Grotesque Tales

The key

I

—Divine, girl, divine…

—But come on through, come through here.

For a moment, the chattering of the two girlfriends stopped. In the middle of the room, between the two night tables with their abat-jour, something of a liturgical feel, solemn, sinful, stretched out, in dark and polished cedar, in an imposing, semi-imperial style—the bed, loaded with curtains, apparently untouched under its luxurious fabric.

And it was neither in the living room, where they had wasted good taste, nor in that charming little parlour, nor in the hallways, nor in the dining room with large stools and big leather backs stamped with hunting scenes and chimaera legs, nor in the bathroom, with its display of tiles, of metal, in rubber and marble, not in the service rooms, the gigantic kitchen decorated with three long rows of aluminium saucepans, but there, in the bedroom, in the vast room lit by a frosted electric balloon since the wedding night, sifting the light into an underwater vagueness, that Carmen asked her friend the familiar question:

—And… are you happy?

—More than this, I couldn’t be… —Clara answered, pale, haggard, closing her eyes tightly.

II

An hour later, Carmen vaguely realized that Clara’s marriage was like everyone else’s. Four or five times, she had gone to visit her close friends during their honeymoon, and always, always, that nonsense of “I adore him” and “he cannot be without me for a moment,” and “we had a late breakfast,” and the “Go figure” and the Bible! But why would she, at thirty years old, get upset over some fool who got married… Such a waste! Still, some vague instinct settled inside herself, like a need to add a few drops of mistrust to that dish of molasses —whatever it was!— and finally, the irrefutable urge, like a law, made her whisper, caressing the hair of the newlywed, all fresh and naive in her trousseau gown:

—That’s what they all say…

And the other one, vividly: —No! And that’s just how it is, at least for me. About the others… I don’t know… Now I feel worse for them than ever because that must be awful… Oh, if only I thought that Jacobo… Nothing! I would go crazy. —And she shook her messy, damp, flowing hair over her shoulder… —I’d go crazy!

—Well, look, girl. Caracas would be a madhouse…

—But you think… —and Clara’s eyes, clear and unbelieving, fixed on the restless brunette, who answers with eyes so black, so wicked, like two bandits in the bushes: —No; I don’t think so… so soon?

—What do you mean by so soon?

—I say, it seems to me that they behave well at first; then, oh girl, they get bored, they entertain themselves… You know how men are!

That naive one, humiliated and suddenly hurt without knowing where, how, or why, could barely resist an aggressive feeling that crept into her spirit, smiling almost ironically: —Don’t be silly! You know better than me…

And the other, with a delightful confidence, and a slight blush: —Oh yes! Much better; maybe I don’t see my married sisters, or perhaps I didn’t see or hear from my brothers… They tell you first about a date with a fantastic friend at the Club, and he leaves you to meet this person for lunch one day; then this person is in Antímano, in Macuto, at Los Dos Caminos, and he has to talk to him there, half a day, a whole day… And if this fantastic person also has a fantastic ranch, you find yourself alone overnight while your husband is out hunting… which, unfortunately, sister, is the least fantastic thing you can imagine… And don’t believe they’d even bring you a piece of fur from the animal they claim to have killed as a gift… A horror! To Margarita, my cousin, Juan Francisco appeared one day with a leg of venison and, poor thing!, a label from the market stall was still stuck to its bone.

—No, girl, it’s not the same for everyone —Clara pushed back in a low voice, wanting to give her words a tone of certainty that denies the distrustful eyes, fixed in a corner of the room, on the wardrobe with its three-sided moon…

There was a pause. Suddenly, she called out:

—Oh, how forgetful, poor Jacobo left the keys!

Through the half-closed door of the wardrobe, a dark line of hanging trousers revealed the chain of keys… She ran to the piece of furniture, unhooked the coat hanger, and tried to loosen the iron fastener… She couldn’t.

—Here, you can do it.

And Carmen, handily, opened the keyring, scattering the keys across the bed.

—Wait, wait… I know them all. This, tiny one, the one from a certain box that no one knows about except the two of us; this one, the flatty, is from the annexo; this one, from the desk; this one, the one from the chest; this one… this one…

Then suddenly she stood up, a troubled wrinkle between her eyebrows… The other looked at her in silence.

—Which key does Jacobo use to open the office, then?

And she kept staring at a nickel-plated English key, reading the metal a bit idiotically: Yale ya… le. Then she thought, by euphonic association: Yeah, I’ll be asking him.

—Why, girl?

—Because this is the key, the only one… López must know… —And then, stepping out onto the gallery, she yelled:

—To López, have him come!

López came; he was her husband’s old servant, half driver, half cook, with a fleeting, concealed profile.

—López, does Don Jacobo have another key to the office?

—Nah, ma’am; I keep it. Opened up this mornin’ an’ swept, as I do every day. That door’s a pain; when he leaves, he slams it shut, an’ I gotta lock it up after…

—And this key?

The older man took it between his fingers after wiping the black garden dirt off on his pants… He stayed thoughtful: —This key? Sure, I know!