Almost Never: A Novel (31 page)

A
ction at dawn: the theft. Over the course of that week, Liborio, Zacarías, Egipto, and Gonzala had become the best of chums. Egipto was the one who proposed the robbery. Let’s begin with the toughest part: the pool hall personnel, those two wimpy, scatterbrained hicks, we know who they are: and: what about this and what about that, convictions, during the first nightlong conversation when Egipto repeated more than nine times the periphrasis: “It’s a golden opportunity,” just a question of encouragement. But those in charge of the pool hall were rather reticent, they hesitated, they swore, honor and dignity should always triumph over corruption, also they were Catholics who crossed themselves frequently, hence their sense of guilt never left them any peace, and stealing—horrors! Their policy was to toe the line and seek new horizons morning, noon, and night, always holding their heads up high. Nevertheless, “It’s a golden opportunity,” persuasion, temptation. During the second conversation Egipto emphasized how fucked their lives were in that harsh, unchanging landscape, with its perpetual component of darkness and unthinkable squalor; he waxed eloquent, that is, on similar subjects. All rotten; images, scenes, simulations, which all came down to how fucked they were, but no, not even then did he convince them. It took till the third conversation for him to be able to touch their souls: the future of their families back at the ranch—how about eternal smiles?, not bad, eh? To leave the worst behind them, like abandoning a filthy nest. Moreover, the robbery would occur at dawn. To wit: do it soon, before Don Demetrio returned. It was a matter of taking all the money from the safe and jamming it lickety-split into a bag, any bag. Then running off and vanishing—come on! It was not easy to push them into sin, he had to talk and talk, in a tone of voice that really softened the edges of the most horrendous ideas.
We won’t take the balls or the cues, just the money, okay?
We must say, there was a lot, because the billiards business was growing at an almost demented rate, in just a few days—wow! so many vagrancy-prone customers.
It’s a golden opportunity, don’t you see?!
Finally Liborio and Zacarías, conscious that they were wavering and seeing the glint in each other’s eyes, were persuaded to throw in their lots. They would cross themselves while they burgled. Midnight action. When all was calm, because in Parras there wasn’t a lot of surveillance, and what little there was: why would they get out of bed at that hour. So: a stellar robbery. Yes, oath taken: from here on out, almost like a trick. Once those two eagerly agreed to go along with the robbery, Egipto invited them to the house. Celebration. A lavish meal for four, prepared by Gonzala, she who would steal Doña Telma’s jewels, a huge quantity in a safe, an artifact that several blows would open. She and Egipto had already talked it over extensively, moreover these two were in love and for both of them the robbery would mean fleeing Parras to live their love somewhere distant and unknown—right? Then they would kiss each other as much as they wanted far away, very far away, perhaps somewhere with good weather. They imagined themselves, therefore, very much in love and bedecked with jewels, maybe even drinking delicious wine in supine satiety. Indistinguishable from the aristocracy, part effort, part merit. A shared dream discussed in frenzied details we’d do better to leave unspoken. During the meal Egipto outlined the scheme while they toasted and wished each other one hell of an awesome life. Nevertheless, a few casual details; to the beat of clanking cutlery and chewing, Egipto explained that everything they took from the pool hall and the house would be divided equally; split five ways because a man with a pickup truck had to be cut in; a man, also a thief, whom Egipto had hired two days earlier, and who was now in on the plot, pretty exciting development, this business of using passwords and the like. When to brake and when to accelerate (not much) the truck: like a shark in the dark, right? The hack couldn’t make it, had other things to do … Everything was working out, thank God. It’s true, few people would be able to resist such a thrifty theft; when the golden opportunity arrives nobody doesn’t want to be a thief … To (gently) steal in order to gain access to a more praiseworthy life, who wouldn’t, especially if no danger is detected. Naturally! anyway nerves get racked, so moving quickly is recommended, to get it over with, or whatever.

All four got along during the meal, which was delicious. Better not to list each thing they ate so as not to make the narrative too bourgeois, but it was all delicious.

Chorizo?

Buttery bits?

A motley mix of meats?

Wines so fine, the four were hanging from the rafters, once they were in their cups?

That’s what we found. And we also found that they were pigging out. All the rest we must merely assume: a long dissertation about the meaning of an augural robbery: jewels and money, big-time; corruption seen as fireworks, a fleeting and luminous spectacle, and its consequences: the lasting embers, those that linger long: life, period, embers, and again, casually, the word “corruption” appeared, so revealing, therefore, crush that word, destroy it, in order to raise it to the loftiest heights: corruption, corrup, corru, co, conquest, insofar as the theft itself would be the same as a silent then smiling flash of lightning. Finally came the good-byes: many
good night
s many
thank you
s, see you tomorrow; careful! tomorrow at dawn the robbery will take place, so we’ll meet at the house at exactly twelve midnight; agreed; say no more; good-bye.

We will give only a few details about the sinister implementation: four in the morning; not a sound in the entire town, so the fortune Liborio and Zacarías removed from the safe, bah, just a matter of stuffing that many bills into a large oilskin bag, and magic and speed to load it stealthily onto the truck, then
vroom
to Doña Telma’s house; there, the fortune the lady of the house left trustingly in Gonzala’s hands was placed in a bag, apace; all the jewelry in another, yes, in the twinkling of an eye, and the escape from Parras, everyone scrambling in. So it came to pass. Worth mentioning that none of the five thieves were from Parras but rather from several different hamlets: past the farthest reaches of the desert, like scattered grains whose names, well, someday we’ll name each hamlet, but for now only one: Paila—and that’s all! Also worth noting something else: the thieves left the door ajar in the pool hall as well as at the house. Carelessly or with intentional malice so that others could go in and take what was left. The first to notice the doors open the following day closed them, that’s right, in both cases they were quite decent. Bam! problem solved. Now all that’s left to speculate about is where the pickup loaded with thieves would go; how they would scatter, questions that belong to the mysterious disappearance of all five, who perhaps ended up fighting among themselves in some desolate spot, under a sky of abstruse hues, between chestnut and orange trees; that there were deaths, perhaps; one person who kept it all, the smartest one, of course, let’s dub it with “perhaps” and move on to something else.

R
ehearsal. So much practicing of apologies there on the bench, the ones Doña Telma and Doña Zulema were ready to offer up in distressed tones, as if for a theatrical performance. One corrected the other, and vice versa, though not the big guy, who watched them impatiently but without a single word of reproach; he also kept turning to look at the house, to see if by now, but no. It was as if the delay made the coming solemnity more robust. More and more stammers popped up during rehearsals. Each word seemed to drag; each sentence seemed pressed on like a stamp; the rest was rhythm and delirium, a mopey flow. Three hours later Renata appeared, as if she’d been quite put out, though shining like never before. You had to see her: gorgeous, though a bit submissive. She was gesturing, “Please, please, come in,” and the tense but enthusiastic trio advanced toward the site of the apologies: they didn’t go through the stationery store (strange) but rather down an ambiguous hallway. The scent of eucalyptus grew stronger inside the house: why? there was no potted plant; then, following Renata’s lead, they reached an (almost) totally yellow room; “Have a seat.” The lady of the house would be coming soon, this said with great feeling. Her predicament, the airs she gave herself, which spread and which those still practicing their apologies in Renata’s presence and in the other’s absence could interpret, under their breath, naturally! and the lass heard them, and was puzzled, until, half an hour later—playing the role of a supposedly portentous diva—Doña Luisa finally appeared. Well, well. Sidelong ironic glances. The jitters, in other words. A generic tension swirled, had to, because whose job would it be to break the ice. The lady of the house with her hint of hostility—or what? One formidable cranky one and a wee repentant trio, this the framework, but it was Doña Zulema who began to hone in on what we can take to be a categorical exoneration as she modulated each idea so thoroughly that her elaborate apology seemed to be but a small piece of a much larger anecdote. The issue of the kiss planted on the back of the hand. The lick of the damsel’s skin as an expression of profound love, that sublime surrender transferred to the tip of the tongue, you must understand the intent, a deeply felt decency that had spilled over into the saliva of that kiss. Doña Zulema had to explain several times that her nephew was a man with the very best of intentions. A believer in everlasting love and more and more such salvos, so many that who knows how, but she began to courageously sweeten the subject and thus slowly departed from her script. Her speech became a treacle tornado. His aunt was dazzling, prodigious, garrulous, until Doña Telma, with studied scruples, tugged on her dress from behind. A warning: somewhat doubtful, silent, to return to what was rehearsed, and the mother, erupting:
We are very sorry about what has happened. My son is the model of paramount decency.
Theater. The speech practiced (of course) on the bench: back to what was agreed upon. So that the penny would drop for the aunt, and it did because suddenly she hadn’t another word to say. Then came a vacuum, in which nobody even clicked her tongue. In any case, they glanced at one another guiltily, as if wanting to hide. The room seemed to have gotten even yellower than it had been, more infectious, sicklier, uglier.

For a while the apologies continued to proliferate, so much so that the main point got murky; stagnation formed a kind of lagoon. In fact, Doña Telma and Doña Zulema finally began to recite their rehearsed speeches, in turns, with such precision that it could (truly) barely be believed; they were outstanding, agile, though without the slightest emotional charge, without pleasantries, and that’s why Doña Luisa stopped them short:
I accept your apologies, but it should never happen again … Now, the one who should apologize is Demetrio, don’t you think? It’s up to him.
They threw the big guy a curveball; he was staring at the skilled craftsmanship of the floor tiles and after hearing himself alluded to, said,
Me?,
and then,
Oh, yes!,
whereat:
I offer the biggest and most complete apology. My intention, when I kissed Renata’s hand, was sincerely affectionate, a tender kiss full of integrity. If I licked her skin it was because I thought of it as an act of devotion. At no moment did it occur to me that I was disrespecting her. So, I repeat my apology.
Doña Luisa smiled (smugly) and Renata did too, following her lead. This is where everything should pause. Then, like an undertow, the lady’s apology, with resounding composure:
I also ask you to forgive me, Demetrio, for what I said to you. I was desperate.
Congratulations.

Nevertheless, the thorniest part remained: the brave act of … Well, aunt and mother turned their vulturelike scowls upon Demetrio; so did Renata; not to mention Doña Luisa. They were waiting for him to come out with what all this had been aiming at: asking for her hand with cloying ardor, all he had to do was utter one well-sequestered sentence to that effect, and they would buoy up the request, elaborating point by point what it would mean for Renata to live by Demetrio’s side: the understanding, the affection, the peace, the secure economic foundation; but, well, feeling the pressure from the eyes upon him, the agronomist spoke like a good-natured person with common sense:
The purpose of our visit is (ahem) to request Renata’s hand. I want her to be my wife before God and the law.
And the cornered fool pulled out the box that contained the engagement ring; he didn’t open it, or rather: he walked around with it. Just imagine the gamboling up and down—how awful! Nonetheless, Doña Luisa, quite severe, threw a dart:

“What do you have to offer my daughter?”

“I have a lot of money. I have a very prosperous business in Parras. Moreover, I love her with all my heart. She will find that I am a man who is willing to make great sacrifices to guarantee her happiness and comfort. For me Renata is a goddess that deserves constant veneration. I’ll give her everything she needs!”

The previous truth-telling paragraph paved the way for his aunt and mother to enhance the petition by assigning Demetrio attributes: a good man (and rising!): a very hard worker and unflagging and with a respectability proven by a thousand small things, and good natured, with a smile perpetually hovering over his lips, prudent, and, to top it off, endowed with a spirit of progress and more progress. Or, in other words: the best of the best, no holds barred. And hence their exordium continued until dilution threatened, because Doña Luisa lifted her finger, she wanted to speak, they didn’t let her, such was the onrush of wonders, and, at a certain moment, raising her voice excessively, Renata’s mother uttered this:

“Okay, my daughter can be Demetrio’s wife after one year has passed. I give my word.”

“What?”

“Just as you heard. Wait one year. My reason is that I still need Renata’s help getting the stationery store off the ground. Around this time next year we will plan the wedding here in Sacramento.”