IN THE FOYER, Dorotea greeted the young man with a profusion of smiles, and then, to break the silence, she said, in a maternal voice:
“It’s not even five in the afternoon! You certainly have come early today!”
“I was tired of walking around, Dorotea, and as you know we have a bit of business beforehand. I am like a great actor; I need a good bit of time to apply my makeup.”
“Please don’t talk so loud, for the love of God! I have more than twenty-five girls working in the front workshop and two ladies waiting in the dressing room!”
“Oh, Dorotea, always putting on airs!”
“Not airs, my boy; this is work. And in the midst of my workday to have to look after these things that, naturally, are not to our liking, neither yours nor mine.…”
“You need not worry your head about me, Dorotea!”
“But, you must understand, she is my best client.”
“Indeed, and I can certainly say she is my best client, as well.”
“Well, aren’t you the cheeky one!”
“Be that as it may, Dorotea, I don’t think I can spend all day here in this foyer.”
“Yes, fine, go on in. I’ll be with you shortly.”
“Is there anything in the dining room, Dorotea? Because I’m a bit hungry.”
“Go right ahead, you needn’t stand on ceremony.”
The young man stood on tiptoe, as if by doing so he could breathe in more easily the feminine air that emanated from the workshop. He turned his back on Dorotea and went down the corridor to the dark, deserted dining room of the house. He turned on the light and starting rummaging around on the sideboard. Throwing away the cigar that tasted more or less like a crematorium, he stretched out on the divan that Dorotea used for her naps, and started in on an improvised sandwich.
When he was down to the last crumb, and just as he was wiping a bit of grease from the fat of the cured ham off his fingers and onto the dining room curtains, Dorotea came in:
“Time to get started?”
“Just a moment, I’m not sure everything is ready.”
“No need for such a fuss, Dorotea.”
“Oh, that’s easy for you to say. They are very elegant people.”
“You have a strange idea of elegance, Dorotea.”
“What do you mean? I don’t pass judgment on personal tastes … But come along, come along …”
Dorotea led her visitor into a bedroom off the dining room. It was her own room.
Family portraits, an oil engraving of Our Lady of Sorrows, a mahogany bed covered by a great pumpkin-colored comforter, and on top of the comforter a package of clothing wrapped in a kerchief. Dorotea inspected the package.
“Yes, I think everything is here.”
The young man sat down on a low chair and began to undo his tie and take off his clothing piece by piece, replacing it with the dirty, torn and pitiful clothing Dorotea had put in the package on the comforter.
“What most riles me, Dorotea, is that you make me put on this Frégoli the impostor act.”
“If you like, you can come just as you are! No, I haven’t quite lost my mind yet. They think that you … just imagine … if they suspected you were …”
“Uh-huh, sure, any day now we’ll slip up on something, and that will be a show worth selling tickets to.”
“God forbid!”
“Go ahead and look shocked. I can just see myself running into him coming out of the Club Eqüestre on my brother’s arm …”
“Don’t you believe it. Do you think for a minute he would recognize you? Don’t you realize they are both under the illusion …”
“What do you think of this underwear, Dorotea? Patched up all over. Mamà makes me put them back in the drawer because of this sudden obsession they have with saving money. I never wear them except on these solemn occasions …”
“I hear her health is very fragile.”
“Yes, she hardly ever leaves the house … And what about the shirt? Do I also have to change my shirt?”
“What do you think! Don’t you realize your shirt is made of silk?”
“Papà certainly complains enough about it. But, Dorotea, do you really want me to wear this disgusting thing? My Lord, where do you find all these rags? No, no, I am not going to wear that! I’d be afraid of catching …”
“The clothes are disinfected, I swear it. Oh, and the medallion and gold chain, give them here …”
“If my mother wouldn’t die of sorrow, I would tell you to keep the medallion. One day at the beach club I almost threw it into the water.”
“Don’t play the heretic with me.”
“Dorotea, I think you’re going to have to find someone else … because, really, how long can this go on?”
“What are you saying! That’s all I need right now. It’s not easy to find someone …”
“… someone as shameless as I, am I right? Well, I don’t like to see myself all decked out like this. I think I look like a guy about to go out and hunt for cigarette butts and, frankly, even though Papà has gone and blown all our dough, we haven’t sunk that low.”
“Look here, do you think you can get away with those smooth cheeks? Didn’t I tell you to come with at least one day’s beard?”
“I forgot, what can I say? Yes, I do look a little too cute; it’s not easy for a kid from a good family to hide it.”
“Maybe a little dark blue eye shadow …”
“Not a bad idea! This mascara will do wonders …”
“No, that’s too much. Wait, let me do it; this will give you a sort of natural grime …”
“Thanks a lot, Dorotea.”
“No offense intended.”
“And you needn’t be such a perfectionist, Dorotea; nowadays everyone knows that even ditch diggers bathe and wear cologne when they have a date with a lady from the aristocracy. Hygiene has become commonplace … It won’t be such a novelty if they find me a bit too clean.”
“Oh my God, Mrs. Planell must be cursing my name — I’ve had her in the fitting room for an hour and a half!”
“Who is this Planell woman?
“Don’t you know her? She’s Don Enric Planell’s wife, a beautiful, bright young woman. Oh, you would like her, all right.”
“Come on, now, don’t make things any harder. Listen, the doorbell.”
“I don’t think they can be here, yet, but she’s always so keen to …”
“I swear to you, Dorotea … if it weren’t for the fact that … Well, no, I’m not going to tell you, you’re too much of a gossip.”
“Ingrate!”
“No, what I mean is, I’m fed up with all this.”
“Be patient my son … three hundred pessetes are three hundred pessetes. Come back here now … to the ‘scene of the crime’ … and for the love of God, don’t make as much noise as you did last time. You can hear everything in an apartment like this.”
The “scene of the crime” was a room that had been converted into a luxurious bedroom, with a glossy, perfumed, and illicit air, imitating a kind of pomp that is no longer in fashion in homes with good taste, but is very common in certain high-ticket Parisian bordellos, frequented by the scions of South American families. Dorotea Palau had pretty precise knowledge of such places, even if no direct experience.
In the bedroom, the young man from a good family dressed as a ditch digger was left to wait, perusing the suggestive iconography on the walls with a cynical chuckle and flicking his pocket lighter on and off, while at the door Dorotea greeted a lady and gentleman of honorable appearance with affected amiability, leading them into one of the fitting rooms. Even though the moment of pleasantries had been extremely brief and the couple had already vanished behind a curtain, the lady could not avoid being spotted by Claudina C., who had been torturing Isabel, the chief apprentice of the house, for two hours. Having finished up her business there, she grabbed Dorotea by the arm in high dudgeon and said to her, one foot inside the door and one on the landing outside: