B004QGYWDA EBOK (7 page)

That same afternoon, as they left the mess hall under the languid gaze of the vicuña, the first fight in the section broke out. I wouldn’t have let him pick on me, neither would Cava or Arróspide, who would? Nobody, just him, because the Jaguar isn’t God and everything would’ve been different if he’d talked back, or if he’d made a joke of it, or if he’d grabbed a rock or a stick, or even if he’d run away, but to start trembling, man, anything but that. They were still crowding down the stairs, and suddenly there was complete confusion and then two of them stumbled and fell down on the grass. As they sat up, thirty pairs of eyes watched them from the stairs as if from a grandstand. No one had a chance to break it up, or even to understand at first what had happened, because the Jaguar turned like a cornered cat and hit the other one square in the face without any warning and then jumped on top of him and hit him again and again on the head, in the face, on the shoulders. The cadets stared at those two unrelenting fists without even hearing how the other one said, “Excuse me, Jaguar, I didn’t mean to push you, it was just an accident, honest it was.” What he shouldn’t have done was get onto his knees, he shouldn’t have done that. And besides, when he put his palms together he looked like my mother during the novenas, or like a little kid getting first communion, you’d’ve thought the Jaguar was the Archbishop and the other one was confessing, I remember all about it, Rospigliosi said, and it made my stomach turn over, man. The Jaguar was on his feet, looking down contemptuously at the kneeling cadet, his fist still raised as if he were going to hit that livid face again. The rest of them were silent. “You make me sick,” the Jaguar said. “You haven’t got any guts or anything else. You’re just a slave.”

“Eight-thirty,” Gamboa said. “Ten more minutes.”

The whole class groaned and shifted in their seats. I’m going to smoke a cigarette in the latrine, Alberto thought as he signed his exam. At that same moment a little ball of paper hit his desk, rolled a few inches and came to a stop against his arm. He glanced all around before picking it up. When he raised his eyes again, Lt. Gamboa was smiling at him. I wonder if he noticed, Alberto thought. Just as he lowered his eyes the lieutenant said, “Cadet, would you like to give me that thing that just landed on your desk. The rest of you keep your mouths shut!”

Alberto stood up. Gamboa took the ball of paper without looking at it. He uncrumpled it and held it up to the light. As he read it, his eyes were like two grasshoppers, jumping back and forth between the paper and the desks.

“Do you know what this is, Cadet?” Gamboa asked.

“No, Sir.”

“The answers to the exam, that’s all. What about that? Do you know who sent you this present?”

“No, Sir.”

“Your guardian angel,” Gamboa said. “Do you know who he is?”

“No, Sir.”

“Give me your exam and sit down.” Gamboa tore it to shreds and put it on the desk. “Your guardian angel,” he said, “has got exactly thirty seconds to stand up.”

The cadets looked at each other.

“Fifteen seconds,” Gamboa said. “I told you thirty.”

“I did it, Sir,” a weak voice told him.

Alberto turned to look: the Slave was on his feet, white in the face, deaf to the laughter of the others.

“Your name,” Gamboa said.

“Ricardo Arana.”

“You understand that each cadet has to answer the questions by himself?”

“Yes, Lieutenant.”

“Very well,” Gamboa said. “Then you also understand that I’ll have to confine you to the grounds on Saturday and Sunday. That’s how the army has to be. No favors to anybody, not even to the angels.” He looked at his watch and added, “Time’s up. Hand in your exams.”

