Breakfast in Bogota

by Helen Young

  The newcomer took the seat beside Karl and grinned over at Luke. He smiled back. Beside this man, Karl was the picture of health. The maid brought a fresh plate. The cook herself followed personally with the fish and a series of other small dishes which hadn’t been served before. Karl filled his neighbour’s wine glass to the rim. If he had to watch this man eat, Luke thought, he might be sick after all.

  ‘This is Don Tomas Caicedo,’ Osorio said, addressing Luke. ‘Don Tomas is the Mayor of Bogotá.’

  ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you,’ Luke said, although the moment for formal greeting had passed. The mayor wasn’t paying attention anyway. He was busy picking his fish clean.

  ‘Gabriel, you know this is my favourite.’ He stabbed his fork at Osorio and then at Luke. ‘Good, isn’t it, Señor Vosey?’

  ‘Call him Luke,’ said Karl.

  Luke smiled again. The three men had clearly dined together before.

  ‘Mr Vosey, forgive us,’ Osorio said, placing his cutlery down. ‘The Pan-American Conference is on your mind. You’re ever the restless architect, or genius, or both perhaps.’ He laughed.

  Luke swallowed. ‘If we’re to get it underway and begin building by the new year, we should start now. I want to start now.’

  ‘That won’t do.’ Osorio signalled for more wine. ‘The president won’t like it. Ospina trained as an engineer, you know, he likes order – planning. If we can get drafts together for the conference then that’s enough. What happens after is a different matter – it’s what we can tell the delegates that counts. Important people, like General Marshall – the Secretary of State, he’s heading the American Delegation – and the foreign press, naturally. No, it’s what comes next – investments and capital pouring in from overseas. This is just the beginning, for us and for you.’

  Luke smiled. ‘Progress on a world stage?’

  ‘Yes.’ Osorio took a pen from his pocket and laid his napkin flat on the table. ‘The actual conference is held at the Capitolio Nacional on Plaza de Bolívar, here.’

  He marked it on the fabric.

  ‘The areas selected for improvement are here, here and here.’

  He drew lines representing some of the streets Luke recognised as those surrounding the main square and government building. He then drew three crosses.

  ‘The Church of Santa Clara, the House of Juan Flόrez Ocariz and the College of San Bartolomé, all close to the main square, and in the way of progress.’

  ‘I’ve been there,’ Luke said, placing his finger over the church. ‘It’s from the 1500s.’

  ‘Then you’ll have seen the havoc the roosting pigeons wreak on the cars?’ This was the mayor.

  ‘Can’t scrub that shit off,’ Karl chimed in.

  ‘The people don’t care about the buildings,’ Osorio said, sighing. ‘Luke, they want homes. How can I put this? You’ve heard the protests, yes? Let’s say that the pueblo has spoken, and we have listened.’

  The mayor laughed, almost choking on a fresh forkful. Luke understood. He’d heard words like those in Jornada.

  ‘Poor Gaitán,’ Luke said, without thinking. ‘I guess, once you’ve made heroes of yourselves, no one will think of him, or his party.’

  ‘Poor Gaitán?’ Osorio sent his fist into the table so that the glassware shuddered. ‘Let me tell you about poor Gaitán – he’s a man who will not bend. He’s a man who wants to take democracy apart, brick by brick, and he demands that the people do it for him. Who is he to demand anything? Of the people or of the president? What is his parentage?’ They were all of them silent, the only sound the chink of the mayor’s fork against his plate.

  ‘Yes, you’re right, of course,’ Luke said, smiling faintly. ‘I guess I’m still learning.’

  Osorio nodded. ‘You’re a stranger here, Señor Vosey, our ways are hard to understand – perhaps it’s better not to try.’ He raised the wine bottle and filled Luke’s glass. ‘We’ve kept the priests happy and, naturally, God has given his consent. Karl will handle things on the ground – lower level administration and such. Tomas here will take charge of the paperwork; get the right people to stamp and sign. We need drawings first, though, something official we can document. You can do that, can’t you?’

