Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax (5 page)

The next day Mrs. Pollifax bought a map and after an hour’s study set out to find the Calle el Siglo and the Parrot Bookstore, for she was conscientious by nature and did not feel she could relax and really enjoy herself until she knew precisely where she must present herself on August 19. To her surprise she discovered that the street was in walking distance of the
hotel, and that it was a perfectly respectable side street already found by the tourists, whom she could identify by the cameras strung about their necks on leather thongs. She wandered almost the length of it, and when she saw the Parrot Bookstore across the street she blushed and quickly averted her eyes. But that one swift glance told her that it was neither shabby nor neglected, as she had somewhat romantically imagined, but a very smart and modern store, small and narrow in width but with a very striking mosaic of a parrot set into its glittering cement façade.

On the following afternoon, returning to the hotel with her two friends after a visit to the National Palace, they found themselves momentarily lost and Mrs. Pollifax steered them all up the Calle el Siglo, saying with a ruthless lack of conscience that it was a direct route to the hotel. This time they passed the door of the Parrot, and Mrs. Pollifax glanced inside and took note of the man behind the counter. She thought he looked very pleasant: about her age, with white hair and a white moustache that was very striking against the Spanish swarthiness of his skin. Like a grandee, she decided.

During the week that Mrs. Pollifax spent sight-seeing in Mexico City she found the opportunity nearly every day to pass the Parrot Bookstore. She did not seek it out deliberately, but if it proved a convenient way to return to her hotel—and it often did—she did not avoid it. Once she passed it in the evening, when it was closed, in the company of Miss Lambert and Mrs. Donahue. Once she and Miss Lambert passed it in the morning when Senor DeGamez was just inserting the key in the door, and twice Mrs. Pollifax passed on the other side without giving it more than a glance. She realized that she was beginning to think of it as
her
shop, and to feel a proprietary interest in it.

When Mrs. Pollifax had enjoyed Mexico City for a week she bid her new friends adios and went by bus to Taxco, where for several days she wandered its crooked, cobblestoned alleys, looked over bargains in silver, and sunned herself in the market plaza. She then returned by way of Acapulco, stopping there overnight. Everywhere she went Mrs. Pollifax found people charming and friendly, and this spared her some of the loneliness of traveling alone. On the bus returning to Mexico City she was entertained by a widower from Chicago who showed her pictures of his six grandchildren, and in turn Mrs. Pollifax showed him pictures of Jane’s two children and Roger’s one.
From the gentleman’s conversation Mrs. Pollifax guessed that he was a professional gambler, but this in no way curtailed her interest—she had never before met a professional gambler.

As soon as she returned to Mexico City—it was August 15 on the day she came back—she found it convenient to walk down the Calle el Siglo and reassure herself about her store. It was still there, and Senor DeGamez looked just as elegant as ever. He really looked so pleasant that she thought, “Surely it wouldn’t hurt just to step inside for a minute and buy something? Other tourists do, and I pass here so often, and I haven’t a thing to read tonight.” As she paused, considering, a party of tourists came out of the Parrot laughing and talking and carrying packages that could only be books tied up in white paper. On impulse Mrs. Pollifax crossed the street and went inside.

After the briefest of glances around her—Senor DeGamez was busy at the counter—Mrs. Pollifax hurried to a corner table that bore the placard
LATEST BOOKS FROM USA
, and plucked one from the pile. The only sounds in the shop were the crackling of fresh paper, as Senor DeGamez wrapped books, and the sound of his voice as he spoke to his customer. Unfortunately, however, he was speaking the language of his country and so Mrs. Pollifax could not eavesdrop. She selected a volume of memoirs by a well-known American actress and groped in her purse for the currency; she was mentally translating dollars into pesos when a strident voice broke the hushed, literary atmosphere. “Old books, new books, read a book,” screeched the voice, and Mrs. Pollifax turned in astonishment to see a live parrot addressing her from a cage nearby.