I was in Sáenz Peña and when I left I was going back to Bellavista on foot. Sometimes I ran into Skinny Higueras, who was one of my brother’s friends before Perico was drafted by the army. He always asked me, “What do you hear from him?” “Nothing. He hasn’t written since they sent him into the jungle.” “Where are you going in such a hurry? Come on and talk for a while.” I wanted to get back to Bellavista as soon as I could, but Higueras was older than I was and he always did me the favor of treating me like someone his own age. He took me into a bar and asked me, “What’ll you have?” “I don’t know, it doesn’t matter, whatever you have.” “Okay,” Skinny said. “Waiter, two shots!” And then he slapped me on the back: “Watch out you don’t get drunk.” The pisco burned my throat and made my eyes water. “Suck a piece of lime,” he said, “it’s smoother that way. And smoke a cigarette.” We talked about soccer, about my brother, about my school. He told me a lot of things about Perico I didn’t know. I always thought he was easygoing but it turned out he liked to fight, one night he even got into a knife fight over a woman. And you’d never have guessed it but he was a ladies’ man. When Higueras told me how he’d knocked up one of his girl friends and they almost made him marry her, I couldn’t say a word. “Yes,” he said, “you’ve got a nephew who must be about four years old by now. Doesn’t that make you feel old?” But I was only delayed for a short time, because I made up an excuse to leave him. When I got home I felt very nervous and I was afraid my mother would get suspicious. I took out my books and said, “I’m going to study next door,” and she didn’t say anything. She barely moved her head. Sometimes she didn’t even do that. The house next door was larger than ours, but it was also very old. Before I rang the bell I rubbed my hands together till they were red, but even so they were still sweaty. Sometimes Tere came to the door. I always felt wonderful when I saw her. But usually her aunt let me in. She was one of my mother’s friends. She didn’t like me, they say that when I was a kid I pestered her all the time. “Go study in the kitchen,” she growled, “the light’s better there.” We studied together while her aunt cooked their dinner, and the room was full of the smell of garlic and onions. Tere was always very neat, it was wonderful to see the neat covers on her books and notebooks and her small, even handwriting. There were never any blots, and she underlined all the headings in two colors. I told her, “You’re going to be a painter,” to make her laugh. Because she laughed every time I opened my mouth, in a way you couldn’t forget. It was a real honest laugh, a good loud one, and she also clapped her hands. Sometimes I’d meet her coming back from school and anybody could tell she was different from the rest of the girls, her hair was never mussed up and she never had ink spots on her fingers. What I liked best about her was her face. Her legs were too thin and you still couldn’t see her breasts, or maybe you could, but I don’t believe I ever thought about her legs or even her breasts, only about her face. If I was playing with myself at night in bed and I suddenly thought about her, I felt ashamed of myself and went to the toilet to piss. But I thought all the time about kissing her. When I closed my eyes and pictured her, I could see both of us already grown up and married. We used to study together every afternoon for at least two hours, sometimes longer, and I always lied, I said, “I’ve still got lots to do,” so we could stay in the kitchen a little longer. I’d tell her, “Look, if you’re getting tired I’ll go home,” but she never got tired. That year they gave me very high grades and all the teachers were good to me, they held me up as an example, they asked me to go to the blackboard and sometimes they made me a monitor, and the guys from Sáenz Peña called me teacher’s pet. I didn’t get along with my classmates, I’d talk with them during school but I’d leave them as soon as we got out. I only spent time with Higueras. I’d see him on a corner of the plaza in Bellavista and the minute he spotted me he’d come over. During all that time the only thing I thought about was getting back by five o’clock and the only thing I hated was Sunday. We studied together through Saturday, but on Sunday Tere and her aunt went into Lima to visit relatives, and I’d spend the whole day in the house or I’d go to Potao to watch a soccer game. My mother never gave me any money and she was always complaining about what a small pension my father left her when he died. “And think of it,” she’d say, “he served the government for thirty years.” The money was just barely enough to pay the rent and the food bills. Before I began studying with Tere I used to go to the movies sometimes with a few of the guys from school, but I think that during that whole year I never went anywhere, not even to a soccer game or anything. The year after that I had some money, but I always felt bitter when I remembered how I used to study with Tere every afternoon.

