Nothing But Dust

by Sandrine Collette

  “Ma, we’ve had a thought. We’d like new saddles.”

  “Because the ones we’ve got, honestly.”

  “They’re dangerous.”

  “And you know it, we’ve been telling you for years.”

  “Just some new saddles.”

  “And bridles.”

  “Yes, and bridles.”

  The mother looks at them, all three of them, since they all agreed on it.

  “And how are we supposed to pay for all that?”

  “Well . . . with the money.”

  “Money? What money?”

  Mauro stands rigid by the motionless bull and clenches his fists. The mother hid the bag and they don’t know where. Oh, for things like this, she’s no madwoman, the old lady, she did it during the night when they were all asleep, you can be sure of that. She even confessed as much, laughing: Sure, sure, in the middle of the night, you were snoring like angels. Initially they didn’t believe her, even if it astonished them to hear her laughing like that—when was the last time they had seen the mother act the least bit cheerful? The little brother said later that he’d never seen her like that. Maybe before, when the father was still around—but the older boys frowned, the father, really? Not that they can recall. On the contrary.

  “Why’d you hide it, Ma?”

  When she spirited the cash away, two days ago, and they grew alarmed—especially Mauro—the little brother opened his eyes wide, incredulous, and Steban, well, Steban still can’t swear he understands what’s going on—she hunted for the words to explain it to them, hunted for a long time, because it’s not her strong point, speaking, she had to think carefully, or come up with a lie. But the mother is not that gifted for this second option either, so she said, abruptly, “So it won’t get stolen. And so it doesn’t get spent just any old way.”

  They can protest and rant and even rail all they like, she doesn’t care. She does things her way, she’s shut herself away with her treasure, and Mauro doesn’t get it, so he yelled, “And how are we going to spend it, if you won’t even let us have the saddles we’d be using ten hours a day?”

  “We’ll see. It’s not lost, don’t worry.”

  “When can we buy something?”

  “We’ll see, I said.”

  “Ma, what’s the point of having this money if you go and hide it?”

  “We know we have it. If we need it, it’s there.”

  “But we need it!”

  “No, not like that. Mustn’t waste it.”

  He nearly choked with rage that day, and he looked at the two brothers who were standing there dumbstruck next to him, why couldn’t they help him out, with their innocent expressions, why didn’t they say something, then finally Rafael reacted.

  “But saddles would be useful. And there’ll be so much money left over, even after that!”

  “Not all that much. Not all that much.”

  And then the little brother squealed, as if she had dishonored him: There is! There was a ton of money! Naturally. That was why Mauro said, gratingly, “Did you count it, Ma, before you hid it?”

  A shrug. He insisted.

  “You wouldn’t have hidden it without counting. Not you.”

  She conceded the fact. Could be. Grudgingly. But he didn’t see things that way, didn’t want her to stop now that she had started, didn’t want her to take them for fools yet again, there was no other way to put it, that’s what he told her when she looked them right in the eye and asserted she didn’t know how much there was, yes, it was a good amount, but not as much as all that, exactly how much she’d forgotten, they had to believe her—a likely story. So Mauro gave them all a start when he began to yell, but it was eating him up inside and he might have wrung the old lady’s neck if she hadn’t replied on the spot, because he’d had enough of waiting and hoping, it was too new, too tempting, what was it to her to give them a figure, it wouldn’t be taking anything out of the bag, it wouldn’t kill her. So the mother gave in: staring at the floor, she mumbled something inaudible, her hands curled into her apron, and Mauro had to yell again, chanting each syllable: I didn’t catch that.

  She spoke again, a little more loudly. This time he paid close attention, and he heard, and the other two did as well, and they opened their mouths even wider, if such a thing were possible.

  “Jesus Christ,” said the little brother, and the mother slapped him.

