Then comes something akin to resignation. What else can they do but wait? And fib a bit when asked about it in the club — Of course we have; two more letters, three actually; you should read the latest poem he sent, dedicated to Georgina. Maybe they lie out of pride. Or maybe they are waiting for reality to accommodate itself to their words. But one night one of the lads at the club seems unusually interested in their responses.
“So he just wrote you, then!” he says, feigning admiration. “And three letters, no less! What does the brilliant poet have to say for himself?”
José and Carlos exchange an awkward glance.
“Well, mostly the same as always…”
“The same as always, is it?”
“Yes… Nothing special. The important thing is that the novel continues. The novel continues.”
The chap starts to laugh, and two or three other patrons laugh with him.
“Well, since you didn’t get those letters via the Wright brothers’ flying bicycle, I highly doubt you actually had the chance to read them.”
“What do you mean?”
He becomes stern.
“Do you two live on the moon or something? You must be the only people in Lima who don’t know.”
“Know what?”
“Not a single ship has entered or left the port at El Callao for weeks. Sandoval’s strike has begun.”
~ ~ ~
◊
To find out, they would only have had to read one of Lima’s five newspapers or forty broadsheets — specifically, the front page of any of them. But neither Carlos nor José reads the newspaper. Nor do they attend their labor law class, in which the El Callao dockworkers have been the subject of lengthy and contentious discussion over the past several days. It’s been weeks since either of them has set foot in the halls of the university. Or Carlos could simply have bothered to listen to his own mother’s prayers, whose novenas and rosaries have, of late, made mention of the strikers. She asks the Lord for there to be peace in Peru and for everyone in the port to go back to being as happy as they used to be, and the Lord will end up listening to her sooner or later, because the Lord always answers the prayers of those who wish for nothing to change.
His father is well informed on the topic and is delighted when Carlos asks him about it. At last his son is showing some interest in business. He tells him about the thirty-five ships anchored in the port. The fourteen thousand tons of rubber going nowhere. The influx of dollars lost every day because of this preposterous wait and the deuced forces of order, which used to do just what their name suggests — impose order by force — and now allow a bunch of jobless, godless layabouts to humiliate the entire country.
“But what is it they’re asking for?” Carlos ventures.
“What is it they’re asking for? Anarchy! You know what anarchy is?”
Carlos says he does. Don Augusto keeps talking.
“Of course, they claim they’re fighting for equality and justice and who knows what other noble ideas… but nobody actually cares about those things! The workers aren’t fighting for justice — they’re fighting to become bosses themselves. It’s the law of life! And the strikers have this novel idea that they’re going to get rich working just eight hours a day… what do you think of that? You think I got where I am working eight goddamn hours a day?”
No, Carlos does not.
That very morning, as he is reading the newspaper in an effort to get up to date, one of the housemaids comes in to gather up the dishes from breakfast. Without looking up from the papers, almost idly, Carlos says:
“Even you must have heard about the El Callao strike.”
The maid stops short, still holding the tray.
“Is it because of my brother, sir?”
“Your brother?”
She bites her lip.
“My brother Antonio, the one who works in the port. He’s on strike with all the others — it’s no secret.”
“I understand.”
“But I’m not like him, sir. You don’t have to worry about me. I’m not going to cause any trouble.”
“Of course not, of course not.”
They stare at each other for a few moments. Perhaps the tray clatters in the maid’s trembling hands.
“So tell me… do you know why they’re on strike in the docks?”
The maid answers swiftly.
“I don’t know. I don’t understand those things.”
And then, calmer:
“But I think it’s because of the length of the workday, sir. They want to work eight hours, can you believe it? Eight hours a day!”
She tries to laugh, but it catches in her throat. She tries to control her heartbeat, afraid the clattering of the dishware might offend the young master.
“Eight hours, is it?”
“And the salaries too.”
“How much are they asking for?”
“Well… three soles a day, sir.”
“You mean that’s what they earn now?”
This time her laugh is genuine.
“Oh, of course not! That’s what they’d like, sir. They get just under two at the moment.”
“Two soles!” Carlos repeats, his eyes widening.
“Two soles, yes. And a piece of bread costs less than half a sol. Of course some people are never happy with anything.”
Carlos closes the newspaper. He ponders a moment.
“How much do we pay you?”
“Me, sir? Well… the usual. Room and board, and half a sol a day. What more could a person want?”
Carlos doesn’t answer immediately.
“Nothing, of course. You may go now.”
But the maid doesn’t move.
“I just… I just want to assure you that you don’t have to worry about me, sir. I know what’s fair.”
“Of course you do.”
“I’m not like my brother. I’m happy with what I have and I don’t cause any trouble. I’m not a revolutionary.”
“No, you’re not a revolutionary.”
And then he thanks her.
~ ~ ~
◊
The negotiations have begun, says the front page of El Comercio, the financial paper, and they go down to the port, hopeful at the news. What they do not know is that the conversations between the chamber of commerce and the strikers have failed; they had already failed, in fact, when the newspaper ink was still drying on the page. And so when they arrive they find the docks teeming with workers trying to prevent the scabs from the Britain Steamship Company from working. Tomorrow El Comercio will say that there were no more than two hundred people; the statement issued by the strikers’ commission will claim fifteen thousand. To José and Carlos, these numbers are unimportant. In any event, there are enough people to fill the port and even to block Calle de Manco Cápac, so it takes them a long time to push their way through the crowd to the edge of the dock.
In the distance they can make out the ships’ rigging, the steamships covered with patches of barnacles and rust. On one of them, who knows which, are the chapters that have not left; on another, the chapters that have not arrived. José and Carlos sit on the breakwater beside the esplanade and contemplate the ships, impotent. Last night, they heard that the Compañía Sud Americana de Vapores and the Britain Steamship Company had offered their regular crews two and a half soles to load the cargo, but the strikers’ union headed them off with a better offer, and now the city’s taverns are full of Russian and German and Turkish sailors who drink until they pass out at the workers’ expense. And so the decks are empty — there is no one aboard any of them save a handful of officers shouting at one another. Them and the rat that travels with the transatlantic mail, of course, which is startled to discover that, for the first time, the boat it calls the universe has stopped rocking and creaking to the rhythm of the waves. For the rat, at least, the strike has brought the whole world to a halt.