Tyrant Memory

Would it be better if nothing remained of our lives, nothing at all?
If death meant our instant obliteration in the minds of all who have had images
of us? Would this be more considerate of those who follow? For it may well be
that what remains of us constitutes a claim on them, a burden they are forced to
carry. Perhaps human beings are not free because they contain too much of the
dead and because this surplus refuses ever to be abolished.

— Elias Canetti, from
The Agony of Flies

Haydée’s Diary

Friday, March 24

It’s been a week since Pericles was arrested. I expected
him to be released today, as has always occurred on previous occasions, when
they let him come home after a week. But now the situation is different. Colonel
Monterrosa told me as much, at noon today in his office, with a look of regret
on his face because he respects Pericles: “I’m sorry, Doña Haydée, but the
general’s orders are final: Don Pericles will remain under arrest until further
notice.” I began to suspect that the general is angry or afraid about something
else when, on that first day, I found out they hadn’t locked him up in the room
next to Colonel Monterrosa’s office — he’s the chief of police — but instead had
taken him to one of the cells in the basement; the colonel told me he was very
sorry, but the decision to deal more firmly with Pericles had come straight from
the top. During his previous imprisonments, my husband could receive visits from
friends authorized by the colonel, and we always ate lunch and dinner together
in that room, where I’d bring the food María Elena and I had prepared. Now,
Pericles is isolated, and they allow him to come up to that other room only once
a day, at lunchtime, to meet me. But I suppose I shouldn’t complain: Don Jorge’s
situation and that of other political prisoners is much worse.

After speaking with Colonel Monterrosa, I returned home and called
my father-in-law to ask if he knows why Pericles isn’t being released. My
father-in-law told me the general has his reasons, and the best thing for me to
do is bide my time. I did not insist. My father-in-law is a man of few words,
loyal to his general, and Pericles’s articles criticizing the government upset
him greatly; every time I’ve ever asked him why they arrested my husband, he
answers simply that acts of disobedience cannot go unpunished.

Then I called my parents’ house to tell them the bad news. My mother
asked me how Pericles is taking it. I told her he seemed to have been expecting
it, his only remark being, “It appears the man is very frightened.” My husband
never calls him “the general” or “Mr. President,” or “the Nazi warlock,” like my
father and his friends do; he simply calls him “the man.” My mother asked me if
Betito and I were going to come over for dinner. I said yes; the youngest is
always the favorite grandchild.

Our neighbors came over for a visit this evening. The Alvarados
expressed their regrets that Pericles had not been released, though they are
very careful when it comes to discussing politics. Raúl is a doctor, but
astronomy is his true passion; he has a telescope and whenever a special
phenomenon is about to take place, which he always knows about, like a meteor
shower, he invites Pericles to stay up with him to watch it. Rosita, his wife,
brought me some women’s magazines she got from the Neighborhood Circle, a club
sponsored by the American Embassy, of which they are members — I’d like to join
but Pericles does not think very highly of it.

Saturday, March 25

I find relief from my solitude writing in this diary.
It’s the first time since we were married that I have been separated from
Pericles for more than a week. When I was a teenager I used to keep a diary, a
dozen or so are stored away in my memory trunk; I used to spend days in my room
reading one novel after another, lost in my own fantasy world. Then came
marriage, children, responsibilities.

This morning, before my father left for his finca, we had a long
conversation. I asked him if he could think of any way to pressure the general
to release Pericles. He told me that in a few days the coffee-growers’
association would meet with the American ambassador, and he would present
Pericles’s case as one more violation of freedom of the press, he said it wasn’t
enough for the dictator to detain Pericles’s boss, Don Jorge, and to keep the
Press Club closed since January, but now he has gone after the columnists. But
he warned me that the Nazi warlock has gone off the deep end and doesn’t listen
to anybody, “not even your father-in-law,” he told me. My father respects my
father-in-law, even though sometimes he calls him “the cantankerous colonel,”
and he doesn’t approve of his total obedience to the general.

At noon, I brought my husband books and tobacco. We ate in silence.
I then talked to him about family matters; he told me he is weary of the lack of
natural light, and the damp. I don’t like his pallor or that cough of his, which
is becoming chronic. He repeated that “the man” feels besieged, trusts no one,
otherwise he wouldn’t have consigned him to this basement cell, and wouldn’t
keep him locked up.