“Well, for heaven’s sake,” she gasped.

“You like my parrot?” asked Senor DeGamez from the counter. His customer had departed and they were alone. “But he startled you, I think. My customers, they are used to him, but Olé surprises the new ones. Come see,” he said, walking over to the cage. “You know parrots? Not many do—this one is exceptionally fine. Have you ever seen such color?”

“Beautiful,” said Mrs. Pollifax in a hushed voice. “But seeing
him was what startled me, rather than hearing him. He is so brilliantly colored, like a sunset—or are parrots she’s rather than he’s?”

Senor DeGamez smiled, and with courtly, old-fashioned humor said, “Well, some are he’s and some are she’s, no? And so it must always be.”

Mrs. Pollifax smiled back at him. “Of course, I wasn’t thinking, was I? I do say things without thinking, it’s a very bad habit. And of course the name of your store is the Parrot. The bird adds just the right touch.”

He lifted a hand. “No, no, my store is named after Olé, not the other way around. My Olé came first—she has been with me twelve years. What I do when she dies I don’t know.”

Mrs. Pollifax nodded sympathetically. “What
will
you do—exactly! Of course
they
would say find another parrot, but it’s never the same, is it?”

He said gently, “That is so, never. You are very wise.”

“No,” said Mrs. Pollifax reflectively, “only experienced, which comes from living a good many years. Wisdom is something else, I think.” Her eyes returned admiringly to the gaudy bird. “She is company for you?” When he looked blank she said, “Your parrot keeps you from being lonely?”

“Oh—
sí
,” he said, nodding in understanding. “Yes. My wife she is dead five years now, and my sons, they are grown and in business. When I wish to hear talk I uncover Olé’s cage and we speak together. She says a few words in English, a few in Spanish, and when we are finished speaking I cover her cage again and she stops.”

Mrs. Pollifax laughed. “The perfect companion!”

“Exactly. And you—you have children too perhaps?” Senor DeGamez was smiling.

Mrs. Pollifax gave her book and her money to him and they moved toward the counter. “Two,” she told him, “a boy and a girl, both grown up now. I’ve been a widow for eight years.”

He at once looked compassionate. “I am so sorry. But you have surely not come to Mexico alone?”

Mrs. Pollifax nodded.

“Then you are courageous. That is good, very good.”

“It’s sometimes a little lonely,” admitted Mrs. Pollifax.

“Yes, but like me with my Olé you can be alone when you choose. Some of these American women, they are like swarms of—you will forgive me—swarms of geese, always together,
always making cackling noises.” Here the senor stepped back and did a very humorous imitation of chattering women.

Mrs. Pollifax burst out laughing. “I’m afraid you’re too good!”

“But think—when you are lonely you need only find some American geese and join them. And when you tire”—he snapped his fingers—“off you go. To read. You like to read? I understand that, or you would not be here. Solitaire? Do you play solitaire?”

Mrs. Pollifax shook her head.

“But senora,” he cried, “you are missing a delight. I myself treasure the solitary cards.” He tapped his forehead. “It clears the brain, it clears the thought, it is mentally sound, mentally healthy.”

Mrs. Pollifax said doubtfully, “I remember trying a few games when I was a child—”

“
Sí
, but you are a grown-up lady now,” he told her, smiling. “Please—you are buying this book? Allow me then to add another as a small gift. No, no,” he said. putting up a hand to cut off her protests, and he walked to a shelf, fingered a few titles and chose one with a bright blue jacket. “This one,” he said, handing it to her with a flourish.
“77 Ways to Play Solitaire.”

“Well,” murmured Mrs. Pollifax, charmed but not sure what to say.

“For the loneliness,
sí
? Because you like my parrot and you are not a geese.”

“Goose,” said Mrs. Pollifax and began to laugh. “All right, I’ll try it, I really will.”

