Three Trapped Tigers

by G. Cabrera Infante

  She was walking along the sidewalk when I saw her. Boccato di castroati. I told Cué. Latins are lady-lovers.

  —Who? he said. —Alma Mahler Gropius Werfel?

  —Vesper Maries. Spermary. Spermaceti. Sperm whale.

  —Whale? I mean where?

  —Starboard, sir. Ahoy! Ahoy! Thar she blows me!

  Captain Cuérageous looked.

  —Holy mackerel! Am I blind drunk? I don’t see one of them, I see two.

  —There are two of them. Excuse my infralanguage, but I only know the one on the outside. She’s a friend of Códac.

  —Fiend not friend. Sacré maquereau.

  —I mean the one on the outside, viejo. Metalanguage for you. And mindyourlanguage.

  —Coño! That’s some sight.

  —Some spectacles you should say.

  —Thanks to Ben Franklyn Delano. A whore in each lens. Bifocal lenses for the opposite sex. Contraria contrariis curantur.

  —Biconvex lenses. Bisexual lentils. Similia similibus curantur.

  —Do you really know her?

  —Yes, viejo. Códac introduced me.

  —You don’t introduce women like these, you make love at first sight. A touching sight. Contact lenses.

  They were turning the corner. It was her, whatchama callit? There was no miss taking her. With a friend of course. Le amiche. The well-knit longliness. The tits of loveliness. A tribe of tribades. You say trilogy, titralogy, and even pentalogy for someone who dares to go as far as five. Would you say sexology for six works? What about two? Biology. Freud says that primitive women, like children, can be persuaded to enjoy any kind of sexual experience. He didn’t say they were underdeveloped. He didn’t know them biblically or otherwise. But this one is overdeveloped. Was she persuaded into it or was it the work of Mother Nature? There’s no such thing as nature. Everything is history. Hystery. Hysteria is a concentric chaos. History, I mean. Freud also said that one might indulge in the most extreme forms of oral kissing, but that one would hesitate to use the toothbrush of one’s beloved. (Or la plume de ma tante?) Julieta? What is it, Romy darling? Have you been using my Prophy-lactic again? Bleaghh! Sigismondo was wrong. I’m ready to go deeper than any toothbrush. Where brushes fear to sweep. Shit, they’re turning down 15th. They are turning the corner of 15th Street, excuse me, Bertrand. Where Russells fear to think. Turn Cué turn, fuck you, fuCué.

  —They’se gone.

  He winced at my infralanguage, the radio-pedant, but, still looking like Cuéptain Ahab hunting Morbid Dyke, he immediately pulled the wheel hard over and the convertible turned, tacked about, with all aboard, including this binnacle or log, the log of Gog and Magog, magloglog, and it sailed into the narrow straits of the side street. Magellan Cué. Cuégellan. Macuéllan. Magalena! That’s who it is. TechniCué. Mnmotechnics. Technical memory. Arsenio Sebastian Cuébot lowered his sails, lay to and anchored on the other corner, to starboard. Depth, five fathoms, three fathoms, two bosoms, mark twin! Lower the boats. Harpoon at the ready.

  —Magellena’s her name. Magalena.

  —Leave it to me!

  Shit, I’ll have to stay on board. Call me Ishmale. He opened the hatch and using the pilot light looked at himself in the rearview mirror. He slicked his hair down. He has an obsession with his hair. This kid hasn’t learned anything from Yul Brynner. He disembarked. Alone. Prince Valiant. Prince Radiant. With his singing sword, a sweet-voiced myth. He plunged into the Jungle.

  —Bring ‘em back alive, Frank Buckué!

  I looked in the mirror and saw him walk off down the left-hand quayside, Cué’s side and certainly not the gayside, as I saw them coming toward him in the mirror road. He’s getting warmer. Nine eight seven sex five four three two one bang! Collision of the sexes. A cross-sexion. A coalision. When works collide. When words collogue. A collusion. A monologue, as he’s doing all the talking. What the fuck will he say? The tale of Cuésimodo and Esmeralda. Call me Emeralda. Enchanteused to meet you. Cuésimodo tries to kiss Esmeralda’s hand—and everything else as well. Sorry, nothing doing. Boy, are you homely. I was born that way. My teepest sympathy. But you’re more homely than Ulysses’ host, what’s his name, Polyphoetus, if you’ll excuse me saying so. He accepts her cuéndolences. Quésimodo racking his brains and pondering and walking up and down the quéys, roués, ballbards and aVenus of his mind thinking how can he get Emeraldita laid. Thinking in the rain. A light bulb for a whalo. That’s it! He would sell fake gargoyles, postcards and other junk as souvenirs of the cathedral of Notre Mom. A procursor. He’ll get rich, like almost all the pioneers, any five-year-old child knows that! Bring a five-year-old boy then. He leaves his little culture’s nest high up in the Gothic rooftops and goes to Pigalle. He hires the most beautiful woman he meets and takes her to dinner at the Tour de Nesle, the best restaurant of the age (thirteenth century, a terrible century: all the men who were born then are dead), and he orders one or two miniatures by artists of the school of Fondantbleu (say cheese) who are historically known to be the best. People will see him the next day titillating the tits of somewhore or more in the morning tablet. Edited by Téophraste Renaudotty. Cuésimodo begins to be on everybody’s lips. Le Tout Paris and all the other touts too—call him tú. The rest call him Cuési. They go Cuézy over him. Some of them call him Mody, Americanizing his name. The same people who say the Bastill when they spend a night in jail (another Americanism) or une drink d’hydrohoney and dance the country dances, well ahead of their times. Quel horreur le Franglais. It would take a Holy Roman Umpire to separate them. It’s the fault of all those Plantagenets with their goings and comings. Les anglais à la lanterne! We shall take care of thee lateh, Joan of Arc. Cuésimodo repeats his journey with another girl of his choice. Today he goes to the Equus Insanus, une taberna. Quel horreur le Franlatin. It’s all the fault of the Ecclesia Romana. Quod scripsi scripsi, Rabelaisius. Vae vatis. Carmen et error. Facsimiles are reproduced on every parchment. Esmeralda who, like almost everybody in the medieval world, is unable to read (that’s why we have to wait five centuries before there is a daily press in Paris) begins to see, like almost everybody else in the medieval world, the very small paintings, esp. a portrait, on ivory, vellum or the like. Cuésimodo with Carmen and also with Error. Cuésimodo with La Belle Dame and with Mercy. What’s he got, this Cuésimodo? she begins (at about the same time as she begins looking at the miniatures) asking herself. Then follow the journeys aux Champs, à la avenue de la Grande Armée, a Saint Germain des Pres and he’s the talk of the town. In this town of talk. Esmeralda is more than intrigued and decided to take a closer look at Cuésimodo. Horror. Even closer. Karma et horror. Closer and closer. Esmeralda has this habit when she is talking to a man of buttonholing him and unbuttoning his shirt. It’s actually a nervous trick: Cuésimodo is one of the giants of real life and of poetry. Esmeralda’s getting warmer. She begins to play with his buttons. But Cuésimodo is no longer interested in this mulatto girl who’s trying to pass herself off as a gypsy. Why? Because there are all those other girls, who are much better dressed and, besides, quel metier! Medievilly speaking, he buttons up his codpiece anew. What the fuck will he say to them? It’s impossible that they’ll recognize him in the dark. By his barky baritone of course. “Oh Rose & Mary I love your Fuck his barbitone voice. The cunnilinguage of the heart. They walk. They walk and talk. Walkie-talkies. The talkies. What a technique. Experience rather. They are coming talking. Trumpets off, clarions off. Strumpets on. And here come the Earwickers, the ear vicaries. Here they are. I open the door and get out. Luckily there’s not much light. I feel a bit like Quasimodo. Uneasy like Queasy. I’ll plug in my erogenous tone. Perfect mimicry. I’m a dumb showoff. Latins are loudy lovers.

