The Notebooks of Don Rigoberto

by Mario Vargas Llosa

  “You can sit down,” Ilse indicated. “Here, on the sofa.”

  He did as he was told. He stepped back and dropped beside his sister-in-law on what must have been a long couch strewn with pillows and placed so that the person sitting there would not miss any part of the show. What did this mean? A chuckle escaped Don Rigoberto: “My Corsican brother is more baroque than I imagined.” His mouth was dry.

  Their expert positioning and perfect joining made it seem as if the couple had been making love their entire lives. The two bodies never separated; with each new posture, legs, elbows, shoulders, hips seemed to find an even better fit, and as the moments passed, each partner seemed to derive even deeper pleasure from the other. There were the beautiful full curves, the wavy jet-black hair of his beloved, the raised buttocks that made one think of a gallant promontory defying the assault of a wild sea. “No,” he said to himself. Rather, the splendid rump in the gorgeous photograph La Prière, by Man Ray (1930). He searched through his notebooks and in a few minutes was contemplating the image. His heart sank as he recalled the times when Lucrecia had posed like this for him, in their nocturnal intimacy, sitting back on her heels, both hands supporting the hemispheres of her buttocks. Nor did he find any dissonance in the comparison to another image by Man Ray that his notebook offered next to the first, for the musical back of Kikí de Montparnasse (1925) was precisely the one displayed by Lucrecia as she twisted and turned. The deep inflections of her hips held him in rapt suspense for a few seconds. But the hairy arms encircling that body, the legs holding down those thighs and spreading them, were not his, nor was that face—he could not make out Narciso’s features—moving now along Lucrecia’s back, scrutinizing it millimeter by millimeter, the partially open mouth indecisive about where to land and what to kiss. In Don Rigoberto’s agitated mind there flashed the image of two trapeze artists at the circus, the Human Eagles, who flew and were united in midair—they worked without a net—after performing acrobatic feats ten meters above the ground. Lucrecia and Narciso were just as skilled, just as perfect, just as suited to one another. He was overcome by a tripartite feeling (admiration, envy, and jealousy) and tears of emotion again rolled down his cheeks. He noticed that Ilse’s hand was professionally exploring his fly.

  “I don’t believe it, this doesn’t excite you at all,” he heard her say without lowering her voice.

  Don Rigoberto detected a startled movement in the bed. They had heard, of course; they could no longer pretend not to know they were being observed. They remained motionless; Doña Lucrecia’s profile turned toward the openwork wall, but Narciso kissed her again and drew her back into the battle of love.

  “Forgive me, Ilse,” he whispered. “I’m disappointing you, and I’m sorry. But I—how shall I put it—I’m monogamous. I can make love only to my wife.”

  “Of course you are.” Ilse laughed affectionately, and so loudly that now, under the light, Doña Lucrecia’s tousled head escaped the embrace of his Corsican brother, and Don Rigoberto saw her large, startled eyes looking in fright toward the place where he and Ilse were sitting. “Just like your sweet Corsican brother. Narciso likes making love only to me. But he needs appetizers, apéritifs, prologues. He’s not as uncomplicated as you.”

  She laughed again, and Don Rigoberto felt her moving away as she stroked his thinning hair with the kind of caress teachers give little boys who are good. He could not believe his eyes: when had Ilse taken off her clothes? There were her things on the sofa, and there she was, athletic, naked from head to foot, striding through the darkness toward the bed just as her remote ancestors, the Valkyries, strode through forests in their horned helmets hunting down bears, tigers, and men. At precisely that moment Narciso moved away from Lucrecia, ran toward the middle of the room—his face revealed indescribable happiness—and opened his arms to receive her with an animal roar of approval. And there she was now, the rejected, recanted Lucrecia withdrawing to the far side of the bed, fully aware that from now on she was not needed, looking to the left and right, searching for someone who could tell her what to do. Don Rigoberto felt pity. Without saying a word, he called her name. He watched her get out of bed on tiptoe so as not to disturb the happy couple, find her clothes on the floor, partially dress, and walk to where he was waiting for her with open arms. She huddled against his chest, trembling.

