Rodrigo Rey Rosa - Severina

She didn’t react. All she said was: “He’s not so keen on it, though. It’s too fashionable; that’s what he says anyway. Do you have something by. . Chesterton?”

I let out a hollow laugh. “OK, that sort of guy. We must have something. It’ll be over there,” I pointed to the opposite side of the store, “on the top shelf. Yeah, with the Cs.”

I went back to the cash register and started flipping through catalogs, to put her at ease. She wandered back and forth between the shelves. I thought I heard her slipping a book into her bag (a volume of Galland’s translation of The Thousand and One Nights, as I was to discover).

A few minutes later she came to the register and said: “No luck. I’ll get him some after-shave.”

“Come back whenever you like.” I stood there watching her. She walked out through the security gate, and once again the alarm remained mute.

I went to the plundered shelf. In the ledger I noted: The Thousand and One Nights, volumes 1, 2, and 3, then added the time and the date. I decided that one day I’d follow her when she left.

A few days later we received a batch of books that included a collection of translations from Russian. They were small, sextodecimo-format volumes with engravings and gilded initials: beautifully crafted, a pleasure to read, perfect as jewels. I put them on a shelf quite close to the cash register, but made sure that some couldn’t be seen by the person who was serving. Those volumes were for her.

It was on a Thursday, almost a month later, that I decided to act. We were alone in the store, just the two of us, and she was browsing under my discreet surveillance. I didn’t mention the new Russian collection; I had greeted her vaguely when she came in, pretending to be absorbed in some financial documents.

She didn’t hear me. I came up behind her so close I could smell the scent of her hair.

“Where have you hidden them this time?” I asked. She started, spun around, and bumped into me.

“What!” she cried. “You frightened me! What do you want? Are you crazy?” When she saw that I was smiling, she laughed.

“Sorry.”

She put her hand on her chest, covering her neckline. “You really scared me.”

“I really want to know where you’ve hidden them.”

Now she was cross; a fine line appeared between her thick, dark, shapely eyebrows. She pushed me aside and started walking hurriedly toward the door. I reached out, pressed a button, and although she ran the last few steps the security grille came down just in time to block her exit. She stopped and shoved at it.

“This is outrageous,” she said and turned to look at me. She took a cell phone from the pocket of her trousers and dialed a number. “Either you let me out or I’m calling for help.”

“Calm down.” A spotlight was shining in her eyes; without turning away, I reached out and switched it off. She was very beautiful. Cornered like that, I found her irresistible. I smiled.

“Easy now, easy.”

“You’re sick!” she shouted at me. She looked at her cell phone. “I’m calling right away if you don’t let me out.”

I let my gaze linger on her breasts, her hips; this time she didn’t have a bag. She finished dialing and turned her back on me. It was perfect.

“Hello! I need help!” she said to the device.

“This is a basement, señorita. There’s no signal. But you’re safe with me. Give me back the books and you can go. I’ve got a list here of all the others you’ve stolen, all the books I let you steal, I don’t know why.”

“Yeah? Why did you? Let me out!” she shouted, but not all that loudly.

“You may not believe this, but there are video cameras here and here and over there,” I said, indicating arbitrary points on the ceiling. “I have proof.”

“Are you serious?” Now I could discern a slight Argentine or Uruguayan accent, which she had been effectively disguising up till then. “I couldn’t see them.” She smiled. “I’m sorry. Will you forgive me?”

“Forgive you? Come on! You can start by giving me back the books.”

She drew one of the little Russian volumes from each of her armpits and another from her trousers. With a slight but jaunty swing to her hips, she walked confidently across to the shelf from which she had taken the books and put them back.

“There,” she said brazenly.

“And the others?”

“Shall we forget them?” she hazarded.

“No, let’s think of it as an outstanding debt, a personal loan from me to you. I have partners in this business, you know.” I pressed the button to raise the grille and let her out.

She almost ran. I just had time to ask her name before she disappeared up the stairs.

“Call me Ana!” she cried.

I told myself that she’d be back. Suddenly I felt very alone among all those books. I wished the cameras had been real.

Bookshops are infested with ideas. Books are quivering, murmuring creatures. That’s what one of my business partners used to say. He was a poet, quite a clever guy (though not as clever as he thought), and likable enough. There’s something to it: the three little Russian books stood there on the shelf next to the cash register for several days, murmuring, quivering, preserving her memory, but she didn’t return. Those were eventful days, or rather I heard that they’d been eventful (there was a rash of lynchings in the inland villages and a coup in a neighboring country, cocaine became the world’s number one illicit substance, stagnant water was discovered on Mars, and Pluto definitively lost its status as a planet), my life having shrunk once more to the ambit of books; I had become another specimen of that sad type, the bookseller with literary aspirations.

All sorts of people came to visit us every day. Poets, students, lawyers, ladies with or without bodyguards, successful people (economically speaking) and failures (of all kinds). We served them calmly and politely. Sometimes they bought a book or two. Thanks to the new security systems, very few people make a habit of stealing books these days. More than half of them, in my experience, are women or literary types with backpacks or satchels.

I worked at the bookstore on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays; the rest of the week I spent writing (or fantasizing about it) and reading.

The next time I saw her, it was in the street. She was wearing jeans, a short embroidered blouse, white sneakers, and sunglasses. Her hair was tied in a ponytail. My heart began to thump, and I felt a fluttering in my stomach, as you do when you unexpectedly see someone you are strongly attracted to. I started walking quickly to catch up, and when she stopped to wait for the light on the corner of Trece and Reforma, I went and stood beside her.

“Hi. Found you at last.”

She looked at me, smiling.

“Ah, it’s you.”

“Taking a walk?”

“Uh-huh.”

The lights changed. We crossed the street.

“Can I come along for a bit?”

“If you like.”

We walked for a while in silence. She set a quick pace.

“Can I ask you something?”

She threw me a wary sidelong glance. “You can ask.”

“What do you do with the books?”

“Look,” she said, “I’m grateful to you for not getting me into trouble the other day, but that’s a question I’d rather not answer. It’s personal, OK?”

We walked on in silence.

“OK. But now I’m more curious than ever.”