  —Good evening.

  Arsenio introduced us. They’re old friends. We’re old friends. Truly friends over the years and the tide of pubic affairs or private parts, to say Cuban is to say amigo and the bird sings even though the branch is breaking and never mind the downpour it’s only Cuban wate
r falling amigos todos woman is king, queen I mean. No, I mean king. Silvestre, Beba and Magalena. Magalena and Beba, Silvestre Inshort. Delighted. I’m soo pleased to meat you. It’s a pleazure. Noo, meazure you now and

  pleazure you later. Giggles. I’m going down well. Was it me that said that? Yes, because Cuérteous Cué magallantly opens the sound-doors of his convertible to bring to you ladies the emotion and romance of a new episode—Tarsanio’s on the air! from the unconscious depths of the jungle in the heart of Darkest Africa boccato di missioneri a cry is heard that defoliates the virgin forest Tanmangakué! It is Zartan, Tarzan’s elder brother’s pet bugger and zoodomite. Listenhoney. Who’s talking? You don’t think baby-blue that we’re going to get in just like that without a roof over our heads. It’s not Magalena. I’m not going in that. Exposed to the bad weather. Don’t you see we’ve just come out of the beauty parlor. It’s the other one who’s talking. What the hell’s her name? Don’t jog me. Don’t hustle me, gentlemen. I’ve got a godawful memory. Beba! Which not only means baby, but also to drink in Cubanned. Drink Coca Phony, the refreshing menopause. Come alike! Drink Fantasy! Señorita, no paella can be fun/ without a sausage in a bun. Radio Suaritos or commercials considered as pubiscity and advertenticing. A sexage and a pun. On all fours, I mean in four hours, senora, we will fly you from Havana to New York, by Nacheeonal Earlines. Are your hands clean, senorita? Then use Revlon nail polish and see the difference. Men about town, if you want a ready-maid go somewhere else. If you want a good hand job go to Casa Pérez, the shirt house. Magalena is talking, Magalena who’s rounded my Cape Horn making the round tour of Dante’s InCuérno and sits down in the back seat. Next to me. Me for you and you for me. Formecation. I sail through the straits of Magellana and founder on a breast, I think. Or are there two of them? Feminine fashions tend to homo . . . Don’t get me wrong. To homogenize, I mean, it’s my tongue that gets me wrong, to make one of what nature intended to be two. There are two breasts, two buttocks and every fashion tries to make them look like one. Cué pressed a knobble, a knipple, a knob. We are sitting two a breast in the Verdun theater and over the sound of the roof sliding back into place we can even hear background music. He also turned on Daniel Amfitheatrophy. Or is it Bakueleinikoff? Or perhaps Erichué Wolfgang Corngold? He’s turned on that sonofabitch of a radio. “Technique is condensed experience.” Evaporated silk. Indirect music that predisposes you to love. “Dear car owner” (the voice interrupting the music purring like a cat in perpetual heat could almost be Cué’s), “please inscribe a knob on your radio panel with my name.” The air carries the words away but melady lingers on. “And now, in the romantic voice of Cuba Venegas and by courtesy of Casino socks, Piloto & Vera’s bolero, `Nostalgic Meeting.’ It’s a Puchito record.” Puchito! What a name! Puke-ito. Cuba Venegas. The romantic voice of the queen of the bolero. La puta nacional, folk’s whore, that’s what she is. Socks in the cocksino. Shit. Neuralgic meeting by Vera and his co-piloto, by Pilot and his co-vera, by Piloto and Viera, Plotov & Beria, the stakhanovites of the bolero. Arslongo Cuébrevis fastens the top and drives off with all on board toward the night of love, madness and death. Would you like to hear the sad Tristory of Isolde? Don’t forget to tune in to the next episoda.

