Eccentric Neighborhood (15 page)

At other times Tío Alejandro stole her notebooks and scribbled dirty words across her homework. Or he would enter her room without permission and steal her crayons and drawing books. Clarissa would run after him wielding a fork, screaming her head off and telling him to leave her alone. Tío Alejandro would twist her arm until he made her drop the fork. Clarissa would tremble with rage and squirm away, perspiration running down her face. They’d roll on the ground, clawing at each other like a pair of tiger cubs. Miña was the only one who could separate them and make them stop fighting.

Abuelo Alvaro always sided with Clarissa and scolded Tío Alejandro roundly. But Abuela Valeria insisted they were both to blame: “You need two to fight,” she told Alvaro angrily. “One can’t fight with oneself, so don’t start accusing Alejandro of everything.” And to Clarissa she’d say: “Your brother really loves you, Clarissa; he’s simply trying to get your attention because he’s bored and wants to play with you. If you were kinder and gentler, you wouldn’t pay any mind to his pranks but would go along with him.” Clarissa had to bow her head and do Valeria’s bidding.

At the Sacred Heart in Guayamés, where Clarissa was going to school at the time, she was taught that God was always just. But the nuns were wrong, because God had made women weaker than men. “Someday, I swear, I’ll kill you,” she yelled at her brother once, “even if I have to go to hell!” Tío Alejandro laughed and, running to hide behind Abuela Valeria’s skirts, accused Clarissa of trying to get back at him for every little thing.

A
BUELA VALERIA WANTED ALL
her daughters to go to the university, something few young women were allowed to do at the time. This is something that always made me proud of being half a Rivas de Santillana. There weren’t many families like Mother’s in Puerto Rico at the time.

When my aunts were teenagers, Abuela gave them long talks about the importance of women getting an education. “You’ll feel much better once you have a college degree,” she told them. “You’ll enjoy life more and acquire prestige in men’s eyes. An education will make it easier for you to find a good husband and you’ll be better mothers to your children.” Her daughters all cheered when they heard this and kissed and embraced Valeria, because traveling to the capital meant they would attend all the social events there. They would make new friends and be able to take advantage of the cultural activities that Guayamés lacked—concerts, the ballet, the theater—and that they had enjoyed when they traveled to Europe with their mother.

Tía Siglinda was the only one of the Rivas de Santillana girls who didn’t study at the University of Puerto Rico, because she always wanted to be a housewife. She dreamed of a white cottage with red roses blooming over her door, where she’d wait every afternoon for her husband to come home from work. Her hobby was sewing tablecloths, sheets, and shawls, and she sat for hours on the terrace of Emajaguas embroidering lilies, roses, and violets, as if a garden were constantly growing from her lap. She was convinced that her threads had magic powers and that once she gave someone a garment she had sewn, the person would never be able to forget her.

Tía Siglinda was Mother’s closest sister; they had been born only one year apart and they were always together. They shared the same room, ate next to each other at the table in the pantry, and always took their baths together. Siglinda had inherited Abuelo Alvaro’s happy disposition—she was always laughing and making jokes, while Clarissa brooded about every little thing. They were like two sides of the same coin, the optimist and the pessimist, the exuberant and the controlled, but they always gave each other support.

When Abuelo Alvaro and Abuela Valeria argued with each other and ashtrays and vases flew like missiles out the windows, the younger children would all run and hide under the bed, until Mother and Tía Siglinda stepped courageously between their parents. “Don’t you love Mom, Dad?” Siglinda would ask Abuelo, laughing. “Don’t you love Dad, Mom?” Clarissa would ask Abuela, sternly shaking a finger at her. And immediately their parents would stop insulting each other and begin to embrace, apologizing for the fright they had given their children and promising they would never fight again.

The first time Tía Siglinda heard Venancio Marini speak was in 1919, at her high school graduation. Siglinda was in the first row of the auditorium when Venancio, a Guayamés lawyer, began to deliver the commencement address. Venancio’s family was of Italian peasant origins and had originally been very poor. His father, Javier Marini, had emigrated to the island thirty years before from Gaeta, a town in central Italy.

Tío Venancio was a brilliant lawyer, I heard Mother say many times. He had graduated from law school at the University of Puerto Rico at nineteen. At twenty-two he was elected to the House of Representatives. By the time he was in his late twenties, he had made a reputation for himself working for American corporations that owned large sugar mills on the island.

