Carlos Fuentes - Adam in Eden

“Oh.”

“For example, friendship. How do you like that? ”

“Oh, of course.”

“I try to avoid mixing my responsibilities and my friendships in the same sandwich. How do you like that?”

I smile. “Onions over here, tomatoes over there”—Góngora doesn’t laugh—“but once you attain power. .” He cracks a smile at that last word.

“Power? Don’t you believe it. Power. . Come on. .! Power. . Don’t kid yourself.”

He cuts me off: “Power imposes responsibilities that are not the least bit pleasant, you know? How do you like that?”

“I know, I know. Wouldn’t that be the sort of thing I’d know?”

“For instance, yesterday’s friend is still today’s friend, but. .”

“But what. .? C’mon, tell me. .”

“Now I know things about yesterday’s friend that I didn’t know about today’s friend. How do you like that?”

“Such as?”

“Whoa now, don’t make me get ahead of myself.”

“Señor Góngora, you are my guest. I wouldn’t make you do anything.”

“Well there you go. Just yesterday, I was a private citizen with a good reputation. . How do you like that?”

I abstain from smiling.

“Even if my enemies don’t believe me.”

“What about your friends?”

“Counselor, are you my friend?”

“I’m not your enemy, if that is what’s worrying you.”

“No, I’m asking are you my friend?”

“I wouldn’t aspire to so much.” I smile again, and pray the Lord not wipe away my smile, because that would give my interlocutor great pleasure.

He moves his lips in a creepy way. “So, it would only be halfway, so, so—”

“You know that a man like me deals with a lot of people. With courtesy, when they deserve it; rarely with friendship.”

“And with disrespect?”

“Never, never. I was brought up right, know what I mean?”

Góngora was made of iron. He didn’t react to my hint at all.

“Would it be foolish,” he asked, “to attack a man with whom, just yesterday, we spoke so courteously?”

“Did we dine at your father-in-law’s house?” I interjected with malicious ambiguity.

He didn’t catch my drift. “Suppose that upon reaching a position of power, one feels the responsibility to investigate a man who only yesterday was, well, if not one’s friend, then without doubt a respected acquaintance.”

“Yes, I understand.”

“And suppose that, upon reaching power, facts become known, evidence is presented that the friend, or acquaintance, as you say, is an evildoer. How do you like that?”

“I follow,” I say, following a line to the wall. “I’m following you.”

Góngora’s metal-rimmed eyeglasses light up.

“What would you do, Señor Gorozpe?”

I put on my most affable expression. “Don’t ask me; obviously this is your problem. I don’t have enemies, you know? How ’bout you?”

“I have a government job. How do you like that?”

My look is a wordless question.

“And sometimes that forces me to take action, despite my nobler sentiments.”

Now I really do offer a look of surprise with an element of mockery.

“Without even good manners,” he confesses in a folksy manner. “How do you like that?”

“What do you intend to do?” I push the fingers from both hands together and raise them to my chin.

“No, not intend, Don Adam Gorozpe, I don’t intend to do, I do. ”

“So, what do you do?”

“I fulfill. How do you like that?”

“Who, or what do you fulfill?”

“My obligations.”

“They seem to weigh on you.”

“I even fulfill my obligations to my friends. How do you like that?”

“Your acquaintances.”

“Yes. I can ruin them if I want to. How do you like that?”

“Well, go ahead, Señor Góngora. What’s stopping you?”

He stood up. He said good-bye. He was already leaving my office when I stopped him and gave him a manly hug.

“I don’t care whether they love me or hate me,” he said, and left my office.

I can deduce many things from Adam Góngora’s visit to my office. I’ll limit myself to three observations and reactions: 1) Góngora wanted to intimidate me, to let me know that he is very powerful, as powerful as he is short , to invite an examination of his brutal track record, and to unsettle me with the question, When will it be your turn? That is, my turn.

I expected all this, and for the time being I’ll limit myself to making two things clear: a) that I understand Góngora’s intention, and b) that I am not going to step into his trap and let this diminutive person frighten me.

I need to figure out 2) what I can do to circumvent Góngora’s evil intentions?

And the unspoken aspect is that 3) Góngora showed up as the hidden lover of my wife Priscila, the Queen of Carnival, without even hinting if he knew that I myself am not faithful to Priscila, and that Priscila, in all fairness, should have the right to the same erotic privileges as I do, especially considering that for twenty-one years, our relationship has come down to playing with scapulars that she uses to cover her genitals, without ever looking at mine.

Having said that, I have no lack of hypotheses concerning the Priscila-Góngora affair. As you know, my wife is a befuddled lady who speaks freely without the constraints of logic or reason. I’m sure that certain men would get turned on by an erotic encounter punctuated with Priscila announcing “Every man for himself!” or “Colgate, for sparkling-white teeth!” or “I’m walking along the tropical path!” or, more germane to the matter at hand, “Make ready the steel and the steed!” Ladies and gentlemen, I stand accused: has the force of habit made me oblivious to the secret sexuality of a woman who was desired by the most sought-after bachelors of her time? So desired in fact that, in the end, they did not marry her, sensing, perhaps, an edge in Priscila that I, miserable me, have been too dim to perceive or have mercilessly wasted?

I study my wife, but I can’t put my finger on anything about her that would set her apart from the woman I’ve been married to for twenty-one years. Is it my fault? Could Priscila possess charms that I no longer appreciate, rendered senseless by force of habit? Do I need a new set of eyes — even eyes as myopic and unpleasant as Adam Góngora’s — to see the virtues of Priscila, which I no longer recognize but that others still do ?

Because of all this doubt, I am on the verge of making a desperate decision: to rediscover Priscila. Truth be told, I have discovered that I married her without love — allow me to confess to the simple scheme known around these parts as mining for gold —only so that I might have entrée into the world of high finance, as one only can if he’s born rich or is married to a rich woman and living in the bosom of her prominent family.

This is my verdict: guilty as charged. I declare myself, ab initio , a scoundrel, a social climber, a despicable gold-digging man. And in so confessing I feel cleansed , washed clean of any sin carried out for the sake of my ascent in society, because of the feeling that maybe, if I thoroughly examined my soul, I would find the truth there, another truth: yes, I fell in love with Priscila, not with her money; yes, I desired her, and I felt victorious over the suitors who, as rumor has it, didn’t want to marry her anyway.

Let’s see, who says so? What if Priscila had been seriously courted by the Maserati boys, and had chosen the most luxurious driver? What if our history was such that — instead of me being her better-than-nothing guy who came across (by chance, by fate, by pity) his better-than-nothing gal — I had conquered her, stolen her away from the generic Maserati bachelors, and she had chosen me over the millionaires besieging her?