The Wind That Lays Waste

by Selva Almada

  The smell of the day laborers bent double in the cotton fields. The smell of the plantations. The smell of fuel from the threshers.

  And closer by, the smell of the nearest town, with its cemetery on the outskirts and the garbage dump half a mile out, and its unsewered neighborhoods with their cesspits and wastewater. And the smell of the passion fruit vine stubbornly climbing posts and wires, filling the air with the sweet scent of its sticky fruit, whose nectar brings the flies.

  Yellow shook his head, overwhelmed by all those recognizable smells. He scratched his muzzle with a paw, as if to clear and cleanse his nose.

  The smell that was all those smells was the smell of the coming storm. Even though the sky was still perfectly cloudless and clear, as blue as the sky in a postcard.

  Yellow lifted his head again, half opened his jaws, and let out a very long howl.

  The storm was on its way.

  17

  The Gringo turned the key in the ignition, and the car’s motor purred like a snuggling cat. He gave a joyful yell and punched the inside of the roof with both fists. Then he got out and stood in front of the open hood with his hands on his hips, unable to wipe the smile off his face.

  “Thought you were going to beat me, didn’t you? Well, take that,” he said to the motor, which was still humming softly, and flipped it the bird.

  He lit a cigarette and looked around for someone to share his triumph with.

  No one. Not even a dog. Where could they have gotten to? He went back to the car, reaching one arm under the steering wheel, and turned the motor off.

  That was when he heard the sharp, plaintive howl, and a chilly tingle ran across his back.

  Damn dog. Gave me a scare. What’s that about, howling at this time of day? Looking for some action?

  He headed for the house. Now he was going to sit himself down and drink all the beer in the fridge: he’d earned it. There was always plenty of beer. Since they lived a long way from town, the guy from the wholesaler came by once a week and dropped off three whole crates. With this heat, the Gringo needed a good supply. He drank it just like water. If he wanted to get hammered, there was whiskey, but for taking it nice and easy, beer was fine.

  He hardly ever got really drunk. Over the years, alcohol had started to make him touchy and aggressive. Even when he’d been young, it had put him in a fighting mood, but then he could still look after himself, he was still quick with his fists. Now that he was getting on, he had to keep out of trouble. Bar fights weren’t what they used to be. Before, when things got out of hand, it might have been settled at knifepoint. Now, any little shit could pull out a piece and blow you away just like that, for nothing.

  If he wanted to tie one on, and he did sometimes, because it feels great, especially at first, when you’re so happy you dance by yourself, he’d stay home and put away one of the bottles of JB the police gave him every now and then, as a bonus, for all his hard work. He’d pull the table out from under the awning, sit himself down, open the bottle, and stay there until it was finished. He’d put on a chamamé cassette and call Tapioca to come sit with him. He didn’t let the kid have whiskey, but he’d offer him a glass of beer or two.

  They would look up at the stars in silence, what silence the music left. And they would watch what traffic there was: cars full of kids on their way to the dance, if it was a weekend; or trucks setting off on their trips in the cool of the evening; or a bold hare crossing the road, stopping on the verge to stare at them for a moment with its shining eyes. Then Brauer would start talking to himself, though he could never remember what he said. Tapioca would stay there, like a soldier at his post, but maybe he wasn’t even listening.

  The Gringo was probably reminiscing. Talking about the old days when he was young and strong as an oak: drinking till the sun came up, getting himself into girl trouble. As a young man, he’d been something to look at: women would offer themselves to him, and he could service several in one night, so as not to give any cause for envy. He rarely felt like it anymore. Just as his muscles had gone soft, getting it up was an exercise he practiced less and less often.

  It would take him several hours to empty the bottle, and in that time he would only leave the table to walk a few steps away and take a piss. Tapioca would fetch the ice, and when the cassette came to the end, he’d turn it over or change it.