  “Do you understand any of it, Rigoberto?” he heard her ask.

  “Only that I love you,” he replied, holding her close. “I’ve never seen you so beautiful. Come, come with me.”

  “What a pair of Corsican brothers.” He heard the Valkyrie laughing in the distance, against a background of a wild boar’s savage bellowing and Wagnerian trumpets.

  Winged Lion Harpy

  Where are you? In the Hall of Grotesques in the Museum of the Austrian Baroque on the Lower Belvedere in Vienna.

  What are you doing there? You are carefully studying one of Jonas Drentwett’s female creatures that bring fantasy and glory to its walls.

  Which one? The one that stretches her long neck in order to better display her bosom and reveal the beautiful, sharply pointed breast with the ruddy nipple that all living beings would come to suck if you had not reserved it.

  For whom? For your lover at a distance, the reconstructor of your identity, the painter who unmakes and makes you at will, your waking dreamer.

  What must you do? Learn the creature by heart and emulate her in the privacy of your bedroom, preparing for the night when I will come. Do not be discouraged because you do not have a tail, or the talons of a bird of prey, or because you are not in the habit of walking on all fours. If you truly love me, you will have a tail and talons, you will walk on all fours, and gradually, through the constancy and tenacity demanded by feats of love, you will cease to be Lucrecia of the Olivar and will become the Mythological Lucrecia, Lucrecia the Winged Lion Harpy, Lucrecia who has come to my heart and my desire from the legends and myths of Greece (with a stopover at the Roman frescoes from which Jonas Drentwett copied you).

  Are you like her now? With your rump tucked in, your bosom haughty, your head aloft? Do you feel how the feline tail begins to appear, the redtinted pointed wings begin to grow? What you still lack, the diadem for your brow, the topaz necklace, the girdle of gold and precious stones where your tender bosom will rest, these will be brought to you, as a token of adoration and reverence, by one who adores you above all other things real or nonexistent.

  The Lover of Harpies

  V

  Fonchito and the Girls

  Señora Lucrecia dried her laughing eyes again, trying to gain time. She did not dare to ask Fonchito if what Teté Barriga had told her was true. She had been about to, twice, and both times she had lost her courage.

  “Why are you laughing like that, Stepmamá?” the boy wanted to know, intrigued. Because from the time he had walked into the little house near the Olivar de San Isidro, Señora Lucrecia had been bursting into these unwarranted fits of laughter and devouring him with her eyes.

  “Because of something a friend told me.” Doña Lucrecia blushed. “I’m too embarrassed to ask you about it, but I’m dying to know if it’s true.”

  “It must be some gossip about my papá.”

  “I’ll tell you, even though it’s very vulgar,” Señora Lucrecia said decisively. “My curiosity is stronger than my good manners.”

  According to Teté, whose husband had been there and told her about it with a mixture of amusement and anger, it happened at one of those gatherings held every two or three months in Don Rigoberto’s study. Men only, five or six childhood friends, acquaintances from school or the university or the neighborhood who continued to meet out of habit, and without enthusiasm, but who did not dare to break the ritual, perhaps because of the superstitious notion that if any one of them failed to attend, bad luck would befall the deserter, or even the entire group. And so they continued to see each other, although undoubtedly, like Rigoberto, they no longer enjoyed this bimonthly or trimo
nthly get-together when they would drink cognac, eat cheese turnovers, talk about those who had died, or discuss politics. Doña Lucrecia recalled that afterward Don Rigoberto’s head would ache with boredom, and he would have to take a few drops of valerian. The incident had occurred at the last gathering, just a week ago. The friends—in their fifties or sixties, some of them about to retire—saw Fonchito come in, his blond hair tousled, his big blue eyes opened wide at seeing them there. The disorder of his school uniform added a touch of abandon to the beauty of his small person. The gentlemen smiled at him: Hello, Fonchito, how big you’ve gotten, how you’ve grown.

