“Yes, Felícito, sure I remember.” The holy woman’s enormous, worried eyes drilled into him.
“And do you remember that when I was saying goodbye, you had a sudden inspiration and told me to do what they wanted and give them the money they asked for? Do you remember that too, Adelaida?”
“Sure I do, Felícito, sure, how could I not remember. Are you ever going to tell me what’s wrong? Why are you so pale and dizzy?”
“You were right, Adelaida. Like always, you were right. I should’ve listened to you. Because, because…”
He couldn’t go on. His voice broke in the middle of a sob and he began to cry. Something he hadn’t done for a very long time, not since the day his father died in that dark, dingy corner of the emergency room of the Hospital Obrero de Piura. Or maybe not since the night he had sex with Mabel for the first time. But that didn’t count as crying because that had been for happiness. And now tears came all the time.
“Everything’s resolved and now we’ll explain it to you, Don Felícito.” The captain finally came back to life, repeating what he’d already told him. “I’m really afraid you won’t like what you’re going to hear.”
He sat up straight in his seat and waited, every sense alert. He had the impression that the people in the small bar had disappeared, that the street noises had become muted. Something made him suspect that what was coming would be the worst misfortune he’d suffered in a good long time. His legs began to tremble.
“Adelaida, Adelaida,” he moaned as he wiped his eyes. “I had to let this out somehow. I couldn’t control myself. I’m sorry, I swear I don’t usually cry.”
“Don’t worry about it, Felícito.” The holy woman smiled, patting him affectionately on his hand. “It does us all good to let the tears flow once in a while. I start wailing too sometimes.”
“Go ahead and talk, Captain, I’m ready,” the trucker declared. “Loud and clear, please.”
“Let’s take it slow,” Captain Silva said hoarsely, playing for time. He raised the cup of coffee to his mouth, took a sip, and continued: “The best thing is for you to hear about the plot the way we did, from the beginning. Lituma, what’s the name of the officer who was guarding Señora Mabel?”
Candelario Velando, twenty-three years old, from Tumbes. Two years on the force, and this was the first time his superiors had him in plain clothes for a job. They stationed him across from the señora’s house on that dead-end street in the Castilla district, near the river and the Salesian fathers’ Don Juan Bosco Academy, and ordered him to make sure nothing happened to the lady who lived there. He was supposed to come to her aid if necessary, write down who came to visit her, follow her without being seen, take notes on whom she met, whom she visited, what she did or stopped doing. They gave him a service weapon with ammunition for twenty shots, a camera, a notebook, a pencil, and a cell phone to use only in case of an emergency, never for personal calls.
“Mabel?” The holy woman’s half-mad eyes opened very wide. “Your girlfriend? It was her?”
Felícito nodded. The glass of water was empty, but he didn’t seem to realize it, because from time to time he brought it up to his mouth and moved his lips and throat as if he were taking a sip.
“It was her, Adelaida.” He moved his head several times. “Yes, Mabel. I still can’t believe it.”
He was a good policeman, reliable and punctual. He liked the profession and so far had refused to take bribes. But that night he was very tired, he’d been following the señora on the street and guarding her house for fourteen hours, and as soon as he sat down in that corner where there was no light and leaned his back against the wall, he fell asleep. He didn’t know for how long; it must have been a while, because when he woke with a start, the street was quiet, the kids spinning tops had disappeared, and in the houses the lights had been turned off and the doors locked. Even the dogs had stopped running around and barking. The entire neighborhood seemed to be asleep. He stood up in a daze, and, keeping to the shadows, approached the señora’s house. He heard voices. He put his ear to one of the windows. It seemed to be an argument. He couldn’t hear a word of what they were saying but he had no doubt it was a man and a woman, and they were fighting. He ran to crouch at another window and from there he could hear better. They were insulting each other and cursing but there were no blows, not yet. Only long silences, and then voices again, quieter. She seemed to be consenting. She’d had a visitor, and apparently the visitor was fucking her. Candelario Velando knew right away it wasn’t Señor Felícito Yanaqué. Did the señora have another lover, then? Finally, the house was completely silent.
