all of us, notables, we have the right to play Poker in the Progress Club and initial draw vanity numb the foot of accounts drinks or meals at the Plaza. We all know what a funeral in Santa Maria. Some were, in turn, the best friend of the family offered us the privilege of seeing the thing from the beginning and also the privilege log.
is better, more harmonious, the thing starts at night, after and before the sun. We went to Miramonte or what Grimm, "Swiss car company." Sometimes, I talk about the veterans, we could choose, others, the election was decided in corners of the house of mourning, for a reason, for ten or none. Yo, when I can, I choose to Grimm for the old families. They feel more comfortable with the brutality and indifference of Grimm, who insists on personally do everything you need and what they invented on a whim. Prefer the old racially motivated, it can see any, but I've seen besides they appreciate their lack of hypocrisy, that provides relief facing death as a business, considering the body as a single transportable package.
We went, usually in the morning, comfortable in serious but unfortunately, a manly voice deliberate and cautious not to knock on the door forever Miramonte illuminated or Grimm. Miramonte, however, hopes all, apparently, and dedicated employees, dressed in black, with black hair, black mustache with his sad and brightness of the eyes slightly misleading mulatto, to mingle among the mourners, to strengthen hands and spread consolations. This like the others, the grandparents had not plowed in the colony, also I have seen. Hit, hit under the purple neon sign and explained my mission to one of the two, the gringo or mulatto; any of them knew five minutes after the last breath and waited. Grimm yawns, puts on glasses and opens a huge book.
- What do you want? question. I say, knowing or calculating.
"What Unfortunately, so young. Finally rest, so old, "says Miramonte, at all hours without sleep and dressed for an old dance middling.
We also know all of us, the two offer or impose a funeral without a fight with two drivers, a coach for the flowers, limos, torches, candles thick, Christ tortured. We know that the ten or four paraded us all around town, "Arial Narrow", on one side Brausen square, walled funds for the fifth of Guerrero, on the road on a slope, irregular, almost exclusively used for that, which leads to the big cemetery, common in time for the city and the colony. After beating us to every bump, from the tops of cars and deceit, not the trot, but a good pace, appreciating each collective impatience to rid themselves, keeping alive, lung and with smiles, talks, talks that we dilute oblong away the dead. We also know this body masses, the rapid and unintelligible murmur, the thick mist of holy water. Compare-we, the veterans, the actions of the deceased father Bergner with those of his successor, the Italian, Favieri, boy, black, skinny, with his indomitable provocative expression, almost obscene. We also
recited obituaries and looking at the earth endure, the hat against the pubis.
All that we know. We all know what a funeral in Santa Maria, we can describe to a stranger, tell epistolary to a distant relative. But that did not know, this burial, thus buried.
I began to know, careless, ironic, never suspecting that he was aware, when enabled by Miramonte came to sit at my desk at Universal, a Saturday shortly before noon and told me he asked permission the liver of her mother. Exaggerated, lied a little, I was looking for alarms. I did not taste. It has long whiskers and the cuffs of his shirt, waving his hands in front of the mouth and flies away languidly. Suggested, by antipathy, removal of the gallbladder to invite and let me through soapy window, I watched with enthusiasm the Summer in the Square, one sensed that beyond the clouds drier in the glasses. Then the goat said, "was the first news that I had and could not have heard, while I smoked and he did not, because it is greedy and rower and is a future for which to care. I smoked, I repeat, diverting the face to make him understand that he should go, watching the white whirlwind had left in the glass of the window soap and sponge, convincing me that summer was back. It was then that said this guy -...
Malabia of the lowest.
"The only. The only thing left, "I said from the side, evil and courteous.
"Excuse me, is the custom, they were two. A great person, Federico.
"Yes," I said, turning to look at her eyes and cause some pain. Grimm buried him. Perfect service. (But he Caseros, the paymaster of Miramonte, hoped that later in the afternoon I was going to say sarcoma talking about his mother. Would not go, did well, as I learned later.)
"Mr. Grimm is a senior in their profession-praised, bit an olive, looked at the stone in the palm of a hand.
And that summer I was shown, offset by the confusion of the whitish cloud in the glass window above the square, the square itself, in the calm river four or five blocks. It was the summer, a hundred feet swelling lazy, slow-laden air, nothing, the smell of jasmine that would lead in the fifth, the tenderness of the skin scent of warming in the sun outside.
