Almost Never: A Novel (33 page)

T
his begins where Doña Telma’s speech ended. It ended when she discovered that Egipto and Gonzala were missing. A quandary, a surprise. They’d escaped, it seems, with the money, which wasn’t much. Even so, desperate screams ensued, louder and louder, there must have been vibrations everywhere, up and down the walls, and now for the part you are not going to believe: Doña Telma looked under the beds. The servants fled with all the money and of course they pinched some other things as well. The lady went to the safe, which was, as she intuited, open: her jewels!, gone! Macabre emptiness, because the thieves had also taken several very beloved gold coins, as well as some valuable presses, metal scraps, and tools. Hence, the lady’s cries burst forth; she cried out with good reason, in the end, all that tremendous moaning heard by Demetrio, who came to embrace her and showed great compassion.
My jewels, those two took everything I most loved.
Then she said that she had already suspected they were secret lovers, and the worst part was she had nowhere to turn. Egipto was from a hamlet in some godforsaken place, and Gonzala was from another, far away. A problem to go to each hamlet, even getting there would be no cakewalk, moreover their relatives would protect their loved ones and who knows anyway if they would even know about the robbery; no, perhaps they hadn’t even gone back there. In the end, a perfect crime, irrevocable. All lost—and now what? Good thing the inheritance had been deposited at the local savings bank. Then the larger conjecture: Egipto as well as Gonzala had worked in her house for more than twenty years. They never stole a cent—why now? Because of the love they had sworn to each other?

The opportunity to do it right.

More than enough money.

They could even buy a house somewhere.

But the barbarity of this act still had a much wider reach. A major robbery, in the end. Doña Telma suggested that her son go to the pool hall to … Already Demetrio was thinking that Liborio and Zacarías were likewise two filthy thieves, or if not they would be able to give him some information about what had happened at the house. A modification, an increase in horror, because at the pool hall certain balls and cues and (to top that off) some chalk were missing. He went to check the cash register. No, or rather, empty, not a single bill or coin. More thieves, as we see, but let’s see if they had anything to do with Gonzala and Egipto? Theft here and there? Really? All on the same day—right? So maybe two separate crimes, or maybe the four had made some kind of pact—but how? There might have been a meeting, a supper, perhaps? Demetrio was already piecing together an approximation in the air: layers of mud (on top of each other), the cash all gone, and another thing, they must have done it at night. But the big guy didn’t waste more time making further conjectures but rather went out to the street and shouted at full throttle:
I’ve been robbed! I’ve been robbed! They robbed my pool hall!
He ran about wildly, indeed he did, going around in circles as if he were playing a game. He stood there screaming in the middle of the street, then suddenly turned south, toward his house, but not. Many passersby were watching the scene and they were moved and they approached to touch the body of the shouter to tell him to “Calm down!” and other things of that sort, but Demetrio kept on in the same vein: shouting wildly, as if he were taunting fate by spewing barbaric things such as:
I’m going to hang those thieves! Their names are Liborio and Zacarías!
No matter how much they tried to console him, nobody managed to calm him down, and he continued spitting out incoherent babble. With their combined forces, however, they did carry the giant, but only for half a minute, after which Demetrio violently bolted. They wanted to take him home, which was only—how many blocks away? But he told them to let him go because he would walk on his own two feet and just fine, thank you. The thing is, once he was put down (roughly) on the ground, Demetrio stopped shouting. On the contrary, he showed a curious kind of dignity as he walked away. A respectable upright man, casually straightening out his shirt and pants. It was a good thing that he had become quite sober, as was appropriate, and he stayed that way until he reached the house. A few followed him, just because. Imagine, then, the embrace between mother and son. The defeated duo, alone. Or, rather, inside the house and with the door closed. Or, rather, they cried a lot. Yes, there was a big because.

The coincidental robberies. The unimaginable. Too much trust given to those who didn’t deserve it. And Demetrio lodged the most serious complaint:

“I always have to start from scratch, always, always, always. I want to come out ahead for a change.”

