Chapter Five
In his time William Sutherland has seen enough reportage of rivers bursting their banks, flooding helpless streets with an intemperate fury.
This is how the historic city’s winding passageways seem to him now, as a torrent of excited people flows unstoppably through alleys and calles, past bustling shops and rainbow stalls, jostling Catholics and non-believers alike.
All surging towards the sound of the drums.
Yet, being predominantly Spaniards, they are chatting and shouting and munching as they scamper, all at maximum volume.
Some are dressed very smartly, in Sunday suits and church dresses, out of respect for the occasion, with many of the women in fashionably high heels, despite the cobbles and the chaos.
Dragging children, dogs, shopping trolleys and darkly widowed grannies in their colourful wake.
The shopkeepers and restaurateurs, who have seen it all before, attempt to divert them with goods and menus.
They point to exquisite Andalusian crafts at ‘practically give-away’ prices and empty tables that won’t be empty for long.
Inevitably, a few tiny tributaries trickle off.
But they’re matched by equally determined shoppers and diners pouring out of tiny doorways, bags in hand and tummies full, anxious to swim with the devoted tide.
William finds himself fearful that Luisa will be toppled and crushed in the good-natured but no less unstoppable stampede.
His spouse is quite solid and strong, perhaps a bit too solid, he thinks uncharitably, but her regular workouts haven’t made her any taller.
Yet she weaves and winds her way through her compatriot throng with such relentlessly single-minded vigour, becoming more Spanish by the minute, that it is he who is in greater danger of being overwhelmed.
“Scusi. Perdón. MOVE! Luisa…?”
He finally catches up with her at a small but tightly packed crossroads, in perfect time to catch what is clearly a massive and meticulously drilled procession. Medieval, unchanging yet curiously contemporary.
Even William recalls that this entire gang, numbering in their hundreds and perhaps even thousands – Nazarenos in their pointed hoods, humble penitents stolidly bearing their crosses, altar boys, bandsmen, churchgoers and clergy – will have set off some time ago from their own local parish church and are treading their slow, solemn way to the magnificent cathedral in the spiritual heart of this great city.
Or maybe they’re on their way back – he would have to look at the map. Not that he actually cares.
But here they are, the guys in the conical hats, and not just in white this time.
This cohort of intensely serious and devout men, scores of them, many barefoot, sport hoods of the deepest purple and carry not shopping bags but massive brown candles or silver sceptres.
Despite knowing that these are just ordinary, self-effacing believers, simple, peace-loving members of the community, processing in proud anonymity, they still give William the shivers.
Calmly they ignore the ranks of justifiably rapt humanity lining the streets or waving from narrow balconies, their eyes fixed firmly on the road ahead or the heavens above.
This is no victory parade, unless the victory is that of a religion whose ceremonies have endured, undiminished by outside forces, for hundreds of years.
He has no idea of the pecking order or whether these anonymous guys are more or less important than the men behind them, men who are struggling – or pretending to struggle – with huge wooden (or pretend wooden) crucifixes.
But the ones to whom his heart goes out, and for whom he feels a genuine respect, are the ranks of men directly under the gigantic object now heaving precariously into view.
Teams of dedicated and sturdy volunteers, the costaleros, who move the dais-like structure forward to the slow but exacting rhythm of the drums.
They’re all burly, medium-sized men, of necessity around the same height, so that the ancient float or paso, a gleaming riot of burnished gold and silver, heavy as anvils, bedecked with velvet and candles and freshly cut flowers, maintains its precarious balance as it proceeds on its meticulously preordained journey.
He recalls with incredulity that these thirty staunch believers are supporting, with their impossibly strong arms, the entire weight of the beams and the sacred panoply that towers above them on the revered and immaculately sculptured floats.
All they wear, to reduce any cranial impact as they bounce and sway under at least a ton of wood, are rough cloth turbans around their heads.
Yet, all that the onlookers can see of these noble bearers, until they stop for breath and water or, he suspects, something stronger, are their firm, richly tanned feet in sandals or trainers, peeping under the thick white cloth that falls, like a room service tablecloth, almost to the ground.
Like so many of the pasos that William is certain will process past him this week – and God knows there will be a host of these floats that pass in the night – this towering structure bears, within its classical depiction of a pivotal Mystery scene, the tortured yet still somehow benign figure of Christ on his cross.
Surrounded by floral tributes and yet more candles, this Sevillano Christ gazes down lovingly on all. It would be either him or his poor mum up there today, sculpted yet almost too real, thinks William. They’re the headliners.
William sniffs the air, scented with incense, freshly baked snacks and human sweat, and looks around for Luisa. She is nowhere to be seen.
He is certain that she will turn up and is not entirely unhappy to be witnessing this undeniably impressive spectacle for a few precious moments on his own.
Or indeed spending the entire day on his own, just him and the world and his laptop.
Which he knows, if he truly thinks about it, is not how things should be.
So William is truly not going to think about it.
He rarely does, because thinking alters little and dwelling in regret doesn’t pay for dwelling in Surrey.
On his office pinboard is the quote “nothing is certain but death and taxes”, sent to him on a postcard by a jovial client, but he’s pretty certain that this is optimistic bollocks.
He knows in his heart that some things are set in stone and precious little will change between the two of them, William and Luisa, thirty years on, even on this week of supposed ‘connection’, like a LinkedIn of the spirit.
Except, of course, their financial security, that will be sure to change, Sod’s Law, if he doesn’t stay forever on the ball.
So he mustn’t forget – he has to make that phone call. Who knows – perhaps the gentleman he will be calling is actually sardined within this or a similarly overstimulated crowd right this very minute.