"The summer I said, more or less directly to him or the table.
-Wine Malabia the boy, as I said, and swallowed the words I spoke.
understood that it was a duel. But he had, he knew, one sick family member, though, of course, could be an attack or accident, or unexpectedly, and asks me, as we understand it, the cheapest funeral you can get. I look nervous and pale, his hands in his pockets, leaning against the counter. I speak this morning, as I opened, because Mr. Miramonte keys and trust me there are days that does not come. A burial. I ask, surprised and afraid, in the case of a relative. But shakes his head and says no, she is a woman who died in one of the farms on the coast. For discretion I did not ask more. I give a price and he remains silent, as if thinking. But then I thought, if he is the father pays. The boy is, you know, quite proud, serious. Not like the other, the eldest, Frederick, of which we spoke. However, I told her not to worry about payment. But he did not, his hands in his pockets, died accidentally sleep at me, asking for the cash price of the cheapest burial. He took some money from his pocket and put it on, counting up the counter. Reached,
no gain to the coffin and the funeral, nothing more. I said yes and gave me the address in the shantytown of the coast, for today at four. Had a death certificate, right, that new doctor is in the polyclinic.
"The hospital" I said.
"Dr. Rios' said enthusiastically.
So at four I send the car. By age could be almost the mother takes him about fifteen years. I do not understand. If it was a family friend, an acquaintance, a maid, had been the father, or himself, but not to bargain, not to insist on paying in cash, not to bury the woman that's almost like a dog. Rita Garcia I, or Gonzalez, single, a heart attack 35 years, broken lungs. Do you understand?
not understand anything. Do not talk about cancer but of hope, let it pay.
- And what side of the shantytown?
"Near the factory. He tried to explain. Clear that the driver go and ask and then tell. Know, too.
- In the big cemetery?
- Where do you think? Does the colony? Mass grave in a month. But always keep up appearances - was reassuring. And then I said, "There is also a goat. He had, raising women. An old goat. I found out after the boy came to hire Malabia.
So then I got a nap in the car in the summer, with little desire be sad. A four-room was at the gates of the cemetery, squatting at the end of the slope of the road, smoking. Summer, the urgings of many tricky previous summers, the columns of smoke from cooking at altitude.
It was about half past four when I saw and I started watching with suspicion, almost with hatred. The guard was taken to the streets, gray lumps, some deep veins almost wet-ground, waved and tried to speak, two men in shirtsleeves, with little tissue in the neck tight to absorb the sweat from his parka imminent, expected bored, leaning on the gate.
not come from above, from the way that all burials we know. Came from the left and presented by surprise, and bounds on the tape slowly sunny land three or four, after having made an extensive detour, refusing burial to the itinerary that we all thought inevitable, removing the city. A road much longer, awkward, convoluted among farms and orchards poor, impeded by ditches, chickens and cows numb. The reconstructed later, at home, while the boy talked of things trying to convince me that he only assumed or ignored.
The guardian of the cemetery has a stick hanging from one arm useless. He went out and looked around. I sat smoking on a stone, the two guys in shirt lying silent, hands dangling at the waist, his pants pockets. Was. A cactus, the churchyard wall of stone on stone, repeatedly bellowing in the background invisible in the afternoon. And the summer sun still unresolved in white and scorekeeper, the buzz, the insistence of newly hatched flies, the smell of gasoline that I had been lazy in the car. The summer, the sweat and dew and laziness. The old man coughed for me and was rebuilt dirty words. Then I got to rest, I saw the road naked, I looked left and was slowly making the grimace of hate and distrust.
wobbling her shiny black dome, the hearse was up the street, slowly, pulled by a yanta unstained. I saw the cross retinta, galley
driver and his little head cocked, dwarf horses, reluctant, outrageous color, almost mules pulling a plow. Then sodic by the sun, climbing loose, brown and golden dust cloud. And immediately after his death, immediately after the light turned leisurely to occupy the area of \u200b\u200bdisturbed earth, I saw them, I measured his unhealthy approach, saw the two little clouds that rose, renewing, to bring them to fund independent without joining. Meanwhile, I approached the driver's face lying in the high seat of funeral, his expression of patience vexed.
