“It was time.” Reyes began to chew. He was dressed in a red velvet robe, blue slippers, and a Liberty ascot.
“Time for what?”
“Time to say goodbye, Luisito.”
“I repeat, time for what? Haven’t I treated you like a brother? Haven’t I kept my Christmas promise? You will be my guest until tomorrow, the Day of the Kings, and—”
“And then kick me out on the street?” The discomfiting brother almost choked on his laughter.
“No. To each his own life,” Don Luis said in a hesitant voice.
“The fact is, I’m having a fantastic time. The fact is, my life now is here, at the side of my adored fratellino.”
“Reyes,” Don Luis said with his severest expression. “We made a deal. Until January sixth.”
“Don’t make me laugh, Güichito. Do you think that in a week you can wipe away the crimes of an entire life?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. We haven’t seen each other in thirty years.”
“That’s the point. You don’t keep very good accounts.” Reyes swallowed a chalupa and licked the cream from his lips with his tongue. “Sixty years, I’m telling you. . You were so solemn as a boy. The favorite son. You condemned me to second place. The clown of the house.”
“You were older than me. You could have affirmed your position as firstborn. It isn’t my fault if—”
“Why should I drag out the story? You were the studious one. The punctual one. The traitor. The schemer. Do you think I didn’t hear you tell our father: ‘Reyes does everything wrong, he’s a boy with no luck, he’s going to hurt us all, Papa, get him out of the house, send him to boarding school.’ ”
Reyes was swallowing chalupas whole. “Do you remember when we both went to Mass together every Sunday, Luisito? Ah, we were believers. It’s what hurts me most. Having lost my faith. And you’re to blame, little brother.”
Don Luis had to laugh. “You astonish me, Reyes.”
“No.” Reyes laughed. “I’m the one who’s astonished. You’re only stupefied. You must have thought you’d never see me again.”
“You’re right. I don’t want to see you again. On the sixth, you—”
“I what? Recover my innocence?”
Luis looked at him gravely. “When were you ever innocent?”
“Until the day you said to me: ‘Asshole, we go to Mass every Sunday, but we don’t believe in God, we only believe in ourselves, in our personal success, don’t go around thinking Divine Providence will come to help you. Look at yourself, Reyes, so overgrown and so devout, look at your younger brother, I tell you, I go to Mass to please Papa and Mama, the family, while you, Reyes, you go because you believe in God and religion, what a joke, the younger brother is smarter than the older brother, the baby knows more than the big galoot. And what does the baby know? That you come into this world to be successful with no scruples, to beat out everybody else, to move ahead over other people’s good faith or conviction or morality.’ ”
He took a foaming drink of beer, tilting back the bottle. “Nobody believes my story, brother. How can it be that the little brother corrupts the older one? Because you corrupted me, Luis. You left me with a malignant relationship to the world. I saw you move up, marry a rich girl, manipulate politicians, negotiate favors, and in passing rip out my innocence.”
“A carouser. You had a vocation for dissipation.”
“How could I believe in the good with a diabolical brother like you?”
“A tree that grows twisted—”
“God made you like that, or did you betray God Himself?”
“Soul of a delinquent—”
“Did you betray God, or did God betray you?”
Don Luis choked on a biscuit. His brother stood up to pound him on the back and didn’t stop talking.
“I wanted an ordered, simple life. Your example stopped me. You moved up so quickly. Ha, like the foam on this brew. You were so greedy. You know how to use people and then throw them into the trash. Your diabolical wife gave you feudal tips. The arrogance of Chilean landowners. And you spiced up the stew with Mexican malice, fawning, climbing, betraying, using.”
“Water. .” Luis coughed.
“Ah yes, Señor.” Reyes moved away the glass. “Everything in order to reach the age of sixty-five with a gorgeous house in Polanco, five-count-’em-five servants, eight board presidencies, a dead wife, and a boozing brother.”
“You are what you wanted to be, a poor devil.” Don Luis coughed. “I didn’t force you.”
“Yes.” With a blow of his hand, Reyes knocked the tray of chocolate and biscuits to the floor. “Yes! You challenged me to emulate you, and I didn’t know how.” His eyes filled with tears. “You lent me the dough to set up a bar.”
“And you got drunk making your customers drunk, you poor idiot,” Don Luis replied, using his napkin to wipe the mess of chocolate and crumbs from his shirt and lap.
“I wanted to be consistent in my vices,” Reyes said with misplaced pride. “Just like you.”
“Pick up what you knocked down.”
Reyes, smiling, obeyed. Don Luis stood, went to the desk, sat, wrote out a check, tore it from the checkbook, and offered it to Reyes.
“Take it. It’s ten thousand dollars. Take the check and get out right now.”
His brother took the check, tore it into pieces, and threw them in Don Luis’s face. “There’s no need. I can imitate your signature. Ask them in the shops. I bought everything on your signature, friend. Ask your servants. Everything I’ve bought has been with your checks signed by me.” He brought his face and his mouthfuls of tortilla up to his brother’s face. “You look confused. That’s why I’ll say it again. Signed by you.” He moved away, satisfied. “It’s an art I learned in order to survive.”
In one hand, Reyes flapped Don Luis’s checkbook like the wing of a wounded bird, and in the other, he waved a silver American Express card. “Look, brother. Life consists in our getting used to the fact that everything will go badly for us.”
5. “No, what do you mean, Don Luis, your brother is a saint. Imagine, he ordered a marble stone for my dear mother’s grave in Tulancingo. I always wanted that, boss, seeing how everybody walks on a grave without a stone, nobody respects a grave marked with little stones and a couple of carnations. And now, thanks to Señor Reyes, my dear mother rests in peace and devotion. And I say to myself, María Bonifacia, God bless the boss’s brother.”
“Well, Señor, I’ve been driving your Mercedes for what? Twelve years? And at the end of the day, what do I have? Taking the bus and traveling an hour to my house. You never thought about that, did you? Well your brother did, he did. ‘Go on, Jehová, here are the keys to your 1934 Renault. You have a right to your own car. What did you think? You’ll never ride a bus again. Of course you won’t.’ ”
“Imagine, boss, I go back to my village on Sunday, and they welcome me with wreaths of flowers saying THANK YOU CÁNDIDO. You know that on the road to Xochimilco, there’s water but no land. Now I have land and water, and my children can take care of cultivating flowers, thanks to the piece of land your brother gave us, that saint.”
“Oh, boss, I’m sorry for the bad impression of your brother I gave you. For years in my village of Zacatlán de las Manzanas, we’ve been asking for a school for the girls because as soon as they’re twelve, they’re deflowered, as they say, and loaded down with kids, and they have to go to work in a rich man’s house, like me. And now the village has a school and a gift of scholarships so the girls can keep studying until they’re sixteen, and then they leave with a diploma and are secretaries or nurses and not just maids like me, and they come to their weddings pure, your brother’s so kind, Don Luisito!”