Читать книгу Ajijic - Patricio Fernández Cortina - Страница 9

Chapter IV

The Book

One afternoon, before the sun began to set, the man visited La Renga for the last time. The bookstore bell rang loudly. Julio, who was in the back patio washing some coffee cups, shuddered. He knew it was him because he had heard the bell. Who else but him would ring the bell when the door is open? Julio crossed the arch and stood next to the counter, still with rag in hand, and, breaking the unwritten rule of silence, the norm mutually understood by the man and the bookseller, which he had been respectful of for years, he said, without hiding his excitement or being able to contain himself:

“Good afternoon, sir. You are very welcome.”

The man did not say a word and did not even turn to look at Julio, but instead began to look at the books on the first bookcase. Julio felt as if a train had stopped him cold in his tracks and held back his words, pretending he had not intended to say anything; his heals spun him around and, following the inertia of this movement, he made a beeline to the back patio stammering incoherently on his way to restarting the washing of the coffee cups. The man smiled, without Julio noticing.

The day before, a seller of old books had left a beautiful copy of The Iliad and the Odyssey for consignment in La Renga. It was a Greek edition by the Scottish brothers, Robert and Andrew Foulis, from the year 1756, and had been on sale at the Bardón bookstore in Madrid. The salesman had heard of La Renga, “that nice little bookstore in the town of Ajijic,” so he had decided to try his fortune hoping that one of its customers might be interested in the book.

“It’s going to be impossible to find a customer for that book,” Julio had told the salesman. “It’s extremely expensive and only a connoisseur or a collector would appreciate it.”

“Have faith, sooner than you can imagine, the book will be sold.”

Julio had placed the book on the third shelf. When he returned from washing the coffee cups, he saw that the man was right in front of that bookcase, which meant that he was in the last stage of his ritual. The man took the valuable book and opened it at the part where The Odyssey began. He closed his eyes and smelled it for a few very long seconds. Julio looked at him, excited, petrified. The man muttered words under his breath that Julio was unable to make out, he could only hear him say something more or less like this: “departure… it’s time.” It was the first time that Julio had heard the man’s voice, albeit ever so faintly. The man stood in front of the bookcase for a long time admiring the book, leafing through it, rubbing its spine with both hands, first with the right and then with the left. Then he brought it up to his chest and embraced it close to his heart. He put it back in its place. Then, as always, he went to the first bookcase, took a book, and tucked it beneath his arm; then he went to the second bookcase and took another book, which he also placed beneath his arm. Julio’s nerves were on edge, now, like flashes of energy that electrified him from the inside. The man had to go to the third bookcase. “If he were to take that book, I would get out from under the hardships I find myself in today,” Julio thought. He took a first step, then another, and just as he was about to reach the bookcase, a large man with white hair and white beard, wearing a blue sailor’s beret, wearing gabardine trousers and a flowered shirt, entered the bookstore leaving behind him a wake of tobacco and tequila, smoking profusely from a beautiful pipe.

He was a retired American, a baby boomer, in whose heart burned the fighting spirit of a man who had risked his life for his homeland, but he had done so fighting in Vietnam with a divided heart because he hated war. He defended freedom and the right of the oppressed to demonstrate and protest. After the war he worked for the United States government at the Pentagon, until he retired. He was known by the nickname of Sugar and he owned a small nursery on the outskirts of town, near La Canacinta, which was a business but also a source of entertainment for himself in the arduous monotony of the days. He was originally from New York and was at the time sixty-five years old. His eyes were blue, like the beret he wore, and a funny belly hid beneath his flowered shirt. His gaze was parsimonious, and he didn’t wear glasses. He was of medium height, always wore tennis shoes, and was a New York Yankees baseball fan. He was a music lover, played the guitar and piano, and liked to cook while listening to Neapolitan songs performed by Pavarotti, like some Italian immigrants he had met in Manhattan. He spoke a passable Spanish after so many years of sharing his time with the townspeople and the customers of his nursery, and he practiced it by watching subtitled movies and memorizing the translated lyrics of the songs that he liked so much. At night, before going to bed, he would often to listen to the melancholic melody “Taps,” as if it were a prayer for peace. A pragmatic and uncomplicated man, he was a promoter of lake-life for the benefit of the retirees, and he used to say that there was no better place in the world than Ajijic: “where we have the best weather in the world!”