That this burial. A car loaded with the dead, as always. But after half a block, curled, bent, bent, however, to reach the cemetery even though it be two leagues farther, the boy and the goat, a little behind the beast, or just a tour conducted by a thick rope, nearly three legs, but refusing to walk. Nothing else, no one, the last tremor of the dust settled, the gentle light burning on the road.
"Let me," the weakest of men in shirtsleeves, letting go of the door and out into the street. He patted the shoulder of the guard who grumbled with your head up to the box's funeral. Why does not fit, Barrientos? Then we have beer in the crypt.
The car had stopped without violence, without effort on the reins, without the will of the bony tip and head down, so absolutely, definitely, that was hard to believe that he had never moved. The sweat of horses austere revived the black spots of bitumen remaining from previous burials sad smell immediately surrounded the car and animals, helped to separate the amazing stillness of the afternoon and the world. Slow down the voice, hostile and exasperating as the song of a bird can.
-is against the law and you know, "said Barrientos, the driver. I have so much I thirst no longer matter or piss beer horse.
Barrientos had an old face and soft, with small eyes and under eyebrows dull gray, outgoing, with a big mouth thin arc introduced into the unshaven chin, with a thrilling mask resigned bitterness.
"What it costs," said the kind Barrientos. No danger, no other funeral today. Calculate the hole is at bottom, about ten blocks, and did not accompany anyone to upload.
"I know you did not follow anyone or really would be better if it had not accompanied by anyone.
Nothing in the world could make him smile, she leaned back, increasing its height in the box, its threatened importance, sweating as if I did for fun, no words to express his protest, to relieve their humiliation. It was wrapped in a winter coat just discovered his hands, the high hat oily held a feathered cockade, black and purple. Pulled from somewhere a Tuscan and began to bite.
-Compute, Barrientos said the other, and without faith. Ten blocks and doing dribbling and no one to help with the manijitas. Between the car, even to the avenue.
Without bending, without moving your head, expert, Barrientos spat Tuscan tip to the left and struck a match.
"That will help the goat. The goat and the other. I do not get my car to the cemetery, I am forbidden, and neither helped. One dead poor is the same as a dead rich. Not so. "He held the Tuscan in the middle of the crescent of the mouth and stared, memorizing inconsolable, the blue smoke rising gently in the afternoon with no wind. Two cars, twenty cars, to me the same thing. But do not cross the city with the goat
and the other the mob back and leaning on farms to laugh. It is indecent. Neither came nor under me. I am driver. That helps the goat.
Rengo and the drool on the chin, with a leg splint, the goat had reached the cemetery gates, rubbed his nose in the short grass of the ditch without getting to eat. The boy of Malabia was with folded arms, hold the rope, supporting tugs, disheveled, dirty and shiny, I looked defiant, dead tired, unsure of stroke, inertia keeping the spirit of defiance that had allowed him to walk more than forty minutes after the funeral, driving the old, giant kid. Barrientos
burial and continued discussion without passion. Jorge Malabia off the goat of the ditch and came to me with a gesture angry and forgiving, with that look used by adolescents in conflict, to confront a man, a man.
- Why are you here? - Said without prompting. Now I have no need anyone. If you do not want to take me I put the shoulder or drag it or leave it here. I do not care. The escort was necessary, not me: the fit with her. Do you understand? No one can understand.
-spent, "I lied pleasant. He came to see a patient and I visited the cemetery because I got to thinking about the next move.
"Because I have a valid certification. Or come to do an autopsy? "I wanted to make fun or would not listen to the gravedigger and tedious haggling behind Barrientos. With a lock almost blond and pasted across his forehead, with great curved nose that would make sense only ten years later, with comic fashion suit had been brought from Buenos Aires.
-No need to leave the drawer out, "he said, and I bent to pet the goat horns. I can help.
Then the old, the guard, caught the story of mortification that segregated Barrientos lazily from the height of the seat, walked over and put the bat on the shoulder of George.
"The kid does not fit," he cried. Can you hear me? The goat did not enter the cemetery.
The boy did not stop looking at me and I thought the little smile he was doing was relief and hope.
"Stop touching me, dirty old man murmured. Beware the Maderita. I pushed the guard
and offered to carry the coffin. Barrientos was smoking on the box, black, sweaty, victim. The old man led the way by moving the stick, turning every ten steps to advise. We were only four people and bastábamos, despite the heat and rough terrain, the great undulating route from shallow graves and monuments. It was, almost, horn carrying an empty box, unvarnished prairie, with a cross carved into the lid. The goat was left at the gates, subject to the gate. It was like carrying a blissful sleep in one afternoon in early summer, between angels, broken columns and helpless women- elegies recorded, exaltation, promises and dates, the ghost of a dead house light, among gnarled wooden planks of respect and tenor.
