Where the Bird Sings Best (15 page)

“The entire orphanage roared with laughter and applause. I’d won my first battle. From that moment on, I would be more monkey than any monkey. After many, many hours of practice, I learned to use my feet in the same way as people who’ve lost their hands. One day, I could eat the banana using only my lower extremities. What a triumph! To see me repeat the trick, the boys gave me their desserts. I could enjoy myself to the fullest and eat as many as I wanted, the only price being occasional indigestion.

Soon I had to expand my repertoire—every day I had to eat the banana a different way. With rage: I bit ferociously, interrupting myself to chew with a big grin. This mixture of hate and pleasure won over the audience. With anguish: after hiding the banana, apparently without realizing it, under my napkin, I howled as I looked everywhere for it, even between my legs. My wailing broke their hearts, and when I finally lifted the napkin and squealed with joy, everyone applauded. But the number that was most popular, that I had to repeat innumerable times, accepting not only desserts but also marbles, tops, cup-and-ball games, and picture cards, was the poisoned banana act. I’d gobble it down like a starving man, overwhelmed to have something sweet into my mouth, a nip to catch a teeny-tiny chunk between my teeth (laughter) and then chew it for a long time as if it were huge (more laughter), swallow it to the tune of a satisfied belch and, a second later, to clutch my stomach as if attacked by an atrocious pain, then twisting up, screaming my lungs out. Overcoming my suffering, I’d drool again, smile, and take another bite. So from piece to piece, from belch to belch, from cramp to cramp, I increased the intensity of the attacks until I died. A highly celebrated death because, in the greatest pain, with my muscles tense, with my eyes rolled back, and with a horrible expression on my face, I would take one final bite of the murderous banana before bashing it majestically against my forehead. So, my popularity grew right along with my alienation. All human gestures were prohibited. Everyone thought that, by giving me little bags of peanuts, they were making me happy.

“One afternoon, the director of the orphanage had dinner with us, an obligation stated in some paragraph in the rules and regulations. He saw me perform. The number he caught was ‘The Bitter Banana.’ In this one, I, the poor, naïve monkey, hungry, deluded, thought I’d found the sweetest banana of all. I peeled it enthusiastically and raised it to my lips. Yuck! What a letdown! It tasted like bile! Then I walked around the tables, picking up as many sugar bowls as I could carry. I went back to my seat and began to pour sugar on the banana, a little, a lot, a ton, rivers of it, but no matter how much I sweetened its surface, it stayed bitter inside. I ended up, helpless, howling not like a monkey but like a whipped dog. Thanks to a little slice of onion I kept hidden in the palm of my hand, I could cry real tears whenever I rubbed my eyes.

“Amid the guffaws and whistles that cheered my misfortune, there was someone else weeping: the director. My act had touched a nerve. He got up from the table, called me over, and in a friendly way led me by the hand to his office, a mysterious, terrible, sacred place where no orphan ever set foot. The room, painted dark green, was Spartan: a filing cabinet, some diplomas displayed on a wall, a picture of the president of the Republic, a metal desk, a vase with white roses, three leather armchairs, and, on a small side table, the photograph of a young woman wearing a wedding dress. Her skin was transparent, almost luminous, and her blonde curls peeked out from beneath her white veil.

“The director asked me: ‘What’s your name, my boy?’

“‘Seraphim, sir.’

“‘Why? That name doesn’t go well with you.’

“‘I was given that name so that in my ugliness there would be at least one beautiful thing.’

“‘I understand. Seraphim, I hope you know you have a great talent. You are a real artist. What you did in the dining room has a deep meaning. It is, neither more nor less than, the picture of the life lived by all of us poor mortals. We try to sweeten it, but the agreeable part stays on the outside because life is always bitter within. Look at that photograph. She was my wife. I loved her as only a man thirty years older than his wife knows how to love. I was forty-seven, and she seventeen. To say I idolized her is to say nothing. She agreed to marry me; the great number of years that separated us mattered not a bit to her. She made me young again, I assure you of it. Every caress took years off me. Everything was sweet until reality revealed its bitter innards. Three days after our wedding, Rocío, in a fit of joy, started to dance. She tripped and fell out the window. We were living in an apartment on the tenth floor. An idiotic tale, a small slip, and an ocean of gall. I’ve spent years trying to get over it, trying to have fun, to love again. Impossible. Like you, I have nothing left but to howl at the fruit that can never satisfy me.’

