Thursday Night Widows (12 page)

Without realizing it, we had crossed a line and I found myself addressing him informally, as “
vos
”.

“What sort of size property are you looking for? Have you got children?” I asked, as we delved into the streets of The Cascade.

“No, it's just two of us – my wife and me. We've been married for five years, but no kids yet.”

“Maybe you'll get the urge here. This is a wonderful place to enjoy with children.”

He didn't answer, but wound down the window and gazed into the street. As we drove on, I began thinking about the moment I had accepted that Juani would be my only child. Before getting married, I had dreamed of having at least three, but once Ronie had lost his job, our efforts were concentrated on maintaining what we already had, rather than taking on anything new. And what we had could be measured in square feet, holidays, comfort, private schooling, a car, sports; not in children. At least there was one to continue the family line.

“I bet your wife gets broody here. Cascade Heights is like a bubble of fertility.” I don't know if he was listening to me. At various points during that drive, I had the feeling that he was not listening. He was quite determined to find a house to rent that very night; as we went up and down the streets, he kept picking out details that I would have dismissed as unimportant, and it was clear that anything I might say for or against a property would make not a blind bit of difference to his decision. “Carla doesn't like dark paintwork,” “Carla hates glass-panelled doors,” “My wife doesn't like lacquered floors,” “If Carla saw the fittings in the main bathroom, she'd die.” These were just some of the arguments he used to reject a string of potential homes.

Finally one turned up trumps. “I think she'll like this,” he said, when I showed him the Garibottis' place. Built all on one level, it was smaller than the average Cascade Heights house, but with some very tasteful features: bespoke fittings, pine floors, antique ironwork. It certainly wasn't typical of a gated community. It was more like something you'd find in Boston.

“I've got another one to show you, at about the same price, but a little more modern and with a much bigger garden.”

“No, this garden's ample. I'll rent this one, it's fine. How much do I have to leave as a deposit?”

“But wouldn't you like your wife to take a look at it first?”

“No,” he said, and he looked at me with an ambivalence that seemed to convey strength and weakness in equal measure. He fumbled for something else to say, as though such a round “no” needed elaboration. “I don't want her to know; it's a surprise. A surprise present.”

It was obvious that he was lying. “Oh, a surprise. Your wife's going to be thrilled!” I lied back. During my years at The Cascade, I had seen many surprise gifts, and lost my capacity for astonishment. There was the Mercedes Benz jeep that Insúa gave to Carmen during a dinner party for various friends at his house and which appeared as they were eating, approaching over the parkland, driven cross-country by a chauffeur, with a white bow and everything. The jeep was sporting the white bow, not the chauffeur. There was the production company Felipe Lagos set up for his second wife, at the end of a course she had been taking in cinematography. There was the shopping trip to Miami for Teresa Scaglia and a friend, funded by El Tano as a present for her last birthday, and with a cruise thrown in. But to rent a house, thirty miles away from your present home, without first consulting your wife? That seemed too farfetched. Buy a house, maybe, but
rent
one? No way.

While I was preparing the paperwork for Gustavo Masotta's deposit, I watched him pacing the ground outside. He was breathing deeply, as though he would have liked to draw all the available air into him. A man alone, who had just chosen the house he was going to share with his wife, who did not need to confirm his decision with her, and yet was absolutely adamant that everything, to the last detail, should meet with her approval.

He came into the house and collapsed into a chair next to me. We both signed the agreement, I took his deposit and informed him how much my commission would be. He wanted to pay it straight away. I told him no, that I would not speak to the owner until that night or the following day, and that, if everything was in order,
next week they could sign the rental agreement and pay the balance. “I want to move in this weekend.”

“Well, we need to tidy up the paperwork and have the house thoroughly cleaned. The owner will have to remove some items.”

“I'll handle the cleaning. And he can leave whatever he wants, it doesn't bother me.”

“I'll see what I can do.”

