Felipe Alfau - Chromos

The clothes took the fire easily and then it touched her. It spread suddenly alive, a sheet of blinding flame, too strong to be absorbed by the flue, jumping outside the fireplace. In one instant it ran along her legs, yet without seeming to eat at them, but glowing dazzlingly from her surface. It ran along her dust leading to the chair and then the old rug was also burning. He backed away, slapping the flames from his shoe and the cuff of his trousers. He saw her there all on fire and still whole, maddeningly incandescent in her final decisive triumph. What was she made of, God? What was she made of?

The fire on the rug was spreading to the furniture. He stood a moment petrified by a panic he had never known before and knew that he was doomed. A white, thick, asphyxiating smoke filled the room with her unearthly odor. The flames darted at him, reaching like possessive prolongations of her limbs, and he recoiled beaten and then ran. He ran wildly for his life, threw the door open, and as he scrambled down the stairs, he could hear the room behind roaring like a furnace.

He emerged in the street and gulped large mouthfuls of the cool night air, and as he ran he looked back and up and saw the flames leaping out of his windows, giving away his secret, proclaiming his loathsome crime, damning him and mixing in infernal chorus with the accursed instant response of fire engine sirens and angry red clouds that rose with unchecked fury to make the sky blush in untold shame.

He fled repeating obsessedly: “Is this the fire of my love?” And as he turned the corner, he saw the engine on its way, swallowing up his path, cutting off his escape, bearing down on him to exact retribution and extinguish the fire of his love.

I was brought back to the present surroundings by the roar of laughter which greeted the end of the limerick about the fellow called Dave.

Fulano had fallen forward on the table, his face hidden, his head resting on his arms, and his frame trembled ever so slightly.

“Too much to drink,” somebody said indifferently. “Should be the signal to break up the party.”

The last group was leaving. Garcia had just gone a short while ago with Cáceres for whom he had developed an admiration verging on superstition. Then followed La Niña de los Madroños and her mother with the Spanish importer who with the aid of some friends had carried his shawls and tapestries to his car parked down the street The last group contained La Colombina, Pinto, Lunarito and Bejarano and also some others who, probably because of the late hour and the alcoholic consumption, I cannot recall. As they paraded past Dr. de los Rios, Don Pedro, and the Señor Olózaga, I thought that the responsibility for the party had been tacitly bestowed upon them.

Of that last scene I can remember only two things clearly:

Lunarito was in front of Don Pedro. She took a red flower from her hair and threw it at him: “To one of the best and the most castizo.”

He caught it deftly: “Thank you, my child, and I will not forget today and your dancing. You know? The memory of some experiences, like this flower — as they say, it perfumes longer than it lasts.”

Others said good night and then La Colombina came forward. She stood very symmetrically erect, holding a white flower with both her hands as if it were a prayer book, or as if she were going to kiss it fervently, and she recited:

“Of all the men I knew who then left Spain, you and Dr. de los Rios are the only ones I remember — the Señor Olózaga, I only had the honor today. Over there, they thought you were mad and I am glad that this country has not returned your sanity. I should like to hear your band. They say it is the best.”

“I doubt you would like it — you know—” His hand moved with dismay. “But what can one do? Perhaps someday, again in Spain.” His usual laughter was missing. “That is what we always say: perhaps someday, and we know the day never comes. We leave in order to think of returning, in order to love more. It is a very old vice and that makes it a virtue, but let us dream, my dear.”

With a very neat curtsy, she offered him the white flower. He held it tightly together with the red one and bowed deeply.

After they left we stood about for a while aimlessly. The place denuded of decorations, under garish fluorescent lights and no more farolitos, looked dismal as any place looks after a big party. We decided to go.

“Coming along, Moor?”

“No, I think I’ll stay a while yet.” He was methodically taking empty bottles from the last table he had occupied by the patio, placing them on the floor, and then replacing them with full or partially full bottles he gathered from nearby tables. His face had the pallor induced by alcohol when it has reached the point of saturation. Then, heaving a deep sigh, he sat down heavily. The bottles were arranged before him like a fence. He poured wine into a glass and placed the two flowers in it.

“Now I am well barricaded for the rest of the night. Don’t worry, Chink, I will close the place when I go. I have keys.” He spoke tiredly: “You are the material owner, but I am the father, the spiritual owner of El Telescopio. I will take good care of my child.”

“Don’t you think you would sleep more comfortably on a bed? You have had enough it seems.”

“No. I want a bed for my soul and not my body, and this is it. One never has enough, life is short but no one knows what it’s all about— little time — the fourth perpendicular shortened by perspective of memory or vision. Who knows? The place is empty now but the recollections of the day still reverberate here and in our memories. We all pass, go home, sleep, but the scene remains here entangled in the corners. The great music of Cáceres echoes and he rises in our minds still omnipotent when all the rest has fallen, making us create recollections of things which perhaps never took place but might have been if life were as we want it, to build up a past that dissipates our feeling of futility. Even I don’t know what it’s all about and yet it all must be so simple — but I know that the scene still lives here and I want to move along with it into time.” His head fell forward and he regarded the two flowers in front of him: “Wine for the pretty Spanish flowers grown in another land.”

Then we went, but at the door, Dr. de los Rios turned impulsively and walked back to Don Pedro. He ran his hand through the brush of his hair, pushing back the head, and looked affectionately into the pale face, like one would do with a sullen, spoiled child who has done enough mischief for a day, but there was still that look of indomitable defiance in the Moor’s face, tempered with one of approval. His eyes swept slowly, appraisingly, up the figure of his friend and with quiet endorsing pride, as one delivering the final imprimatur: “You are very all right — one of the few real ones left — very good, very good.”

As Dr. de los Rios released him to join us, the head fell forward again and that is how we left him: still looking at the flowers.

Outside we stumbled on empty bottles. De los Rios and the Señor Olózaga consulted the time and proposed to go to Brooklyn Bridge to watch the sunrise. Not for me. I wanted to go home. They walked down the street. Someone had started a rubbish fire on a corner and I saw them outlined against the glow. Then I looked back at the café and saw for the first time its real name on the window glass, in chipped black and gold letters. It read: CAFÉ LA DEMOCRACIA.

I must have looked at it many times before but probably always from the inside, and seen that way it had never meant anything.

Then I started for the West Side through the empty streets, the music of Cáceres still assaulting my mind in waves of memory, in bright visions, making the mind a torch in the night I knew that all those who had lived there that day must feel as I did, because of our common bonds, that the thoughts that had been evoked, whether real or imagined, had proven authoritative, legitimate, and with the music still in my ears I began to understand Don Pedro and possibly my people and even other peoples, within myself.