“‘I’m very sorry for you. The lady was very pretty. Given my situation, I envy you, Mr. Director. Those three days will be eternal in your memory. I’ll never live anything like that, not even three minutes.’

“‘There’s another lesson you’ve taught me, Seraphim: things can always get worse. I like you and I’m going to do something for you. I think you have a profession. You’re a good clown. You can make a living from your jokes. I’m going to give you a wagon and two horses so you can wander the roads. By making faces, you’ll earn money. Tell me how you’d like to decorate the wagon and what name you’d like to have painted on it. I’ll have the workshop people do the job.’ He pulled a bottle of pisco out of one of the desk drawers. ‘Get out of here, Seraphim, I’m going to get drunk.’

“And that’s exactly what happened. He gave me this wagon. I never saw him again, but I found out he’d committed suicide by jumping out of the same window. I’ve been traveling the roads for many years now, just as he wanted. People are poor. When I pass the hat around, I pick up, along with a few pennies, a carrot, a fresh egg, a couple of pears. And that’s how I’ve been living. Once the show was over, no one ever came over to talk to me. Why would they? I had to content myself with exchanging whinnies with my faithful Whitey and Blacky. I really suffered when they died of old age, but the love I had for them didn’t keep me from slicing up their meat to dry in the sun to make jerky. My stomach was their grave.

“Luckily, I’d saved some money and replaced them with another pair of horses of the same colors. Putting on shows in Valparaíso, I realized that in the red-light zone there were sailors of all nationalities walking around not knowing a word of Spanish. They stood there, mute, getting drunk with the prostitutes. Sometimes they showed snapshots of women, children, dogs, and they’d wave them around, letting out alcoholic hiccups. That’s where I found another opportunity to get a bit of human warmth: I became an interpreter. I prayed to the Three Marys to help me find an instructor who could teach me lots of languages. The miracle happened: I found the Anarchist, a wise and generous man who taught me quickly and for nothing.

“I then divided my work in two parts. During the summer and the spring, I was a clown. During the fall and the winter, a translator, a mascot for the whores, sailors, and smugglers. It’s true that no one bothered to get to know my heart; all they were interested in was for me to transpose what they were feeling from one language to another, that’s all. Another accompanied solitude, but closer and closer. I could feel on my untouched skin the heat of their breath soaked in tobacco and alcohol. A minimal contact for normal beings, but enormous for me. Do you understand me now? Thanks to the earthquake, for the first time, someone has boarded my smelly wagon.

“When you’re all alone, you don’t take care of yourself, and I confess I don’t wipe myself or wash very often. When you, madam, blushed, I saw the Virgin of Dawn. When you fed your fleas and revealed your white flesh, I confused it with the Virgin of the Snows. I know that someday you’ll turn black—I can’t imagine how—and through you the Virgin of the Night will speak. My three saints have sent you. Our meeting was miraculous. Tell me, please, what do your fleas know how to do besides answering to their names?”

“They know how to jump through burning hoops, play tambourines, play ball, and tell the future.”

“Fabulous! You are just what the doctor ordered! The solitary circus is going to expand. If we join together and Madame Teresa presents her little animals, we’ll be a hit in Santiago and the other big cities. Monkey Face and Madame Ochichornia with Her Magic Fleas! We’ll earn a lot of pesos, which we’ll split equally. And that way you two can feed your family.”

Alejandro listened to all that not knowing how to react, but the children were fascinated. Teresa, uncharacteristically nervous and indecisive, felt a tingle. To turn herself into a fortune teller was an idea that—she had no idea why—filled her with joy. Seeing that his proposition wasn’t immediately and indignantly refused, Monkey Face sighed with relief.