  “Can’t you say hello?” Don Rigoberto had gruffly admonished him.

  “Yes, of course,” replied the crystalline voice of her stepson. “But, Papá, please, if your friends want to hug me, tell them not to touch my bottom.”

  Señora Lucrecia burst into the fifth laughing fit of the afternoon.

  “Did you really say something so outrageous, Fonchito?”

  “But they pretend they’re hugging me and all the while they never stop touching me there.” The boy shrugged, not attributing too much importance to the subject. “I don’t like anybody touching me there, not even as a joke, because then it itches. And whenever I itch I scratch so much I break out in a rash.”

  “Then it’s true, you did say it.” Señora Lucrecia passed from laughter to astonishment and back to laughter. “Obviously: Teté could never make up anything like that. And Rigoberto? How did he react?”

  “His eyes were furious and he told me to go to my room and do my homework,” said Fonchito. “Later, when they had gone, he really scolded me. And he took away my Sunday allowance.”

  “Those old men with their roving hands,” exclaimed Señora Lucrecia, suddenly indignant. “It’s disgusting. If I had ever caught them doing that, I would have thrown them out. And was your papá still so angry when you told him? But first, swear. Was it true? They touched your bottom? Could it be one of those strange things you think up?”

  “Sure they touched me. Right here,” and the boy showed her where, patting his buttocks. “Just like the priests at school. Why, Stepmamá? What is it about my backside that makes everybody want to touch it?”

  Señora Lucrecia stared at him, trying to guess if he was lying.

  “If it’s true, then they have no shame, they’re abusive,” she exclaimed at last, still doubtful. “At school, too? Haven’t you told Rigoberto, so that he can complain?”

  The boy assumed a seraphic expression. “I don’t want to give my papá anything else to worry about. Least of all now, when he’s so sad.”

  Doña Lucrecia bent her head in confusion. This child was a master at saying things that made her feel bad. Well, if what he said was true, then good for him for making those dirty old men uncomfortable. Teté Barriga’s husband had said that he and his friends could not move and did not dare to look at Rigoberto for a long while. Then they made jokes, though their faces were grim. In any event, enough about that. She moved on to something else. She asked Fonchito how things were going at school, if he wasn’t getting into trouble at the academy when he left before classes were over, if he had gone to the movies, to a soccer game, to some party. But Justiniana, who came in with tea and biscuits, brought it up again. She had heard everything and began to give her opinion, and she had a lot to say. She was certain it was a lie: “Don’t believe him, Señora. It was just more of that little devil’s mischief to shame those gentlemen in front of Don Rigoberto. Don’t you know him yet?” “If you didn’t make such delicious sweet buns I’d be angry with you, Justita.” Doña Lucrecia felt that she had been imprudent; by allowing her morbid curiosity to get the better of her—one never knew with Fonchito—perhaps she had awakened the beast. And, in effect, as Justiniana was gathering up the cups and saucers, the boy’s question pierced her like the thrust of a sword.

  “Why is it that grown-ups like children so much, Stepmamá?”

  Justiniana slipped away, making a sound in her throat or stomach that could only be stifled laughter. Doña Lucrecia looked into Fonchito’s eyes. She scrutinized them calmly, searching for a spark of malice or evil intention. No. What she saw was the luminous clarity of a diaphanous sky.

  “Everybody likes children,” she said hypocritically. “It’s normal for a person to be affectionate with them. They’re small, fragile, and sometimes very delicious.”

  She felt stupid, impatient to escape those great, still, limpid eyes that were resting on her.

  “Egon Schiele liked them a lot,” Fonchito said, nodding his agreement. “In Vienna, early in the century, there were so many abandoned little girls living on the streets. They begged in churches, in cafés.”