Clemen dropped by this afternoon. He’s outraged that his father is
still behind bars. I told him his grandfather has recommended patience, for
there is nothing to be done at the moment. My eldest son is hot-blooded,
imprudent; he was cursing the general, calling him “that little shitfaced
dictator,” saying that nobody wants him anymore, he should step down and leave
the country. I suggested he show some restraint with his words. He promised he
would come for lunch tomorrow, Sunday, with his wife and children.

Later in the afternoon, Carmela came by, and we had a cup of coffee
on the terrace; she is still my best friend, has been ever since high school.
She brought a delicious lemon pie. She was very sorry to hear that Pericles had
not been released, and she warned me that there are new rumors of a coup d’état.

A short while ago, just as I was sitting down to write, my sister
Cecilia called. I told her about Pericles, but we soon started talking about the
cross she bears, much weightier than mine: her husband, Armando, has become an
inveterate alcoholic, and every time he gets drunk he turns aggressive, violent;
he has never hit her, because he’s afraid of my father, but he always gets into
serious trouble and ends up at that house of ill repute. They live in Santa Ana,
the city where we were born and raised, where I married Pericles; it’s also
where my grandfather’s old mansion is, which my father has turned into a
coffee-processing plant.

Sunday, March 26

Patricia called from Costa Rica quite early this morning.
I told her that her father was still in jail. There was a long silence. She is
the most sensible of my three children, the one most like Pericles, the one
who’s closest to him. She asked me how her father’s spirits were. I told him
that his spirits aren’t a problem but his cough is. She told me her husband also
has a bad cold. Patricia and Mauricio were married last December first in San
José; such a lovely wedding. She asked me to call her the moment Pericles is
released. My poor daughter: this is the first time she has been far away when
her father is in jail.

Then I went to eight o’clock Mass, as I do every Sunday. I prayed
for my husband to be released soon, even though he doesn’t believe in religion
or want anything to do with priests — he has always respected my beliefs, as I
respect his. On my way out of church, I stopped to chat with Carmela and some
other friends. They invited me to accompany them to the Club, but I had several
chores to do at home, particularly because María Elena has gone home to her
village. One weekend a month she visits her family, at the foot of the volcano,
near my father’s finca.

I spent the rest of the morning making chicken with rice and a beet
salad. Betito had gone to swim at the Club, and he returned a little before noon
to accompany me to the Black Palace — that’s what we call police headquarters.
They don’t let Betito come into the room where I meet with Pericles; he must
remain in the waiting room. Those are the general’s orders: I am the only person
authorized to see my husband and only for half an hour a day. Pericles was in a
very good mood: I assumed he must have had some good news, but he didn’t say
anything. I have been warned to never talk about politics during my visits,
because the walls have ears.

Clemen, Mila, and my three grandchildren arrived punctually at one
o’clock. The children are rambunctious and poorly behaved. Marianito is five
years old, but he is already a little demon; the twins, Alfredito and Ilse, just
turned three, and they seem headed in the same direction. Pericles quickly loses
patience with them; he doesn’t like how destructive, willful, and ill-mannered
they are. He says that Clemen and Mila do not make the best couple. “What else
could come from a union between a frivolous man and a shifty woman?” he
complained angrily once when the children got into his library and tore apart
several books; I told him not to talk like that. This afternoon, they started
running around the house asking for their grandpapa the moment they arrived.
When he is calm, Marianito is a tender, sweet child, the spitting image of
Clemen at that age.

After lunch, while Mila was out on the patio watching the children
play with Néron, our old dog, I asked my son what would happen to his father if
he were in prison during a coup d’état. Clemen said, without hesitating, that it
would be for the best, that a coup was, in fact, the speediest means for
Pericles to regain his freedom. Then I asked him what would happen to his
grandfather, Colonel Aragón, who has always been so loyal to the general. He
answered that this would depend on the position his grandfather takes during the
coup. I don’t share Clemen’s confidence that the best way to secure Pericles’s
release is a coup d’état. I’m fearful; I’d rather be with my husband if
something like that happens. I don’t understand very much about politics, but my
son is rather rash. And the general has been ruling this country with an iron
fist for twelve years.

