“Not this one.”
“Obviously not.” Wilma tossed the newspaper on the floor and took off her spectacles. She couldn’t read without the spectacles, since she was far-sighted, but she could see across the room better without them. Amy’s face looked pale and numb. “I gather you noticed the initials?”
“Yes.”
“And concluded, of course, that Rupert and I are madly in love; that we have, in fact, been carrying on an affair for years and years behind your...”
“Shut up,” Amy said. “I hear the girl in the bedroom.”
Consuela had let herself in with her passkey and was now making up the beds. Her shoulders slumped and her feet dragged from weariness because she’d had a fight with her boyfriend that had lasted well into the night. The cause of the fight was, to Consuela, absolutely ridiculous. All she did was pilfer a black nylon slip from 411, but her boyfriend became very angry and told her she would lose her job and accused her of trying to steal the smell off a goat if she got the chance. Besides all that, the slip had been too small for her and she’d torn the seams attempting to force it over her hips.
Life was unfair. Life was cruel as a bull’s horn. Consuela groaned as she changed the sheets, and made small suffering sounds as she slopped a little water around the washbasin. Why would I steal the smell off a goat?
“You’re jealous,” Wilma said softly. “Is that it?”
“Of course not. It just doesn’t seem proper to me. And if Gill finds out he’ll make a big fuss about it.”
“Don’t tell him, then.”
“I never tell him things. But he always finds out in some way.”
“Why do you still care what your brother thinks, at your age and weight?”
“He can cause a lot of trouble,” Amy said. “He’s always been suspicious of Rupert anyway. I don’t know why.”
“I could tell you why, but you wouldn’t like it. You probably wouldn’t even listen.”
“Then why bother telling me?”
“I’m not going to.” Wilma finished her drink. “So you don’t care whether I give Rupert the box, just so long as Gill doesn’t find out about it. That’s very funny.”
“Not to me, it isn’t. And I don’t see why you had to buy such an expensive gift in the first place.”
“Because I wanted to. You wouldn’t understand. You haven’t done anything because you wanted to in your whole life. I have. I do. I saw this box in the window of a little shop and it reminded me of something Rupert said once, that the sea looked like hammered silver. I never really understood what he meant until I saw the box. So I bought it. I simply went in and bought it, without thinking of money, or you, or Gill, or all your weird, complicated...”
“Not so loud. The girl...”
“The hell with the girl. The hell with the box, too. Take the damn thing and throw it over the balcony!”
“We can’t very well do that,” Amy said quietly. “There are too many people on the street. Someone might get hurt.”
“But that’s what you’d like to do, isn’t it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Oh, admit it. Admit something for a change. You want to get rid of the box.”
“Yes, but...”
“Do it then. Chuck the thing over the railing. That’ll be the end of it. And good, good riddance.”
In the bedroom Consuela let out a little bleat of protest. To throw a silver box out into the street like garbage would be a terrible sin. Suppose someone very rich saw it falling through the air and caught it and became even richer — Consuela groaned at the thought of such injustice and cursed herself for her stupidity in pretending to the two ladies that she couldn’t speak English. Now she could not present herself to them and state her case: I am a very poor and very humble peasant. Sometimes I am even tempted to steal...
No, that would not have been good, giving them ideas about her stealing. Perhaps it was just as well that she had pretended not to know English. This way she could simply confront the ladies, looking very poor and humble and honest, and they might offer to give her the box.
Consuela glanced in the mirror above the bureau. How did one go about looking honest? It was not easy.
She picked up the carpet sweeper and headed for the sitting room, already making plans for the silver box. She would sell it and buy lottery tickets for tomorrow’s drawing. Then, on Tuesday morning when her winning number was published in the papers, she would tell her boyfriend to go kiss a goat, thumb her nose at the hotel manager, and leave immediately for Hollywood where she would have her hair bleached and walk among the movie stars.
She spoke in Spanish, sounding very poor and humble. “If the good ladies will excuse me, I have come to clean the room.”
“Tell her to go away and come back later,” Wilma said.
Amy shook her head. “I don’t know how.”
“I thought you took Spanish in high school.”
“That was over fifteen years ago and only for a semester.”
“Well, find the book of common phrases for tourists.”
“We — I left it on the plane.”
“Oh, for God’s sake. Well, get rid of her some way.”
Consuela had discovered the silver box on the coffee table and was making excited noises over its beauty, its craftsmanship, and the number of lottery tickets it was worth.
“She must be talking about the box,” Amy said.
“Let her talk.”
“If you’re just going to throw it away anyway, you could give it to her instead.”
“I could,” Wilma said, “but I won’t. And who said I intended throwing it away?”
“You did. You practically promised.”
“Nothing of the sort. I said if you wanted to throw it away you were to go ahead and do it. But you didn’t have enough nerve, so you lost your chance. The box is mine. I bought it for Rupert and I’m giving it to Rupert.”
Consuela, cheated out of her blond hair and her movie stars, squawked in protest and held her hand against her heart as if it were breaking.
Wilma glared at her. “Go away. We’re busy. Come back later.”
“Oh, you are a wicked one,” Consuela moaned in Spanish. “A selfish one, a bad one. Oh, may you spend eternity in hell.”
“I can’t understand a word you’re saying.”
“Oh, I wish you could, you black witch with the evil eye. Children grow pale and sicken when you look at them. Dogs put their tails between their legs and slink away...”
“I’ve had enough of this,” Wilma said, addressing Amy. “I’m going to the bar.”
“Alone?”
“You’re perfectly welcome to come along.”
“It’s so early, barely five o’clock.”
“Then stay here. If you can dig up some of that high school Spanish of yours, I’m sure you and the girl can have a ball.”
“Wilma, don’t drink too much when you’re in this mood. It will only depress you.”
“I’m already depressed,” Wilma said. “You depress me.”
At seven o’clock Amy set out to look for her.
The hotel operated two bars, an elaborate one on the roof with a lively orchestra, and a smaller one between the lobby and the dining room for people who preferred martinis without music. Amy tipped the elevator boy two pesos and asked him what direction Wilma had taken.
“Your friend in the fur coat?”
“Yes.”
“First she went up to the roof garden. A little time later she came down again. She said the marimbas made it too noisy to talk.”
“Talk?” Amy said. “To whom?”
“The American.”
“What American?”
“He hangs around the bar. He is what you call homesick, for New York. He likes to talk to other Americans. He is harmless,” the boy added with a shrug. “A nobody.”