belt. He lit a cigarette and offered one to the woman.
‘I’m Perico’s sister. You worked with him at the Dobronich cotton gin in Machagai, if you remember.’
‘Perico. What’s he up to?’
‘Haven’t heard from him in years. He went to Santiago, to work, and never came back.’
The boy was lying on the ground and the dogs were snuffling at his ribs, looking for the stick hidden under his body. He was laughing like crazy.
‘He’s a good little kid,’ said the woman.
‘How old is he?’
‘Almost nine. He does what he’s told and he’s healthy. He’s well brought up.’
‘Did he bring clothes?’
‘There’s a bag in the truck.’
‘All right. Leave him then,’ he said and flicked the cigarette butt away.
The woman nodded.
‘His name is José Emilio, but everyone calls him Tapioca.’
When the truck pulled away and began to climb slowly toward the road, Tapioca started crying. Standing still, he opened his mouth and let out a howl, and the tears ran down his dirty cheeks, leaving tracks. Brauer bent down to his level.
‘Come on, kid, let’s have a Coke and give those dogs something to eat.’
Tapioca nodded, still watching the truck, which had climbed right up onto the road now, with his mother inside, taking her away forever.
Brauer picked up the bag and started walking toward the pump. The dogs had run up onto the verge, following the truck; now they were coming back with their tongues hanging out. The boy sniffled, turned around, and ran after the Gringo.
Tapioca started clearing the table and Leni got up to help him.
‘Let me do it,’ she said, taking the knives and forks he was holding, then briskly gathering the plates and glasses. ‘Tell me where I can wash them.’
‘Over here.’
Leni followed him to the back of the little house, where there was a cement basin with a tap. As she washed up, she handed the things to Tapioca. The wet dishes piled up in his arms.
‘Do you have a tea towel?’
‘Inside.’
They went into the single room. It took Leni’s eyes a few minutes to adjust to the darkness. Gradually she identified the shapes: a stove with a gas cylinder, a fridge, a small table, a few shelves nailed to the wall, two folding beds, and a wardrobe. The bare cement floor was clean.
Tapioca put the things on the table and picked up a rag. Leni took it from him and started drying.
‘You know where things go; you put them away,’ she said.
They finished the job in silence. When she had dried the last fork, Leni shook out the rag and hung it over the edge of the table.
‘Done,’ she said with a satisfied smile.
Tapioca wiped his hands on the legs of his trousers, ill at ease.
Leni hardly ever did housework because she and her father didn’t have a home. Her clothes were sent to the laundry; they ate in dining rooms where other people cleared the table and washed the dishes; and the hotel beds they slept in were made and changed by the staff. So she took a certain pleasure in these tasks that another girl might have found tiresome. It was like playing house.
‘What now?’ she asked.
Tapioca shrugged.
‘Let’s go out,’ she said.
When they stepped outside, Leni’s eyes had to adjust again, now to the fierce early-afternoon glare.
The Reverend was dozing on his chair, and Leni put a finger to her lips, warning Tapioca not to wake him. She walked away from the porch and beckoned to the boy, who followed her.
‘Let’s go under that tree,’ she said.
Tapioca tagged along. Except as a child, with his mother, he had never been in female company. Another boy would have resisted, feeling that the girl was pushing him around.
They sat down under the leafiest tree they could find. Even so, the hot wind smothered everything in a hellish torpor.
‘Do you like music?’ asked Leni.
Tapioca shrugged. Not that he disliked it. But he wasn’t sure if he liked it, exactly. The radio was always on, and sometimes, when they played one of those cheerful, up-tempo chamamés, the Gringo would turn the volume right up. He’d always give a whoop and sometimes even dance a few steps, which amused Tapioca. Now that he thought about it, he liked the other kind more, the sad ones, about ghosts and tragic love affairs. That music was really beautiful; it made your heart go tight. It didn’t make you want to dance; it made you want to keep still, watching the road.
‘Put this in,’ said Leni, helping him to insert one of the little earphones. Then she put the other one into her ear. Tapioca looked at her. The girl smiled and pressed a button. At first, the music startled him: he’d never heard it so close up, as if it were playing in his brain. She shut her eyes; he did the same. Soon he got used to the melody, and it didn’t feel like something that had intruded from outside. It was as if the music came surging up from his core.
The car had broken down as they were leaving Gato Colorado. Leni was amused by the name, and especially by the two cement cats, painted bright red, sitting on two pillars at the entrance to the town, which was on the border between the provinces of Santa Fe and Chaco.
The bad noises had begun much earlier, as they were coming in to Tostado, where they had spent the night in a small hotel. Leni said they should get it checked before setting off again, but the Reverend paid no attention.
‘The car won’t let us down. The good Lord wouldn’t allow it.’
Leni, who had been driving since she was ten and took turns at the wheel with her father, knew when a noise was just a noise and when it was a warning signal.
‘We better get a mechanic to take a look before we leave,’ she insisted as they drank coffee early that morning in a bar. ‘We could ask here if they know someone who’s good and doesn’t charge too much.’
‘If we take it to a garage, they’ll make us wait the whole day. We have to have faith. When has this car ever broken down, eh?’
Leni kept quiet. They always ended up doing what her father wanted, or, as he saw it, what God expected of them.
When they’d been on the road for two hours, the car gave one last snort and stopped. The Reverend tried to start it again, but it was no use. Leni looked through the insect-spotted windscreen at the road stretching away and said, without turning her head, but in a clear and firm voice:
‘I told you so, Father.’