The Partido Republicano Incondicional was in power at the time and Tío Venancio became one of its members. It proposed statehood as the solution for the island’s economic ills and it sympathized with American interests. Thanks to his valuable connections, Venancio was elected mayor of Guayamés. That same year he was invited to give the commencement address at the public high school.

He was a wonderful orator. He was known in Guayamés as Pico de Oro, the Golden Beak, who never read from notes but “spoke from the heart,” as the local newspapers put it. Siglinda looked up at him as he stood on the palm-decorated platform and was immediately smitten by his good looks. He had an imposing physique: he was six feet tall and his arms were as thick as a wrestler’s from lifting weights every day. He was wearing a brand-new linen suit, two-tone shoes with the tips so polished he could see his face mirrored in them, and a diamond as big as a chickpea on his little finger. Tío Venancio modulated his voice so it felt like a cool wave of foam breaking over one’s head. He was the kind of orator who compelled his audience to believe in everything he said, even if it didn’t make much sense when his listeners went back home and sat in their own living rooms, beyond the magnetic power of his voice.

The night of Siglinda’s graduation ceremony, Venancio noticed her unwavering gaze on him. She was a little overweight, but this only made her more appealing. He didn’t like slender women; he was a man of substance and liked to embrace what he owned. Once the ceremony was over, he approached Siglinda during the party in the school’s gymnasium and offered her a glass of punch. As she held it in her hand, he discreetly took a silver flask from his pocket and poured her a shot of rum. Prohibition was in full force, and if anyone had seen him, he would have been put in jail. But Siglinda was delighted, and she immediately drank up.

Abuelo Alvaro and Abuela Valeria didn’t attend the graduation ceremonies, and Miña was busy talking to her friends in the school’s kitchen, so Siglinda danced all night with Venancio. Before she said good-bye she invited him to visit her at Emajaguas. Venancio gladly accepted. Siglinda was enchanted. They had been dancing a rumba and it was very hot; when it was over she took out her fan and vigorously cooled herself.

“I love fans,” she told Venancio. “I made this one myself, with sandalwood and a little bit of lace.” Venancio looked at it closely. It was delicately embroidered, with a painted swan swimming peacefully on a lake.

“Do you know what Josephine de Beauharnais asked Napoleon Bonaparte when she met him at a ball in Paris?” Venancio asked Siglinda. Siglinda shook her head; she had a faint idea who Napoleon Bonaparte was but had never heard of Josephine de Beauharnais.

“‘What is the most effective weapon you’ve encountered in your military career, Monsieur?’ Josephine asked. ‘Your fan, madame,’ Napoleon said.” Siglinda giggled and Venancio kissed her hand. Then Siglinda said she had to go to the girls’ room to take a pee, gave Venancio her fan for safekeeping, and disappeared from sight.

Venancio waited for Tía Siglinda for an hour but she never came back. He told his chauffeur to bring his De Soto around and drove home feeling very depressed. He couldn’t sleep all night. He was torn between accepting her invitation to visit her at Emajaguas and his fear of repercussions. Siglinda was very young; he didn’t want to do anything that would harm his reputation as a promising politician. He decided he wouldn’t go. He put Siglinda’s fan under his pillow and fell into a troubled sleep.

The next afternoon he had to drive by Emajaguas on his way to make a speech to the Girl Scouts Association in the next town. As he drove past the heavy wooden gate, he couldn’t resist temptation and told the driver to stop because he wanted to return Miss Siglinda’s fan.

It was raining as it can rain only in Guayamés; water was pouring down the roof of the house like a cataract. Venancio’s chauffeur held a huge black umbrella over Venancio’s head as he got out of the car. Venancio picked up the bouquet of red roses wrapped in green wax paper he had brought along for the head of the Girl Scouts Association, walked up the wide granite stairs to the house, and rang the bell. Miña answered and, when she saw the mayor, opened the door. “Is Miss Siglinda in?” he asked. “Please tell her Don Venancio Marini has come to call.” And then he entered and folded his dripping umbrella in the hall.

With Taíno discretion, Miña tiptoed to Siglinda’s room and knocked lightly on her door. “There’s someone very important to see you in the living room,” she whispered. Then she went back to the hall where Venancio was waiting, opened the frosted-glass doors to the living room, and politely ushered him in. She told him Siglinda would be right there.

