(Original Spanish text at the end of this post. Louis Villalba translated it into English)

On a winter Sunday afternoon at dusk, I did not know why I decided to leave the San Fernando stage and stay in Cádiz. There was the Sunday sadness of the seaports on the dock. I did not feel happy but aggressive and wanted to make some mischief. I went into the store of a Cantabrian man and ordered fried fish and white wine. I ate and drank in abundance. These Andalusian grocery stores sum up the region’s character: they are small, picturesque, and complicated.

I left the grocery store, went to a cafe on Calle Ancha, had a few glasses of liquor, and left there ready for anything.

It was already night; my boots made a tremendous noise through the deserted streets.

It seemed to me that perhaps I had not had enough to be as insolent and disorderly as I wanted. I sat down at a tavern table on a sidewalk on the street. There was such a profusion of grocery stores and barbershops that it seemed that local people spent their lives between plates of fried fish and hair curling irons.

Next to me was a drunken man, dressed in black, with his hat on the side and a red flower in his buttonhole. He got up from his chair and approached me, smiling. I was so angry that I glowered at him and asked him,

“What’s going on? What do you want?”

He smiled stupidly.

“Seaman?” he asked in English, pointing his finger at me.

“Yes, sailor,” I replied. “What’s it to you?”

“I’m a sailor too,” he added. “You, Spanish?”

“Yes, Spanish.”

“Me, Dutch. Two sailors. Two drunks. Good friends.”

After saying this and shaking my hand, the Dutchman sat down at my table. We drank together. The Dutchman was the corvette Vertrowen’s captain. He was pug-nosed, reddish-skinned, blond, with yellowish mustaches, drooping and straight like a Chinese man, and an almost formal black suit that in that tavern attracted attention. I became his defender. I thought that if they made fun of him, he would have the right to cause some devilry. 

We both got up. Then in Cádiz, and still now, the same routine would probably take place. There was the custom of walking through a few streets at night, especially on holidays. These streets were Ancha, Columela, San Francisco, and I don’t remember whether there was another one. This nocturnal paseo gave us a similar feeling as that of a religious procession.

The captain of the Vertrowen and I rambled those streets. There was everywhere the smell of fried oil and the smoke of roasted chestnuts. On the benches in the squares, people sat resting peacefully. Some workers in their Sunday dresses walked by, playing the guitar and singing.

The kids laughed at us. We invited some girls with an air of doubtful reputation to a drink in a cafe or tavern. But when they saw us drunk, they fled. Bored and tired, we landed up, exhausted, in another Cantabrian man’s store near the Puerta del Mar. That night, I wasted my useless anger and rage.

From “The Concerns of Shanti Andía,” by Pio Baroja

Pio Baroja is one of the best Spanish authors. He writes with the Spanish language’s poetic flow and the stern realism of his birth land, the Basque country. From time to time, he sprayed a few sentences in the Basque language. These words seem to belong to the original tongue spoken by the Iberian Peninsula’s inhabitants before the Roman Empire and its Latin took over. The Basque language is not related to Latin or any other known tongue. The book regaled us with beautiful descriptions and exciting stories. Pio Baroja exerted a significant influence on Ernest Hemingway, who visited the Spanish novelist a few weeks before he died in Madrid in 1956. Hemingway told him,

“Allow me to pay this small tribute to you who taught so much to those of us who wanted to be writers when we were young. I deplore the fact that you have not yet received a Nobel Prize, especially when it was given to many who deserved it less, like me, who am only an adventurer.”

HAPPY FATHER’S DAY

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Un fragmento de “Las inquietudes de Shanti Andía,’ de Pio Baroja:

Un domingo de invierno, por la tarde, al anochecer, no sé por qué me decidí a dejar la diligencia de San Fernando y a quedarme en Cádiz.

Había en el muelle esa tristeza de domingo de los puertos de mar. No me sentía alegre, sino agresivo, con gana de hacer una brutalidad cualquiera. Entré en una tienda de montañés, pedí pescado frito y vino blanco. Comí y bebí en abundancia. Estos colmados andaluces resumen el carácter de la región: son pequeños, pintorescos y complicados.

Salí del colmado, fuí a un café de la calle Ancha, tomé unas copas de licor y me marché de allí dispuesto a todo.

Era ya de noche; mis botas metían un ruido tremendo por las calles desiertas.

Me pareció que quizá no había bebido bastante para ser todo lo insolente y procaz que quería, y me senté en la mesa de una taberna, en la acera, en una calle en donde hay tal profusión de colmados y de peluquerías, que no parece sino que aquella gente se ha de pasar la vida entre el plato de pescado frito y la tenacilla para rizarse el pelo.

A mi lado había un hombre borracho, vestido de negro, con el sombrero ladeado y una flor roja en el ojal.

Se levantó de su silla y se acercó a mí sonriendo. Yo le miré de mala manera y, como estaba iracundo, le pregunté:

—¿Qué pasa? ¿Qué quiere usted?

El sonrió estúpidamente.

—¿Marino?—me dijo después, en inglés, señalándome con el dedo.

—Sí, marino—le contesté yo—. ¿Y qué?

—Yo también marino—añadió él—. ¿Usted español?

—Sí, español.

—Yo, holandés. Los dos marinos…, los dos borrachos. Buenas amistades.

Después de decir esto y estrecharme la mano, el holandés se sentó a mi mesa. Bebimos juntos. El holandés era capitán de la corbeta Vertrowen. Era chato, rojo, rubio, con unos bigotes amarillentos, caídos y lacios como los de un chino; el traje negro, casi de etiqueta, que en aquella taberna llamaba la atención.

Yo me constituí en su defensor, y pensé que si se burlaban de él tenía derecho para hacer algún disparate.

Nos levantamos los dos. Entonces en Cádiz, y ahora probablemente pasará lo mismo, había la costumbre de andar de noche por unas cuantas calles, los días de fiesta sobre todo. Estas calles eran la calle Ancha, la de Columela, la de Aranda, la de San Francisco, y no recuerdo si alguna más. Este paseo nocturno tenía algo de procesión.

El capitán de la Vertrowen y yo nos echamos por aquellas calles; había por todas partes olor a aceite frito y humo de castañas asadas. En los bancos de las plazas, gente sentada pacíficamente descansaba; algunos obreros, endomingados, pasaban en coche, tocando la guitarra y cantando.

Los chiquillos se reían de nosotros. Invitamos a algunas muchachas de aire equívoco a tomar algo en los cafés y tabernas; pero al vernos borrachos huían. Aburridos, cansados, dimos con nuestros cuerpos en una tienda de montañés próxima a la Puerta del Mar. Aquella noche hice yo un gasto de cólera y de rabia inútil.