Death in the Andes by Mario Vargas Llosa Page A

the country, somehow.
    â€œI thought about everything and nothing, Corporal.” His adjutant’s voice trembled. “I felt like smoking but didn’t get up, so I wouldn’t wake her. It was so strange to be lying next to her. So strange to think, ‘If I stretch out my hand, I can touch her.’”
    â€œGet on with it,” Lituma grumbled. “You have me on pins and needles, Tomasito.”
    â€œDid you do it because you liked me?” Mercedes asked suddenly. “When you picked me up at the Tingo María airport, with the fat man? Did you notice me then?”
    â€œI saw you before that,” Carreño whispered, feeling as if talking made his mouth hurt. “Last month, when you went to Pucallpa to spend the night with Hog.”
    â€œYou were his bodyguard in Pucallpa? That’s why I thought your face looked familiar when I saw you in Tingo María.”
    â€œIn fact, she didn’t remember that I had picked her up on the first trip, too,” said the adjutant. “That I was the one standing guard all night in Pucallpa, in that house between the river and the woods. Listening to him beat her. Listening to her beg.”
    â€œIf this doesn’t end with some fucking, I’m going to beat you,” Lituma warned.
    â€œSure, that’s why your face looked familiar, that’s it,” she went on. “So it wasn’t disgust and it wasn’t religion that made you go crazy. You’d already noticed me. It was because you liked me. You were jealous. Is that why you shot him, Carreñito?”
    â€œI was blushing so hard my face burned, Corporal. ‘If she goes on talking like this, I’ll slap her mouth shut,’ I thought.”
    â€œYou fell in love with me,” Mercedes declared, half annoyed, half pitying. “Now I get it. When men fall in love, they’ll do anything. Women are colder.”
    â€œYou think you’re so much because you’ve been around, because you’re experienced,” the boy finally responded. “I don’t like it when you treat me like I was still in short pants.”
    â€œThat’s exactly what you are, Carreñito. A kid in short pants.” She laughed and then became serious. She continued talking, pronouncing her words carefully. “But if you liked me, if you fell in love with me, why haven’t you told me? Now that I’m with you, I mean.”
    â€œShe was absolutely right,” exclaimed Lituma. “Why didn’t you do anything? What were you waiting for, Tomasito?”
    The sound of frantic barking on the street made her stop talking. They heard “Shut up, you shits” and a stone hitting something. The dogs calmed down. The boy, his entire body covered in perspiration, saw her stand up and walk around the bed. Seconds later, Mercedes’s hand was buried in his hair. She began to play with it, very gently.
    â€œWhat are you saying?” Lituma’s voice choked.
    â€œWhy didn’t you go straight to my bed when you came back from the bathroom, Carreñito? Wasn’t that what you wanted?” Mercedes’s hand moved down from his hair to his face, stroked his cheeks, and came to rest on his chest. “It’s beating so hard! Boom boom boom. You’re so strange. Were you embarrassed? Do you have a problem with women?”
    â€œWh-wh-what?” Lituma repeated, sitting up in the darkness, peering at Tomasito.
    â€œI’d never take advantage of you, I’d never hit you,” the boy stammered, seizing Mercedes’s hand, kissing it. “Besides…”
    â€œYou’re lying,” Lituma repeated, incredulous. “It can’t be, it can’t be.”
    â€œI’ve never been with a woman,” the boy confessed at last. “You can laugh if you want.”
    Mercedes didn’t laugh. Carreño felt her sit up and lift the spread, and he moved over to make a place for her. When he