House on the Lagoon (30 page)

“She looks just like I did when I was a child,” said Petra, “when my color was still African black, and not watered down by age.” And as she held the child in her lap she began to sing in a strange language that Alwilda had never heard before, and the little girl closed her eyes.

Alwilda explained her plight to Petra and asked if she would keep Carmelina and raise her at the house. The little girl had already fallen off the half-rotten balcony of her house once, she said; it was lucky she had been there to save her. The next time she might drown in the lagoon’s mud.

Petra listened without saying a word. When Alwilda finished, she looked pensively at the child, asleep on her lap. “Carmelina was the most beautiful of my four daughters,” Petra said to Alwilda, “and also the most high-strung. She was born during a terrific thunderstorm. Next to our house in Guayama there was a royal palm tree, and right after Carmelina was born a bolt of lightning struck it. The fire ran down the tree trunk and jumped into our house through the window; it missed Carmelina’s crib by inches. But the spirit of the god of fire entered her body, anyway. Except, instead of in her heart, it lodged in the wrong place: her pussy. When she grew up, every time Carmelina crossed her legs, men were struck by lightning and fell in love with her. Many of them had been friends before they met her, but once they saw her they burned with desire and jealousy, and finally one of them killed her to eliminate the problem.” Petra paused, as if trying to make up her mind.

“I’ll do my best and see if I can smuggle the baby into the Mendizabals’ house, but I hope she didn’t inherit Carmelina’s curse.” Having said that, she went into her room with Carmelina still asleep in her arms, and closed the door. She put the baby on her bed and knelt on the mud-packed floor in front of Elegguá’s effigy. And as she rubbed the stem on its head with her hand, she prayed, “Olorún, ka kó koi bé re,” asking him to take pity on the little girl.

Alwilda returned to Las Minas, and Petra took Carmelina to the servants’ bath at the spring. She undressed her and put her in the cement trough; she scrubbed her with a corn husk until she shone like a polished little coffee bean. Then she combed Carmelina’s hair in two tight pigtails which stood out like tamarind pods on the sides of her head, sprinkled her with lavender water, put her pink dress on again, and took her upstairs. She had little hope that Buenaventura and Rebecca would let the baby live at the house, but maybe she could persuade them to let her stay for a few days.

It was five in the afternoon and Rebecca was playing bridge with three of her friends on the golden terrace when Petra appeared with Carmelina in her arms. “Isn’t she beautiful? She looks just like a black Kewpie doll!” the ladies exclaimed. Petra put the baby in Rebecca’s arms, and she was passed from one woman’s lap to the next. They cooed and sang and made her laugh. “The backs of her hands are black as licorice,” they noted with wonder, “but her palms are soft and pink!” Rebecca called out to Patria and Libertad, who were playing Chinese checkers on the other side of the terrace.

“Look what Petra brought you!” she said to them, smiling. “It’s a new doll, only she eats real food and goes peepee in her diaper, not like the rubber dolls you’re used to playing with!” The girls squealed with delight, and begged their mother to let them hold the child. Rebecca asked Petra to bring a blanket and a pillow, and soon Carmelina was lying on the floor, with the girls busily changing her diaper.

Several days passed, and the girls were still enchanted with their new toy. The first thing they asked for when they woke up was Carmelina, who was already giggling when Petra brought her upstairs, all spick-and-span and smelling of lavender. Carmelina was a placid baby; she liked to sit on the floor and let the girls do whatever they wanted: she ate porridge when they fed it to her, let them wash her ears, and was still as they changed the outfits Eusebia, Rebecca’s seamstress, made for her.

After a week, however, Patria and Libertad began to tire of Carmelina. One afternoon Eulodia, who usually stayed with them and the baby, went down to the cellar and lost track of time, talking to a relative who had come for a visit. Patria and Libertad found a can of paint the housepainters had left behind, and as Patria picked up a brush from the floor, she said to Libertad: “I’m tired of playing with a black doll. Let’s paint Carmelina white, to see how she looks.” They took off her little gingham dress, Patria held her up, and Libertad spread the white oil paint all over her body.