But that movie deal was better than the chicken or the midget. Stop that, Skimpy, stop biting me. A lot better. And that was when we were in the Fourth Year, and even though it’d been a year since Gamboa broke up the big Circle, the Jaguar went on saying, “They’ll all join up again someday and we four’ll be the bosses.” And it was even better than before, because when we were Dogs the Circle was only one section and this time it was as if the whole Year was in the Circle and we were the ones who were really running things, the Jaguar more than the rest of us. And then there was the time the Dog broke his finger and you could see the whole section was with us and backed us up. “Climb up the ladder, Dog,” Curly said, “and make it snappy or I might get mad.” How the Dog stared at us! “High places make me dizzy, Cadets.” The Jaguar started laughing and Cava got mad. “Do you know who you’re making fun of, Dog?” So he climbed up, but he must’ve been really scared. “Keep on, keep on, sonny,” Curly told him. “And now sing,” the Jaguar said, “but like a real singer, using your hands.” He was hanging on like a monkey and the foot of the ladder rattled against the tiles. “But what if I fall, Cadets?” “So you fall,” I told him. He straightened up, still shaking, and began to sing. “He’ll crack his skull any minute now,” Cava said, and the Jaguar was doubled up with laughter. But it wasn’t much of a fall, I’ve jumped from higher places out in the field. Why did he have to grab at the washstand? “I think he’s torn his finger off,” the Jaguar said when he saw how the Dog’s hand was streaming blood. “You’re all confined to the grounds for a month or more,” the captain said, “until the guilty parties step forward.” The section didn’t squeal and the Jaguar asked them, “Why don’t you come back into the Circle if you’re all such he-men?” The Dogs were all gutless, that was the trouble with them. Our battles with the Fifth were better than the initiations, even when I’m dead I won’t forget that year, most of all what happened in the movies. The Jaguar set it up. He was right beside me and they almost broke my back. The Dogs were lucky, we hardly touched them that time, we were too busy with the guys from the Fifth. They say that revenge is sweet, and that’s right, I’ve never enjoyed anything so much as that day in the stadium when I came face to face with one of the bastards that initiated me when I was a Dog. They almost expelled us, but it was worth it. That business between the Fourth and the Third, that’s just a game, the real deal is between the Fourth and the Fifth. Who could forget the initiation they gave us? And that business of getting in between the Fifth and the Dogs in the movies, that was done on purpose, to get something started. The Jaguar also dreamed up that trick about our caps. When you saw somebody from the Fifth coming along, you let him get near you and when he was a yard away you’d raise your hand as if you were going to salute him, so he’d salute you and you’d just take off your cap. “Are you trying to make a fool out of me?” “No, Cadet, I’m just scratching my head, I’ve got an awful case of dandruff.” It was a real war, you could tell that very clearly from the rope deal and from what happened in the movies. It was during the winter but it was hot in there, we almost smothered under that tin roof with over a thousand guys crammed together. I didn’t see his face when we went in, I just heard his voice, but I bet he was a peasant. “What a mob,” the Jaguar said, “my ass is too big for the space.” He was at the end of the row and the Poet was dunning somebody: “Look, do you think I work for nothing, or just because you’re so pretty?” It was dark by then and somebody told him, “Shut up or we’ll shut you up.” I’m pretty sure the Jaguar didn’t put the bricks on his seat just so he’d block the view, he wanted to see better. I was bending over to light a match and when I heard the guy from the Fifth I dropped my cigarette and got down on my hands and knees to look for it and that’s when it all started happening. “Look, Cadet, clear those bricks off your seat, I want to see the picture.” “Are you speaking to me, Cadet?” I asked him. “No, the one next to you.” “You mean me?” the Jaguar asked. “Who do you think I mean?” “Will you please shut your big mouth,” the Jaguar said, “and let me watch these cowboys?” “You’re not going to get rid of those bricks?” “I guess not,” the Jaguar said. Then I got back in my seat without looking for the cigarette any more, I couldn’t find it. Things were getting started now, so I tightened my belt a little. “You aren’t going to obey me?” the cadet from the Fifth asked him. “No,” the Jaguar said, “why should I?” He was having a good time baiting him. Then the ones in back started to whistle. The Poet began singing
