LA NOCHE DE LOS ALCARAVANES (A short story in Spanish)
The three of us
were sitting around a table when someone slid a coin into the jukebox, and the
Wurlitzer replayed the record all night long. The rest of us did not have time
to think about it. It happened before we were able to remember where we were;
before we could regain our bearings. One of us put a hand on top of the counter
to search for the others (We couldn’t see the hand. We heard it.). It bumped
into a glass and remained still afterwards. Now two hands rested on the hard
surface. Then the three of us searched for each other in the darkness and met
there, on the tabletop, in a pile of thirty fingers. One said:
“Let’s
go.”
And
so we stood up as if nothing had happened. We had not had a chance to feel confused.
As
we passed through the corridor we heard nearby music weaving around us. We
could smell the sorrowful women, sitting and waiting. We sensed the long
emptiness of the corridor in front of us as we walked towards the door. We
would soon be met by the bitter smell of the woman who sat just outside. We
said:
“Let’s
get out of here.”
The
woman did not respond in the least. We heard the creaking of a rocker, easing upwards,
relieved of her weight when she stood up. We sensed her footsteps on the loose
wood. She returned to her chair after we heard hinges creak, and the door closed
shut at our backs.
We
turned. Right there, behind us, was the harsh, biting air of the invisible dawn
and a voice that said:
“Get
away from there, I’m trying to get past with this.”
We
threw ourselves backward. And the voice came back to say:
“You’re
still against the door.”
And
only then, when we had moved everywhere possible and we could not escape the voice,
we said, “We can’t get out of here. The stone-curlews took our eyes.”
Then
we heard many doors opening. One of us got loose from the others’ hands and we heard
him drag himself in the darkness, staggering, crashing into the objects that
surrounded us. He spoke from somewhere in the darkness:
“Now
we must be close,” he said. “It smells like there are piles of trunks around
here.” Once again we felt the touch of his hands. We leaned against the wall
and another voice passed, but in the opposite direction.
“They
could be coffins,” one of us said.
The
one who had dragged himself into the corner spoke again at our side:
“They’re
trunks. When I was young I learned to recognize the smell of stored clothes.”
And
so we moved in that direction. The ground was soft and flat, like trampled
earth. Someone held out their hand. We made contact with the full, lively skin,
but now we did not feel the wall behind us.
“This
is a woman,” we said.
The
other, the one that had known about the trunks, said:
“I
think she’s sleeping.”
The
body shook under our touch. It trembled. We felt it slip away, but not as if it
had gone beyond our reach. Instead it was as if it had ceased to exist.
Nonetheless, after an instant in which we remained still and drew closer
together, shoulder to shoulder, we heard her voice.
“Who
goes there?” she asked.
“It
is us,” we responded without moving.
You
could hear creaking in the bed and the shuffling of feet looking for slippers
in the darkness. Then we imagined the woman sitting, watching us, not yet fully
awake.
“What
are you doing here?” she asked.
And
we answered:
“We
don’t know. The stone-curlews took our eyes.”
The
voice said that she had heard something about this. The newspapers had said
that three men were drinking beer on a patio where there were five or six
stone-curlews. Seven stone-curlews. One of the men began to sing like a
stone-curlew, imitating them.
“Unfortunately
it was at a backward hour,” she said. “And so the birds jumped onto the table
and took out their eyes.”
That
was what the newspapers said, she explained, but no one had believed them. We said:
“If
people went there, they would have seen the stone-curlews.”
And the woman said: “They went. The patio was
full of people the next day, but the woman had already taken the stone-curlews
somewhere else.”
When
we turned, the woman stopped speaking. There, once again, was the wall. Simply by
turning we would always find the wall. A wall was always around us, enclosing
us. The same man once again freed himself from our hands. We heard him trace
the ground again, sniffing, saying:
“Now
I don’t know where the trunks are. I think we’re somewhere else.”
And
we said:
“Come
here. Someone is here, next to us.”
We
heard him come closer. We felt him raise himself to our side and again his warm
breath grazed our cheeks.
“Reach
your hands over here,” we told him. “There’s someone who’s heard of us.”
He
must have put out his hand. He must have moved where we told him to, because an
instant later he returned to tell us:
“I
think it’s a boy.”
And
we told him:
“Okay,
ask him if he knows who we are.”
He asked. We heard the uninterested, simple
voice of the boy who said:
“Yes,
I’ve heard of you. You’re the three men whose eyes were taken out by the stone-curlews.”
Then
an adult voice spoke. It was a woman’s voice that seemed to be behind a closed door,
saying:
“Now
you’re talking to yourself.”
The
child’s voice carelessly replied:
“No.
It’s the men whose eyes were taken out by the stone-curlews.”
Then
there was the noise of hinges creaking, followed by the adult voice, closer
than the first time.
“Bring them home,” she said.
And
the boy replied:
“I
don’t know where they live.”
The
adult voice answered:
“Don’t
be so disagreeable. Everyone has known where they live since the night the stone-curlews
took their eyes.”
Then
she went on, speaking in another tone, as if she were talking to us:
“What
happened is that no one wanted to believe it. They said that it was a bogus
story, made up by the newspapers to increase sales. No one has seen the
stone-curlews.”
So
we said:
“But
no one would believe us if we took them through the streets.”
We
didn’t move. We were motionless, leaning against the wall, listening to her.
The woman said:
“If
he wants to take you it’s different. After all, no one gives a damn what a boy
says.”
The
childish voice interceded:
“If
I go out there with them and I say that they’re the men whose eyes were taken
by the stone-curlews, the other kids will throw stones at me. Everyone says
that it’s impossible.”
There
was a moment of silence. Then the door closed. The boy began to speak once more:
“Anyways,
I’m reading Terry and the Pirates.”
Someone
whispered in our ear:
“I’ll
convince him.”
He
inched towards the voice.
“I
like that one,” he said. “At least tell us what’s happening to Terry this
week.”
He’s
trying to gain his trust, we thought. But the boy said:
“I
don’t care about that. I only like the colored comic strips.”
“Terry is in a labyrinth,” we said.
“That
was Friday. Today is Sunday and I like the colored ones.” He said with a cold, detached,
indifferent voice.
When
the other man returned to us, we said:
“We’ve
been lost for almost three days and we haven’t rested once.”
And
one replied: “Okay. We’ll rest for a while, but without letting go of our
hands.”
We
sat. An invisible warm sun began to heat our shoulders. But not even the
presence of the sun interested us. We felt it there, wherever we were, having
lost our sense of time, space, and direction. Many voices passed us.
“The
stone-curlews took our eyes,” we said.
And
one of the voices said:
“These
guys are taking the newspapers seriously.”
The
voices disappeared. And so we stayed sitting like that, shoulder to shoulder.
We waited for a familiar scent or voice to pass in that river of voices and
images. The sun continued to warm our heads. Then someone said:
“Let’s
go towards the wall again.”
And
the others, motionless, with heads raised towards the invisible light, said:
“Not yet. Let’s at least wait until the sun
begins to burn our faces.”
1953.
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