The Wind That Lays Waste

by Selva Almada

  “Okay, now it’s your turn,” said the Gringo eagerly. It wasn’t so bad after all, sharing memories. “How many men have you seen die?”

  The Reverend put his lips to the edge of the glass and sipped at the froth, making a little noise that was drowned out by the din of rain on the tin roof. Then he wiped his face with his hand; his cheeks were rough with the day’s stubble.

  “Plenty. But all in their beds,” he said, and they both smiled.

  Pearson drank again; this time he broke through the barrier of foam and took a gulp of liquid.

  “Although, when I was a kid, I saw a hanged man.”

  The Gringo leaned forward, intrigued.

  “As a boy, I lived with my mother and my grandparents in their house. My father left us before I was born. Behind the house, at the back of the yard, there was a little room with a bathroom, which my grandfather let to an acquaintance. An old man, on his own, without any family. A bachelor. He’d been in the merchant navy and had a good pension, but he’d never started a family because he’d always been at sea. That was where he lived. We didn’t have much to do with him. He came and went. He had his life outside. He went out a lot at night and slept during the day. I suspect he was a gambler. I was fascinated by him; he was quite a bit younger than my grandfather, more like my father, in age, at least. But he wasn’t interested in children, so he paid no attention to me. Years later I learned that my father had been in the navy too, so I guess that was a sort of connection. Anyway, I was always looking for excuses to go to his room. Even if it meant annoying him. I’d kick a ball against the wall in the middle of the afternoon until he came out in his pajamas, with his hair all a mess, and gave me an earful. And I was satisfied with that. But sometimes my grandmother sent me to see him. If she was cooking something special, she’d always make an extra helping and ask me to take it out to him. One day, at lunchtime, she had made one of his favorite dishes, and she was about to send me out with the plate. Then we realized we hadn’t seen him for a couple of days or noticed the scent of English aftershave that he left in the corridor when he went out. With the warm plate in my hands, I went to his door and knocked several times. Since there was no answer, I tried the handle. It wasn’t locked, so I pushed the door open with my shoulder. The room was dark; the shutters were closed. As soon as I stepped in I smelled something sweet, disgusting, and unrecognizable. I put the plate down on the first surface I could find by feeling around. Then I felt for the light switch. The first thing I saw, at eye level, level with the eyes of a seven-year-old, were the shoes, handmade and shiny; then I looked up at the trousers, the tucked-in silk shirt, the jacket, the handkerchief in the breast pocket, the rope around his neck. For some reason my gaze went no higher than the knot but came down again to the slumped shoulders, the arms hanging limp, the shirt cuffs with their gem-studded cufflinks, partly covering the veined hands. I took two or three steps back and went out into the yard for some air. I knew and didn’t know what was happening. I knew, but I didn’t know how I would say it. The strangest thing is that I went back to the house and sat down at the table and ate up all the food on my plate. When I had swallowed the last mouthful, I threw it all up on the floor. And when I’d finished vomiting, I said to my grandfather: ‘Go and see him; he’s dead.’”

  Pearson finished his story and took several gulps in a row. His mouth felt dry and his cheeks were burning. God knew how long it had been since he had thought about that incident. He might have told the story only once before, to Leni’s mother, when they were courting, to impress her.

  The Gringo was impressed too. As if seeing a man die right in front of you was less dramatic than finding one who has already taken his own life. Different kinds of shock, for sure, but the underlying question was the same: Why did the bachelor hang himself? Why did the engineer kill his colleague? What is death but the same dark, empty nothing, regardless of the hand that deals it?

  20

  Tapioca tried to show Leni a simple game to play with the Spanish cards. But she went straight for the photos in the shoebox. Where’s the pleasure in looking at a bunch of pictures of people you don’t even know? Tapioca, it seemed, had no idea what a girl’s idea of fun might be.

  He couldn’t tell her about the photos, except for the four or five that showed him and the Gringo at the Bermejito river. There were brown pictures of Brauer’s dead relatives. And one of a little kid who might have been his boss, maybe.

  Leni grabbed the photo and examined it, then looked at Tapioca. It wasn’t him, obviously—the image was more than forty years old—but there was a certain resemblance.

  The Gringo and Leni’s father were chatting away. She tried to listen, but because of the racket the rain was making and the softness of their voices, she couldn’t catch more than the odd word. Something about drunks and a guy who hanged himself. They seemed to be getting on fine, in the end.

  She had never seen her father like this. Just drinking and talking, taking it easy, not mentioning Jesus all the time. She liked the idea of her father just talking with an ordinary, rough sort of guy. But what would Reverend Pearson have thought?

  It was her father she had to live with, most of the time anyway, but Reverend Pearson would not have approved of this fraternizing, not at all. He would have converted Brauer already. Her father couldn’t do that on his own.

  “Mr. Brauer,” she said, and she had to call his name again to make him turn around. “Is this you?” she asked, holding up the little photograph.

  In the dimness, at a distance, he couldn’t see a thing, of course.

  “Give me a look,” he said, beckoning her.

  She put the rest of the photos back in the box and came over to the table. The Gringo took the cardboard rectangle and raised it to his eyes.

  “Yes. I must have been four,” he said and passed the photo to Pearson, who looked at it and smiled affectionately.

  “It’s funny to think of being a kid,” said the Gringo, lighting a cigarette.

  “Recently I’ve been thinking a lot about when I was a boy,” said Pearson.

  “I’ve never seen a photo of you when you were little, Father.”

  “Really? There must be one around somewhere.”

  “Or one of me as a little girl either, now that I come to think of it.”

  “I’ve never been that keen on photos.”

  “Don’t tell me you think they steal your soul,” said the Gringo sarcastically.

  The Reverend smiled and shrugged his shoulders.

  “Aren’t there any photos of me, Father?”

  “There must be, Leni. We’ll have a look tomorrow.”

  Leni went back and sat down on the bed. If there were photos of her, if she could find them, maybe her mother would be in one. Then she wouldn’t have to worry about losing the memory of her face; whenever it began to fade, she’d have the image there to remind her.

  “Almost all those photos belonged to my mother. When she died, I brought them here; I think that’s the box she kept them in. I don’t even know who most of the people are. Why do we keep photos, anyway? What really matters, after all, is what’s in here,” said the Gringo, tapping his forehead with a finger.

  They were quiet for a while. The sound of the rain was so persistent that it had become a part of the silence.

  Pearson felt that the moment had come to say what he wanted to say. And he spoke loud and clear to make sure that the Gringo would not be the only one to hear it.

  “Listen, Brauer, I’d like Tapioca to come with us to Castelli.”

  Tapioca, who was playing solitaire, lifted his head when he heard his name.

  “To Castelli? And what’s Tapioca going to do in Castelli?”

  “It’ll just be for a couple of days. To see the place.”

  “He’s seen it already. We’ve been there plenty of times, haven’t we, kid?”

  “What?” asked Tapioca, pretending not to have heard.

  “We’ve been to Castelli quite a few times.”<
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  “Yes.”

  “All the better. He can show Leni around.”

  “Come on, Pearson, what’s this about?”

  The Gringo lit another cigarette and emptied his glass.

  Now Pearson adopted a confidential tone and lowered his voice so that only Brauer could hear him.

  “Look, my daughter’s a difficult girl. We’re not getting on too well. For some reason—I guess it’s her age—she’s become rebellious. She’s always angry, always finding fault with me. But she’s hit it off with Tapioca. She doesn’t get on like that with anyone, I mean it. I think he could be a good influence on her. Like I said, I’ve never known a heart as pure as his.”

  The Gringo laughed softly, shaking his head. He tilted his face back and blew a jet of smoke up into the air. Then he pushed his chair away from the table; the plastic legs scraped on the cement. He got up and fetched another beer from the fridge. He felt around under the counter and put some more bottles into the freezer. There wasn’t much point because the power was still out. But there was still some ice on the walls, so the bottles would cool down a bit.

  Some of the candles had already gone out; the others were guttering. He opened a new packet; he always had a good supply for situations like this. Blackouts were common in the area. He lit several candles and stuck them in the wax where the others had been. The yellowish light intensified suddenly.

  He peered out through the window. Although it was still raining, the storm had continued on its way. He slid one pane open. The wind had dropped; there was just a cool breeze now. The candle flames fluttered but held out against the draft.

  Fresh air began to circulate. Only then did they realize how hot it had become inside. Although their clothes had dried a little, they were still damp and sticky from the stuffiness.

  Brauer filled the glasses again. As far as he was concerned, the conversation was over.

  But Pearson wasn’t prepared to leave it there.

  “Tapioca’s company will do Leni a world of good.”

  “We have a lot of work to do here, Pearson.”

  “Just for two days. I promise you. I’ll bring him back Tuesday morning.”

  “No. It’s not going to be possible.”

  Tapioca had been waiting for an invitation to join in the conversation again. Leni kept looking through the photos, but she too was following closely what was happening at the table.

  “It will be good for him too, Brauer. He’ll get to meet other kids his age, and talk with them. It’s a very healthy environment. It’ll be like a little vacation.”

  “Some place full of evangelical kids, going on about Jesus all day long. Give me a fucking break, Pearson.”

  “I could go. If you let me, Gringo,” Tapioca stuttered from the bed.

  Brauer paid no attention. He didn’t even turn to look at him.

  “See?” said the Reverend with a slight smile.

  The Gringo picked up the bottle and went out onto the porch.

  21

  Yellow went out after him. He stretched out his front paws, shook his back, and let out a little yawn that sounded like a whimper. Then he sat down on the wet ground.

  The Gringo set the bottle on the table awash with water and craned his head out from under the awning. It was still raining, but not with the force of the first hours. The rain was falling monotonously, as if discharging a duty, without enthusiasm. Every now and then there was a weak and noiseless flash of lightning.

  The storm must have been over Tostado, or even farther south by now, moving faster than any new car. And it probably wasn’t so wild anymore. As if tired out by the traveling.

  The next day, on the radio, it would be all about the storm. Sheds blown down, crops destroyed, dead animals, and human victims too, for sure. Someone always got killed: a power pole came down, cables broke, and there was some poor soul who happened to be in the wrong place at just the wrong time. Farther north, one of the rivers would have flooded. That was how it always went. Punished by drought, and then by rain. As if the land couldn’t stop acting up and had to be punished all the time. It never got any slack.

  The Gringo swigged from the bottle and took a deep breath. Clean air at last, without the dirt that was always floating in it, getting into your nose and your lungs. That’s why his lungs were ruined: breathing in all that lethal dust.

  In a soft flash of lightning, he saw the shiny asphalt and the treetops washed clean, as if newborn; even the car bodies looked like new, ready to hit the road again.

  But there was no point fooling himself. In the morning it would all be the same as before. The burning sun would soon obliterate any memory of the rain.

  Nostalgia overtook him. In the damp and dark, he saw himself as a young man, using his sheer brawn to lift the front end of a tractor or haul it several yards with a chain as thick as his leg. It was almost like dragging a child’s toy—everything was so easy then. He remembered his military service: fifty of them sleeping in a shed full of that young-male stink. In a few years he would be an old man. Nothing he could do about that, although he didn’t like the thought.

  “Brauer.”

  Pearson’s voice startled him.

  “Listen to me, please. I need you to understand.”

  “To understand what? Why don’t you leave us alone?”

  “You don’t realize how special that boy is; there’s a treasure in him.”

  “A treasure! What are you talking about, Pearson? Tapioca’s a good kid. We agree about that. He’s a good kid and soon he’ll be a good man. No mystery there. Or maybe there is, for you. Maybe you’re not so good yourself, if it seems unusual to you. Maybe you’re not the sort of man you want us to think you are, Pearson.”

  “Tapioca is much more than a good person. He’s a pure soul. Christ has marked him out.”

  “Cut the crap, will you?”

  “It’s the truth. Please believe me. The boy is destined for great things.”

  “Great things! And what do you mean by great things, Reverend? You wouldn’t be talking about yourself there, would you? You might think you’re some great thing, Pearson, but let me tell you: you’re greatly fucking mistaken.”

