Mario Llosa - The Real Life of Alejandro Mayta

A reconsideration? All eyes were fixed on Comrade Medardo. There was so much smoke that from the corner where he was sitting, next to the pile of Workers Voice , Mayta saw their faces as if in a cloud.

“Was he desperate, crushed, did he feel his world was collapsing?”

“He was confident, calm, even optimistic, or at least that’s how he appeared.” Blacquer moves his head in negation. “He wanted to show me that being expelled didn’t affect him in the slightest. It might well have been true. Did you ever meet one of these guys who discovers sex or religion in old age? They get anxious, fiery, indefatigable. That’s how he was. He had discovered action and he seemed like a kid with a new toy. He looked ridiculous, like an old man trying to do the latest dance steps. At the same time, it was hard not to envy him a little.”

“We’ve been enemies for ideological reasons, and for the very same reasons we can be friends now.” Mayta smiled at him. “Being friends or enemies, as far as we’re concerned, is purely a matter of tactics.”

“Are you going to go through the rite of self-criticism and request membership in the party?” Blacquer ended up, laughing.

The veteran revolutionary in decline who one fine day discovers action and throws himself into it without thinking, impatient, hopeful that the fighting and the marching are going to recompense him for years of impotence — that’s the Mayta of those days, the one I perceive best among all the other Maytas. Were friendship and love things he understood only in political terms? No: he talked that way only to win Blacquer over. If he had been able to control his sentiments and instincts, he wouldn’t have led the double life he led, he wouldn’t have had to deal with the intrinsic split between being, by day, a clandestine militant totally given over to the task of changing the world, and, by night, a pervert on the prowl for faggots. There’s no doubt that he could pull out all the stops when he had to — we see the proof of it in that last attempt to attain the impossible, the support of his arch-enemies for an uncertain revolt. Two, three buses pass and Blacquer still can’t get on. We decide to walk down Larco; maybe on Benavides it’ll be easier.

“If news of this gets out, the only people who will gain by it will be the reactionaries. It’s also a black eye for the party,” Comrade Medardo explained delicately. “Our enemies will be rubbing their hands with glee, even the ones from the other RWP. There they go, they’ll say, tearing themselves to bits in one more internal struggle. Don’t interrupt me, Joaquín, I’m not asking for an act of Christian forgiveness or anything like that. Yes, I’ll explain what kind of reconsideration I’m talking about.”

The atmosphere of the garage on Jirón Zorritos had thickened. The smoke was so dense that Mayta’s eyes were burning. He saw that they were listening to Moisés with relief burgeoning on their faces, as if, surprised at having defeated him so easily, they were thankful that someone was giving them an out whereby they could leave with a clear conscience.

“Comrade Mayta has been castigated. He knows it, and so do we,” added Comrade Medardo. “He will not come back to the RWP(T), at least not for now, not as long as current conditions last. But, comrades, he’s said it. Vallejos’s plans are still in effect. The uprising will take place, with or without us. Whether we like it or not, it’s going to affect us.”

What was Moisés’s point? Mayta was surprised to hear Moisés refer to him still as “comrade.” He suspected what the point was, and in an instant all the depression and anger he had felt when he saw all those raised arms in favor of the motion disappeared: this was a chance he’d have to take.

“Trotskyism will not participate in the guerrilla war,” he said. “The RWP(T) has unanimously decided to turn its back on us. The other RWP isn’t even aware of the plan. But the plan is serious and solid. Don’t you see? The Communist Party has a great opportunity here to fill a vacuum.”

“To stick its neck in the guillotine. A great privilege!” growled Blacquer. “Drink your coffee and, if you like, tell me about your tragic love affair with the Trots. But don’t say a word about that uprising, Mayta.”

“Don’t make up your minds now, not even in a week — take all the time you need,” Mayta went on, paying no attention to him. “The main obstacle for you all was the RWP(T). That obstacle has vanished. The insurrection is now the sole property of a worker-peasant group of independent revolutionaries.”

“You, an independent revolutionary?” Blacquer said, enunciating carefully.

“Buy the next issue of Workers Voice (T) and you’ll see for yourself,” said Mayta. “That’s what I’ve become: a revolutionary without a party. See? You’ve got a golden opportunity here. To run things, stand at the head of it all.”

“That was the resignation you read,” Blacquer says. He takes off his glasses to breathe on them and clean them with his handkerchief. “A decoy. No one believed in that resignation — neither the guy who signed it nor the ones who printed it. So why did they bother? To trick the readers? What readers? Did Workers Voice (T) have any readers beyond the — how many, seven — the seven Trots in the party? That’s the way history is written, comrade.”

All the stores on Avenida Larco are closed, even though it’s still early. Because of the news about the invasion down south? Around here, there are fewer people than on the Diagonal or in the park. And even the gangs of beggars that overrun the streets and the cars are thinner than usual. The side of the Municipal Building is covered with an enormous graffito in red paint: “The People’s Victory Is Coming Soon.” It’s decorated with the hammer and sickle. It wasn’t there when I passed by three hours ago. A commando came with paint and brushes and painted it right in front of the cops? But now I realize that there are no police guarding the building.

“Let’s at least give him a chance, then, to do a little less damage to the party,” Comrade Medardo went on cautiously. “He should resign. We’ll publish his resignation in Workers Voice (T) . Besides, it would be proof that the party bears no responsibility for whatever he does in Jauja. A reconsideration in that sense of the word, comrades.”

Mayta saw that various members of the Central Committee of the RWP(T) were nodding in approval. Moisés/Medardo’s proposal might be accepted. He thought it over quickly, balancing the advantages and disadvantages. Yes, it was the lesser of two evils. He raised his hand: Could he speak?

At Benevides, there are as many people waiting for buses as there were at the Tiendecita Blanca. Blacquer shrugs: patience. I tell him I’ll wait with him until he gets on. Several people near us are talking about the invasion.

“Over the years, I’ve come to realize that he wasn’t so crazy,” Blacquer says. “If the first action had lasted longer, things might have turned out the way Mayta planned. If the insurrection had caught on, the party would have been forced to enter and try to take over. As it has with this revolt. Who remembers that, for the first two years, we opposed it? And now we’re fighting the Maoists for control, right? But Comrade Father Time shows no pity. Mayta was twenty-five years too early with his plans.”

Intrigued by the way he talks about the party, I ask him if he was readmitted or not. He gives me a cryptic answer: “Only halfway.” A lady with a child in her arms who seemed to be listening to him suddenly interrupts us. “Is it true the Russians are in it, too? What did we ever do to them? What’s going to happen to my daughter?” “Calm down, nothing’s going to happen. It’s a lot of baloney,” Blacquer consoles her as he waves at an overloaded bus that just keeps on going.