“Do you remember hearing that Miquel married someone called Nuria Monfort?”
“Miquel, married?”
“Do you find that odd?”
“I suppose I shouldn’t, but…I don’t know. The truth is that I haven’t heard from Miquel for years. Since before the war.”
“Did he ever mention the name of Nuria Monfort?”
“No, never. Nor did he say he was thinking of getting married or that he had a fiancée…. Listen, I’m not at all sure that I should be talking to you about this. These are personal things Julián and Miquel told me, with the understanding that they would remain between us.”
“And are you going to refuse a son the only possibility of discovering his father’s past?” asked Fermín.
Father Fernando was torn between doubt and, it seemed to me, the wish to remember, to recover those lost days. “I suppose so many years have gone by that it doesn’t matter anymore. I can still remember the day when Julián told us how he’d met the Aldayas and how, without realizing it, his life was forever changed….”
…In October 1914 an artifact that many took to be a pantheon on wheels stopped one afternoon in front of the Fortuny hat shop on Ronda de San Antonio. From it emerged the proud, majestic, and arrogant figure of Don Ricardo Aldaya, by then already one of the richest men not only in Barcelona but also in the whole of Spain. His textile empire took in citadels of industry and colonies of commerce along all the rivers of Catalonia. His right hand held the reins of banks and landed estates of half the province. His left hand, ever active, pulled at the strings of the provincial council, the city hall, various ministries, the bishopric, and the customs service at the port.
That afternoon the man with exuberant mustache, kingly sideburns, and uncovered head whom everybody feared, needed a hat. He entered the shop of Don Antoni Fortuny, and, after a quick glance at the premises, he looked askance at the hatter and his assistant, the young Julián, and said as follows: “I’ve been told that, despite appearances, the best hats of Barcelona come out of this shop. Autumn looks nasty, and I’m going to need six top hats, a dozen bowler hats, hunting caps, and something to wear for the Cortes in Madrid. Are you making a note of this, or do you expect me to repeat it all?” That was the beginning of a laborious and lucrative process during which father and son combined their efforts to get the order completed for Don Ricardo Aldaya.
Julián, who read the papers, was well aware of Aldaya’s position and told himself he could not fail his father now, at the most crucial a
nd decisive moment of his business. From the moment the magnate had set foot in his shop, the hatter levitated with joy. Aldaya had promised him that if he was satisfied, he would recommend his establishment to all his friends. That meant that the Fortuny hat shop, from being a dignified but modest enterprise, would attain the highest spheres, covering heads large and small of parliamentary members, mayors, cardinals, and ministers. That week seemed to fly by in a cloud of enchantment. Julián skipped school and spent up to eighteen or twenty hours a day working in the back-room workshop. His father, exhausted by enthusiasm, hugged him every now and then and even kissed him without thinking. He even went so far as to give his wife, Sophie, a dress and a pair of new shoes for the first time in fourteen years. The hatter was unrecognizable. One Sunday he forgot to go to church, and that same afternoon, brimming with pride, he put his arms around Julián and said, with tears in his eyes, “Grandfather would have been proud of us.”
One of the most complex processes of the now disappeared science of hatmaking, both technically and politically, was that of taking measurements. Don Ricardo Aldaya had a cranium that, according to Julián, bordered on the melon-shaped and was quite rugged. The hatter was aware of the difficulties as soon as he saw the great man’s head, and that same evening, when Julián said it reminded him of certain peaks in the mountains of Montserrat, Fortuny couldn’t help agreeing with him. “Father, with all due respect, you know that when it comes to taking measurements, I’m better at it than you, because you get nervous. Let me do it.” The hatter readily agreed, and the following day, when Aldaya arrived in his Mercedes-Benz, Julián welcomed him and took him to the workshop. When Aldaya realized that he was going to be measured by a boy of fourteen, he was furious. “But what is this? A child? Are you pulling my leg?” Julián, who was aware of his client’s social position but who wasn’t in the least bit intimidated by him, answered, “Sir, I don’t know about your leg, but there’s not much to pull up here. This crown looks like a bullring, and if we don’t hurry up and make you a set of hats, your head will soon be mistaken for a Barcelona street plan.” When he heard those words, Fortuny wanted the ground to swallow him up. Aldaya, undaunted, fixed his gaze on Julián. Then, to everyone’s surprise, he burst out laughing as he hadn’t done in years.
“This child of yours will go far, Fortunato,” declared Aldaya, who had not quite learned the hatter’s surname.
That is how they discovered that Don Ricardo Aldaya was fed up to his very back teeth with being feared and flattered by everyone, with having people throw themselves on the ground like doormats as he went by. He despised ass lickers, cowards, and anyone who showed any sort of weakness, be it physical, mental, or moral. When he came across a humble boy, barely an apprentice, who had the cheek and the spirit to laugh at him, Aldaya decided he’d hit on the ideal hat shop and immediately doubled his order. That week he gladly turned up every day for his appointment, so that Julián could take measurements and try on different models. Antoni Fortuny was amazed to see how the champion of Catalan society would fall about laughing at the jokes and stories told by that son who was for him a stranger, that boy he never spoke to and who for years had shown no sign of having any sense of humor. At the end of the week, Aldaya took the hatter aside, to a corner of the shop, and spoke to him confidentially.
“Let’s see, Fortunato, this son of yours has great talent, and you’ve got him stuck here, bored out of his mind, dusting the cobwebs in a two-bit shop.”
“This is a good business, Don Ricardo, and the boy shows a certain flair, even though he lacks backbone.”
“Nonsense. What school does he attend?”
“Well, he goes to the local school….”
“Nothing but a production line for workers. When one is young, talent—genius, if you like—must be cultivated, or it becomes twisted and consumes the person who possesses it. It needs direction. Support. Do you understand me, Fortunato?”
“You’re mistaken about my son. He’s nowhere near a genius. He can hardly pass his geography. His teachers tell me he’s a scatterbrain and has a very bad attitude, just like his mother. But at least here he’ll always have an honest job and—”
“Fortunato, you bore me. Today, without fail, I’ll go to San Gabriel’s School to see the admissions board, and I’ll let them know that they are to accept the entry of your son in the same class as my eldest child, Jorge. Anything less would be miserly of me.”
The hatter’s eyes were as big as saucers. San Gabriel’s School was the nursery for the cream of high society.
“But, Don Ricardo, I would be unable to finance—”
“No one is asking you to pay anything. I’ll take charge of the boy’s education. You, as his father, only have to agree.”
“But of course, certainly, but—”
“That’s decided, then. So long as Julián accepts, of course.”
“He’ll do what he’s told, naturally.”
At this point in the conversation, Julián stuck his head around the door of the back room with a hat mold in his hands.
“Don Ricardo, whenever you’re ready…”