Edgar Brau

ARGENTINE SUITE

Grimaldi’s Christ

Translated by Donald A. Yates

(excerpt)

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INTRODUCTION

Around 1969, encouraged by the examples of Cuba and Vietnam and with the pretext of combating the military government that had assumed power three years earlier, the first guerilla groups became active in Argentina. In 1973, when the dictatorship handed over power to a democratic government formed through free elections, the most important groups withdrew their opposition. But this would prove to be only a pause in their activity. Before long the attacks on military bases and the indiscriminate assassinations of police and military officers were renewed. Now they were fighting not just against a military regime but for political power itself. The government drew on the full capacities of the Armed Forces to fight the insurgents. The results, however, were insignificant. The military, from its perspective, came to understand that a fully backed and sanctioned repression, given the impediments posed by a democratic system, would make success impossible. For them, a coup d’état would provide the solution. This was a move that the country, weary of economic problems, of strikes and the lack of an effective governing presence, seemed to be hoping for, perhaps even expecting. The leading politicians called urgent meetings, followed by last-minute plans and troop movements of a type that announce the imminence of a storm. But it was too late. On March 24, 1976, a military junta overthrew the government and installed a regime called the Process of National Reorganization (1976-1983). Thus began for Argentina a long dark night marked by widespread violence and barbarism unrestrained by humane considerations.

The four stories collected in this book, while they are the product of imagination, contain in their structures certain real aspects of the repression instituted by the military government in its attempt to annihilate the guerilla groups. The first of the four, Grimaldi’s Christ, takes place at the Naval Mechanic School, one of the most infamous clandestine detention centers during this period, located in central Buenos Aires. There, cells composed of ten officers and subordinates each and called Work Groups carried out their mission (the mission of all military and paramilitary officers wherever they were located), which was to kidnap guerilla fighters and those merely suspected of that activity, take them to the detention camp, subject them to torture and then kill them. In these circumstances, given that the official procedure was to dispose of the bodies of those killed (which gave rise to the term of “disappeared” person), the death and subsequent disappearance of the victims was carried out in one simple operation: the victims were administered a sleeping drug and then were thrown, alive, from an airplane into the River Plate. The second of the stories, The Child, has as its setting one of the many military barracks converted into detention camps and describes the process of dealing with pregnant prisoners: after giving birth in their place of imprisonment, their infants were taken from them. In an attempt to pacify the mothers, they were told that the child would be handed over to its grandparents, and they were asked to write a letter to the family in which they surrendered the child to their care. What actually happened was that the baby was usually adopted by a member of the military or the police force. The third, Mandrake, describes the activity of paramilitary groups (composed for the most part by retired police officers or those willing to put in overtime hours) in houses located in the city, primitively remodeled so that they could accommodate twenty or thirty prisoners. These places were given very curious names: Banfield Well, Olympic Garage, Vesuvius, etc. The last of the stories, The Key, has as its setting a military installation located in a rural area of the northern province of Tucumán, where operations were carried out by the Compañía de Monte of the E.R.P., a Marxist-Leninist group.

Four stories, then, to form this “suite” in the manner of a musical composition whose movements, in similarity of theme, intertwine, reflect on each other, and are resolved in the same common tonality. Four sections, four autonomous segments whose “polyphony” is arranged and sustained under the same dark chord that, like an irresistible wind, envelops the narrative structures and imparts to them its pervasive mood. And also an “Argentine” suite, Argentine in the ironic sense of an identifying stamp that is attached to the segments of a repeated process, Argentine as the ideal modifier (in a negative context) for the so insistently recurring historical and military manifestations of the second half of the twentieth century, whose escalating barbarism could not help but result in the imposition of this all-encompassing discord.

Finally, a consideration regarding the point of view taken in presenting the characters in these stories. It is possible that the appearance of wrongdoing may seem limited to one side, that is to the actions of the repressors, and this could lead a reader to think that the author supported, or supports, the activities the guerillas carried out. This is not so. It has occurred simply because in this sort of narrative the author rarely places himself in opposition to the victim. And in this instance, the State, by adopting an illegal, terrorist method of operation with which to combat those who were attacking it, had turned the aggressors into the victims. Theirs was a terrorist regime whose crimes (in truth, there were other crimes much worse than those described here) took on a perverse, monstrous dimension since in order to commit them it denigrated and rode roughshod over all those rules of justice and legality that centuries of civilization had conferred on the world’s established communities. These stories, then, with their one-sided literary focus, do not excuse the crimes committed by the guerillas. They do lay the blame elsewhere for this lapse in history unworthy of any State that considers itself civilized, unworthy of men in general and of uniformed men in particular, whose lives, according to their testimony, are justified by their acts, and unworthy, finally, of a country that not too long ago, on the basis of its wealth, culture and possibilities for human improvement, found itself in the company of the first nations of the world.

To the memory of that country, many of whose civic qualities these political maneuverings have not been able to conceal, and as an exorcism, I dedicate this book.

