by Jack Tollers
*
It must have been almost seven in the morning when Victoria opened the old wooden gate, keeping the dogs at bay and avoiding their display of affection since they were bound to leave dirt marks all over her tidy clothes. Walking slowly, letting herself go amid the spring fragrances all around her, escorted by the song of a hundred birds, the morning light changing every colour by the minute, Victoria walked, as always, talking to herself. She couldn't quite remember the linen-flower’s colour. Wasn't it mauve? Yes, something like that. Victoria walked leisurely that morning and sang a little bit to herself.
I saw her blossom like a linen flower
In an Argentine field, ripened by the sun.
Presently she reached that magic Boulevard called Avenida Francia, one flanked by sycamore-trees soldierly arranged in neat files on either side. The chinaberry trees on the main avenue were in full flower and their delicate fragrance made Victoria a bit dizzy. Those delicate flowers would only last till the next rain, she thought, a case of one or two weeks of glory in Spring, not more. Once again Victoria reflected on how fortunate it was that this ample avenue had never been paved. Of course, in those years there were few cars in Bella Vista, but all the same, you couldn't see or hear one on this long boulevard, which became quite a trap after half a day of rain.
She turned to the right after a quick sign to a small image of the Blessed Virgin that guarded the entrance to the boulevard. On her right, a derelict railway with a very narrow gauge silently accompanied her stride with its rusted tracks and wild flowers growing among the stones.
Her father had informed her that the song they had been discussing had been written by one Homero Expósito, but she knew nothing about him, except that he had a brother called Virgilio who was a poet too and that he had also penned some very celebrated tango lyrics. Homer and Virgil, she thought, Well, well, well, she grinned to herself, the whole of western literature in two names...
A gardener passed by on his bicycle and eyed Victoria curiously, but she didn’t notice. She was thinking of the Expósito brothers and their tango music.
Tango was something that in those times was not generally listened to by the Argentine middle or upper classes but Victoria's father was something of a melomaniac and had induced his children to listen to and appreciate it with surprising results: the old songs frequently cropped up in the family’s singing sessions.
In any case, Victoria was out of her class.
She had lately discovered that she didn't like people who straggled with their feet pointing like the clock’s needles at ten to two, to east and west while they moved northwards. She found it quite inelegant to walk in that manner (“like a duck” she used to say) and so after considering this for some time, she had resolved to keep her feet pointed straight forward, carefully stepping in perfect parallel lines, a discipline that came to her easily, an instinctive reflection of her natural modesty.
Suddenly a dog frightened her out of her wits with a gnarl, flinging itself against a fence by the sidewalk, only a few inches away from her tartan kilt. She lost her step and put a foot in a small puddle. ‘Now I've put my foot on it,’ she said reproachfully, a bit to the snarling dog, a bit to herself. She cleaned the tarnished shoe with one of those minute handkerchiefs that young girls use, swearing under her breath while she inspected her imperceptibly stained white socks.
Presently she resumed her walk along the old sidewalk made up of French bricks laboriously put together over the uneven surface. Some patches that had escaped the sun were covered with slippery moss, so she reduced her pace and walked carefully. At seven o’clock of this particular October morning it was still a bit chilly. But at that time of the year people avoided wrapping up too much: at midday one could easily find oneself carrying cumbersome coats or jackets to no purpose. So Victoria only had a white sweater on, a sort of screen against which her long dark hair projected hanging loosely down to her waist. She was proud of her hair, and rightly so. On the other hand she didn't like her spectacles that, in addition to her thin lips, gave her a grave demeanour and a rather stern air, which, she thought, kept most boys away. So she only used them when reading. A tall girl, she had fine blue eyes, very white skin, a small nose and a single charming dimple only an inch from her mouth’s left corner that appeared when she smiled. A stunning girl by any standard.
And, of course, she knew it. Not that it mattered much to her. She was too much taken up with her books and her music, her ideas and her dreams. She played the guitar quite well but her voice wasn't exactly a singer's voice, with those husky undertones of hers. Such a low pitched voice coupled with Victoria's looks invariably surprised people. But she sang all the same, unconscious of the effect it had on those who listened to her. Victoria had her shortcomings, but never ‘the-girl-will-not-play-the-piano’ syndrome. In fact, she could play the piano just as well.
When she got to the station (it was on another railway line, a few blocks away and parallel to the narrow gauge one she had previously crossed), she bought a ticket —a small cardboard affair in two colours, orange and white, with the date mechanically impressed on the back—and sat down to wait for her train. It was a very English station, as they all are, part of the national landscape by now, like the Australian wind mills and eucalyptus trees, bits of foreign lands that have made up this one, like the old French houses, the English clothes, the Italian gestures and the Spanish food. Someone once said that Argentina is a place full of Italians who dress like Englishmen, eat like Frenchmen, and speak in Spanish. But of course, that was before the American way of life took over the national aesthetics and the whole country was submerged by Hollywood films, hamburgers, blue jeans, rock and roll, chewing gum and Coca-Cola. However, in those years, all that was barely beginning.
She opened a book, threw away the week-old ticket she had been using as a bookmark and replaced it with the one she had just bought. Even since a child, Victoria had acquired settled habits; she was a methodical girl whose life seemed to be punctuated with little rites and diehard habits like this one. And, of course, the most odd one of all, she smoke ‘black’ cigarettes, an exceptional thing in itself.
She was absorbed by Oscar Wilde's De Profundis that she was reading in a Spanish translation, a book she had picked at random from one of the chaotic bookshelves at home; except Victoria's father, nobody ever knew how any particular volume had arrived there and the books themselves were usually unhelpful without a signature or an ex-libris that could give a clue as to who had acquired or read them before. That is, until Victoria had had a go at them. Because she loved to read with a pencil between her teeth and the traces of her readings could be found all over a book she had perused, frequently full of notes written in minute calligraphy at the end of the chapters or in any space available for such a purpose.
Now Victoria bit her red pencil intent on her book and remained perfectly silent. She only spoke out loudly when thinking, but she kept silent while reading because she was, so to speak, listening to the author, a telling frown on her bespectacled face which contributed to her well earned fame for being bookish.
When the train arrived—for once on time—she hurriedly put down her book, stamped out her cigarette, and with a single gesture, put away her pencil and handkerchief while she hopped into a carriage going straight to a seat by the window. She enjoyed the trip, probably because she had never had to commute during weekdays when that same train was head to toes full with rough workers and loud voiced females. One could never get a seat except on weekends. But on Saturdays it was all quite civilised, not particularly clean and always a bit smelly, but, on the whole with a bit of luck you could get hold of a seat and maybe enjoy an uneventful journey. Out came the book, the pencil and the spectacles, and in plunged Victoria, oblivious to her surroundings.