Twentieth century, full of problems, loud and new
If you don’t cry you don t get the milk
If you don’t steal, then the fool is you.
Go on! Get on with it!
We all end up in the same stew.
Don’t give it a second thought, fill your plate
No one gives a damn if you’re honest or you’re great
If you break your back day and night
If you murder, cure, or don’t know wrong from right.
Alma sips her mate and comments:
‘He’ll be locked away for years.’
‘They’ve already found lots of extenuating circumstances. He won’t be inside for many years. It’s only in tangos that crimes of passion lead to prison for life.’
Waiters in uniform and carrying silver platters. Carvalho watches them go by from a chair that seems to want to eat him. Gálvez Jr. is more used to such extravagant comfort, and has managed to drape his frame in such a way as to avoid the sucking mouth of the giant upholstered sea-slug. The two other men, Ostiz and Maetzu, are seated quite naturally and comfortably, and watch with amusement Carvalho’s efforts to squirm and prod himself into a proper upright position. Ostiz, who is gaunt-faced and bald as a billiard-ball, has begun lecturing Gálvez.
‘I’m sure you agree, Richard, that your father’s body should not stand in the way of our relations, which should of necessity be excellent.’
Maetzu, a man with a sad drunk’s eyes and half a kilo of platinum rings, underlines the message: ‘Unfortunately, there’s no way to bring him back to life, but anyway, by dint of hard work and intelligence, you managed to preserve the best part of your inheritance.’
Then Ostiz chimes in again, as if on cue: ‘Richard, you must agree that your father – that poetic man, poetic and poignant – yes, that’s the word, poignant – in his last incarnation as Robinson Crusoe, had something to teach us which we should not forget – the lesson of universal solidarity.’
Maetzu closes his sad, alcoholic eyes and adds: ‘He was one of us, and we need to emphasize that we too think of others, that not everything comes down to creating wealth – which is also for others of course, but mainly for ourselves. We wealthy people of Argentina have got a bad reputation, and it’s the fault of those Perónists. The days when Menem was first in power, and we demonstrated side-by-side with the trade unionists, are long gone. Why, even our wives were Perónist then.’
‘Carder’s “Must”, perfume and underarm sweat. I read about it in Nuevo Porteño.’
Carvalho’s comment amuses Ostiz and annoys Maetzu. Gálvez nods for Carvalho to go in for the kill.
‘My client and I would just like to add however that there remains the small matter of someone ordering the death of Señor Gálvez and his chauffeur.’
Ostiz and Maetzu look at each other and by mutual agreement call a waiter. One comes over, carrying a huge leather case, like those used for carrying architect’s drawings. Inside there is a big sketch, and the two financiers have to get up and hold it open with all four hands, as if they were folding a sheet. It shows the river, between Buenos Aires and the sea.
It is Ostiz who explains the project.
‘Our idea is to build an artificial island in honour of your father. It will be called the “Robinson Joaquín Gálvez” Island: we already have raised the initial capital, and it’s quite possible we may be able to get Barbara Bush involved. We see this as almost entirely charitable enterprise, although we don’t know if she agrees. You have a guaranteed fifteen per cent, Richard. Oh and by the way, Robinson Island, theme park, will give part of its profits to research into new diseases. We won’t mention AIDS directly, so that nobody will associate that with your father.’
Once again, Carvalho supplies the voice like a ventriloquist on behalf of Gálvez.
‘Why an artificial island? Aren’t there any real ones left?’
‘Yes, but they’re so expensive! Anything in the Tigre is impossible nowadays; and besides, in Buenos Aires they’re still fascinated with Le Corbusier’s nonsense about constructing an artificial island.’
Gálvez Jr. nods, beginning to warm to the idea. Yes, of course a natural island would be impossible.
Maetzu starts to dream. ‘I can just see it! In my mind’s eye! The “Joaquín Gálvez” Robinson Crusoe Island.’
Carvalho is still hoping that Richard wants to get back to the question of his father’s death, and makes a final attempt to try to raise it.
