Mario Vargas Llosa - The Discreet Hero

And at that moment, returning to ordinary reality, he noticed that Doña Lucrecia had come into the study without his having heard her open the door. What was wrong? She stood next to him, her eyes wet and dilated and her lips half open, trembling. She struggled to speak but her tongue didn’t obey, instead of words, an incomprehensible stammering emerged.

“More bad news, Lucrecia?” he asked in terror, thinking about Edilberto Torres, about Fonchito. “Bad news again?”

“Armida called crying like a madwoman,” Doña Lucrecia sobbed. “Right after he said goodbye to you, Ismael collapsed in the garden. They took him to the American Clinic. And he just passed, Rigoberto! Yes, yes, he just died!”

“What’s wrong, Felícito?” the holy woman repeated, bending toward him and fanning him with the old straw fan riddled with holes that she held in her hand. “Don’t you feel well?”

The trucker saw the concern in Adelaida’s large eyes, and in the fog that filled his head it occurred to him that since she could prophesy, she must know what was wrong. But he didn’t have the strength to answer her; he was dizzy and certain that at any moment he’d faint. He didn’t care. Sinking into a deep sleep, forgetting everything, not thinking: how wonderful. He thought vaguely of asking the Captive Lord of Ayabaca for help; Gertrudis was especially devoted to him. But he didn’t know how.

“Do you want a nice glass of cool water right from the filter, Felícito?”

Why was Adelaida talking so loud, as if he were going deaf? He nodded and, still in a fog, saw the mulatta wrapped in her rough mud-colored tunic running in her bare feet toward the back of the herbs and saints shop. He closed his eyes and thought: “You have to be strong, Felícito. You can’t die yet, Felícito Yanaqué. Balls, man! Where are your balls?” He felt his dry mouth and his heart struggling to grow larger among the ligaments, bones, and muscles of his chest. He thought: “It’s coming right out of my mouth.” At that moment he realized how precise that expression was. Not impossible, hey waddya think. That organ was thundering so energetically and so uncontrollably inside his rib cage that it could suddenly leap free, escape the prison of his body, climb up his larynx, and be ejected in a great spewing of bile and blood. He’d see his heart at his feet, flattened on the dirt floor of the holy woman’s house, deflated now, quiet now, perhaps surrounded by scurrying, chocolate-colored cockroaches. That would be the last thing in this life he’d remember. When he opened the eyes of his soul, he’d be before God. Or maybe the devil, Felícito.

“What’s going on?” he asked uneasily. Because as soon as he saw their faces, he knew something very serious had happened, which explained the urgency of their summons to the station, their uncomfortable expressions, the evasive eyes and false half smiles of Captain Silva and Sergeant Lituma. The two policemen had become mute and petrified as soon as they’d seen him walk into the narrow cubicle.

“Here you go, Felícito, nice and cool. Open your mouth and drink it slow, in little sips, baby. It’ll do you good, you’ll see.”

He nodded, and without opening his eyes he parted his lips and felt with relief the cool liquid Adelaida brought to his mouth, as if he were a baby. The water seemed to douse the flames on his palate and tongue, and even though he couldn’t speak and didn’t want to, he thought: “Thanks, Adelaida.” The tranquil semidarkness in which the holy woman’s shop was always submerged calmed his nerves a little.

“Important business, my friend,” the captain said at last, becoming serious and standing to shake his hand with unusual effusiveness. “Come, let’s have a coffee somewhere cooler on the avenue, where we can talk better than in here. It’s hotter than hell in this cave, don’t you agree, Don Felícito?”

And before he had time to respond, the chief took his kepi from the hook and, followed like a robot by Lituma, who avoided looking him in the eye, headed for the door. What was wrong with them? What important business? What was going on? What fly had bitten this pair of cops?

“Do you feel better, Felícito?” the holy woman asked.

“Yes,” he managed to stammer with difficulty. His tongue, palate, and teeth hurt. But the glass of cool water had done him good and returned some of the energy that had been draining from his body. “Thanks, Adelaida.”

“That’s good, thank God for that,” the mulatta exclaimed, crossing herself and smiling at him. “That was some scare you gave me, Felícito. You were so pale! Oh, hey waddya think! When I saw you come in and drop into the rocker like a sack of potatoes, you looked like a corpse. What happened, baby, who died?”

“With all this mystery you have me on pins and needles, Captain,” Felícito insisted, beginning to be alarmed. “What is this business, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“A good, strong coffee for me,” Captain Silva told the waiter. “An espresso cut with milk for the sergeant. What’ll you have, Don Felícito?”

“A soda, Coca-Cola, Inca Kola, whatever.” He was impatient now, tapping on the table. “Okay, let’s get to the point. I’m a man who knows how to hear bad news, with all that’s happened I’m getting used to it. Let’s have it, no more beating around the bush.”

“The matter’s resolved,” said the captain, looking him in the eye. But he looked at him not with joy but with sorrow, even compassion. Surprisingly, instead of continuing, he fell silent.

“Resolved?” Felícito exclaimed. “Do you mean you caught them?”

He saw the captain and sergeant nod, still very serious and displaying a ridiculous solemnity. Why were they looking at him in that strange way, as if they felt sorry for him? On Avenida Sánchez Cerro there was infernal noise, people going and coming, car horns, shouts, barking, braying. A band was playing a waltz, but the singer didn’t have Cecilia Barraza’s sweet voice, how could he when he was an old man reeking of aguardiente?

“Do you remember the last time I was here, Adelaida?” Felícito spoke very quietly, searching for the words, afraid he’d lose his voice. To breathe more easily he’d unbuttoned his vest and loosened his tie. “When I read the first spider letter to you.”

“Yes, Felícito, sure I remember.” The holy woman’s enormous, worried eyes drilled into him.

“And do you remember that when I was saying goodbye, you had a sudden inspiration and told me to do what they wanted and give them the money they asked for? Do you remember that too, Adelaida?”

“Sure I do, Felícito, sure, how could I not remember. Are you ever going to tell me what’s wrong? Why are you so pale and dizzy?”

“You were right, Adelaida. Like always, you were right. I should’ve listened to you. Because, because…”

He couldn’t go on. His voice broke in the middle of a sob and he began to cry. Something he hadn’t done for a very long time, not since the day his father died in that dark, dingy corner of the emergency room of the Hospital Obrero de Piura. Or maybe not since the night he had sex with Mabel for the first time. But that didn’t count as crying because that had been for happiness. And now tears came all the time.

“Everything’s resolved and now we’ll explain it to you, Don Felícito.” The captain finally came back to life, repeating what he’d already told him. “I’m really afraid you won’t like what you’re going to hear.”

He sat up straight in his seat and waited, every sense alert. He had the impression that the people in the small bar had disappeared, that the street noises had become muted. Something made him suspect that what was coming would be the worst misfortune he’d suffered in a good long time. His legs began to tremble.