Genara would never accept this reasoning. She did not want to do anything that might contradict Papa’s wishes, though the contradiction in those wishes was that whatever she did, she would be both good and evil. Good if she obeyed instead of rebelling but evil because she disobeyed Papa. Genara wondered if this was the father’s policy — leave his daughters in permanent suspense, condemn them if they acted and also if they did not act? Genara felt very sad about having this conflict. Julia at least deceived others. Genara deceived herself. She continued to be a doll sitting on their father’s quilted bed, surrounded by flickering candles beneath a crucifix without nails where the figure of Our Lord seemed to be flying toward heaven.
Then their father came out of the bathroom, freshly shaved, smelling of Yardley lavender, of Barry’s Tricopherous, of Mum deodorant, with his colorless eyes and his hair of a yearning albino, to say: “I’m going to show you something you’ve never seen before.”
He always says it and disappears into the remains of the steam in the sauna.
None of them dares enter the sauna. Not even their father’s bathroom.
All the cosmetics and lavenders cannot lubricate the dry skin of the father who disappears walking backward, at a turtle’s pace, into the mists of his daily grooming routine.
A ceremonious man.
A rigid man.
The regularity of our lives.
A man who simultaneously represents the fantasy and the business of the world. Etcetera.
“Give us peace,” Genara says in a frightened voice.
“That depends on us, not on him,” interjects Augusta. “We shouldn’t give him a minute’s peace. We have to criticize him, question him, unmask him, pull the rabbits out of the hat, take the deck of cards out of his hands. Look, our father is a carnival magician, a theatrical wizard, a sorcerer at a fair. He is an illusion. A phantom. A sheet blown by the wind.”
Julia again collapsed into tears, her arms around the coffin. Like a Pietà among sisters, the group composed itself when Genara and Augusta embraced Julia, dissolved when they separated, somewhat confused about their own attitudes, and embraced again as if a decisive warning — night falling, a period of time about to conclude, the end of the plot — obliged them to defend themselves, united, against their father’s terrorist wishes, whatever they might be.
Augusta looked at them with a measure of scorn. The ten years would be over tonight. They had obeyed Papa’s posthumous decision. And then what? Would they never meet again? Would they consider the test decade concluded, the time in which each one had done as she wished knowing that this was what their father wanted, for them to do what he didn’t want them to do only in order to blame them and in this way oblige them to continue, as they had for the past ten years, this ceremony determined by him, almost as an act of contrition?
Is this what their father wanted? To have daughters who were free but poor (Genara), free but modest (Julia), prosperous but in the end obedient (Augusta)? And what were the three sisters looking for? To prove to their father that they could live without the inheritance even though they lived waiting for the inheritance? Because otherwise, why would they come to the annual appointment in the sunken park? Had none of them thought about rebelling against the command of their damn paterfamilias? Excluding herself from the ceremony? Telling him to go to hell?
“Did you ever think about disobeying Papa? Did one of you ever say to yourself: ‘Enough, I’ve had it up to here. That’s it. We don’t know if this is a game or a punishment? In any case, it’s tyranny.’ Did you ever think that?” Augusta spoke in a moderate way. She looked at her sisters without emotion. “Let’s see who is capable, right now, of leaving here,” she continued.
“And be left not knowing the secret?” Julia said again.
“Never finding out how it all ended?” Genara supported her again. “Nobody leaves a movie without finding out how it all turned out. We can’t even stand for somebody to tell us about it later.”
“No matter the consequences?” Julia asked with the timidity of a novice.
Augusta did not reply. It was better, she thought, to leave the answer in the air. Or in the heart of each sister. She made a calculation. Genara could go. Julia and Augusta would remain. Julia and Genara could go. Augusta would remain alone.
The mere idea broke her impassivity. She felt real terror. Terror of absence. Knowing herself absent. Alone. Absent: stripped of inspiration or speculation. Incapable of even commemorating her own death.
How was she going to flee their father? Didn’t she know that ten years after his death, as soon as the secret of the inheritance was revealed, their father would impose a new time period? And what new surprise was waiting for them when they completed this one, and the next, and the next? Didn’t he once say before he went in for his daily sauna, “If I begin something, I don’t stop”?
The twelve strokes of midnight sounded in San José Insurgentes.
7. Six in the morning had sounded. Genara stretched. She had fallen asleep against her will. The beach chair was comfortable.
Poor Julia, sitting all night on a piano stool. She wasn’t there. Genara looked for her. Julia was putting on makeup, looking at herself in a pocket mirror. Pink powder. Purple lipstick. Eyeliner. Mascara. All arranged on top of the coffin.
Julia fluffed out her hair. She adjusted her bra. “Well, the next appointment is with the notary. We’ll see one another then. This business of a conditional will is so annoying! Well, we’ve fulfilled the condition. Now we’ll execute the will. Though we never lost our rights. . did we?”
“Unless we’re disinherited,” Augusta said from the shadows in the garage.
“What are you talking about!” Julia laughed. “It’s obvious you two didn’t know Papa. He’s a saint.”
Julia pushed the clanking metal door. Light from the sunken park came in. Birds were chirping. Julia went out. A Mustang convertible was parked in front of the garage. A boy in a short-sleeved shirt with the collar open whistled at Julia and opened the door for her. He didn’t have the courtesy to get out of the car. This didn’t seem to bother Julia. She got in, sat down beside the handsome young man, and gave him a peck on the cheek.
Julia looked young and agile, as if she had shed a gigantic bearskin.
She did not look back. The car took off. She had forgotten the revolving stool.
Genara smoothed her skirt and arranged her blouse. She looked at Augusta, wanting to ask her questions. She felt a hunger to understand. Julia would not explain anything to her. Julia’s world was resolved, free of problems. She was sure about inheriting. She had left.
Would Augusta explain things to her?
Genara took her handbag, a Gucci copy, and went toward the metal door. She insisted on looking at Augusta. The oldest sister did not return her look. Disorientation was etched on Genara’s features. She knew she could not expect anything of Augusta. She armed herself with patience. She was prepared to continue living her life decorously. In solitude. In front of the wheel. And then in front of the television set. With a cold supper on a tray.