  After the last gulp of whiskey, Brauer would slam the horn cup down on the tabletop. He’d wake up the next day, well into the morning, on his bed, still dressed.

  Now as he walked past the old gas pump, Yellow groaned, dropping from his upright howling position, stretching out his front paws and shaking his haunches.

  “What’s up, Ruski? Don’t tell me you’re in love,” he said, ruffling the dog’s head on his way to the open door.

  18

  When the Gringo came out again, wearing a clean shirt and holding a cold bottle of Quilmes, it was getting dark.

  Only a few minutes had passed.

  “What the fuck?” he said, stepping out from the porch.

  Fat, gray, heavy clouds had filled the sky. They were full of wind and lightning and hopefully rain as well. The storm had gathered in the blink of an eye.

  If they hadn’t needed the rain so badly, the Gringo would have stopped it like his mother taught him, because it wasn’t looking pretty. She had passed the secret on to him before she died. Out in the open, facing the storm front, you drive an ax into the ground six times, to make three crosses, and after the last blow you leave it stuck there. It’s hard to believe if you’ve never seen it done, but the sky opens and the raging storm turns into a blustery passing wind. The storm slinks off, with its tail between its legs, to someplace where no one knows the secret. But those who know it must use it with care. Every crack in the earth was crying out for rain. This was no time to turn a storm away.

  Nature’s secret, thought the Gringo, kills any secrets man can know.

  He opened the bottle with his lighter and took a gulp. The wind was swirling up dirt. Plastic bags, pieces of paper, and small branches began to blow past.

  Through the dust, he saw the Reverend come trotting down from the edge of the road. One by one, the dogs appeared, ten or twelve of them—Brauer had lost count—and huddled all together under the table. All except for Yellow, or Ruski, who stayed by his side, with his mouth half-open, baring his teeth at the increasingly black and angry sky.

  The Gringo felt like letting out a whoop. His lungs had been shot for years, but somehow he summoned the breath and the strength to make the darkening afternoon resound with his cry. Yellow joined in with a long howl.

  The wind was blowing the Reverend’s thin hair about. He approached with his shirt hanging out and flapping behind him; the force of the wind had unbuttoned it, revealing his white, hairy belly.

  He was smiling. He had his secret reasons to thank God for the storm. Joyfully, the Gringo put his arm around the Reverend’s shoulder and handed him the bottle. Pearson drank from it without turning up his nose; and the two stood there, facing the storm as it came panting like a huge, wet, terrifying animal.

  That was when Tapioca and Leni appeared: two skinny figures battling through the wind, their eyes and mouths full of dust, but smiling. The girl’s hair was a total mess and her skirt blew up, showing her pale, firm thighs.

  They were received into the embrace of that human barrier against the coming storm. All four raised their faces to the sky. Right then, nothing could have been better.

  How long did it last? Who can say? In that unique moment of plenitude, the four of them were one. The bottle went from hand to hand until it was empty. Even Leni gave it a kiss without her father objecting.

  The first drops began to fall, hard and cold. Then came a barrage, and the infantry squad ran for cover, retreating to the porch.

  19

  The rain came pounding down. The porch awning, made of leaves and branches, leaked all over, and fierce gusts of wind blew the rain in from the sides. But the
four of them stayed out there for a while, watching the downpour, seeing how the thirsty earth absorbed the drops as soon as they hit the ground. It would have to rain for a couple of hours before any mud began to form.

  Leni hugged herself. The temperature had barely fallen, but her clothes were wet, and the water dripping from her hair was running down her back. She couldn’t remember a storm like this. Blue cracks flashed in the sky, giving the landscape a ghostly look.

  Five hundred yards away, in a field, lightning struck a tree, and the orange flames held out against the rain for a good long while.

  It was a beautiful spectacle. Sometimes the curtain of water was so dense they couldn’t see the old gas pump, although it was just a few yards away.

  The four of them were quiet, absorbed in their own private thoughts, until the Gringo said hoarsely:

  “Let’s go in.”

