About the Author 35 страница

“WHAT DO YOU MEAN, you got married by accident, son? ” Ambrosio laughs. “Do you mean you were forced into it? ”

It had started on one of those white, stupid nights which, through a kind of miracle, had been transformed into a party of sorts. Norwin had called La Cró nica saying that he was waiting for them in El Patio and, after work, Santiago and Carlitos had gone to meet him. Norwin wanted to go to a whorehouse, Carlitos to El Pingü ino, they flipped for it and Carlitos won. Were they expecting a wake? The nightclub was dreary and there were few customers. Pedrito Aguirre sat down with them and bought them beers. When the second show was over, the last customers left and then, suddenly, unexpectedly, the girls in the show and the boys in the band and the bartenders all ended up together in a happy round of tables. They’d started off with jokes, toasts, anecdotes and teasing, and suddenly life seemed happy, lively, spontaneous and pleasant. They drank, sang, began to dance, and next to Santiago, China and Carlitos, silent and close together, were looking into each other’s eyes as if they’d just discovered love. At three in the morning they were still there, drunk and loving one another, generous and talkative, and Santiago felt he was in love with Ada Rosa. There she was, Zavalita: short, fat-assed, dark. Her pigeon-toed feet, he thinks, her gold tooth, her bad breath, her cursing.

“A real accident, ” Santiago says. “An auto accident. ”

Norwin was the first to disappear, with a chorus girl in her forties who had a wild hairdo. China and Carlitos convinced Ada Rosa to go with them. They took a taxi to China’s apartment in Santa Beatriz. Sitting beside the driver, Santiago had a distracted hand on Ada Rosa’s knee. She was riding in back, dozing beside China and Carlitos, who were kissing furiously. At the apartment they drank all the beer in the refrigerator and listened to records and danced. When the light of day appeared in the window, China and Carlitos shut themselves up in the bedroom and Santiago and Ada Rosa were left alone in the living room. At El Pingü ino they had kissed and here they caressed and she had sat on his knees, but now when he tried to take her clothes off, Ada Rosa reared up and began to shout and insult him. It was all right, Ada Rosa, no fighting, let’s go to sleep. He put the cushions from the easy chair on the floor, dropped down and fell asleep. When he woke up, through bluish clouds he saw Ada Rosa curled up like a fetus on the sofa, sleeping with her clothes on. He stumbled to the bathroom, bothered by a bilious heaviness and the resentment of his bones, and he put his head under the cold water. He left the house: the sun wounded his eyes and brought tears to them. He had a cup of black coffee at a cheap café on Petit Thouars and then, with vague, fluctuating nausea, he took a group taxi to Miraflores and another to Barranco. It was noon on the Town Hall clock. Señ ora Lucí a had left a note on his bed: call La Cró nica, very urgent. Arispe was crazy if he thought you were going to call him, Zavalita. But just as he was about to get into bed, he thought that his curiosity would keep him awake and he went down to phone in his pajamas.

“Are you unhappy with your marriage? ” Ambrosio asks.

“My, my, ” Arispe said. “A nice voice from beyond the grave, my good sir. ”

“I went to a party and I’m all hung over, ” Santiago said, “I haven’t slept a wink. ”

“You can sleep on the trip, ” Arispe said. “Get on over here right away in a taxi. You’re going to Trujillo with Periquito and Darí o, Zavalita. ”

“Trujillo? ” A trip, he thinks, a trip at last, even if it was only to Trujillo. “Can’t I leave a little …”

“Actually, you’ve already left, ” Arispe said. “A sure piece of information, a million-and-a-half winner in The Kitty, Zavalita. ”

“All right, I’ll grab a shower and be right over, ” Santiago said.