E. B.

Grimaldi’s Christ

He remembered (and the rain outside lent a touch of complicity to the evocation) Naval Captain Prieto remembered, with his gaze fixed on the image of Christ crucified that hung on the wall behind his desk, the first masses of his childhood in the chapel of the religious school that he had been transferred to. He remembered his surprise at that world of devotion that he had just been introduced to and his no less surprising and immediate embracing of it. He remembered above all the large sorrowful Christ, next to the main altar that, amidst flickering candles and the tinkling of bells, lifted His clouded eyes to the high vaulted ceiling, as if seeking an opening through which He could best accomplish His ascension into Heaven, a miracle celebrated in ceremonies — one that would leave behind for those who wanted to accompany Him (such was his own case) the empty cross. From his pew he would follow that gaze, but not seeing anything other than shadows high amid the exquisite carvings, he lowered his glance to the Savior’s eyes that perhaps disconcerted by the unbroken ceiling, had lost some of their fixed appearance; the eyes no longer merely stared, the lips parted slightly and the hands seemed on the point of closing around the nails and ripping them out. On the observer’s part, however, it took only a blink of his eyes, a minimal distraction, for that fantasy to disappear and for the anguished gaze to continue raised above, unaware of the illusion that below, in one of the pews, it had dispersed.

       And then Easter would come —the captain recalled— and that expectation and that desire to imitate Christ would increase immeasurably. Also a kind of continuing rapture filled the chapel during those days. Everything was intensified. The perfume of the incense, the habits smelling sweetly of wax and honey, the banners with their embroidered gold edges, succulent spongy Eucharistic wafers, the Latin phrases, in whose deep sonority a child’s ear could sense the voice of the invisible, all of this created an atmosphere of absolute piety and provided at the same time, in conjunction with the worshipful mood of each person, an apotheosis of divine suffering that, according to the terms of the liturgy, was preparing for a later moment a triumph where finally and without delays Jesus Christ would achieve His salvation… Without delay? To be on the safe side and in order to obtain a better result, he would merge his imagination and his persistence: he would invent prayers in which abounded words favoring a proper Ascension (and his own ascension, of course), he would deliberately exaggerate his distress, would confess more than he needed to, performed the penitence of humility, his shoulders bowed as if burdened by the chords cast down from above by the ubiquitous organ…

       Thus it went, until the arrival of that promised Sunday when, despite his conviction, the Resurrection did not remove Christ from the cross; astonishingly, that was something that apparently occurred secretly, a miracle whose effects were celebrated joyfully, even though its achievement was not to be seen, even though everything seemed to be exactly as it was before. It was all something astonishing, to be sure, or perhaps more accurately, something disturbing. What if the reason of the unfulfilled hopes was a lack of fervor, a deficient surrender? Ah, then there was nothing more to do but hope for the future. Perhaps next year, with a little more devotion on his part, the elevation of Christ into heaven would be real.

       But even so, one could not be careless; it was necessary in the next mass, with the glory of Easter behind, for him to renew his efforts. It was a matter of persisting and persisting.  He needed to begin by prostrating himself again before the grand Christ in the chapel, gazing constantly at his face until succeeding in converting him, by means of the most sincere contemplation, into any common Christ, the one in his mother’s bedroom, for example, or the casual crucifix in someone’s office, and continuing with that enchanted registry, (even though interrupted by a knocking and a voice), continuing until…

       “May I come in, captain?  Captain?”

       A navy corporal was rapping softly on the half-open door and calling to him.

       Captain Prieto, his back turned to the door and his head leaning against the back of the swivel chair, turned around slowly.

       “Excuse me, captain. Since you didn’t answer, I opened the door,” the corporal said when the captain turned. He stepped into the room cautiously. He was carrying several dossiers and a smallish package wrapped in gift paper.

       Captain Prieto rubbed his hand across his face, pointed at the desk and turned again to the wall.

       “Thank you, captain,” the corporal said, placing the dossiers and the package on the desk and waiting for a response.

       “That’s all, corporal,” Prieto said without turning around.

       “Of course, captain,” the corporal said, and left the room.

       Captain Prieto clasped his hands behind his head and continued gazing at the crucifix. The rain was now falling heavily against the shutters of the window. He turned back to face the desk.  He picked up the package that the corporal had delivered and opened it. Inside were two Easter eggs. The card that accompanied the parcel read: In case I don’t see you on Sunday, Happy Easter! Cap. Grimaldi. Below this was added: The extra egg makes up for the one I didn’t send you last year.