  Mauro was stunned. Wow. That’s a packet. We can buy all the saddles and bridles we want. He saw the two younger boys next to him, counting in silence, trying to figure the number of zeros. But they didn’t have enough fingers and they got muddled, started over, got the math wrong, and Mauro wasn’t really all that sure himself, to be honest, and he was sorry Joaquin wasn’t with them, he’d more of a head for numbers than they had and he would have written the sum out in the dust on the ground before they rubbed it out with the soles of their boots so there’d be no trace. Rafael, with his hand on his cheek, looked up at him as if he were bound to know, so the older brother put on a calculating expression and nodded his head, gravely, crossing his arms over his chest, because he too was nevertheless measuring the extent of the treasure, mutely, and the mother was, too, and the little brother looked at them one after the other with this prayer in his eyes, he wanted so badly to be able to comprehend what this sum represented, a sum so enormous that it made the older ones fall silent. As they still refused to say anything, Mauro guessed from the little brother’s wrinkled brow that he was trying again, biting his lips from the effort, pressing his fingers discreetly to count and count again, eventually giving up, shoulders drooping, yes, it must be a huge amount all the same, to judge by the looks on their faces, the mother and Mauro, and with a knowing air the little brother said: “Ah, I see. That much, huh.”

  But now it’s been days and Mauro’s patience has run out, he doesn’t want the mother to think he’s forgotten about it, or accepted the situation, the next time he goes to Emiliano’s he’ll be the one taking Joaquin and paying for the beer and the girls, and next time could be tomorrow, time is short.

  He has not gotten over the loss of his twin. Particularly as their first parting, the one owing to the mother and her poker, could have been fixed, in his opinion, because they bore no blame in the matter, either one of them. They would have seized the old lady by the waist before going into the bar, had they known, they’re not to blame, no, not at all, no one would ever have bet a peso that the night would end like that. But the second parting had left the older brother with a bitter taste in his mouth, and he’s been stuck with it, deep in his throat ever since, the insipid, metallic bile of the imbecile who didn’t dare to leave, who didn’t want to play the role of a traitor, and who looked at his brother walking away and was dying to go with him—madre, the old lady is going to pay for it, for everything that is collapsing inside him, eating away at him. There are evenings when he withdraws in the emptiness of the room and feels an abyss opening inside him, and it wouldn’t take much for him to plunge into it altogether, all of him, overcome by unprecedented, violent terrors. So to keep from going under he seeks something to cling to—bestial work that stifles all emotion, the vibrant pain of his exhausted body, the hope of making a little cash so he can meet Joaquin for a night out—a few pesos, he begs, when the mother could be bathing in a tub full of bills, ever since the little brother came back with the bag, a few pesos, what would that cost her?

  And like an animal, who mourns for two days when it loses an old companion, then rejoins the herd and finds a new one, Mauro has gradually drawn closer to his remaining brothers. Of course he hasn’t stopped despising them, with all the force of his hatred, but without saying a word they have sealed a strange alliance behind the old lady’s back, they are bonded by the feeling that they’ve been swindled, by their anger at not seeing the money again, neither Mauro nor the little brother, who fully expected some part of it
to be his due, nor even Steban, who nods his head to everything they say at night, hiding in one of the rooms. Incomprehension has yielded to a cold, consuming rage, but for all that none of them have dared confront the mother. And even Mauro is restrained by a sort of fearful respect, a mixture of recognition and caution—and the certainty that if he resorted to force, the old lady wouldn’t give in any more readily, stubborn as she is and, as he’s found out, incredibly greedy. When he reproaches her, she shouts and defends herself; and maybe deep down he senses she is more frightened than miserly—with her features that have grown more dark and deep and hollowed out than in the days when it was a struggle to pay what she owed on time, but Mauro doesn’t care, he wants some money, and he shouts and yells about it more and more often. Just let her sit down and complain that she’s tired, and he’ll bark, I don’t give a damn! Or that she’s got aches and pains: then he will laugh out loud.

  “If we had money, you could see a doctor. Seems a bit stupid, don’t it, Ma.”

