The Shadow of the Shadow

by Paco Ignacio Taibo II

  And lulled by the sound of the pianola, that's exactly what he did.

  " H ow' D I T GO ? " asked the poet.

  "I had myself a nice little nap..." said Verdugo.

  "No, the dinner, idiot."

  "Oh, it was all right, as those things go..." said Verdugo, trying somehow to distract the journalist and keep him from playing his last two, leaving Verdugo with the double in his hand.

  "And the widow?" asked Manterola, slapping the two/one onto the table.

  "She's one of a kind, all right. She manages to be everywhere at once without really trying. Margarita, the Widow Roldan, a hell of a name, if you ask me... She's sharp, too. I'd call her a sweetenedup version of Lucrezia Borgia."

  It was well past 2 a.m., and the bartender, in keeping with established ritual, went around turning off the lights one by one like someone plucking the feathers from a chicken or blowing out the candles on a cake, until the domino players remained together inside a single circle of yellowish light.' here was something Last Supperish about the scene, only with four glasses of Havana brandy in place of the supper. The cantina was nearly deserted. Reckless Ross was sleeping it off under the bar. His days as a hero on the motorcycle circuit long past, he'd taken to drowning his sorrows in mezcal, a drink he acquired a taste for following that famous race in Toluca when he was carried off the course in a stretcher after dropping his bike at sixty-five miles per hour.

  "I'm out, senoles," said the Chinaman dryly, playing his last bone. He failed to see the humor in his friends' jokes, their needling of the new aristocracy-as though, despite their selfimposed marginality, they'd never quite managed to break the ties that bound them to the world from which they came.

  "You pulled that one out of thin air, Tomas. I had no idea," said the journalist, counting up Verdugo's and Valencia's remaining dominoes.

  "So what's the gist of it, man? I want to know what really happened," insisted the poet again, trying to take his mind off the game he'd just lost.

  "Well, to make a long story short: What it all boils down to is one gorgeous and shrewd widow, one gendarmery colonelwho I'm sure you'll recognize when the time comes, one personal secretary who, going by appearances, doesn't hold said colonel in very high esteem, one female hypnotist-scientific-mumbo- jumbo-type to cure the widow's migraines and toothaches, one French industrialist's son living off daddy's bank account, one rough-looking Spic-the kind you can dress up in silks but still can't hide the scars-and one police lieutenant who seems to serve as the colonel's errand boy. That's what we could call the inner circle. The rest of the guests seemed as out of place as I was. Or rather, at least as lost and a lot less charming than yours truly."

  "I think I can add a new detail," announced the reporter, licking a few drops of brandy off his mustache. "I found out how the Widow Roldan became a widow. Her husband was poisoned."

  His three friends turned to stare at the journalist who paused for a moment to relish the effect of his surprise announcement.

  "The late Senor Roldan owned a print shop. He died of lead poisoning, or saturnism, as it's known in the printer's trade."

  "I remember my father used to talk about that," said the poet. "He always drank lots of milk to protect himself from the lead."

  "Sounds like the widow's late husband didn't drink enough," observed Verdugo.

  "So who poisoned him?" asked the Chinaman, his curiosity piqued at last.

  "He owned the Industrial Printworks, the largest print shop in the city."

  "The CLOM's got a union there," observed Tomas, adding his own bit of expertise.

  "What about the woman? I want to hear more about her. What does she look like? I only saw her in the picture, after all," said the poet, losing interest in the defunct spouse. "Young, beautiful, domineering..."

  "And, lest we forget, her picture was found in the pocket of a murdered trombonist, and she was there in person when the trombonist's brother fell to his death out of a third-story window," added Manterola.

  "This much we know," said the poet.

  As the dominoes shuffled and clicked across the tabletop, the bartender brought over another bottle of Havana brandy. The sound of the bones was sacred and he set it down gently.

  "This colonel you'le talking about is Gomez, isn't it?"

  "You guessed it, my friend. Jesus Gomez Reyna, one and the same.

  The Chinaman pictured the face of Gomez, chief of the Mexico City gendarmerie, the mounted police, the same man who almost a year ago ordered the police attack on the strikers at the Palacio de Hierro Department Store. The same Gomez who ordered his troops to fire on the militant railroad workers. The black beast, the arch-enemy of the anarcho-syndicalists in the Valley of Mexico.