  That’s how they talk on Cuban radio and the episolde is only another selected item from my two years before the mast (urban), the adventures of Long John Silver and how he met Robinson Cuésoe on the Island of Lesbos. Caco Phony.

  Cué missed his Cué going down 17th not because he’s superstitious but because he prefers 21st, for reasons that are purely numerical and besides it’s personal. So we return to the avenue and make for the sea. The red light stopped us on Linea and I saw Magalena’s beautiful face turn from cinnamon to cinder thanks to the mean tungsten light. It was then I noticed her birthmark, a pale shadow cutting across her nostrils and on her cheeks. I thought she noticed me looking so I said quickly:

  —Códac introduced us one evening.

  That’s what he said, and she pointed her finger at Cué, its long nail painted with what would have been red nail polish if the lapis lazuli, chalcedony or chrysoprase (it needs words like these to correspond to its infernal color) bulb of that brilliantly lit public enemy of lovelight hadn’t been shining over us.

  —Arsenio’s the name. Arsenio Cué.

  Ferocious barbarhythms, translated of course from the American. He also says afluente instead of próspero, moron for idiota, me luce instead of me parece, chance for oportunidad, controlar instead of revisar and things like that. Que horror el Espanglish. Doctor Esperanglish, I consume. We’ll take good care of you one day, Lyno Novás.

  —Ah, the other one said, the one who’s called Beba. —It’s true. You’s the actor on TV. I’ve often seen you on it.

  She was a woman not a girl and she must have had some ancestor from Africa who had disappeared in the crossing of other tropical rivers. One of those mulattos who aren’t mulattos, but so cleverly mixed that only a Cuban or a Brazilian or maybe Faulkner would be able to detect it. She had long black hair that had been done up a moment ago and big brown eyes with plenty of eye shadow and a mouth which was not so much sensual as what people here call depraved. Wisdom of the elite. As though forms, aside from being sketched in by light and having dimensions and a position in space, could also adopt moral concepts. An ethics for Leonardo. A touch of the brush is a moral problem. The face is the mirror of the soul. Lombroso’s prog-nose. O tempera, O mores. Venus vide, da Vici.

  Etcethics. She must have a stunning figure but now all I could see of her was a sculptor’s bust, her head in the shadows. I saw Cué looking at himself in the mirror. Or rather, looking in the mirror. He was spying on Magalena in the rear-view mirror. Supposing he offers me a swap, what then? Or is he planning a chicken switch? I’ll tell him to go fuck his mother and get out. Or should I stay and say O.K. cunt me in. In any case I’d gain by changing. Shit, I don’t like oldies. Gerontophobia. Is a woman old at twenty-five? You must be out of your mind, you pervert. A sensualist, a sexualist, that’s what you are. I don’t want to deprave you of life but you’ll end up like Humbert Humbert started off. Or like Hunger Humbert. Or like Humble Humbert by Humperdinck. Hansel & Gretel. First with Gretel and then fuck with. You Humble Pervert. Shit! Better a eunuch. Eugene Eunusco. I’ll go work for Unesco. Just a moment. Have you no honor? No country? No loyalty to royalty—royalty to loyalty? Magalena’s no chicken, nor’s the other so old as all that. One at a time. A chick in the hand. Don’t covet thy neighbor’s whore. Let’s take another peep at her. She’s not at all bad. Why the fuck should she be? Who saw her first? I or me? Nineteen and thirty-six, twenty-four, thirty-eight. The Cabala? No, statistics. Cuban bodice. Cuban boy. Cuban body. Body by Fisher. MagaleNash Ramper, exhibited on La Rampa. The name of the agency is Amber Motors. Sepia Motors. General Motels. Window wenching. Fordnicating. Statitstics. Venus video. Vice. Latin’s a lousey lover. Cacofunny.