The Argentina Rhodochrosite (6 page)

10

Ainsley was swabbing her crusty piece
of baguette around the plate, soaking up the herby green
chimichurri
sauce, when the meat arrived.

The process required two people: One waiter to clear space in the center of their table, and the other waiter to carry and hoist the
brasero
.

As the grill landed before her, Ainsley’s jaw nearly hit the tablecloth. There were fourteen different meats on the grill, both sausages and cuts of steak. The waiter turned each one over, as a courtesy, before wishing them a good meal.

This was the
parrilla
.

Ainsley had only been in Argentina for less than six hours, and already she was about to gorge herself on more cow meat than she’d usually eat in a year.

Horacio had guided her to this place, La Cumparasita, an out-of-the-way restaurant in a nearby barrio, that he claimed was the best place for steak in the entire city of ten million. Ainsley was inclined to believe him. Plus she was hungry, and had absolutely nowhere else to be for several hours.

It was a simple place, with wooden tables and wooden chairs. A television hung in the corner, playing a talk show. A table of several businessmen were eating nearby. The place felt rough, manly, solid.

She and Horacio were the only exceptions. He was looking at her. “How did you get so skinny?”

“My husband left me,” she said. “What about you?”

“I never really eat anything,” Horacio replied. “I only taste. Let me give you a quick tour of the blessings.” He poked at a sausage. “This is
longaniza
. It’s a good one to start with. Or this one, the
biraldo
.” Ainsley sampled both; they were delicious.

Then her dining partner poked at a third sausage, a plump purple tube. “This is the
morcilla
. A special taste. Not for me. Do you want some?”

Ainsley nodded. She was game for almost anything. Horacio moved it to a separate small plate and handed it to her. As she cut into the sausage, a heavy reddish-purple liquid spurted out and pooled on one side of the plate. It started to congeal.

She suddenly recognized it. “Is this blood sausage?” she said.

“You don’t like it?”

Ainsley scooped some of the liquid into her mouth. The tang of iron hit her tongue. She made a face and pushed the plate away. “Ugh. I’m with you.”

“Who isn’t? Try this one instead.” He lifted a thick brownish-orange coil from the grill, with a beige condiment squirting out of one end. As she wondered what it could be, her imagination gripped her, disgusting images passing through her mind—

—until she realized her imagination was, this time, absolutely correct. That was an
intestine
, a real one, nicely stuffed and grilled, but a poop chute nonetheless.

“No, thank you,” she said.

Horacio was already sampling it. “Every time I come here I have to taste this. It’s amazing.”

As lunch went on, he described how this restaurant raised its own cattle on its own
estancia
in southern provinces. How it was better to think of this place not so much as a restaurant, but instead as a huge ranch that happened to serve a few scraps of its meat in the city.

He explained each of the pieces to her, the
asado de tira
, the
vacio
, the
entraña
. He explained how this
asador
was the best in Buenos Aires because of the heat of his grill, which had been measured at nearly six hundred degrees Farenheit. He described the salt rub that coated the meat. Ainsley learned to appreciate how the charred, crunchy exterior complemented the soft pink interior.

As she sampled cut after cut, Ainsley had a revelation: She could never be a vegetarian. She knew all the moral objections that animal rights groups had postulated. She knew about the environmental effect that cattle grazing had upon the earth. It didn’t matter. There were certain times—not often, but occasionally—when she just needed a huge piece of red meat on her plate. It was as simple as that.

Still, she kept waiting for other food to be brought to the table, some vegetables, mushrooms, pasta. But there was nothing else. Lunch was really that simple: a piece of bread, a glass of wine, and about four pounds of meat.

If only her mission were equally simple. Horacio was on his third glass of wine, so she began shifting the conversation back towards the issue.

“When did you start working for our brother?” Ainsley said.

“When he started getting death threats.”

“Do you like it?”

“Sure. It’s not dangerous, he’s just paranoid. If somebody wanted to kill him, they’d find an easier way. He’s not that hard to find.” The taster put down his knife. “How are you going to write your profile?”

She thought quickly. “You know, why the superstar refuses to play. The people’s outrage.”

“Do you
know
why he won’t play?” Horacio was watching her with sharp eyes.

“No,” she lied. “Maybe you could tell me?”

“I really don’t know myself,” he said casually, yawning. “It might have something to do with his politics.”

Ainsley’s ears pricked up. “What do you mean?”

“Nadia didn’t tell you?”

“No.”

