Almost Never A Novel

34


Action at dawn: the theft. Over the course of that week, Liborio, Zacarías, Egipto, and Gonzala had become the best of chums. Egipto was the one who proposed the robbery. Let’s begin with the toughest part: the pool hall personnel, those two wimpy, scatterbrained hicks, we know who they are: and: what about this and what about that, convictions, during the first nightlong conversation when Egipto repeated more than nine times the periphrasis: “It’s a golden opportunity,” just a question of encouragement. But those in charge of the pool hall were rather reticent, they hesitated, they swore, honor and dignity should always triumph over corruption, also they were Catholics who crossed themselves frequently, hence their sense of guilt never left them any peace, and stealing—horrors! Their policy was to toe the line and seek new horizons morning, noon, and night, always holding their heads up high. Nevertheless, “It’s a golden opportunity,” persuasion, temptation. During the second conversation Egipto emphasized how f*cked their lives were in that harsh, unchanging landscape, with its perpetual component of darkness and unthinkable squalor; he waxed eloquent, that is, on similar subjects. All rotten; images, scenes, simulations, which all came down to how f*cked they were, but no, not even then did he convince them. It took till the third conversation for him to be able to touch their souls: the future of their families back at the ranch—how about eternal smiles?, not bad, eh? To leave the worst behind them, like abandoning a filthy nest. Moreover, the robbery would occur at dawn. To wit: do it soon, before Don Demetrio returned. It was a matter of taking all the money from the safe and jamming it lickety-split into a bag, any bag. Then running off and vanishing—come on! It was not easy to push them into sin, he had to talk and talk, in a tone of voice that really softened the edges of the most horrendous ideas. We won’t take the balls or the cues, just the money, okay? We must say, there was a lot, because the billiards business was growing at an almost demented rate, in just a few days—wow! so many vagrancy-prone customers. It’s a golden opportunity, don’t you see?! Finally Liborio and Zacarías, conscious that they were wavering and seeing the glint in each other’s eyes, were persuaded to throw in their lots. They would cross themselves while they burgled. Midnight action. When all was calm, because in Parras there wasn’t a lot of surveillance, and what little there was: why would they get out of bed at that hour. So: a stellar robbery. Yes, oath taken: from here on out, almost like a trick. Once those two eagerly agreed to go along with the robbery, Egipto invited them to the house. Celebration. A lavish meal for four, prepared by Gonzala, she who would steal Doña Telma’s jewels, a huge quantity in a safe, an artifact that several blows would open. She and Egipto had already talked it over extensively, moreover these two were in love and for both of them the robbery would mean fleeing Parras to live their love somewhere distant and unknown—right? Then they would kiss each other as much as they wanted far away, very far away, perhaps somewhere with good weather. They imagined themselves, therefore, very much in love and bedecked with jewels, maybe even drinking delicious wine in supine satiety. Indistinguishable from the aristocracy, part effort, part merit. A shared dream discussed in frenzied details we’d do better to leave unspoken. During the meal Egipto outlined the scheme while they toasted and wished each other one hell of an awesome life. Nevertheless, a few casual details; to the beat of clanking cutlery and chewing, Egipto explained that everything they took from the pool hall and the house would be divided equally; split five ways because a man with a pickup truck had to be cut in; a man, also a thief, whom Egipto had hired two days earlier, and who was now in on the plot, pretty exciting development, this business of using passwords and the like. When to brake and when to accelerate (not much) the truck: like a shark in the dark, right? The hack couldn’t make it, had other things to do … Everything was working out, thank God. It’s true, few people would be able to resist such a thrifty theft; when the golden opportunity arrives nobody doesn’t want to be a thief … To (gently) steal in order to gain access to a more praiseworthy life, who wouldn’t, especially if no danger is detected. Naturally! anyway nerves get racked, so moving quickly is recommended, to get it over with, or whatever.

All four got along during the meal, which was delicious. Better not to list each thing they ate so as not to make the narrative too bourgeois, but it was all delicious.

Chorizo?

Buttery bits?

A motley mix of meats?

Wines so fine, the four were hanging from the rafters, once they were in their cups?

That’s what we found. And we also found that they were pigging out. All the rest we must merely assume: a long dissertation about the meaning of an augural robbery: jewels and money, big-time; corruption seen as fireworks, a fleeting and luminous spectacle, and its consequences: the lasting embers, those that linger long: life, period, embers, and again, casually, the word “corruption” appeared, so revealing, therefore, crush that word, destroy it, in order to raise it to the loftiest heights: corruption, corrup, corru, co, conquest, insofar as the theft itself would be the same as a silent then smiling flash of lightning. Finally came the good-byes: many good nights many thank yous, see you tomorrow; careful! tomorrow at dawn the robbery will take place, so we’ll meet at the house at exactly twelve midnight; agreed; say no more; good-bye.

We will give only a few details about the sinister implementation: four in the morning; not a sound in the entire town, so the fortune Liborio and Zacarías removed from the safe, bah, just a matter of stuffing that many bills into a large oilskin bag, and magic and speed to load it stealthily onto the truck, then vroom to Doña Telma’s house; there, the fortune the lady of the house left trustingly in Gonzala’s hands was placed in a bag, apace; all the jewelry in another, yes, in the twinkling of an eye, and the escape from Parras, everyone scrambling in. So it came to pass. Worth mentioning that none of the five thieves were from Parras but rather from several different hamlets: past the farthest reaches of the desert, like scattered grains whose names, well, someday we’ll name each hamlet, but for now only one: Paila—and that’s all! Also worth noting something else: the thieves left the door ajar in the pool hall as well as at the house. Carelessly or with intentional malice so that others could go in and take what was left. The first to notice the doors open the following day closed them, that’s right, in both cases they were quite decent. Bam! problem solved. Now all that’s left to speculate about is where the pickup loaded with thieves would go; how they would scatter, questions that belong to the mysterious disappearance of all five, who perhaps ended up fighting among themselves in some desolate spot, under a sky of abstruse hues, between chestnut and orange trees; that there were deaths, perhaps; one person who kept it all, the smartest one, of course, let’s dub it with “perhaps” and move on to something else.