  The storm had cut off the electricity, so he used the little quivering flame of his lighter to guide him as he went looking for the packets of candles. He lit several and placed them around the room. Tapioca brought in some plastic chairs, which he dried, and they sat down around the kitchen table.

  The roof began to leak in the middle of the room, and they put a pan there to catch the drip. Despite the racket of the rain on the tin, that regular, metallic sound was clearly audible.

  The dogs had made themselves comfortable under one of the beds, except for Yellow, who was lying near the door.

  “It’s going to be a long night,” said the Gringo.

  He went to the fridge and took out some cold meat, a piece of cheese, and bread. Tapioca brought glasses and Cokes for himself and Leni. The men drank beer. They ate in silence. The excitement of the storm had made them hungry. The moment of communion outside, facing the elements, was followed, in the shelter of the house, by introspection.

  The Reverend made no attempt to say grace. They ate as if they had returned from a hard day’s work. Leni rarely had much of an appetite (it had been quite a struggle for Pearson to get her to touch her food after they left her mother), but now, inspired by the storm’s voracity, she ate as much as the men.

  When they finished all the food, and were full, Leni cleared the table, collecting the boards and knives and wiping away the crumbs with a rag. Assuming her role as the woman of the house, when the Gringo lit a cigarette, she duly brought him a clean ashtray.

  She suggested they play cards, although she didn’t know any games. Tapioca got a shoebox down from the top of a wardrobe. There was a pack of cards in it, along with dice, a cup, and a pile of photos. Brauer and the Reverend told the young ones to go ahead and play. Pearson, of course, frowned on games of chance, but he decided to let it pass, this once. The Gringo was right: the night would be long, and they might as well amuse themselves somehow until they were ready to sleep.

  So Leni and Tapioca settled down at opposite ends of one of the beds, with the shoebox between them.

  The Reverend and the Gringo remained seated at the little table, face-to-face, their knees almost touching underneath.

  Nothing could be seen through the slightly open window. It was all completely black, except for when the lightning flashed. But nothing was visible then either: it all went completely white. The thunderstorm was blowing over: the lightning bolts were followed now by a muffled rumbling. The wind had dropped as well, but the rain continued, heavy and dense. After the long summer of drought, the earth was beginning to slake its thirst and regurgitate water, burping up bubbles, as if to say that’s enough for a while.

  The Gringo, who had seemed to be on another planet since the beginning of the meal, shook his head and said: “Did I say I got your car going?”

  “No. That’s great news.”

  “Yeah. Pity I didn’t finish before the weather turned bad.”

  The Reverend smiled.

  “Well, let’s just be grateful we weren’t on the road when the storm hit.”

  “True. That would have been tricky.”

  “You see what I mean: the Lord always has a reason for doing things the way he does.”

  “We’re not going to start talking about God, Pearson,” said the Gringo, gently shaking his head. “There’s plenty of things you couldn’t explain the reason why he does them like that. I’d run out of fingers pretty quick if I started counting them up.”

  “All right. You have your ideas.”

  “Yep. I have mine and you have yours.”

  The Reverend took a sip from his glass. Now that Brauer had started talking, he didn’t want to break off the dialogue.

  “What was wrong with the car in the end?”

  “Damned if I know. I fixed up so much stuff it’s like I built you a new motor from scratch. Mechanics, it’s a mystery sometimes, like that Christ of yours and his ways,” he said slyly.

  The Reverend smiled again.

  “Tell me, Brauer, what did you do before you became a mechanic?”

  The Gringo lit a cigarette and leaned back on his chair. He blew the smoke straight up. He wasn’t used to talking about himself. When he talked with other men it was about things that were happening there and then, in the present, and memories came up only because they were shared: Remember when? Opening up is something men like Brauer just don’t do. Not even in unguarded moments, when they’re in bed with a woman. Brauer never opened up. Or maybe when he was drunk, but the only person there to hear was Tapioca, and with the years of living together, Tapioca had become a part of him. Talking to the kid was like talking to himself.