“You can phone the story in to me tonight, ” Arispe said. “Forget about the shower and get right over here, water is for pigs like Becerrita. ”

“No, I’m happy with it, ” Santiago says. “The only thing is that I really wasn’t the one who made the decision. It was imposed on me, just like the job, like everything that’s ever happened to me. Nothing was ever my doing, it was more like I was their doing. ”

He got dressed in a hurry, wet his head again, ran down the stairs. The taxi driver had to wake him up when they got to La Cró nica. It was a sunny morning, there was a bit of heat that delightfully entered the pores and lulled muscles and will. Arispe had left the instructions and money for gasoline, meals and hotel. In spite of your not feeling well and your sleepiness, you felt happy with the idea of the trip, Zavalita. Periquito sat next to Darí o and Santiago stretched out on the back seat and fell asleep almost immediately. He woke up as they were getting into Pasamayo. On the right there were dunes and steep yellow hills, on the left the blue, resplendent sea and the precipice that kept getting higher, in front the highway painfully climbing the bald flank of the mountains. He sat up and lighted a cigarette; Periquito was looking into the abyss with alarm.

“The Pasamayo curves have sobered you sissies up. ” Darí o laughed.

“Slow down, ” Periquito said. “And since you haven’t got eyes in the back of your head, it would be better if you didn’t turn around to chat. ”

Darí o was driving fast, but he was sure of himself. There were hardly any cars in Pasamayo, in Chancay they stopped for lunch at a truck stop by the side of the road. They started out again and Santiago, trying to sleep in spite of the jiggling, listened to them talking.

“This Trujillo business is most likely a lie, ” Periquito said. “There are shitheads who spend all their time giving false tips to newspapers. ”

“A million and a half soles for one single person, ” Darí o said. “I didn’t use to believe in The Kitty, but I’m going to start playing it. ”

“Change a million and a half into females and then talk to me about it, ” Periquito said.

Moribund villages, aggressive dogs that came out to meet the van with their teeth in the air, trucks parked beside the road, sporadic cane fields. They were passing milestone 48 when Santiago sat up and had another smoke. It was a straight stretch, with sand flats on both sides. The truck hadn’t taken them by surprise; they saw it glimmering in the distance at the top of a rise and they watched it coming closer, slow, heavy, corpulent, with its load of drums tied with ropes in the back. A dinosaur, Periquito said, at that instant Darí o slammed on the brakes and turned the wheel, because at the very point where they were going to pass the truck, a hole ate away half the road. The wheels of the van fell into the sand, something crunched under the vehicle, straighten out! Periquito shouted and Darí o tried and there we were, fucked up, he thinks. The wheels sank in, instead of climbing up the edge they skidded, and the van kept on going forward, tilting way over like a monster until, overcome by its own weight, it rolled like a ball. An accident in slow motion, Zavalita. He heard or gave a cry, a twisted, slanting world, a force that threw him violently forward, a darkness with stars. For an indefinite time everything was quiet, dark, painful and hot. He first tasted something bitter, and even though he’d opened his eyes, it took him a while to realize that he’d been thrown out of the vehicle and was stretched out on the ground and that the harsh taste was the sand that was getting into his mouth. He tried to stand up, dizziness blinded him and he fell back down again. Then he felt himself grabbed by the feet and hands, lifted, and there they were, in the background of a long, hazy dream, those strange and remote faces, that feeling of infinite and lucid peace. Would it be like that, Zavalita? Would it be that silence without any questions, that serenity without any doubts or remorse? Everything was weak, vague and alien, and he felt himself being placed on something soft that was moving. He was in a car, lying on the back seat, and he recognized the voices of Periquito and Darí o and he saw a man dressed in brown.

“How do you feel, Zavalita? ” Periquito’s voice asked.

“Drunk, ” Santiago said. “My head aches. ”

“You were lucky, ” Periquito said. “The sand held the van back. Another turn and it would have squashed you. ”

“It’s one of the few important things that ever happened to me, Ambrosio, ” Santiago says. “Besides, that was how I met the girl who’s now my wife. ”

He was cold, nothing hurt, but he was still groggy. He heard talk and murmuring, the sound of the motor, other motors, and when he opened his eyes they were putting him on a rolling stretcher. He saw the street and the sky that was starting to get dark, he read La Maison de Santé on the faç ade of the building they were going into. They took him up to a room on the second floor, Periquito and Darí o helped undress him. When he was covered up to his chin by sheets and blankets, he thought I’m going to sleep for a thousand hours. Half asleep, he answered the questions of a man with glasses and a white apron.

“Tell Arispe not to print anything, Periquito. ” He barely recognized his voice. “My father mustn’t know about this. ”

“A romantic meeting, ” Ambrosio says. “Did she win your love by healing you? ”

“Sneaking me smokes is more like it, ” Santiago says.

