One morning, while I was looking for a book in the Librerнa del Sуtano, I noticed that a film was being shot in the middle of the Alameda and I went over to see what I could see. I recognized Jacqueline Andere straight away. She was on her own, gazing at a row of trees to her left, hardly moving, as if waiting for a signal. Spotlights had been set up around her. I don't know what possessed me to ask for her autograph; I've never been interested in autographs. I waited till they had finished shooting. A man approached her and they talked (was it Ignacio Lуpez Tarso?). He gesticulated irritably, then walked off, and after a few moments of hesitation Jacqueline Andere chose a different path. She was coming directly toward me. I started walking too and we met halfway. It was one of the simplest things that has ever happened to me: no one stopped me, or said anything, or came between Jacqueline and me. No one asked me what I was doing there. Before our paths crossed, Jacqueline stopped and turned back to look at the crew, as if she were listening to something, although none of them had spoken. Then she kept walking with the same carefree air toward the Palacio de Bellas Artes, and all I had to do was stop, greet her, ask for an autograph, and hide my surprise at how short she was, even wearing high heels. For a moment we were alone together and it struck me that if I had wanted to kidnap her, I could have. The mere thought made the hair stand up on the back of my neck. She looked at me from toe to head, with her ash-blonde hair (I didn't remember it being that color — maybe she had dyed it), her big brown almond eyes, so soft, no, soft is not the word, calm, astonishingly calm, as if she were sedated or brain-dead or an alien, and she said something to me, but I didn't catch it at first.
A pen, she said, a pen to sign with. I found a ballpoint in the pocket of my jacket and got her to sign the first page of The Fall. She took the book from me and looked at it for a few seconds. Her hands were small and very delicate. How would you like me to sign? As Albert Camus or Jacqueline Andere? Whichever you prefer, I said. Although she didn't look up from the book I could tell she was smiling. Are you a student? she asked. I replied in the affirmative. So how come you're here instead of in class? I don't think I'll ever go back to school, I said. How old are you? she asked. Seventeen, I said. And do your parents know you're not going to school? No, of course not, I said. You still haven't answered my question, she said, looking up and into my eyes. Which question? I asked. What are you doing here? When I was young, kids used to hang out in pool halls or bowling alleys when they skipped classes. Well, I read books and go to the movies, I said. Anyway, I'm not skipping a class. No, you leave that to the amateurs, she said. Now it was my turn to smile. And what movies can you see at this time of the day? All sorts, I said, some of yours. She didn't seem to like that; she looked at the book again, bit her bottom lip, looked at me and blinked as if her eyes were hurting. Then she asked my name. Well, let's get this signed, she said. She was left-handed. Her handwriting was large and hard to read. I have to go, she said, handing me back the book and the pen. She held out her hand, shook mine and went back across the Alameda towards the film crew. I stood still, watching her. When she was about fifty yards away two women approached her, dressed as missionary nuns, two Mexican missionary nuns who escorted Jacqueline to the shade of an ahuehuete tree. Then a man went over to her, they talked, and the four of them walked away down one of the paths that lead out of the Alameda.
On the first page of The Fall, she had written: "For Arturo Belano, student at large, with a kiss from Jacqueline Andere."
Suddenly I had no desire to browse in a bookshop, walk around, read, or least of all go to a matinee. The prow of an enormous cloud appeared over the center of Mexico City, while to the north the first thunderclaps resounded. I realized that the shooting of Jacqueline's film had been suspended because of the imminent rain and I felt lonely. For a few seconds I didn't know what to do, where to go. Then the Grub said hello to me. Having seen me so many times, he had begun, I suppose, to recognize me too. I turned around and there he was, sitting on the same bench as always, a clear-cut presence, absolutely real, with his straw hat and his white shirt. The scene, as I was troubled to discover, had undergone a subtle but decisive transformation with the departure of the film crew: it was as if the waters had parted to reveal the sea floor. The empty Alameda was the seafloor, and the Grub its most precious treasure. I said hello, probably made some banal remark, and it began to pour. We left the Alameda together and headed for the Avenida Hidalgo; then we walked down Lбzaro Cбrdenas to the corner with Perъ.