At first Carmelina liked the new game, but then she began to feel uncomfortable and kicked Libertad, as if to make her drop the paintbrush. But Libertad was tall and gangly and she had long arms, so she stepped back and went on painting Carmelina. Once the job was done, the girls took Carmelina to the bathroom, so she could see how she looked. When Carmelina saw the little white ghost staring back at her in the mirror, she let out a terrified wail and Petra came running from the kitchen.

A few minutes later Rebecca, Petra, and Carmelina were in Buenaventura’s silver Rolls-Royce with Brambon at the wheel, driving to Presbyterian Hospital, which was the nearest one to Alamares. Carmelina had lost consciousness; the lead in the oil paint was poisoning her. When they got to the hospital, she was taken to the emergency room, and the paint was removed with a special combination of mineral oils and soap and water. Another half an hour of being white, and Carmelina would have died.

The episode had unexpected consequences. Rebecca felt so bad about the baby’s near-fatal accident that she let Petra keep her; and that was why Carmelina Avilés was brought up at the house on the lagoon.

T
HE NEXT TIME QUINTÍN
went into the study, he found five new chapters in Isabel’s tan folder. He had begun to dread reading the manuscript, but after the first few sentences his forebodings began to dissipate. If in the previous chapters Isabel had tried to pull him into her web of lies and he had struggled to bring her back to reality, now they were in complete accord. She was his loving wife again; she remembered some of the happy moments they had shared—how they had met at the Escambrón boardwalk, and how he had retrieved the stolen medal of the Virgin of Guadalupe for her. Quintín remembered the incident clearly, and it was just as Isabel had described it. That was the day he had seen her for the first time. She looked like a goddess, with her jet-black eyes and beautiful figure. She was laughing with her cousin, holding on to the railing on the boardwalk, her red hair blowing in the wind.

Quintín remembered Isabel’s graduation from Vassar, that rainy spring morning when he took her in his arms right after the ceremony. He recalled, too, how he had comforted her when Abby died and when she had to put Carmita in an asylum. How close they had been!

Quintín felt reassured that Isabel still loved him. For a while he had been afraid the novel was a kind of leave-taking, her way of saying goodbye.

Rebecca and Buenaventura had always feared that Isabel’s background was too different from Quintín’s. Some of Buenaventura’s salesmen who visited the interior of the island went so far as to call the Monforts little more than white trash. The Antonsantis were a well-known family in Ponce, but once Don Vicenzo died and Carlos, Carmita’s husband, took charge of her inheritance, they quickly lost their capital. Abby had had to struggle tooth and nail to educate Isabel. She was probably the only Vassar College student who paid for her education in custards and cakes. Then Carmita went mad and Carlos killed himself. Quintín’s parents cautioned him, pointing out these things and insisting that he should think carefully before making a decision. Psychological problems were often inherited, and Carmita’s madness was not to be taken lightly. His children might develop it; Isabel, too. But Quintín was in love with Isabel. He would walk barefoot across the mountains from San Juan to Ponce for her, he told them. He would swim around the island just to be with her.

Steeped in his own thoughts, Quintín stopped reading. Something
—
birds, or maybe bats
—
rustling in the mangrove swamp brought him back to reality and he got up from the study’s couch to pour himself a brandy. He drank it in one swallow and sat down again. The next chapter was “Rebecca’s Book of Poems,” and the minute he began reading, apprehension welled up in him. He laughed when she described Buenaventura as a glutton, gorging himself on pigs’ feet and
garbanzos.
But he was shocked by her revelation that his father periodically took his black mistresses to Lucumí Beach and made love to them on the sand for a few dollars. He wondered how Isabel had found out; he’d certainly never mentioned it to her. But, unfortunately, he had to admit it was true.

What he didn’t understand was why she insisted on baring his family’s secrets to the world. He thought they had patched up their quarrel, and here she was again, going after his family with an ax. Instead of pointing out Buenaventura’s good qualities
—
his loyalty to his family, his gentleness, his industriousness
—
she had made up yet another lie about him and now called him a wife beater. She could have been discreet about his foibles
—
his weakness for black women, for example
—
but she accused him of immoral behavior. Isabel was heartless. At least she could have been diplomatic about Buenaventura’s shortcomings. What was the imagination for, anyway? Good writers should try to protect the people they love, not make bloody sacrifices of their reputations. Besides, what right had she to criticize Buenaventura when her grandfather, Vicenzo Antonsanti, had done the same thing? She didn’t criticize
him
for it. Most men had mistresses at the time. Isabel didn’t know anything about these things. She was a woman, how could she?

