The Case of Lisandra P. (12 page)

Eva Maria goes into Estéban's room. She has been pacing restlessly around the house all day, and the day is over. Estéban is sitting on his bed. He is polishing his bandoneon. Eva Maria plants herself in front of him. She looks at the tape recorder next to him. Estéban intercepts her gaze.

“Do you need it again?”

“No. Can I borrow your bike?”

Estéban puts down his bandoneon.

“My bike? What for? Where do you want to go?”

Eva Maria tries to lift the bike from its hook on the wall. Estéban gets up off the bed. He goes over to help her. Eva Maria pushes him away.

“Leave me alone, I can manage on my own.”

Estéban forces Eva Maria to one side.

“No, you cannot manage on your own.”

Estéban unhooks the bike. He sets it down in front of Eva Maria.

“You can't always do everything on your own in life.”

Eva Maria looks at him. She takes the bike. She bumps into the door as she leaves the room. She bumps into the furniture in the corridor. Estéban stops her.

“Go ahead. I'll take it out for you.”

Eva Maria lets go of the bike. Estéban lifts it up over his head.

“Years of experience, not to wake you up at night. You've got to admire it.”

Eva Maria opens the front door. Estéban puts the bike down next to her.

“Where are you going?”

“I'll be back.”

“When?”

“I don't know.”

Eva Maria sits on the bicycle. She is awkward. She puts her foot on the ground several times. Estéban shouts to her.

“The brake is on the left.”

Eva Maria eventually finds her balance. Estéban watches her figure move away into the night. A neighbor goes by with his dog. Showing approval, the man raises his thumb in the air, pointing at the now-empty street. Estéban gives him the thumbs-up. What else can you do to transform a tragic situation into an ideal one? He goes back into the house. He looks at the coatrack. Shakes his head. Eva Maria didn't take her coat. Or her handbag. What is going on with her these days? “I need your bike,” Estéban mutters. “I need you.” Estéban thinks about the cassette. “Miguel.” He didn't listen to it, out of respect. Estéban wonders if there's any point to respect. Who is this Miguel? What is it all about? Estéban wonders what Eva Maria is playing at. Then Estéban amends his thought. Eva Maria hasn't been playing at anything for a long time. Estéban remembers how they used to play Truco,
*
how it used to be so much fun. Why does life do this? Estéban heads toward Eva Maria's room. She's always accusing him of going through her things; at least now she won't accuse him wrongly anymore. He wants to know. Only by knowing can he protect her.

