Antonio Molina - In the Night of Time

“I’ll be back Thursday night, Friday morning at the latest,” he said to Adela, who hadn’t looked him in the eye or registered his presence since she came home from the hospital, and when she did talk to him, it was in a neutral, unemotional tone. Only he was aware, and perhaps his sensitive son too, of that indifference, that subtle retaliation, a wound inflicted with a blade that left no trace, discrediting anything he might do or say, the adulterous husband whose betrayal only she knew of, the man overwhelmed by a guilt she alone administered, for it wasn’t dispensed in public or through familial vilification. Adela, contrary to what Ignacio Abel in his cowardice expected, said nothing to anyone, sought no refuge in her parents or her brother, who questioned her solicitously, certain that the reason she’d attempted to take her own life was the infidelity of her husband, whom he’d never trusted. Not even to Víctor did she acknowledge that this had been her intention. She regained consciousness in the hospital bed and at first didn’t remember anything or know where she was. As she gradually recalled in disconnected flashes the letters and photographs, the key in the drawer lock, walking in high heels on the path soft with pine needles, the water entering her nose, she decided she would explain nothing, at first because of fatigue and then so as not to allow anyone to join in a resentment she preferred to discharge whole on the person who had humiliated her; it would belong to her marital intimacy as much as her love of earlier times. She wouldn’t raise her voice. She wouldn’t make any accusation or cause a scene. She wouldn’t lower herself to that level, despite the injury that the man she’d trusted for sixteen years had inflicted on her. She wouldn’t give anyone, least of all him, the opportunity to feel sorry for her, and she wouldn’t offer him the spectacle of a hysteria that would allow him to feel justified in his impulse to run away from a suffocating situation. She wouldn’t grant him the benefit of rejecting and then gradually accepting the false explanations, the promises to change inspired only by male cowardice and a transitory remorse. All she did was agree distractedly if he spoke to her, or look away, or imply with a subtle gesture she no longer believed anything that came out of his mouth, reducing his status from an adulterous husband to a mediocre impostor, a contemptible hypocrite. On Sunday morning, when the table was already set and lunch delayed because she and her parents still hoped Víctor would come from Madrid, she saw Ignacio Abel approach her and the children and understood he was going to tell them he’d go back to Madrid after lunch and not that night, or the next morning, as he had assured them on Saturday morning when he arrived. (The car was in the shop for repairs; the mechanic told him he could pick it up on Monday or Tuesday; one constantly makes plans in life, taking the immediate future for granted.) She saw that he was approaching but didn’t have the courage. Almost with pity (he was so impaired, so anxious in recent days), Adela noted his nervousness, she knew him so well, better than anyone, the way his gestures betrayed him, too awkward to lie, too lacking in courage to know what he wanted. She acted as if she were devoting all her attention to how the always negligent maids had arranged the silverware and napkins on the table under the trellis, on the north side of the garden, where it wasn’t so hot, where a stream that flowed over mossy rocks highlighted the sensation of coolness. When they were alone the fiction they usually performed in front of others was more uncomfortable. Without witnesses, they didn’t know how to speak. He delayed the moment of saying he’d leave after lunch; Adela guessed how disconcerting the continuing postponement of lunch was for him; time stood still and at the same time it was fleeing; the train’s departure was approaching without the meal arriving, without his saying anything. It was a relief for Ignacio Abel when Don Francisco de Asís came out to the garden holding his pocket watch. He too was waiting, wondering why his reckless fool of a son was so late in coming from Madrid. “And he knows how his mother worries,” said Don Francisco de Asís, with no theatrics now, looking older, his shirt without a collar, his suspenders hanging beside his trousers. “It’s nothing. He’s always late. We shouldn’t make others wait. Let’s eat.” Adela spoke to her father, but Ignacio Abel knew it was him she was addressing, letting him know she was aware of his impatience and couldn’t care less whether he went back to Madrid that afternoon.

“How annoying. And to think how much he likes my rice and chicken. Something must have happened to him.”

