“What I can assure you,” said my Aunt Josefina, “is that Merceditas Herrera was a saint, and so refined and discreet.”
“And Doctor Medrano, what was he like?”
“A great doctor,” she opened another scone and spread orange marmalade on it. “Good-looking and congenial as well. And very cultured.”
There was a quarter-second silence before the last statement: the word cultured is slippery with my Aunt Josefina and one has to step carefully.
“Trafalgar is also good-looking and congenial,” I said, “but I don’t know if he’s cultured. He knows a ton of strange things.”
“It’s true, he’s congenial, very congenial and friendly. And very considerate with an old lady like me. Now, I think good-looking is an exaggeration. His nose is too long, just like poor Merceditas’. And don’t tell me that mustache isn’t a little ridiculous. A man looks much tidier if clean-shaven, thank goodness your sons have gotten over the beard and mustache phase. But I have to admit that the boy is elegant: he had on a dark gray suit, very well cut, and a white shirt and a serious tie, not like some of your extravagant friends who look like. I don’t even know what they look like.”
“Would you like a little more tea?”
“No, no, please, you’ve already made me drink too much, but it was delicious and I have overdone it. That was Thursday or Friday, I’m not sure. I went into the Burgundy because I was fainting with hunger: I was coming from a meeting of the board of directors of the Society of Friends of the Museum, so it was Thursday, of course, because Friday was the engagement party of María Luisa’s daughter, and you know Thursday is Amelia’s afternoon off, and frankly I had no desire to go home and start making tea. There weren’t many people and I sat down far away from the door, where there wouldn’t be a draft, and when they were serving my tea the Medrano boy came in. He came over to say hello, so kind. At first I couldn’t place him and I was about to ask him who he was when I realized he was Merceditas Herrera’s son. It was so unsettling, seeing him standing there beside the table, but although I am old enough to do certain things, you understand that a lady never invites a man, even though he’s so much younger than she is, to sit at her table.”
An “Oh, no?” escaped me.
My Aunt Josefina sighed, I would almost say she blew out air, and great-grandmother’s eyes stopped me cold.
“I do know customs have evolved,” she said, “and in a few cases for the better, and in many others unfortunately for the worse, but there are things that do not change and you should know that.”
I smiled because I love her a lot and because I hope I can get to eighty-four years old with the same confidence she has and learn to control my eyes the way she does although mine aren’t even a tenth as pretty.
“And you let poor Trafalgar go?”
“No. He was very correct and he asked my permission to keep me company if I wasn’t waiting for anyone. I told him to sit down and he ordered coffee. It’s appalling how that boy drinks coffee. I don’t know how he doesn’t ruin his stomach. I haven’t tasted coffee in years.”
She doesn’t smoke either, of course. And she drinks a quarter glass of rosé with every dinner and another quarter glass, only of extra-dry champagne, at Christmas and New Year’s.
“He didn’t tell you if he was going to come by here?”
“No, he didn’t say, but it seems unlikely. He was going, I think the next day, I’m not really sure where, it must be Japan, I imagine, because he said he was going to buy silks. A shame he devotes himself to commerce and didn’t follow his father’s path: it was a disappointment to poor Merceditas. But he’s doing very well, isn’t he?”
“He’s doing fabulously. He has truckloads of dough.”
“I sincerely hope you don’t use that language outside your home. It is unbecoming. Of course, it would be best if you never used it, but that’s evidently hopeless. You’re as stubborn as your father.”
“Yes, my old man, I mean my father, was stubborn, but he was a gentleman.”
“True. I don’t know how he spoke when he was among other men, that doesn’t matter, but he never said anything inappropriate in public.”
“If you heard Trafalgar talk, you’d have an attack.”
“I don’t see why. With me, he was most agreeable. Neither affected nor hoity-toity—no need for that—but very careful.”
“He’s a hypocritical cretin.” That I didn’t say, I just thought it.
“And he has,” said my Aunt Josefina, “a special charm for telling the most outlandish things. What an imagination.”