Granted, it was wrong of Buenaventura to have other women. It hurt Rebecca and broke the sacred vow of matrimony. But independence was part of a man’s nature, the essence of his masculinity. A woman would say, “I love you and I’m yours forever.” A man would say, “I’ll love you forever,” but he’ll never say, “I’m yours.” It wouldn’t be in character. A man must always belong to himself if he wants to be a man. If the man she loves tells a woman, “I’m yours,” what does she hear? That she’ll have to take care of
him
. That he’ll hide under her skirts when danger threatens. Women want their men to be strong, they don’t want a wimp around the house. Rebecca knew about Buenaventura’s trysts at Lucumí Beach and never reproached him for them. She was wise, like the women of her generation; she looked the other way. If she didn’t acknowledge it, it wouldn’t hurt.
“Ojos que no ven, corazón que no siente”—
Eyes that do not see, heart that does not feel
—
goes the old Spanish saying. For Rebecca, it was so. But Isabel was different. She was a modern woman and thought that one should be completely candid about one’s mistakes. But no one was perfect, and so divorce was on the rampage.

The more Quintín read, the angrier he became at Isabel. Rebecca had now fallen out of favor and was ridiculed for not wanting to grow old, for being a self-centered egotist, for abandoning him to the servants while she doted on Ignacio. A pack of lies! The fact was that Isabel had been jealous of Quintín’s special affection for his mother, to whom he had been closer than either Ignacio or his sisters. Isabel had seen Rebecca as a rival from the start. Something, someone, was pressing Isabel to write these awful things about his family. A mysterious force seemed to be driving her. Could Petra be behind all this? Could Isabel have fallen under her spell, as Buenaventura had so long ago? Petra had the ability to creep into people’s hearts, and after she was entrenched in them, there was no way to get her out. She was a relentless gossip, endlessly spreading false rumors about his family in the house and even in the neighborhood of Alamares. Quintín began to suspect Petra was responsible for the web of lies Isabel was weaving around him. She wanted to show him that his family was a disaster, so he would lose his self-respect.

Why was Isabel so angry, so resentful? Hadn’t he loved her enough? Had he mistreated her in any way? He’d always tried to be as kind and considerate as he could, not out of politeness, but because he truly loved her. Outwardly, they were a model couple; everyone in San Juan envied them their happiness. They were almost the only ones in their group who weren’t divorced. It was inconceivable that after twenty-six years of marriage they should break up over a silly novel!

Isabel’s description of the cellar of the house on the lagoon in Rebecca’s time, when its dark labyrinth of tunnels had seethed with servants living off his father’s magnanimity, and where all sorts of unholy activities took place, confirmed his suspicions. Petra, entrenched in the cellar’s common room like a spider, made his hair stand on end.

Quintín made up his mind to destroy the manuscript. He would get up from the couch, go to the kitchen, and burn it. He had the matches in his pocket. He carried them with him all the time. But he didn’t move. He knew, if he destroyed the novel, Isabel would leave him. Quintín felt like a fly, caught in Petra’s web.

I
N APRIL 1956 REBECCA
and Buenaventura took Patria and Libertad on a six-month trip to Spain. The girls were about to enter La Rosée, in Lausanne, and they would travel with their parents until September before beginning school. Quintín and I were happy during that time. We both loved our apartment. It was very modern, one of the first condominiums to be built in San Juan. We were on the tenth floor, and the Atlantic Ocean was visible from all the windows, so it felt as if we lived aboard a ship.

I had begun to write short stories, none of which I liked enough to try to have published. Quintín was totally immersed in his job at Mendizabal & Company. By then he had the business well in hand, and since Buenaventura was away, he had been making all the decisions. He ordered new stock, kept track of sales, supervised the office personnel and the workers at the warehouse. He worked ten hours a day and was paid a very low salary, but he didn’t mind; he considered it a necessary apprenticeship.