their vans, even out of town, into the surrounding country. Th e games were constellations, a conjunction of values telling their secrets to each other at a distance, each addictive game at its point in the black sky of the gambler’s night; so they couldn’t help but carry their addictions with them everywhere. It was a way of life with them: circulating at full speed, in an almost exultant simultaneity of numbers and figures.
Ramón Siffoni’s quarrel with Chiquito had grown over time, as quarrels do in small towns. It had begun at some moment or other, and almost immediately had encompassed the whole of one of those private universes . . . Ramón believed, not without naïveté, that it would be possible to keep the quarrel in a stable state until he decided . . . what? Impossible to say. Until he decided to look his delusion in the face; a delusion is, by definition, that which always turns its back.
And now, vehicle-less, walking in a place with no roads and no way to find them, he discovered that the moment had arrived. All moments arrive, and this one too. Chiquito had taken control of everything . . . of what? Of his wife? He would never have gambled Delia away at cards, he wasn’t a monster, and he had other things to wager first, many other things, almost an infinite number of things . . . But there was a moment, that moment, when it arrived . . . in which Ramón realized the bet might have been placed anyway, without him knowing it; that had happened to him before. He’d predicted this would happen . . . but now he didn’t know if it had happened or not.
He walked all morning, at random, trying to keep in a straight line so he could cover more terrain, and above all so he wouldn’t end up back at the hotel he’d fled. And although there’s nothing in the desert, he found some surprising things. Th e first was the remains of a black Chrysler, smashed up and lying there. He stopped and looked it over for a while. Th ere were no bodies inside, and it didn’t look like anyone had died in the accident; he saw no blood, at least, and the whole front seat had stayed more or less intact, basketed. It was a taxi: it had a meter . . . And the license plate was from Pringles. In fact, it bore an uncanny resemblance to the car that belonged to his friend Zaralegui, the taxi driver. Ramón understood a fair amount about mechanics, it was one of the many skills a life of idleness had taught him; but getting this wreck running again was out of the question, its body had been twisted so badly there was no longer any front or back. He calculated that the crash had happened at a formidable speed, there was no other way to explain how smashed up it was. Th e fact that such an old car had reached such a speed was a credit to the engine, an old one so perfect and solid that it had been left mostly intact; if anyone had been interested, it would have been the only recoverable thing in the wreck.
He mentally took its coordinates; he didn’t know why (he couldn’t even take shelter there if it rained, since the roof was now below the blown-out tires). But at least it was a thing, a discovery, something he could return to. He went on.
Th e second find was half-buried. It looked like a round-topped wardrobe, but on closer examination he saw that it was the magnificent shell of a gigantic Paleozoic armadillo. What stuck out was barely a fraction of it, but he discovered that the earth trapping it was fragile, crystallized, and would shatter and disperse at a breath. He dug with a loose rib, out of pure curiosity, until the whole shell lay exposed; it was twenty-four feet long, fifteen wide, and nine high at the middle. In life this had been an armadillo the size, more or less, of a baby whale. Th e shell was perfect, unbroken, a color you might call brown mother-of-pearl, worked over to the last quarter-inch with knots, borders, Islamic flourishes . . . When it was struck it made a dry little noise, like wood. It wasn’t
Ramón Siffoni’s quarrel with Chiquito had grown over time, as quarrels do in small towns. It had begun at some moment or other, and almost immediately had encompassed the whole of one of those private universes . . . Ramón believed, not without naïveté, that it would be possible to keep the quarrel in a stable state until he decided . . . what? Impossible to say. Until he decided to look his delusion in the face; a delusion is, by definition, that which always turns its back.
And now, vehicle-less, walking in a place with no roads and no way to find them, he discovered that the moment had arrived. All moments arrive, and this one too. Chiquito had taken control of everything . . . of what? Of his wife? He would never have gambled Delia away at cards, he wasn’t a monster, and he had other things to wager first, many other things, almost an infinite number of things . . . But there was a moment, that moment, when it arrived . . . in which Ramón realized the bet might have been placed anyway, without him knowing it; that had happened to him before. He’d predicted this would happen . . . but now he didn’t know if it had happened or not.
He walked all morning, at random, trying to keep in a straight line so he could cover more terrain, and above all so he wouldn’t end up back at the hotel he’d fled. And although there’s nothing in the desert, he found some surprising things. Th e first was the remains of a black Chrysler, smashed up and lying there. He stopped and looked it over for a while. Th ere were no bodies inside, and it didn’t look like anyone had died in the accident; he saw no blood, at least, and the whole front seat had stayed more or less intact, basketed. It was a taxi: it had a meter . . . And the license plate was from Pringles. In fact, it bore an uncanny resemblance to the car that belonged to his friend Zaralegui, the taxi driver. Ramón understood a fair amount about mechanics, it was one of the many skills a life of idleness had taught him; but getting this wreck running again was out of the question, its body had been twisted so badly there was no longer any front or back. He calculated that the crash had happened at a formidable speed, there was no other way to explain how smashed up it was. Th e fact that such an old car had reached such a speed was a credit to the engine, an old one so perfect and solid that it had been left mostly intact; if anyone had been interested, it would have been the only recoverable thing in the wreck.
He mentally took its coordinates; he didn’t know why (he couldn’t even take shelter there if it rained, since the roof was now below the blown-out tires). But at least it was a thing, a discovery, something he could return to. He went on.
Th e second find was half-buried. It looked like a round-topped wardrobe, but on closer examination he saw that it was the magnificent shell of a gigantic Paleozoic armadillo. What stuck out was barely a fraction of it, but he discovered that the earth trapping it was fragile, crystallized, and would shatter and disperse at a breath. He dug with a loose rib, out of pure curiosity, until the whole shell lay exposed; it was twenty-four feet long, fifteen wide, and nine high at the middle. In life this had been an armadillo the size, more or less, of a baby whale. Th e shell was perfect, unbroken, a color you might call brown mother-of-pearl, worked over to the last quarter-inch with knots, borders, Islamic flourishes . . . When it was struck it made a dry little noise, like wood. It wasn’t
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