‘What if we returned from Never-Never Island? Do you have a reply to the question...’
‘Leave it for now, Carvalho,’ Richard Gálvez orders him, as only a captain of industry can give orders, and Carvalho reflects that Robinson Gálvez was Richard’s father, not his. So he sits back and listens to the smooth flow of conversation between Gálvez Jr. and the men who had ordered his father’s death, how they agree with each other, how they speak the same language, how they decide to drink and eat together in the near future. Occasionally, Richard tries to work out what Carvalho must be thinking, and to bring him into the conversation.
‘The real gourmet is Señor Carvalho here.’
‘Is that true?’
‘I hate gourmets, but I suppose to a certain extent, I am one, yes.’
‘How interesting.’
Ostiz was the one expressing interest.
‘I own vineyards and make a few wines. Some friends of mine and I have set up a Gourmet Club. We dine privately at Chez Reyero, and all we talk about is what we are eating, have eaten and are going to eat. Would you be our guest, Señor Carvalho? And you too, of course, Richard.’
‘I can’t tell a potato from an aubergine.’
‘Would you allow us to invite you, Carvalho?’
‘Would I allow myself to be invited by this bunch of bastards?’ Carvalho wonders. ‘Say something,’ he says to himself.
‘Yes.’
The brilliantly bedecked yacht sails down the river. The mist is as murky as the waters below, but the glow of the guests and the strings of lights give their gentle progress its splendour. The boat is full of the highest class of criminals – at least one archbishop, several supposed politicians, the press, TV cameras. Gálvez provides the offscreen commentary in Carvalho’s ear on who all the most important guests are. Suddenly, Maetzu’s voice rings out from the foredeck: ‘Island in sight!’
The yacht drops anchor. A beaming Ostiz spreads his arms towards the waters of the river.
‘There’s the island!’
Carvalho cannot see it anywhere. But all the guests hang over the port side of the ship, and finally he spots a small concrete mixer on a barge. The load seems to be ready, and so Ostiz leans to ask the city mayor to finish the task, and the archbishop to give his blessing. The mayor helps the workmen tip the first load of concrete of what is to become the island into the river. The archbishop gives his blessing. Gálvez Jr. whispers admiringly into Carvalho’s ear: ‘They’re putting twenty million dollars into it.’
He says no more, as it is time for the speeches and a soft but interminable national anthem. Gálvez takes Carvalho by the arm.
‘Papa would be pleased; Robinson less so. Don’t feel let down, Carvalho. The truth isn’t always necessary. One has to wait for the right moment. Either it’ll come, or I’ll provoke it, but I swear to you his death won’t go unpunished. How about having dinner with me? Let’s go to Puerto Madero. They tell me the choice is better there than in La Recoleta. Now that Gato Dumas has gone, La Recoleta has become ordinary again. Wouldn’t you like to? You don’t seem very enthusiastic.’
‘Drink to remember, eat to forget. How do you deal with those priorities?’
Gálvez thinks about this for a moment, then replies.
‘Wasn’t it the other way round? The important thing is to remember or to forget when we need to.’
Now they are installed
at a table in an Italian restaurant that likes to consider itself the equal of the best Italian restaurants in the world – those in New York – and Carvalho is trying to follow the abundant, melancholy thoughts of Gálvez Jr. when a gloved hand comes to rest on his shoulder. Looking up, he sees it is Marta, the White Lady, with her pink smile and flowing golden hair.
‘D’you remember me?’
‘Whether you’re Beatriz or Marta, you are unforgettable. But do you remember me? From Spain? The Frigola case? Do you remember Señor Frigola?’
But all she does is give a little laugh, as if he had paid her a compliment. Then she says, hurriedly:
‘Leonardo is in jail. But not for long.’
‘I know.’
At that point he notices that Marta is accompanied by an elegant-looking young man, who is waiting for her at a discreet distance.
‘It’s over between us – I mean, the relation there was between Leonardo and me. But we’re still good friends. I go and visit him every week. Don’t worry. I don’t want any more suicides on my conscience.’
