An ovation exploded, and in one voice they sang “The International” at the top of their lungs. Then Sofía Lam appeared, falling down drunk, hugging a prostitute dressed in red:
“Bastards! This long-suffering woman has more balls than all of you, poor he-men who know how to sing silly songs with the voice of a hot burro, but you abandon your leader when a rich boy starts shooting!”
She tore her Communist Party membership card to pieces.
“I’m leaving the Revolution for prostitution, that’s my song!” And she fell into the arms of her lover, who picked her up like a baby and carried her off to the bars at the port. Paying no attention, the demonstrators finished singing the anthem, and to keep Recabarren and Jaime from being beaten by the police, who most certainly would be waiting for them at the train station, they gave them two mules and a guide who led them through the hills to Antofagasta. They took the Longitudinal and returned to Santiago. Before they went in, the master passed the revolver wrapped in a handkerchief to Jaime, saying, “Lautaro, you keep it so Teresa doesn’t see it. Always keep it clean and loaded. You never know.”
The portrait of Lenin went on peeling. By now it no longer had a face. During their silent meals, from time to time they heard the small sounds of the paint hitting the oilcloth table cover. When, in January 1924, the news came from Russia of the death of the great revolutionary, all that was left of the portrait was a white stain, rather like a ghost. Recabarren, without showing his emotions, went to the chamber, delivered a verbal portrait of Lenin, and asked that a condolence telegram be sent to Moscow. His proposal was rejected.
That night, back at home, Recabarren did not eat. He was sitting in the garden until 3:00 a.m. Teresa, always like a ship slicing through water, brought him hot tea every half hour. When the eighth cup came, the man broke his silence:
“Don’t sacrifice yourself, Teresa, go to bed. You listen to my silences as if they were screams. Do I have to explain what’s wrong with me? You know that ever since I was a boy I’ve given my life to the people. I’m not even fifty, but people call me ‘the old man.’ I’m no dreamer; I’ve only asked for what is right. It’s not crazy to demand an end to war and the exploitation of man by man. Those who deny that are the ones who live outside reality, giving the orders, massacring innocents to preserve their power, making themselves owners of the Earth’s riches, exacerbating consumption, leaving the workers hungry. It’s insane! I never should have gone to Russia. I saw things. Errors I don’t want to remember. Lenin died because he could not go on living that way. Now, Comrade Stalin… terrible… Well… Don’t make me speak, woman. I no longer know what man is.”
“We don’t know what man is when he’s asleep, Luis Emilio. The man who is awake is sublime. If you don’t believe me, just look at yourself.”
They embraced tenderly. He rested his head on Teresa’s strict bosom and, without making a sound and with his jaws clenched, dominated the weeping that shook his shoulders. Jaime, hidden by the curtain, heard everything from his window, listening avidly to his master’s words, and felt ashamed to be spying on such an intimate scene. He stepped away, went to look at himself in the mirror, and gave himself a couple of good slaps.
In March, the master’s term as deputy was up. He presented himself for reelection but did not make serious efforts. He didn’t get enough votes. In September, a contingent of military men invaded the Senate to express their annoyance, demanding a political and administrative purification. Parliament approved the petitions presented to it. Arturo Alessandri, alleging he’d lost control of power, resigned and left the country. Exactly as Recabarren had predicted! That same month, a military junta met intent on dissolving Congress and convoking an assembly to draft a new constitution. Public opinion applauded enthusiastically, and the conservatives were obsequious and docile as events unfolded. Exactly as Recabarren had predicted!
The master was tired when he came home from the Party meeting. He handed Jaime some money and asked him to buy some pisco. My father returned with three bottles. It was the first time Recabarren expressed a desire to drink. Taciturn, they sat down under the huge white ghost. There was a liter for each of them. Gulping it down, the master began to empty his bottle. My father and Teresa copied him. Little by little they lost equilibrium and began to sweat.
The leader drank the last drops and began to guffaw. Teresa tried to smile, but her face was petrified. She put her head under her arm, imitating a hen, and began to snore, sitting in that odd position.
“The Lion of Tarapacá turned out to be sterile, Lautaro. His reactionary, anti-labor government has been replaced by a junta of generals who are even more reactionary. What a charade! They make promises to the people that go from the human to the divine only so the workers will bend their backs and keep on wearing the yoke. We’re on our way to a criminal dictatorship, here and in Russia. All demagogues. Shut up! There’s no more pisco?”
Jaime passed him the quarter liter he had left. The master finished in one swallow.
“Would you like to know, Quinchahual, how some young comrades responded because I suggested that believing that the proletariat alone, through its own efforts and a great struggle, could establish a Workers Government was an infantile idea? They shouted that I was foolish to think myself owner and master of the Party, that I behaved like an absolute monarch fencing in his servants. I was treated like a rat, and one militant dared to spit in my face! Can you believe it, Lautaro? Within the bosom of the Party there are fights and internecine struggles provoked by those sleeping men. Someday someone has to wake up! Go get the gun.”
“But… ”
“Obey your father!”
Overwhelmed by Recabarren’s will — he seemed to have aged a century — Jaime fetched the pistol.
“Let no one say that what I am going to do is the result of alcohol. Let’s wait until we’re sober.”
The master took a notebook out of a drawer and leafed through it. It was covered with his tiny, tortured handwriting.
“These are the memories of my life. Here is what I really saw in Russia, what I think of Lenin and of the future that awaits us if things don’t change.”
He put the notebook in a metal tray and set fire to it. The rooster began to crow. Teresa awoke and saw the pistol. She dug through the ashes trying to find a legible fragment. The ashes flew around the dining room like a flock of nocturnal butterflies. She said, with infinite dignity, “Good-bye, Luis Emilio. You know what I feel for you. I’ll never forget you.”
Recabarren brought the pistol to his head and squeezed the trigger. He fell over with a red rose on his temple.
The government didn’t dare forbid the funeral procession that would pass on Sunday through the center of the city to the General Cemetery. The coffin, covered with a red flag, was followed by a multitude of workers who filled the streets like a slow, silent, incredibly long river. The union banners paraded with a black ribbon on top of the letters embroidered in the velvet. Delegations of miners, maritime workers, men from the copper and coal mines, peasants, students, railroad men, bricklayers, bakers, and, at the head of the parade, guiding the coffin with a firm step, Teresa. Dressed in workers clothes, she glanced with pride toward the windows of the elegant houses where groups of people gathered to look out.
A barricade of one hundred policemen, armed with rifles and wearing metal helmets, stopped the procession. The human river paused. The master’s companion, standing next to the coffin, sang with such intensity that her voice could be heard blocks away: