The Informers

by Juan Gabriel Vasquez

  they'd declared upon entering the country. Another sentence. In the Guterman family's hotel things happened that destroyed families, disrupted lives, ruined futures. . . . The sentences were no longer the ones I'd written, and it wasn't because of the violent irony that had begun to fill them; their words had changed, too; foreigner didn't mean the same as it had before, nor did futures. The book, my book about Sara Guterman, was the closest thing to those years and the only thing able to suggest the (ill-fated) presence of my father; but it was also the proof a tricky prosecutor would have used to allege my father's nonexistence, the Cheshire cat.

  I looked over the blue and brown spines of the oldest books, looked over the disorderly colors of the more recent ones, and didn't find a single title I didn't recognize, not a single jacket flap or flyleaf that could have contained, at this stage, the slightest surprise. My father's meticulousness, his idea that a messy environment is one of the causes of a messy thought process, had obliged him to arrange all his lecture notes, his twenty years of speaking on how to speak well, on the same shelf; I chose one of the folders at random and examined it, imagining I might find an incriminating document; I found nothing. Was there not in this place a single piece of paper that contained the dead man's youth, not a newspaper clipping about the blacklists or a book that might contain annotations, not some reference to Enrique Deresser or his family or Bogota in the 1940s? A man's private history irremediably obliterated: How could that be possible? In a manipulable world, a world susceptible to being reprogrammed by us, its demiurges, would there not have been an immediate need to remedy that? Thinking of that, I picked up my book and opened it to the Appendices, chose an example of a report from the ones I'd found during the course of my investigation--the different ones they used in the cases of real infiltrators or active propagandists, and that later came to light, were always partially censored by officials--and copied it by hand, adapting it to my uncertainties, on the blank pages that seem designed for such purposes between the printer's imprint and the flyleaf. I wrote: Military Intelligence Division, War Department General Staff, Military Attache Report. And then:

  Interviewed in El Automatico cafe, the witness Gabriel Santoro declared that Konrad Deresser, proprietor of Cristales Deresser, has extremely close relations with supporters of the Colombian Nazi Party (with its head-quarters in Barranquilla and elements infiltrated all over the territory) and on several occasions has demonstrated anti-American attitudes in the presence of Colombian citizens. It has been determined that the witness's word is trustworthy.

  I turned the page. I wrote: In accordance with Special Order No. 7 of the Military Attache, Bogota, Colombia, investigated the references with the following results. And then:

  Interrogated in the offices of the Embassy of the United States of America, Bogota, the informant Santoro (NI. See below, Hotel Nueva Europa dossier) declared that Mr. Konrad Deresser has very close relations with known propagandists (principally Hans-Georg Bethke, KN. See below, List of Blocked Nationals, updated November 1943) and on several occasions has demonstrated anti-American attitudes in the presence of Colombian citizens, as well as his employees, whom he regularly greets in German. His declarations have been verified against those of other sources. The word of the informant has been deemed trustworthy.

  I put the book back in its place and discovered the universe hadn't been transformed by my falsifying the contents of those pages. My father was still incognito in his own memory, dead but also clandestine. But perhaps what would be impossible, in my father's case, was the opposite: a hole, a gap in the art of erasing fingerprints, a defect in the rigor of the most rigorous man in the world, an inconsistency in his powerful desire to erase Deresser the way Trotsky (just one example) was erased from the photos and encyclopedias of Stalin's time. If it was about revising his history, my father--my revisionist father--had achieved it with success. But then, he'd committed the error that we all perhaps commit: telling secrets after sex. I imagined the lovers. I imagined them walking around this apartment naked, going to the kitchen to get a drink or to the bathroom to throw away used condoms, or sitting like teenagers in this chair. She is naked on my father's lap like a ventriloquist's doll, and her recently shaved legs (her shins covered in goose pimples) hang over the arm of the chair without touching the floor; he is wearing his bathrobe, because there are certain levels of decency one never loses. "Tell me about yourself, tell me about your life," says Angelina. "My life is of no interest," answers my father. "It will be to others," says Angelina. "I'm interested." And my father: "I don't know, I don't know. Maybe some other time. Yes, one day I'll tell you all about it." Maybe if we go to Medellin, thinks my father, maybe if you accompany me to do what I cannot do alone.

  On my father's desk, not on his bedside table, I found his telephone book, but Angelina's surname didn't pop into my head immediately, as happens with our own acquaintances, so it took me a moment or two to find her number among the squadron of scribbles jotted down with his left hand. It was after midnight. I sat beside the pillow, on the edge of the bed, like a visitor, like the visitor I was. At the foot of the lamp there was a film of dust; or maybe it was on every surface in the apartment, but here, because of the direct and yellow light, it was more visible and indecent. I opened the drawer and rummaged through HB pencils and 200-peso coins, and then I found a cheap little book, the kind they sell in supermarkets or pharmacies (displayed beside the razors and the chewing gum), that I hadn't noticed the last time. It was a gift from Angelina. Books for Lovers, it said on the laminated, greenish cover, and underneath: Kama Sutra. I opened it at random and read: "When she holds and massages her lover's lingam with her yoni, this is Vadavaka, the Mare." Angelina the mare, massaged my father's lingam, here, in this bed, and suddenly the elaborate diatribe I'd prepared at the back of my mind began to blur, and Angelina, far from embodying my father's fall from grace, turned into a vulnerable but shameless woman, sentimental and affected but also direct, capable of giving a withdrawn professor of classics in his sixties a cheap version of an illustrated sex manual. I hesitated, thought of hanging up, but it was too late, because the phone had rung two or three times, and I was the more surprised by the question I was pronouncing. "Could I speak to Angelina Franco, please?"