“Without a no, there is still the possibility of a yes. Wonderful! I’m going to suggest something good for you. In Santiago, I have an empty room where you can stay and a few neighbors who can be useful to you, among them the Anarchist. Don Alejandro will look for a corner where he can set up his shoe shop, and I’ll introduce you to a dwarf lady who can take care of the children while you, Madame Ochichornia, go on tour with me and return every week with a good amount of money and food. We’re partners! Get up there, Whitey! Get up there, Blacky! We have to be there tomorrow afternoon!”

Lola seemed to hear the flies on that road singing, in tiny female voices, a celestial melody.

Seraphim lived in a tenement in the Independencia neighborhood. At the entrance there was a sign that read
Society of Free Brothers and Sisters. We are not the State
. When the Spanish word for tenement,
conventillo
, was translated into Russian for them as “little convent,” Alejandro and Teresa did not understand the name. The place was filthy and miserable. Its architecture seemed more inspired by a prison than by a temple, with a long central passageway and rooms arranged like jail cells along it. The families lived packed into those spaces without windows, spaces that at the same time were living room, bedroom, kitchen, and latrine.

“The Anarchist will explain the situation better than I can. Chile is not Europe. Here there are two separate realities. A few people live in paradise, and all the rest live in the greatest misery. Only the rich can become even richer; all we poor folk can expect is to become even poorer.”

“The Anarchist?”

“First, settle into this room, then I’ll introduce you. I’ll bring in some bags of straw you can use as beds. Other furniture you’ll have to make out of some empty boxes I’ve picked out of the market garbage. Here is a hammer and some nails. And also some onions, goat cheese, carrots, and a little pea soup. Try to use the charcoal stove as little as possible. It’s bad for your lungs. Organize the space, and I’ll come back to pick you up so you can meet your neighbors. Oh yes, I’d forgotten! In this hole in the corner, you can take care of your needs. It’s not very appetizing to mix the smells of the food on its way in with the smells of the food on its way, but that’s how the owners did it to save money on plumbing and make a few more rooms. Money calls the tune. Anyway, you’ll see that you’ll get used to it more quickly than you think.”

My grandparents were happy. No matter how horrible, better a roof over your head than no roof. They had a few morsels of food, an interpreter, nice neighbors, perhaps, and new professions. What more did they need to restart their lives in this unknown land? Teresa, in a short time, used the boxes to make a table, chairs, and dressers. Meanwhile, Alejandro prepared, with great dedication, his shoemaker’s bench. When Monkey Face returned with the bags of straw, he also brought some pieces of fabric, thread, and needles, so my grandmother could sew them together and make quilts, tablecloths, and curtains. He also gave them a collection of empty jars they could use as pots and dishes. He immediately brought them to visit their neighbors. They began with the Anarchist. Monkey Face explained:

“People say that this gentleman is a member of one of the richest families in Chile, but he got disgusted with money obtained by exploiting the poor. The fact is that he came to live in our tenement because he was attracted by the name of the neighborhood: Independencia. And instead of earning abominable pesos, he invents new professions so we can earn a living. In exchange for that, we pay his rent and give him food. You’ll see: he’s a great man. He was one of the few—I can count them with the toes of one foot—to recognize my human intelligence. A wise man who knows more than thirty languages, he taught me just what was absolutely necessary of several and made me into an interpreter. Money, love, food, vice: what more is there to know? We, his disciples, have formed the Committee of Brothers and Sisters, which does not consider freedom “rebellion,” but rather the retention of an imagination without limits under the restrictions imposed by power. Well, he’ll explain things better. Step inside, there’s no problem here.”

He opened the door of Room 9, where it was written, “No Name. Anarchist. Inventor of Professions.” They were received by a short man of undetermined age, bald, with thick glasses under long black eyebrows. He was biting his fine lips and shaking his pale, almost blue fingers, stained with nicotine. The walls of this room were hidden by piles of books that went from the floor to the ceiling. Instead of chairs, there were encyclopedia volumes. The tables were also a mountain of books, as was the object that should have been a bed.

“Greetings, brother Russians. Your homeland, once profound, now mobilizes the new, worldwide error: truth gagged by a centripetal power dictating relationships of vertical obedience. Luckily, you, pariahs of history, have fallen into the best company and belong, from now on, to our anarchist fraternity. But let us understand one another well.”