James Cain - Serenade

I played an introduction, and started to sing. It was Eri Tu , from Ballo in Maschera. But I couldn’t be bothered with pedaling that old wreck. I walked out in the aisle, and walked around with it, singing without accompaniment. I finished it, sang it again, and checked pitch. It had pulled a little sharp. That was right, after that long lay-off, it ought to do that. I played a chord for pitch, and started another. I sang for an hour, and hated to quit, but at that high pitch an hour was the limit.

She sat in a pew, staring at me as I walked around. The sacrilegio didn’t seem to bother her much any more. When I stopped, she came in the vestry room with me, and we dropped off what we had on, and lay down. There were six or seven cigarettes left. I kept smoking them. She lay beside me, up on one elbow, still staring at me. When the cigarettes were gone I closed my eyes and tried to go to sleep. She opened one eye, with her finger, and then the other eye. “That was very beautiful, gracias.”

“I used to be a singer.”

“Yes. Maybe I made a mistake.”

“I think you did.”

“... Maybe not.”

She kissed me then, and went to sleep. But the fire was dead, the moon had gone down, and the window was gray before I went to sleep.

We pulled into Acapulco the next afternoon around five thirty. We couldn’t start before four, on account of that busted top, that I had to stow away in the boot. I didn’t mean to get sunstroke, so I let her sleep and tried to clean up a little, so I would leave the church about the way I found it, except for a few busted locks and this and that. Getting the car out was a little harder than getting it in. I had to make little dirt run-ways up the steps, soak them with water, and let them bake in the sun, so I could get a little traction for the wheels in reverse. Then I had to tote all the stuff out and load it again, but I had more time, and made a better job of it. When she came out of her siesta, we started off. The arroyo was still a stream, but it was clear water now, and not running deep, so we got across all right.

When we got to Acapulco she steered me around to the hotel where we were going to stop. I don’t know if you ever saw a hotel for Mexicans. It was a honey. It was just off the road that skirts the harbor, on the edge of the town, and it was just an adobe barracks, one story high, built around a dirt patio, or court, or whatever you’d call it, and that was all. In each room was a square oil can, what they use to carry water in all over Mexico, and that was the furnishings. You used that to carry your water in, from the well outside, and there wasn’t anything else in there at all. Your mat, that you slept on, you were supposed to have with you, and unroll it on the dirt floor yourself. That was why she had been packing all those mats around. Your bedclothes you were supposed to have with you too, except that a Mexican doesn’t need bedclothes. He flops as is. The plumbing was al fresco exterior, just over from the well. In the patio was a flock of burros, tied, that the guests had come on, and we parked our car there, and she took her hatbox, the cape, the espada , and the ear, and the hostelero showed us our room. It was No. 16, and had a fine view of a Mexican with his pants down, relieving his bowels.

“Well, how do you feel?”

“Very nice, gracias.”

“The heat hasn’t got you?”

“No, no. Nicer than Mexico.”

“Well, I tell you what. It’s too early to eat yet. I think I’ll have my suit pressed, then take a walk around and kind of get the lay of the land. Then after sundown, when it’s cooler, we’ll find a nice place and eat. Yes?”

“Very nice. I look at house.”

“All right, but I got ideas on the location.”

“Oh, the politico already have house.”

“I see. I didn’t know that. All right, then, you see the politico , have a look at the house, and then we’ll eat.”

“Yes.”

I found a sastrería , and sat there while they pressed my suit, but I didn’t waste any time on the lay of the land after that. You think I was going to bookkeep for a whorehouse now? A fat chance. Those high notes down the arroyo made everything different. There was a freighter laying out there in the harbor, and I meant to dig out of there, if there was any way in God’s world I could promote passage on her.

It was nearly dark before I found the captain. He was having dinner at the Hotel de Mexico, out under the canopy. He was a black Irishman, named Conners, about fifty, with brows that met over his nose, a face the color of a meerschaum pipe, and blistered sunburned hands that were thin and long like a blackjack dealer’s. He gave me a fine welcome when I sat down at his table. “My friend, I don’t know your uncle in New York, your brother in Sydney, or your sister-in-law back in Dublin, God bless her, nevertheless. I’m not a member of the Ancient, Free, and Accepted Order of Masons, and I don’t care if you ever get the twenty pesos to take you to Mexico City. I’ll not buy you a drink. Here’s a peso to be off, and if you don’t mind I’ll be having my dinner.”

I let the peso lay and didn’t move. When he had to look at me again I recited it back to him just like he had handed it to me. “I have no uncle in New York, no brother in Sydney, no sister-in-law in Dublin, thanks for the benediction, nevertheless. I’m not a member of the Ancient, Free, and Accepted Order of Masons, and I’m not on my way to Mexico City. I don’t want your drink, and I don’t want your peso.”

“By your looks, you want something. What is it?”

“I want passage north, if that’s where you’re headed.”

“I’m headed for San Pedro, and the passage will be two hundred and fifteen pesos, cash of the Republic, payable in advance, and entitling you to a fine deck stateroom, three meals a day, and the courtesies of the ship.”

“I offer five.”

“Declined.”

I picked up his peso. “Six.”

“Declined.”

“I offer sweat. I’ll do any reasonable thing to work this passage out, from swabbing decks to cleaning brass. I’m a pretty fair cook.”

“Declined.”

“I offer a recipe for Iguana John Howard Sharp that I have just perfected, a dish that would be an experience for you, and probably improve your disposition.”

“ ’Tis the first sensible thing you have said, but there would be a difficulty getting the iguana. At this season they move up to the hills. Declined.”

“I offer six pesos and a promissory note for two hundred and nine. The note I guarantee to redeem.”

“Declined.”

I watched him eating his fish, and by that time I was beginning to be annoyed. “Listen, maybe you don’t get this straight. I intend to haul out of here, and I intend to haul out on your boat. Write up your contracts any way you want. The thing to get through your head is: I’m going.”

“You’re not. You’ve taken my peso, so be off.”

I lit a cigarette and still sat there. “All right, I’ll level it out, and quit the feinting and jabbing. I was a singer, and my voice cracked up. Now it’s coming back, see? That means if I ever get out of this hellhole of a country, and get back where the money is, I can cash in. I’m all right. I’m as good as I ever was, maybe better. To hell with the promissory note. I guess that was a little tiresome. I ask you as a favor to haul me up to San Pedro, so I can get on my feet again.”

When he looked up, his eyes were smoky with hate. “So you’re a singer, then. An American singer. My answer is: It wouldn’t be safe for me to take you aboard. Before I was out of the harbor with you I’d drop you into the water to rid the world of you. No! And don’t take up any more of my time with it.”