I went to the Club this afternoon. I learned that Betito had been
drinking beer with some friends from school, secretly — he’s only fifteen years
old. When I got home, I scolded him, I told him he should have more respect for
me and not take advantage of his father’s absence to do foolish things,
for Pericles is very strict and would punish him on the spot; years ago he had
the same kinds of problems with Clemens.

After dinner, I spoke for a long time on the phone with Mama Licha.
The poor thing suffers from arthritis, which makes it difficult for her to walk.
She told me that every single day she asks my father-in-law when they will
release Pericles, and every single time the Colonel answers her with an
irritated harrumph. My mother-in-law adores my husband, her firstborn. She asked
me how Patricia is, and she complained that neither Clemente nor Betito had come
to visit her in the last two weeks. Cojutepeque is about twenty-five miles away;
the colonel’s the governor there.

Later, my mother called to tell me they had just returned from the
finca, where they had lunch with several couples, friends of theirs, including
Mr. Malcom, the British commercial attaché, and his wife. I assume the men, as
usual, spent their time in heated discussions about the war in Europe, then
mocking the general and his wife; my father says the English simply can’t
understand how that Nazi warlock has been able to hold onto power, nor why the
Americans make no concerted effort to remove him. My mother asked if there was
any news about Pericles.

Raúl and Rosita came by for a while this evening. We listened to the
radio, drank hot chocolate, and ate delicious vanilla biscuits. Raúl has his
clinic, but he also teaches at the university, where, according to him, the
atmosphere is quite heated and new protests are being planned against the
general. Both are very worried about Chente, their eldest son and a medical
student, who seems to be involved in planning the protests and refuses to
accompany them to the beach for the Easter holidays.

Monday, March 27

It’s strange how sometimes when I write in this diary I
feel nostalgic for my adolescence. Then I remember I turned forty-three last
October, I have three children and three grandchildren, and I started writing
this diary as a substitute for my conversations with my husband. I needed this
time alone, Pericles’s long absence, to get me to open this beautiful notebook
and begin to let my fountain pen glide across its bone-colored pages. I bought
it nine years ago in Brussels, when we’d already moved into the house on
Boulevard du Régent; in the mornings, after Pericles had left for the embassy
and Clemen and Pati for school, I would roam around the city for a few hours
with Betito, who at five years old was too young to go to nursery school in a
foreign language. I bought this notebook at a shop near Saint Catherine’s
Square. I saw it in the window, I loved the design on its hard cover, and I
immediately decided to buy it to write down my impressions as a stranger in that
city, a fantasy I’d been harboring ever since we crossed the Atlantic by
steamship. But I never wrote in it, not till now.

This morning, María Elena returned from her village later than
usual; usually she’s here by eight, but today it was almost eleven before she
arrived. She explained that Belka, her daughter, has a terrible flu, and they
had to take her to the hospital early in the morning; Belka is six years old,
spirited and charming, and lives with María Elena’s parents and siblings, and we
only get to see her when we visit the finca; María Elena’s family has always
worked for my family. I asked her to finish cooking the meatballs and rice that
were already on the stove while I packed the rest of the food in the basket I
take to Pericles every day: a thermos of coffee, hard-boiled eggs, milk, and
sweet rolls for breakfast; and ham and cheese sandwiches for dinner. What
matters most is that he not have to eat that filthy food they serve at the
palace.

My husband was very upset today: he found out that the general
didn’t have him arrested because of the article he wrote criticizing him for
violating the Constitution so he could get re-elected president, but rather
because somebody had told him that Pericles had agreed to join the group headed
by Don Agustín Alfaro, the leader of the coffee growers and bankers who are now
opposing the general, most of whom are Father’s friends. I told him that was
nonsense, the general knows very well that none of them agree with Pericles’s
ideas, which they consider communist. But gossip is gossip. And this wouldn’t be
the first time it’s happened: a few years ago, when the War in the Pacific
began, the general kept Pericles in jail for a week for no apparent reason,
though subsequently we learned that someone had told him that my husband was
spreading rumors about the general concocting a plan to re-supply Japanese
submarines on Mizata Beach and another plan to land Japanese troops in
California, and supposedly those stories had turned the government of the United
States against “the man.” But these accusations against my husband are
groundless, the whole world knows of the general’s sympathies for the Germans
and the Japanese and of his plans to assist them.