“I didn’t know you had a maid,” I said.
“She only comes in the mornings, on weekdays. She has six children in Vinces.” He opened a bottle of aguardiente and served two shots. “Lunch will be ready in a few minutes. You’ll have to excuse Bachita, she’s running late.”
“I understand. This looks like a big house for just one person to do all the work.”
He laughed. “I’m sorry, my friend, but here in Ecuador we’re not used to palaces and rows of servants like in your country.”
I smiled. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, but not everybody in Spain has rows of servants or palaces. My wife and I lived in an apartment that was half the size of your house.”
As soon as I sat down, Martin handed me the drink. One could get used to this pleasurable existence of drinking and eating in excess. How different men were. On my wedding day, I’d been cautious not to eat too much, lest my stomach might swell or I might stain my dress. Mamá always said that men didn’t like gluttonous women, though I doubt Cristóbal cared or even paid attention to what I ate. As a woman, there had been so many rules to follow.
“Anyway,” I said, holding on to my glass. “This morning I ran into Dr. Aquilino’s maid, Mayra. I don’t know if you’ve met her? Well, the poor girl is devastated because she lost her job and is looking for a new one.”
“So you thought I ought to hire her.”
“Yes.” I crossed my leg, mimicking Martin’s confident gesture. “You could all benefit: Mayra would have a job and a place to live, Bachita would serve your lunch on time, and you would have a cleaner house.”
He studied me for a moment. “Sounds like a grand plan. But tell me, if she’s so wonderful why did Aquilino fire her?”
I finished my drink. How much should I tell him? He was bound to find out she was expecting, but he didn’t need to know all the details.
“She’s expecting a baby.”
He unfolded his leg. “Absolutely not.”
“Oh, come on. You can’t be so prudish. Not after what I’ve seen you do! These things happen.”
“It’s not a matter of principle. Pregnant women are complicated. What am I supposed to do with a child running around the house?”
“Nothing. The child will have a mother to look after him.”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you going to let that poor girl wander aimlessly without a home? You know what happens to women when they fall in disgrace.”
“But why don’t you talk to Angélica? She has a lot more money than I do.”
“Because she already has two maids and besides, Mayra is Julia’s cousin and Julia is vexed with her.”
“All right, all right, this is already too much information.”
I bit my lower lip. I’d said too much. Cristóbal didn’t care for this much detail pertaining to our staff, either. I recalled all the times I’d talked about La Cordobesa and how the entire town had treated her like a pariah. My husband had the same bored expression Martin now had.
“Was that all you wanted to talk to me about?”
I hesitated. To say or not to say.
“You know, you ought to try chocolate and stop chewing on those beans. If you want, I’ll make some for you after lunch.”
*
The kitchen filled with the fine aroma of toasted cacao beans. I couldn’t believe I had so much Nacional bean at my disposal. They were considered the finest of the beans and as such, they were expensive. I was used to working with Forastero beans, their African counterpart, which were sometimes easier to find in Sevilla. To think that I practically owned a plantation bursting with this so-called golden seed.
Bachita and Martin stared at me wide-mouthed as I ground the beans I had just roasted and peeled in a mortar, transforming them into a creamy brown paste. I wished they had a mill—it would’ve made the process much faster.
“Hand me some milk,” I told Bachita, “and sugar and cinnamon, please.”
At first, Bachita and Martin had both been astonished that I, a man, would get into the kitchen and prepare something so complex, but I informed them that the first chocolate houses in Europe were opened and run by men. Besides, Martin himself had prepared bass for me the other day.
Their curiosity about the process and what would come out of it was enough to distract them from their own cultural norms and preconceived roles.
Or so I hoped.
In an odd way, Bachita reminded me of my assistant at the chocolatería. The way she lingered by me, attentive and obedient. It was strange that she would remind me of La Cordobesa because they didn’t look anything like each other. La Cordobesa was lean and had an angular face, like a wire hanger, whereas Bachita was hefty and her nose had the texture of a ginger root. Martin stood there, watching with the same bewildered expression of a child discovering that hens laid eggs.
And I was the one introducing him to this delicacy. There were only a few things I was confident about in my life and making chocolate was one of them. The process never failed me. Since my grandmother first taught me her recipe, I’d felt the same anticipation. The transformation from bean to paste was something I never grew tired of seeing. It was magical.
“And now, the secret ingredient,” I said. “Sea salt.”
Both of them looked at me as if I should be sent to the nearest asylum.
“Just trust me,” I said.
“You have to add a pinch of salt to the chocolate,” my grandmother would say, “to moderate the kick.”
I initially didn’t believe her. I was, after all, trying to make a dessert. But after hesitantly following her instructions, I realized how salt had the strange ability of enhancing the flavor and made the dark chocolate and cocoa a little less bitter.
“Look at that,” Martin said.