Manuel proposes to Simona and decides to stay in Argentina at a turning point in which a life built on concealment becomes a chosen, shared future. On 11 November 1950 in Buenos Aires, Manuel Arroyo Benítez tells Simona Gaitán Peroni that he loves her and wants to marry her; if she refuses, he will return to Europe. She questions whether the proposal is a declaration or a form of pressure, but ultimately says yes. He answers by revealing the truth of his identity and history, and she accepts him while continuing to call him “gallego.”

Background: A Life of Assumed Names

Manuel’s proposal follows years of exile and clandestine work, during which his identity has been something to conceal, adapt, or use as cover. In 1939 he returned to Geneva after the Spanish Republic’s defeat. He missed Meg Williams, who no longer lived there, and the loneliness of the city shaped that period even as he worked for Pablo de Azcárate. His unofficial assignment took him from a small office rented under the name of a fictitious commercial agency to meetings with representatives of neutral and Allied countries in cafés, parks, and public squares. He presented himself as Felipe Ballesteros Sánchez and sent reports to Taplow when he could find space on a British military aircraft.

The position was safe compared with the hardship endured by many Spanish exiles in Europe, but safety did not make it feel like home. Manuel would have exchanged his comfortable room in a Swiss boarding house for the exposure of a French camp. That restlessness belongs to the long history behind the proposal: his life has been shaped by political defeat, separation, and movement between countries, not by a settled choice to make a home in Buenos Aires.

On 10 September 1946, he entered Spain through Gibraltar on a British military aircraft. France would have been a less conspicuous route, but the border was closed, and crossing the mountains with a clandestine guide risked an injury that could ruin his mission. His cover was that of an American citizen visiting his parents’ homeland for the first time. The clothing laid out on rooftops in La Línea and the wind of the Strait stirred a powerful sense of homecoming, but he kept that response from the British official who met him. His return was at once emotional and covert: even the feeling of belonging had to be hidden behind a false account of who he was.

The Decision to Stay

By the time of the proposal, Manuel had expected to return to Europe when his mission ended. In Buenos Aires on 11 November 1950, however, he no longer felt that he had to leave. His declaration makes the decision explicit without making it unconditional: Simona’s answer will determine whether he stays. Europe remains a real alternative, but he says that nothing else in Buenos Aires would keep him there if she refused.

That condition gives the scene its emotional pressure. Manuel offers marriage as both an avowal of love and a choice about where to live, while Simona recognizes the leverage built into the offer. She asks whether he is declaring his love or blackmailing her. The question does not end the exchange; instead, it names the difficulty of answering when his future has been placed in her hands. The scene turns on a shift from the anticipated return to Europe toward the possibility of remaining with her.

Simona’s Answer and Her Past

The decision is not detached from Simona’s own history. She has endured seven years in a marriage in which Renato Bley controlled her clothes, hair, meals, movements, and contact with her family. When a doctor told her that her husband was sterile, Renato beat her; he and his sisters nevertheless treated her as responsible for not becoming pregnant. Visits to Buenos Aires for her birthday came with beatings before and after, intended to keep her silent and prevent her from staying. Gifts and declarations of affection alternated with violence, and Simona came to confuse fear with guilt.

Against that history, her hesitation over marriage carries particular weight. She asks why Manuel wants to marry when they are already together, and points to her lengthening hair as something that means something to her. She tells him that she loves him, but does not immediately agree. When she sees his expression change, however, she gets up, sits on his knees, embraces him, and says they can marry if that is what he wants. The gesture turns a guarded answer into a freely offered closeness within the scene; it is not a claim that the past has vanished, but the evidence of her decision in that moment.

Confession and a Shared Name

After Simona agrees, Manuel tells her everything. He explains who he is, what his name is, where he was born, what work he does, why he came to Buenos Aires, and what her love means to him. His disclosure lasts from daylight into night. The time devoted to it marks the difference between yet another cover story and an account entrusted to someone who has chosen to stay with him.

Simona listens with her lips closed and her eyes wide. Her silence is attentive rather than evasive; the emotion in her face grows as she recognizes another person’s unhappiness. The narrative connects her response to the night when she told him her own story: each has listened to the other’s suffering, and her understanding is conveyed through that reciprocal act rather than through a speech of reassurance. She asks only what she should call him now. Manuel says he would rather she continue calling him “gallego.”

That answer preserves a name born of intimacy even as the confession restores his actual identity to the relationship. The choice is neither to keep the deception intact nor to erase the private language they have made together. Simona’s final invitation, “Dale, gallego. Llevame a la cama,” completes the movement from proposal to acceptance, from disclosure to renewed intimacy. Manuel’s decision to stay in Argentina is therefore bound to both truths: she knows the man behind his assumed identities, and she may still address him by the affectionate name that belongs to their life together.

Significance and Aftermath

The proposal brings a recurring conflict over false identity into a private relationship. Earlier, Manuel’s work depended on presenting himself under names such as Felipe Ballesteros Sánchez; here, he does not make another identity useful to his mission but tells Simona who he is and why he came. The choice does not undo his exile or the years of concealment. It changes what he is willing to share and makes a future in Argentina conceivable on terms other than operational necessity.

The outcome is a commitment rather than a simple resolution. Simona agrees to marry him, and Manuel stays, but the scene does not say that their difficulties have ended. Its close places hope beside the story’s continuing uncertainty: Manuel has long believed that he has had much bad luck and much good luck, and for more than twenty years he dared to think the bad luck, sated with misfortune, had finally given up. The marriage decision is the intimate turning point that makes staying possible, not proof that history has stopped pressing on their lives.