“I need to move in as soon as possible.” This wasn't a request – his tone of voice made that clear. It reminded me of the obstinate way in which El Tano had demanded a certain plot of land for his house, and not another – no other one would do. They were both purposeful, but in other respects their bearing was very different. Gustavo did not have that same quiet confidence of getting what he wanted. There were suspicion and pain in his resolve. Not in El Tano's. And yet there was something in Gustavo Masotta that reminded me of El Tano Scaglia, something that drew them together like magnets, in spite of their being so different.

“Do you play tennis, by any chance?” I asked him, as we were leaving.

“I used to play it, a long time ago, before I got married. I was seeded.”

“In that case, once you're settled in, let me know. I'd like to introduce you to El Tano Scaglia, one of our members who plays tennis spectacularly well and hasn't been able to find anyone of his level to play with.”

“I hope I don't disappoint him,” he said, and this sounded like false modesty. “But that would be good for me. I need to meet new people.”

“Yes, when you come to live here you always need to meet new people. It's the same for all of us. Everyone
else, your old friends, seem very far away.” He looked at me and smiled, then his gaze was lost once more in the view through the window. Out of the corner of my eye I watched him and I wondered if I really had forgotten my mobile, or if everything had been orchestrated by Gustavo in his urgency to rent a house that very evening. And I had no doubts as to the answer.

It was eleven o' clock in the morning and Carmen was still in bed. She couldn't summon the energy to get up. The night before she had lain awake troubled by images from a news item which showed a plane failing to gain altitude then tacking along the coast before crashing into the Golf Association's driving range. The same driving range where Alfredo played golf every Friday, she had thought. Nearly one hundred dead, she thought that she had heard. She had finally fallen asleep, but now the prospect of facing the morning bore down on her. The maid (a new one) knocked on the frame of the door and, without stepping into the room, said, for the third time that morning: “Shall I bring your breakfast, Señora?”

Carmen gave up. She got out of bed and went to have a wash. “Bring me a glass of Rutini to the bathroom.”

She was trying to give up smoking again and, rather than eating more – which was what had happened the first time – found she could not start the day without a glass of wine. Especially not this day. She turned on the shower and stepped under the hot water. The first drops stung her body. Outside the sun had already melted the morning frost in the garden. She wondered how to
spend the rest of the day. No particularly tempting idea came to mind. The only thing she had learned to do during her years in The Cascade was to play Burako, which she had loved, but recently the game had lost its charm. Making
escaleras
no longer appealed. It was like knitting was for other women: something to keep your hands busy. Placing the tiles down on the table smacked of self-deception – here was uselessness disguised as productivity. For years she had been putting off various projects, persuading herself that she would come to them once her children were at school all day. Then, she told herself, she would put herself first and concentrate on her own work. But now the twins were about to leave secondary school and Carmen had still not managed to get her teeth into anything. She liked interior decorating, but Alfredo judged that the courses available at tertiary level were “not up to much, a waste of money”. She liked drawing and painting. Perhaps the time had come to sign up for one of Liliana Richards's painting classes. Or maybe it would be better to leave it for a few months. She wasn't sure. She also liked psychology. She had never had analysis, but had begun to feel an interest in the subject during sessions with a psychologist after her operation. “Total hysterectomy,” the doctor had said and, although she had not heard these words before, she understood their implication. Since the operation, she had not gone back to help in the children's centre at Santa María de los Tigrecitos. “Go on, it will make you feel better,” said Alfredo. But she didn't go back. She would have liked to be a psychologist. Or to study counselling, a shorter course, like Sandra Levinas. Alfredo approved of that idea. Her husband liked Sandra Levinas; he said she was
“cute”. But any of these options would require her to take exams in the subjects still pending from secondary school and, given that nobody knew she hadn't finished school – least of all Alfredo – it was going to be very hard to do that without arousing suspicion.

At noon, she went down to the garden. She moved a lounger into the sun and lay down on it to read the decor magazine that came every month. At half-past twelve the maid appeared and asked, “Does Señora want lunch?” Carmen asked for a lettuce and watercress salad. “Bring it to me out here,” she shouted, just as the woman was going into the house. Ten minutes later the maid returned with a tray. On it was a medium-sized salad bowl containing the specified greens, which were dressed with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, “the way Señora likes it”, as well as cutlery, a cloth napkin, a glass, a jug of water and also a plate of chargrilled steak, “in case Señora feels like it”.