“Ovidio is preparing to run for president.”

“The president of what?”

He looked out the window, into the distance. “The president of Argentina.”

Ainsley lowered her fork. Neither said anything for several seconds. The more she thought about that, somehow, the more upset she felt.

“That’s ludicrous,” she said. “I mean, he’s just an athlete.”

“Schwarzenegger was just a movie star,” said Horacio.

“But Ovidio doesn’t seem fit to lead a country.” Her voice had risen. The table of men nearby turned and looked at her.

“You mean our brother,” Horacio reminded her.

“Our brother,” she said, “couldn’t lead a starving cat to a bowl of food.”

“It doesn’t matter,” said the taster.

“And he’s the
moodiest
man I’ve ever met.”

Horacio lifted his palms. “I agree with you, but none of it matters. The people have always loved him. He knows it.”

Ainsley thought of Nadia, how she hadn’t mentioned any of this. She must not have wanted the
yanqui
to step into those waters.

“But he refuses to play,” Ainsley said. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Every game that he doesn’t play makes the people more angry. They are beginning to turn against him.” Horacio paused, listening. He twisted around in his seat and looked at the television. “They’re joking about it on the program. Go watch.”

Ainsley stood up and walked to the television. A group of three beautiful people, the talk show hosts, were chatting on a couch. A picture of Ovidio had popped up on the screen, underneath which was a survey.
El Mono returns next week/next month/it doesn’t matter, I’ll never vote for that bastard
.

She returned to the table. “He’s shooting himself in the foot.”

Horacio laughed. “That’s a good description. Here we say that he’s letting the turtle get away from him.”

“But why?” she said. “Why is he doing this to himself?”

She was testing Horacio, to see if he knew about the theft of the necklace, but he didn’t take the bait. “Oh, I think he’s just playing hard-to-get. To see how much the people miss him. Or maybe he’s going to time the announcement of his presidency with his return.”

“What an ego,” Ainsley said.

“That’s Argentina,” said Horacio. “Every man here is that way. We all need to be coddled.” He looked pissed at his own countrymen. “Dessert would make me feel better.”

“What do you recommend?”

He looked at Ainsley like she was stupid. “The classic.”

The waiter brought a flan coated with what appeared to be caramel. It was the sweetest thing Ainsley had ever tasted. Horacio watched her. “
Dulce de leche
. Condensed milk and sugar. Browned until it’s thick. Our national pride. We put it on everything.” He shrugged. “Not much to it, really.”

“I have a question.”

“You’re a journalist. If you didn’t, you would be fired.”

“Why did that program call our brother El Mono?”

“Because that’s his nickname.”

“How did he get it?”

“He scored a goal and swung from the bar, screaming. The announcer said he was the best monkey in the league. The name stuck.” Horacio paused. “Don’t say it to him. He gets upset.”

Ainsley imagined how bad “upset” could be. Then she thought back to the photo in Nadia’s office, the one with the bared incisors. That must’ve been the moment.

Horacio regarded Ainsley coolly. “You really didn’t sleep with him?”

“Are you kidding?” she said. “I just met him.”

“But that’s how it usually works.”

“No,” she said, “absolutely not.”

“Hm.” Horacio looked confused. “He usually loves
periodistas
. And they always love him.”

Ainsley shrugged. “I’m not that kind of girl.”

He regarded her so closely that Ainsley began to feel like an insect under a microscope. “I wonder what kind of girl you really are.”

The waiter brought the bill and placed it in front of Horacio. He passed it over to Ainsley. She looked at him with shock.

“What is this?” she said. “You asked me to lunch.”

Horacio smirked. “Don’t journalists always pay? So you can remain ‘objective’? Just put it on your charge account. You must have one.”

She didn’t like his insinuations, or his tone. This lunch had taken a real nosedive. The flamboyant little bastard was putting her through a shit test. And she’d have to play along to keep her cover.

Ainsley pulled her only personal credit card from her purse. She kept the face of it turned away from Horacio. She hopefully had enough open credit to cover the bill.

He toyed with his phone, pretending to text, while they waited for the waiter to return with the receipt. When he did, Ainsley signed quickly, put the card back in her wallet, and zipped up the purse.

Outside the restaurant, she and Horacio separated with barely a goodbye. As Ainsley hailed another taxi, she thought about two things.

One, she didn’t like being used for a free lunch. Two, she didn’t like the sleazy vibe she was getting from some of the people in Ovidio’s camp.

