Read Online Amulet by Roberto Bolaño - Free Book Online
Authors: Roberto Bolaño
Tags: prose_contemporary
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along, and he was a year or a few months younger, so Arturito had to yield his ambivalent place of honor. But there was no tension or jealousy between them, and when Arturo returned from Chile, in January 1974, Ernesto San Epifanio went on being his friend.
What happened between them was very odd. And I'm the only one who can tell the story. At the time, Ernesto San Epifanio seemed to have some kind of illness. He was hardly eating and had become very thin. At night, throughout those Mexico City nights canopied with sheet upon linen sheet, he drank but ate nothing, hardly talked to anyone, and when we went out into the street, he looked around as if he were afraid of something. When his friends asked what was going on, he remained silent or replied with some quote from his beloved Oscar Wilde, but even his characteristic wit had grown sluggish, and those quips, delivered so despondently, provoked only puzzlement and pity. One night I passed on some news about Arturo (which I'd heard from his mother and his sister) and Ernesto listened to me as if he was thinking that going to live in Pinochet's Chile might not actually be such a bad idea.
For the first few days after returning, Arturo stayed at home, hardly setting foot outside, and, for everyone but me, it was as if he still hadn't come back from Chile. But I went to his apartment and talked to him and found out that he'd been imprisoned, for eight days, and although he hadn't been tortured, he'd acquitted himself bravely. And I told his friends. I said, Arturito's back, and I painted his return with colors borrowed from the palette of epic poetry. And when, one night, Arturito finally appeared in the Café Quito on the Avenida Bucareli, his old friends, the young poets, saw him in a different light. Why? Well, because for them, Arturito now belonged to the category of those who have seen death at close range, and the subcategory of hard men, and, that, in the eyes of those desperate Latin American kids, was a qualification that commanded respect, a veritable compendium of medals.
It also has to be said that, deep down, they remained somewhat skeptical. I mean I was the source of the legend; they heard it from my mouth, from my lips hidden by the back of my hand, so although everything I had said about him while he was shut up in his apartment was essentially true, the story wasn't altogether credible, simply because of its source; that is, me. That's how it is on this continent. I was the mother and they believed me, but they didn't believe every word I said. Except for Ernesto San Epifanio. During the days leading up to Arturo's public reappearance, Ernesto made me tell and retell the story of our friend's adventures at the ends of the earth, and with each repetition, he became more enthusiastic. What I mean is that as I talked and invented adventures, Ernesto San Epifanio's lethargy gradually fell away, and his melancholy too, or at least his lethargy and his melancholy stirred, shook themselves and began to breathe again. So when Arturo reappeared and everyone wanted to be with him, Ernesto San Epifanio was present along with the others, and took part, albeit in a self-effacing way, in the welcome that Arturo's old friends organized for him, which consisted, if I remember rightly, of standing him a beer and a serving of chilaquiles at the Café Quito, a modest repast by any standard, but well matched to the economic resources at the group's disposal. And when they all went home, Ernesto San Epifanio remained, leaning against the bar of the Encrucijada Veracruzana, since by then we had moved on from the Quito, while Arturo sat alone at a table, accompanied only by his ghosts, staring at his last tequila as if a shipwreck of Homeric proportions were occurring in the bottom of the glass, which was, you have to admit, strange behavior for a kid his age, not quite twenty-one.
Then the adventure began.
I saw it. I can testify. I was sitting at another table, talking to a
What happened between them was very odd. And I'm the only one who can tell the story. At the time, Ernesto San Epifanio seemed to have some kind of illness. He was hardly eating and had become very thin. At night, throughout those Mexico City nights canopied with sheet upon linen sheet, he drank but ate nothing, hardly talked to anyone, and when we went out into the street, he looked around as if he were afraid of something. When his friends asked what was going on, he remained silent or replied with some quote from his beloved Oscar Wilde, but even his characteristic wit had grown sluggish, and those quips, delivered so despondently, provoked only puzzlement and pity. One night I passed on some news about Arturo (which I'd heard from his mother and his sister) and Ernesto listened to me as if he was thinking that going to live in Pinochet's Chile might not actually be such a bad idea.
For the first few days after returning, Arturo stayed at home, hardly setting foot outside, and, for everyone but me, it was as if he still hadn't come back from Chile. But I went to his apartment and talked to him and found out that he'd been imprisoned, for eight days, and although he hadn't been tortured, he'd acquitted himself bravely. And I told his friends. I said, Arturito's back, and I painted his return with colors borrowed from the palette of epic poetry. And when, one night, Arturito finally appeared in the Café Quito on the Avenida Bucareli, his old friends, the young poets, saw him in a different light. Why? Well, because for them, Arturito now belonged to the category of those who have seen death at close range, and the subcategory of hard men, and, that, in the eyes of those desperate Latin American kids, was a qualification that commanded respect, a veritable compendium of medals.
It also has to be said that, deep down, they remained somewhat skeptical. I mean I was the source of the legend; they heard it from my mouth, from my lips hidden by the back of my hand, so although everything I had said about him while he was shut up in his apartment was essentially true, the story wasn't altogether credible, simply because of its source; that is, me. That's how it is on this continent. I was the mother and they believed me, but they didn't believe every word I said. Except for Ernesto San Epifanio. During the days leading up to Arturo's public reappearance, Ernesto made me tell and retell the story of our friend's adventures at the ends of the earth, and with each repetition, he became more enthusiastic. What I mean is that as I talked and invented adventures, Ernesto San Epifanio's lethargy gradually fell away, and his melancholy too, or at least his lethargy and his melancholy stirred, shook themselves and began to breathe again. So when Arturo reappeared and everyone wanted to be with him, Ernesto San Epifanio was present along with the others, and took part, albeit in a self-effacing way, in the welcome that Arturo's old friends organized for him, which consisted, if I remember rightly, of standing him a beer and a serving of chilaquiles at the Café Quito, a modest repast by any standard, but well matched to the economic resources at the group's disposal. And when they all went home, Ernesto San Epifanio remained, leaning against the bar of the Encrucijada Veracruzana, since by then we had moved on from the Quito, while Arturo sat alone at a table, accompanied only by his ghosts, staring at his last tequila as if a shipwreck of Homeric proportions were occurring in the bottom of the glass, which was, you have to admit, strange behavior for a kid his age, not quite twenty-one.
Then the adventure began.
I saw it. I can testify. I was sitting at another table, talking to a
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