“You’re throwing me out?” asked Joanes, snapping out of his silence for the first time.
“Nobody fights under my roof without consequences.”
The professor scoffed at the hotel owner.
“Nobody’s fought anyone here. Didn’t you hear what I said? I fell over.”
“Let this man speak for himself,” replied the hotel owner.
“Fine by me,” said Joanes. “I don’t want to stay here a minute longer.”
“What are you talking about?” cried the professor. “You can’t be serious. Where will you go?”
“There’s a place,” said the hotel owner. “Back on the road to Los Tigres, you go down a couple of miles. On the left you’ll see a cabin. They put it up for the construction workers who were meant to build a hotel nearby. But the project didn’t go ahead, and now the cabin is empty.”
“A cabin?”
“It has brick walls and a solid roof,” said the owner. “It’ll hold out against the wind.”
“But how’s he going to get there?” asked the professor. “Have you all lost your minds? We’re in the middle of a hurricane!”
“It’s no big deal,” said Joanes. “I said I’m leaving.”
The professor pleaded with him to calm down. He asked everyone present to calm down.
“Let’s talk about this. You and I.”
“I don’t want to talk to you again.”
“I know. But I’m asking you as a favor. Think about this for a moment. You don’t need to do this.”
Joanes didn’t respond, so the professor asked the others to give them a moment alone. The hotel owner nodded and told the rest to return to their rooms. The Mexican guests left grudgingly. Some of them held back to try to catch what they could of the conversation.
Joanes gave the professor a look as if to say “get on with it.”
“There’s no need for you to leave. We can talk to that man, to the owner. I’m sure he’ll put you up in another room if you don’t want to stay with us.”
“That’s all you have to say?”
“Ah, so you think I owe you an apology? The right thing would be for you to apologize to me.”
“Don’t you speak to me about what’s right or wrong.”
“I’m not following you.”
“Forget it,” said Joanes, walking off. “I’m out of here.”
“No. Wait. Before you go, we need to get everything out in the open.”
Joanes stopped.
“Go on.”
“Everything I said is true. I can help you. I don’t understand why you reacted the way you did. Perhaps you thought I was talking down to you. But that’s not the case. I only want to help you, in return for you helping me.”
“This is what you wanted to get out in the open?”
“Well what else? I have to find out how my son is. I’ll do whatever it takes. I have to know if the explosion left him badly injured, or if—”
“What explosion?” interjected Joanes. “You told me it was a diving accident.”
“It was both,” hastened the professor. “A diving accident and an explosion. I don’t know the details. You see why I have to speak to my son, or with someone who knows something?”
Very slowly, a smile was spreading across Joanes’s face.
“What is it?” asked the professor, clearly offended.
“You’re lying to me.”
“Excuse me?”
“None of this is true. This story about your son in Egypt, with the explosions and all the rest, it’s not true.”
The professor turned red.
“You’re doing it again,” Joanes continued. “You’re lying to me. I don’t know why, but you are. Who knows why you want my phone. You’re a liar, a manipulator. You always have been. For as long as I’ve known you. A manipulator,” he repeated.
“How dare you!”
Joanes shook his head, still smiling.
“I should never have given you the time of day. Not now, not then.”
And with that, he walked off.
“Come back here! Don’t be a fool!”
“Do not call me a fool!” answered Joanes, who turned, grabbed the professor by his shirtfront, and began to shake him.
The Mexican guests in the hallway started shouting, and two of them ran over to pull the men apart. The hotel owner followed as fast as his lame leg would carry him.
“Enough already! I want you out of my house, now! Both of you!”
“I’m not going anywhere,” replied the professor. “My wife isn’t well.”
Three of the hotel owner’s relatives stepped forward. One of them was well over six feet tall. He wore a sleeveless shirt, and you could see his muscly, heavily tattooed arms and shoulders plainly. He was holding a beer can in his hand, flexing his arm to show off his biceps.
“What’s the problem, man? Didn’t you hear my uncle?”
The hotel owner held up his arm, calling for calm.
“You have to go,” he insisted.
“But, my wife. .” began the professor, clearly worried.
“What’s wrong, old man?” Joanes cut in. “You scared? It’s just a little storm.”
The professor’s cheeks went red again.
“If you’re considering staying,” continued Joanes, “remember you don’t have any money to pay for the room. You spent it all trying to get ahold of your son. The one who had an accident.”
The hotel owner accompanied Joanes to the storeroom, where he handed him a kerosene lamp, a box of matches, three blankets that had been darned and re-darned innumerable times and gave off a thick stench of damp, three bottles of water, and something to eat.
“That’ll keep you going till tomorrow morning.”
Joanes felt the weight of the lamp.
“It’s half empty.”
The hotel owner scratched his lame leg and shrugged his shoulders.
“That’s all there is.”
“Right, that’s all there is,” said Joanes, who gave the owner a few pesos in exchange for the bundle of things.
“And the money for the room.”
“Don’t even think about it.”
The hotel owner held his gaze but in the end let it go.
The lobby was heaving. Most of the guests had congregated there to witness their departure. The professor turned up, pushing his wife in her wheelchair. Far from seeming shocked or worried, she was smiling a kind of resigned smile. When she reached Joanes’s side, she told him, “I knew it would come to this.”
One of the Mexican women offered her a waterproof poncho. The professor’s wife looked at her suspiciously but then took it, muttering a few words of thanks.
“You’re going to need this,” the hotel owner told Joanes, handing him a flashlight. “You should head out first. Bring the car around so it’ll be easier for them to. . you know.”
He pointed to the wheelchair.
Joanes nodded and put his rain jacket over his head and shoulders. The hotel owner went and stood by the door. When Joanes gave him the sign, the hotel owner unbolted the door and opened it. The wind and slashing rain flew straight into the lobby, driving back the crowd. Within seconds, the floor was plastered with water, leaves, and branches.
“Go!” bellowed the hotel owner.
Joanes hesitated, taken aback by the howling of the storm. Then, clutching his backpack to his body, he dipped his head and launched himself into the darkness.
The hotel owner needed the help of one of his relatives to close the door. Then all eyes turned on the professor, who stared back at them without the slightest hint of emotion.
He made for the car as fast as he could. The front lawn had turned into a quagmire. The beam of the flashlight barely penetrated the darkness.
Once inside the car, he sat motionless behind the wheel, catching his breath. It was as if invisible hands were hurling buckets of water at the windshield. He said to himself that this wasn’t exactly a hurricane. Just a storm. And it would weaken in strength as it traveled north.