The Musical Brain: And Other Stories by César Aira Read Free Book Online Page A

they were
deafening, drowning out the noise of the motor, filling the world. Something that
should have been obvious right from the start was finally sinking in: the dog had
seen (or smelled) someone who was traveling on the bus, and he was after that
person. A passenger, one of us . . . This explanation had evidently occurred to
others; people started looking around with inquisitive expressions. Did someone know
the dog? What was it about? An ex-owner, or someone the dog had once known . . . I
was looking around too, and wondering, Who could it be? In a case like this, the
last person you think of is yourself. It took me quite a while to realize. And the
realization was indirect. Suddenly, moved by what was still a vague presentiment, I
looked ahead, through the windscreen. I saw that the way was clear: ahead of us a
row of green lights stretched off almost to the horizon, promising rapid,
uninterrupted progress. But then, with anxiety rising inside me, I remembered that I
wasn’t in a taxi: a bus has fixed stops every four or five blocks. It was true that
if there was no one at the stop and if no one rang the bell to get off, the bus
would keep going. No one had approached the back door, for the moment. And with a
bit of luck there would be no one at the next stop. All these thoughts occurred to
me at once. My anxiety continued to mount and was about to find the words with which
to declare itself. But this was delayed by the very urgency of the situation. Would
chance allow us to drive on without stopping until the dog abandoned his chase?
Having averted my gaze for barely a fraction of a second, I looked at him again. He
was still keeping up, still barking as if possessed . . . and he was looking back at
me. Now I knew: I was the one he was barking at, the one he was chasing. I was
seized by the terror that attends the most unexpected catastrophes. I had been
recognized by that dog, and he was coming to get me. And although, in the heat of
the moment, I was already resolving to deny it all, and not confess to anything,
deep in my heart I knew that he was right and I was wrong. Because I had once
mistreated that dog; what I’d done to him was truly, unspeakably disgraceful. I have
to admit that I’ve never had very firm moral principles. I’m not going to try to
justify myself, but the lack can be explained in part by the ceaseless battle that
I’ve had to fight, from the tenderest age, simply to survive. It has gradually
dulled my sense of rectitude. I’ve allowed myself to do things no decent man would
ever do. Or would he? We all have our secrets. Besides, my misdeeds were never all
that serious. I didn’t commit actual crimes. Nor did I forget what I had done, as a
real scoundrel would have. I told myself I’d make amends, though I never really
stopped to think about how. This was the last thing I was expecting: to be
recognized in such a bizarre way, confronted with a past that had been buried so
deeply it seemed forgotten. I realized that I had been counting on a certain
impunity. I had assumed, as anyone in my place might have done, that a dog being
first and foremost a dog, its individuality would be reabsorbed by the species and
finally disappear. And with that disappearance my guilt would vanish too. My
despicable betrayal had individualized the dog for a moment, but only for a moment.
There was something supernatural and terrifying about the idea that the moment had
lasted so many years. But, as I thought it over, a hope appeared, and I grasped at
it: too much time had passed. Dogs don’t live that long. If I multiplied the years
by seven . . . These thoughts were tumbling in my head, colliding with the muffled
barks that kept getting louder and louder. No, it wasn’t true that too much time had
gone by; doing the sums would just have been a way of prolonging my self-deception.
My last hope was the classic psychological reaction of retreat into denial when
faced with something that is too much to bear: