Jean-Marie Blas De Robles - Where Tigers Are at Home

“A trick as old as the world,” Kircher said, “but that always works. Examine the spoon yourselves: a little channel has been made in it. All you have to do is to fill it with gold powder in advance & block the opening with a little wax. When the time comes the heat of any mixture will melt the stopper, releasing real gold into the crucible. Yours, for example, my dear Sinibaldus. As for the fact that the man had previously been a monk, I admit I took a few risks. I’m taller than Blauenstein & while he was talking I had the opportunity to observe the top of his head. I was struck by a curious anomaly. His hair was much thicker on the back of his head, which could be easily explained by him having had a tonsure for several years. All I did after that was to set him a trap in the course of our conversation by mentioning his suitability for religious service. He couldn’t repress a slight look of concern, which confirmed my initial deduction. Child’s play, as you will agree. But that’s enough talk, this business has given me an appetite. What would you say to giving the coup de grâce to a few chickens from our friend Carlino just down the road?”

We accepted with pleasure & Sinibaldus insisted on paying for our feast.

When he returned home a few hours later, the alchemist & his wife had decamped. After this incident Sinibaldus remained eternally grateful to my master, though one could not say the same of Blauenstein. Defeated and humiliated by Kircher, he vowed implacable hatred to him, the results of which were to appear several years later, as we will see at the appropriate time.

“At least we have to get a copy of the project,” Eléazard said with a frown, “otherwise there’s nothing I can do. You can’t write things without proof, you know, especially when you’re exposing someone.”

Alfredo shook his head as he angrily filled the glasses with vinho verde . It was clear he didn’t see things the same way. “What about his wife? There’s no way of getting her in on it?”

“Not at the moment,” Loredana replied. “According to Dr. Euclides it’s personal with her. It’s her money so she can intervene.”

“Didn’t she suggest you give her some Italian classes?” Eléazard asked. “Has nothing come of that?”

“On the contrary, she’s to ring me back on your phone in the next few days. That’ll give me a chance to sound her out a little.”

“Right …” said Alfredo sulkily. “If I can sum up: there’s an American base going to be established here on the quiet, a shit of a governor who’s using that information for some quiet speculation and three stupid bastards sitting here twiddling their thumbs just waiting for it to happen.”

“Give it a rest, Alfredo,” Eléazard said. “They’re not going to have it that easy, I promise you, but it’s too soon to act. If they get wind that we’re on to them before we can take effective action, they’ll clamp down on everything and that’ll be that.”

“He’s right,” Loredana said. “Trust us.”

“ Trust us ,” Alfredo repeated, parodying her soothing tones. “I’m very fond of you both, but it’s my country, my region, so I don’t trust anyone and I can promise you that …” He broke off, distracted by the appearance of the hotel’s three American guests.

“I can’t stand them any longer,” he said after the couple and their daughter had walked past the little group as if their table were invisible. “They don’t leave their room except to order Socorró around or hang out in the bars. You should see the state they’ll be in, all three of them, when they come back.”

When he’d come to the hotel that morning, Eléazard had tried to talk to the old servant, but she refused to accept any wages that did not come from her work. All labor, she said, has its share of ingratitude, God had arranged things that way. She still preferred the humiliation of fanning these Americans to that of begging. She was, nonetheless, grateful for his interest but politely asked him to mind his own business.

“Poor old Alfredo,” Eléazard said when he and Loredana were back at his house, “he’s taking this business very much to heart.”

“And you’re not?” she asked, an aggressive note in her voice.

“Of course I am,” he immediately agreed, “but I really can’t see what can be done at the moment. And even later, if you think about it. Despite our advice, Alfredo will inform his friends in the PC do Brazil , their rag will publish a model accusation à la Zola , and then what? Moreira will have a good laugh and arrange to have them silenced. And he will make them pay for their noble indignation, believe me. As for me: assuming dear Carlotta suddenly turns into a martyr of the revolution — and you’ll allow me to have my doubts about that — and brings me the material I need for an article, do you think that’ll make one iota of difference? Millions of dollars and the Pentagon against Eléazard von Wogau, on German police files as a sympathizer with all that was worst in the left-wing splinter groups twenty years ago … You get the picture?”

Loredana looked him straight in the eye, as if she were wondering about his ability to hear what she was going to say. “You have to beat the grass to flush out the snake. When you’re a little less pessimistic I’ll talk to you about the Thirty-Six Stratagems , OK?”

It was Eléazard’s turn to size her up with an odd look. “Why not?” he said in a tone that expressed his lack of interest in the book.

“You look like your parrot when you make a face like that,” she said, switching on the computer. “You know what they say back home? Chi non s’avventura non ha ventura! Right, I’ll let you get on with your ‘work’.…”

Funny girl, he thought, when Loredana went off to see Soledade in her room. He was, he admitted openly to himself, attracted by her nonconformism, by her constant mixture of affection and unfailing clearheadedness to the point where she was beginning to obscure the image of Elaine on his high altar, where he endeavored to keep it. He couldn’t get over her attitude at the governor’s party. The way she’d schemed with the sole intention of being able to slap him! Very clever, but it left him unsure; seeing others so deftly manipulated, he couldn’t prevent himself from wondering if he was in danger himself. Wasn’t she behaving in the same way toward him? Even Euclides had succumbed to her spell. Having said that, she had given the Americans in the hotel a hard stare that still sent shivers down his spine. If there was one thing Eléazard was certain of in all this, it was that she was capable of anything.

LOREDANA KNOCKED ON Soledade’s door; she went in without waiting for a reply. Sprawled out on her unmade bed, an open packet of cookies beside her, she was watching a soccer match on TV.

“Brazil versus the Soviet Union,” she said without taking her eyes off the screen for a moment. “One all, it’s almost over. Quick, come and sit down.”

Loredana took a step then pulled up abruptly: large, damp letters could still be seen on the white walls. Turning a full circle, she read one sentence repeated all round the room up to the fly spray left on the dressing table: Eléazard, te quero …

“So that’s it,” she said with a smile, “you’re in love with him.”

Soledade looked up, eyes wide. Seeing the message she thought she’d wiped off, she screwed up her eyes in comic fashion, then covered her face with the sheet to avoid Loredana’s look.

She went to sit down beside Soledade. “Don’t be silly,” she told her gently, “I won’t say anything. It’s none of my business.”