Candelario went back to the corner where he’d fallen asleep. He sat down again, lit a cigarette, and waited, leaning his back against the wall. This time he didn’t nod off or become distracted. He was sure the visitor would reappear at some point. And in fact, he did reappear after a long time, taking the precautions that gave him away: barely opening the door, putting only his head out, looking to the right and the left, and only when he was sure no one would see him, beginning to walk. Candelario saw the full length of his body, and his silhouette and movements confirmed it couldn’t be the very short old man who owned Narihualá Transport. This was a young man. Candelario couldn’t make out his face, it was too dark. When he saw him heading toward the Puente Colgante, he went after him, walking slowly, trying not to be seen, keeping a fair distance without losing sight of him. He moved a little closer as they crossed the Puente Colgante because night owls were on the bridge and he could hide among them. Candelario saw him take one of the paths on the Plaza de Armas and disappear into the bar of the Hotel Los Portales. He waited a moment and then went in too. He was at the bar—young, white, good-looking, with an Elvis Presley pompadour—gulping down what must have been a small bottle of pisco. Then Candelario recognized him. He’d seen him when he came to the station on Avenida Sánchez Cerro to make his statement.
“Are you sure it was him, Candelario?” Sergeant Lituma asked, looking doubtful.
“It was Miguel, absolutely, positively, definitely,” Captain Silva said drily, bringing the cup of coffee up to his lips again. He seemed very uncomfortable saying what he was saying. “Yes, Señor Yanaqué. I’m very sorry. But it was Miguel.”
“My son Miguel?” the trucker repeated very rapidly, blinking constantly, waving one of his hands; he’d suddenly turned pale. “At midnight? At Mabel’s?”
“They were having an argument, Sergeant,” the guard Candelario Velando explained to Lituma. “They were really fighting, using curse words like ‘whore,’ ‘motherfucker,’ and worse. After that it was quiet for a long time. I imagined then what you must be imagining now: They made up and went to bed. And why else but to fuck, though I didn’t hear or see any of that. That’s only a guess.”
“You shouldn’t tell me those things,” Adelaida said, uncomfortable and lowering her eyes. Her lashes were long and silky and she was upset. She gave the trucker an affectionate pat on the knee. “Unless you think it will help you to tell me about them. Whatever you like, Felícito. Whatever you say. That’s what friends are for, hey waddya think.”
“A guess that reveals what a filthy mind you have, Candelario.” Lituma smiled at him. “Okay, boy. You passed. Since there are asses involved, the captain will like your story.”
“Finally, the end of the thread. We began to pull on it and undo the knot. I already suspected something when I questioned her after the kidnapping. There were too many contradictions, she didn’t know how to lie. That’s how it was, Señor Yanaqué,” the chief added. “Don’t think this is easy for us. I mean, giving you this awful news. I know it feels like a knife in the back. But it’s our duty, I hope you’ll forgive us.”
“No chance there’s been a mistake?” he murmured in a voice that was hollow now, and somewhat pleading. “No chance at all?”
“None at all,” stated Captain Silva pitilessly. “It’s been proved ad nauseam. Señora Mabel and your son Miguel have been p
ulling the wool over your eyes for a long time now. That’s where the spider story begins. We’re really sorry, Señor Yanaqué.”
“It’s more your son Miguel’s fault than Señora Mabel’s,” Lituma said, then immediately apologized for adding his two cents: “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
Felícito Yanaqué no longer seemed to be listening to the two police officers. His pallor had intensified; he looked at empty space as if a ghost had just materialized. His chin trembled.
“I really know what you’re feeling and my heart goes out to you, Felícito.” The holy woman had placed a hand on her chest. “Well, yes, you’re right. It’ll do you good to get it off your chest. Nothing you tell me will leave here, baby, you know that.”
She hit her chest and Felícito thought, “How strange, it sounded hollow.” Ashamed, he felt his eyes filling with tears again.
“He’s the spider,” Captain Silva declared categorically. “Your son, the white-skinned one. Miguel. It seems he didn’t do it just for the money; his motives are more twisted. And maybe, maybe, that’s why he went to bed with Mabel. He has something personal against you. A grudge, resentment, those bitter things that poison a person’s soul.”