  She never reacts to his jokes, which aren’t jokes, because he’s not in a laughing mood, his tolerance has been undermined, he wants to shake her up but doesn’t know how to go about it, his mind is full of a treasure that’s spilling over and preventing him from thinking, and he feels the bitterness into his very gums when he has to speak, he hates her for standing up to him, for sticking to her guns. Because the money will stay right where it is until she decides to get it out, is what she said, and Mauro knows just what this means: he’ll never see the color of it, in spite of his determination to show her she’s wrong, to convince her the bag is worth no more hidden than it would be lost for good.

  So he looks up at her from under his brows, and spies on her every moment he can, seeks in every flicker of her eyes where she might have put the satchel to bed. One day when he’s talking about it yet again, vehemently, and she glances over at the barn, he’s convinced she’s just given herself away, and he drags Rafael and Steban along with him and they spend the night digging through the hay. In vain. Tired and exasperated, as dawn breaks he curses her, thinks up plots that will go nowhere, while the other two listen and vigorously nod their heads without doing a thing. Yet his hope goes on tormenting him, indestructibly, and every morning he launches a new attack, interrogating the mother and driving her crazy with his insinuations, and she yells and insults him in turn, all the trouble she’s taken to raise him, to raise all of them, honestly.

  Rafael says he is sure the money is in her room, and that now she too sleeps on it, to reassure herself. One morning he deliberately cuts his finger, runs back to the house to treat it, and slips into the room with its closed shutters. He opens the wardrobe, hunts around, bends down to peer under the bed. Probes the mattress and checks the slats of the floorboards, but he finds nothing, holding one hand cupped under his bleeding finger all the while; finally he has to wipe his finger on his trousers. When he goes back out, frowning, he looks at his brothers and shakes his head, almost imperceptibly.

  “Fuck,” spits Mauro.

  Behind him, the mother says, What’s the matter?

  “Nothing. Nothing’s ever the matter around here.”

  Thoughts, dreams come to Mauro, all tinged with violence. Squeezing his hands around the mother’s neck until she confesses, until she capitulates, spluttering the hiding place, her eyes popping out and her tongue turning blue, and when he has heard he goes on squeezing, to teach her a lesson, and because he doesn’t need her anymore. Yes, in his dreams.

  In reality, he’s hopping mad at the little brother, who was the cause of it all, coming home like that and saying life was about to change—well, you can say that again, it’s changed, you can’t see it but underneath there’s this huge transformation, the spite and frustration the sons relay to each other and exchange, just whose fault is it, the mother who hid the bag, or Rafael who came home with it, spreading the poison over the estancia, or even Steban and Mauro, the former through his fearful immobility, the latter because he shoots his mouth off but is none the more active for all that. But if he did take action . . . Christ, the carnage, because nothing would stop him then, and the house would become a cemetery, bodies spread all over the place, even those of the dogs, no, honestly, he’d better get a hold of himself, he trembles with fury, it mustn’t get out, that’s what he says to Steban and Rafael, and the little brother frowns.

  “If we kill her, it’s up to me to do it,” he says.

  Mauro lets out a nasty guffaw.

  “You? And why should it be you?”

  “It’s my money. I’m the one she robbed.”

  “She didn’t take it from you, you gave it to her.”

  “She didn’t ask me. Did you hear me say even once that I was giving it to her?”

  The two brothers think for a moment.

  “That’s true,” says the twin.

  The little brother nods, insistent.

  “I just wanted to show it to her.”

  “But if we get it, you’ll have to share with us.”

  “Yes. We’ll share, of course. That’s what I meant to do.”

  In the stables the sons go on plotting and murmuring, their blood boiling. As for the mother, they don’t even call her the mother anymore. They say, “she.” In that she there is all the defiance and rage on earth.

  So Mauro decides. One evening he explains to the brothers—he doesn’t ask, he imposes, this is how it will be. He says: We stop working. She doesn’t want to listen, doesn’t want to know. So we show her.