Eva Maria pedals. She hasn't ridden a bike in years. She had forgotten this sensation, how the wind plays in your hair. Over your face. Over your hands. She opens her mouth to take in the air. She doesn't know how she can help Vittorio anymore. Eva Maria has come here without thinking. Usually she makes a detour to avoid this place. Not today. Eva Maria imagines the mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, sadly making their way, each playing a bit part in the national tragedy. The photograph on a sign hanging around each woman's neck. Eva Maria will never come here to lose Stella among all these photographs. She will never reduce her daughter to a photograph. A photograph reveals a person's appearance, not their significance. She doesn't want to talk about her misfortune; she doesn't ever want to seek comfort in the sound of a “That's how it was for me.” No! It's not how it was for you, dear! Only with Vittorio had she been able to talk about it. Eva Maria looks down, the wheels of the bike spinning quickly, spinning around the square, around the obelisk, the tires whirling like the moon around the earth, every year moving 3.8 centimeters farther apart. A single step on the moon, hundreds of feet pounding the square, every Thursday. Eva Maria rides over their footsteps. The very idea she might lose her balance and have to put a foot on the ground causes
her toes to curl, like claws, causes her entire being to cling to the pedals. She mustn't get involved in any of that, must never be part of it. Eva Maria swerves to one side. Abruptly. She pedals faster than ever, to get away from the plaza. To flee. Eva Maria had forgotten this sensation. The wind playing in her hair, over her face, over her hands. She had forgotten that the wind can make your tears so cold. One should always stay away from squares. Eva Maria thinks about the Capacocha
.
The main plaza at the heart of the city of Cuzco, in Peru: the symbolic center of the Incan world. Summer solstice, winter solstice. Eva Maria thinks about the feast days that are beginning, the luxurious holy days sacrificing children. A young girl with long braided hair. A little boy. And a very little girl. The most beautiful children, chosen from among the elite. The most beautiful children of their age group. The very little girl is six, the little boy is nine, and the young girl with long braided hair is fourteen. You can see them in detail. Not a single imperfection. The slightest blemish or physical anomaly would have disqualified them from the start. Supreme beauty, supreme responsibility. The children are received by the Incan emperor. On the morning of the eleventh holy day, the little boy, the very little girl, and the young girl with the long braided hair depart. They are followed by a procession of close relatives and sun priests. They travel a thousand miles along roads through the Cordillera of the Andes, several months of pilgrimage until they reach the Puna. A place where the convulsions of the earth's crust caused some of the highest summits of the planet to emerge. The volcano is there. The highest of all. A sacred mountain joining the earthly and the divine. Its gray rocky mass culminates at 6,739 meters. The children chew and chew coca leaves they have been given to withstand the high altitude and lack of oxygen. Between 5,800 and 6,500 meters, the slope becomes very steep and the terrain more
unstable. Once they reach the summit, the three children are each clothed in an
unku
, an official tunic which is too big for them, but which will allow them to continue to grow through all eternity. They are given chicha to drink. To make them drunk. To make them drunk to help them fall asleep. The young girl with the long braided hair allows herself to be lowered into the pit that has been dug for her in the dark volcanic earth; she sits cross-legged and waits, a noble vestal, drugged; she is wearing a headdress of white feathers, feathers to resist the demons; the young virgin is wrapped up in a man's tunic, the one her father had placed on her shoulders during the feast days; she falls asleep; the pit is covered with stones; she dies. The scientists who find her five hundred years later will call her “the Maiden.” The little boy does not want to go into his pit. He wants to stay with his mother. He puts his head in the lap of the woman who nursed him at her breast and he curls up like a fetus. Wrapped in several lengths of fabric, he is wearing moccasins and short socks of white fur. His mother makes him drink the chicha. His mother strokes his hair. The sun priests place the offerings in the pit dug for him in the dark volcanic earth: a necklace of shells, more valuable than gold, because water is beyond price in these arid lands; two little male figurines; and three figurines of llamas. The sun priests are cautious. These items have magic powers. The little boy no longer feels the biting cold. “He is asleep,” murmurs his mother. “What do we do now?” ask the men around her. One of them has an idea: he unwinds a long rope that was holding a bag, and winds it around the boy's knees to hold them together. Thus they lower the little boy into the pit, in a posture worthy of his rank, now that of a deity; he has a large silver bracelet around his right wrist, and in his left hand he holds a slingshot. Something drops to the ground beside him; it's a pair of sandals, for his journey into the Other World; the pit is covered with
stones; he dies. The scientists who find him five hundred years later will call him “the Little Boy.” The very little girl, six years of age, squeezes her knees in her arms, and by her side there are statues, pottery, sacks filled with food, and a bag of coca made with the feathers of an Amazonian bird; she turns her head to the sky, to the faces and voices of her parents, who are comforting her from up above, encouraging her, telling her how proud they are; she doesn't understand; she is trusting, her face turned to the voices of those who brought her into the world and who are now dismissing her from the world; she falls asleep; she is covered with stones; she dies. After thousands of days go by a storm will erupt, the sky will be streaked with lightning, the lightning will strike her. More than a meter beneath the ground, a face turned toward the sky, a face that had failed to stop her parents, will draw down the crazed bolt of lightning. Five hundred years later the scientists will choke on the smell of burning when they move the stones aside. They will call her “the Thunderstruck Little Girl.” “The Capacocha rite is finished. The children did not die, they became gods, intercessorial gods, protective gods who watch over their people from the highest summit of the highest volcanoes. Now everything will be all right: famine, epidemics, military defeats; the life of the Incas will be better.” The archaeologist takes the liberty to add, “We do not discuss their customs. Nowadays these practices seem cruel, but for the Incas, these children were entering into a divine world.” Eva Maria raises her hand. She begins to speak. “Monstrosity never thinks it is monstrous; it always finds reasons within itself to behave as it does—acts of torture become acts of justice, or even honor—but one must never excuse monsters, ever, unless one is oneself an unrepentant bastard.” Eva Maria loses her balance. A car blows its horn. Another car blows its horn. She had raised her hand, just like the day at that seminar. She may still know how to
ride a bike after all these years, but only with both hands. Eva Maria remembers the day they removed the training wheels from Stella's bike. Stella would not have been chosen for the Capacocha: she was not noble and she was not perfect, she had a little dimple in the middle of her chin. But she was chosen by other monsters, for something else. To each monster his own prey, and all criteria are valid when you're a monster. And Lisandra? What other sort of monster had killed her, and why? And that, too, was on a square . . . Eva Maria says to herself, Stay away from plazas—she has said it before, “Stay away from plazas”—but it will be her duty to come back to this one.

Eva Maria climbs off the bike. She looks up at the window. She's back to square one. You always end up back at square one. Time to decide whether to stop. Or to go on. Eva Maria crosses the plaza. She leans the bike against the wall. She goes into the little café. Francisco turns around. He raises his arms to the sky. Eva Maria thinks about the Incan rites.

“Eva! What a nice surprise, we haven't seen you in a long time.”

“That makes sense . . . I haven't been coming.”

“You're not the only one.”

“I can imagine.”

“The usual?”

Eva Maria sits at the counter.

“No, a coffee, please.”

“Oh, really? Right, then, one evening coffee coming up!”

Francisco looks at Eva Maria.

“Have you been crying?”

“It's the wind.”

“Do you miss him?”

“Who?”

“Vittorio.”

“I haven't thought about it.”

“It must be tough to stop like that overnight.”

“I haven't thought about it.”

Francisco puts the coffee on the counter.

“It must make a strange impression all the same, to find out that the guy who's been explaining life to you is a murderer; it's as if I were poisoning my wife—that would send a chill down my customers' spine . . .”

“What, you have a wife now?”

“Just a manner of speaking.”

“Go on, then,
Poisoner
, make me another coffee instead of talking nonsense.”

Francisco sets the cup down in front of Eva Maria.

“Two espressos in the evening; you're in for a sleepless night.”

Eva Maria drops a sugar lump into the steaming liquid.

“Coffee only prevents happy people from sleeping. With others, it's not the coffee that keeps them from sleeping.”

“I'll quote you on that one.”

Silence falls. Eva Maria drinks her coffee. Francisco plays with a little spoon next to the saucer.

“Still, you have to wonder, a shrink who turns murderer . . .”

“Haven't you heard of ‘presumption of innocence'?”

“In case you hadn't noticed, your innocent man is still in prison.”

“You really have it in for him.”

Francisco strikes the zinc counter with the little spoon.

“I don't have it in for him; I just know.”

“Do you hear what you're saying?”

“I have proof.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yes.”

“What sort of proof?”

“I have proof that Lisandra had a lover.”

Eva Maria shoves her coffee cup to one side.

“That's the first I've heard.”

“And it's because Lisandra had a lover that Vittorio killed her.”

“That's pretty simplistic.”

“If truth has to be complicated, well then, there's nothing I can do for you.”

“I'm not expecting anything from you.”

“If you weren't expecting anything from me, you would have sat in the room, the way you usually do, and not at the counter.”

Eva Maria touches his temple. Twice.

“You've certainly got your share in there.”

“Yeah, well, see, a waiter is like a shrink, only not as expensive.”

“I would've said more like a private detective, given everything you seem to know.”

Francisco busies himself folding the dish towel in front of him.

“A madwoman who drives you crazy—it wouldn't be the first time.”

“Stop making these mysterious pronouncements. If you have something to say, say it.”

Francisco starts wiping glasses.

“If she did it with me, she surely did it with others.”

“If she did what with you?”

“Carried out her weird plan.”

“What weird plan?”

“You'll never believe me.”

“Of course I will.”

“I tell you, you'll never believe me.”

“Try me.”

“One morning she came to see me and she asked me if I would sleep with her.”

“What?”

“It's the truth; she was even sitting right where you are. She told me to meet her that evening at the hotel at nine thirty; she was wearing a very short skirt, to give me something to fantasize about. Well, it's true she often wore these risqué kinds of outfits, but this skirt was
really
short, it really was to get me fantasizing.”

“In the end, did you go?”

“No, not ‘in the end'; why are you saying ‘in the end' when you know I'm giving you important elements? If you want to go to your grave with your own idea about the matter, we may as well stop talking about it, it's pointless.”

“All right, then, I didn't say ‘in the end.' So she often wore these risqué outfits and it's important. So . . . you went to the hotel.”

“For a start, you have to know, that girl always did something to me, I don't know . . . whenever I saw her, and it wasn't just because of the way she dressed, if it came to that, in my profession . . . In fact, it was as if I had always known something would happen between the two of us.”

“So you went.”

“She had me say my name twice before she opened the door. When I came in, she told me she didn't want to hear the sound of my voice, I would have to murmur. She gave me a flask made of transparent glass—there was no label—and she asked me to put some on, this cologne and no other, she insisted on it. She said would I leave as soon as we had finished—she would go into the bathroom to do what she had to do and when she came back into the room she wanted me to be gone. She gave me the key so that I could come in without her having to open for me and then she made me go back out. I didn't understand what was going on. I put some cologne on and I came back in using the key. She had her back to me; she had pulled up her skirt; she wasn't wearing anything underneath. I came closer and I took her from behind, well, not from behind, but from behind . . .”

“Yes, yes, it doesn't matter, go on.”

“No, don't say, ‘it doesn't matter'—it's important: she wanted everything her way. She took my hands and did everything she wanted, she told me the words I had to murmur to her, and she saw to me, to what I had to do. We did everything she wanted to do and then she went into the bathroom; that was the signal, so I left. And that was the first time.”

“Because there were other times?”

“Yes. The following week, same hotel, same thing: she had me repeat my name when I arrived, she slid the key under the door, she was standing in exactly the same place as the first time, in the same position, her skirt up, her ass out to me. Same thing. She asked me to say the same words and make the same gestures as the first time. It was crazy, she wanted exactly the same scene all over again. I saw Lisandra four Tuesdays in a row—it was all I was waiting for, all I could think about; I went over it again and again in my head, I knew exactly what I had to do, I knew exactly how I would find her: she was always dressed in the same way, take her from behind, get her clothes off, quick, hold her tight, say dirty words to her, and tender words, too. She always had her eyes closed, and she said, ‘Yes, that's it, like that, yes, like that.' She would adjust my hands when they weren't doing what she wanted. We drank white wine, no toasts, no looking at each other, ever; the bottle was already open when I got there and our glasses were filled. She wanted to do it everywhere: first on the chest, and on the floor, and then afterward in the bathroom, always in the same order, then we ended up on the bed, her legs around me, her cunt in my mouth; she sucked me, I sucked her, there was something so impatient about it, even if it was methodical, so strong; she'd get on top of me and jerk me off; I had to look inside her, I had to describe the shape of her cunt, with the words she whispered to me and which corresponded so exactly to what was before my eyes that
afterward I knew them by heart and she didn't have to repeat them to me anymore; I had to fuck her, but it was always the same. And with each passing week it got better and better. There was nothing but pleasure in it for me. I've never been used in this way. I've never had so little freedom, and yet I felt so free, because she liked everything I was doing to her. I would get a hard-on as soon as I left her, and the closer the days got to Tuesday, the harder I got. But I wanted to keep myself for her; I was so impatient, I felt so alive when I took that girl. When she came. And she got off on it, too; that was the one thing that varied during the two hours we spent together: she never came at the same time, and that's how I know it was genuine.”

Francisco had whispered everything he said. As if in one breath. Now Eva Maria watches him inhale deeply. His eyes are big.

“Then one day I fucked up.”

“What did you do?”