Carmen sent back the steak; it struck her as impertinent that the maid should meddle with her diet. This woman was no Gabina – she did not even know how to cook. “Bring me the Rutini that I had this morning, the whole bottle,” she said severely, and the maid took away the steak, then returned with the wine, making no further comment.

After lunch, she fell asleep in the sun. She dreamed. A heavy dream, as sweet and warm as the sun that sedated her. Sleep clung onto her, not allowing her to surface. She dreamed in red. But with no pictures, no story. It was the maid who woke her up, with a telephone call. “Señora, Teresa Scaglia is on the phone,” she said. On the ground beside the lounger, the glass had toppled over and dregs of wine had stained the magazine.
Carmen took the phone. Teresa was inviting her to a seminar on Feng Shui in an hour's time at her children's school, “in aid of a home for needy children. Didn't you hear about it?” Carmen asked if it was for the “Los Tigrecitos” centre. “No, some other poor children, not ours.” Teresa had a spare ticket. She talked her into it: “You love decoration, and I'm telling you, these tickets were one hundred pesos each, so it's got to be good, even if it is for charity.”

While Carmen got changed, she tried to contact Alfredo. He was in a meeting and couldn't speak to her. Invariably, at around midday, Alfredo claimed to be in meetings, and switched off his mobile. She had found no further clues in the credit card statements, nor did she need to: it was increasingly obvious that Alfredo was cheating on her with someone, and that he didn't care if she knew about it. Perhaps he even wanted her to know, she thought. But what did he expect her to do? She was not going to look the other way.

She kept trying to get him on the phone; she was out of cheques and she needed him to bring back a new cheque book. The secretary wasn't there either. “They must be in some motel,” she thought, as she put on make-up in front of the mirror.

At 3 p.m., Teresa Scaglia sounded the horn of her four-by-four. Carmen came out. “Lala's coming too, and Nane Pérez Ayerra,” said Teresa with enthusiasm, as Carmen climbed into the jeep. It surprised Carmen that Nane would be interested in this sort of thing; she was very sporty and spent most of the day playing tennis or in the gym. “No, she hasn't got a clue what it's about, but she's laid up with a pulled muscle in her leg, so she thought she'd come along.”

The auditorium at Lakelands School was jam-packed. Carmen counted only three men in the audience. All the rest were women. A heady confusion of imported perfumes pervaded the air and she felt herself submitting again to the torpor of her earlier siesta. But this sensation was not sweet, or red.

The speaker came onto the stage to ringing applause. Carmen applauded, too. He did not have any oriental features. He surely was not Chinese. In fact he described himself, according to the simultaneous translation feeding into Carmen's right ear, as “a Master of Feng Shui in Palo Alto, California”. Looking around her, she saw that very few women were wearing the earpiece, not even Teresa, who knew only a smattering of English, gleaned on her shopping trips to Miami.

“I am not going to teach you the traditional Feng Shui practised in the East, but a westernized Feng Shui,” said the speaker. He paused for dramatic effect – evoking that moment of suspense on television shows, before the commercial break – then said: “I wouldn't dare try to transform the wonderful houses I have seen around here into pagodas.”

The audience laughed, appreciating his flattery. “Let us take from Feng Shui that which is useful to us, and leave the rest for others.”

Carmen latched onto the word “others” and missed the next sentence. She wondered if the others referred to Chinese people, or to those who had not come here to listen to the master, or to her own father, who, after her mother left him, had lived alone in a one-roomed flat in Caballito, paid for by Alfredo, and who was buried now in a plot at the memorial cemetery, also paid for by Alfredo. The others might also be her husband's
secretary, in this case “the other woman”. Or her mother, to whom she had not spoken since her father's funeral, and whom she regarded as even more dead than him. The women who took part in those Burako tournaments that she had once organized with Lala or Teresa were not “others” because they were here, and they acknowledged her. The “others” were never defined, or perhaps they were lost in translation.