Sugar looked at the man and without saying anything except “Hi, sir!” stepped between him and the bookcase and began looking at books. Julio was sweating profusely thinking that his sale would disappear, because he was sure that the white-bearded American wasn’t going to buy that book. Things happen for a reason, Julio thought, and that episode might turn out be an omen that the day would not be a fortuitous one. Sugar took the valuable book in his hands and started flipping through it. Julio was startled and looked at the mysterious man who, undaunted and without moving, was waiting with two books under his arm. Then Sugar, holding The Iliad and the Odyssey in his hands, stepped away from the bookcase and headed for the counter. He almost hit the other man when he turned around, but he barely said “sorry,” showing the slight outline of a smile. The man did not answer, as he stood in front of the center of the bookcase, stiff as a board, without even blinking. Sugar placed the book on the counter and smiled again, showing his teeth among his white beard, and said:

“How much for this little treasure, mister?”

Julio told him the price and glanced at the man who had still not moved from his place. Sugar laughed out loud, slapped the book, and put it on the counter. He walked out of the bookstore to the right, down the street, just managing to say with a laugh, when he had already turned his back to the others:

“¡Goodbye, mister…goodbye, sir!”

Julio waited a moment for the man to react, but he still did not move. So, Julio took the book, left the counter, and returned it to its place on the shelf. Having done this, he returned to his place behind the counter. After a few tense moments, the man took a few steps and stood in front of the bookcase. He took the valuable copy of The Iliad and the Odyssey, and now, with the three books under his arm, he approached the counter. Julio’s heart was about to explode, a big drop of sweat ran down his back. The man turned towards the arch of the back patio of the bookstore, but this time his gaze was much more fixed and penetrating, giving the impression that he was not just contemplating something but, containing an inner cry, crumbling on the inside. His eyes were perceptibly moist, and he opened and closed his hands, leaning his body slightly forward and clenching his jaws. Next, he turned to look at the cash register as a sign that he wanted to know if Julio had finished doing the sum. “What was going on with that mysterious character?” Julio mused as he left the receipt next to the books. The man took it and looked at it, unperturbed. He reached into one the pockets of his pants, took out the bill holder, and looking at the stamped figure of the Statue of Liberty, removed bills until he had collected the requested amount, which he slowly put on the counter. It was, as has been said, a considerable amount of money by La Renga’s standards. Julio counted the bills; it was the exact amount. The man took the three books and left the bookstore towards the right, down the streets towards the lagoon, withdrawing from Julio’s eyes forever.

That afternoon Julio was very happy. With the sale of the valuable book, he would pay off his debts, paint the bookstore and have a not insignificant amount left for his finances. It would take some time before Julio knew who the mysterious man who had visited the bookstore for years in such an extravagant way really was. At night, before he began to read in his attic beneath the light of a lamp, he opened his sales ledger again to review the books that that man had purchased from La Renga. He did not have all the records, because he kept those belonging to the first years of the bookstore in a cellar with expired files. Since he did not know the customer’s name, who also always paid in cash, he had recorded his purchases under the initials MM: “mystery man.” As he scrolled through the lines of the pages he had been able to find, he saw, without causing his curiosity to wane, that the man had acquired several cheap editions of The Odyssey, and books such as Pedro Páramo, The Invention of Solitude, Kokoro, Resurrection, Don Quixote, The Last Encounter, The Invisible Man, The Trial, The Barcarolle, Hopscotch, The Book of Disquiet, Paradise Lost, Invisible Cities, Walden, Duino Elegies, The Book of the Friend and the Beloved, The Master of Petersburg, A Mortal Spring, The Novel of My Life, To Kill a Mockingbird, Zorba the Greek, The Impostor: A True Story, Kyoto, Just Kids, The Kingdom of This World, Verses On the Death of His Father and The Treaty on the Brevity of Life, among others. Julio had read those books and was reflecting on their point in common. They had, in effect, a point of contact, a common denominator: searches and losses.