Suddenly his attention is diverted.
William finds himself standing next to a small boy, hardly more than six or seven years old and unusually fair for a local. He is clearly with his parents, a Spanish couple, warm and loving, with whom he seems very much at ease.
Something about the child stops William cold.
He knows that he must not stare, that it would make the child and his parents uneasy, yet he finds that he can’t take his eyes off the boy. Short, newly-trimmed Easter hair, with that barber’s trademark point at the nape, pale blue eyes, crushingly innocent face. And a smile of such wonder.
William’s heart begins to pound, at the same time as his mind rebukes him for his foolishness.
Not now, William. Not here. Creepy is not a good look.
The boy is clearly unaware of William. Or of anyone. He is consumed by the procession and especially the float, as he stares upwards, open-mouthed, at the timeless magic passing slowly by.
“Senor – Senor!”
The screech of the old gitano woman tears William away. A new scent has entered his awareness – hardly surprising as she is thrusting a sprig of rosemary almost up his nose.
He shakes his head and backs away from the tiny and almost toothless Romani vendor.
Not that there is much room for evasion in the solidifying crowd.
She moves in deftly for the sell, staring into his glasses and his brain, muttering impenetrable incantations, which he assumes are about her crippling poverty and his desperate need for a herb best known for flavouring lamb.
He waves her off with a vehemence that almost sends her entire stock flying.
The shrieked imprecations hang in the air as she shuffles off to another victim.
And then he sees it. Ploughing towards him.
A bus, of a kind he doesn’t recognise, but then how the hell does he know the buses of Andalusia? What he does know is that it has come out of nowhere. Hurtling down the narrow street directly opposite, which he had assumed was fully blocked off to traffic and pedestrians.
It is approaching at such speed that he doesn’t have time to wonder why no one has noticed it or why they aren’t instantly scurrying away in terror.
Or indeed how come the Nazarenos around the massive float aren’t either scattering in religious panic, coned hats wobbling, or rooting themselves to the spot in frozen fear.
Why is no one screaming to God, when surely today of all days he can’t be far away?
William calls out for Luisa but he can’t see her in the crowd. The sound of the drums and the golden, high-pitched trumpets is deafening.
All he knows is that the bus is coming.
All he knows is that he has to save the child.
Reaching out, he grabs the small boy by his tiny, warm arm and wrenches him tightly into his body, at the same time pulling both of them away as best he can in the throng, out of the path of the relentlessly oncoming vehicle.
Only it doesn’t come.
The bus, of whatever vintage, simply fades and disappears. Like a vapour or a ghost. Touching nothing, disturbing no one.
Well, no one except William, who manages to gaze inside the spectral vehicle for just a fraction of a second before it totally vanishes.
He glimpses, standing next to the phantom driver, a young couple huddled so closely together.
She has a bright red bag over her shoulder, he sports longish hair of a not dissimilar hue and a tattered duffle-bag on his arm.
And then they’re gone.
The passengers, the driver, the bus.
And all sense of reality.
“Senor!”
The appalled father is staring at William, as he yanks his confused child back into the safe harbour of his sane, Sevillano family.
William notices, amidst the angry scowls and muttering, and a fist raised in righteous and quite justifiable fury, that the man has a small but vivid purple birthmark on his cheek, in the rough yet distinct shape of a star.
This strikes some distant chord in William, even as he is quite busy noticing that the man is no more keen on being stared at than on having his child snatched.
“William?”
“Luisa! There you are. Did you see it?”
The advent of his wife has probably saved William Sutherland, potential child-abductor, from being beaten to a deserved pulp, but such an outcome is not even on the fringes of William’s tormented mind right now.
“See what? See you grabbing somebody else’s child?”
“Luisa—”
“What were you thinking?”
He notices that the afflicted family are moving well away from him and further into the crowd, as if at this moment they would prefer to be mown down by a horde of crucifix-bearing penitents or a gigantic, multipedal Son of God.
“The bus, Luisa. Coming straight at us! Full speed! And then it…” He shakes his head. “Please don’t stare at me like that.”
“Whisky on a plane. Is like three whiskies on land. And you had three, so—”
“Oh, please!”
“And now you are smoking again.”
“Brace yourself for the crack cocaine. Luisa…?” But he stops and sighs, realising that this conversation is pointless and his delirium tremens a given.
He shakes his head once more, as if to reboot his troubled mind.
Could it be the whisky? Surely not – although God knows he needs one now.
“Okay, fine. Well, maybe we should just check that Pedro’s not made off with our luggage. And I have to make that call.”
“Or else you die. And his name is Pablo. Not every Spanish man is Pedro. So go.”
“Luisa—”
“Go. GO! I stay here.”
He stares at her, as the all-too-familiar anger surges up and momentarily shunts aside whatever shock and humiliation has recently flooded his system.
“This wasn’t my bloody idea, you know! This ‘trip’ – at my busiest time. What with – everything else.”
Her hands move towards his neck. He doesn’t flinch as she releases the fraying strap of his laptop bag, which has become tangled, not for the first time, under his collar.
“It is this place,” she murmurs, as she briskly straightens him out. “Thirty years, William!” She gazes all around her. “I cannot believe where we are.”
“Neither can I, Luisa,” says William, as he moves off into the thickening crowds. “Neither can I.”
Luisa watches him shoulder his clumsy way through the masses, towards a hopefully quieter street. Well before he is out of sight, she turns back to catch the tail-end of her first procession in so very many years.
Before it passes her by.