  "This woman reminds me of another woman I used to know," said Manterola, choosing his seven bones one by one and standing them up in front of him.

  "It's been known to happen,"said the poet. "One woman reminds you of another one, who reminds you of another one, who..."

  "Gentlemen, please," said the lawyer.

  "And the winner by threeeee huuuundred yaaaaards," roared Reckless Ross from the floor underneath the bar.

  The cuckoo clock called out the half hour.

  THE POET OPENED THE CENTER section of the newspaper and admired his work. Anonymous by nature, not really the kind of thing he'd be doing if he had a choice, but there it was in black and white all the same.

  Here's a cure that's guaranteed for that gentleman in need... Suffering from gonorrhea? Three days, ten pesos.

  The competition, Gorreina, had an ad alongside his that was unmistakably inferior.

  In the left-hand column there was another one of his master works:

  Tan lac has successfully cured thousands of Mexicans living in the USA. Countless Mexicans have seen how their relatives and friends in the USA have regained health and happiness with Tanlac, the world-famous cure for all stomach ailments.

  He was particularly proud of the ad's semi-religious tone, its sanctimonious air, emphasized by the kindly face of the old man in the accompanying picture, drinking Tanlac and feeling like all the world.

  Another one of his best efforts appeared in the bottom lefthand corner, like a variation on a theme:

  Chronic case ofgonorrhea? Here's a cure that's guaranteed. You can trust our humble creed.- sure as a man's word of honor. Only three days, ten pesos.

  He liked this one for its military tone, designed to appeal to the young officers so susceptible to social diseases.

  There were a few more of the offspring of his underemployed pen scattered here and there across the page:

  Mental fatigue? Brain drain? Reach for marvelous Cerebrina cordials.

  Both the jingle and the name of the product in that one were his own invention.

  The poet saw his work, which some fools were starting to refer to as "marketing," as the ultimate joke, something to while away the sleepy mornings, to pay for his scrambled eggs, salsa borracha, and tortillas. A way to mark his passage through the turbulent streets of Mexico City, a way to survive. Maybe what he liked the most about it was that in the two years he'd been writing ads for patent medicines (back pain getting to be too much, threatening your stability?-he liked this one for its magical, enigmatic strangeness) no one had been able to get him to pop a single pill into his mouth (Dr. Lovett's Little Pink Pills guaranteed to return you to health, whatever your ailment).

  In his daily perusal of the medical adverts page in the newspaper, there was something of the contented air of a rural patriarch, spiced with an ironic but professional sense of satisfaction.

  On this particular morning, he worked at his desk with the window open and the breeze carrying a rainy dampness into the room. He glanced over the competition and then settled back to think up a name for the latest product from the laboratories of F. M. Espinosa and Company, designed to cure feminine maladies, headaches, weakness, sterility, tumors, liver spots, and other disorders, etc.

  He dipped the point of his
pen in the inkwell and without hesitation started to write:

  Saravia Espinosa. Cures all...

  THE WOMAN TURNED AROUND and stared."MayIask why you're following me?" she said.

  "My name is Pioquinto Manterola, ma'am, journalist by trade. And your face..."

  They stood in the middle of Alameda Park, in the center of town. The woman held a yellow parasol against the penetrating rays of the sun,while the journalist was forced by a sense of chivalry to doff his English-style cloth cap, exposing his bald dome to the merciless heat. Nearby a small boy sold fruit-flavored shaved ices from a cart.

  "I certainly hope you realize that the mere fact of being a reporter doesn't give a man the right to go following a woman all over town. Why, if that were the case..."

  She smiled. Manterola had spotted the Widow Roldan and a companion walking down the street as he left the newspaper and he'd followed them to the park. Her friend had left her only a few minutes earlier, and the journalist had chosen that moment to close the distance between them.

  "Do you want me to stop following you or would you like to hear my story?" asked Manterola.

  The woman smiled again and walked toward one of the benches near the bandstand.

  "Well?" asked the widow once they sat down.

  "Excuse me, but I only know your late husband's name. What may I call you?"

  "My name is Margarita. Margarita Herrera."

  "Well the story is that I happened to be on the third floor of the building where I work on the day Colonel Zevada fell out of the window across the street. And it was my good fortune to happen to see you there at that very moment."

  The woman paled momentarily. "Would you be so kind as to buy me an ice cream? This heat is unbearable."

