They were sad days. Things had been going badly before, but from then on everything got worse, Amalia would think later. The mistress was in bed, pale, her hair dissheveled, and all she had to eat were a few bowls of soup. On the third day Miss Queta left. Do you want me to bring my mattress up to your room, ma’am? No, Amalia, you go ahead and sleep in your own room. But Amalia stayed on the living room sofa, wrapped in her blanket. In the darkness, her face felt damp. She hated Trinidad, Ambrosio, all of them. She would nod and wake up, she was sorry, she was afraid, and one of those times she saw a light in the hall. She went up, put her ear to the door, she didn’t hear anything and she opened it. The mistress was stretched out on the bed, uncovered, her eyes open: had she been calling her, ma’am? She went over, saw the fallen glass, the mistress’s eyes showing white. She ran shouting into the street. She’d killed herself, and she rang the bell next door, she’d killed herself, and she kicked on the door. A man in his bathrobe came, a woman was slapping the mistress’s face, they pressed on her stomach, they wanted her to vomit, they telephoned. It was almost daybreak when the
ambulance
arrived.
The mistress spent a week in the Loayza Hospital. The day she went to visit her, Amalia found her with Miss Queta, Miss Lucy and Señora Ivonne. Pale and thin, but more resigned. Here’s my savior, the mistress joked. How can I tell her there isn’t even anything to eat? she thought. Luckily, the mistress remembered: give her something for her expenses, Quetita. That Sunday she went to meet Ambrosio at the car stop and brought him to the house. He already knew that the mistress had tried to kill herself, Amalia. And how did he know? Because Don Fermín was paying the hospital bill. Don Fermín? Yes, she’d called him and he, gentleman that he is, seeing her in that situation had felt sorry for her and was helping her. Amalia fixed him something to eat and then they listened to the radio. They went to bed in the mistress’s room and Amalia had a laughing attack she couldn’t stop. So that’s what the mirrors were for, so that’s what, the mistress was a regular she-devil, and Ambrosio had to shake her by the shoulders and scold her, annoyed by her
laughter
. He hadn’t spoken about the little house or getting married again, but they got along well, he and she, they never fought. They always did the same thing: the streetcar, Ludovico’s little room, the movies, one of those dances sometimes. One Sunday Ambrosio got into a fight in a native restaurant in Barrios Altos because some drunks came in shouting Long Live APRA! and he Down with It! Elections were coming up and there were rallies on the Plaza San Martín. The downtown area was full of posters, cars with loudspeakers. Vote for Prado, you know him! they said on the radio, fliers, they sang Lavalle is the man Peru wants! with waltz music, photos, and Amalia was taken by the polka Forward with
Belaúnde
! The Apristas had come back, pictures of Haya de la Torre came out in the newspapers and she remembered Trinidad. Did she love Ambrosio? Yes, but with him it wasn’t the way it was with Trinidad, with him there wasn’t that suffering, that joy, that heat the way there was with Trinidad. Why do you want Lavalle to win? she asked him, and he because Don Fermín was for him. With Ambrosio everything was
peaceful
, we’re just two friends who also go to bed together crossed her mind once. Months passed without her visiting Señora Rosario, months
without
seeing Gertrudis Lama or her aunt. During the week she kept storing up everything that happened in her head and on Sunday she would tell Ambrosio, but he was so reserved that sometimes she would get furious. How’s Missy Teté? fine, and Señora Zoila? fine, had young Santiago come back home? no, did they miss him much? yes, especially Don Fermín. What else, what else? Nothing else. Sometimes teasing, she would scare him: I’m going to pay a visit to Señora Zoila, I’m going to tell Señora Hortensia about us. He would start frothing at the mouth: if you go, you’ll be sorry, if you tell her, we’ll never see each other again. Why all the hiding, all the mystery, all the shame? He was strange, he was crazy, he had his ways. Would you feel the same sorrow you did for Trinidad if Ambrosio died? Gertrudis asked her once. No, she’d cry over him, but it wouldn’t be like the end of the world, Gertrudis. It must be because we haven’t lived together, she thought. Maybe if she’d washed his clothes and cooked for him and taken care of him when he was sick it would have been different.