“This is your night, Quetita, ” Malvina said. “You look positively royal. ”

“You’re going to be picked up by a chauffeur. ” Robertito blinked. “Like a queen, Quetita. ”

“It’s true, you’ve won the lottery, ” Malvina said.

“Me too and all of us, ” Ivonne said, taking leave of her with a malicious smile. “You know, with golden gloves, Quetita. ”

Earlier, when Quetita was getting ready, Ivonne had come to help her set her hair and oversee her dressing personally: she had even loaned her a necklace that matched her bracelet. Have I won the lottery? Queta was thinking, surprised at not being excited or happy or even curious. She went out and at the door of the house she gave a little start: the same daring and startled eyes from yesterday. But the black man looked at her directly for only a few seconds; he lowered his head, murmured good evening, hastened to open the door of the car, which was black, large and severe like a hearse. She got in without answering his good evening, and she saw another fellow there in front next to the chauffeur. Also tall, also strong, also dressed in blue.

“If you’re cold and want me to close the window …” the Negro murmured, sitting behind the wheel now, and she saw the whites of his large eyes for an instant.

The car started up in the direction of the Plaza Dos de Mayo, turned down Alfonso Ugarte toward Bolognesi, went along the Avenida Brasil, and when they went under the lampposts, Queta noticed the greedy little animals still in the rear-view mirror, looking for her. The other man had started to smoke and didn’t turn to look at her or even take a peek in the mirror during the whole drive. Near the Malecó n now, they entered Magdalena Nueva along a side street, following the streetcar line toward San Miguel, and every time she looked at the mirror, Queta saw them: burning, fleeing.

“Have I got monkeys on my face? ” she said, thinking this idiot is going to run into something. “For you to keep looking at me? ”

The heads in front turned and went back into place, the black man’s voice came out unbearably confused, him? sorry, was she talking to him? and Queta thought how afraid you are of Cayo Shithead. The car went this way and that down the small, dark, silent streets of San Miguel and finally came to a stop. She saw a garden, a small two-story house, a window with curtains that let the light filter through. The black man got out to open the door. He was there, his ash-colored hand on the door handle, head down and cowardly, trying to open his mouth. Is it here? Queta murmured. The little houses were identical, one after the other in the stingy light, behind the little trees lined up on the gloomy sidewalks. Two policemen were looking at the car from the corner and the fellow inside made a signal as if to tell them it’s us. It wasn’t a large house, it couldn’t be his house, Queta thought: it must be the one he uses for his filthy stuff.

“I didn’t mean to bother you, ” the black man babbled, with an oblique and humble voice. “I wasn’t looking at you. But if you think I was, I’m terribly sorry. ”

“Don’t be afraid, I won’t mention it to Cayo Shithead. ” Queta laughed. “I just don’t like fresh people. ”

She went through the garden that smelled of damp flowers, and when she rang the bell she heard voices, music from the other side of the door. The lights inside made her blink. She recognized the thin, small figure of the man, his devastated face, the boredom of his mouth and his lifeless eyes: come in, welcome. Thanks for sending the car for me, she said, and was silent: there was a woman there, looking at her with a curious smile, in front of a bar covered with bottles. Queta was motionless, her hands hanging alongside her body, disconcerted suddenly.

“This is the famous Queta. ” Cayo Shithead had closed the door, had sat down, and now he and the woman were observing her. “Come in, famous Queta. This is Hortensia, the mistress of the house. ”

“I thought they were all old, ugly and peasants, ” the woman shrilled liquidly and Queta managed to think in confusion, boy, is she drunk. “Or did you lie to me, Cayo? ”

She gave another laugh, exaggerated and graceless, and the man, with a weak half-smile, pointed to the chair: sit down, she was going to get tired standing up. She came forward as if over ice or wax, afraid to slip, to fall, and sink into an even worse confusion, and she sat down on the edge of the chair, rigid. Again she heard the music that she had forgotten about or which had stopped; it was a tango by Gardel and the phonograph was there, mounted in a mahogany cabinet. She saw the woman get up weaving and saw her clumsy uncertain fingers manipulating a bottle and glasses at one end of the bar. She studied her tight iridescent silk dress, the whiteness of her shoulders and arms, her coal-black hair, the hand that sparkled, her profile, and, still perplexed, thought how much she looked like her, how much they looked alike. The woman came toward her with two glasses in her hands, walking as if she didn’t have any bones, and Queta looked away.