  The journalist nodded and waved to an ice cream man who stood with his cart about twenty yards away. The widow sat in silence, staring at the fountain. Manterola observed her calmly. She'd gained control of herself once again.

  A group of charros rode past on horseback. Nearby a rowdy pack of truant cadets tossed a sack full of papers into the air.

  "You were saying, sir, that you'd had the good fortune to..."

  "I'm sorry the circumstances were what they were, but I must say... that the look of distress on your face made a great impression on me," said the journalist.

  "Do you think that I pushed him?"

  "I'm a journalist, not a judge, ma'am. I'm not accusing you of anything. It's just my natural curiosity."

  "What else do you know about me?"

  "I saw your photograph in the pocket of a trombonist who died a few days before the incident with Colonel Zevada."

  The woman paled again. She tugged nervously at a silk handkerchief embroidered to match her parasol.

  She hadn't tasted the ice cream. Now she let it drop to the ground.

  "Senora, if I can be of any help to you in any way...You can count on my discretion."

  The widow stared at him, searching for some sign in the journalist's face. But her violet eyes probed deeper, until she found the wound left there by another woman, the wound with its vulnerable scar tissue.

  "What did you say your name was?"

  "Pioquinto Manterola."

  The sack of papers fell with a loud thud next to their bench, and for a moment they were surrounded by the riotous cadets.

  The widow stood up. When the reporter was about to do the same, she stopped him with a wave of her hand.

  "You'll be hearing from me very soon," she said, and she walked away twirling her parasol.

  Manterola followed her with his eyes. He knew that she'd found his weak spot, but at least he was aware of it. "I may be stupid but I'm not blind," he told himself.

  THE POET OUGHT TO REMEMBER itwell enough, since he was my only witness. I brought my hand up to my throat and undid the rope around my neck.lhen I started to cry. Only, without making a sound. Like a man who can't talk would cry. Not a sound, just these big fat tears rolling down my cheeks, and me, that is the other me, the new me, the survivor, not even trying to stop them.

  That's the first thing I remember about myself, about my new life. That, and the feeling that this new life came complete with memories of the old one. Those memories were my reward-the feeling that even though I'd been so close to death I still hadn't managed to leave behind the baggage I'd meant to take along with me when I went. That's when I told myself: "If you want to go on living, then you're just going to have to put up with yourself."

  Ever since then I've been easier on myself, more forgiving of my faults, the master of my own misery, you could say, more tolerant of this nearly forty-year-old man who keeps on with his stubborn fight with the minutes and the hours... With this time that's been graciously loaned to me, or perhaps I should say: returned.

  THEY CLOSED OFF ROSARIO STREET, parking a car at one end and camouflaging it with a few clay flower pots for appearances' sake. Then they fenced off the other end of the block and set up the security team, revolvers showing in the men's back pockets. Banners hung on the walls with the emblems of the CGT (General Workers Confederation) and the Textile Federation. Security wore red arm bands, the reception committee wore green ones. Fry stands bloomed all along the block. There were literature tables and, in the middle of the street, a small stage for the orchestra, the singers, and the speakers. At eight o'clock the people started to arrive.

  They came from San Angel, Contreras, Chalco, Tlalpan, Doctores, San Antonio Abad, and Tacubaya, dressed in their Sunday best but without the slightest air of pretension, worn-out vests over clean white shirts, buttons polished to a shine, their distinctive wide-brimmed hats freshly brushed. Under their vests they carried their iron,.22 revolvers, Browning automatics, Belgian pistols bought off the docks in Veracruz, short-barreled Colts, knives. Theirs was a festive force in a state of war. Red ribbons hung from their buttonholes with slogans inscribed in golden letters: NEITHER GOD NOR MASTER. SON OF THE EARTH. FREE OF CHAINS. PARIAH.

  The Barrio Rosales Orchestra arrived shortly after eight and stormed the bandstand.

  Jacinto Huitron was scheduled to speak following the overture (Wagner, oh well). The skinny anarchist scrambled onto the stage as the last notes faded away, and opened fire with the following words:

  "Let us invoke the emancipating spirit of Spring! Now is the time for Jupiter to obliterate the steps of the tyrant's throne, for Mars to shatter his weapons of war and devour himself, for Janus to cast down the naves of the temple and crush the worshipers within, and for Croesus to consummate his union with Temis the concubine and cut off his own head with his double-edged sword. Long live Anarchy!"