Ay, ay, ay
and the rest of the section joined in. “Are you trying to make fun of me?” the guy from the Fifth demanded. “It looks that way, Cadet,” the Jaguar said. It was going to take place in the dark, it was really going to be something to talk about, in the dark and right in the Assembly Hall, something that’d never happened before. The Jaguar said later that he was the first one, but I saw what really happened, it was the other one or else a friend of his that stuck his oar in. And he must’ve been furious, he piled on the Jaguar without any warning and my ears hurt the way they were shouting. Everybody stood up and I saw some shadows on top of me and they started kicking me. I don’t remember anything about the movie, it’d just begun. And what about the Poet, were they really beating him up or was he just shouting like that so they’d think he was a lunatic? And you could also hear Lt. Huarina shouting, “Lights, Sergeant, lights, are you deaf?” Then the Dogs started shouting, “Lights, lights!” without knowing what was going on, and they said the other two Years’ll jump on us while the lights are out. The air was full of cigarettes, everybody wanted to get rid of them, we didn’t want to get caught smoking, it’s a miracle there wasn’t a fire. What a chance, come on, gang, let’em have it, this is where we get our revenge. I don’t know how the Jaguar got out of it alive. The shadows kept circling around me and my hands hurt me and so did my feet from all that fighting, I know I must’ve hit some of the guys from the Fourth also but how could you tell what you were doing in the darkness? “Sgt. Varúa, what’s the matter with those goddamn lights,” Huarina bellowed, “can’t you tell these animals are killing each other?” There were fights everywhere, that’s the honest truth, it’s just lucky no one was really hurt. And when they turned the lights on, all you could hear were the whistles. Huarina wasn’t in sight, but the lieutenants and noncoms of the Fifth and Third were shouting at us. “Clear the way, damn it, clear the way!” What a laugh, nobody’d let them through, and the bastards got mad and started swinging at anybody, I’ll never forget how the Rat, that Pezoa, hit me so hard in the belly I couldn’t breathe. Then I started looking around for the Jaguar, I told myself if they’ve beat him up they’ll have to answer to me, but there he was, as fresh as a daisy, slugging away and dying of laughter, he had more lives than a cat. And afterward, what a lot of faking, everybody sticks together when it comes to screwing the officers and the noncoms, nothing’s been going on, we’re all buddies, I don’t know a thing about it, and it was the same way with the Fifth, you’ve got to be fair to them about that. Finally they got the Dogs out, they were all scared to death, and then the Fifth. So then we were the only ones in the Assembly Hall and we started singing
Ay, ay, ay
. “I think I made him eat a couple of those bricks he was bitching about,” the Jaguar said. And they all started saying, “The Fifth is really pissed off, we made fools out of them in front of the Dogs, they’ll attack the Fourth tonight.” The officers were running around like mice, asking us, “How did this mess begin? Start talking or you’ll go to the guardhouse.” We didn’t even listen to them. They’re going to come, they’re going to come, we can’t let them surprise us in the barracks, we’ll go out and wait for them in the field. The Jaguar was on top of a locker and we all listened to him the way we used to when we were Dogs and the Circle met in the latrine to plan our revenge. We’ve got to defend ourselves, a man who’s prepared is worth two that aren’t, you guards go out to the parade ground and keep watch. The minute you see them coming, shout for us to come out. Get some things to throw, roll up some toilet paper and squeeze it in your hand, that way your punches’ll have a kick like a mule, fasten razor blades on the tips of your boots like the spurs on the gamecocks at the Coliseum, fill your pockets with stones, don’t forget to wear jockstraps, a man has to watch out for his balls more than his soul. Everybody obeyed him and Curly jumped up and down on the beds, it was like the Circle again except the whole Year was in on it, listen, they’re getting ready in all the other barracks too.

