ranchera as a polka or a danzón. I ordered two sodas, and when I got back to our table Cesárea wasn't there anymore. Where have you got to? I wondered. And then I saw her. Where do you think she was? That's right, on the dance floor, dancing alone, something I'm sure is normal in this day and age, nothing out of the ordinary, times change, but back then it was the next best thing to an open provocation. So there I was with a serious dilemma on my hands, boys, I said to them. And they said: what did you do, Amadeo? And I said, ay, boys, what would you have done in my place? I got out on the dance floor and started to dance. And did you learn to dance on the spot, Amadeo? they said. Well, the truth is, I did, it was as if the music had been waiting for me all my life, waiting twenty-six years, like Penelope waiting for Ulysses, yes? and suddenly all the obstacles and all my qualms were a thing of the past and I was moving and smiling and watching Cesárea, what a pretty woman, and the way she danced! you could tell it was something she did all the time, if you closed your eyes out there on the floor you could imagine her dancing at home, or on her way out of work, or as she made herself her cafecito de olla, or as she read, but I didn't close my eyes, boys, I looked at Cesárea with my eyes wide open and I smiled at her and she was looking at me and smiling too, the two of us as happy as can be, so happy that for a moment I thought of giving her a kiss, but in the end I didn't dare, since things were good between us the way they were, after all, and I never had a one-track mind. It's all in the first step, as they say, and that's how it was for me with dancing, boys, all in the first step, and then I couldn't find a way to put an end to it. There was a time, but this was many years later, after Cesárea had disappeared and the fervor of youth had faded, when all my ambitions in life were centered on my biweekly visits to the dance halls. I'm talking about my thirties, boys, then my forties, and even a good slice of my fifties. At first I went with my wife. She didn't understand why I liked to dance so much, but she went with me. We had a good time. Later, after she died, I went alone. And I had a good time then too, although the flavor or the aftertaste of the places was different, and the music was different. I certainly didn't go there to drink or seek companionship, as my sons believed, Francisco Salvatierra and Carlos Manuel Salvatierra, a professor and a lawyer, two good boys whom I love dearly although I don't see them much, they have their own families now and too many problems, I suppose, but anyway I've already done all I can for them, given them a good education, which is more than my parents did for me, so now they're on their own. What was I saying? That my sons thought I went to the dance halls in search of a friendly face? Ultimately, they may have been right. But to my way of thinking, that wasn't what got me out the door each Saturday night. I went for the dancing and in some sense I went for Cesárea, or rather for Cesárea's ghost, which was still dancing around those places that always seemed to be on their last legs. Do you like to dance, boys? I said. And they said, it depends, Amadeo, it depends who we're dancing with, not alone, that's for sure. Oh, those boys. And then I asked them whether there were still dance halls in Mexico and they said that there were, though not many, or at least they didn't know of many, but that they existed. Some, according to them, were called funk joints, such a strange name, and the music that got them moving was modern music. Gringo music, you mean, I said, and they said: no, Amadeo, modern music made by Mexican musicians, Mexican bands, and then they started to name names, each one stranger than the next. Yes, I remember some of them. Las Vísceras de los Cristeros, that one I remember for obvious reasons. Los Caifanes de Marte, Los Asesinos de Angélica María, Involución Proletaria, strange names that made us laugh and argue. Why Los Asesinos de Angélica María, when Angélica María seems like such a nice girl? I said. And they: Angélica María is extremely nice, Amadeo, it must be an homage, not a threat, and I: isn't Los Caifanes a film starring Anel? And they: Anel and María Félix's son, Amadeo, you're so up to date. And I: I may be old, but I'm no fool. Enriquito Álvarez Félix, yes sir, an upstanding young man. And they: you have a fucking amazing memory, Amadeo, let's toast to that. And I: Involución Proletaria? who are they when they're at home? And they: they're the bastard offspring of Fidel Velásquez, Amadeo, they're new workers hailing back to a preindustrial age. And I: I don't give a rat's ass about Fidel Velásquez, boys, the one who always inspired us was Flores Magón. And they: salud, Amadeo. And I: salud. And they: viva Flores Magón, Amadeo. And I: viva, feeling a sharp pain in my stomach as I thought about the old days and how late it was, that time when night sinks into night, though never all of a sudden, the white-footed Mexico City night, a night that endlessly announces her arrival, I'm coming, I'm coming, but is a long time coming, as if she too, the devil, had stayed behind to watch the sunset, the incomparable sunsets of Mexico, the peacock sunsets, as Cesárea would say when Cesárea lived here and was our friend. And then it was as if I could see Cesárea in General Diego Carvajal's