  Fermin Valencia, professional poet, stood in the crowd, cozying up to Odilia the munitions factory worker. But he couldn't keep his eyes off the lay-poet improvising on stage. What drove these crazy anarchists to embellish their political message with thirdrate poetry? The band struck up a tango, wild and melancholy, and the workers danced.

  By the time Pioquinto Manterola arrived arm in arm with the lawyer Verdugo, the orchestra had switched gears and was sounding off on a lively polka.

  Manterola was radiant. It was just his kind of thing. The noise, the gaiety, were like the gloved hands of a thousand fairies caressing his senses. He loved to watch the solemn faces of the textile workers, the men and women with their open, tired smiles, the girls from the Palacio de Hierro sweatshops, the seamstresses from the Nueva Francia bonnet factory, the hatmakers, the young men from Ericsson Telephone halfway between workers and skilled technicians. The two friends cordially ignored the poet caught up in his conquest of the beautiful Odilia, and went on to look for the Chinaman, lost somewhere in the dancing, chattering multitude that filled the street. They found Tomas at a literature table arguing with Ciro Mendoza, a young anarchist leader from the textile mills.

  "But we've got to be patient, Tomas," Ciro was saying.

  "Patience is fol the bosses," answered Tomas, and noticing his two friends he waved them over.

  "Cilo, I wa
nt you to meet a couple of fiends of mine. This is Pioquinto Mantelola, and this is the illustlious licenciado Veldugo. Veldugo tlanslated Malatesta. Why don't you ask him what Malatesta had to say about patience?"

  "Sorry, Tomas, I don't quote Malatesta at parties."

  "This isn't a party. Or well, sure, it's a kind of party, but you can quote Malatesta here and nobody's going to mind," said the union leader.

  The music was picking up steam and the journalist separated himself from the conversation and drifted off to mingle with the dancing couples. At one of the stalls, partygoers threw baseballs at a caricature of Napoleon Morones, eternal leader of the procapitalist unions. The prize for hitting the effigy three times was an anarchist songbook. A little farther on they were raffling off the complete works of Bakunin, and beyond that the Estrella strikers were raffling off a goat.

  A thin young man with a bow tie was in the middle of a fiery speech. He had the sort of intensity about him that came from endless days and nights dedicated to the struggle.

  "The movement doesn't try and tell you how to think, the organization isn't looking for sheep. What the movement needs is militant activists. Criticism isn't something we want to silence, it's something that has to run free like a rushing river..."

  V E R D U G O THE LAWYER stuck one foot in through the window, grabbed his hat, and slipped into the darkened house.

  After leaving the anarchists' ball, and over the journalist's objections, he'd decided to make a pass by the widow's mansion. He carried a map of the layout in his head and figured that if he were caught, at the very worst, he could bow out more or less gracefully with a story about a midnight rendezvous with his friend Conchita.

  He closed his eyes and waited for them to get used to the dark. He counted to ten, took a step, and tripped over a chair that shouldn't have been there. Groping tentatively, he headed for the banister which would lead him down the stairs to the main floor. Finally, after a few more collisions and a decidedly unpleasant encounter with something that could either have been a cat or a giant rat, he found the stair rail and started to descend. His prodigious memory told him there should have been twenty-one steps, so when he got to the twenty-fifth he started to think that either he'd broken into the wrong house or that, despite his calculations, he was somehow heading down into the basement. Finally, well past the thirtieth step, he was forced to conclude the staircase wasn't the same one he'd seen on the evening of the picture show. Most likely it was another staircase that led from the front of the house into the kitchen, or something like that. He was thinking so hard he hardly noticed when the stairs suddenly ended, the floor leveled out under his feet, and he found himself standing in front of the main fireplace, with its marble mantelpiece, just where he would have expected to find it. He cursed himself, swearing never to trust his treasonous memory again. Then he reoriented himself in the room and with his arms outstretched groped for the door next to the swinging door to the kitchen, which Conchita had told him led to her room. Finally his fingers touched wood and, imitating the cat he'd run across upstairs, he scratched on the door with his fingernails. If Conchita was out he could go on and search another part of the house. He scratched again just to be sure and then heard a noise coming from the front hall. Someone turned on a light. The lawyer opened the door and stepped quickly into Conchita's bedroom. The light from the street shed a vague glimmer over the empty bed. "Dammit," murmured Verdugo.