  Luke was silent. The three men looked at him. He’d already said yes at the opera but it seemed he needed to do it again here, in front of the mayor.

  ‘Vosey,’ Karl said. ‘You going to say yes?’

  He looked at the men. Here was his chance. ‘I’d want control over the design,’ he said. ‘I won’t put my name on just anything.’

  ‘Of course.’ Osorio leaned forward.

  ‘And we’ll build in housing?’

  ‘Naturally,’ Osorio said.

  ‘We haven’t got all night, Luke, and if you…’

  Osorio held up his hand to silence Karl.

  Say yes, Luke. Say it, he thought, making quick calculations of how it could be. He’d get Felisa to work on it. It would make her career as well as his. Why not alongside his? He’d explain to her about the buildings for the poor – she’d like that. She wanted change, didn’t she? Did it matter who was offering it?

  ‘I’ll get Felisa to draw something up,’ he said.

  ‘Felisa?’

  ‘My draughtswoman,’ Luke replied.

  ‘A woman? No good. Get Blanco on it. He’s discreet.’

  ‘No good,’ Luke said, meeting his stare.

  Osorio shrugged. ‘As you wish.’

  Luke pushed back his chair and rose, steadying himself against the table edge. It took the last of his strength to stand up to Osorio – to a man who wasn’t used to being questioned.

  ‘You don’t look at all well, Mr Vosey,’ Osorio said.

  ‘Is there a bathroom?’

  Karl rose. ‘I’ll show him.’

  15

  Luke left after dinner was over. He said goodbye to Karl, the mayor and Osorio and took the car back into the city alone. Before the car left the hacienda behind, he peered back at the house, seeking out the three men one last time. He imagined them changed somehow, into something nightmarish and true. Anything is possible here, he thought, loosening his collar. He found them inside of the dining room. They were just sitting there, smoking cigars. Then he was too far down the drive to see anything at all, save the flare of a few fireflies that could have been the tips of their cigars.

  The driver pulled up outside his apartment block. Luke was glad to see the doorman. It was as though he’d been away longer than an evening and this was a homecoming of sorts. The man smiled oddly, but Luke felt this reproach was a sign he understood; that change was coming for him too. It was only when he reached the floor of his apartment and saw the figure leaning against his door that he realised he should have known better.

  ‘Hello, Rocío,’ he said.

  ‘Luke.’

  Her mouth was painted an achingly deep shade of red. When she smiled it was with Catherine’s smile. Rocío, Catherine, what did it matter? He was finally moving on.

  ‘The boarding house is locked now,’ Rocío said. ‘I waited too long.’

  ‘You can’t stay here, I’m sorry.’ He slipped the key into the lock.

  She stepped forward. ‘You’ve been unwell, Papi. I was worried.’

  He looked at her and sighed. ‘You’re really locked out?’

  She smiled eagerly.

  ‘OK, but it can’t be like before, Rocío.’

  She nodded and smiled again. It will never be like before, he thought.

  *

  When he woke up the next morning, he was alone, though the far-off sound of running water told him this wasn’t true. There was someone in the kitchen, and his first thoughts turned to Señora Rojas. Since learning of his illness, she’d taken to arriving early on Saturdays before heading to market. He rolled over and saw Rocío’s dress draped over the table lamp. There were two versions of what the morning could be: the first – in which Señora Rojas was readying his breakfast – and the second, i
n which Rocío had turned up at his door last night and was now naked, boiling water for coffee. He sat up fast and felt complicit; he was naked too.

  ‘Good morning, Luke.’

  Rocío stood in the door frame. She was wearing his robe and, over this, Señora Rojas’ apron. She handed him a cup of hot coffee.

  ‘I don’t think you should be wearing that.’

  She grinned.

  ‘I don’t have to.’

  Rocío undid the apron string and removed it. She made her way on to the robe.

  ‘Leave that,’ he said, sitting up.

  She retied the belt and positioned herself on the corner of bed.

  ‘It’s nice here.’

  ‘How did you know where I’d be?’

  ‘A friend,’ she said, looking at him and then away again. ‘I hope it was a nice surprise?’