  “Just like Lima,” she said, not knowing what she was saying. Once again she was overwhelmed by the sensation of being a fly lured, despite all her efforts, into the jaws of a spider.

  “And he would go to Schonbrunn Park, where there were hundreds of them. He took them to his studio. He fed them and gave them money,” Fonchito continued, inexorably. “Señor Paris von Güterlash, a friend whom Schiele painted—I’ll show you his portrait in a minute—says there were always two or three girls from the street in his studio. They lived there at his expense. They would sleep or play while Schiele painted. Do you think there was anything wrong in that?”

  “If he fed them and helped them, how could there be anything wrong?”

  “But he made them get undressed and pose for him,” the boy went on. There’s no escape for me now, thought Doña Lucrecia. “Was it wrong for Egon Schiele to do that?”

  “Well, I don’t think so.” His stepmother swallowed. “An artist needs models. Why have a nasty mind? Didn’t Degas like to paint his little mice, the young dancers at the Opera in Paris? Well, young girls inspired Egon Schiele too.”

  Then why had he been arrested, accused of kidnapping a minor? Why was he sent to prison for circulating indecent pictures? And why had he been obliged to burn a drawing on the pretext that children had been exposed to indecency in his studio?

  “I don’t know why.” She tried to calm him when she saw his agitation. “I don’t know anything about Schiele, Fonchito. You’re the one who knows everything about him. Artists are complicated people, your papá can explain it to you. They don’t have to be saints. You shouldn’t idealize them or demonize them. Their work is what matters, not their lives. Schiele’s legacy is how he painted those girls, not what he did with them in his studio.”

  “He had them wear those colored stockings he liked so much,” said Fonchito, putting the finishing touches on the story. “Sprawled on the sofa, on the floor. Alone or in pairs. Then he would climb a ladder so he could look down at them from a height. At the top of the ladder he would make a sketch; his notebooks have been published. My papá has the book. But it’s in German. I could only look at the drawings, I couldn’t read it.”

  “He climbed up a ladder? That’s how he painted them?”

  Now you were caught in the web, Lucrecia. The kid always managed it somehow. Now you didn’t try to have him change the subject; you followed along, trapped. It’s true, Stepmamá. He said his dream was to be a bird of prey. To paint the world from a height, to see it as a condor or buzzard saw it. And if you look closely, it was absolutely true. He would show her right now. He jumped up, rummaged in his portfolio from the academy, and a moment later he was crouching at her feet—as always, she was on the sofa and he on the floor—turning the pages of another voluminous book of Egon Schiele reproductions that he rested on his stepmother’s knees. Did Fonchito really know all those things about the painter? How many of them were true? And why did he have this mania for Schiele? Had he heard things from Rigoberto? Was this painter her former husband’s latest obsession? In any case, his description was accurate. Those sprawling girls and entwined lovers, those phantasmal cities without people or animals or cars, the houses crowded together and almost frozen along the banks of empty rivers, all appeared as if viewed
from a height by a rapacious bird that soared above them with an all-encompassing, merciless eye. Yes, it was the perspective of a bird of prey. The angelic face smiled at her. “Didn’t I tell you, Stepmamá?” She nodded in dismay. Behind those cherubic features, that innocence worthy of a religious painting, dwelled a subtle, precociously mature intelligence, its psychology as complex as Rigoberto’s. And at that moment she realized what was on the page. Her face flared like a torch. Fonchito had left the book open to a watercolor in red tones and cream-colored spaces, with a mauve border, and only now did Doña Lucrecia pay attention to its subject: the artist himself in sharp outline, sitting, and between his open legs a naked girl with her back turned, holding on high, as if it were a flagpole, his gigantic virile member.

  “This couple has also been painted from above,” the crystalline voice informed her. “But how could he have done the sketch? He couldn’t do it from the ladder, because he’s the man sitting on the floor. You know that, don’t you, Stepmamá?”