“Cayo told me she was quite beautiful and I thought it was a tale. ” She was looking at her from the feet up and hesitating, looking at her from the top down with the glassily smiling eyes of a pampered cat, and when she leaned over to give her the glass, she smelled her belligerent, incisive perfume. “But it’s true, the famous Queta is quite beautiful. ”

“Cheers, famous Queta, ” Cayo Shithead commanded without emotion. “Let’s see if a drink will lift your spirits. ”

Mechanically, she raised the glass to her mouth, closed her eyes and drank. A spiral of heat, a tickling in her eyes, and she thought straight whiskey. But she took another long sip and took a cigarette from the pack the man offered her. He lit it for her and Queta discovered the woman sitting next to her now, smiling with familiarity. Making an effort, she also smiled.

“You look just like …” she got the courage to say and a thread of falseness invaded her, a sticky feeling of the ridiculous. “Just like a certain singer. ”

“What singer? ” The woman encouraged her, smiling, looking at Cayo Shithead out of the corner of her eye, looking back at her again. “Like? ”

“Yes, ” Queta said; she took another sip and breathed deeply. “Like the Muse, the one who used to sing at the Embassy Club. I saw her several times and …”

She stopped speaking because the woman was laughing. Her eyes were shining, glassy and fascinated.

“That Muse is an awful singer, ” Cayo Shithead commanded, nodding. “Don’t you think so? ”

“I don’t think so, ” Queta said. “She sings nice, especially boleros. ”

“You see? Ha! Ha! ” the woman broke out, pointing to Queta, making a face at Cayo Shithead. “You see how I’m wasting my time with you? See how you’re ruining my career? ”

It can’t be, Queta thought, and that feeling of the ridiculous came over her again. It burned her face, she felt the urge to run, break things. She finished her glass in one swallow and felt flames in her throat and a touch of warmth in her stomach. Then a pleasant visceral warmth that gave her back a little of her self-control.

“I knew it was you, I recognized you, ” she said, trying to smile. “Just that …”

“Just that you’ve finished your drink, ” the woman said in a friendly way. She got up like a wave, weaving slowly, and looked at her happily, euphorically, gratefully. “I adore you for what you said. You see, Cayo, you see? ”

While the woman stumbled over to the bar, Queta turned toward Cayo Shithead. He was drinking seriously, looking into the dining room, he seemed absorbed in intimate and grave meditations, far away from there, and she thought it’s absurd, she thought I hate you. When the woman handed her the glass of whiskey, she leaned over and spoke to her in a low voice: could she tell her where the …? Yes, certainly, come along, I’ll show you where. He didn’t look at them. Queta went upstairs behind the woman, who was clutching the railing and feeling the steps with mistrust before putting her foot down, and it occurred to her she’s going to insult me, now that the two of them were alone she was going to throw her out. And she thought: she’s going to offer you money to leave. The Muse opened a door, showed her the inside without smiling now and Queta murmured a quick thanks. But it wasn’t the bathroom, it was the bedroom, one out of a movie or a dream: mirrors, a thick carpet, mirrors, a screen, a black bedcover with an embroidered yellow animal that was spitting fire, more mirrors.

“There, in the back, ” was said behind her, without hostility, in the woman’s insecure, alcoholic voice. “That door. ”

She went into the bathroom, locked the door, breathed with anxiety. What was that all about, what kind of a game was that, what were those people thinking about? She looked in the bathroom mirror; her face, all made up, still had the look of perplexity, upset, surprise. She turned the water on to fake it, sat on the edge of the tub. Was the Muse his …? He’d had her come to …? Did the Muse know that? It occurred to her that they were spying on her through the keyhole and she went to the door, knelt down and looked through the small opening: a circle of rugs, shadows. Cayo Shithead, she had to get out of there, she wanted to get out of there, Shithead Muse. She felt rage, confusion, humiliation, laughter. She stayed inside a short while longer, tiptoeing on the white tiles, wrapped in the bluish light of the phosphorescent tube, trying to put her boiling head in order, but she only got more confused. She flushed the toilet, fixed her hair in front of the mirror, took a breath and opened the door. The woman had lain across the bed, and Queta felt for an instant that she was distracted, looking at the reclining figure motionless with such white skin, in contrast to the jet black shiny bedcover. But the woman had raised her eyes in her direction. She was looking at her slowly, inspecting her with a slow, prolonged relaxation, not smiling, not annoyed. An interested and at the same time thoughtful look, under the drunken mirror of her eyes.

