“Here is the happy part. Our cabin was so low, just above the water line, that the port had to be kept closed all the time and you saw the sea racing by and then you saw it solid green as the sea went past the porthole. We had built a barricade with trunks and suitcases roped together so that Tom could not fall out of the berth and when his mother and I would come down to see how he was, every time we ever came, if he was awake, he was laughing.”
“Did he really laugh when he was three months old?”
“He laughed all the time. I never heard him cry when he was a baby.”
“¡Qué muchacho más lindo más guapo!”
“Yes,” Thomas Hudson said. “Very high-class muchacho. Want me to tell you another happy story about him?”
“Why did you leave his lovely mother?”
“A very strange combination of circumstances Do you want another happy story?”
“Yes. But without so many smells In it.”
“This frozen daiquiri, so well beaten as it is, looks like the sea where the wave falls away from the bow of a ship when she is doing thirty knots. How do you think frozen daiquiris would be if they were phosphorescent?”
“You could put phosphorus in them. But I don’t think it would be healthy. Sometimes people in Cuba commit suicide by eating phosphorus from the heads of matches.”
“And drinking tinte rápido. What is rapid ink?”
“It is a dye to make shoes black. But most often girls who have been crossed in love or when their fiancés have not kept their promises and done the things to them and then gone away without marrying, commit suicide by pouring alcohol on themselves and setting themselves on fire. That is the classic way.”
“I know,” Thomas Hudson said. “Auto da fé.”
“It’s very certain,” Honest Lil said, “They nearly always die. The burns are on the head first and usually all over the body. Rapid ink is more of a gesture. Iodine is au fond a gesture, too.”
“What are you two ghouls talking about?” Serafín the barman asked.
“Suicides.”
“Hay mucho,” Serafín said “Especially among the poor, I don’t remember a rich Cuban committing suicide Do you?”
“Yes,” Honest Lil said. “I know of several cases—good people, too.”
“You would,” Serafín said,
“Señor Tomás, do you want something to eat with those drinks? ¿Un poco de pescado? ¿Puerco frito? Any cold meats?”
“Sí,” Thomas Hudson said. “Whatever there is.”
Serafín put a plate of bits of pork, fried brown and crisped, and a plate of red snapper fried in batter so that it wore a yellow crust over the pink-red skin and the white sweet fish inside. He was a tall boy, naturally rough spoken, and he walked roughly from the wooden shoes he wore against the wet and the spillage behind the bar.
“Do you want cold meats?”
“No. This is enough.”
“Take anything they will give you, Tom,” Honest Lil said. “You know this place.”
The bar had a reputation for never buying a drink. But actually it gave an uncounted number of plates of hot free lunch each day; not only the fried fish and pork, but plates of little hot meat fritters and sandwiches of French-fried bread with toasted cheese and ham. The bartenders also mixed the daiquiris in a huge shaker and there was always at least a drink and a half left in the shaker after the drinks were poured.
“Are you less sad now?” Honest Lil asked
“Yes.”
“Tell me, Tom. What are you sad about?”
“El mundo entero.”
“Who isn’t sad about the whole world? It goes worse all the time. But you can’t spend your time being sad about that.”
“There isn’t any law against it.”
“There doesn’t have to be a law against things for them to be wrong.”
Ethical discussions with Honest Lil are not what I need, Thomas Hudson thought. What do you need, you bastard? You needed to get drunk which you are probably doing even though it does not seem so to you. There is no way for you to get what you need and you will never have what you want again. But there are various palliative measures you should take. Go ahead. Take one.
“Voy a tomar otro de estos grandes sin azúcar,” he said to Serafín.
“En seguida, Don Tomás,” Serafín said. “Are you going to try to beat the record?”
“No. I’m just drinking with calmness.”
“You were drinking with calmness when you set the record,” Serafín said. “With calmness and fortitude from morning until night. And you walked out on your own feet.”
“The hell with the record.”
“You’ve got a chance to break it,” Serafín told him. “Drinking as you are now and eating a little as you go along, you have an excellent chance.”
“Tom, try to break the record,” Honest Lil said. “I’m here as a witness.”
“He doesn’t need any witness,” Serafín said. “I’m the witness. When I go off I’ll give the count to Constante. You’re further along right now than you were the day you set the record.”
“The hell with the record.”
“You’re in good form. You’re drinking well and steady and they’re not having any effect on you.”
“Fuck the record.”
“All right. Como usted quiere. I’m keeping count just in case you change your mind.”
“He’ll keep count all right,” Honest Lil said. “He has the duplicate tickets.”
“What do you want, woman? Do you want a real record or a phony record?”
“Neither. I want a highbalito with agua mineral.”
“Como siempre,” Serafín said.
“I drink brandy, too.”
“I don’t want to be here when you drink brandy.”
“Tom, did you know I fell down trying to get onto a streetcar and was nearly killed?”
“Poor Honest Lil,” Serafín said. “A dangerous and adventurous life.”
“Better than yours standing all day in wooden shoes behind a bar and serving rummies.”
“That’s my trade,” Serafín said. “It’s a privilege to serve such distinguished rummies as you.”
Henry Wood came over. He stood, tall and sweating and newly excited by a change of plans. There was nothing that pleased him, Thomas Hudson thought, like a sudden change of plans.
“We’re going over to Alfred’s Sin House,” he said. “Do you want to come, Tom?”
“Willie’s waiting for you at the Bar Basque.”
“I don’t believe we really want Willie on this one.”
“You ought to tell him, then.”
“I’ll call him up. Don’t you want to come? This is going to be very good.”
“You ought to eat something.”
“I’ll eat a good big dinner. How are you doing?”
“I’m doing fine,” Thomas Hudson said. “Really fine.”
“Are you going to try for the record?”
“No.”
“Will I see you tonight?”
“I don’t think so.”
“I’ll come out and sleep at the house if you like.”
“No. Have fun. But eat something.”
“I’ll eat an excellent dinner. Word of honor.”
“Be sure and call Willie.”
“I’ll call Willie. You can be quite sure.”
“Where’s Alfred’s Sin House?”
“It’s an absolutely beautiful place. It overlooks the harbor and it’s well furnished and really delightful.”
“I mean what is the address.”
“I don’t know but I’ll tell Willie.”
“You don’t think Willie will be hurt?”