“It’s not the end of the world. We won’t be starting from scratch. Fortunately, I still have money saved. Though I never thought such a thing could befall us.”

They kept talking sorrowfully, standing up, without losing their balance, and embracing each other, though soon they loosened their grip. There in the middle of the courtyard their desolation pointed in a certain direction. Then the pair began making futile speculations. Here’s one example: why were others able to lift themselves up with no problem, while they, no matter how hard they struggled, just couldn’t.
God doesn’t love us,
she declared, then immediately added nuance to her affirmation, beginning with the following banality:
Or, He loves us with tough love.
After elaborating on the advantage of being close to God, his mother proposed they go to church to pray for more than two hours. Demetrio, without hesitating, agreed and rejoiced, for it was of utmost importance to thank the Almighty that they hadn’t been completely scalped; for the robbery, in both cases, had been somewhat prudent. It was not a catastrophe, it just was, and—what might have happened if they’d stayed in Sacramento for two more days? or a week? eh? For now, let’s watch mother and son walking with their heads down, leaning on each other with good balance and clutched hands. Many passersby saw that saddened pair take one step after another. But what they mostly noted was their entrance into the temple. Their rustic humility that would be rewarded in the great beyond. Anyway, finally they kneeled and then began a kind of harsh penitence, parabolic, parodies of Our Fathers and Ave Marias: whatever they knew partially, thus: a gallimaufry of somewhat dim-witted prayers, and wedged in there were mother and son requesting that nothing dark happen in their lives again. In the end, their prayers were spicy enough to burn their tongues. There was generosity and even pain, for they remained kneeling for three hours, and their knees … ayayay … Then they left, almost stumbling over themselves. The walk back was more difficult. Mother and son were thinking—in between the
ay
s—about everything they had to do. Renew their trust in people, but—to whom, what nature of folks, would they give it? The truth is, things were complicated, really, supercomplicated.

O
h my, the queue. We wish to emphasize the number of people looking for a job. More than twenty-five were counted. All men, and Demetrio requested solid references from each: a letter—signed? the name of the reference, and, if he lived in Parras (rather than some nearby locale), precisely where. Sometimes he was swayed by summary impressions; an agreeable smiling face, a placid voice, mild manners, and other such niceties. When someone struck a chord, he was asked to return that afternoon. More revealing exchanges ensued, a deeper digging into the details. That is, to be more precise: in the morning there was a queue and in the afternoon there wasn’t. Three days were sufficient to find someone who might fit the bill. He liked three people, so he focused on them. Next step: inquiries: find out where the reference lived? Go there. Take the trouble. Talk to him, and in each case this was done. A scrupulous mechanism for the selection of the most virtuous. He would have liked Renata to be with him, an already official wife with a good eye, that is: a vast switch of dimensions; women, their premonitions, the notion that they are never wrong. He conducted his investigations laboriously, but the two young men he picked, in the end, seemed to have been sent to him by Providence. Consider Demetrio’s lucky star, perhaps for a time hidden behind clouds, or consider the hopeful prayers in the church, the penitence so well enacted, or, also, let’s remember that it was high time things began to go well for him, in any case these two young men: as the days went by, Ángel and Aníbal, overflowed with industriousness. In fact, they were willing to work more than twelve hours a day, even on Saturdays and holidays, for a quite paltry salary. What joy!

