Zama by Antonio Di Benedetto

Author:Antonio Di Benedetto
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: New York Review Books
Published: 2016-06-13T04:00:00+00:00

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I do not know whether any of this in fact took place, though Luciana told the story at such length, with such emotion, and to such effect that an understanding grew up between us.

Very quickly it was as if we were hand in hand.

We sipped sweet maté unhurriedly, lazily. As the tertulia progressed, she gave me a scolding for putting myself in the hands of ineffectual intermediaries and for resigning myself to a post she considered incommensurate with my abilities. I agreed and told her so, charmed, comforted, contented. “Very well: Let’s see what favors Doctor Don Diego de Zama can expect from a woman.”

“You shall see,” she answered with great resolve and immediately began developing plans that centered on this newly revealed brother who was, she assured me, a gentleman of the court.

This was a dream to cherish warmly. I was furnished with a rich supply of new hopes.

My consent given, she promised to dispatch a missive by the first mail.

Much later, she leaned briefly into the gallery to glance up at the sky. I thought she was checking on the elements. Would there be a storm to delay the arrival of a boat or calm weather to favor it?

But she had a different reason. “You must go, and quickly,” she urged. “Honorio will be home for dinner soon. It’s late.”

I felt the blood rush through my body.

“Your husband is in the city?” I asked in dismay, reproaching her without giving her time to answer so obvious a question. “You didn’t warn me.”

“But then . . . you thought he was at the hacienda?”

It was Luciana’s turn to be startled by my ignorance and to laugh unconcernedly and with such good-hearted ingenuousness that I was soothed.

Had she become more of a girl-child, more innocent? Had she set aside her wiles?

She even asked, “How could you believe he was at the hacienda when I didn’t say so in my note?”

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