Here the waves began to rear up. One of the bolder ones crashed against the ship, leaving drops of water on Ada Liz’s forehead and closed eyes. She tossed away her cigarette, turned around, and stared straight at the captain:
“If I were a flower, you could pluck me. But, Captain, I am not. Your ship is taking me back to the eyes in which I first discovered life. That’s why you’ll never know me. Save your vessel from the storm, make it brave for the wintery fogs.”
The violent wind thrashed and the ship suddenly pitched, a cloud of foam licking the deck. The captain shouted his orders, his voice hammering the night, ruling it. Ada Liz put aside her listlessness and eagerly breathed in the danger. The waves punished her as she gripped the rail tightly, her hands growing tired, the open sea intent on plunging into her body.
•
That night was long. The exhausted stokers toiled in the engine room below. The sea continued to batter the deck, sweeping one sailor away. The helmsman’s hands were bloody.
•
When Ada awoke, she let out a cry. She was sleeping, naked, in the place where she had refused to go. Her wet clothes were piled on a chair beside the bunk. The ship rocked gently, the sea was calm, the maritime routes reopened.
Ada Liz didn’t remember where she was headed or why she was there. Perhaps her dreams had carried her out to sea. She heard someone walking on the deck above the cabin, then the sound of footsteps coming down the stairs and along the corridor. She sat up, swung her feet onto the floor, and chastely covered her trembling breasts with the sheet.
The steps paused outside the door, and her heart began to pound. Had they really stopped? A voice she would never have thought so familiar asked:
“Are you asleep, Ada Liz?”
Should she reply?
“The sun is high, and we’re lost. I’m sorry for you, Ada Liz, not for me.”
Taking her silence for an answer, he entered. He was naked from the waist up, his hair falling across his weary forehead. Their eyes suddenly met, frightened.
“What is it about your eyes, Ada Liz? The storm’s turned them green and blue, shifting like aquamarine. Close them!” he shouted wildly.
She refused to obey, and with eyes strangely open, her voice devoid of intonation or nostalgia, she reprimanded him:
“You’ve stripped me of my dreams, Captain.”
He grew pale, and a shudder ran the length of his body as the memory of a certain night rushed over him.
At a loss for words, Ada Liz again envisioned the tiny vessels that grew from raindrops one day and bore the names she had chosen: Veloce, Ardent, Ignotum. Without thinking, she added another: The Southern Cross.
The captain kissed Ada Liz’s knees as her dreams faded, and with gentle fingers he moved the covers aside without touching her.
“If I’ve stripped you of your dreams, may I fill you with memories? Rest now, Ada Liz, your eyes are frank. May I kiss your knees. You weep?”
Translucent tears shone in Ada Liz’s eyes. Had she had been capable of thinking, perhaps she would have discovered that she wept for the bottomless waters, or for the human hearts lost on the high sea. Even these words couldn’t help her understand why her eyes were damp. Then, at the point where the clouds die and the horizon begins, the captain asked:
“Dreamy Ada Liz, where were you going if not to me? Who could you yearn for, other than for me, even if I had left you with no memories of me? On every horizon, my heart has found you, and in finding you anew, I will never lose you now. Where were you going, siren, but to the sea? To me.”
“I was going—”
“To me!”
“No. I was going. . Tell me where I was going. Tell me why I climbed aboard this vessel, why yesterday—”
“Today! Look at the sea. Here your memories begin. This morning I held you against my heart. That is why the flower you were holding has been shorn of its petals, and now I lose myself in you. I beg you, set me free.”
Ada Liz doesn’t understand; he rests his lips on her forehead.
“I hunger for you, Ada Liz. I have no words to offer, only tenderness, and the passion to awaken your heart that now sleeps still as a lake. My arms are made for your body, my lips for your mouth. All my desires lie in you. Will I find no caress from you, Ada Liz? None, Ada Liz?”
Her hands reach toward his head. She brushes away his hair, but it tumbles back down. Silently, her hands move down his neck, pause over his veins, rest briefly on his shoulder. Then a hand grips his furiously beating heart.
•
The sea washes the body of a dead mariner onto a deserted beach. His eyes are open. From time to time the waves lap across the anchor tattooed on his chest.
ON A DARK NIGHT
“Why am I in this room?” I asked myself suddenly, but my thoughts refused to respond. Along with everything else, they too were lost.
“You see?” Loki exclaimed as she sat on my lap. “The windows of my house are for decoration. Neither light nor wind enters them.” Then she added, as if it were the most natural thing, “Did you know that I was born to live only at night?”
At night I reached this house that has but one room. I don’t know how I arrived, without taking a step I daresay. You’ll spot a. . but what advantage would there be for me to tell which path to take? Unless you know how to find it, it will always be the path that is the easiest to miss. No dream could ever conjure up this girl; she is like none other. Who could imagine her, much less find her, in this unfamiliar place, where not even the rumbling canons keep us from loving each other? I explained to Loki what war was; she didn’t understand. It’s better that way: she would suffer needlessly.
You must think me mad. I had seen many of my fellow soldiers fall. Others lay injured, groaning as they lost blood. One had empty eyes. Evening was falling when the battle ended. For three days we never stopped burying men! When the first star appeared, the clamor of fighting had ceased. Clouds slowly covered the sad, wan sky, engulfing the star. I don’t know how or why I began walking. “Where are you going?” asked the companion we all have but don’t want because we wish to be alone with our tedium. For two days and two nights we had fought side by side in the trenches. As he charged, he screamed the words patria, ideal, freedom. Hearing him inspired me with courage, although at times I wanted to kill him so I wouldn’t hear his voice. “Where are you going?” I didn’t reply. We had spent the night nailed to the same spot, all the men, elbow to elbow, eyes that couldn’t see from straining to look. Not a drop of alcohol to boost our strength, only nerves and memories. Not even memories now. Complete exhaustion. A sense of animality. All my desires converged: I wanted sleep. But my memories are stubborn. They arrive and take possession of my thoughts, filling them with shadows. Sometimes a man feels an infinite, almost delirious thirst for love, and he embarks upon the quest with the confidence that what he seeks exists. Then he feels cheated. All of us have experienced this. In my case, it was especially baneful. The more passionate we are, the worse off we are. Look at it this way: they say I’m a brave man. That is false. Disappointments make us strong. If courage stems from contempt for life and death, it lacks merit. When my dreams were thwarted, I became what I am. We stumble through life more or less mechanically. You know you have a soul or that you are filled with a passion that dares not manifest itself because. . I’m drifting away from what I wanted to say. Dark night crept in, and I pushed forward, on and on, driven mad by all those days of gunfire and deafening explosions. Not an inch of land had been seized.