As for Doña Telma, she made less of an effort selecting her servants. Naturally she made sure they were not young, preferring grown women doggedly devoted to the drudgery of domestic duties: washing, sweeping, mopping, cooking, each chore performed to the utmost and with serious intent. No, there was no queue, but there was a high frequency of knocks on the door in response to the more or less arresting announcement the dear lady hung in one of the windows facing the street. A high frequency of questions lasting about four hours on one day, a sufficient span of time to say this one and this one. Modesty was the telling sign, servants should not know how to either speak well or string together a long (elaborate) sentence, far less two, the worst would be if they could connect two ideas. Horrors. Intelligent—what for? Obedient: yes!, like absolutely noble burros. Results in a trice. Without gratuitous strife. It was never okay to argue, or more specifically: when an applicant argued even a little she thereby disqualified herself. Hence we can say that Doña Telma spent little more than two hours choosing two servants (stout middle-aged women, single—how fortunate!), who would be her daily companions and we say this because she had a room for them with two beds. Extraordinary accommodations. Doña Telma, nowise prudent, did not ask for detailed references regarding who, in fact, Amalia and María Fulgencia were, she took her impression from their looks. No, she did not investigate. She did not go to talk to their references, who did exist and lived nearby, a question of walking ten blocks, maybe a bit more. No, nothing but trust, understood pejoratively. Better, therefore, to put her trust in God and Saint Jude Thaddaeus to ensure that her intuition functioned to a tee, whereby: the proof: their behavior when at work. No order she gave brought a scowl to their faces. On the contrary, they obeyed happily and, well, that’s enough about that.

Things were also going well for Demetrio. Once again the overly idle flocked to the pool hall. A prodigious business. A money mill: think of it as an unstoppable force: truly. The employees Ángel and Aníbal seemed never to flag in their hard work, and they always wore a broad smile. Nevertheless, a week after reopening the business for local recreation, the big guy realized that he had to make a trip to Monterrey to buy more cue balls, more quality cues, more fine chalk.

So, off we go! And the big guy left with his two model employees. By truck: an exhausting trip. They would not spend the night in the Sultan of the North, as Monterrey was called. Seven hours there, along a dirt road, and seven hours back, along the same one: a more or less jumpy ride. Their watchword was to buy and to come back. No recreation or even reasonable leg stretching. Such admirable criteria.

And they managed it all almost in one breath, in a manner of speaking, but yes, indeed.

Before the trip to Monterrey there was a banking issue: the mother withdrew money and warned her son as follows:
I have very little money left from the inheritance. We must make no mistakes in our investments. The pool hall must do well.
We shall deem everything that came before a series of false steps. Now the appropriate precision, for there was no longer any choice. A vantage point from which to glimpse uninhibited growth. This is what mother and son talked about during their dinner for two:
Every peso you spend is critical.
Whence arose, in a sudden burst, the huge cost of everything wedding related: yes, yes, naturally, there must be a feast, but only for a few guests, but … ; as to the bridal gown, no pompous exhibitionism, no bloated presumption, but not a shoddy garment, either, something middling, but … ; as to the honeymoon: travel, hotels, meals in restaurants, oh, nevertheless, Demetrio thought they should choose one spot and there have their movie moments. A hotel, with a pool. Hopefully! He thought of Piedras Negras, the border town, who knows why. Not Sabinas, nor Monclova nor Saltillo nor Torreón, not Monterrey either or anywhere else. So Piedras Negras—why? Perhaps because it was a place nobody talked about … anyway, we’ll see … More and more discussion, never without Doña Telma’s insidious and recalcitrant warnings:
Watch every peso you spend. This is our last chance.
But strutting—even embellishing—his stuff, Demetrio rose from his chair and cited the dependability of his lucky star (and the blahblahblah started—oh mercy me!), insisting that anything he did was bound to turn out hunky-dory. All the more so because they had prayed for hours in the church, on their knees—right? remember how much pain there was during the prayers, and still they remained. So we can now move on to what happened in the following weeks. December came and, Congratulations! Christmas and New Year’s celebrations, quite delightful; January came and, Congratulations! February came and, a few ups and downs, but generally good, very good! We now find ourselves in March 1949, in full marvelous ascension. As far as the house goes, hmm, Amalia and María Fulgencia were exceptional; the same goes for Ángel and Aníbal in the pool hall. What splendid hires!