Cesar Aira - Shantytown

But it was like the Nazca lines: the inspector had been able to discover the pattern only by seeing the whole thing from the air, as no one had ever seen it before. Most of the dealers in the shantytown were from Peru or Bolivia, and they may have drawn inspiration from that Pre-Colombian land art, adding electricity to bring it up to date, or maybe they were using an ancestral communication technique whose secrets had been handed down from generation to generation.

Not only was the system as a whole revealed to him in its abstract form; thanks to the Pastor’s fatal mistake, Cabezas also knew where the proxidine had been stashed that night. “Seventeen duckling”. . the “duckling” was obviously a configuration of lights at the entrance to a street, and “seventeen” referred to a particular shack. He had seen the roughly painted numbers and he even thought he remembered, somewhere on the perimeter, a string of lights that looked like a duck in profile. It wouldn’t be hard to find, anyhow. And the Pastor had died before he could tell anyone that Cabezas knew the address. So the proxidine would still be there. .

By association, this insight led to memories of the magical drug whose benefits he had so liberally enjoyed. And that was when the last pieces of the puzzle fell into place. As well as kicking himself about the street signs — “Why didn’t I see it before?” — now he was thinking, “How could I have forgotten the proxidine!” This was yet another confirmation of the method on which he had based his police career, which consisted of keeping all the relevant data in play at once. It was the only way to solve a case, and if on this occasion he had abandoned it momentarily, and as a consequence lost heart, he did at least have an excuse: the situation was truly exceptional; he was staking his fate on a single card. In fact, he hadn’t altogether forgotten about the proxidine but he had only been considering its exchange value. Now, remembering its intrinsic value, he realized, finally, that it held the key. Because the drug’s much-touted effect, which was to increase the proximity of things, applied above all to the elements of a problem: by bringing them into sudden contiguity, it brought them closer to the solution.

Of course! The proxidine! What was he thinking? And suddenly it was there, within reach. . Although it wouldn’t be quite that easy. He still had to go and get it. He had a vague hunch that it wasn’t just the regular stash they needed for a night of dealing. There was a reason why they had all decided to launch a final offensive, in spite of the rain: himself, the judge, those two brats, and the Pastor. . True, some were following others (he had followed the girls, for example), but it wasn’t a vicious circle. The Pastor wouldn’t have been standing there on the esplanade in the rain unless something special was happening. And to have reached the scene of the crime two minutes after her son’s death, the judge must have set out well in advance, with all her men, too, armed for battle. The Pastor must have been waiting to tell her about the location of the shipment — and instead he had told Cabezas. Even the television crews must have been tipped off. . They had their own contacts, as well as being big consumers (a while back one of the networks had been accused of running a subliminal ad campaign for proxidine because of its slogan: “the news up close”).

A big shipment. . or something better: the mother of all drugs. Cabezas had heard of “super-pure proxidine”; people were always talking about it, but he’d never really stopped to think about what it might mean. Perhaps it was unthinkable. The expression itself was hyper-redundant. But the thing to which those senseless words referred was his talisman, the only thing left that could free him from the judge’s fatal embrace.

By going back to the shantytown, he would, of course, be putting his head in the lion’s mouth. He did, however, have the advantage of knowing exactly where to go, and with the confusion produced by the manhunt as well as the rain, his chances of slipping in under the radar were, paradoxically, better than ever.

He had made up his mind. He got to his feet, then noticed the two girls sitting at the table. That pair of airheads still hadn’t run away! Just as well: he could use them to create a diversion. He took his cell phone out of his pocket and put it on the table:

“Listen carefully. When the rain stops, go home. But first, right now, or as soon as I’m gone, call the judge and tell her that I’m not holding you hostage, you’re free, and I’ve gone to Paraguay; tell her to catch me if she can.” He paused for a moment, then added: “All you have to do to call the judge’s secret number is hit zero.”

He splashed out the door. The current outside was so strong it almost toppled him. But he reached his car, got in, started it, and drove away gunning the engine and parting the waters, like a new Moses.

As soon as the killer policeman was gone, Vanessa astonished her friend, who had already opened her mouth and was about to launch into a commentary on what had just happened, by demanding silence with a peremptory gesture and turning toward the table where the pair of sweethearts were sitting, still holding hands, as silent as two objects.

“Heddo,” she said, and tried again, grimacing, but without any more success, on the contrary: “Geddgo. . leglo. .” Then, finally, she got it right: “Hello!” She apologized with a smile: the nervous tension had made her tongue go numb. “I didn’t say hello before because I didn’t want that madman to notice you. Do you know who it was? Did you hear him?”

“Ma’am, yes,” said Adelita — it was her.

Jessica turned her head with a look of shock and horror, as if to say: “This is too much! If there’s one more twist in the plot. .” And perhaps her dismay was justifiable. As a beekeeper may be killed by just one more sting because of all the toxins that have accumulated in his system, although a bee sting in itself is almost harmless, there may be a limit to the quandaries that a mind can accommodate. Vanessa, who was more than willing to explain now that she had recovered the ability to speak, enlightened her friend immediately:

“She works on the third floor in your building. She was the first person I turned to when this all started, don’t you remember? I told you! The Pastor’s friend. . which reminds me,” she added, spinning around to face Adelita: “You know he’s dead? He was killed by that guy who was here with us. We were witnesses.”

“Ma’am, yes. I saw it on television,” Adelita said, pointing at the screen. “But he wasn’t my friend. You saw me walking with him, but that was the only time we ever spoke.”

“And what did he say to you?”

“Ma’am, he told me to believe in Jesus and things like that. But I didn’t listen.”

“Good for you. It was all a front. Luckily the truth always comes out in the end.”

Talking had restored Vanessa’s confidence, and she wanted to regain control, to wrest the initiative away from the television. She went and sat down at the couple’s table; Jessica followed. Perfunctory introductions were made:

“This is Jessica, my best friend. It was pure chance that we got dragged into this business.”

“Hi.”

“Hi,” said Jessica.

“Hi,” both girls said to the boy, who was fugly and insignificant and hadn’t opened his mouth.

“This is Alfredo, my fiancé.”

“Uhuh? You’re engaged?” asked Vanessa in a slightly supercilious tone, thinking, “Birds of a feather.”

“Ma’am, we were separated for a while but we got back together again tonight, thanks to your brother.”

“Maxi!? You know him?”