for Inga R
 

Madrid, 1799.

I must set sail before Napoleon tries to conquer London, winter has been hard in Madrid. From the beginning of spring I have enlisted as first gunner on a pirate ship. An old friend, a German Captain, has given me a map and a letter for some gentlemen in Memel. I have been serving among men of his Majesty Charles III. A betrayal has put my name among his enemies. In truth, my goal is to keep track of a beautiful woman, who seems an honest person. I've known her just by sight and hearsay, in the famous Klaipėda Castle during a trip by this port with English traders. She was discussing with master control, even too highly educated for my sword. She is a port that I don’t know. Her eyes guide me, but also betray me. In a few centuries my children will be writing about this feat. Useless for history; perhaps even bloody. This is my logbook. The rest should be decided by the fury of the wind, my trusty sword and the unpredictable night. First of all, I must learn her language to smell her tracks in her own Russian language. I do not know if one day I will find her. I just know that she lives near the Baltic Sea. There are Only a few students in these terms that they don’t know my search. Her eyes must find my voice. Now, I have just a face, a name, and I have seen that her eyes have strayed a dagger. Her words have founded that night in Memel more roads in my mind than all my adventures on the seas; even the women were silent, and her hands were distracting their humiliated eyes between adolescent flushes.

I have inherited this letter from my grandparents, it is a family treasure found at the bottom of a trunk by our ancestors. History tells us that he found her.

Klaipėda, 2011.

by Enrique Ferrer-Corredor

Enrique Ferrer Corredor is a Colombo-Venezuelan author and professor with a great academic background, has worked for William & Mary College and Hampton University in USA (currently he lives in USA, Virginia). He divides his time between literature, economics, political science and his love for soccer. He received an MA in Linguistics and Literature (Col) and a PhD in linguistics (Spain). He has been a professor also in other universities in Colombia as Universidad Externado, Universidad Pedagógica Nacional and Escuela Nacional de Ingeniería. He taught the Latin American poetry chair at the Instituto Caro y Cuervo. With "The Other Death of Salazar" he won second place in the the City of Florence's short story contest. He is co-founder of Común Presencia (literary Magazine) and, founder and director of Papeles (Papers); he belonged to many writers' workshops in Colombia and Venezuela. Ash of Moon, his first collection of poems, was published in 1994 and had two editions in 1998. In 2006, he published his book El público en escena (short stories). Also he has published many articles of literature and political science in international magazines. Today he is part of Word4word, a group of writers in Newport News, Virginia (USA).