“What did he tell you?”
“Obviously, maybe it’s not all imagination. It gives you the impression that he is telling the truth, but so embellished that at first glance you could think it was a big lie. I’ll tell you I spent a very entertaining interval. How is it possible that when I arrived home Amelia was already back and was worried at my delay? The poor thing had called Cuca’s house, and Mimi’s and Virginia’s to see if I was there. I had to start in on the phone calls to calm them all down.”
I got serious: I was dying of envy, like when Trafalgar goes and tells things to Fatty Páez or Raúl or Jorge. But I understood, because my Aunt Josefina knows how to do many things well; for example, to listen.
“What did he tell you?”
“Oh, nothing, crazy things about his trips. Of course, he speaks so well that it’s a pleasure, a real pleasure.”
“What did he tell you?”
“Sweetie, how you insist! Besides, I don’t remember too well.”
“Yeah, tell me what you remember.”
“One says ‘yes,’ not ‘yeah.’ You sound like a muleteer, not a lady.”
I ignored her.
“Of course you remember. You catch cold with a constancy worthy of a greater cause and your stomach is a little fragile, but don’t tell me you have arteriosclerosis, because I won’t believe you.”
“God preserve me. Have you seen Raquel lately? A fright. She was at the Peñas’, I don’t know why they take her, and she didn’t recognize me.”
“Josefina, I am going to go crazy with curiosity. Be nice and tell me what Trafalgar told you.”
“Let’s see, wait, I’m not really sure.”
“For certain he told you he had just arrived from somewhere.”
“That’s it. It must be one of those new countries in Africa or Asia, with a very strange name I have never heard before or ever read in the newspaper. What surprised me was that they were so advanced, with so much progress and so well organized, because they always turn savage: look what happened in India when the English left and in the Congo after the Belgians, no? Your friend Medrano told me it was a world—a world, that’s what he said—that was very attractive when one saw it for the first time. Serprabel, now I remember, Serprabel. I think it must be close to India.”
“I doubt it but, anyway, go on.”
“Nevertheless, almost certainly, yes, it must be near India, not only because of the name but because of the castes.”
“What castes?”
“Aren’t there castes in India?”
“Yes, there are, but what does that have to do with it?”
“If you let me tell you, you’re going to find out; weren’t you in such a big hurry? And sit properly, it’s so obvious you are all used to wearing pants. There are no elegant women anymore.”
“Tell me, in Serprabel, are there elegant women?”
“Yes, according to the Medrano boy, there are splendid women, very well dressed and very well bred.”
“It doesn’t surprise me; even if there’s only one, he’ll find her.”
“A shame he never married.”
“Who? Trafalgar?” I laughed for a while.
“I don’t see what’s funny about it. I’m not saying with a foreigner, and from so far away, who may be a very good person, but have different customs, but with someone from his circle. Don’t forget, he comes from a very well-connected family.”<
br />
“That one’s going to die an old bachelor. He likes women too much.”
“Hmmmmm,” went my Aunt Josefina.
“Don’t tell me Medrano Senior did, too!” I exclaimed.
“Be discreet, sweetheart, don’t talk so loud. In fact, I can’t confirm anything. A few things were said at the time.”
“I can imagine,” I said. “And Merceditas was a saint. And on Serprabel Trafalgar was looking for romance, just as his father would have been.”
“But how can you think that? He wasn’t looking for romance, as you say. And if he were, he wouldn’t have told me. One can see he is a very polite boy. What he did, or what he says he did, because it was most likely nothing more than a story to entertain me for a while, what he did was to try to help a poor woman, who was very unfortunate for many reasons.”
“Ay,” I said, and once again thought that Trafalgar was a hypocritical cretin.
“Now what’s the matter?”
“Nothing, nothing, go on.”
“Well, it seems that there they maintain—following those eastern religions, no?—a caste system. And there are nine. Let’s see, let me think: lords, priests, warriors, scholars, merchants, artisans, servants, and vagabonds. Oh, no, eight. They’re eight.”
“And everyone has to be in one of the castes.”
“Of course. Don’t tell me it isn’t an advantage.”
“Oh, I don’t know. What does one do if one is an artisan and has the vocation to be a merchant, like Trafalgar? Do they take an exam?”
“Of course not. Everyone lives within the caste to which they belong and they marry people from their own caste.”
“Don’t tell me: and their children are born within that caste and die within that caste and the children of those children and so on forever.”
“Yes. So no one has pretentions and everyone stays in their place and they avoid disorders and revolutions and strikes. I said to Medrano that, paganism aside, it seemed to me an extraordinary system and he agreed with me.”
“Ah, he agreed with you.”
“Of course, he even told me that in thousands of years there had never been any disorder and they had lived in peace.”
“How nice.”
“I know it must sound a little old-fashioned to you, but Medrano says the level of development in everything, color television and airlines and telephones with a view screen and computer centers, is impressive. I’m surprised they don’t advertise more to attract tourism. I myself, if I were inclined to travel at my age, would be very happy to go for a visit. Listen, he says the hotels are extraordinary and the service is perfect, the food is delicious, and there are museums and theaters and places to visit and splendid, just splendid landscapes.”
“I don’t like that caste thing. I wouldn’t go even at gunpoint.”
“Nor I, believe me, I would not enjoy such a long plane trip. But the caste thing is not that important, because anyone can govern.”
“What did you say?”
“That anyone can govern. Above everyone is a kind of king who lives in the center of the capital, because the city is a circle and in the middle is the Palace which is all marble and gold and crystal. Anyway, that’s what your friend says. I don’t doubt that it’s very luxurious, but not that much.”
“And anyone can become king? I mean, everything else is hereditary and that, specifically, is not?”
“That’s what Medrano told me. So you see, if the highest authority can be elected, everything is very democratic. The king is called the Lord of Lords and governs for a period of five years; when it’s over, he can’t be reelected, he goes back home and then the Lords elect another.”
“Wait, wait. The Lords? So then the others don’t vote?”
“Nobody votes, sweetie. The Lords meet every five years and elect a Lord of Lords and look how nice, they almost always, or always, elect him from among the inferior castes, you see?”
“Heck yes, I see. And the Lord of Lords governs everybody?”
“I suppose so, that’s what he’s elected for. Although your friend Medrano says no, he doesn’t govern.”
“I thought so.”
“Oh, sure, if he says it, it’s holy writ.”
“Fine, but what is it he says?”
Another of my Aunt Josefa’s virtues is that she can’t lie: “He says he’s a puppet of the Lords who are the ones who really govern, so as to keep everyone happy with the illusion that they or someone of their caste might become king, but that the Lord of Lords is the ultimate slave, a slave who lives like a king, eats like a king, dresses like a king, but is still a slave.”
And one of her defects consists in believing only what she wants to believe: “You see that can’t be. Surely the Lords form a kind of Council or Chamber or something like that and your friend took one thing for another. Or he probably invented it to spice up the story.”
“Yes, just probably. I warn you, Trafalgar is capable of anything.”
“He also told me, this seems more reasonable to me, that the inferior castes are the more numerous. There is only one Lord of Lords. There are very few Lords, I think he told me there are a hundred. A few more Priests, many more, I think around three hundred. Many more Warriors and even more Scholars, he didn’t tell me how many. Many, many Merchants, Artisans, and Servants, especially Servants. And it seems there are millions of Vagabonds. It must be a very populous country. And anyone of any caste, except the Lord of Lords, of course, can be Owner or Dispossessed.”
“Having money or not having money? Rich and poor, let’s say.”
“More or less: he who has land is an Owner; he who does not is Dispossessed. And within each caste anyone who is an Owner is superior to the Dispossessed.”
“And can one go from being Dispossessed to Owner?”
“Yes, so you already see that it’s not as terrible as you thought. If one puts together enough money, one buys land, which is very expensive, just like everywhere. It seems to be a very rich country.”
