The Good Cripple Read online

  Copyright © 1996 by Rodrigo Rey Rosa

  English translation copyright © 2004 by Esther Allen

  Originally published as El Cojo Bueno.

  Published by arrangement with Agencia Literaria Carmen Balcells, S. A., Barcelona.

  All rights reserved. Except for brief passages quoted in a newspaper, magazine, radio, television, or website review, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the Publisher.

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  New Directions Books are printed on acid-free paper.

  First published as a New Directions Paperbook Original (NDP979) in 2004

  Design by Semadar Megged

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Rey Rosa, Rodrigo, 1958–

  [Cojo bueno. English]

  The good cripple / by Rodrigo Rey Rosa ; translated by Esther Allen.

  p. cm.

  ISBN 0-8112-1566-0 (alk. paper)

  I. Allen, Esther, 1962– II. Title.

  PQ7499.2.R38C6513 2004

  863’.64—dc22 2004000949

  eISBN: 9780811225106

  New Directions Books are published for James Laughlin

  by New Directions Publishing Corporation

  80 Eighth Avenue, New York 10011

  Part One

  I.

  Laughing to himself, Bunny watched him through the little window in the entryway as he got into the car and drove away. “He’s not much of a man,” he thought. In his place, he wouldn’t have hesitated to shoot him or hit him in the back of the neck with that cane of his. He probably meant to do that but chickened out.

  He walked away from the window and poured himself a whiskey at the minibar in a corner of the living room, then sat back down on his sofa. But what if Juan Luis had come only to hear his suspicions confirmed, and would now have him killed?

  “I’ll have to hide again,” he thought with a tired feeling, and memories of the kidnapping started running through his mind. He felt guilty, but only in part. He wasn’t lying when he claimed the whole thing was El Horrible’s idea. It hadn’t struck him as a bad one, at first. His most important contribution had been to bring in Carlomagno and the Sephardi, whom he’d met by chance, the latter at a wedding, and the former in a sleazy cantina.

  He’d let himself be drawn into that disastrous adventure out of youthful recklessness, and though he’d invented the story about the damage to his brain, it was true that time had transformed him. In the end, he’d had some luck. His wife, while no beauty, was truly a good woman, and his children had brought him a lot of happiness; they’d restored his love for his parents and for respectability.

  If Juan Luis had had the nerve to kill him, Bunny thought bitterly, at least it would have saved him from the tormenting thought that his parents or children might some day find out about the whole story. If at least he’d gotten rich off it … But he was even poorer than his parents were, and that was his greatest sorrow.

  He’d been ready to allow himself to be killed, he now realized. Juan Luis had been incapable of doing it, and Bunny understood that it hadn’t been out of goodness, but out of deep contempt. “He might still kill me,” he repeated to himself. “Can’t let my guard down.” He went to the kitchen to leave the empty glass in the dishwasher and told the servant, “Chi yoo sa li tenamit.”

  “Us,” she replied without raising her eyes from the cutting board where she was dismembering a hen.

  Bunny left his house and walked to the center of town to use one of the public phones in the arcade that ran along the front of the town hall. He dialed the area code for Cobán and the number of a cantina on the road to Carchá that belonged to Carlomagno.

  “¡Vos, hombre!” Carlomagno’s voice exclaimed. “What a surprise to hear you.” He laughed. “Something bad must be going on, for you to call me.”

  “Guess who came to see me today.”

  “The Sephardi,” Carlomagno said immediately, and Bunny could hear the fear in his voice.

  “Close,” said Bunny. “Juan Luis.”

  “Luna?”

  “Of course Luna.”

  “And? What did he want?”

  “Pues, I don’t know. I was going to ask you if he’d been to see you.”

  “No. I didn’t even know he was around. Wasn’t he living in Africa?”

  “He came back a while ago.”

  “How did he manage to find you?”

  “Through my mother.”

  “Hadn’t you warned her?”

  “Yeah, sort of. But not much is getting through to her any more, poor old woman. Listen, I think that guy is up to something. It looks to me as if he wants to settle the score after all this time. For the foot …”

  “I hadn’t forgotten about that. What are we going to do?”

  “Be on the lookout. And stay in touch. I’ll check with the capi’s friends and see if there’s an arrest warrant out with our names on it, or a contract, ya sabés.”

  “Well, keep me posted.”

  “And you keep me posted. The main thing is not to let them take us by surprise.”

  “Apart from that, how are things going over in Salcajá?”

  “All right, thanks. And in Cobán?”

  “Pasándola. Listen, Don Chusito’s just come in––he’s asking me for a beer.”

  “I’ll let you go, then, ingrate.”

  “Adiós, Bunny. Thanks for the call.”

  How strange, Bunny thought as he walked from the arcade toward the cantina around the corner of the plaza, that his contact with the others was like that: a series of threads cut off and reconnected in no order at all. Carlomagno. Juan Luis. The damned Sephardi. Now there was a man he’d like to kill, even if it was too late to get any of the money back. He thought fleetingly of his children. He’d wanted to give them a good education, to move to Mexico City, for example, or Buenos Aires, as he’d once dreamed, instead of Salcajá.

  He went into the cantina, walked to the bar and ordered a cold beer. He drank it standing up at the bar, paid, and went back to the arcade to make another call, this one to a lawyer’s office in Zone Four of Guatemala City

  “Pedro, how you doing?”

  “Ah, Bunny. What are you, in trouble again?”

  “You remember that client, why bother naming the name— about eleven years ago.”

  “No! What’s with him?”

  “He came to see me, here in Salcajá.”

  “What did he want.”

  “To talk.”

  “About what.”

  “Everything that happened.”

  “And you did him the favor.”

  “Pues, I did.”

  “You talk too much, hombre. Where are you calling from?”

  “Salcajá.”

  “Not from your house, I hope.”

  “No. From town hall.”

  The lawyer hung up or the call was disconnected, Bunny wasn’t sure. He called back.

  “I’m in no mood for kidding around, señor”––and the lawyer hung up on him again.

  That Monday, Bunny went to Guatemala City on the pretext of paying a visit to his mother. He called the lawyer from the Galgos terminal, and they arranged to meet in a bar in Pasaje Rubio, near the Palacio Nacional.

  The lawyer was waiting for him, sitting at a table for two beside the door, beneath a rod of neon light. He had pale, oily skin and e
yes like a fish, and his skimpy moustache seemed deliberately calculated to make him look like a crook.

  “Hola, genius,” he said.

  Bunny put his overnight bag on the floor and sat down with a guilty smile.

  “What?”

  The lawyer spoke in a low voice, “How many times have I told you Don Luna was never going to let this one rest, Bunny-boy. To this very day, special agents are going to Salcajá and Cobán all the time. You and Carlomagno are watched even more closely than I am. The old man never gets tired of shelling out the money, even if it’s just for the pleasure of confirming that people’s habits don’t change much. I bet you he knows which of the whores in Las Flores you’ve had. He can give in to his urge any day he decides to. I imagine he hasn’t had enough hard evidence yet to do what he wants to do. But if you’ve told his son …”

  “Yes,” Bunny acknowledged. “I talked too much. But he already knew.”

  “You can be certain that every public phone in Salcajá is bugged. You love to shoot off your mouth, my dumb Bunny-boy.”

  “No, seriously, you shit. What do I do now?”

  The lawyer laughed.

  “Defend yourself, amigo. Defend yourself.”

  They drank their beers.

  “Hide out for a while,” the lawyer advised. “Starting right now.”

  Bunny glanced at his overnight bag, which held only two changes of clothing, and felt depressed at the thought that he wouldn’t be going home for quite a while. He wasn’t going to let himself get caught, not after all this time. The laws had changed. They could shoot him today for something he’d done more than ten years earlier. It seemed unjust. He’d have to warn Carlomagno; it wouldn’t be good at all if he got picked up. He’d give him a call after he left the bar, he thought.

  “Do you have enough money to get by on?” the lawyer asked.

  “No.”

  “Then you really are fucked.”

  “Loan me some dough, tigre.”

  “Fair enough,” El Tigre replied. “But you know the story: with interest.”

  “Gracias.”

  “Come by my office later on. And keep a sharp eye.” He put a five-quetzal bill down next to his empty beer glass, stood up, and said goodbye.

  Bunny turned off Pasaje Rubio onto Calle Nueve with his overnight bag over his shoulder and one hand in his pocket where he had two twenty-five centavo coins. He crossed the street and went to a public phone that stood at the door of a bakery.

  “Carlomagno? Mirá, it looks like there’s some danger. Auntie is ill and it’s contagious. She’s got to see the doctor. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “So a vacation, starting now.”

  “Vacation?”

  “Yes. Va-ca-tion.”

  Then he called his house in Salcajá.

  “Hola, cuchi. Got bad news for you.”

  “What happened?”

  “Mamá’s not doing so well. I’m going to stay a few days and help out as much as I can. To make matters worse, the phone’s broken. And I may have to take a little trip to Cobán before I can get back home. There’s some land for sale. I spoke to a potential buyer today. I want to get the commission.”

  “Let’s hope so, mi amor.”

  “I’ll call you. Kiss the kids for me.”

  The lawyer was exaggerating, thought Bunny, sitting in one of the front seats of the Monjablanca Pullman that was advancing noisily through the night toward El Rancho, where it would turn aside and continue along the mountain range to Salamá and Cobán. There would have been time for him to go back to Salcajá and get his things so he could take this trip like a decent person, he said to himself coldly, his eyes fixed on the patch of light that the Monjablanca bus cast on the road.

  When he got off at the central plaza in Cobán it was almost midnight. He went straight down Calle Empinada toward the Hostal de los Acuña, where the servants all knew him from the time when, still convalescing from the explosion that had cost El Horrible and the Tapir their lives, he had come to visit Carlomagno. Out of some strange sense of loyalty, Carlomagno had sent an emissary to Bunny when he found out he was still alive and in the hospital, and had given him a fifth of his share of the ransom. “After all,” Bunny––who didn’t understand, either, why the Sephardi had given his share to Carlomagno––told himself, “I’m the one who made the connection for him.” He’d spent a month in Cobán, and even started thinking about staying on and living there, partly because he was embarrassed by the scar that cut across his temple. But then he met his wife, who owned two houses and a granary in Salcajá, and that changed his luck.

  Efraín, a young Kekchí who was Evangelical one year and would go back to being Catholic the next, put him in room number one, which had a double bed rather than bunks.

  “There’s no tourism, no tourism,” he said. “It’s been exactly a year since they lynched that gringa in San Cristóbal, and they’re celebrating.” He laughed.

  “Do you still serve breakfast?”

  “Of course.”

  “Send mine up at eight, por favor.”

  “La Luvia will bring it to you.”

  “She’s still here?”

  “Still here.” He looked serious, then smiled.

  “I’m glad,” said Bunny and sat down on the bed.

  “Buenas noches, señor.” Efraín stepped back into the hallway in order to shut the door.

  Bunny lay down on the bed with all his clothes on and for a moment felt much younger than he was. It had done him good to get away from the family, even just a few days. The swarm of memories stirred up by Juan Luis’s visit had taken him back to the state of mind he was in eleven years ago. He sat up on the bed, reached for the overnight case which was on the ground and took out a small plastic bag of marijuana, then extracted a rolling paper out of his wallet. After patiently separating out the stems and seeds, like a real connoisseur, he rolled himself a joint. He stood up and opened the window a crack to throw out the stems and seeds and blow the smoke out toward the back of the garden.

  Defend yourself, the lawyer had said; it was the only thing he could do. The bitter taste of frustrated talent was in his throat; the marijuana he’d smoked made him daydream about plans he had never carried out. “Bah,” he exclaimed as he put out the butt which was starting to burn his fingertips. He crushed it and threw it out the window. Life was like that.

  What luck that Luna had. He’d been dead, practically, but now he was alive, and not only did he have money to burn and a beautiful wife, he was a writer and could act like he was some kind of superior being. The disdain he had emanated during the few minutes his visit lasted! But the thing that most wounded Bunny’s self-esteem now was the memory of the admiration he’d felt for Juan Luis when he asked so serenely about the details of the kidnapping: Juan Luis had seemed like a truly wise person.

  “He won’t have us killed,” and a twisted smile formed on his face. “All he has to do now is have us arrested.”

  In Guatemala City, after making a call to Salcajá, Bunny had taken a taxi to his mother’s house, which was in the Old City. He had the key to the front gate, so he went in without knocking. It was noon, so the gardener wasn’t there, and Bunny took advantage of that to do what he’d come to do. He went into the garage where the telephone box was, lifted the iron lid, and stuck his hand inside to disconnect one of the cables. Then he walked around the side of the house and went in the front door, calling out, “Hola mama! Where are you?”

  The old woman came out of the kitchen wearing a radiant smile, her glasses fogged with steam.

  “Mijo, what a surprise.”

  Bunny put his hands on her shoulders and kissed her forehead.

  “How are you? And papa?”

  “You know, more or less. He’s in bed again. Depression.”

  “Oh.”

 
“What brings you here?”

  “Business. I’m going to have to go to Cobán. There’s a little finca for sale and I have a client who’s interested in buying some land around there. I’ve been offered a commission.”

  “I’m so glad, mijo. The way things are, verdad. Everything so expensive. How much more can we take? I worry a lot about all of you. About the children, especially.”

  “Don’t worry, mama. We’ll come out of it, little by little. We could be worse off.”

  “It’s too bad you didn’t bring me the patojos. I could have taken care of them while you went to Cobán. They probably don’t even remember me by now. They must have grown so much—who knows if I’d recognize them.”

  “Of course they remember you. But it’s true, they’re growing up very fast. I’ll bring them with me next time.”

  The old woman glanced at her watch and began making her way towards the kitchen.

  “The noodles are ready,” she said. “Are you having lunch with me?”

  The double bed in the Hostal de los Acuña was in bad shape and he had to change position several times before he was finally comfortable and could fall asleep. When Luvia knocked at the door with breakfast at eight, he wasn’t hungry, because of his nerves, but he was already bathed, dressed, and ready to go out.

  “Buenos días, Don Armando,” Luvia said with the same smile as ever. She had very little white hair and her skin was still young. “It’s a long time since you’ve been back here.”

  “How are you, Luvia. I’m glad to see you.

  “Are you staying a few days?”

  “No, afraid not. I’m going on a little trip with Carlomagno, to see some land around Yalpemech.”

  “You’re always on the go, verdad? I’ll leave this for you here.”

  Bunny gulped down the orange juice and ate half a mollete dipped in coffee.

  From the reception desk he heard the voice of Señora Acuña, who had just come in. Bunny didn’t want to waste any time saying hello to her, so he waited a moment to give her time to go to the kitchen, as she usually did, before he emerged into the corridor. Luvia’s younger brother Julián was on duty at the reception desk, and Bunny paid him for the night, then went out to the street with his bag. He walked quickly through the south end of the city towards the road to Carchá, where Carlomagno had his cantina.