Evelio Rosero - Feast of the Innocents

God.

He swore he would give his life just for one embrace and an exuberant caress from Primavera at that exact moment of desolation, or to at least get into bed with her and never mind that she would wake against her will and in a bad mood, he thought, he would have her there anyway, all of her, and when she turned over, exasperated, to sleep far away from him — her face towards the other side of the bed, her soul much further off — the light of the dawn would help him appraise at leisure the marvellous rear of the unapproachable Primavera, the rounded whiteness with pinkish sheen, and perhaps later on his medic’s hand — his medicinal hand, his hand well-versed in desperation — would caress her with that lightness of touch akin to fearfulness, persistent in the end, advancing from hair to hair towards Primavera’s most hidden ones, the doctor was just imagining this ritual of sleep-love when Primavera Pinzón woke up, unfortunately for them both, she opened her eyes and first of all saw the ghastly shadow, the shadow in flesh and blood of an ape in her room, both hairy arms raised over her, ready to go for her throat, Primavera screamed noiselessly, her hands shielded her face, she tried to get to her knees under the heavy bedspread but did not manage it, her legs were turned to butter, now she saw that the immense ape was grabbing its head, gripping it as though it were hurting him, Primavera’s eyes goggled, she could not believe it but had to, there was an ape in her bedroom, and in a whirl of panic she was able to remember that apes carried off native girls and took them to their dens in the trees and there they possessed them like female apes, surely this one would be no exception, he would carry her to the garden, take her up to the top of the cherry tree and once there — not only in front of her daughters, but the servants and a neighbour or two — convert her into a female ape crying out, but in terror or pleasure, she was able to wonder, regretting her very question; who knows whether he would take her from the front or behind, Primavera was able to wonder that too in her swoon, now still more horrified to see, incredulous, that the ape was taking off its head and out came the head of, who could it be, my God, my husband, she cried.

With the ape head in his hands the doctor only dared to smile at his wife’s astonished face as if expecting a kiss and begged “forgive me, I’m going to explain” when she interrupted him, stammering “God, but what a beast you are,” and now she could neither stammer nor breathe — out of fear or indignation, the doctor wondered — because Primavera’s mouth gaped open, searching for air, her chest was contracting inside, the vein in her neck was throbbing, her staring eyes finally closed and her head lolled to one side in defeat. Doctor Proceso hurled the ape head onto the pillow and stretched his arms towards his wife; he tried to take her pulse but the ape’s great mitts hindered him.

With considerable effort he took off the ape hands, threw them on the floor as if they were burning, pressed his fingers to his wife’s neck and gave a start; it was necessary to ask for help — he realized — fetch a heart doctor, and he ran from the bedroom as if he were escaping, hurled himself at the staircase and, between the second and first floors, while shouting “Primavera could die of shock” to himself, stopped in his tracks remembering that he was the doctor, so he headed once more for the bedroom to give Primavera mouth-to-mouth resuscitation: cruel sarcasm to kiss his wife in such a manner, he thought, an urgent and desperate kiss, it’s quite possible Primavera is already dead, to think we will have to hold the wake right on Innocents’ Day, and it was during this very brief trajectory, while he painfully ascended the stairs, that he convinced himself his wife would, in fact, die, it was true, Primavera Pinzón would vanish from the earth, innocent victim of a joke more innocent yet, and the news of his joke would not only fly around the city, but take hold of the entire country and maybe the world, it is not very often a man kills his wife with an ape costume the moment she wakes up.

And after that unlucky death, through which, of course, life’s cruelty, its fatality, its irony would be corroborated, a man wants to make his wife laugh and kills her, he would be “overwhelmed by grief” and attend the burial “dressed in black” although he should go dressed as an ape, he thought, suddenly considering, in the brief time spent going back up the stairs, the other possibility: that Primavera’s death would free him to marry another woman, lusty and warm, more willing than Primavera when it came to caressing, more lenient and generous than Primavera Pinzón — cold, bitter, perpetually unfaithful, and that was the hardest thing to bear, he thought, her ugliness is the terrifying type, the ugliness which hides behind beauty is much more shocking — he cried out imagining another woman in his bed, but it seemed unwise to desire another woman at this juncture, he told himself with remorse, and preferred to consider another possibility, imagining that after so much pain, in the middle of the funeral, right there in the cemetery, his two daughters and the other relatives would unexpectedly begin to laugh, pointing to him as the victim of his own invention; Primavera Pinzón’s death had been a joke on the back of his own unsuccessful prank; the coffin lid would open, Primavera would emerge with a sprightly leap attired as a bride — as she wished to be when she died — a balletic leap, looking tastier than ever — thought the doctor, who used to liken his wife’s beauty to the sampling of an exquisite dish — and meanwhile he, the victim, would be congratulated by the Bishop of Pasto, also an effective partaker in the joke, and his friends, the professor Arcaín Chivo and the mayor Matías Serrano, would greet him, and even the gravediggers and the rest of the mourners, half the city would surround him, because after all was said and done how magnificent that joke was, begun by him, cleverly carried on by his wife and then by the city, the joke would last a thousand years, he said to himself, and now he fervently wished his wife would live, that he would not find her lifeless — as he had left her.

He entered the room, fearful, swallowed up by anxiety — it was quite possible Primavera would be dead from an attack of indignation — he entered at a run, half dressed as an ape, and lurched to a standstill: there, sitting on the edge of the bed that Wednesday, December 28, 1966, Innocents’ Day, happy prelude to the Black and White Carnival, Primavera Pinzón, her mouth open, the tip of her tongue passing over her lips, was contemplating with enormous curiosity the black ape head resting on her knees, she turned it round and round, discovering the seams, tracing the red film over the eyes with trembling fingertips, testing the consistency of the fangs, stroking the wiry fur and then, expressionless, getting to her feet, depositing the hairy head extraordinarily carefully on the bed, in the very place where the doctor used to sleep, his place , and pointing to the great ape head as she breezed past, she said:

“I prefer him.”

He woke alone, what time did he succumb to sleep? He did not hear his younger daughter’s shrieking, as was the norm, a delight of childish pandemonium all over the place, but he remembered as if in a fog that Floridita and Luz de Luna, along with their mother, were travelling that morning to the finca to finalize details for the birthday party, what time would they celebrate it? He had forgotten, hordes of children would turn up, the clown company, the puppets, the trio of musicians. He had bought Floridita a Shetland pony as a present, which was being kept hidden in the stables, with a great yellow bow around its neck.