‘You really are dangerous. Men just love to kill and commit suicide for you.’
Marta laughs crazily, and brushes Carvalho’s lips with hers before slinking off to her table. Carvalho sits down again, and refuses to satisfy Gálvez’s silent curiosity. Marta has eased herself into a chair opposite her companion, and takes advantage of the first glass of champagne to turn towards Carvalho and toast him in the distance. The detective returns her gesture. Gálvez finally admits his curiosity.
‘Who is that? Might I be allowed to know?’
‘She’s a no-good woman, and no-good women can cost you your life or your fortune, or both. D’you like no-good women?’
‘I know the man she’s with. He’s the son of Leonardo, who runs a lingerie business.’
‘Didn’t he join a sect?’
‘I don’t know the latest details. But to answer your question – yes, I like no-good women. They fascinate me.’
Carvalho spreads his hand, palm up, as if offering Gálvez the opportunity to take his chance with Marta.
‘Go on then, but try not to kill anyone while you’re at it.’
The no-good woman has been following their conversation, openly ignoring the stern words her companion seems to be addressing to her. She gives Gálvez Jr. a knowing look, which he returns, raising his glass too in a silent toast.
Chapter 4
Borges’ Love Child
The oldest port area of Buenos Aires, far beyond the La Boca that tourists know. A man of around forty, badly dressed and unkempt, although something in his demeanour speaks of what used to be called ‘good breeding’ – but this might just be the cautious way he moves. He glances suspiciously up and down the street. Eventually decides to enter one of the abandoned shops. He seems to hesitate in his choice of a corner, but gradually relaxes and pulls out a syringe, then starts to prepare his heroin ritual. Shoots up. A broad smile spreads across his anxious features. A second man appears. A light behind him means the first one cannot see who it is. The addict’s face shows only pleasure and trust. Then suddenly the newcomer’s fist is raised, and starts to pound the other’s face. He receives the blows without a murmur. His empty eyes watch as the fist smashes them shut in an explosion of star-filled darkness. He takes a dozen blows to the head, delivered by an ever more incensed attacker. Finally his body slumps to the floor, alongside the uninvolved, almost dainty shoes of his assailant.
A coffered ceiling, alabaster busts, marble, tear-drop chandeliers. A very theatrical setting for a press conference. Television cameras, journalists crowding round, radio reporters with phallic microphones stuck to their lips, the electric shock energy of important events. Then comes the dramatic pause before a great announcement and a serious, deep voice declaims, as if from the heavens:
The span of heaven measures my glory.
Libraries in the East vie for my works.
Emirs seek me, to fill my mouth with gold.
The angels know my latest lyrics by heart.
The tools I work with are pain and humiliation.
Would that I had been born dead.
All the journalists – and not just the sports reporters sent to cover what they were told was a patriotic literary event – look startled, up at the ceiling to try to discover where the voice of this exotic god may be coming from. As the recital of the poem draws to a close, a strange figure steps out from behind the curtains: it looks as if it is Jorge Luis Borges himself.
‘Borges!’ everyone exclaims, even the sceptics and those who aren’t even aware the poet is dead.
The imposing figure is in full control of the situation, and he takes advantage of the general amazement to stride to the centre of the platform, to stare gravely at the assembled journalists, and to declare in the most Borgesian of voices: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Ariel Borges, and I am Jorge Luis Borges’ love child.’
This announcement is greeted by murmurs, whispers, some whistled dissent, until the alleged son of Borges raises his arms to silence his audience.
‘I am the biggest story of the century, and I’ll even give you the headline for your pieces: The Best-Kept Secret in Universal Literature.’
Cameras flash, the TV lights snap on. The supposed Ariel Borges is besieged by the journalists’ recorders, microphones, urgent questions:
‘How did such a phenomenon occur?’
‘My mother was the daughter of an eccentric English lord and a princess from Samarkand. She was a dancer, and she met my father during a tour of Argentina.’
‘What kind of a dancer? A belly dancer?’
