“You told him that?”
“Well, practically. I sure wanted to tell him. You bet your bottom peso I wanted to, you know?”
“Well, you’ll have to forgive me, but I would’ve said it. Yes. We all have our dignity. I’d’ve said, just because you don’t think we’re quite as high up as you, that’s no reason to insult us, Licenciado.”
“Well, you know how it is, that Chayo thinks she’s the queen bee. I guess it’s not all her fault, and the truth is, the chief, old Maldonado, ’s a pretty good guy…”
They signed the payroll, cashed their checks, and walked away counting the bills in their pay envelopes. Felix was torn between following them and cashing his check. The man at the window looked at him impatiently.
“May I help you?”
“Maldonado,” said Felix. “Cost Analysis.”
“I’m sorry, but I’ve never seen you before. Do you have any identification?”
“No. Look, my secretary usually comes to take care of this for me.”
“I’m sorry, sir. I’ll have to have some identification.”
“All I have with me is my credit card. Here.”
“Is your name American Express? We don’t have anyone with that name on the payroll.”
“Isn’t my signature enough? You can compare it with the ones on the previous checks.”
The cashier shook his head severely and Felix left the window, determined to look for his driver’s license, his passport, his National Party card, even his birth certificate, if necessary. How could Malena cash a check in his name every two weeks without any problem if he, the one the check was made out to, had to have identification? Angry, he walked toward the elevator. Without success, he looked for the two secretaries who’d been talking about him. Was there another Maldonado in the Ministry? Well, why not? It wasn’t an unusual name.
6
ONCE in the self-service elevator, again surrounded by strangers, he told himself that the simplest thing would be to send Malena, as he always did; Malena dear, run down to the cashier’s for me, will you? He got off the elevator on his own floor, still annoyed because he had had no identification with him. He walked down the narrow, crowded hallway and paused to look out at the low flat roofs in the surrounding Colonia de los Doctores, each roof with its own water-storage tank.
His life was so predictable, he thought, so orderly, and he always went only to places where he was known. He was given special treatment in the bars and restaurants where all he had to do was sign with his American Express card. Except for some small change for tips, that was all he ever needed. But an idiot cashier had asked for what no one ever required at the Hilton or the Jacarandas Club, an identifying photo.
“Underdeveloped as hell,” he muttered as he entered his office, “the idiot still isn’t aware of the existence of credit cards. They must pay him with glass beads.”
Malena and the two secretaries who’d stood before him in the line had their heads together by the door to his office. They might have been in a football huddle. He coughed, and Malena trembled. They broke apart, guiltily, and the two girls said offhandedly, “We’ll see you around, Mallie, ask your mother to let you come see the rodeo on Sunday,” and Malena, who could not contain herself, cried: “You bitches! Don’t leave me here all alone.”
She sobbed, and sat down at her ancient Underwood, protected by its bulk.
“Why don’t you wear the typewriter cover for a witch’s hat; you’re certainly acting the part,” Felix said brutally.
Suddenly Malena became calm. She arranged a silken curl, picked up the telephone, dialed a short number, and said, with no trace of tears but with an expression that seemed to Felix one of a vengeful, tattletale child: “He’s here now. He’s back.”
Felix Maldonado entered his private office, turned on the fluorescent lights, and automatically took out his felt-tip pen to sign the stack of daily communiqués and memoranda. Customarily, the efficient Malena had all the papers needing his signature ready a little after one. But today, pen in hand, Felix saw that the folder was not on the desk.
As he reached out to buzz his secretary, a short, blond man entered without knocking. One of those short skinny towheads, thought Felix, who thinks he’s hot stuff and because he’s light-skinned and good-looking can get away with murder. He’s the kind who thinks being short allows him to be aggressive, that being a runt excuses all his excesses and commands everyone’s respect. But this one was even more annoying than usual because of the penetrating odor of clove drifting from the artfully arranged handkerchief in his breast pocket. Felix wanted to say all this to this man who’d intruded so impertinently.
“Yes? What can I do for you?”
“Sorry. May I sit down?”
“I thought you already were.”
“What did you say?”
“Sure. Make yourself comfortable,” Felix said, at last gratified. If he’s asking my permission, that means he knows this is my office.
“My name’s Ayub. Personnel. Simon. Uh … what shall I call you?” He coughed.
“Whatever you want,” said Felix coldly, thinking, Ayub, that’s strange, a blond Lebanese. If he’d heard the name without seeing its owner, he would have imagined a thick moustache and an olive complexion.
“What’s going on … Licenciado … uh?” said Ayub, questioning but discreet. “What’s going on is that we’ve found an abnormality in the personnel time cards.”
“Whatever you say, Ayub. I’m an official. I don’t punch time clocks.”
“But the fact is … Licenciado … the fact is that all morning we’ve been combing the area for a man who … usually … works in this office … uh, unsuccessfully.”
“Express yourself clearly. He works unsuccessfully, or you’re looking for him without success?”
“That’s what I mean, Licenciado, that’s what I mean.”
“What?”
“That we can’t find him.”
“What’s his name?”
“Felix Maldonado.”
“I am Felix Maldonado.”
The blond man stared at Felix with desperation. He swallowed several times before speaking. “Well, that’s not to your advantage, believe me, Licenciado … uh?”
“It’s not to my advantage to be myself?” Felix asked, disguising his discomfort with a blow of his fist that cracked the protective glass covering of the desk.
“Don’t get me wrong,” Ayub said, between coughs. “We’re trying to see this from a global point of view.”
Felix stared with irritation at the green vein of broken glass running like a scar across the photograph of his wife, Ruth.
“You’ll have to pay for the damage to government property,” said Ayub, in an absolutely neutral voice, also looking at the scar on the official’s desk.
Felix considered it beneath his dignity to reply.
“The Director General told me to tell you to see him today at six,” Ayub said abruptly. He stood up, excused himself, and walked out the door, trailing a wake of clove. “So long. Good luck.”
This reminded Felix that he had to be at the Restaurante Arroyo in Tlalpan by lunchtime. With the traffic as it was, it would take him at least an hour. He glanced at his watch: one-thirty. When he went out to the main office, he found that Malena had already left. The typewriter was covered with precision; a single violet exhaled in a crystal bud vase, and a worn teddy bear was ensconced in little Malena’s desk chair.