Tomás Gonzáles - In the Beginning Was the Sea

THE SOMMELIER uncorked the bottle and poured a little into the glass. Fernando, the bank manager, sniffed the bouquet — he had already sniffed the cork — and said it was lovely. After the waiter left, Fernando muttered that he had had better, but that it was acceptable. J. had called to say he wanted to talk and asked if they could meet somewhere other than the bank. Fernando invited him to lunch at Club Medellín, where he was a member. “He’s going to want to talk about Europe,” thought J. “Jesus, the guy’s a pain in the arse…” He asked Elena to go with him. “I’ve no desire to see that little prick again,” she said.

Fernando had lived in France for four years, J. had spent two years in England. And since J. desperately needed an extension on his loan, he had no choice but to go, alone, and talk about Europe. The four years Fernando had spent in France had been the most important in his life; back then he had been wild and crazy, he stole tins of food from supermarkets, novels from bookshops, he even found a way of calling Colombia from a callbox without paying. They had been the most creative years of his life; he had visited cathedrals, met artists, he had even managed to become a personal friend of Paco de Lucía. This is what they talked about while Fernando delicately sipped his wine, savouring the bouquet like a connoisseur.

When the food arrived, J. made the most of the interruption to solemnly solicit some professional advice. He told Fernando about his idea for the lumber business and asked his opinion. Flattered, the banker lucidly laid out the pros and cons. Broadly, he was in favour of the venture but was careful to warn that he would have to see a detailed business plan before he could offer a decisive opinion. “I’ll come down for a few days’ holiday soon,” he said when J. invited him to visit the finca . The plates were cleared away and Fernando ordered a liqueur. “A pousse-café after a meal is a great aid to digestion, I learnt that living in France,” he said as J. shot him a sardonic look devoid of even a flicker of warmth.

J. drank his liqueur, thinking it “sickeningly fucking sweet”, then casually mentioned the fact that he needed to renew his loan. Fernando first sang the praises of his pousse-café and then began to speak slowly, very slowly about the loan. It was clearly a prepared speech, since he had been rambling for some time before J. managed to work out where it was headed. He talked about the statement of income J. had provided — which was clearly not good — he mentioned their long-standing friendship, talked about his position at the bank and how important it was that he be seen to be scrupulous, especially when it came to lending. Finally he said that, yes, he would extend the loan, but that this was the last time. He flushed slightly and lit a cigarette. J. thanked him and also lit a cigarette. Exhaling smoke from his mouth and nose, he asked about some trivial detail of Fernando’s time in France.

THE NEW FINCA had two small palm-thatched houses, each with two bedrooms, so buying the estate offered a solution to housing the lumbermen. One of the houses needed repairs, but the other was habitable. Before heading back from Medellín where, in addition to extending his loan, he had signed the agreement to purchase the new finca , J. and Elena talked to a timber merchant Julito knew in Turbo. They arrived back at the finca with seven loggers, each with his own two-stroke chainsaw. They also brought a large barrel of petrol that J. had purchased to sell back to the workmen. It weighed a ton and proved difficult to carry across the beach. For lack of a better place, it was stored in the shed he had had built twenty metres from the house where they kept rabbits and guinea pigs, a gift from Don Eduardo, who had a rather biblical mindset. J. was unhappy at the idea of storing this huge oil drum, which gave off choking fumes in the heat, next to his animals. “We need to find somewhere better to store it,” he thought, “though it needs to be nearby so I can sell the fuel and so no one steals the petrol…”

J. had been warned about the loggers. According to Julito, they were the worst of the worst, they needed to be ruthlessly managed, they had no redeeming features, they would steal anything that was not nailed down, they were aggressive when drunk and sloppy in their work. J. assumed he was exaggerating; the men he had hired seemed entirely ordinary. True, they seemed a little cocksure of their abilities — though the same might be said of Julito — and were quick to boast. “Like everyone else around here,” J. thought. The men talked a lot and they clearly shared a sense of humour — they laughed a lot — though it was one J. found all but incomprehensible. All seven were tall and muscular; all of them were black. The timber merchant had assured him they were excellent workers and experienced loggers. “I’ve got some first-class lumbermen, exactly what you’ll be needing,” he had said. “And every man jack of them has his own tools.” J. decided he would start out with seven men, partly because the second house had not yet been refurbished and he did not want to house workers in his own house, and partly because he felt he needed to get the hang of this new business.

Despite his misgivings, the workers spent their first night at his house. Between one thing and another, it was too late to head to the other finca on foot carrying their chainsaws and their other belongings. They strung hammocks up on the veranda and settled down for the night. J. stayed up late with them, drinking aguardiente and talking about business, about how many board feet a lumberman could cut per week, what sort of rigs would need to be installed on the steeper slopes, and so forth. They came to an agreement about food: initially they would come to the house where Mercedes would cook for them, but J. was already talking to Salomón and his wife to see whether they might be prepared to take on the work. Seemingly keen to show willingness, the loggers agreed with everything.

All night, Elena and J. were plagued by the sound of the men snoring and the reek of petrol. Elena, already in a foul mood because the loggers were staying at the house, woke J. again and again to tell him she could not get to sleep for the smell of sweat and gasoline and complaining about the snoring from the veranda. Finally, J. snapped: the loggers smelt no better or worse than any other men, he said angrily; besides, they hadn’t come for a society ball, they’d come to cut timber. And she might as well get used to the smell of petrol since it would be around for some time. “We have to make a living somehow,” he growled, “so shut up and stop bitching.” Elena fumed in silence until eventually she fell asleep while J., now wide awake, sat up drinking and smoking until drink finally got the better of him at some point.

The next morning, they were woken by laughing voices from the veranda. They were still in bed when they heard the deafening roar of a chainsaw. Elena leapt out of bed and went to remonstrate with the man who had started it up. He told her he had simply been testing it. “Well go test it somewhere else, hermano ,” she said. “We don’t need fucking chainsaws making a racket here.” The man shut off the engine, staring at Elena with a mixture of curiosity and contempt, but he said nothing. Back in the bedroom, she found J. with the sheet pulled up to his chin, staring at the ceiling, nursing a vicious hangover from too much aguardiente . He did not like the way she had spoken to the lumberman, but the throbbing pain behind the eyes deterred him from starting what could easily become a protracted argument. He took two aspirin and slept for a little longer. When he woke up again, he felt better and went out to talk to the loggers.