The Miracle Cures of Dr. Aira by César Aira Read Free Book Online

about this, he asked himself a question: Why
hadn’t Dr. Actyn, who had tried his hand at so many options, ever considered
tempting him with a woman? He had set him so many traps that were so baroque, so
elaborate, sometimes quite absurd . . . but never the simplest and most classic.
It couldn’t be due to ethical qualms, because he had done much worse things. Was
this not, then, the decisive proof of reality? How could he possibly have failed
to take that into account? Did he have too much respect for him? Did he consider
him above such temptations? If so, how wrong he was! Because Dr. Aira’s thirst
for love made this the temptation he was most likely to succumb to. He was
perfectly capable of falling into that trap, even if he knew it to be a trap,
because he trusted in the power of love. Would it not have been the perfect
romance, the valiant adventure that would make manifest all his fantasies in the
material world? In fact, he thought that losing that battle would be the same as
winning the war. But for some incomprehensible reason, Actyn had abstained from
attacking him along that flank. Did he fear that the missile of love would end
up piercing him? Or was he saving it for when all else had failed?
    Without love, Dr. Aira was condemned to perpetual
installments . . . But he had to think positively and concentrate specifically
on the practical aspects. With the arrival of the winter solstice, he felt he
had reached the point of no return. He should already be making models of the
installments, drawing the diagrams, choosing the typeface, the paper . . . They
would be installments, that was settled . . . But in hardcover. He could be
reasonable, but not to such an extent; some of his madness must survive. He had
considered a thick, very stiff cardboard for the covers that would make a nice
contrast with the small number of pages they would contain, though he still
hadn’t decided if there would be four or eight, but no more than that.
    Nor had he figured out the costs. He would, needless to
say, have to spend the minimum amount possible; in fact, he couldn’t talk about
“costs” because there would be nothing to offset them, that is, against which to
measure them. The project didn’t include selling the installments; to do that he
would have to set up a company, register as a publisher, pay value-added tax,
and a thousand other things he would never dream of doing. He would give them
away; nobody could stop him from doing that.
    The ideal thing would have been to operate with a dual
monetary system, such as the one in Ancient China. There, they had official
money for ordinary citizens and another for the poor, who were, of course, the
vast majority of the population. The connection between the two, which never
played out in reality, consisted of dividing the smallest unit of the official
money — let’s say, a cent — into ten thousand units; that multiple was the
sapek
, the basic unit in the poor people’s system. A fistful of
watermelon seeds cost a
sapek
. All business in the impoverished sectors
was conducted with this money; the poor, the peasants, and children used no
other, and these humble transactions met their survival needs. There was never
any “exchange” because who would ever collect a million
sapeks
to
exchange for one “cent” of the official money, a unit that had, on the other
hand and on another level of life, a minute value, not even enough to pay for
the cheapest item in a store, or the simplest dish in a restaurant? Whereas with
much less money than that — under certain circumstances, a mere hundred
sapeks
! — a poor person could pay an entire month’s food, shelter,
and all other necessities. And everybody was happy and well fed.

III
    Even for people who lead a routine life without incident, for those who are sedentary and
methodical, who have renounced adventure and planned their future, a colossal
surprise is waiting in the wings, one that will take place when the