  “I agree,” says the little brother.

  And Steban nods his head. Yes.

  They look at each other, their eyes black, their faces hard. Mauro doesn’t recall them ever being so determined and unanimous, so he looks at them again carefully to ensure their pact is firmly in their minds, then he clenches his jaws, what a pair of idiots, if for once he manages to get something out of them, and he holds out his hand.

  “Let’s slap hands on it.”

  Just as they’re about to put their three hands together, a cow moos out in the pen and the dogs leap up, barking. Rafael twists around to see what’s going on, and misses Steban’s and Mauro’s hands, which slap together just the two of them, so the little brother apologizes and fumbles to slap their hands in turn, but it’s too late, he’s botched it, Mauro is choking with rage and gives him an almighty punch, fist closed so it will hurt, damned idiot Rafael, useless, worthless bringer of bad luck, they’re not out of the woods yet.

  THE MOTHER

  Oh how she hates and despises them, little beggars who don’t understand a thing, look at them still sitting outside the barn against the wall in the afternoon, same as this morning, when Mauro came to tell her they wouldn’t lift another finger until she gave them the money. She’s begotten a filthy race—to see the three of them bored and wandering around in circles and sitting back down again, rather than giving in after a good fit of anger. At least that’s one meal to the good, since she didn’t make lunch, what did they expect; maybe they thought she was going to feed them to be idle? But it’s meager consolation, and while the mother may have plenty to do around the house, the farmyard, and the kitchen garden, she also knows the cattle won’t be fed or looked after, and all it will take is a premature birth or an injury or a fight and she’ll lose a steer or a lamb. So that lot sitting there on their asses waiting for time to go by: she truly hopes they will die of hunger.

  And give up this harebrained scheme of theirs.

  Because shearing season has begun.

  But with all that’s happened, and the little brother’s return, and the confusion on the estancia, she’s running late. The ewes should already be here. And now these idiots balking and staring at her from afar with their arms crossed, if she tells them to go and fetch the sheep, they’ll laugh in her face, they’ll want something in exchange, set their conditions. Only a few weeks ago she could have ordered them out t
o the pastures with one shout. Nowadays by granting herself the right to hide the money she has lost every other right: those of demanding, deciding, and commanding. But she knows she is right, and she won’t give in.

  Because she is the only one who knows.

  This money is tainted.

  It didn’t take her long to make the connection with what she’d heard in town. The breeder who was robbed, up there in the pampas, and the bandit who managed to get away from everything—rifle shots, traps, the militia. Only to end up in the clutches of her youngest kid, leaving him the money, but the money wasn’t his to begin with, so if she’d really wanted to do a good deed she should have given it back—what is to her a godsend of a treasure—give it back? Jesus Christ, did you hear what you said, woman: Give it back?

  Maybe, to thank her, the rich man would have given her a roll of bills. One roll, when there are a thousand. And give up all the rest?

  Even when she was gambling she’d never had the opportunity to get her hands on an amount like that. She’s so unused to the idea that every evening she scribbles figures on the table before she cleans it, putting lines between the zeros so she can scan the thousands and the hundreds, and of course it’s lunacy to have hidden it all, an absurd decision she’s sinking into ever deeper, the sort of choice an unhinged person would make, she trembles at the thought of it, while she scrubs hard at the polished surface to erase all trace of her arithmetic. And yet she didn’t hide the bag just on a whim, and she’ll stand by her decision whatever it takes. Don’t reveal a thing. Wait however long it takes until everyone has forgotten the story about the rich breeder, so that no suspicion will fall on her, the mother, that she might have stolen the bag from the corpse and, consequently, from the breeder, she wouldn’t like to bet on her chances of survival at that point. But how many years will she have to be patient, until she’s no longer afraid? They’ll all be dead first. And deep down, knowing the money is hidden away where no one can find it reassures her a little.