We put the drawer on the floor, a man dropped quietly into the fresh grave.
The boy touched my arm.
"It's over," he said. This was it, the rest does not interest me. Thanks, anyway.
When we arrived at the gates untied the goat and went to stand, still challenging but with a principle of appeasement, young, returning to the cynical, tender security where he had been displaced.
"I could have left here and disinterested. The commitment I made up was accompanied to the cemetery with the bastard. I think he has a broken leg a few days ago to just eat. I wish you could do something, but do not worry, it's worth, and perhaps it is fitting that nobody can do anything for him.
without looking, since tall upright on the black stillness of the car, on the faded quiet animals, Barrientos spat and continued smoking.
quietly contemplate after the decline of the sun on the ground and planted the green hill to the right of the cemetery. We were tired. I saw his pleased smile, the smell of the goat breath mingled with the gloom of the car and the team.
- Why I do not ask questions? "Said the boy. Nobody cheated. What will you do now?
I gave him a cigarette and lit another
"We can put the animal in the back seat," I said. We can go to my house and try to guess what is in the leg and how much time you have left to live. It's rare that I'm wrong. I will not do anything, anything that deserves to be asked in that tone.
We put the goat in the back of the car, I heard him groan and settle, a dry sound of billiard balls, knuckle against a door and started shooting into the city. Then I heard the panting of the animal, incessant, isochronous, like a car engine malfunction. I took the path he had made the funeral because it was the longest. The curve
Gramajo was loosening the throttle and spoke softly.
- How long ago broke his leg?
He laughed. Her legs crossed, hands on belly.
"A day or two days or three or a week," he said slowly, looking at the scenery, I mixed things at the end or are mixed now. After sleep we'll see. The bastard has no home because she was living on borrowed time at the ranch of a cousin, sister or aunt. An old filthy anyway. But Grandma, it was becoming necessary for her to have been born. So take it to my home until they die and have to invent a stupid lie because they are the only ones who believe. But you, why not ask? Paw bastard is not interested. Ask for the woman, the dead. If it was my lover, if we marry in secret, if it was my sister emputecida. Playing
poise, maturity, sitting to my left in the car, arms crossed over his belly and legs, with his shaggy fur teenager falling into the eyes, with his ridiculous costume citizen. I drove with one hand and holding the cigarette with the other, the kid behind me rattling, restless and smelly. No thought of the woman, he saw further efforts down the street from the cemetery, separated from me by the absurd weight coffin, skinny, young, noble, stubborn, playing well until the end of the game that had been imposed, burning and without true conviction. Bowled by thirst and exhaustion, with its striking dark jacket, new, fitted, very short, buttons, yellow with a white handkerchief neatly leaning on the chest, with a stiff neck, bright, freshly soiled with a shirt that showed his pale triangle lists in the velvet jacket.
-Oh "I said, I just want to be helpful. May cure the goat, and not the woman, whoever.
nodded and returned to laugh always full and demanding security element, without illusions, understanding. We arrived at the tobacco industry and I turned right to go to the center.
"Wait, stop," he said touching my arm. I stopped and lit a cigarette, he did not want another. Can you kill him? The bastard. We come to your house and give it a shot. This will be another funeral.
I do not understand a lot of goats. But I can try to cure.
"Okay, continue. If you take the coast can leave me at home.
When we did not want to help lower the goat. I saw in the mirror of the windshield that the animal would not walk, over the board in the leg, secured with strips of twine, like a stem bush. The boy was inspecting the front of the house and then approached the car smiling.
"Give me a cigarette now, please. Spent them all at the wake, almost, was a wake for two, as the funeral. The bastard got dirty car. Its going to die and have to be. I see myself doing well in the garden. Well, thank you for some things that you never suspected.
I sat in the seat and put my hands on the wheel. Through the window glass half uploaded looked at smoking, both with the cigarette dangling from his mouth.
-bathed and sleep, "he said. If the goat does not die, I am at your disposal to cure.
"Well," he murmured, shaking her cigarette. Besides, I have to thank him for not tutearme.
