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Authors: Mario Vargas Llosa
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grasped her hand and kissed it.
"Be still," she said, looking around in fake alarm. "Are you
forgetting I'm a married woman? Suppose somebody here knows
Robert and tells him about this?"
I said I knew perfectly well that her marriage to the diplomat was
a mere formality to which she had resigned herself in order to leave
Cuba and settle in Paris. Which seemed fine to me, because I too
believed one could make any sacrifice for the sake of Paris. But,
when we were alone, she shouldn't play the faithful, loving wife,
because we both knew very well it was a fairy tale. Without
becoming angry in the least, she changed the subject and said there
was a damn bureaucracy here too and she couldn't get French
nationality for two years, even though she was legally married to a
French citizen. And they had just rented a nice apartment in Passy.
She was decorating it now, and as soon as it was presentable she'd
invite me over to introduce me to my rival, who, in addition to being
congenial, was a very cultured man.
"I'm going to Lima tomorrow," I told her. "How can I see you
when I get back?"
She gave me her telephone number and address and asked if I
was still living in that little room in the garret of the Hotel du Senat,
where she had been so cold.
"It's hard for me to leave it because I had the best experience of
my life there. And that's why, for me, that hole is a palace."
"This experience is the one I think it is?" she asked, bringing her
face, where mischief was always mixed with curiosity and coquetry,
close to mine.
"The same."
"For what you said just now, I owe you a kiss. Remind me the
next time we see each other."
But a moment later, when we said goodbye, she forgot her
marital precautions and instead of her cheek she offered me her lips.
They were full and sensual, and in the seconds I had them pressed
against mine, I felt them move slowly, provocatively, in a
supplementary caress. When I already had crossed Saint-Germain
on the way to my hotel, I turned to look at her and she was still
there, on the corner by Les Deux Magots, a bright, golden figure in
white shoes, watching me walk away. I waved goodbye and she
waved the hand holding the flowered parasol. I only had to see her
to discover that in these past few years I hadn't forgotten her for a
single moment, that I loved her as much as I did the first day.
When I arrived in Lima in March 1965, shortly before my
thirtieth birthday, photographs of Luis de la Puente, Guillermo
Lobaton, fat Paul, and other leaders of the MIR were in all the
papers and on television—by now there was television in Peru—and
everybody was talking about them. The MIR rebellion had an
undeniable romantic aspect. The Miristas themselves had sent the
photos to the media, announcing that in view of the iniquitous
exploitative conditions that made victims of peasants and workers,
and the surrender of the Belaunde Terry government to imperialism,
the Movement of the Revolutionary Left had decided to take action.
The leaders of the MIR showed their faces and appeared with long
hair and full-grown beards, with rifles in their hands and combat
uniforms consisting of black turtleneck sweaters, khaki trousers,
and boots. I noticed that Paul was as fat as ever. In the photograph
that Correo published on the front page, he was surrounded by four
other leaders and was the only one smiling.
"These wild men won't last a month," predicted Dr. Ataulfo
Lamiel in his study on Calle Boza in the center of Lima, on the
morning I went to see him. "Turning Peru into another Cuba! Your
poor aunt Alberta would have fainted dead away if she could see the
outlaw faces of our brand-new guerrillas."
My uncle didn't take the announcement of armed actions very
seriously, a feeling that seemed widespread. People thought it was a
harebrained scheme that would end in no time. During the weeks I
spent in Peru, I was crushed by a sense of oppressiveness and felt
like
"Be still," she said, looking around in fake alarm. "Are you
forgetting I'm a married woman? Suppose somebody here knows
Robert and tells him about this?"
I said I knew perfectly well that her marriage to the diplomat was
a mere formality to which she had resigned herself in order to leave
Cuba and settle in Paris. Which seemed fine to me, because I too
believed one could make any sacrifice for the sake of Paris. But,
when we were alone, she shouldn't play the faithful, loving wife,
because we both knew very well it was a fairy tale. Without
becoming angry in the least, she changed the subject and said there
was a damn bureaucracy here too and she couldn't get French
nationality for two years, even though she was legally married to a
French citizen. And they had just rented a nice apartment in Passy.
She was decorating it now, and as soon as it was presentable she'd
invite me over to introduce me to my rival, who, in addition to being
congenial, was a very cultured man.
"I'm going to Lima tomorrow," I told her. "How can I see you
when I get back?"
She gave me her telephone number and address and asked if I
was still living in that little room in the garret of the Hotel du Senat,
where she had been so cold.
"It's hard for me to leave it because I had the best experience of
my life there. And that's why, for me, that hole is a palace."
"This experience is the one I think it is?" she asked, bringing her
face, where mischief was always mixed with curiosity and coquetry,
close to mine.
"The same."
"For what you said just now, I owe you a kiss. Remind me the
next time we see each other."
But a moment later, when we said goodbye, she forgot her
marital precautions and instead of her cheek she offered me her lips.
They were full and sensual, and in the seconds I had them pressed
against mine, I felt them move slowly, provocatively, in a
supplementary caress. When I already had crossed Saint-Germain
on the way to my hotel, I turned to look at her and she was still
there, on the corner by Les Deux Magots, a bright, golden figure in
white shoes, watching me walk away. I waved goodbye and she
waved the hand holding the flowered parasol. I only had to see her
to discover that in these past few years I hadn't forgotten her for a
single moment, that I loved her as much as I did the first day.
When I arrived in Lima in March 1965, shortly before my
thirtieth birthday, photographs of Luis de la Puente, Guillermo
Lobaton, fat Paul, and other leaders of the MIR were in all the
papers and on television—by now there was television in Peru—and
everybody was talking about them. The MIR rebellion had an
undeniable romantic aspect. The Miristas themselves had sent the
photos to the media, announcing that in view of the iniquitous
exploitative conditions that made victims of peasants and workers,
and the surrender of the Belaunde Terry government to imperialism,
the Movement of the Revolutionary Left had decided to take action.
The leaders of the MIR showed their faces and appeared with long
hair and full-grown beards, with rifles in their hands and combat
uniforms consisting of black turtleneck sweaters, khaki trousers,
and boots. I noticed that Paul was as fat as ever. In the photograph
that Correo published on the front page, he was surrounded by four
other leaders and was the only one smiling.
"These wild men won't last a month," predicted Dr. Ataulfo
Lamiel in his study on Calle Boza in the center of Lima, on the
morning I went to see him. "Turning Peru into another Cuba! Your
poor aunt Alberta would have fainted dead away if she could see the
outlaw faces of our brand-new guerrillas."
My uncle didn't take the announcement of armed actions very
seriously, a feeling that seemed widespread. People thought it was a
harebrained scheme that would end in no time. During the weeks I
spent in Peru, I was crushed by a sense of oppressiveness and felt
like
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