“Don’t worry.”

Fermín lowered his eyes as Alicia’s footsteps disappeared up the gangway. He turned around without looking up and set off walking, his hands in his pockets.

He found Daniel at the end of the dock, sitting with his legs dangling over the edge. They exchanged glances, and Fermín sighed.

He sat down beside Daniel. “I thought I’d managed to give you the slip.”

“It’s that new cologne you drench yourself in. I could even trail you in the fish market. What did she tell you?”

“Alicia? Stories to keep one awake at night.”

“You might like to share them.”

“Some other day. I’m an expert when it comes to insomnia and I don’t recommend it.”

Daniel shrugged. “I think the advice comes a bit too late.”

The echo of a ship’s horn flooded the port. Daniel tipped his chin toward the liner as it cast off and began to pull away from the quayside. “Those are the ones that go to America.”

Fermín nodded.

“Fermín, do you remember, years ago, when we used to come and sit down here, and we’d solve the world’s problems?”

“That was when we thought they could still be solved.”

“I still think they can be.”

“Because deep down you’re still a kid, even if you shave now.”

They stayed there, watching the liner cutting through the reflection of the whole of Barcelona across the waters of the port, its wake of white foam breaking up the greatest mirage in the world. Fermín didn’t look away until the stern of the ship was lost in the sea mist that swept through the mouth of the port, escorted by a flock of seagulls.

Daniel gazed at him pensively. “Are you all right, Fermín?”

“As fierce as a bull.”

“Well, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you look so sad.”

“That’s because you need to have your eyes checked.”

Daniel didn’t insist. “What do you say? Shall we get going? What if I treat you to a few glasses of bubbly at the Xampanyet, just like old times?”

“Thanks, Daniel, but I think I’ll say no today.”

“Don’t you remember? Life is waiting for us . . .”

Fermín smiled, and for the first time, Daniel realized that his old friend didn’t have a single hair on his head that wasn’t gray.

“It’s waiting for you, Daniel. Memories are all I have waiting for me.”

Daniel pressed his arm affectionately and left him alone with his memories and his conscience.

“Don’t be long,” he said.

1964

Every time his son Nicolás asked him how one became a good journalist, Sergio Vilajuana replied with the same maxim: “A good journalist is like an elephant: he has a good nose, good ears, and above all, he never forgets.”

“What about the tusks?”

“He’s got to take care of those, because there’s always some well-armed individual who wants to take them from him.”

That morning, like every other morning, Vilajuana had taken his youngest son to school before heading for the editing room of La Vanguardia. The stroll helped him to sort out his ideas before delving into the maelstrom of the newsroom to battle with the topics of the day. On arriving at the newspaper’s headquarters on Calle Pelayo, he came across Jenaro, an office boy who for the last fifteen years had been trying to persuade the editor to admit him into the sports section as an unpaid trainee, a maneuver by which he hoped to be allowed into the president’s box at the Barcelona Soccer Club, the great ambition of his life.