“I demanded his word of honor as my son and a gentleman that he wouldn’t attend Calvo Sotelo’s funeral.”

“God rest his soul.”

“And the poor Assault Guard lieutenant too.”

“I feel sorry for his widow, so young, she wasn’t to blame for anything.”

“They say she was pregnant.”

“What a feat for whoever committed the crime, making an orphan of a baby who hasn’t been born yet.”

“He promised me he’d come today. Something’s happened to the boy.”

“What happened to him is what happens every Sunday, Mamá. He gets distracted in Madrid and always arrives late.”

“Or with all this upset the trains aren’t running.”

“Of course they’re running. I’ve heard them go by on time all morning.”

“A sign that nothing serious has happened and you don’t have to worry.”

“We should have waited a little longer to put in the rice. There was no hurry.”

“But Mamá, we’re all famished.”

“That boy doesn’t eat right when he’s alone in Madrid. At least if I see him eating well on Sunday, I rest a little easier.”

“Keep a plate covered for him, and when he comes you’ll see how hungry he is when he eats.”

“But Adela, you know that if the rice sits too long it’s no good and the taste is ruined.”

“Your chicken and rice is a classic, Mamá. It gets better with time.”

“What ideas you have, Papá.”

Don Francisco de Asís and Doña Cecilia called each other Papá and Mamá. Ignacio Abel listened to the conversation and could predict the exchange almost word for word, just as he predicted the saffron-heavy taste of Doña Cecilia’s rice casserole and the sucking sounds of the diners, including the paterfamilias, as Don Francisco de Asís called himself. So many Sundays, one after the other, exactly the same, so many summers around this same table, the present identical to the past and undoubtedly to the future. Víctor would arrive at the last moment and Doña Cecilia would urge the maid to serve him his plate of rice, lamenting that its time was past, it’s a shame but rice can’t wait. Víctor would devour it, denying with a full mouth his mother’s protestations because the rice was delicious, he liked it better this way. But this Sunday lunch ended and Víctor hadn’t arrived, and Doña Cecilia, as she had so often, ordered the maid to keep the señorito’s plate of rice covered in the pantry, listening for a car coming down the road or a whistle announcing the arrival of a train.

He remembers the torpor into which the heat of a July afternoon and Doña Cecilia’s rice-and-chicken casserole immersed the people in the house after Sunday dinners. “If it’s so hot here,” someone would say, about to succumb to sleep, “I don’t want to think what they’re suffering in Madrid.” “There’s a difference of only three degrees centigrade.” The day before, on Saturday, he’d bought the paper before boarding the train, and a report on the Council of Ministers said nothing about the rumors of a military coup. “Everybody envies the noble Spanish institution of the siesta.” “I can’t get over how upset I am about that boy not tasting the rice today.” He couldn’t imagine that in a few hours he’d be with Judith, hearing her voice. “He still might come and have it for tea.” Impatient, he’d ring the bell at Madame Mathilde’s, which would emit a sound of chimes. “It’s not good anymore.” He’d cross the hot, dark house smelling of perfume and disinfectant, push the door open. “Your rice is incomparable, Mamá.” The sound of their voices was as lethargic as the cicadas at that hour of high heat. Ignacio Abel went into the cool, shadowy bedroom, put on a clean shirt and tie, and washed his hands with lavender soap. He looked at his watch over and over again with a reflexive gesture. Through the open window came the sound of the rusted swing his children were sitting on. Had he heard the train whistle? Impossible — it wasn’t due for another half hour. He’d have time to wait, alone, on a bench on the platform. Nothing mattered to him now. Only the expectation of his encounter with Judith, more and more real as the minutes brought it closer. He’d arrive in Madrid and the suffocating tension of Friday night would have dissipated, erased by the heat and the invincible normality. He’d take a taxi and ride through the empty city on a summer Sunday to the chalet of Madame Mathilde. Someone entered the bedroom and he turned, thinking he’d see Adela’s face. But it was Don Francisco de Asís in his collarless shirt and house slippers, his face that of a helpless old man.