’ve been overcome”—he looked toward the grave—“by the events of the past few days.”
“There’s no need to apologize. I know how you feel.”
Manuel said nothing more. The brother took leave with a slight nod and hurried to catch up with his wife, who was assisting the matriarch. The wife gave way, allowing him to replace her at his mother’s side.
The young priest crossed the cemetery toward him. Only the burial team remained, the foreman and a group of workmen smoking as they huddled together against the side of the church.
“I’d like to speak with you for a moment.” The priest paused. “álvaro and I have been friends since childhood. We went to school together. But just now I have to take these things off,” he said, indicating the voluminous liturgical vestments. “If you’ll wait, I’ll be back in just a minute.”
“I don’t know,” Manuel replied evasively, looking toward the way out of the church clearing. “I’m actually in a bit of a hurry.”
“It’ll take just a minute, I promise,” the priest replied, breaking into a run toward the side entrance of the church.
Manuel glanced at the workmen smoking and chatting cheerfully, but he saw that the foreman, the only one not wearing overalls, was staring at him. Manuel had the odd feeling that the man was about to leave the group to come tell him something. But after a moment Manuel simply acknowledged the man with a nod and walked toward the open grave. He wandered past the crosses and read the inscriptions as he went.
Apparently Gri?án was right about the posthumous austerity of the nobility. The graves were marked only with the names and the dates of birth and death. No mention of titles or distinctions. Some were from the 1700s, and the only aspect that differentiated those from the more recent ones was the color of the stone used for the crosses.
Next to the open grave stood colorful flower arrangements that would be placed over it. They bore ribbons that proclaimed the names of the sponsors, clues to how much they’d cost. The arrangements were piled high, a perfumed funeral pyre. Without thinking, he reached into his coat pocket and extracted the waxy gardenia he’d picked on the way there. Its strong perfume diffused into the air and dominated all the rest. Manuel stepped close enough to see the coffin, now partly obscured by the handfuls of dark earth the family had tossed upon it during the prayer for the dead. There were no flowers in the grave, as might have been expected, suggesting that Gri?án’s comment about austerity was accurate. After all, the brilliance of these expensive floral tributes was being reserved for display during the burial, when everyone could see them.
He looked again at the now dull surface of the coffin with its crucifix and image of a wasted, dying Christ. He raised the flower to his lips, took in the aroma, lightly kissed it, and held his hand out over the grave. He closed his eyes as he searched within himself for the fiercely defended chamber where his pain was confined. He couldn’t locate it. He sensed a presence behind him. He closed his hand around the flower as if to shield it.
He turned toward the priest, who stood waiting a few steps behind him. In street clothes the man looked even younger, although he was still wearing his clerical collar.
“If you need more time . . .”
“No,” he responded, walking toward the man as he returned the gardenia to his jacket pocket. “I’ve finished here.”
The priest’s eyebrows rose in surprise at his curt tone. Manuel saw that and forestalled any possibility of the expression of compassion likely to follow. “As I mentioned, I don’t have very much time,” he said in a rush. Suddenly the melancholy of the cemetery was unbearable. He wanted to flee.
“Where’s your car?”