“The Vagabonds can buy land, too?”
“No, no. The Vagabonds are vagabonds. They don’t even have houses, I don’t know how people can live like that.”
“I don’t understand. Now tell me what happened to Trafalgar on Serprabel.”
“It’s a little cool, don’t you think?”
“Do you want to go inside?”
“No, but help me put the jacket over my shoulders,” not that my Aunt Josefina needs help to put on her jacket. “That’s it, thank you. According to him, some of everything happened. He went there to sell jewelry and perfumes. He says he didn’t do too well with the perfumes because they have a good chemical industry and flowers, you should see the flowers he described to me, very heavily scented ones from which they make extracts. But as there are no deposits of precious stones, he sold the ones he took very well. Of course, he had a few problems, believe me, because anyone who goes to Serprabel has to become part of a caste. They considered him a merchant and he had to use vehicles for Merchants and go to a hotel for Merchants. But when he learned that there were superior castes with better hotels and more privileges, he protested and said he was also a Scholar and a Warrior. He did the right thing, don’t you think? Of course, since there one can’t belong to more than one caste, they had to hold a kind of audience presided over by one of the Lords who had the strangest name, that I’m really not going to be able to remember, and there he explained his case. Oh, he made me laugh so much telling me how he had disconcerted them and remarking that he was very sorry he couldn’t say he was a Lord, and that he would also have liked to say he was a Priest, which is the second caste. The bad part was he didn’t know anything about the religion and he doesn’t have mystical inclinations. Although I think he was educated in a religious school.”
“That he has no mystical inclinations remains to be seen. So what happened?”
“They accepted that in other places there were other customs and they reached an agreement. He would be a Warrio
r but one of the lowest, those of the Earth, although an Owner, and with permission to act as a Merchant.”
“What’s that about those of the Earth?”
“Well, each one of the four superior castes has categories. For example, let’s see, how was it, the Lords can be of Light, of Fire, and of Shadow, I think that was the order. The Priests can devote themselves to Communication, Intermediation, or Consolation. The Warriors act in the Air, the Water, or on the Earth. And the Scholars are dedicated to Knowledge, Accumulation, or Teaching. The others are inferior and don’t have categories.”
“What a mess. And each one can also be Owner or Dispossessed and that influences their position?”
“Yes. It’s a little complicated. Medrano told me that a Lord of Light, an Owner, was the highest rank. And a Warrior of Air but Dispossessed was almost equal to a Priest devoted to Consolation but an Owner. Understand?”
“Not really. Anyway, they gave Trafalgar a very passable rank.”
“He was very satisfied. The took him to a very superior hotel and that’s even though he says the Merchants’ hotel was very good, and they set four people to attend him exclusively, aside from the hotel personnel. The fact that he had jewels to sell also must have had some influence, because they are a real luxury. He says a delegation of Merchants went to see him and that although they couldn’t enter the hotel, which was solely for Warriors, they spoke in the park and offered him a very well located shop where he could sell what he had brought. A few wanted to buy one or another piece of jewelry so as to sell it themselves but they were very expensive and the Merchants, although they aren’t exactly poor, aren’t rich, either. Only one of them, who was an Owner, and of a lot of land, might have been able to buy something from him, but Medrano didn’t want to sell him anything; he did well, because why make such a long trip and end up splitting the profits with another? In any event they had to give him the location even though they didn’t end on very friendly terms, because every caste has its laws and among the Merchants one can’t go back after having offered something verbally or any other way, but above all verbally. Another law for all of the castes—which frankly, I don’t know what result it would produce—seems very silly to me, it says no one can repeat to those of his own caste nor to those of other castes something he has overheard a member of another caste say, although they can repeat what members of their own caste have said. Of course this is hard to control, and no one speaks gladly to someone from another caste but only out of obligation, but every so often they catch an offender and the punishments are terrible; anyway, I don’t know if it’s really worth all that.”
Trafalgar Page 14