  "Speaking," said the voice at the other end of the line, sleepy and a little irritated. "Who is this?"

  "Do you have any idea what time it is? You're crazy, Gabriel, calling at this time of night. You scared the hell out of me."

  It was true. Her voice was thick and accelerated. She coughed, took a deep breath.

  "Did I wake you?"

  "Well, of course you woke me up, it's after midnight. What do you expect? Look, if it's to give me a hard time . . ."

  "Partly, yeah. But don't worry, I'm not going to shout at you."

  "No? Well, thanks a lot. The one who should be shouting here is me. The nerve!"

  "Look, Angelina, I don't know how things were with my dad. But people don't do things like what you did to him, that seems obvious. Was it for the money?--"

  She cut me off. "All right, all right. No insults."

  "How much did they pay you? I would have paid you as much to keep quiet."

  "Oh yeah? And I would have been just as happy? I don't think so, dear, I don't think so. Do you want me to tell you the truth? I would have done it for free, yes, sir. People need to be told things as they are."

  "People don't give a damn, Angelina. What you did--"

  "Look, I have to go to sleep. It's late and I have to get up early. Don't call me again, Gabriel. I don't have to explain myself to you or to anybody. Ciao."

  "No, wait."

  "What?"

  "Don't hang up on me. You know where I am?"

  "Why should I care? No, really, don't tell me you called me to talk crap? I'm going to hang up. Bye."

  "I'm in my dad's apartment."

  "Great. What else?"

  "I swear."

  "I don't believe you."


  "I swear," I said. "I came here to find your phone number. I was going to phone you to insult you."

  "My phone number?"

  "In my dad's phone book, I don't have your number."

  "Oh. Right, very interesting, but I need to go to sleep. We'll talk some other time. Bye."

  "Did you watch the program tonight? Did you see yourself on television?"

  "No, I didn't watch the program," said Angelina, obviously annoyed. "No, I didn't see myself on television. They didn't call me, they said they'd call before showing it and they didn't call me, they lied to me, too, OK? Can we hang up, please?"

  "It's just that I need to know a couple of things."

  "What things, Gabriel? Come on, don't be a drag. I'm going to hang up. I don't want to hang up on you, hanging up on people is rude, but if you force me to I will."

  "What you did to my dad is serious. He--"

  "No, no, wait a second. What he did to me, that was serious. Leaving without saying anything, dumping me there like an old rag. That is what you don't do to a person."

  "Let me speak. He trusted you, Angelina. Not even I knew those things, he hadn't even told me the things he told you. And that, obviously, affects me as well. All those things he told you. All the things you said on television. So I want to know if it's true, that's all. If you made some of it up or if it's all true. It's important, I don't have to explain why."

  "Oh, so now you're accusing me of lying."

  "I'm asking you."

  "With what right?"

  "Without any. Hang up if you want."

  "I'm going to hang up."

  "Hang up, go on, hang up, don't worry," I said. "It's all lies, isn't it? You know what I think? I think my dad hurt you, I don't know how, but he hurt you, leaving you, getting tired of you, and you're getting even like this. Women can't stand anyone getting tired of them, and this is how they get even, like you're doing. Taking advantage of the fact that he's dead and can't defend himself. You've got a chip on your shoulder, that's all, that's what I think. You betrayed him in the most cowardly way, and all because the old man decided that this relationship wasn't worth carrying on, something anyone has the right to do in this bitch of a world. This is slander, Angelina, it's a crime and you can go to jail for it; of course you're the only one who knows if you're slandering him or not. What do you feel when you think about it, Angelina? Tell me, tell me what you feel. Do you feel strong, do you feel powerful? Sure, it's like sending an anonymous threat, like insulting someone under a pseudonym. All cowards are the same, it's incredible. The power of slander, eh? The power of impunity. Yes, slander is a crime, although no one's ever going to prove it in your case. That's you, Angelina, you are the lowest of the low: a thief who got away with it."

  She was crying. "Don't be mean," she said. "You know full well I didn't make any of it up."

  "No, the truth is I don't know. The only thing I know is that my dad's dead and you're dragging his name through the mud all over Bogota. And I want to know why."

  "Because he left me in the worst way. Because he took advantage of me."

  "Please, don't be trite. My dad's incapable of taking advantage of anybody. He was incapable."

  "Well, that's what you think; it's not for me to tell you any different. But no one ever left you, you can see that for miles. I know what happened in Medellin, I know what he made me believe. He made me think he was coming back and he didn't come back, he told me to wait for him and left me there waiting, I know all that, and that was from the start, he planned all that, he needed my support and he thought: Well, she can come with me and once we get there and she's no use to me anymore, I'll leave her there. He made me believe--"

  "What did he make you believe?"

  "That we were going away together. That we were a couple and we were spending Christmas together."

  "And didn't you go away together?"

  "No, we went so he could take care of a little business. And once I'd completed my function I turned into a nuisance."

  "They're two separate things."

  "What are?"

  "One: asking for help. Two: wanting to be helped."

  "Oh no, don't give me that crap. All men--"

  "Where are your parents, Angelina?"

  "What?"

  "Where is your family?"

  "No, just a moment. That's out of bounds, watch it."

  "How long has it been since you spoke to your brother? Years, right? And wouldn't you like to speak to him again, have someone who reminded you of your parents? Of course you would, but you don't because you've been estranged for a long time, and now it's hard to get close again. You'd like to, but it's difficult. Getting close to people is always difficult. People who are distant are frightening, it's completely normal. But you know what? It would be easier if someone helped you, like if I went with you to Cartagena."

  "Santa Marta."

  "If I went with you to Santa Marta and sat and had something to drink while you went and met your brother and talked out what you need to discuss. If things went well, there I'd be for you to tell me. If they went badly, if your brother told you to go to hell and said he didn't want anything to do with you, to go back where you came from, there I'd be. And we could go to the hotel, or wherever, and we'd lie down and watch television, if that helped you, or we'd get drunk, or screw all night, whatever. But there is another possibility: after going to see him, you decided for other reasons you didn't want to come back. That's something else, it wouldn't be a reason for me to go around slandering you afterward. Get the message or shall I explain it more clearly?"

  "I don't want to see my brother."

  "Don't be an idiot. It's an example, an analogy."

  "It might be what you say. But all the same, I don't want to see him."

  "That's not what we're talking about. Oh please, what an idiot. We're talking about my dad."

  "I have no interest in seeing my brother. Maybe he did, but I don't."

  Silence.

  "OK," I said. "How do you know he's not interested?"

  "No, I don't know, I imagine."

  "Why do you imagine that?"

  "He didn't come to my parents' funeral. What else does that prove?"

  "Don't cry, Angelina."

  "I'm not crying now, don't mess with my life, OK? And if I feel like crying, what's it to you? Leave me alone or I'm hanging up right now, let me be--"

  "Can I tell you something odd?"

  "Or I'll slam the phone down."

  "I went to give blood. The day of that bomb, when they blew up Los Tres Elefantes."

  Silence.

  "What blood type are you?" she said after a while.

  "O positive."

  Another silence.

  Then: "Like my dad. Did you really donate blood that day?"

  "Yes, I went with a friend who's a doctor," I said. "The person who would have operated on my dad if Social Security didn't exist. He forced me to go. I didn't want to."

  "Where did you go?"

  "Most of the wounded were at the Santa Fe and the Shaio. The clinics closest to the store, and the best equipped, I imagine. I went to the Santa Fe."

  "Where do you give blood in the Santa Fe?"

  "On the second floor. Or the third. Up some stairs, in any case."

  "And what's the place like?"

  "Are you testing me?"

  "Tell me what the clinic's like."

  "It's a big room with coffee-colored sofas, I think, and there are little windows," I said. "You talk to a nurse, then they send you in."

  "To the back on the left?"

  "No, Angelina, to the back on the right. There are cubicles, lots of people giving blood at the same time. They make you sit in very high chairs."

  "Those high chairs," Angelina said. "You gave blood. Gabriel never told me."

  "I'm sure he didn't know. He didn't follow my life that closely."

  "Amazing," she said. "I remember when Gabriel asked me about my parents and I told him, I got upset, h
e said so many nice things. He talked to me a lot that day, he even told me about his wife's illness, but he never told me this. How amazing, I'm amazed."

  "It's not such a big deal. Everyone in this city has given blood."

  "But it's the connection, you know what I mean? It's amazing, I swear. I don't know what my dad's cause of death was, I didn't want to know whether it was a blow, or . . . but if you . . ."

  "Take it easy. Don't talk about that if you don't want to."

  "My mum was A positive. That's more difficult."

  "Did you get along well?"

  "Average. Fine, I think. But not too close. They were there and I was here."

  "I guess people grow apart."

  "Yes, that's right. And the one time they come to visit me, they get hit by a drug lord's bomb. What rotten luck, man, I must be jinxed."

  "No, not really. Sooner or later it hits us all, and sorry for saying such stupid things. Are you happy here?"

  "Oh, it doesn't matter, there're bombs in Medellin, too, bombs wherever a person goes, Gabriel." And then laughing: "Like the moon."

  "But if they were alive, wouldn't you consider going back to Medellin?"

  "I've been here for quite a few years now, I'm used to it. Moving is no fun, it's awful. I don't know about you, but people who are always moving don't seem trustworthy, like . . . like untrustworthy, that's the only word, I can't put it any better. To go away from where you were born isn't normal, is it? And going away twice from where a person's from, or leaving your own country, you know? Going to a country where they speak something else, I don't know, it's for strange people; rootless people can do bad things."