Venancio sat down cautiously in a rocking chair. He was still holding the roses when Miña came in with a vase and put them in it. Venancio didn’t dare get up from the rocking chair—he didn’t want to break anything. He was a big man, and the living room was crowded with potted palms, delicately carved love seats, and half a dozen little marble-topped tables on which sat Abuela Valeria’s biscuit porcelain baby dolls, all dressed in smocks and caps she had embroidered herself. Abuelo Alvaro walked into the living room by chance.

“Who let you in here?” Abuelo said coldly, without putting out his hand. Venancio got up from his chair. “Your maid, sir. I was just driving by and I thought I’d drop in to return your daughter’s fan. She left it behind at the high school graduation party last night.” Abuelo Alvaro stared at him. “Seventeen-year-old girls don’t get visits from politicians, at least not
my
daughters,” Abuelo Alvaro said. Venancio was an inch taller than Abuelo; both men were equally robust and they puffed out their chests like roosters, measuring themselves against each other. Siglinda entered the living room at that moment and drew near to introduce Venancio to her father, but Venancio cut her short.

“I’m Venancio Marini, sir, the mayor of Guayamés,” Venancio said.

“I know that,” Abuelo answered, “and I also know that it’s raining outside.” And he took the roses out of the vase and shoved them back into Venancio’s arms, dripping water all over the mayor’s suit. “I think you’d better leave,” he said.

Venancio pretended he wasn’t offended. He took the roses and placed them calmly over his right arm, pulled out his handkerchief from his pocket, and wiped the water from the front of his vest. Siglinda accompanied him to the door in tears. “Don’t you worry, my little swan,” Venancio told her, offering her a single rose. “One day you’ll be my Siglinda and rid yourself of the moth-eaten Rivas de Santillana name.” And head held high, he walked out into the downpour, leaving his umbrella behind.

Tía Siglinda was heartbroken; that night she woke Clarissa up with her sobs. Lifting the mosquito netting around her sister’s bed, Siglinda slipped under the sheets with her. “What should I do?” she asked. “Venancio wants me to elope with him, but I don’t want to upset Father.”

“Do you love Venancio?” Mother asked. “Yes,” Tía Siglinda answered, “and he loves me. But he scares me a little too. When I listen to him, I feel compelled to do what he wants. I can’t control myself.” Clarissa liked Venancio. He was a good mayor. He always had new projects: the dam at Río Corrientes, which had doubled Guayamés’s electric power; the orphanage on Calle Méndez Vigo; the quay at the end of the main street, which permitted all the merchandise that arrived by ship to be unloaded and carted easily to the warehouses in the center of town. “Don’t worry about it now,” Clarissa told her. “Love has a funny way of solving life’s problems.” And she took Tía Siglinda in her arms and stroked her sister’s hair until Siglinda fell asleep.

A week passed, during which Siglinda could think of nothing but Venancio. She dreamed about him every night and woke with the sheets wet with perspiration. Miña had secretly delivered several notes informing her that Venancio would be waiting for her every night outside Emajaguas’s walls. The following week Tía Siglinda finally made up her mind. She got out of bed at three in the morning, went to the pantry for a loaf of bread, opened the back door of the house, and escaped down the backstairs. She ran out into the garden in her nightgown, threw the geese some bread as she hurried by their shed, so they wouldn’t cackle at the commotion, climbed up a mango tree that grew next to the ten-foot-high fence, jumped down on the other side, and got into Venancio’s blue De Soto, which was waiting for her at the curb. By the time it pulled away, Venancio had drawn the gray velvet curtain over the partition behind the front seat and Siglinda lay naked in his powerful arms.

When Abuelo Alvaro discovered the next morning that Siglinda was gone he was furious. He notified the police that his daughter, a minor, was missing. A patrol was sent out to find the couple, but Abuela Valeria bristled when she heard about it.

“Do you think that’s wise, Alvaro?” she said, giving him one of her Boffil stares. “Venancio Marini is mayor of Guayamés. He’s a very powerful man.” Abuelo stared back at her with bloodshot eyes. “All politicians are corrupt. And this one’s as vain as a peacock. How can you even consider letting him take Siglinda away from us? She’s only seventeen,” he said.