‘My mother was an artiste, a contortionist. She could dance the dance of the cygnets like a spider – like Carlota von Usslser used to do, bent backward on all fours, spinning on her hands and feet.’
‘How did your mother succeed in being fecundated by the undoubtedly eminent writer Jorge Luis Borges?’
‘In order not to offend Aunty Nora or Aunty Victoria, my father – Borges, that is – never publicly acknowledged his paternity. My mother always explained this by saying that instead of semen, Jorge Luis had writing ink inside him, and to admit he could have had a child horrified him, because it was tantamount to saying all his inkwells had dried up.’
‘How are you when it comes to inkwells?’
Borges Jr. does not even blink. Instead he bows, and from behind the curtains a scrawny rag of a woman steps out. Apart from a slight disdain, her face betrays no emotion. She looks like a tiny schoolteacher made up to look like an old woman refusing to admit her age. She is smoking a pipe, and pushing a supermarket trolley overflowing with books. As she hands them out to the journalists, she calls out their titles, like a soulless robot: Secret Letter to My Father, and Universal History of Infamy. As she does this, Borges Jr.’s voice booms out through the room:
‘I am the son of a king and a princess, and through my veins flows the blood or ink that helped Wordsworth write his Ode to Immortality.’
Some hours later, he displays exactly the same attitude in front of the TV cameras in an air-conditioned studio, with a décor appropriate to the literary event of the century. In close-up, Ariel Borges repeats the phrase he pronounced for the assembled journalists: ‘I always say I am the son of a king and a princess, and that through my veins flows the ink or blood that helped Wordsworth write his Ode to Immortality.’
The camera pulls back to reveal Borges Jr. next to a presenter who seems to have escaped from one of Jorge Luis Borges’ literary fantasies. They are in bed. She is in her slip, while Borges is wearing a tweed jacket, his tie poking out from above the sheets, and his fingers interlaced around a cup of tea.
‘So you are the happy fruit of a poetic encounter, an encounter between Borges and the descendant of a princess from Samarkand.’
‘My granny’
‘That’
s right, your granny. There is something magical about that encounter. How did it happen?’
The son’s eyes widen as he starts the story of how his life might have begun.
‘My mother was performing in a small theatre in Palermo Chico that no longer exists, and my papa went to see her one night with all his usual group: Victoria Ocampo, Aunty Nora, Uncle Guillermo, who was Spanish, and Bioy. If only Bioy would say what he knew – but he doesn’t want to share Borges with anyone. That night...’
His face fades from the screen, and a group of actors dramatize the flashback. The probable lack of truth of the scene is reinforced by the unreal way it is represented. The contortionist is still smoking her pipe as she wheels around flung backwards on hands and feet, to a simple piano accompaniment. Amidst the smoke and dim lights of the auditorium the figure of Borges can be seen, played by his alleged son. At a certain point in the dance, he stands up and begins to recite:
Four-footed at dawn, in the daytime tall,
and wandering three-legged down the hollow
reaches of evening: thus did the sphinx,
the eternal one, regard his restless fellow,
mankind; and at evening came a man
who, terror-struck, discovered as in a mirror
his own decline set forth in the monstrous image,
his destiny, and felt a chill of terror.
We are Oedipus and everlastingly
we are the long tripartite beast; we are
all that we were and will be, nothing less.
It would destroy us to look steadily
at our full being. Mercifully, God grants us
the ticking of the clock, forgetfulness.
The contortionist pauses in her dangerous dance. She has become a polyhedron of flesh, her legs crossed above her head as she peers out into the audience, as if trying to make out the poet. When she does not succeed, still in her extraordinary position, she takes a pair of glasses out of some unlikely fold in her ballerina’s dress, puts them on, and renews the puffing on her pipe. A few moments later, she returns to her feet, and walks off down the theatre aisle, leading Borges by the hand. He is big and shambling, as slow and clumsy as if he were already blind. Both the aisle and the corridor they disappear along look unreal; and at the same time the voice of Borges Jr. can be heard commentating:
The Buenos Aires Quintet Page 24