Señora Hortensia came back to San Miguel all skin and bones. Her clothes were floppy on her, her face was sucked in, her eyes didn’t shine the way they had before. Didn’t the police get her jewels back, ma’am? The mistress laughed listlessly, they’d never find them, and her eyes watered. Lucas was sharper than the police. She still loved him, poor thing. The truth was she hadn’t had many left, Amalia, she’d been selling them because of him, for him. How foolish men were, he didn’t have to steal them from her, Amalia, all he had to do was ask me for them. The mistress had changed. Bad things came to her one after the other and she indifferent, serious, quiet. Prado won, ma’am, APRA turned on Lavalle and voted for Prado and Prado won, that’s what the radio said. But the mistress wasn’t listening to her: I lost my job, Amalia, the fat man didn’t renew my contract. She said it without fury, as if it were the most normal thing in the world. And a few days later, to Miss Queta, my debts are going to swamp me. She didn’t seem scared or concerned. Amalia no longer knew what story to make up when Mr. Poncio came to collect the rent: she’s not home, she went out, tomorrow, Monday. Before, Mr. Poncio had been nothing but flirtation and charm; now he was a hyena: he would get red, cough, swallow. So she’s not home, eh? He gave Amalia a shove and barked Señora Hortensia, enough tricks! From the top of the stairs the mistress looked at him as if he were a little cockroach: what right do you have to shout like that, tell Paredes I’ll pay him another time. You haven’t been paying and Colonel Paredes is on my back, Mr. Poncio barked, we’re going to get you out of here legally. I’ll leave when I damned well please, the mistress said without shouting and he, barking, we’ll give you until Monday or we’ll take steps. Amalia went upstairs afterward thinking she’d be furious. But she wasn’t, she was calm, looking at the ceiling with gelatinous eyes. In Cayo’s time, Paredes refused to take any rent, Amalia, and now, what a difference. She was speaking with a terrible languor, as if she were far away or falling asleep. They’d have to move, there was no other way out, Amalia. Those were agitated days. The mistress would leave early, come home late, I looked at a hundred houses and all too expensive, she would call one man, and another, ask them for a note, a loan, and hang up the telephone and twist her mouth: thankless ingrates. On moving day, Mr. Poncio came by and shut himself up with the mistress in the little room that had been Don Cayo’s. Finally the mistress came down and told the truckers to bring the living room and bar furniture back into the house.
The lack of that furniture wasn’t even noticed in the apartment in Magdalena Vieja, it was smaller than the little house in San Miguel. There were even too many things, and the mistress sold the desk, the easy chairs, the mirrors and the sideboard. The apartment was on the second floor of a green building, it had a dining room, bedroom, bath, kitchen, small patio, and a maid’s room with its little bath. It was new, and once fixed up, it was quite pretty.
The first Sunday she met Ambrosio on the Avenida Brasil at the Military Hospital stop, they had a fight. Poor mistress, Amalia told him, the trouble she’d been through, they took away her furniture, Mr.
Poncio’s
rudeness, and Ambrosio said I’m glad. What? Yes, she was a bitch. What? She sponged off people, she spent her time asking Don Fermín for money and he’d already helped her so much, she had no
consideration
. Drop her, Amalia, look for another house. I’ll drop you first, Amalia said. They argued for about an hour and only half made up. All right, they wouldn’t talk about her anymore, Amalia, it wasn’t worth our fighting because of that crazy woman.
With the loans and from what she sold, the mistress wasn’t doing too badly while she looked for work. She finally got a job at a place in Barranco, La Laguna. Once more she began to talk about giving up smoking and she awoke in the morning with her makeup still on. She never mentioned Mr. Lucas, only Miss Queta came to see her. She wasn’t the same as before. She didn’t crack jokes, she didn’t have the wit, the grace, that careless, happy way she had before. Now she thought about money a lot. Quiñoncito is crazy about you, girl, and she didn’t even want to look at him, Quetita, he didn’t have a dime. Then, after a while, she began to go out with men, but she never let them in, she kept them waiting at the door or in the street while she got ready. She was ashamed to have them see how she was living now, Amalia thought. She would get up and fix herself her pisco and ginger ale. She listened to the radio, read the newspaper, phoned Miss Queta, and drank two, three. She didn’t look as pretty, as elegant as before.