But she couldn’t complain. She was just the temporary hired help.

And she had the feeling that things were going to get even sleazier tonight.

11

Ainsley guessed that there would be
plenty of hotels in the Microcentro, the business district, so she cabbed over to the obelisk, paid the fare, and began walking.

The
porteños
rushed past her, wrapped in dark coats and colorful scarves, their intense gazes focused past their aquiline noses. Many were talking on phones. Several male heads swivelled as she walked by, but there was no
piropo
, no shouted comments, no kissyface, no quick patter of footsteps.

Ainsley suddenly understood Buenos Aires. This was New York City, except in Spanish, and on the other side of the world.

She walked past two hotels without stopping. A third looked slightly more promising, except for the doorman dressed in Regency regalia stationed outside. That wouldn’t do. Ainsley had never felt comfortable with costumed people holding doors for her. Actually, she’d felt fine with them. Her wallet usually didn’t.

Then she noticed a simple door marked with beautiful woodwork. A discreet brass sign embedded in the wall read Gran Hotel Hispano.

A healthy-looking couple stepped out of the doors, love in their eyes. They didn’t look Argentinian, didn’t own that peculiar intensity that had been so apparent to her in just the last few short hours. She guessed that the couple were on their first trip together, stoking the flames of love.

This hotel might do.

She entered the vestibule and trekked up an old-fashioned circular staircase. A creaky cage elevator ran alongside. At the top of the stairs, she stood winded, breathing hard. A male clerk stationed behind a front desk looked up.

“Welcome,” he said. “What do you need?”

“What’s the cost for seven nights in a standard room?”

“Cash or credit?”

“Cash.”

“Then it will be less.”

His fingers danced over a calculator. He turned the device so she could see the result. The total came to just under a thousand pesos. Ainsley hesitated. That sounded like a lot. Then she did a quick check on her phone of the exchange rate.

It was 3.87 to 1. Pesos to dollars.

She refreshed the page and checked again. Yes, that was right. Nearly four-to-one. Her thousand-peso hotel was actually going to cost her a little over two hundred and fifty dollars. For a week.

This country was a wonderland of a bargain.

Ainsley paid him in cash, and he handed her the room key. “Breakfast is from seven to nine,” he said, gesturing around the corner. “You will find free Internet access there too.”

He was fairly attractive, and Ainsley waited for the inevitable compliment or come-on, but it never arrived. He’d merely returned to work, like a professional man would in most other countries.

As she turned away, Ainsley found herself feeling both relief and disappointment.

She turned the corner and found herself standing in a surprisingly striking atrium, its brick walls painted pink, green ferns hanging from the glass canopy above. Black wrought iron decorated the walls. This hotel hadn’t looked this big from the street. A pair of computer terminals were tucked away discreetly in one corner.

It dawned on her that this space looked a lot like the tearoom in the swanky hotel earlier. Ainsley was starting to get a sense of the
porteño
aesthetic.

She found her room easily. It was spare but clean. A simple queen bed, green comforter, plus a television and a floral couch. She dropped her bag.

Then she noticed the French doors. Her tummy flipped. She knew what French doors meant.

She pushed through them and found herself on a narrow balcony overlooking the street. Ainsley had always loved balconies, and now she breathed deeply, taking in the scene. The sound of rush-hour traffic rose from the cement beneath her. A bouquet of green buds at the top of a tree was within toe-reaching distance.

She was seized by that feeling of unreasonable anticipation, the sense of being in a completely different country, alone. Her heart quickened. Everything felt different yet familiar.

She coughed once, then realized that it wasn’t the first time in the last hour. The diesel engine fumes were particularly strong here, in the Microcentro, with its density and commerce.

Ainsley returned inside and closed the French doors. She stripped off her clothes and showered. Then she dried her hair and wrapped the complimentary bathrobe around her.

She hadn’t planned to come to Argentina. As a result, there was a lot that she didn’t know about this country. But Ainsley
did
know that if she was going to succeed in finding Ovidio’s rhodochrosite necklace, then she needed to begin familiarizing herself.

She glanced at the clock. It was only five o’clock. She didn’t have to be at the
puerta cerrada
until nearly ten.

In her slippers and robe, she left the room and returned to the atrium. The staff had laid out a small table of hors d’oeuvres. Ainsley poured some cheap red wine into a paper cup, then assembled a small plate of cheese, crackers, and olives. She took a seat at one of the computer terminals and opened a browser.

It was time to learn about Argentina.