  That night, though, was different. There they were, trapped by the rain. And Pearson wanted to talk. Fair enough. Why sit there drinking and watching each other like a pair of wary dogs? The man was trying to start a conversation. He didn’t seem like a bad sort. Although they lived in different worlds.

  “Before I did my military service—that was in Bahía Blanca; I’d never been so cold in my life; from one kind of hell to the other, imagine it—before that, I worked with my father. We had a bar, in Villa Ángela, opposite the train station. It was open twenty-four hours a day. And during harvest, we were flat out. We didn’t stop. We took turns sleeping. My father, my mother, and me—I don’t have any brothers or sisters—and a waiter, who was always changing; we never had any luck there: some of the guys were good for a start, but soon enough they all got a taste for the drink. And there was so much in easy reach. My father worked the till, my mother cooked, and the waiter and me took orders from the tables and served drinks. I started working as soon as I could lift a bottle. My mother always wished she had a girl to help in the kitchen, but she was unlucky there too. After I was born, she couldn’t have any more kids. She always wanted to take in a girl and bring her up as her own. Back then, the day laborers used to come with their families; they all worked in the cotton fields, and plenty would have been happy to let someone else raise one of their daughters. Lots of rich women who couldn’t have children did a deal like that. But my father was always against it. He said blood was thicker than water, and one day out of the blue the kid would up and go back to her family, however good it was with us.”

  “Is that what you believe too?” said the Reverend, cutting in, thinking perhaps of his ex-wife and Leni.

  “What?”

  “That blood is thicker than water.”

  The Gringo thought of Tapioca, and what his mother had said when she left him.

  “I don’t know. We make our own destinies, that’s what I believe. We know why we do what we do.”

  The Reverend shook his head and looked at the Gringo.

  “So they had a bar and you worked with them,” he said, picking up the thread.

  Brauer got up and replaced the empty bottle with a full one.

  “Uh-huh. Until I was drafted at eighteen. And then my life changed. I’d never left the town. We didn’t even have time to go fishing. Mind you, I saw all sorts of things when I was working in the bar. It wasn’t just workers who came in. My mother was a good cook and the place
was open all day. So as well as the day laborers, there were the engineers from the railways and the cotton gins, the landowners, Indians blowing the bit of cash they had. Alcohol is a great leveler, you know. One time a couple of engineers who worked at La Chaco got into a fight. They sucked the whiskey up like sponges, the gringos. And that stuff was pure kerosene, believe me. We got it smuggled in from Paraguay, you can imagine what it was like. These two came in like friends and started putting it away. They were talking their language, so we didn’t understand a thing. All of a sudden, for some reason, they started arguing. My old man never got involved unless it was turning really ugly. But the gringos left him no time to react. One of them suddenly pulled out a revolver and blew the other’s brains out. All the customers were drunk that night, as usual, but they sobered up fast, I’m telling you. They sat there, white in the face, like ghosts. Even the cigarette smoke froze. The gringo who had fired the shot started trembling like a leaf; he wanted to put the barrel in his mouth, but he couldn’t, he was shaking too much. My father took the gun off him, led him to the door, and gave him a little push. Off you go, mister, back to the residence and watch yourself, he said. Then he came back in and sent me to the police station. I went on my bike, and you might find this shocking, but I was excited; the mission made me feel important. The police came and took the body away. No one asked any questions. My mother wiped the gringos’ table and cleaned up the brains spattered on the floor. My father said: ‘A drink on the house for everyone, doctor’s orders.’ In five minutes, it was all in the past, and we were back to business. The customers drank even more than usual; I think they were celebrating their luck: they were just glad it hadn’t been them.”

  The Gringo laughed. The Reverend drained his glass and pushed it forward to be refilled.