  ‘Very,’ he said. ‘But I don’t think it’s a good idea – the doorman for one.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘If they knew, back at the boarding house, I’d lose my place there.’

  ‘You want to leave it?’

  She shot him a look of disbelief.

  ‘That was a stupid thing to say. I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Shall we dress and go out?’ Luke reached down to the floor for his trousers.

  ‘Together?’

  ‘Unless you’re embarrassed to be seen with me?’

  She giggled, genuine and true. He thought of Felisa then.

  ‘I’ll walk you back.’

  ‘Oh, OK.’

  They dressed quickly and while Rocío was in the bathroom, Luke washed up the cups and made one final check of the bedroom to make sure nothing was out of place. ‘I only look after you,’ Señora Rojas had said on taking the job. He met Rocío in the corridor coming out of the bathroom. They smiled awkwardly at each other. Her mouth was clean of lipstick and up close, looked vulnerable and small. I should kiss her now, he thought, but couldn’t bring himself to do it. The moment quickly passed. They headed out of the apartment. There was a different doorman in the lobby but he wore the same grin, Luke thought, holding the door for her himself.

  He walked Rocío as far back as La Candelaria. A street before the boarding house, they stopped to share coffee and fresh bread, purchased from a café they’d passed. Rocío had taken ownership of a bench and moved to make space for him when she saw him approaching, laden down with supplies. Luke sat down beside her and they ate in silence. The coffee was tepid and the bread dry and hard to swallow. She nibbled hers and he felt instantly wanting, thinking she deserved more than the meagre meal he’d provided. She expects more for herself too, he thought. At least the fever had passed. Perhaps Rocío had something to do with it. No, he thought, dismissing the idea. It was Felisa who had saved him, and that potion of hers. After they’d finished eating, there was nothing for it but to go their separate ways. Rocío looked up at him with those big eyes and tried the smile again but it had lost most of its allure. When Felisa smiled it was as herself. Luke kissed Rocío once and promised to call at the boarding house in a week’s time.

  Alone again, he wandered without thinking. Luke took streets that wound upwards through La Candelaria, finding himself pulled closer to the mountain. After the evening spent with Rocío, the morning surprised him, as though it were a new idea that day should follow night. Over his shoulder and further down the basin, the city was still lost in shadows. Before him the mountain seemed to glow. He wanted the warmth of it. Luke turned his back on the city and climbed. People passed him, heading down into Bogotá’s wide belly. Today, he didn’t have the stomach for it. The new commission was there, at the front of his mind, but Rocío’s unexpected visit had left a mark on the day. She shouldn’t come again, he thought, he should find a way to tell her that. Her longing, though, to be loved, was sincere. He walked faster. Guilt was an emotion he could do without. Not on top of what he already had. The past was harder to shake than he’d thought and now this familiar woman had some stake in it. Why had he shown her the photograph? It gave her some hold over him; a false intimacy, he thought.

  He reached the small white church of Las Aguas, perfectly framed by the mountains of Monserrate and Guadelupe, rearing up steeply behind. It was a pretty spot. The San Francisco river started here, flowing directly down from Monserrate to slip beneath its foundations and out the other side. When it reached the city it would change colour, depending on what washed through it, he’d learned that. Soon, Luke ran out of street and was faced with the mountain proper. Monserrate became his left and right and eventually his up. It dominated the skyline. He craned backwards and looked up. There was the little white church at its peak, sweet and promising as a curl of icing. The rest of the time, Monserrate imposed its will on the city and all its inhabitants but right now, right now, Luke thought, it wants to conquer me. I’ll put paid to that, he thought. He crossed the road to the ticket office, bought a ticket at the booth and boarded the train. The car fit a good twenty people, in five stacked, standing carriages, although there were only a handful at this time – tourists and a few nuns. It began its ascent. From the open windows he watched the city slip out of reach and lose definition below. Up here, it was easy to see how Bogotá tightrope-walked a straight line from north to south. At its centre stood Chapinero, the commercial district, with the main avenues of Seventh and Jiménez running like arteries through it. As the car climbed higher, entire blocks were reduced to the grid-like simplicity of a circuit board. In Candelaria, the buildings were packed in, in a tighter formation. He looked for La Merced but it was as if it didn’t exist at all from up here.