“Good, you accept my gift then. Better yet you read it and use it. Remember,” he said as he finished tying up the book she had purchased, “remember you are not a child now, you will appreciate better the enjoyment.” He nodded affably to a man and a woman who had entered the store. “This has been a pleasure to me, senora, may you have a beautiful visit.”

Mrs. Pollifax felt deeply touched and warmed by his friendliness. “Thank you so much,” she said, “and thank you for the book.”

She had reached the door when he called across the store, “Oh, American senora …”

Mrs. Pollifax turned.

He was smiling. “How can you play seventy-seven games of solitaire without cards?” He had picked up a deck from below
the counter and now he tossed the pack of playing cards the length of the room to her.

Mrs. Pollifax said, “Oh, but …” and reached up and caught the cards in midair. Her son, Roger, would have been proud of her.

“How do you Americans say it—‘on the house!’ ” he called out gaily.

How nice he was. Mrs. Pollifax gave in graciously—after all, he had other customers waiting. She held up the playing cards to show that she had caught them, dropped them into her purse and with a wave of her hand walked out.

Mrs. Pollifax had gone less than a block when she stopped, aghast, her mouth forming a stricken O. She had just realized that the charming gentleman with whom she had been chatting for half an hour was no other than Mr. Carstairs’ Senor DeGamez. She had not intended to speak to him at all, she had meant only to walk in and very discreetly make a purchase and leave. How could she have allowed herself to be carried away like that? What on earth would Mr. Carstairs think of her now? For that matter what would Senor DeGamez think when on the nineteenth of August he looked for Mr. Carstairs’ courier and it turned out to be the American tourist lady who was not a geese.

“How awful,” she thought, hurrying along with burning cheeks. “How terribly undignified of me. This is not the way secret agents behave at all.”

Thoroughly penitent, Mrs. Pollifax returned to her hotel, and as punishment resolved not to go near the Calle el Siglo again until the nineteenth. To further punish herself she made a list of
Things To Do
during the next four days: souvenirs to be found for Roger, Jane and the grandchildren, postcards to be sent to friends at home, and she even went as far as to carry her camera with her to Xochimilco and take a few pictures.
Dear Miss Hartshorne
, she wrote without enthusiasm,
Mexico is lovely. I have visited
 … and she listed some of the places she had seen.
I hope you are having a pleasant August. Sincerely, your neighbor, Emily Pollifax
. All of this seemed to her exceedingly dull because it deprived her of the opportunity to observe the Parrot, toward which she felt an almost maternal solicitude after this length of time. It was this frustration that led her to open the book that Senor DeGamez had given her, and to her surprise she discovered that she really could enjoy solitaire. Instead of going to bed with a book each night she invested
in a tray upon which she could spread out her playing cards. The first ten games in the book were quite easy and she quickly mastered them; as the nineteenth of August drew nearer and she became increasingly restless she went on to more difficult games, sometimes playing them in the hotel lobby after breakfast or carrying the cards in her purse to spread out on a park bench or a cafe table. She found that solitaire not only relaxed her nerves but entertained her mind, and she wondered if she ought to mention this to Senor DeGamez when they met again.

“Better not,” she decided regretfully; this time she really must play the part of secret agent to perfection. She would be cool, impersonal, businesslike.

On the eighteenth Mrs. Pollifax ventured out to complete her shopping for the family and when she retired that night there were serapes draped across desk, bureau and chairs. “Not the very best serapes,” reflected Mrs. Pollifax as she turned out the lights, “but buying six is so expensive and of course I’m paying for these myself.” She had kept a conscientious account of every dollar spent, recalling how grimly Jane’s husband talked of waste in Washington. She had the distinct feeling that as a taxpayer Jane’s husband would not enjoy contributing to her three-week holiday in Mexico. For the first time it occurred to Mrs. Pollifax to wonder why Mr. Carstairs had sent her here for three weeks. Why not one week, she wondered, or two at the most, and for a fleeting moment she toyed with the idea that her visit to the Parrot Bookstore might be more important than Mr. Carstairs had led her to believe.