office, sitting at her desk with her shiny typewriter in front of her, talking to the general's bodyguards, who usually spent their off-hours there too, lounging in the armchairs or leaning in the doorways as the general raised his voice in his office, and Cesárea, to keep them busy or because she really needed their help, sent them to run errands or to look for a certain book at Don Julio Nodier's bookstore, some book she needed to consult for an idea or two, or a quote or two, for the general's speeches, which according to Manuel she usually wrote herself. Incredible speeches, boys, I said, speeches that circulated all over Mexico and were printed in the papers all over the country, Monterrey and Guadalajara, Veracruz and Tampico. Sometimes we read them aloud at our meetings at the café. And Cesárea wrote them at the general's office, and in the most peculiar fashion: as she smoked and talked to the general's bodyguards or to Manuel or me, talking and typing the speeches all at once. The talent of that woman, boys. Have you ever tried such a thing? I have, and it's impossible, something only a few natural writers or journalists can do, be talking about politics, for example, and at the same time writing a little article on gardening or spondaic hexameters (which I can tell you, boys, are a rare phenomenon). And that was how she spent her days at the general's office, and when she had finished her work, sometimes quite late at night, she would say goodbye to everyone, gather up her things, and leave on her own, although often someone would offer to accompany her, sometimes the general himself, Diego Carvajal, the big man, the grand pooh-bah, but Cesárea wouldn't hear of it: certainly not, here are the papers from the attorney general's office, General (she called him General, not mi general, as the rest of us did), and here are the ones from the government of Veracruz and here are the Jalapa letters and here is tomorrow's speech, and then she would leave and no one would see her until the next day. Haven't I told you anything about mi general Diego Carvajal, boys? In my day he was the patron of the arts. What a man. You had to have seen him. He was on the short side, and thin, and even then he must already have been close to fifty, but more than once I saw him stand up all alone to some of Congressman Martínez Zamora's gunmen, saw how he looked them straight in the eye, never reaching for the Colt in his underarm holster, though it's true his jacket was unbuttoned, and I saw how the gunmen shriveled under his gaze and then I saw them back away, murmuring excuse me, mi general, the congressman must have made a mistake, mi general. An honest-to-God man if ever there was one, General Diego Carvajal, and a lover of literature and the arts, although as he said himself, he didn't learn to read until he was eighteen years old. The life he led, boys! I said. If I started to tell you about him I could keep going all night and we would need more tequila, it would take a whole carton of Los Suicidas mezcal for me to be able to give you some idea of that black hole in the Mexican firmament. That blazing black hole! Jet-black, they said. Jet-black, that's right, boys, I said, jet-black. And one of them said I'll go right now and buy another bottle of tequila. And I said off you go, and drawing energy from the past I got up and hauled myself (like lightning, or the idea of lightning) along the dark hallways of my apartment to the kitchen, and I opened all the cupboards in search of an unlikely bottle of Los Suicidas, although I knew very well there weren't any left, muttering and cursing, rummaging among the cans of soup that my sons bring me every so often, among the useless junk, finally accepting the bitter truth, up to my ears in ghosts, and I chose some little things to stave off hunger: a few packages of peanuts, a can of chipotle chilies, a package of crackers, and I brought them back at the speed of a World War I cruiser, a cruiser lost in the mists of some river or delta, I don't know, lost, anyway, since the truth is that my steps didn't lead to the living room but to my bedroom. For goodness's sake, Amadeo, I said to myself, you must be drunker than you thought, lost in the fog, with only a little paper lantern hanging from my forward guns, but I didn't panic and I found the way, step by step, tinkling my little bell, ship on the river, warship lost at the mouth of the river of history, and the honest truth is that by then I was walking as if I were doing that heel-toe dance step, whether it's still something anyone does I don't know, I hope not, touching the heel of the left foot to the toe of the right and then the heel of the right foot to the toe of the left, a ridiculous step but one that had its day, don't ask me when, probably while Miguel Alemán was president, I danced it at some point, we've all done foolish things, and then I heard the door slam and then voices and I said to myself Amadeo stop being an ass and make your way toward the voices, part the mists of this river with your rust-eaten prow and return to your friends, and that's what I did, and I made it to the front room, my arms overflowing with snacks, and the boys were in the front room, sitting there waiting for me, and one of them had bought two bottles of tequila. Ah, what a relief to come into the light, even when it's a shadowy half-light, what a relief to come where it's clear.