“Because you forced him to do military service, it seems,” Lituma intervened again. And this time too he apologized: “Excuse me. At least, that’s what he led us to believe.”
“Are you listening to what we’re telling you, Don Felícito?” the captain asked, leaning toward the trucker and grasping his arm. “Do you feel sick?”
“I feel great.” The trucker forced a smile. His lips and nostrils were trembling, as were the hands holding the empty bottle of Inca Kola. A yellow ring encircled the whites of his eyes, and his voice was like a thread. “Just go on, Captain. But excuse me, I’d like to know one thing, if I can. Was Tiburcio, my other son, also involved?”
“No, it was just Miguel.” The captain tried to be encouraging. “I can assure you of that definitively. You can rest easy as far as that’s concerned, Señor Yanaqué. Tiburcio wasn’t involved and didn’t know anything about it. When he finds out, he’ll be as shocked as you are now.”
“This terrible story has a good side, Adelaida,” the trucker grunted, after a long pause. “Even if you don’t believe it, it does.”
“I believe it, Felícito,” said the holy woman, opening her mouth wide, showing her tongue. “Life’s always like that. Good things always have their bad side and bad things their good side. So, what’s the good side here?”
“I’ve resolved a doubt that’s been eating at my heart ever since I got married, Adelaida,” Felícito Yanaqué murmured. At that moment he seemed to recover: He regained his voice, his color, a certain sureness in his speech. “Miguel isn’t my son. He never was. Gertrudis and her mother made me marry her by telling me she was pregnant. Sure she was pregnant, but not by me, by another man. I was her dumb cholito. They stuck me with a stepson, passing him off as mine, and Gertrudis was saved from the shame of being a single mother. I mean, tell me how that white kid with blue eyes could be my son? I always suspected something fishy there. Now I finally have the proof, though it’s a little late. He isn’t mine, my blood doesn’t run in his veins. A son of mine, a son of my blood, would never have done what he did to me. Do you see, do you get the picture, Adelaida?”
“I see, baby, I get it,” the holy woman agreed. “Give me your glass, I’ll fill it again with cool water from the distilling stone. I can’t tell you how it makes me feel to see you drink water from an empty glass, hey waddya think.”
“And Mabel?” the trucker mumbled, his eyes lowered. “Was she involved in the spider plot from the beginning? Was she?”
“Unwillingly, but yes.” Captain Silva was modulating his words, as if reluctant to speak. “She was. She never liked the idea, and according to her, at first she tried to talk Miguel out of it, which is possible. But your son is strong-willed, and—”
“He isn’t my son,” Felícito Yanaqué interrupted, looking him in the eye. “Excuse me, I know what I’m saying. Go on, what else, Captain.”
“She was fed up with Miguel and wanted to break it off, but he didn’t let her and threatened to tell you about their affair,” Lituma interjected again. “And she began to hate him for dragging her into this mess.”
“Does this mean you’ve talked to Mabel?” asked the trucker, disconcerted. “What did she confess to?”
“She’s cooperating with us, Señor Yanaqué.” Captain Silva nodded. “Her testimony was instrumental in our learning about the entire spider plot. What the sergeant told you is correct. At first, when she became involved with Miguel, she didn’t know he was your son. When she found out, she tried to break it off, but it was too late. She couldn’t because Miguel blackmailed her.”
“He threatened to tell you everything, Señor Yanaqué, so you’d kill her or at least give her a good beating,” Sergeant Lituma interjected again.
“And leave her in the street without a cent, which is the main thing,” the captain continued. “It’s what I told you before, Don Felícito. Miguel hates you, he feels a great deal of rancor toward you. He says it’s because you forced him and not his brother Tiburcio to do military service. But it looks to me like there’s something else. Maybe his hatred goes all the way back to when he was a kid. You’d know.”
