Harlequin Espa¤ol Portable -

He fled to Seville, changed his name, and opened a tailor shop that no one visited. By day, he mended trousers and hemmed dresses. By night, he sewed the black-and-white suit—the Traje del Contragolpe (the Counterblow Suit). It had no colors because it was meant to absorb all colors. The silver bells were not for music; they were for tracking. Every time a bell rang, it would echo through the forgotten places where El Duende hid his prisoners.

The door creaked open. A young woman stepped inside, shaking rain from her curly black hair. Her name was Lola Montero, and she was the fastest cantaora (flamenco singer) in Triana, though tonight she looked like a ghost.

And somewhere in a village you’ve never heard of, a child is drawing diamonds on a piece of paper with a stolen crayon. She does not know why. She only knows that when she finishes, she wants to laugh. harlequin espa¤ol

“Don Mateo,” she whispered. “He’s back.”

Each diamond was a story. The green ones were for the year of the famine, when the harlequin stole bread from a duke to feed a hundred children. The red ones were for the blood spilled in the riot of ’43. The yellow ones were for the gold the harlequin refused to take from the church. And the black ones—the black diamonds were for the laughter he gave away. He fled to Seville, changed his name, and

He began to hunt them. Every harlequin in Spain. Not to kill them—no, that would be merciful. He captured them and sewed their mouths shut with silver thread, then locked them in the basement of a defunct monastery outside Toledo. There, they could not laugh. And without laughter, El Duende’s suit loosened.

He lifted the black-and-white suit from his lap. It shimmered, though no light touched it. “Wear this. Go to the monastery outside Toledo. Sing. Not a soleá , not a bulería . Sing the Cante de la Risa Perdida —the Song of the Lost Laughter. My grandmother taught it to me when I was twelve, and I have never dared sing it. But you, Lola, you have no fear.” It had no colors because it was meant to absorb all colors

At the name, the candle on his table flickered. Outside, a horse screamed. Mateo set down his needle. He had been waiting for this moment since the night he buried his own laughter in a clay pot under the lemon tree.