What happened next is hazy, as if seen through the rain that was lashing the streets, yet perfectly natural. The bar was called Las Camelias and it was full of mariachis and chorus girls. I ordered enchiladas and a TKT, the Grub ordered a Coke and a bit later on he bought three turtle eggs from a vendor. He wanted to talk about Jacqueline Andere. I soon realized, to my astonishment, that he didn't know she was a movie star. I pointed out that she was there for a film shoot, but he simply didn't remember the crew or the equipment they had set up. Jacqueline's apparition on his path, near his bench, had obliterated all the rest. When it stopped raining, the Grub pulled a bunch of bills from his back pocket, paid and left.
We saw each other again the next day. From the expression on his face when he saw me I thought he couldn't remember who I was or didn't want to say hello. I went over to him anyway. He seemed to be asleep, although his eyes were open. He was thin, but his flesh, except on his arms and legs, gave the impression of being soft, even flaccid, like the flesh of an athlete no longer in training. His flaccidity, however, was not so much physical as psychological. His bones were small and strong. I soon discovered that he was from the north, or had lived there a long time, which comes to the same thing. I'm from Sonora, he said. By coincidence, that was where my grandfather came from. This intrigued the Grub and he wanted to know what part of Sonora. From Santa Teresa, I said. I'm from Villaviciosa, said the Grub.
One night I asked my father if he knew Villaviciosa. Of course I do, said my father, it's a couple of miles from Santa Teresa. I asked him to describe it for me. It's a very small town, said my father, wouldn't be more than a thousand people (later I found out there weren't even five hundred), pretty poor, not many jobs, and no industry at all. It'll disappear sooner or later, he said. What do you mean disappear? I asked him. Emigration, he said, the people will leave and go to Santa Teresa or Hermosillo or the United States. When I reported this to the Grub he didn't agree, although it would be an exaggeration to say that he ever agreed or disagreed with anything. The Grub never argued or expressed opinions, but not out of any particular respect for others; he simply listened and stored things away, or maybe he just listened and forgot it all, off in a world of his own. His speech was soft and monotonous, although occasionally he would raise his voice, and then he sounded like a madman imitating a madman. I never knew whether those outbursts were intentional, part of some private game, or beyond his control, cries from hell. His conviction that Villaviciosa would endure was founded on the town's long history, but also (though I only came to understand this later) on the tenuous nature of its existence, threatened from all quarters, which is precisely what doomed it to extinction, according to my father.
Although the Grub was not a curious man, few things escaped his notice. Once he examined the books I was carrying, one by one, as if he could barely read or couldn't read at all. After that he never showed the slightest interest in my books, although I had a new one every morning. Sometimes, perhaps because he considered me a fellow countryman of sorts, we talked about Sonora, which I hardly knew: I had been there only once, for my grandfather's funeral. He would speak of towns like Nacozari, Bacoache, Fronteras, Villa Hildalgo, Bacerac, Bavispe, Agua Prieta, Naco, names that were pure gold to my imagination. He would mention forsaken villages in the districts of Nacori Chico and Ba-cadйhuachi, near the border with Chihuahua state, and then, I don't know why, he would cover his mouth as if he were about to sneeze or yawn. He seemed to have roamed over all the mountain ranges, on foot, camping out: the Sierra Las Palomas and the Sierra La Cieneguita, the Sierra Guijas and the Sierra La Madera, the Sierra San Antonio and the Sierra Cibuta, the Sierra Tumacacori and the Sierra Sierrita right up into Arizona, the Sierra Cuevas and the Sierra Ochi-tahueca in the northeast, near Chihuahua, the Sierra La Pola and the Sierra Las Tablas in the south, toward Sinaloa, the Sierra La Gloria and the Sierra El Pinacate, up northeast, on the way to Baja California. He knew the whole of Sonora, from Huatabampo and Empalme on the Gulf coast to the remote one-horse towns in the desert. He could speak Yaqui and Pбpago (a language that straddles the Sonora-Arizona border) and he understood Seri, Pima, Mayo, and English. His Spanish was dry, with a slightly oratorical tone from time to time, undercut by the look in his eye. Like a soul in torment, I have wandered all over your grandfather's country, may he rest in peace, he said to me once.