  The car stopped, locking onto the platform at the summit. He exited the carriage along with the small mixed group. The tourists scattered, turning their Kodak 35s left and right. The nuns had departed silently for the church. He decided to follow them; to keep climbing. The air was thin and made any ascent slow and laboured. As his body struggled, he thought of himself as a building of sorts, made up of material framed only to last in the right conditions. His heart, lungs, muscles all depended on air, as the structures he founded did on the people who inhabited them, bringing to life that which was really an empty shell. People, the body, life itself, this had been Catherine’s field, not his – the nurse and the architect.

  He stopped. There he was again, thinking of her. He truly didn’t want to. It was because he’d allowed Rocío back into his life. Maybe it was OK to have those thoughts up here, though, on the mountain? Up here, he might finally be free of her, of all the shame associated with her, shame that surrounded him like nervous energy. He walked on, picking up his pace, despite what it cost his lungs. His leg had started to ache again. Catherine. He could cast her off the summit if he wanted to. He recalled long nights spent with their own limbs fused temporarily together, at the height of making up over some argument over whether his creations lived or not. She believed not, and he always argued against her. She always bloody won. She had a way of doing that. Luke reached the cobbled veranda in front of the church. From here, he could see the monastery of Guadalupe on the sister mountain. He went across to the ledge in front of the church and peered down. God, he hated her. It was a long way back to Bogotá. A low wall was the only thing separating him from a fast descent through the overgrowth and then a hard arrival onto the streets below.

  16

  Their last few weeks at La Merced finally arrived. Telma took the end personally, flitting around the building with Felisa close behind, making an inventory in her sketchbook of anything the secretary asked of her. Luke’s room was to become the concierge’s office and the one below a mailroom. The bulk of the furniture from the buildings had already departed along with the larger machinery, all shipped back up the Magdalena River to the refinery. Soon, there’d be no trace of them at all. La Merced was deserted. The red brickwork shone and behind each façade nothing but empty, expectant space. The last of the workmen had been paid off a week ago so that besides himself and the temporary foreman, Telma and Felisa wer
e the only ones left. The foreman was busy overseeing the transportation of the last of the machinery onto the back of trucks at the far end of the works and Telma he could hear below, loudly opening and closing filing cabinets and drawers. That just left Felisa, who, as well as helping Telma, he’d employed in sketching the buildings as a series. He looked out of the window for her now. He’d wanted the sketches for himself and paid her out of his own pocket, providing a box of watercolours for her use.

  ‘I don’t think we can keep this.’

  Luke jumped. It was Telma, standing in the doorway with a large potted fern.

  ‘Why don’t you take it?’ he said.

  ‘I’d never make it on the tram,’ she said, sighing and looking down at it. ‘No, take it for your apartment.’ She went over to his desk and placed it down.

  ‘Is Felisa still here?’ he asked.

  ‘That girl!’ Telma rubbed her hands together. ‘I asked her to pack up the cabinets but she’s off with her sketchbook.’

  Luke smiled. ‘I can help if you like?’

  ‘You?’ Her hand went to her mouth. ‘Excuse me, señor.’

  ‘I’m going to need a secretary, Telma. I have a new commission. Not yet, but when I do, well, the job’s yours if you want it?’

  Telma let out a little cry. ‘Yes, Señor Vosey. I would like that very much.’

  Luke left her picking over the files and went outside. He walked upwards on 34th Street and took the forked road left onto Fifth. It ran parallel to the piece of land they’d turned into a park. Banked up against it was a single row of houses, the grandest they’d built.

  Felisa was sitting on a low brick wall with the park behind her. She was sketching a large corner house. Her head down, she was completely absorbed by the structure, guiding every aspect of its form down through her arm and onto the page. He turned and tried to retrace his steps unseen.

  ‘Luke!’ she called.

  He waved and went over.

  ‘Look,’ she said.