The Butterfly Box(72)

‘You are a godless man, Don Ramon.’

‘Far from it, Señor, I am a believer. I just don’t blindly believe the garbage I’m told by weak mortals who call themselves priests and claim to be in constant dialogue with God. They are no more holy than I.’

‘Papa, Ramon is a good man.’

‘He’s lucky he’s not a dead man,’ Pablo replied, getting up. ‘Go on then, live in sin. I don’t know you any more.’

‘Papa, please!’ Estella begged tearfully, throwing her arms about him. ‘Please don’t turn your back on me.’

‘As long as you’re with this selfish, godless man, I don’t want to see you,’ he said sadly. Estella followed him out to his truck. She tried to persuade him to give Ramon a chance, but Pablo refused to listen. ‘After all we’ve done for you,’ he said, turning the key in the ignition.

‘Papa, please don’t leave like this,’ she sobbed.

But he drove up the road without so much as a glance in his rear mirror.



Estella gave birth to a baby boy in the same hospital in Valparaiso that she had been born in twenty-two years before. Ramon was as proud as any new father and held the tiny creature in his big hands, declaring that he be named Ramon. He placed his lips on his mottled forehead and kissed his son. ‘Ramon Campione,’ he said and smiled at Estella. ‘We don’t need marriage when we have Ramoncito to bind us together.’

Estella missed her mother dreadfully. The birth had been painful without her herbs and soothing words. She longed to contact her but she was afraid of their rejection. Her father’s harsh words had inflicted a deep wound that had left her feeling isolated and more dependent on Ramon than ever. A month after the birth they had moved into a pretty beach house that Ramon had bought just outside Zapallar so that she could be near her parents and the friends she had grown up with. He reassured her that her father would forgive her in time.

‘Time heals everything,’ he said knowingly. ‘Even my father might forgive me one day for letting Helena go.’

At the end of October Ignacio and Mariana had moved to their house in Cachagua for the duration of the summer. Mariana had hired a new maid called Gertrude, a sour old woman who had nothing pleasant to say about anyone and complained constantly about the state of her health. Ignacio liked her because she was so disagreeable he didn’t have to make the effort to be nice to her. In fact, she responded better to his cantankerous nature than she did to Mariana who tried to mollify her with kind words and smiles. Gertrude never smiled. When Mariana had foolishly mentioned Estella, Gertrude took it upon herself to inform her that there was a rumour that Estella had given birth to a monkey as a direct result of her getting pregnant outside wedlock. ‘That’s what happens to those who disobey God’s commandments,’ she crowed gleefully.

It never occurred to Ignacio and Mariana that their son might be the father.

‘I miss Estella,’ Mariana said to her husband.

‘Yes,’ he replied, laying out the pieces of a monumental puzzle on top of the card table in the sitting room.

‘How could Gertrude be so unkind? A monkey indeed.’ She sighed despairingly. ‘Where do these people hear such rubbish?’

‘It’s folklore, woman,’ Ignacio replied, adjusting his glasses.

‘Well, any intelligent human being must know it’s untrue.’

‘You believe in God, don't you?’

‘Yes.’

‘But you have no proof.’

‘Nacho!’

‘It’s just an example, woman.’

‘On a completely different level.’

‘As you wish,’ he replied, hoping she’d leave him alone to concentrate on his puzzle.

‘You know, I might find out where Estella lives and go and visit her. You know, just to make sure she’s all right.’

‘Como quieras, mujer,’ he said impatiently. Mariana shook her head and left him to his puzzle. The minutiae of my wife’s world never cease to amaze me,’ he sighed once she had gone, and sat down to commence his task.



Ramon watched his son sleeping in his cradle. The baby didn’t move, didn’t even twitch. Once again he panicked that his son might be dead. He bent into the cot to listen for his breathing. When he heard nothing he put his face to the

baby’s in order to feel his breath on his cheek.

‘Mi amor, you’re not worrying again? Ramoncito is alive and well,’ Estella whispered, placing the clean washing on the chest of drawers.

‘I just had to be sure.’ He grinned at her bashfully.

‘You’ve forgotten what it was like,’ she chuckled, planting a tender kiss on his cheek.