Paprika and Diesel

Oil never lies. If the cast-iron skillet still holds its soot-stained bottom from ten years of hearth-fire and the flame stays gentle, the minced garlic starts to sing with a fine, almost lazy murmur, releasing that earthy moisture of a fresh garden that it still keeps between its teeth. There is no need to rush it.

Roi Fontán has no need to check the wall clock with its rust-eaten face. He knows it is past seven because the Atlantic light is crumbling into a sticky, ash-grey against the salt-crusted windows, and because the bacon cubes, sweating for ten minutes on the low heat, are starting to turn a translucent amber over the iron, crying out for the sweet paprika so they won't wither.

He rubs with his thumb the old burn on his left forearm. Three centimeters of tight skin, white as a horse mackerel bone, a souvenir from the treacherous steam of a conger eel pot.

Fire.

He is fourteen years old and his grandfather is gripping his wrist with a hard hand, full of dry scales and calluses like flint stones. Don't look away, boy, the old man tells him without looking at him, his voice broken by shag tobacco and the dampness of the fish market; smoke in the eyes teaches you to see what others can't make out in the fog. And he doesn't give him a hug because on this coast nobody hands out caresses that aren't meant to warm a wet net, but he leaves half a warm scallop pie on the board for him to eat while he cleans the stoves.

Saudade, they say as they cross the border in Tui, as if sadness needed a passport to hurt less. Morriña, we say on this side, who cares; here in the ría we swallow the bitterness with a gulp of harsh red table wine and say our eyes are watering because of the green wood.

It was calm. No, not calm. It was a slack truce, one of those lulls that spring tides leave right before the moon turns and carries off the buoy lines.

The worn edge of the kitchen knife strikes the olive-wood board with a rhythm he no longer controls. Tap, tap, tap. A dry strike every two seconds, methodical, chopping the red onion into a rain of fine strands that go straight into the rendered fat.

And his chest felt heavy. Just like that. Suddenly, without a single sensible reason besides the cold rain lashing against the corrugated tin roof.

A violent slam shattered the kitchen's silence, making the brass ladles hanging from the hood rattle.

A slap of salty wind rushed in, mixing the heaviness of low tide with that sour stench of burnt diesel given off by the fishing boats moored stern-to at the west dock.

Antón Rivas walked in. Water from the ría was dripping down the folds of his yellow rubber raincoat, leaving a murky trail over the terracotta floor tiles. He had his cap pulled down almost to the bridge of his nose, his white beard full of big drops, and his breathing broken.

"Put that flame out, Roi, or you're going to smoke out the tavern before service opens," Antón blurted out, shaking his sleeves like a wet dog.

"The fire is right where it needs to be," Roi replied without taking his eyes off the skillet, turning the gas down half a millimeter with a flick of his fingernail. "And wipe your boots on the coir mat, I've just scrubbed the floor."

"The floor, he says. Patience, Virgin of Carmen, getting all worked up over four drops of fresh water."

"It's dock water, Antón. And it comes with engine shit."

Antón made no move to back off. He stepped forward, dragging his rubber-cleated soles, pulled off a canvas glove with his teeth, and drew from his chest a crushed bundle he had been protecting under the oilskin of his slicker. He dropped it onto the zinc counter with a flat thud.

It was a glossy magazine, folded down the spine and with its edges curled by the dampness.

On the cover, a double-page report on the shipwrecks of the Sisargas bank stood out, but the page was open in the middle, slumping over a feature article. At the foot of a grainy black-and-white photograph, the black typography left no room for doubt: Text by Lidia Salgado.

A thick drop of rain fell from the brim of Antón's cap straight onto the ink, blurring the letter L of his surname.

"What's this about?" Roi asked, keeping the slotted spoon motionless over the sofrito.

"About how this is no longer just one of those tales they tell while playing tute down at the fish market. She got off the four-thirty bus at the junction stop."

"She must have come to sort out the paperwork for her aunt and uncle's house."

"Her aunt and uncle sold that ruin five winters ago to move into a Lugo nursing home, and you know it well. She's wearing a navy blue coat that looks like it's from the English merchant navy and a leather briefcase pulling at her shoulder. Even the seagulls at the shipyard recognized her."

Roi picked up the four-folded linen rag resting on the ledge. It was a rough cloth, hardened by a thousand washes in brine water and dried in the northern wind, stiff with cheap starch. With deliberate calm, he began to scrub the zinc around the wet paper, cleaning the rain splashes without daring to touch the magazine.

"This town is very small, Antón. People see a stranger and they already think the bailiff is coming."

"She's no stranger, damn it. It's Lidia. And you know damn well what she's come looking for."

Antón reached into the pocket of his work trousers and pulled out a crushed pack of black tobacco. He tried to pull out a cigarette with his fingers swollen by the cold, but the paper tore in half.

"Damn wet matches. Do you have a light?"

"There's the auxiliary burner. Come over here and stop whining."

The sailor shuffled over to the iron stove, lit the ruined tip of the cigarette in the live flame, and took two deep puffs that filled the room with a pungent smell of tar and dry grass. He looked at the ash falling onto the burner and clicked his tongue.

"The sea never gives back what it swallows; it only spits it out torn and battered when you've already forgotten how to name it," Antón recited by rote, pointing at the magazine with a nail stained black with tar. "It says so right there. In the second paragraph. It says he heard an old skipper say it in the ría of Muros. Does it sound to you like any of us talks like that, Roi? Not even the priest after three shots of pomace brandy talks such nonsense."

"She writes however she pleases. It's her job."

"She writes for those who read on the train on their way to the office, which is different. And if she's here, it's not to talk about sardines or hake quotas."

Roi did not answer. The thick steam of the sofrito rose in a warm column of toasted onion and grease that fogged up his glasses. He took them off with a mechanical gesture, using the back of his right hand, where the olive oil left a shiny trail over his weather-beaten knuckles. He blinked against the ash-colored light of the window.

In the stone sink, the lunch dishes piled up, still with dried bits of frying flour and sardine heads that nobody would wash until midnight. The white apron, soot-stained on the chest, hung from the cupboard knob like a hunched specter watching over his silences.

"Go down to the dock, Antón. Low tide ends at eight and you've got your boat scraping the green slime off the pier."

"I already gave the bow a long line, leave me in peace."

"Well, go eat dinner at home, Rosa is going to lock you out."

"Rosa is at her cousin's novena, she won't expect me until ten," the old man retorted, settling onto a low stool with a groan of worn-out knees. "Go on, throw the paprika in that, the onion is already crying out for dirt and it's going to turn bitter on you."

Roi took the red tin of La Vera paprika from the shelf, its metal dented on one corner. He popped the metal lid off with the edge of the knife and dumped two heaping spoonfuls over the sofrito. The crimson dust collided with the boiling oil, thickening it instantly in a reddish bubble that filled the air with a dense, sweet, smoky perfume, wiping out the trace of diesel in one sweep.

Outside, a gust of wind lashed the shutters with the force of a damp whip.

The brass bell above the door jingles with the salty breeze; looking up from the onion sofrito, Roi meets Lidia's hazel eyes gazing at him through the tavern's thick fog.