When he had proved to his satisfaction that he could quash almost all the feeble resistance his opponents might muster, he dispensed with them and, to complete the perfection of his game, bought a computer against which he would play long, obsessive matches that kept him up till the small hours. During that time, he slept little and badly, and got up very early to resume feverishly the game abandoned the night before.
VI
The day he considered himself ready to face the old man, he got up, as usual, at eight on the dot. He took a cold shower and went down to the supermarket, but the old man did not appear. He loitered around the fruit counter, looking at the oranges, the pears, the lemons piled in wicker baskets. He asked the fruit seller when the strawberries would be arriving this year. Then he saw the old man. As the answer died on the edge of the shop assistant’s lips, Álvaro rushed off in pursuit of his neighbour, who was now heading for the checkout. On the way out of the establishment, he held the door open and let the old man go first. He walked beside him all the way home. He talked of the weather, of how dirty the steps were, of the number of door-to-door salesmen that had been pestering them in the building; to win his complicity, he made a malicious joke about the concierge. The old man looked at him with eyes of cold crystal and praised the concierge, who helped him with his housework; besides, he always thought their steps were the neatest in the neighbourhood. When they got to the front door, Álvaro changed the subject. He mentioned the computer he’d just bought: he used it principally to play chess.
‘I know it’s not for me to say, but the truth is I’m a better than average player,’ said Álvaro, feigning a cloying petulance.
The old man’s face sketched a hard smile.
‘You don’t say!’ he replied sarcastically.
Álvaro briefly recounted a few of his victories, in the most precise and technical terms he could think of, proposed a few variations he hadn’t used at the time and assured him that his computer had seven levels of difficulty and only after the fifth did it pose any challenges. Less surprised than irritated by his neighbour’s vanity, the old man announced that he too played chess. Álvaro seemed delighted. They arranged to play the following day in old man Montero’s apartment.
As he closed his door, Álvaro felt both satisfied and anxious. Satisfied because he had finally achieved his objective of getting inside the old man’s apartment and would now have at least the possibility of getting friendly with him. Anxious because perhaps he had gone too far, maybe he had seemed too sure of himself, he’d boasted excessively and may have put the whole operation at risk, given that, as was not rash to presume, if the old man played more brilliantly than he did and finished him off with ease, it would all be put down to the mere bluster of a neighbourhood braggart, and not only would he have wasted the enormous amount of time he’d invested in studying the game, but all possibility of forming any kind of relationship with the old man would practically disappear into thin air, which would endanger his chances of ever finishing the novel.
Troubled by the fear of failure, he began to go over openings he knew by heart. That’s when someone knocked at the door. Since he suspected it was the concierge, he didn’t even get up from his armchair. Ten minutes later the bell was still ringing. He opened the door in a rage without first looking through the peephole.
‘Hi!’ said the journalist with the granulated face. ‘Look, sorry to bother you, but I was just making some lunch when suddenly I realised I’d run out of potatoes and, since it’s so late, I’m sure the supermarket’s closed. So I said to myself, “Surely Álvaro can lend me a few. He’s so organized!”’
Álvaro remained sunk in impatient silence. He noticed his stomach hurt. Angst always seized him in the stomach.
‘Álvaro!’ demanded the journalist again. ‘Have you got a couple of potatoes?’
‘No.’
‘Any oil?’
‘Nope.’
‘OK, then give me a bit of salt.’
The journalist pushed into the dining room. Álvaro came back from the kitchen with a little bag filled with salt, offered it to her without handing it over and walked to the door. With a hand on the knob of the half-open door, he looked at the girl, who remained in the centre of the dining room with the air of someone visiting Roman ruins. For a moment she seemed much younger than he’d previously thought: in spite of her decisive manners and her false adult air, she was barely an adolescent. Where had he got the idea she was a journalist? In that case, she must still be studying for her degree, because she could hardly be twenty. ‘On veut bien être méchant, mais on ne veut point être ridicule.’ Ridiculing her would be an efficient antidote against the impertinence of her visits.
‘Hey,’ he said in an ironic tone, ‘you’ve really grown lately, haven’t you?’
The girl let out a sigh and smiled with resignation.
‘Whereas for you time stands still.’
Álvaro couldn’t help but blush. She helped him open the door the rest of the way and said goodbye. Álvaro stood with the door half closed, his left hand on the doorknob and in his right the bag of salt. He slammed the door closed and felt absolutely grotesque with the bag of salt in his hand. He hit himself on the head with it, then he threw it into the toilet and flushed. As he sat back down at his desk, he abruptly reflected on the coincidence that he and the concierge, at the most ludicrous point of their two most recent phenomenal performances, had both stood gripping the doorknob in their left hands while holding the door half closed. A cold shiver ran up his spine as he remembered the dream of the green hill with the white door and its golden doorknob; he smiled to himself and decided he should put all those symmetries to use in some future novel.
The bell rang again. This time he sneaked up to the door and, holding his breath, spied outside through the peephole. Irene Casares was standing outside with her shopping trolley. Álvaro glanced in the hall mirror, smoothed his chaotic hair and adjusted the knot of his tie.
He opened the door and they greeted each other warmly. Despite her protests, her insistence that she didn’t want to disturb him and that she still had to get lunch ready, he invited her into the living room. They sat down opposite each other. After an expectant pause, the woman declared that she’d come to thank him for all he’d done for her husband. He’d told her about his conduct and was full of gratitude. She said she didn’t know how they’d ever repay him (Álvaro made a vague magnanimous gesture with his hand, as if indicating that such a concern had never even entered his head) and that he should count on their friendship for absolutely anything. He then noticed the woman’s gentle serenity: her eyes were bright and blue, her voice clear, and her whole body emanated a freshness barely in keeping with her pauper-princess clothes.
Álvaro thanked her for the visit and for her kind words, played down the importance of his role, insisted that anyone in his place would have done the same. He offered her a cigarette, which she politely declined; he lit one. They talked about the dangers of smoking, about anti-tobacco campaigns. He assured her he’d tried several times, with the results she saw before her, to give up the vice. She declared she’d overcome it five years earlier and, with the excessive passion of the convert, listed one after another the unquestionable benefits such a success brought with it. Then she claimed her duties at home prevented her from enjoying his company any longer. When they were standing in the dining room, Álvaro said his job allowed him to keep abreast of developments in the labour market and he would not hesitate to use his influence, slight as it was, to help her husband find a job. She looked him in the eye with disconsolate candour and mumbled that he could not imagine how much that would mean to her family and, as her tremulous hands clutched the handle of the shopping trolley, she admitted their situation was desperate. She opened the door, gripping the doorknob in her left hand, and held it half open while she turned towards Álvaro as if trying to add something. He hurried to reiterate his promises, practically pushed the woman out the door and suggested that one of these days (this elastic expression would allow him to fix the date at the time best suited to his objectives) they must come over for dinner. Señora Casares accepted.