They kissed, but curiously there was nothing lewd about the touching of their lips. He felt merely that he was holding something rare and precious between his hands.
Steadily the rain fell, all through the night, and the next two daysthere was also intermittent rain. But by Thursday the deluge ceased, the sky was of a startling and pure blue, and both the car and the body were pulled up.
The car was crumpled like an accordion, they said. It would be a closed casket funeral.
They buried Cándido that same Thursday, with haste, and the next day was the first night of the novenario. Lulú spent most of the evening weeping instead of praying, while the Zorrilla sisters tried to comfort her with talk of heaven and the mercy of God. Perla and Sarita Novo passed out tamales. Father Anselmo complained that they were dry and the atole was too thin.
Ulises stood in the living room, contemplating a portrait of Cándido, which had been decorated with a huge black bow atop it, and smoked cigarettes. He saw Inés and Bartolo talking, noticed how he stood close to her and how she leaned in closer, smiling. It was a dazzling smile, warm and full of possibilities.
The sight of them together soured the atole in his mouth. Why should she pay so much attention to that boy?
He followed them when they walked out of the room and watched from a window as they spoke in the courtyard. More smiling, more of that coy look, that leaning in. Eventually, Bartolo excused himself and went back inside, leaving Inés alone. Ulises quickly walked toward her.
She stood in front of a wall that had been painted a rich yellow ocher, which had peeled off in several patches, showing traces of older blue and green paint. She was looking up at a niche that held a statue of the Virgin of Guadalupe. When she heard his footsteps upon the tiled floor, she turned around and seemed surprised to see him.
“Expecting your friend?” he asked.
“Bartolo went to get us a couple of drinks. What do you want?”
“You seemed fairly cozy.”
“He doesn’t think Cándido’s death was an accident.”
“Don’t tell me he suspects foul play.”
She ran both hands through her hair, pulling it back, her eyes darting nervously above Ulises’s shoulder. “We better talk somewhere else. He might return and see us together.”
She pulled him by the arm; they went down a narrow path that ran parallel to the house and connected the courtyard they’d been standing in with a rectangular patio. Here there were stone sinks for the washing and clotheslines for the drying of laundry.
“Does he suspect foul play?” he asked again, his voice low.
“He’s not sure what he thinks, just that it doesn’t add up. If Cándido had taken a curve too quickly, if the vehicle had skidded, the car wouldn’t have plunged into the ravine the way it did. And there was no reason for him to be there at night.”
“Why is he telling you all this?”
She looked over her shoulder quickly, then back at him. “I asked him about the inquest. I suppose he’s trying to impress me with his detective work.”
“That nosy goddamn son of a bitch.”
His hands were shaking; he jammed them in his pockets to somewhat conceal his nerves. Still, she raised an amused eyebrow at him. “Are you frightened?”
“Yes, and you’re frightened too. Don’t try to pretend you’re not, you keep looking over your shoulder.”
“All right, I’m nervous,” she conceded. “But it won’t do us any good if we’re jumpy and start acting stupid. Beto is so lazy he wouldn’t be bothered to type a report, never mind conduct an actual investigation, and Bartolo doesn’t know the first thing about police work. The reason he was hired is because Beto is his godfather and his family wanted him to have a proper job.”
“There’s still that private investigator from Mexico City who came looking for me. Suppose Bartolo got in touch with him?”
“Why would he? He’d never connect Cándido’s death with that man.”
“I guess you’re right.”
She ran a hand down the front of her dress. “He’s probably looking for me. I have to go back and—”
“Flirt with him some more?” he asked. The words escaped his mouth before he could consider them, their acidity surprising him, and yet the way she’d smiled and stood close to the guy had been shocking. He’d never seen her act like that with Bartolo, and to now witness such a display stung. It was playacting, he understood that, just as his letters to lonesome women, his marriage to Perla, were merely games, but it rankled him.
She looked up at him sharply. “I’m not flirting. It’s useful if we know what he’s thinking, and this way he’s distracted, right? That’s better than having him pulling at every thread and seeing where it leads. You can’t be so stupid you don’t understand that.”
“I’m not stupid at all, which is why I know you’re flirting, and yes, I’m sure the erection he’s getting every time you brush against him is distracting. But don’t try to tell me blue is red and black is yellow.”