“He also must have suspected he wasn’t my son, Adelaida,” the trucker added. He sipped at the fresh glass of water the holy woman had just brought him. “All he had to do was look at his face in the mirror to realize he didn’t have, couldn’t have my blood. And that’s how he must have begun to hate me, what else could it be. What’s strange is that he always hid it, never showed it to me. Do you see?”
“What do you want me to see, Felícito?” exclaimed the holy woman. “Everything’s very clear, even a blind person could see it. She’s a girl and you’re an old man. Did you think Mabel would be faithful to you until she died? Especially with you having a wife and family and her knowing she’d never be anything but your girlfriend. Life is what it is, Felícito, you must’ve known that. You come from poor people, you know what suffering means, like me and all the poor Piurans.”
“Of course, the kidnapping never was a kidnapping, it was a joke,” said the captain. “To put pressure on you, on your feelings, Don Felícito.”
“I knew it, Adelaida. I never had any illusions. Why do you think I always chose to look the other way and never asked what else Mabel was up to? But I never imagined she’d get involved with my own son!”
“So now maybe he’s your son?” the holy woman chided him mockingly. “What difference does it make who she got involved with, Felícito. How can that matter to you now? Don’t think about it anymore, compadre. Turn the page, forget about it, it’s over. It’s for the best, believe me.”
“Do you know what I think about now with real sorrow, Adelaida?” His glass was empty again. Felícito was shuddering. “The scandal. You must think that’s silly, but it’s what tortures me most. It’ll be in tomorrow’s papers, on radio and television. Then the reporters will come after me. My life will be a circus again. Reporters persecuting me, curious people on the street, in the office. I don’t have the patience or energy to go through all that again, Adelaida. Not anymore.”
“He fell asleep, Captain,” whispered Lituma, pointing to the trucker whose eyes were closed, his head bent.
“I think he has,” the captain agreed. “The news crushed him. His son, his girlfriend. From bad to worse. No surprise there, damn it.”
Felícito heard them without hearing them. He didn’t want to open his eyes, not even for a moment. He dozed, hearing the noise and hubbub on Avenida Sánchez Cerro. If all this hadn’t happened, he’d be at Narihualá Transport, reviewing the morning’s movement of buses, trucks, and cars, studying today’s total number of passengers and comparing it to yesterday’s, dictating letters to Señora Josefita, settling accounts or cashing checks at the bank, getting ready to go home fo
r lunch. He felt so much sadness that he began to tremble from head to foot, as if he had tertian fever. Never again would his life have the tranquil rhythm it once had, never again would he be an anonymous face in the crowd. Now he’d always be recognized on the street; when he went into a movie theater or a restaurant the gossiping would begin, rude glances, whispers, fingers pointing him out. This very night or tomorrow at the latest, the news would become public, all of Piura would know about it. And his life would be hell again.
“Do you feel better after that little snooze, Don Felícito?” asked Captain Silva, giving him an affectionate pat on the arm.
“I nodded off for a minute, I’m sorry,” he said, opening his eyes. “Forgive me. So many emotions at the same time.”
“Sure, of course,” the officer reassured him. “Do you want to keep going or leave the rest for later, Don Felícito?”
He nodded, murmuring: “Let’s go on.” During the few minutes he’d had his eyes closed, the bar had filled with people, most of them men. They smoked, ordered sandwiches, sodas, beers, cups of coffee. The captain lowered his voice so he wouldn’t be overheard at the next table.
“Miguel and Mabel have been detained since last night and the investigating judge is up to date on everything. We have a meeting with the press at the station at six tonight. I don’t think you want to be present for that, do you, Don Felícito?”
“No way,” exclaimed the trucker, horrified. “Of course not!”
“You don’t have to come,” the captain assured him. “But prepare yourself. The reporters are going to drive you crazy.”
“Miguel confessed to all the charges?” Felícito asked.
“At first he denied them, but when he found out that Mabel had turned on him and would testify at the hearing, he had to accept reality. As I said, her testimony is devastating.”
“Thanks to Señora Mabel, in the end he confessed to everything,” Sergeant Lituma added. “She’s made our work easier. We’re writing up the report. It’ll be in the hands of the investigating judge tomorrow at the latest.”