That was how days and weeks went by. When the mistress stopped singing at La Laguna, Amalia only found out about it two days later. The mistress stayed home a Monday and a Tuesday, wasn’t she going to sing that night either, ma’am? She wasn’t going back to La Laguna anymore, Amalia, they were exploiting her, she’d look for a better job. But on the days that followed she didn’t seem too anxious to find another job. She’d stay in bed, the curtains drawn, listening to the radio in the shadows. She’d get up wearily and fix herself a pisco and ginger ale and when Amalia went into the bedroom she would see her, motionless, her gaze lost in the smoke, her voice weak and her gestures tired. Around seven o’clock she would start making up her face and fixing her nails, combing her hair, and around eight o’clock Miss Queta would pick her up in her little car. She would return at dawn, all done in, quite drunk, so tired out that sometimes she would wake Amalia up to help her undress. See how thin she’s getting, Amalia said to Miss Queta, tell her to eat more, she’s going to get sick. Miss Queta would tell her, but she didn’t pay any attention to her. She kept taking her clothes to a seamstress on the Avenida Brasil to have them taken in. Every day she gave Amalia the money for the day and paid her wages punctually, where was she getting money from? No man had spent the night in the Magdalena apartment yet. She probably did her things elsewhere. When the mistress started to work at the Montmartre, she no longer talked about giving up smoking or worried about drafts. Now she didn’t even give a hoot about singing. The way she put on her makeup was so dreary. And keeping the house neat and clean didn’t interest her, she who used to get hysterical if she ran her finger across a table and found dust. And she didn’t notice if the ashtrays were full of butts and hadn’t asked her in the morning anymore did you take a shower, did you put on deodorant? The apartment looked a mess, but Amalia didn’t have time for everything. Besides, cleaning was more work now. The mistress has infected me with her laziness, she told Ambrosio. It’s funny seeing the mistress like this, so sloppy, Miss Queta, could it be that she hasn’t gotten over Mr. Lucas? Yes, Miss Queta said, and also because drinking and tranquilizers keep her half dopey.
One day there was a knock on the door. Amalia opened it and there was Don Fermín. He didn’t recognize her that time either: Hortensia’s expecting me. How old he’d gotten since the last time, all those gray hairs, those sunken eyes. The mistress sent her out for cigarettes, and on Sunday, when Amalia asked what Don Fermín had been doing there, he made an expression of disgust: to bring her money, that damned woman had made a patsy out of him. What did the mistress ever do to you for you to hate her so much? Nothing to Ambrosio, but she was bleeding Don Fermín, taking advantage of his goodness, anyone else would have told her to go to hell. Amalia became furious: what are you sticking your nose in for, what business is it of yours? Look for a different job, he insisted, can’t you see that she’s starving to death? leave her.
Sometimes the mistress would disappear for two or three days, and when she came back I was on a trip, Amalia. Paracas, Cuzco, Chimbote. From the window Amalia would spot her getting into men’s cars with her suitcase. Some of them she knew by voice, on the telephone, and she tried to guess what they were like, how old they were. Early one morning she heard voices, she went to spy and saw the mistress in the living room with a man, laughing and drinking. Then she heard a door close and thought they’ve gone into the bedroom. But no, the man had left and the mistress, when she went to ask her if she wanted any lunch, was lying on the bed with her clothes on, a strange look in her eyes. She kept on looking at her with a silent little laugh and Amalia didn’t she feel good? Nothing, all quiet, as if all of her body had died except her eyes, which were wandering, looking. She ran to the telephone and waited, trembling, for Miss Queta’s voice: she killed herself again, she’s on the bed there, she can’t hear, she can’t speak, and Miss Queta shouted shut up, don’t be frightened, listen to me. Strong coffee, don’t call the doctor, she’d be right over. Take this so you’ll feel better, ma’am, Amalia whimpered, Miss Queta’s on her way over. Nothing, mute, deaf, staring, so she lifted up her head and brought the cup to her lips. She drank obediently, two small streams trickling down her neck. That’s the way, ma’am, all of it, and she stroked her head and kissed her hands. But when Miss Queta arrived, instead of feeling sorry she began to curse. She sent her out to buy some rubbing alcohol, made the mistress drink more coffee, she and Amalia together undressed her, rubbed her forehead and temples. While Miss Queta was scolding her, you fool, you nut, she didn’t know what she was doing, the mistress was coming around. She smiled, what was all the fuss about, she moved, and Miss Queta was fed up, I’m not your nursemaid, you’re going to get in a jam, if you want to kill yourself, do it right out and not little by little. That night the mistress didn’t go to the Montmartre, but she was all better when she got up the next day.