“Did you use the name Ulises Linares with that widow?”
“No. Something else. There was a photograph of mine, a gift I gave her when I was courting her, but I destroyed that before I left town.”
How had they found him? He hadn’t been able to recover a couple of letters that tied him to Iztapalapa, and with that address he could have been tracked to the place where he’d lodged, but that would have required a dedicated detective. Perhaps they’d found one. From there he supposed the detective could have bribed the owner of the guesthouse for information. Not that he’d told Pánfilo where he was headed, but Pánfilo was always snooping on everyone; the old man had likely noted the postmarks on his letters. He might not remember the exact address on the envelopes, but he must have remembered the name of the town.
That old bastard. And after Ulises had actually paid him the rent he owed him! Well, almost all of it. A decent amount, in any case. He should have run out of the guesthouse without handing him one sorry peso.
“If he comes here there will be trouble,” Inés said. “He could arrest you. Maybe you could stay away for a couple of days.”
“That would seem suspicious. No, I’ll meet him. When he comes, make sure he talks to me, no one else. Don’t let him talk to any of the servants. Try to be near the door. If we’re lucky you can invite him inside and fetch me fast, before anyone knows we have a visitor.”
“And if he should come later, when my aunt is here?”
“Same thing. But I hope he comes soon.”
She nodded. He turned back to the mirror and looked at himself. He parted his hair down the middle rather than his usual side parting and shaved his mustache. Perla might remark on the mustache, but he could tell her he’d grown bored of it. He had a pair of glasses that had belonged to his father, a memento that he kept by the mirror, along with a tin can with black shoe polish and a rag.
He quickly went through his shirts and trousers and discarded them all, finally picking a sleeveless white undershirt that clung tightly to his body and a pair of rumpled trousers.
Ulises applied shoe polish to the sides of his head, blackening his gray hairs. Without the mustache, with his hair blackened, he looked younger, and the clothes gave him a disheveled air. He added the glasses as the final touch.
She returned a few minutes later. “He did come. He’s in the sitting room.”
Inés looked at him with interest, likely noticing his glasses and the hair. They hurried down the stairs, but then he paused before entering and strolled into the sitting room as if nothing was amiss. The man waiting for him resembled a bulldog. He was wide of shoulder, short, with a great big jowl and a bald head.
“Good day,” Ulises said. “I’m told you need to speak to me? If it’s about selling us an encyclopedia, I’m afraid we’re not in the market for it.”
“It’s not about an encyclopedia,” the man said. “My name is Jaime Contreras, and I’m a private investigator.”
“Like in the movies?” he asked, adding a touch of naïveté and foolishness to his voice. If this was a fairy tale, he would play the role of the court jester.
“Not quite.”
“I’m not sure what a private investigator would want in my house.”
“I’ve been hired to find a man, and I have reason to think he might be hiding in this town.”
“What does that have to do with me?”
“Maybe nothing, maybe something. I’d like to ask you a few questions.”
“I suppose that would be fine,” Ulises said, and turned to Inés, who was hovering by the door. “Won’t you get me a coffee? Detective Contreras, would you like a cup of coffee?”
“I would not. Thank you,” the man said, his face serious, even sour.
Inés stepped out. They sat down and the detective opened a notebook without taking his eyes off Ulises. Ulises imagined he was remembering the description he’d been given of the swindler he was after and comparing it to the man in front of him.
“You said you had a few questions for me?”
“I’m told you moved here recently from Mexico City, Mr. Linares.”
He pretended he hadn’t heard the detective and asked him to repeat the question. “I did,” he said. “Fine place it is! I always wanted to live in a mountain town. All this fresh air, and none of the traffic of the big city.”
“Have you ever been to Jalisco?”
“Once when I was a child.”
“Not recently?”
