“Yes, Colonel!”
“Hurry up or you’ll spend the night in jail. Let’s see if you find that funny.”
He didn’t have to tell me twice. I got up as best I could and set off toward my house, hoping to get there before my feet led me off in
to some other seedy dive. The walk, which would normally have taken me ten or fifteen minutes, took three times as long. Finally, by some miracle, I arrived at my front door only to find Isabella sitting there, like a curse, this time inside the main entrance of the building, in the courtyard.
“You’re drunk,” said Isabella.
“I must be, because in mid delirium tremens I thought I discovered you sleeping in my doorway at midnight.”
“I had nowhere else to go. My father and I quarreled and he’s thrown me out.”
I closed my eyes and sighed. My brain, dulled by alcohol and bitterness, was unable to release its torrent of denials and curses.
“You can’t stay here, Isabella.”
“Please, just for tonight. Tomorrow I’ll look for a pension. I beg you, Señor Martín.”
“Don’t give me that doe-eyed look,” I threatened.
“Besides, it’s your fault that I’ve been thrown out,” she added.
“My fault. I like that! I don’t know whether you have any talent for writing, but you certainly have plenty of imagination. For what ill-fated reason, pray tell me, is it my fault that your dear father has chucked you out?”
“When you’re drunk you have an odd way of speaking.”
“I’m not drunk. I’ve never been drunk in my life. Now answer my question.”
“I told my father you’d taken me on as your assistant and that from now on I was going to devote my life to literature and couldn’t work in the shop.”
“What?”
“Can we go in? I’m cold and my bum’s turned to stone from sitting on the steps.”
My head was going round in circles and I felt nauseated. I looked up at the faint glimmer that seeped through the skylight at the top of the stairs.
“Is this a punishment from above to make me repent my rakish ways?”
Isabella followed my eyes upwards, looking puzzled.
“Who are you talking to?”
“I’m not talking to anyone, I’m delivering a monologue. It’s the inebriated man’s prerogative. But tomorrow morning first thing I’m going to talk to your father and put an end to this absurdity.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea. He’s sworn to kill you if he sees you. He’s got a double-barrel shotgun hidden under the counter. He’s like that. He once killed a mule with it. It was in the summer, near Argentona—”
“Shut up. Not another word. Silence.”
Isabella nodded and looked at me expectantly. I began searching for my key. At that point I couldn’t cope with this garrulous adolescent’s drama. I needed to collapse onto my bed and lose consciousness, preferably in that order. I continued looking for a couple of minutes, in vain. Finally, without saying a word, Isabella came over to me and rummaged through the pocket of my jacket, which my hands had already explored a hundred times, and found the key. She showed it to me, and I nodded, defeated.
Isabella opened the door to the apartment, keeping me upright, then guided me to my bedroom as if I were an invalid, and helped me onto my bed. After settling my head on the pillows, she removed my shoes. I looked at her in confusion.
“Don’t worry, I’m not going to take your trousers off.”
She loosened my collar, sat down beside me, and smiled with a melancholy expression that belied her youth.
“I’ve never seen you so sad, Señor Martín. It’s because of that woman, isn’t it? The one in the photograph.”