       Captain Prieto threw the card onto his desk, leaned back in his chair and, even though he understood immediately that the message was an allusion to his alleged lack of courage or something along that line (an allusion that the last line scarcely attempted to disguise), he broke into a smile. There would be ample occasion to talk about courage after he carried out his plan to bring Ship’s Captain Grimaldi before a court-martial and put an end to his career. For two long years the rivalry between them had continued, practically from the first moment when, shortly after Prieto’s arrival for duty there, the Vice-Admiral in charge of the installation (less interested in the subversive movement than in drinking and his relationship with one of the woman prisoners) had handed off to Prieto most of his authority. Grimaldi was at that time a naval lieutenant, and his fearlessness and zealousness had made him stand out among his colleagues. He had two weaknesses: a habit of shocking his associates in the most bizarre of ways and also spiriting off to a convenient hotel female prisoners who had just endured a session of torture; the almost animal-like docility of these women at those times aroused him to the point where he ignored any strict rules prohibiting such behavior. When Prieto learned of these violations, he ordered Grimaldi to end them. The latter, who was expecting to be promoted for his skill in directing the squads in charge of kidnapping those suspected of being involved in subversive activity, decided not to undermine his chances and obeyed the order, but in his own fashion: from then on the women were assaulted in the same room where they had undergone brutal interrogation. Prieto was furious and threatened to bring him before the Vice-Admiral. This time Grimaldi followed the order of a superior officer. Thereafter, he would make sure that rumors of all sorts would reach Prieto about his determination to soon avenge the insult.

       The second issue that would increase the hostility between the two men occurred some months later, when Grimaldi had been promoted to a level that then brought him into the position of third-in-command, behind Prieto and the Vice-Admiral. In this instance, it was Prieto’s effort to prevent Grimaldi and other men under his direction from keeping for their own benefit personal possessions removed from the homes of the kidnapped suspects. There were confrontations, excuses, then anonymous letters containing death threats —which Prieto carefully preserved— but in the end, the latter succeeded in forcing that new restriction on his rival (since Grimaldi’s efficiency in the eyes of others had now conferred on him that designation).

       In the months following, the frequency of Grimaldi’s challenges to Prieto’s authority steadily increased. Prieto understood that most of the affronts were deliberate provocations and for a while pretended indifference. He soon learned that he was gaining the reputation of being weak and spineless. He took the matter to his superior, but Grimaldi’s growing status had transformed him into a person who was practically untouchable; the Vice Admiral had heard only of his achievements. Prieto understood then that he had two choices: carry the matter to the Admiralty (which surely would question the delay in reporting the situation) or request a transfer. After giving several day’s thought to it, he decided on the latter resolution. He wrote out his request and waited to present it exactly two years from the date of his arrival at the base. When the moment came, he prepared to submit the letter. But then two things occurred. Prieto found out, first with perplexity and then with indignation, that in the event that he was transferred, Grimaldi would be moved into his position. He also heard a rumor. A rumor that involved Captain Grimaldi and that at first he discounted, since even though he knew that his lower-ranking officer was capable of mindless actions (and it was no coincidence that the code name he used in his operations was Folly), he nonetheless could not believe he would dare to try something so unbelievable. Certain inquiries he made on that day, however, with the assistance of a trusted lieutenant who despised Grimaldi, led him to believe that the rumor was true.

       It had to do with the mass of the Resurrection which, as during Easter seasons past, would be celebrated at nightfall on the Sunday following Good Friday in the base’s large main courtyard, before a huge cross that was installed at the side facing the river. The cross had no Christ; Captain Grimaldi had announced that he would take charge to correcting that “lamentable deficiency,” and that he would do so by crucifying a live man, in the same circumstances in which Jesus had died, which is to say nailed to the cross and wearing only a brief covering over his thighs. The details of the spectacle (a black curtain would conceal his “gift” until the final moment of the event) had been arranged with the priest who was to officiate over the mass, without, however, indicating that on the cross there would be a real man. He also had said that owing to certain commitments, he would be unable to arrive at the beginning of the mass and would leave the details in charge of two sub-lieutenants whom he had known from several years back and who had just arrived in town in order to participate in the next “transfer” of prisoners —such was the term used to conceal their being thrown out of an airplane into the sea.

    As for the victim, Grimaldi had preferred not to identify him. His identity was perhaps the most important part of the surprise. For that reason, his face would be concealed under a hood until the curtain was pulled aside. But there were suspicions that he would be a high-level subversive, recently picked up in a Buenos Aires neighborhood. whom Grimaldi had been pursuing for some time and who had been promised a “special” kind of treatment. To be sure of what was going on, Prieto decided to keep a discreet eye on Grimaldi with the help of his lieutenant. He was seen examining the huge cross and writing down notations; he was seen, in the naval storeroom, rolling out a large piece of black canvas (from which the prisoners hoods were made) and taking measurements. And the lieutenant later heard him ask a sub-official in the foundry “to see about the nails”. His vigilance increased. One day Grimaldi was overheard in conversation with the physician in charge of drugging the prisoners who were dumped into the ocean. They spoke about the chances of survival of a human body suspended by nails. The doctor mentioned muscles and effects on them, he estimated risks and the time involved, he predicted the eventual causes of death and made a final recommendation: to avoid twisting and contortions, it would be desirable that the victim be under the effects of a tranquilizer, of the sort that the prisoners were given…

       Prieto needed no further proof. He ordered the lieutenant to tell no one of these findings, shut himself up in his office and tore up his letter requesting a transfer. Things were working out in a way that would allow Captain Grimaldi to be dealt with in accordance his own style.

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