Carlos Fuentes - The Death of Artemio Cruz

In the rear of the office, he saw under a greenish light those eyes that had been screwed into the depths of the cranium, those eyes of a tiger on the prowl, and he bowed and said: "I'm at your disposal, Mr. President…To serve you unconditionally, I assure you, Mr. President…"

I smell that old oil they use to muck up my eyes, my nose, my lips, my cold feet, my blue hands, my thighs, near my sex, and I ask them to open the window: I want to breathe. I push this hollow sound out through my nostrils and I let them do what they wish and I cross my arms over my stomach. The linen of the sheet, its coolness. That is something important. What do they know, Catalina, the priest, Teresa, Gerardo?

"Leave me alone…"

"What does the doctor know? I know him better. It's another trick."

"Don't say anything."

"Teresita, don't contradict your father…I mean, your mother…Don't you see that…"

"Ha. You're just as responsible as he is. You because you're weak and a coward, he because…because…"

"Enough, enough."

"Good afternoon."

"Come this way."

"Enough, for God's sake."

"Keep it up, keep it up."

What was he thinking about? What was he remembering?

"…like beggars, why does he make Gerardo work?"

What do they know, Catalina, the priest, Teresa, Gerardo? What will their grief, hysterics, or the expressions of sympathy that will appear in the papers matter? Who will have the honesty to say, as I say now, that my only love has been to possess things, their sensual property? That's what I love. The sheet I embrace. And all the rest, what is now passing before my eyes. A floor made of Italian marble, veined in green and black. The bottles that store up the summer of those places. Old pictures with chipped varnish: in a single blotch, they pick up sun- or candlelight and allow us to wander slowly through them with our eyes and our sense of touch as we sit on a white-leather sofa decorated with gold fillet, with a glass of cognac in one hand and a cigar in the other, wearing a light silk tuxedo, our patent-leather slippers resting on a thick, silent carpet made of merino wool. There a man can take possession of landscape and the faces of other men. There, or sitting on the terrace facing the Pacific, watching the sunset and reiterating with his senses, the most tense, yes, the most delightful, the ebb and flow, the friction of those silver waves on the moist sand. Land. Land that can translate itself into money. Square plots of land in the city on which the forest of construction timbers begins to rise. Green and yellow property in the country, always the best, near the reservoirs, passed over by the roar of the tractor. Vertical property of mountain mines, gray treasure boxes. Machines: that tasty smell of the rotary press as it vomits out its pages in an accelerated rhythm…

"Oh, Don Artemio, do you feel okay?"

"It's nothing, just the heat. This glare. What's going on, Mena? How about opening the windows?"

"Right away…"

Ah, the noises of the street. Suddenly. It's impossible to tell one from the other. Ah, the noises of the street.

"What can I do for you, Don Artemio?"

"Mena, you know how enthusiastically we defended President Batista, right down to the last moment. But now that he's no longer in power, it's not easy to do. It's even harder, in fact, to defend General Trujillo, even though he's still in power. You represented the two of them, so you'll understand…It's hard to make a case for them."

"Don't worry, Don Artemio, I'll see to arranging things. But with so many nuts around…And while we're at it, I've brought along a short article that explains the work of the Benefactor…Nothing more…"

"Good. leave it to me. Díaz, good thing you came in when you did. Print this on the editorial page with a phony signature…Mena, I'll be seeing you. Stay in touch…"

In touch. Touch. Stay in touch. In touch with my white lips, ooooh, a hand, give me a hand, oh, another pulse to revive mine, white lips…

"I blame you."

"Does that make you feel better? Good. We crossed the river on horseback. We went back to my part of the country. My country."

"…we'd like to know where…"

Finally, finally, they're giving me the pleasure of coming to me on their knees, physically, to ask me for it. The priest hinted at it. It must be that something is going to happen to me soon, for these two to have found their way to my bedside with that tiny tremor I can't help but notice. They're trying to guess what my joke will be, the final joke I've enjoyed so much by myself, the definitive humiliation whose ultimate consequences I won't be able to enjoy, but whose initial spasms delight me right here and now. This may be my last little flame of triumph…

"Where…" I murmur with so much sweetness, so much secrecy…"Where…Let me think…Teresa, I think I remember…Isn't there a mahogany box…where I store my cigars…? It has a false bottom…"

I don't have to finish. The two of them get up and run to the huge, horseshoe-shaped desk, where they think I sometimes pass away my insomnia-ridden nights reading: they wish it were so. The two women force open the drawers, they scatter papers, and finally find the ebony box. Ah, so it was there all along. There was another one there. Or someone took it. Their fingers must get the second clasp, hastily sliding it off. But there's nothing there. When was the last time I ate? I urinated a long time ago. But eating. I vomited. But eating.

"The Undersecretary is on the phone, Don Artemio."

They closed the curtains, didn't they? It's nighttime, isn't it? There are plants that need the moonlight to flower. They wait until nightfall. The convolvulus. At that shack there was a convolvulus, at the hut by the river. The flower opened in the afternoon, yes.

"Thank you, miss…Hello…Yes, this is Artemio Cruz. No, no, no, no, no, reconciliation is impossible. It's a clear-cut attempt to bring down the government. They've already managed to get the unions to abandon the official party en masse; if things go on like this, what will your power base be, Mr. Undersecretary?…Yes…It's the only way: declare the strike null and void, send in the troops, rough them up, and put the leaders in jail…Of course, things are that serious, sir…"

Mimosa, too. I remember that the mimosa has feelings; it can be sensitive and modest, chaste and palpitating, alive, the mimosa…

"…yes, of course…oh, and one thing more, just to put my cards on the table: if you people show weakness, my associates and I will take our capital out of Mexico. We need guarantees. Listen, what do you think will happen, for example, if in two weeks a hundred million dollars leaves the country?…What?…No, I do understand. Of course!…"

That's it. It's all over. Ah. That's all. Was that all? Who knows. I don't remember. I haven't listened to that tape in a long time. I've been masquerading for a long time, and in fact I'm thinking about things I'd like to eat, yes, it's more important to think about food because I haven't eaten for hours, and Padilla disconnects the recorder, and I've kept my eyes closed and don't know what they can be thinking or saying-Catalina, Teresa, Gerardo, the child, no, Gloria went out, she left with Padilla's son, they're kissing out in the hall, taking advantage of the fact that no one's there-because I keep my eyes closed and only think about pork chops, pork roast, barbecue, stuffed turkey, the soups I like so much, almost as much as I like desserts, oh yes, I always had a sweet tooth and in this country the desserts are delicious, candied almond and pineapple, coconut and curd, ah, custard too, cakes from Zamora, I think about those Zamora cakes, candied fruit, red snapper, bass, filet of sole, I think about oysters and crabs…

We crossed the river on horseback. And we reached the sandbar and the sea. In Veracruz.