Conversation in the Cathedral by Mario Vargas Llosa Read Free Book Online Page B

mine, it’s what young Santiago gave me.” Amalia laughed. “Just to do a little something for you.”
    The street door was open, outside it was beginning to grow dark and sometimes and in the distance the sound of streetcars was heard. A lot of people were passing along the sidewalk, voices, laughter, some faces paused to look for a moment.
    “They’re getting out of the factories now,” Amalia said. “It’s too bad your father’s laboratory isn’t near here, child. I’ll have to take the streetcar to the Avenida Argentina and then the bus.”
    “Are you going to work at the lab?” Santiago asked.
    “Didn’t your papa tell you?” Amalia said. “Yes, starting Monday.”
    She was leaving the house with her suitcase and she met Don Fermín, would you like me to get you a job in the lab? and she of course, Don Fermín, anywhere, and then he called young Sparky and told him to telephone Carrillo to give her a job: what a show-off, Popeye thought.
    “Oh, that’s good,” Santiago said. “You’ll be much better off in the lab.”
    Popeye took out his pack of Chesterfields, offered a cigarette to Santiago , doubted a moment, and another to Amalia, but she didn’t smoke, child.
    “You probably do smoke and you’re fooling us the way you did the other day,” Popeye said. “You told us I can’t dance and you knew how.”
    He saw her grow pale, no, child, no, he heard her stammer, he sensed that Santiago was moving in his chair and he thought I put my foot in it. Amalia had lowered her head.
    “I was kidding,” he said, and his cheeks were burning. “What have you got to be ashamed of, did anything happen, silly?”
    She was getting her color back, her voice: she didn’t even want to remember, child. How bad she felt, the next day everything was still all mixed up in her head and things danced in her hands. She raised her face, looked at them timidly, enviously, with amazement: didn’t Coca-Cola do anything to them? Popeye looked at Santiago, Santiago looked at Popeye and they both looked at Amalia: she’d vomited all night long, she’d never drink Coca-Cola again in her life. And still, she’d drunk beer and nothing happened, and Pasteurina, nothing, and Pepsi-Cola, nothing, could that Coca-Cola have gone bad, child? Popeye bit his tongue, took out his handkerchief and blew his nose furiously. He squeezed his nose and felt that his stomach was going to explode: the record was over, now was the time, and he quickly took his hand out of his pants pocket. They were still sunk in half darkness, come on come on, sit down for a while and he heard Amalia: the music had finished, child. A difficult voice, why had the other child turned out the light, barely fluttering, that they should turn it back on or she was leaving, complaining without strength, as if some overpowering dream or languor were extinguishing her, she didn’t like the dark, she didn’t like it that way. It was a shapeless silhouette, one more shadow among the other shadows of the room and they seemed to be struggling in a sham way between the night table and the bureau. He got up and went over to them, go out into the garden, Freckle Face, and he it’s too much, he bumped into something, his ankle hurt, he wasn’t going, bring her to the bed, let me go, child. Amalia’s voice rose up, what’s the matter, child, she was getting furious, and now Popeye had found her shoulders, let me go, he should let her go, and he dragged her, what a nerve, how dare the young master, eyes closed, breathing heavy and he rolled onto the bed with them: there it was, Skinny. She laughed, don’t tickle me, but her arms and legs kept on struggling and Popeye laughed anxiously: get out of here, Freckle Face, leave me alone. He wasn’t leaving, why should he leave, and now Santiago was pushing Popeye and Popeye was pushing him, I’m not leaving and there was a confusion of clothing and wet skins in the shadows, a whirl of legs, hands, arms and blankets. They