Bogota,
January 6, 1944
Honorable Senators Pedro J. Navarro, Leonardo Lozano Pardo and Jose de la Vega:
My name is Margarita Lloreda de Deresser. I was born in Cali to a traditionally Liberal family. My father was the late Julio Alberto Lloreda Duque, engineer by profession and consultant on public works for the government of the late Doctor Olaya Herrera.
The reason for this letter is none other than to request your intercession on my behalf and that of my family in the light of the situation which I here relate:
In 1919 I married Konrad Deresser, a German citizen. The marriage has remained solid under the eyes of God since then and we have one son, Enrique, a young man of exemplary conduct who is now twenty-three years of age.
Due to his nationality my husband has seen his name included in the "blacklist" of the government of the United States of America, which as Your Honors undoubtedly are aware brings terrible consequences for any individual or business, and our case has not been different. In the space of the few weeks since the unjust inclusion on the "list" we have been brought to a state of crisis which appears to have no escape and will without a doubt soon bankrupt us.
However, my husband has never had, does not have, nor will he ever have any sympathy for the government currently in power in Germany, for which reason his inclusion on the list is unfair and unjustified and due to nothing but rumors without any basis in fact.
My husband is the proprietor of a small family business, Cristales Deresser, dedicated to the
"Does it end here?" I said. "Don't you have the rest?"
Enrique took out another of the plastic-sleeved pages. "Don't get in a state," he said sarcastically. "The world's not going to end just yet."
manufacture and commercial sale of window panes and all kinds of glass. The total capital does not exceed 8,000 pesos and we have no more than three full-time employees, all of whom are Colombian.
My husband, furthermore, is part of the broad German community that arrived in Colombia at the beginning of the century and since then has loyally abided by all the laws of our country. He has distinguished himself among the people of Bogota by the strictness and honesty of his morals and habits, as so often occurs with members of this race of elevated qualities. And in spite of having always felt proud of his origins my husband has never prevented me from raising my son in the religious and civic values of our Colombia, in the Catholic church and our valued democracy, which today we see under threat. Which my husband regrets as much as all Colombian citizenry of which he considers himself a part.
With all due respect I ask Your Honors, not only in my name but in the name of the rest of the German families who find themselves in analogous situations, that you intercede before the Government so that our names may be removed from the aforementioned list and our civil and economic rights may be restored. My husband and many other German citizens are suffering the consequences of the place where they were born by virtue of Providence but not of their actions or deeds. Deeds and actions that have always been in accordance with the laws and customs of this nation which has taken them in so generously.
I thank you in advance for the attention you can give this matter. And awaiting demonstrations of your goodwill, I remain,
Yours faithfully,
Margarita Lloreda de Deresser
"How did you get it?"
"By asking," said Enrique. "As simple as that. Yes, I thought it was strange, too. But then I thought: What's so strange? Those papers are of no interest to anybody. There are hundreds of letters like this, thousands, it's not like they're irreplaceable. There was a fire a few years ago. Many of them went up in smoke. Do you think anyone cared? Wastepaper, that's what those archives were. The civil servant who gave it to me confessed the truth. They cut those papers into strips and put them on the desk so people who get fingerprinted have something to wipe off the ink with."
"And you went to Bogota, you requested it, and they gave it to you?"
"You're surprised, aren't you? What did you think, that Sara Guterman was the only obsessive? No, Sara is an amateur next to me. I've taken this matter very seriously indeed. I'm no dilettante. If there were a guild of document collectors, I'd be the president, don't doubt it for a second."
"Oh, you're into that," said Rebeca as she came in. In her hand were the directions, streets and avenues that would take me to the hotel, which, of course, I now had no desire to get to. "Poor thing, he has no one to show his toys to."
"I do have," said Enrique, "but I don't want to. This isn't for any old nobody."
"I don't suppose I can take them with me," I said. "Even if I brought them back first thing tomorrow morning."
"You suppose right. These papers don't leave this house while I'm alive."
I said I understood (and I wasn't lying). But that was the letter Sara Guterman had told me about. And Enrique had it. He'd shown it to me. I had seen it. In the middle of that family archaeology, I thought the tacit agreement that Enrique and his wife had arrived at was tremendous: they both spoke of that letter lightly, as if that way they could neutralize the gravity of its contents. I, for one, didn't want to enter into the game. What was radiating from the paper, from Margarita Deresser's signature, even from the date, prevented me.
"If you lost one of these papers, if you damaged it, I'd have no choice but to kill you," said Enrique. "Like spies in movies. I like you, man, I don't want to kill you."
"Me neither," I said, handing back the second page of the letter. I stood up and went over to Rebeca to kiss her good-bye. "Well, thank you for everything-," I was saying.
"But if you want," Enrique interrupted me, "you could sleep here."
"No, no. I've already made a reservation."
"So cancel it."
"I don't want to inconvenience you."
"The inconvenience will be all yours," said Rebeca. "The sofa's hard as a rock."
"There's something else," said Enrique. "There's something else I'd like to do with you. I haven't been able to do it on my own, and who better than you to go with me?"
And he told me about how often he'd driven on the road up to Las Palmas, thinking all the time he'd go and look at the site of the accident, thinking of parking the car by the side of the road and walking down like a tourist on the mountainside, if that was possible. No, he'd never been able to: each time he'd kept on going, and a couple of times he'd reached the extreme-ridiculous, yes, he knew it-of turning up the volume on the car radio so as not to hear the urgency of his own meddling thoughts.