“I stayed in the room after it was over. That girl had gotten under my skin; I'd fallen in love with her—it was driving me crazy and I had to tell her, and besides I believed she had fallen in love with me, too, what an idiot. She came out of the bathroom; at first, I saw she was a little bit afraid—she didn't expect to see me there—but very quickly she got hold of herself and looked at me so coldly. She wouldn't let me speak; she picked up her handbag and left the room—I can still hear the door slamming. The next day she came by the café. I apologized, I told her that next time I would leave. She told me there wouldn't be any next time. I asked her if it was all over between us—I should never have said that to her, what an asshole I was. She replied saying that for anything to be all over it had to have actually started. That's how it ended. No one has ever got me as hard or done such a good job putting me in my place as that girl did.”

Eva Maria doesn't know what to say. Francisco continues his story. More about himself, this time. Quietly.

“I just didn't get it. Why? Why this? Why me? She could have any guy she wanted.”

Eva Maria thinks it over. Francisco goes on. Louder this time. Emphatically.

“But I'm sure she replaced me after that. With someone else. Another more disciplined sexual object. She was sick, I can tell you that much, she couldn't have stopped from one day to the next; that girl had to fuck, she needed it. If Vittorio had been a good shrink he would have realized his wife was a complete wreck; before he went helping others he would have done better to pay attention to what was happening at home, and looked after his own wife.”

“When was this?”

“Next Tuesday will make three months.”

“Which hotel was it?”

Francisco doesn't answer.

“You'd rather not say?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I don't know; I just don't want to, that's all.”

“Have you been back to the hotel since then?”

“Every Tuesday. I went back there every Tuesday after she left me, and every time I was full of hope, and every time they told me they hadn't seen her again. I don't see why they would lie to me. She changed her lover so she must have changed her venue. I was probably not the first; she must have changed dicks the way she changed her underwear.”

“Except that she didn't wear any. You see I've been listening to you.”

Francisco suddenly stands up straight.

“You don't believe me, do you?”

“Yes, I do. I believe you.”

“Then why are you looking at me like that?”

“I'm not looking at you ‘like that.' Come closer.”

Francisco moves his face closer to Eva Maria's. Eva Maria buries her face in Francisco's neck. She sniffs him. Francisco recoils.

“Stop it! What are you doing?”

“The bar stool must be giving me ideas.”

“You're such a bitch.”

“This is the cologne she asked you to wear, isn't it?”

“How do you know?”

“I recognize it. I know someone who wears it.”

“Well, that's really helpful.”

“Vittorio wears this cologne.”

“Who?”

“Vittorio.”

“No way; what the hell is going on?”

Francisco shakes his head. He opens the dishwasher. He takes the cups out one by one. All the glasses, one by one. He sets them onto a tray. Eva Maria watches him. She knows it's not these objects he's tidying away but his thoughts.

“I hope he'll get life.”

“It must have been hard when it stopped. How did you deal with it?”

“What do you think? It's not every day that casual fucking of this caliber comes knocking on your door; already sex is addictive enough as it is, but like this . . . and besides, I fell in love with Lisandra, really.”

“You were mad at her for stopping.”

“How could I not be mad at her?”

“She died on a Tuesday, or hadn't you noticed, the day of your appointments.”

Francisco turns around. Abruptly. His gesture dislodges the
tray. The cups and glasses go crashing to the floor. The white porcelain mixing with the transparency of the glass.

“Fuck, what the hell are you insinuating by that? Stop right now, Eva. I've got nothing to do with Lisandra's death.”

“It doesn't take long to toss a woman out the window. The time it takes to smoke a cigarette.”

“I don't smoke.”

“So you never go to the toilet, either?”

“Just stop your nonsense right there. Anyone rather than him, is that it? You would rather I got locked up than to lose your precious shrink. You can replace a waiter, but not a shrink. Sorry to inform you, I've got an alibi from every customer I had that night.”

“The cops might find all of this very interesting.”

“Don't worry, they already know about it.”

“What do you mean?”

“I already told them everything.”

“You? You told them everything?”

“Yes. I want that fucker to end up in jail. I am sure he knew that Lisandra was cheating on him—he must have realized and he went berserk, that's what happened; it may be ‘simplistic,' as you say, but murders are not exempt from clichés and I want to see justice done.”