There was a period following the breakup of his second marriage when he started to see the mystery woman more often. One time it was at a movie theater. She had gone to see the same film and they exchanged looks in the lobby, their faces lit up by the glow of the marquee. Shortly after, he spotted her on the corner while he was riding the bus. It was only a fleeting vision, but clear enough for him to realize that she was as magnificent as ever and that all those times he had seen her, she had never been with somebody else. She was always alone, as if she didn’t need anyone by her side. She stood out like a single flower against the dull gray background of a vacant lot. Sometimes he thought about her. When he found himself in the tiny apartment he rented after his second divorce, lying on the bed with his shoes off and his hands clasped behind his neck, he would entertain himself by imagining the long-awaited encounter with this mysterious woman who, he supposed, was some kind of high point or milestone in his life.
He wasn’t particularly religious, but since he was on his own again he occasionally flipped through a Bible that someone had given him in the hopes that it might bring him some comfort, and he read some verses that said that there is a time for everything: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to sow and a time to reap. Would there be a time for him to be with this mystery woman who kept turning up with the randomness of a winning lottery number? He saw her again during this period, three or four more times. They even said hello when they saw each other, as if they were friends, but he always walked right on by, regretting that he didn’t have the courage to stop and talk to her. She must have thought he was a strange and timid little man.
He started to dream up stories about this woman: that she was always alone because her lover was a jealous millionaire who insisted that she visit him on the weekends at some luxurious hotel in the country or at an exclusive beach with a dock full of yachts. Or, he imagined that she had sworn to become an unsolvable riddle to all men because of some horrible betrayal during her adolescence. Or that her mother or her father were invalids, and that caring for them had used up her ability to show affection for others. He preferred to stick with the image of the millionaire lover: that way, he could feel like he was playing a small, tangential role in the beginning of a risky but worthwhile adventure. Three years after that string of chance encounters with the woman, he saw her once again. She was leaving a clothing store, carrying the kind of bag used for feminine garments and accessories. Her movements were light and silky, flowing like a creature who was not of this world. She seemed so distant and unreal that for a few seconds he felt as if she were a product of his imagination. Her hair was styled in the latest fashion, shimmering with an iridescent glow that made him think of the black marble dome of a Hindu temple in one of those exotic tourist brochures. He chose not to approach her, as always. What could he possibly say to her? That they knew each other on account of a bunch of completely random encounters? Should he play the fool by introducing himself and offering his hand like some kind of pretentious Casanova? But time is unforgiving, he thought, and he was afraid that they might both be old and gray before they met again and finally had the opportunity to talk. Would there even be another opportunity? The chance meetings were just that, unlikely to be repeated.
In reality, he had given up hope of seeing her again during the two years that had passed since the last time he saw her leaving a women’s clothing store. He imagined, in his fantasy, that she had finally gotten tired of the putative millionaire lover and had left him, or that her sick mother or father had died and that she had finally decided to live her life freely, after putting it off for so long. Later he thought, more realistically, that the laws of chance were just playing their own mysterious games. After his second divorce, he never committed the imprudent act of getting married again. A few relatively short-lived relationships served to alleviate his loneliness and to satisfy the sexual needs of a man approaching his mid forties. I wonder how old she is? he sometimes asked himself, when he thought of her at all. Thirty? Thirty-two? She wouldn’t be as fresh and attractive as before. Beauty was fleeting by nature, that’s what made it so special.
So that when he saw her again, he felt a tremendous urgency, because this could easily be the last chance encounter he would have with this woman whom he had seen growing from adolescence to the fullness of womanhood in widely separated bursts, and who was now beginning her inevitable decline. He ran inside the building and headed for the elevators, but decided to take the stairs instead, figuring he wouldn’t miss her that way, no matter what floor she was on.
He climbed the steps eyeing every female shape going up or down, hoping to find the woman he was looking for. Panting for breath, he reached the top floor, which wasn’t really a floor but an empty terrace made of lumpy concrete that was crumbling in spots. She must have gone into one of the building’s many offices, and trying to find her by checking each of the offices would be like searching for a needle in a haystack. He decided to go back down the stairs and wait by the entrance. She had to leave the building at some point.
He still had a number of business matters to attend to that morning, but he shrugged his shoulders and resigned himself to spending a few hours waiting for her. He was prepared to spend the whole morning waiting outside the building if need be. But as he rushed downstairs, he grew worried about the possibility that the woman might have left the premises while he was looking for her on the upper floors. In the end, he planted himself by the doors like a nervous spy on his first day on the job and began to scrutinize the people leaving the building.
After a good three-quarters of an hour, it occurred to him to ask the uniformed doorman if there was another exit to the building. He answered that yes, there was another exit on the side street. All hope of seeing the woman vanished in an instant: She could have left by the side door. And he might never see her again, he thought. That day’s chance encounter with the rare milestone in his life that she represented could have been the last. But he didn’t lose heart. If she entered the building and he didn’t see her leave, it was possible that she worked in one of the offices, or at least had some reason to visit one of them. Studying the directory of the building’s occupants, he saw that it listed all kinds of businesses: legal counseling, doctors and dentists, several real-estate agencies, consulting services, even an employment agency. Where to start? Even though he was falling behind in his work, he decided it could wait while he conducted his investigation. If only he knew the woman’s name, at least, he thought that night when he got back from the pub where he usually ate. If he knew her name, it would be as easy as pie: He’d simply ask for her by name in all the businesses and offices in the building. Or even better, look her up in the telephone directory. But identifying someone whom he knew absolutely nothing about was really a job for a professional investigator, way too much work for a man who was actually pretty lazy when it came to doing anything beyond the demands of his day job. Maybe he should trust his luck and hope that he might run into her again someplace? He shook his head and decided to make himself a cup of weak coffee so it wouldn’t keep him awake. He had run into her at least seven or eight times by chance, and he was sure that the laws of chance or coincidence wouldn’t help him anymore regarding the woman he had carelessly allowed to slip past him for so many years.