The Enlightened Army

by David Toscana

  A few things haven’t changed in forty-four years, Román says: the same chronometer, the same pistol, and the same runner. The chronometer is working like a marvel, the pistol only makes a metallic click, and we’ll see if the third one is still able to cross a finish line. There’ll be no doubt this time about the moment when the starting shot will come, whether it’s punctual or delayed by two hours and twenty-three minutes, because the radio that’s turned on in Román’s car is receiving live the details of the Olympic marathon. The announcer affirms that this race has become the private property of Abebe Bikila, who today plans on winning his third consecutive gold medal; he mentions the names of the Mexican competitors and announces a commercial break. Imbecile, Matus shouts, the runners can start off in the middle of a soap advertisement. Santiago calms him down, there’s still a minute to go, Matus, plus the time the judges add if the sun hasn’t gone down. Then after a shirt ad the voice on the radio announces the start of the race in the same tone that is used at the horse track. Matus begins to run and Román starts the chronometer. Santiago acts surprised and it takes him a few seconds to pull the useless trigger. This time the route has been flipped: the starting point is at Piedras Negras railroad track and the finish line for the race will be in Monterrey. When they reach Villa de García, Matus will trace a four-kilometer circle that he designed so that the finish line would not be in front of the cathedral, as the traffic has increased in the city since 1924; and this time, rather than jokes coming from the passersby, he would find cars threatening to run him over and red traffic lights. He placed the white banner serving as the finish line twenty meters short of the cigarette factory, next to the train tracks; a few meters from there he would come to the first dangerous crosswalk, one of the first ones to have a stoplight. Although he’s wearing a tank top, he is not dressed like a runner: he’s wearing military boots and an olive-green pair of pants.

  Forty-two kilometers, Matus said that morning, exactly the distance we fell short of reaching the Rio Grande; that’s why today I’ve got more at stake than the athletes in Mexico City. They will reach a finish line; I will conquer a territory.

  Matus’s steps are short and unsteady, like those of a racewalker. He marches free of worry, he knows that there are no gringos among the favorites, no heir of Clarence DeMar; and this time all he needs to do is to cover the distance to receive the medal, it doesn’t matter if he comes in last, the physical condition in which he arrives doesn’t matter either. No one can ever claim he doesn’t deserve the bronze medal hanging from his neck.

  Once again I’ve got the disadvantage, he’d said to Santiago. Whose idea was it to schedule a marathon for 3:30, as though they hadn’t learned the lesson in Paris? The temperature might be agreeable in the capital; here the sun is going to fry me. They’re running at an altitude of two thousand meters, Santiago replies, maybe that’ll erase the advantage. Matus recognizes that the circumstances are equivalent, but now that he thinks about his skinny legs, slow and dried out, he concludes that the runners that by now will have departed from the Olympic stadium have years of advantage over him. According to what he read, Abebe Bikila is the oldest of the group, and even with him there’s almost a thirty-year difference.

  This time they don’t accompany him on horseback, but in a car; they will not follow alongside him the whole way because the terrain can’t be traversed and because at this speed the motor will quickly overheat. They’ve agreed to meet at every point where the tracks cross a street or highway; that way Román and Santiago will give him news about the advance of the competition and they’ll offer him water. So long, Santiago says, we’ll meet up in Villa de García, and he steps on the gas. Matus doesn’t reply, he’s concentrating on his stride, he tries to make out any of the seventy-six runners who left him behind, far behind.

  In the society pages for October 20, 1968, the same day as the marathon, there’s a photo of Arechavaleta: he’s wearing his dress uniform from the Colegio Francomexicano and, as always, he looks haughty and his hair is all slicked back. Gold medal, the headline says, and the text explains that a jury composed of teachers from different institutions agreed to award him first place in the school Olympics, as this outstanding student recited without stumbling and with patriotic fervor the first five articles of our Constitution. There was, nevertheless, an instant in which the future leader had to fall silent, when the audience interrupted with their applause the conclusion of the third article. Halfway through the news item there is a phrase from the president of the jury, who asserts that what our country needs is more citizens like Arechavaleta.

  A breeze kicks up the dust between prickly pears and thistles. Matus thinks the setting is a long way from the charm of an Olympic route, and perhaps he could compare it to where the Africans train. Nevertheless Matus isn’t there, in the Monterrey desert, but in Mexico City; at this very moment he is accompanying one of the runners who is advancing through anonymous streets, with potholes, with the aroma of tortillas and chiles and communal bathrooms, streets lined with hawkers and shouting women and flags with five rings, alongside monuments to heroes without ideals, very different from the enlightened army; but at least there’s room to run. If one day the Olympics take place in Monterrey, they would have to build a traffic circle measuring a kilometer around; the imposing statue of Fatso Comodoro would rise up in the middle. Very good, gentlemen, forty-two turns and one hundred and ninety-five meters, on a 13th of July, at 40 degrees centigrade.

  Upon the completion of the first half hour, Matus reaches the highway to Villa de García. He sees Román’s car off to one side. He feels calm, no pain, his breathing is not heavy; he knows his speed will not make him pant, but he can’t go any faster, not at his age. After all, today he’s running an endurance race.

  Santiago tenders him a sponge bathed in water. Matus takes it and drinks from it; then he squeezes it over his head. He turns to the left onto the highway to begin the four-kilometer circuit. Román starts the car and follows behind his friend. Thirty-three minutes, he sticks his head out the window and tells him, and I’ve got some bad news for you: Kenneth Moore, from the United States, is in first place. He’s followed by a Belgian and a Mexican.

  Matus is huffing; he knows that this time the gringo will beat him irremediably, he’s not after him but another one of the runners. Román turns the volume of the radio up. It looks like Abebe Bikila is off his game this afternoon, because he’s not even among the front-runners, but what should interest us, dear listeners, is that the Mexicans are doing a great job. This is followed again by ads for soap and shirts, and Matus asks his friend for a favor: if the gringo remains in first place, run over him with the car. With pleasure, Román says and makes his six-cylinder engine roar. Seconds later the commercials are over, and with a voice of alarm the announcer says esteemed listeners, a tragedy has just occurred, the North American athlete Kenneth Moore was run down by a drunken driver who appeared out of nowhere, with the result that the Mexican Ignacio Matus has taken the lead.

  The traffic light has three colors, the teacher says. Does anyone know what red means? A hand goes up with the index finger pointed up at the ceiling. What does it mean? she repeats, and a voice from out of the blue answers that yellow is like the sun or like urine or like old pages or the hair of a Swedish woman or the dress . . . The teacher interrupts and explains that she is not talking about the yellow light and she’s not looking for comparisons. I’m asking what red means, and it’s important for you to know, it’s a detail that can save your lives. The same voice from a few seconds before speaks of blood, of some cars, other dresses, and tomato juice. Once again the teacher interrupts and, when she sees no hands are raised, she directs her question to the face that she thinks is paying the least attention. Tell me, Caralampio, what happens if you’re going down a street and the traffic light turns red? He looks at the picture the teacher is showing, the rectangle with the three colored circles, and is sure he knows its meaning, how many times have they told him ab
out the traffic light? Almost as many times as they told him about the trunk of the elephant or the vowels you use to shout. He crosses his arms, holding them as tight as possible, and leans his head forward on the table. He knows his life will take place at an eternally red intersection, and he hates the teacher for not doing a review of the vowels, right at this moment when he needs them so badly.

  The gringos are falling behind, Santiago informs him, and Abebe Bikila has already dropped out. The news cheers Matus up and, although it’s imperceptible to his friends, he knows that he’s sped up his pace. I’ll beat the Rome and Tokyo champions, and I’ll also beat anyone who, no matter how young he is and how many trophies he has, lacks the tenacity to cover this distance, and of course at least one gringo will fall, overcome by a pain in his knee, or by a grating ankle, or by a knotted leg: pains that in war would be nothing, that would never have defeated Fatso Comodoro.

  There are dozens of pictures of a dead fat boy hanging on the walls of Ubaldo’s bedroom. In some of them you see the body just lying down, in others there’s blood or mutilations: in all of them, the eyes are crosses. Ubaldo’s mother is worried about her son’s new artistic phase, which is why she’s torn up some of the pictures, the ones she calls the bloodiest, and she suggests he return to his days of drawing rabbits and cows and trees. He refuses and spends hours admiring his letter-size masterpieces. He feels a special pride in the one that shows Comodoro stretched out face down in a bloody pool of water; hundreds of colored fish swim around him or nibble on him, and a stake emerges from his behind. His hands and feet are those of a skeleton; his cheeks are purple. In the center, over the waters, Cerillo hovers like a dove.

  A little before the midpoint Matus receives more water and more news. The winner has come in, Santiago informs him, once again from Ethiopia. Matus smiles to himself. Another Ethiopian: undoubtedly, just like Bikila, another military man under orders from his emperor, another military man who wins his stripes by running for his country rather than defending it.

  The terrain is flat and the car can runs alongside the tracks for a few minutes. Santiago is seated next to the window ledge and is calling out more news. Mamo Wolde is the winner’s name, and a Japanese with an unpronounceable name is about to come in. Matus anxiously awaits the arrival of the third-place winner; he can consider it a triumph if there are no gringos on the podium. Michael Ryan, Santiago tells him, and Matus waves his hand as though asking the public to rise to their feet: a senseless sign for that moment, but he can’t get any words out, he’s only got enough breath left to breathe. Román finally understands. Matus wants to know where he’s from. New Zealand, Santiago shouts, and Matus smiles despite the pain he’s feeling in his left ankle. He read someplace that marathon winners become heroes as a consequence of the many hours devoted to training; the day of the race, on the other hand, the heroes begin to arrive after four hours. Today, Matus says to himself, I’ll be a hero.

  In the course of the following minutes a Turk will come in, two Brits, another Ethiopian, another Japanese, a Canadian, and two runners whom Román simply identifies as Europeans. Shoulder to shoulder a gringo and a Mexican come up to the finish line, Matus picks up his pace when he hears this news and he has no doubt as to who’ll get there first.

  Román stops the car because the road is broken by an electrical substation next to the tracks. The tone of the radio commentator is neutral, no one gets excited by the arrival of more runners, and his words regarding the recognition of the effort and the determination of the sportsmen sound scarcely sincere; he barely raises his voice when the second Mexican comes in in twenty-sixth place. The number of ads increase and Santiago asks himself when they will break off the transmission. He can see the bobbing head of Matus through the front window; it’s after 6 p.m. and the sun is casting shadows into infinity. Román turns up the volume when an Irish runner comes in, one Michael Molloy, with a time of two hours and forty-eight minutes. Matus’s Paris time would have given him forty-first place. The runner slowly disappears into the distance. Román opens the medal’s box and contemplates it under the afternoon’s reddening sun. And with the time Matus is going to do here, he says, he wouldn’t even take the false bronze.

  Farther along they will tell Matus about the Irishman’s time, and he will see himself reaching the finish line alongside him, singing, drinking, praying, and he will know that the messages shot out by Comodoro did reach the glorious St. Patrick’s battalion.

  Wearing a gown, Cerillo is lying face down on a wooden table in the living room of his house. His mother strikes five notes on the piano with her index finger and turns around to face him. Ave María, she mutters through clenched teeth, Ave María, gratia plena. Cerillo tries to smile and only succeeds in twisting his lips. His mother abandons the keyboard and puts her hands over her face.

  It’s almost nine at night and Matus is approaching the finish line. He didn’t doubt for a minute he’d make it because at his age pain is no longer an obstacle; what in the past seemed to him a cramped thigh is the thigh he wakes up to every day. At his age, to give in is the same thing as dying. Perhaps he feared that he would dislocate a knee, but he still might be able to drag himself or jump on one foot. He’s no longer running, Santiago says when he sees him go by, he’s not even walking. Matus has stopped pumping his arms, he holds both of his fists close to his chest, one next to the other, as though he were carrying a rosary in his hands. He crosses Gonzalitos Avenue which puts him four hundred meters from the goal post. That point is the marathon gate, now all he has got to do is greet the public, throw kisses, and complete a turn around the tartan track. Did the Tanzanian come in? Matus asks. Can’t you see him? Román says, he’s right at your side, if you don’t pick up the pace you’ll be the last one in. Don’t disappoint the public that’s shouting your name and the name of your country. Matus uses a burst of energy to straighten out his stride; his speed increases very little, but at least he now looks like a man in full. Román as well as Santiago know that the runner from Tanzania came in almost two hours ago, also limping his way in, amid the fraternal applause of those who had the patience to wait for him, among bored judges, yawning, wishing he had dropped out halfway through so they could all go get a beer. Nevertheless the lie is necessary, they’ve got to get Matus to increase his rhythm because they can make out far down the line the light of a locomotive and what they can hear is not the ovation from the public but the whistle that warns of its crossing through another intersection, one that Matus left behind a few minutes ago. They climb into the car, and Santiago, once again seated next to the window, yells to him to speed it up, he can’t let a feeble African leave him behind in last place.

  Matus knows that several runners already dropped out of the race: Abebe Bikila dropped out before the halfway point, a Mexican barely made it past the tenth kilometer, and a Finn was the first to give up, as though to show that Mexico is not Paris and that the world is not what it was forty-four years ago. Altogether nineteen athletes have fallen, among them two Latin American hopes; but I’m no longer competing with those who throw down their weapons and ask for amnesty at the first cramp or blister or hemorrhage or sign of exhaustion, because someone who gives up on a marathon shows that he has no idea what a marathon is all about, no matter how many medals he has on his résumé. Hurry it up, Matus, run, fly, because the black man from Tanzania is catching up with you. And Matus recognizes, two hundred meters in front of him, the broomstick with the cloth banner: the finish line five hours later, forty-four years and a war later; the finish line and the definitive triumph over Clarence DeMar, my dear Clarence, stiff in his grave without a cross; the goal post and Comodoro jumping down from the cart to offer himself in sacrifice because we’ve got to break the siege and recover the Alamo and our honor, and long live the enlightened army that gave us the fatherland and dignity; the finish line and the bronze that is likely not worth all that much. Run, Matus, fly, because the black man from Tanzania is nipping at your heels and the feeble bla
ck man from Tanzania weighs tons and roars and squawks and gives off smoke as black as his skin; run, Matus, it’s the least you can do because Azucena is holed up in her room and Ubaldo now draws dead boys and Milagro yells eight by eleven, forty-two, always forty-two, your eternal distance, the distance of man; and run, Matus, because Cerillo sleeps motionless dressed in white next to a sobbing mother, and he no longer slobbers, he has become a white tile Comodoro brings out at the right moment to win the game.

  Run, Matus, fly like those Finns of the past. Only one hundred meters left, Román or Santiago shouts or the two of them together, and one of them shows the bronze medal hanging from the light blue ribbon. Look, Matus, your trophy, your immortality for the wars you have won and the kilometers you have run, your perpetual remembrance of the Alamo. The spell works and the runner on the train tracks turns into an agile boy, from time gone by and with an enlightened expression, and he’s pumping his arms with elegance, breathing rhythmically, and lengthening each stride with his knees rising high in the air and his chest thrust out, down the streets of Paris and Athens and London and Rome and Mexico; and despite the strident whistle of the locomotive and the screeching of metal, Santiago and Román will later swear that above all else they could hear the laughter of the immortal runner from Monterrey, the cackle of that Ignacio Matus, who kept his elbows up and showed his fists and bore his rifle and commanded his troops toward that white flag and dead-eagle finish line, toward that frontier, so unreachable, absurd, and eternal as the Rio Grande.