“Might I know what I’m doing here? ” she asked with drive, taking a few resolute steps toward the bed.

“Come on, all we need is for you to get mad. ” The Muse lost her seriousness, her sparkling eyes were looking at her in amusement.

“Not mad, I just don’t understand. ” Queta felt herself reflected, projected on all sides, thrown upward, sent back, attacked by all those mirrors. “Tell me why they had me come here. ”

“Stop your nonsense and talk to me in the familiar form, ” the woman whispered; she moved a little on the bed, contracting and expanding her body like an earthworm, and Queta saw that she had taken off her shoes, and for a second, through her stockings, she saw her painted toenails. “You know my name, Hortensia. Come on, sit down here, stop your nonsense. ”

She was speaking to her without hatred or friendship, with her voice a little evasive and calm because of the alcohol, and she kept looking fixedly at her. As if appraising me, Queta thought, nauseous, as if … She hesitated a moment and sat on the edge of the bed, all the pores of her body alert. Hortensia was leaning her head on a hand, her posture was abandoned and soft.

“You know only too well why, ” she said, without anger, without bitterness, with a lascivious trace of mockery in her eyes that she was trying to hide and Queta thought what? Her eyes were large, green, with lashes that didn’t look artificial and which shaded her eyelids; she had thick, moist lips, her throat was smooth and long and the veins could be sensed, thin and blue. She didn’t know what to think, what to say, what? Hortensia fell back, laughed as if in spite of herself, covered her face with her arm, stretched with a kind of avidity and suddenly reached out a hand and took Queta by the wrist: you know only too well why. Like a customer, she thought, frightened and not moving, as if, looking at the white fingers with blood-red nails on her dull skin and now Hortensia was looking at her intensely, without hiding it now, challenging now.

“I’d better go, ” she heard herself say, stammering, quiet and astonished. “You’d rather I left, wouldn’t you? ”

“I’m going to tell you something. ” She was still holding her, she had got a little closer to her, her voice had grown thicker, and Queta felt her breath. “I was terrified that you’d be old, ugly, that you’d be dirty. ”

“Do you want me to leave? ” Queta babbled stupidly, breathing with effort, remembering the mirrors. “Was I brought here for …? ”

“But you’re not, ” Hortensia whispered and brought her face even closer and Queta saw the exasperated joy in her eyes, the movement of her mouth as it seemed to smoke. “You’re pretty and young. You’re nice and clean. ”

She put out the other hand and took Queta’s other arm. She was looking at her boldly, mockingly, twisting her body a little to sit up, murmuring you’re going to have to teach me, letting herself fall backward, and looking at her from below, her eyes open, exultant, she was smiling and raving use the intimate form with me right now, if they were going to bed together she couldn’t address her formally, could she? without letting go of her, obliging her with soft pressure to lean over, to let herself go against her. Teach you? Queta thought, me teach you? giving in, feeling her confusion disappearing, laughing.

“Good, ” commanded a voice behind her that was beginning to come out of its boredom. “You finally became friends. ”

He woke up ravenous; his head no longer ached, but he felt jabs in his back and cramps. The room was small, cold and bare, with windows opening on a passageway with columns along which nuns and nurses passed. They brought him his breakfast and he ate voraciously.

“Please don’t eat the dish, ” the nurse said. “I’ll bring you another roll, if you want. ”

“And more coffee too, if you can, ” Santiago said. “I haven’t eaten a bite since yesterday noon. ”

The nurse brought him another full breakfast and stayed in the room, watching him eat. There she was, Zavalita, so dark, so neat, so young in her white unwrinkled uniform, her white stockings, her short boy’s bob and her starched cap, standing by the bed with her trim legs and her filiform model’s body, smiling with her hungry teeth.