The house on the corner of Diego Ferré and Ocharán was fronted on both streets by a white wall about three feet high and thirty feet long. There was a lamppost at the edge of the sidewalk near the corner, and the post and the wall served as the goal for one of the teams, the team that won the toss. The losers had to make a goal fifty yards back on Ocharán by putting a rock or a pile of jackets at the edge of the sidewalk. But although the goals were only as wide as the sidewalk, the playing field included the whole street. The game they played was soccer. They wore sneakers, just as they did on the field at the Terraza Club, and they made sure the ball was not fully inflated, to prevent it from bouncing too high. For the most part they kept the ball on the ground, making very short passes and trying for goals from close up, without kicking hard. They marked the bounds with a piece of chalk but after a few minutes their sneakers and the ball erased the lines and there were hot arguments to decide whether a goal was legal. The game took place in an atmosphere of vigilance and dread. No matter how careful they were, there would always be the time when Pluto or one of the others would forget himself and kick the ball too hard or hit it with his head. It would fly over the wall of one of the houses along the playing field, land in the garden and squash the geraniums, and if it had real force behind it it would bang against a door or a window, that was the worst because it rattled the door or broke the windowpane, and when that happened the players gave the ball up for lost and shouted a warning and ran away. As they ran, Pluto would keep yelling, “They’re after us, they’re coming after us!” No one would turn his head to see if it was true, they would all run faster, shouting, “Hurry up, they’re after us, they’ve called the cops!” That was the moment when Alberto, who was out in front, gasped, “The cliff, let’s go down the cliff!” And they all followed him, saying, “Good, the cliff!” He could hear the labored breathing of his friends: Pluto’s, irregular and animal-like; Tico’s, short and steady; Babe’s, farther and farther away because he was the slowest; Emilio’s, the calm breathing of an athlete who measured his strength scientifically, breathing in through his nose and out through his mouth; and next to him, Paco’s and Sorbino’s, and that of the rest, a muffled sound that surrounded him and encouraged him to run faster down the second block of Diego Ferré to the corner of Colón and then to the right, keeping close to the wall to save distance on the turn. After that it was easier because Colón was downhill and the red bricks of the Malecón were only half a block away, and beyond them, merging with the horizon, the gray ocean whose shore they would soon reach. The other boys in the neighborhood always made fun of Alberto because whenever they were lying around on the small lawn at Pluto’s house, discussing plans, Alberto always said, “Let’s go down the cliff.” Those trips were long and difficult. They crossed the brick wall at the end of Colón, then stood on a little jut of land while they figured out a way down, studying the steep drop with skilled and serious eyes, debating the best route, searching out the obstacles between their perch and the stony beach. Alberto was the most eager strategist. Without taking his eyes from the cliffside he described the route he favored in quick, short phrases, imitating the speech and gestures of a movie hero: “First, that rock down there, the one with the feathers on it, it’s good and solid, then you’ve only got to jump about three feet, see there, then you go down along those black rocks, they’re all flat, after that it’s easier, you can slide all the way down the other side, and it’ll take us to a beach we’ve never been on.” If anyone objected—Emilio, for example, who liked to be the leader—Alberto defended his ideas passionately, and the group took sides. Their excited arguments warmed the damp mornings in Miraflores. Behind them, an uninterrupted line of cars passed along the Malecón. Sometimes a passenger thrust his head out of a window, and if it happened to be a boy their eyes were filled with envy. Alberto’s point of view usually won out, because he fought so hard and so stubbornly in these arguments that the others became bored. They went down the cliff very cautiously, forgetting all about the disagreement, joined in a complete friendship that showed in their looks, their smiles, the words of encouragement they exchanged. Every time one of them got around an obstacle or made a dangerous leap, the others cheered him. Time went by slowly, full of tension. The closer they came to their objective, the more daring they became. They could hear, close to them now, that strange noise which reached their beds at night in Miraflores, and which here was a deafening roar of stones and water; they could smell the salt and clean sea shells; and then they were on the beach, a tiny fan between the cliff and the water’s edge, where they all dropped in a heap, joking, kidding about the dangers of the descent, pretending to shove each other, keeping up a great racket. If the morning was not too cold, or if it was one of those afternoons when a lukewarm sun came out unexpectedly in the ashen sky, Alberto took off his shoes and socks, rolled up his pants above his knees, and jumped into the surf, while the others cheered him on with their shouts. He felt the cold water on his legs and the polished stones under his feet, and from there, holding up his pants-legs with one hand, he splashed his friends with the other. They ducked behind each other, then took off their socks and shoes and went out to drench him, and the grand battle began. Later, soaked to the skin, they returned to the beach, stretched out on the stones, and argued about the climb back up. It was difficult and exhausting. When they got back to the neighborhood they sprawled out on the lawn at Pluto’s house, smoking the Viceroys they had bought at the corner store along with some peppermints to hide the smell of tobacco on their breath.