  “There are destinies greater than ours, Brauer.”

  “Your car’s ready. As soon as it’s light, and it won’t be long now, I want you to go. If it wasn’t for your daughter, I’d have kicked you out a while back.”

  “Listen to me. I was like Tapioca when I was a boy. I was good, Brauer, but I didn’t grow up right because I didn’t have a guide. Christ is my guide, but there were times when I couldn’t understand what he was telling me, because I was slow, and young, and all on my own. All the people I put my trust in, they left me on my own. They wanted something else from me. When I saw Tapioca, I saw myself forty years ago. Suddenly I understood what Christ had really destined me for: I was meant to find that boy and save him.”

  “Save him? Stop this bullshit. You’re drunk, Reverend.”

  “No. You don’t understand. Joseph raised Jesus, but he knew to let go of him when the time came. I’m asking you to have the same generosity. You have no idea of the destiny awaiting that boy. You’re going to ruin it all.”

  “Fuck you,” said the Gringo and raised the bottle to take another gulp.

  Pearson gripped him by the shoulder. The Gringo reacted instinctively: his free hand flew out, and he shoved at the Reverend’s chest with an open palm. Pearson stumbled and fell on his butt. The Gringo let go of the bottle, bent over, and picked him up by the collar of his shirt. At first he meant to help him up, but once Pearson was on his feet, he gave him another shove, out into the rain.

  It looked as if the Reverend would fall again, but he managed to keep his balance. And then, without thinking, he clenched his fists and threw himself at Brauer. The Gringo was unprepared for this reaction; he slipped in the mud and tumbled over with Pearson on top of him. He tried to prize himself free, pushing up on his opponent’s chest, but the Reverend had him by
the hair. Pearson’s twisted features crowded into his field of vision, and he could smell his hot, alcoholic breath.

  “You fight like a woman,” Brauer scoffed, although his head was still half-buried in the mud, and he couldn’t get free.

  Ashamed, the Reverend let go of Brauer’s hair and drew back, straddling his hips, preparing to land a fresh blow. That momentary relaxation allowed Brauer to shove him off easily, like a piece of fluff.

  Now the Gringo was angry for real. He let his feet sink into the mud of the yard until they were planted firmly. He got into position.

  Two yards away, the Reverend did the same.

  “Come on,” said the Gringo, beckoning scornfully with the fingers of one hand, stirring him up. “I’m waiting.”

  Pearson saw red. He ran at the Gringo. Never having fought before, he didn’t have a plan. Brauer received him with a cross to the jaw. Pearson felt as if his brain had jumped inside his skull. He saw white. Then he took a punch to the stomach, and everything went black.

  When he opened his eyes, he didn’t know how much time had passed: Brauer was leaning over him, with his hands resting on his knees and water dripping from his hair. He looked worried. Pearson smiled as he lifted his arms and gripped Brauer’s neck with the force of a crane. The Gringo leaped back, trying to get free, and this lifted the Reverend to his feet. Brauer landed a punch in the region of the kidneys, where the Reverend was particularly sensitive. The wave of pain loosened Pearson’s grip and released the Gringo, who took a few steps back, massaging his neck with one hand.

  Brauer licked the water dripping from his mustache. He laughed.

  “Where’s Christ now?” he shouted. “Why hasn’t he come to help you?”

  “Don’t be a fool,” gasped the Reverend. “This is pointless. Tapioca will come with me whether you like it or not.”

  Hearing the other man say his boy’s name kindled the Gringo’s rage. He charged at Pearson with his head down and knocked him over. But the exertion set off a coughing fit. He began hacking convulsively, phlegm and spittle dripping from his open mouth as he struggled to get some air back into his lungs. Bent double, gripping his stomach with one hand, he used what strength he had left to kick the Reverend in the ribs. Then he fell down, on his side, still coughing. He propped himself up on one arm to keep his head out of the mud and coughed awhile longer until the fit subsided. Then he flopped on his back beside the Reverend, who was lying still, with his arms at his sides.