“So you’re a newspaperman? ” Her eyes were lively and impertinent and she had a thin mocking voice. “How did you happen to turn over? ”

“Ana, ” Santiago says. “Yes, very young. Five years younger than I. ”

“The bumps you got, even though nothing is broken, sometimes leave a person a little foolish. ” The nurse laughed. “That’s why they’ve kept you under observation. ”

“Don’t lower my morale like that, ” Santiago said. “Give me some encouragement instead. ”

“Why does the idea of being a father bother you? ” Ambrosio asks. “If everybody in Peru had that idea, there wouldn’t be any people left in the country, son. ”

“So you work for La Cró nica? ” she repeated; she had one hand on the door as if she were going to leave, but she’d been standing there for five minutes. “Journalism must be very interesting, isn’t it? ”

“Although I have to confess that when I found out I was going to be a father I got terrified too, ” Ambrosio says. “It takes you a while to get used to it, son. ”

“It is, but it’s got its bad points, a person can crack his skull from one moment to the next, ” Santiago said. “You can do me a great favor. Could you send someone out to buy some cigarettes? ”

“Patients aren’t allowed to smoke, ” she said. “You’ll have to bear with it while you’re here. It’s better that way, you’ll get rid of all the poison. ”

“I’m dying for a smoke, ” Santiago said. “Don’t be mean. Get me some. Even if it’s just one. ”

“What does your wife think? ” Ambrosio says. “Because she must certainly want to have children. Women like being mothers. ”

“What will you do for me in return? ” she asked. “Will you print my picture in your newspaper? ”

“I suppose so, ” Santiago says. “But Ana’s a good person and does what I like. ”

“If the doctor finds out, he’ll kill me, ” the nurse said with the look of an accomplice. “Smoke it on the sly and put the butt in the bedpan. ”

“Ugh, it’s a Country, ” Santiago said, coughing. “Do you smoke this crap? ”

“My, how choosy, ” she said, laughing. “I don’t smoke. I went out and stole it for you so you could keep up your habit. ”

“The next time steal a Nacional Presidente and I give you my promise I’ll print your picture on the society page, ” Santiago said.

“I stole it off Dr. Franco, ” she said, making a face. “God protect you from falling into his hands. He’s the nastiest one here, and stupid besides. All he ever prescribes are suppositories. ”

“What did this poor Dr. Franco ever do to you? ” Santiago asked. “Does he flirt with you? ”

“What a thing to think, the old man hasn’t got any wind left. ” Two dimples appeared on her cheeks and her laugh was quick and sharp, uncomplicated. “He must be over a hundred. ”

All morning they had him back and forth between one room and another, taking x-rays and giving tests; the hazy doctor from the night before put him through a questioning that was almost a police grilling. There was nothing broken, apparently, but he didn’t like those shooting pains, young man, they’d see what the x-rays said. At noon Arispe came by and joked with him: he’d covered his ears and made a sign against the evil eye, Zavalita, he could imagine the curses he’d gotten. The editor sends his greetings, that you should stay in the hospital all the time you need, the newspaper would also pay for any extras just as long as you didn’t order any banquets from the Hotel Bolí var. You really don’t want your family notified, Zavalita? No, the old man would get a scare and it wasn’t worth it, there was nothing wrong with him. In the afternoon Periquito and Darí o came; they only had a few bruises and they were happy. They’d got two days off and that night they were going to a party together. A while later Soló rzano, Milton and Norwin arrived, and when they’d all left, there appeared as if just rescued from a shipwreck, cadaverous and lovey-dovey, China and Carlitos.

“Look at your faces, ” Santiago said. “You must have kept that wild time of the other night going right up till now. ”

“We did, ” China said, yawning ostentatiously; she flopped onto the foot of the bed and took off her shoes. “I don’t know what day it is or even what time it is. ”

“I haven’t been to La Cró nica for two days, ” Carlitos said, yellow, his nose red, his eyes jellylike and happy. “I called Arispe and invented an attack of ulcers and he told me about the accident. I didn’t come earlier so I wouldn’t run into anyone from the paper. ”

“Regards from Ada Rosa. ” China gave a loud laugh. “Hasn’t she been to see you? ”

“Don’t talk to me about Ada Rosa, ” Santiago said. “The other night she turned into a panther. ”