The Argentina Rhodochrosite (7 page)

12

The first topic was that amazing
exchange rate. Ainsley munched on a small slab of manchego cheese and crackers as she read through some webpages on Argentine economic history.

Argentina had experienced a devastating crash five days before Christmas 2001. The cause was simple: the government had unpegged the Argentinian peso from the U.S. dollar. The value of the currency had plunged overnight. There had been no run on the banks, since the banks had frozen everybody’s accounts. People had taken to the streets instead. Now, more than a decade later, inflation had raised prices, but the currency still hadn’t really recovered.

And that hadn’t been the only crash. Throughout the twentieth century, the Argentine economy had gone bust more times than an oil wildcatter. One analyst said that Argentines look at financial crises like seasonal floods. They plan accordingly, by stocking up on canned food and U.S. dollars. Then they wait, because there is always another coming.

Ainsley spat an olive pit out of her mouth onto the plate and nodded. Economic turmoil was something she could definitely relate to.

Then she turned to the
guerra sucia
, or dirty war. She felt embarrassed that Nadia had explained it like she was a third-grader.

A few webpages made the history clear. A horrific military junta, led by General Videla and Admiral Massera, took control of Argentina in 1976. They kidnapped, tortured, and killed thirty thousand of their own people, spread propaganda and enormous lies, and then started a pointless war over
Las Malvinas
(the Falkland Islands) with another government, Margaret Thatcher’s Britain, which was in similar need of a pointless war. Argentina lost, and the junta nightmare finally ended seven years after it had begun.

But this hadn’t been the first such military takeover either. Nine different military juntas had assumed control of the Argentine national government in the last century. It’s as though Argentina has been dealing cards: one for democracy, one for dictatorship, one for democracy, one for dictatorship, back and forth. The Argentine people call this long history of instability “the sausage”, an idiom that didn’t quite translate, but whose meat imagery Ainsley thought was totally appropriate for the country.

Still, she felt a deep revulsion creeping up her body as she read the descriptions of the torture in the late seventies. The prisoners had been led beneath a door on which someone had written the words “The Path to Happiness.” Beyond it had been a torture chamber with unbelievable torture machines. A
picana
, or cattle prod. An iron-banded bed connected to a 220-volt machine. An electrode that went up to 70 volts. Cutting instruments, puncturing instruments, bags filled with sand to beat people without leaving marks.

When the torture was finished, some of the bodies had been burned in open fields behind the “detention centers”, as the torture facilities were known, their limbs awkwardly curling up in the flames until their tendons were clipped. Many others, the ones who hadn’t died under torture, had been given Penathol injections, dragged into airplanes, flown out over the Atlantic, and dumped naked into the ocean.

The junta had even used a horrific euphemism to describe such murders: the prisoners had been “transferred”. As though they’d merely changed crosstown buses.

Ainsley sat back. Her arms were shaking, and her stomach was a mess. A hundred years ago, Argentina had been one of the top ten wealthiest countries in the world. She wondered how the country could devolve into something as horrendous as this.

She also thought about Ovidio’s mother, a woman whom nobody had ever known.

Ainsley did a new search on her employer’s name. She found more than four hundred thousand webpages relevant to Ovidio Angeletti, which she supposed is what happens to celebrities. Ainsley glanced through several. Most featured that famous photo from Nadia’s office,
El Mono
swinging from the crossbar with his incisors bared. She suddenly understood Ovidio’s frustration with his nickname. He was much more complicated than that single primitive image. But it was impossible for him to change it now. He’d already played his hand to the public.

Nadia had mentioned that Ovidio had played soccer in Europe, but hadn’t divulged exactly where. Ainsley learned immediately: Ovidio had been the star striker for Arsenal, in London. That was one of the most powerful soccer clubs in the world. Apparently he’d had a falling out with the owner, which didn’t surprise Ainsley at all, before bouncing around to Barcelona and Bayern Munich on one-year contracts. And now he’d returned to Argentina, his homeland, to his retirement league. He was thirty-five years old, which is actually quite old for a striker, a testament to his level of fitness more than anything else.

“Ah,” a voice said at her elbow, “you are interested in
El Mono
?”

Ainsley jumped, startled. Standing beside her was the front desk clerk. She realized that night had fallen, darkness pouring in from the overhead skylight.

“Yes,” Ainsley said, “he’s fascinating.”

His eyes noticed her paper cup. “Did you serve yourself?”

“Of course. Why?”

A look of irritation flashed across his face. “That was very poor form,” he said. “Only men pour wine. I will bring you more.”

He brought the bottle over to the computer terminal and refilled her cup.

“Thank you,” she said.

“You’re welcome. I have another talent, if you would care to discover it.” She looked up. His lips blew her a kiss and his hand discreetly touched his crotch.

There it was. A
piropo.
The first she’d encountered in several hours.

“Your talent is probably not as great as you think,” she said.

He was unfazed. “Did I offend you? I’m sorry. But you offended me first, sitting here in”—he pointed to her bathrobe—“that garment. Don’t you have anything real to wear?”

Ainsley froze. In the excitement of the day, she had completely forgotten: She’d left most of her clothing back in Uruguay. Certainly all of her nice outfits. And she needed to look her best tonight.

“What time is it?”

“Seven thirty.”

Crap. She suddenly had no more time for his shenanigans. “Where can I go shopping nearby?”

“Calle Florida.” The clerk jerked a thumb in its general direction. “Do you need help in the changing room?”

Ainsley was over the flirtation. “Forget it, I have a boyfriend.”

“Then I should have charged you double,” he said.

“Maybe you should just go back to work,” she replied.

The clerk shrugged and moved on, turning on lamps in the atrium. Ainsley closed the browser and shoved her chair under the desk. It was time for a quick shopping expedition.

As she returned to her room, Ainsley admitted the embarrassing truth to herself.

She enjoyed the game of
piropo
.

But only a little.

13

At ten o’clock pm, in Barrio
Norte, near a main thoroughfare called Avenida Santa Fe, a
remise
, or taxicab, flew around the corner onto Paraná.

In the backseat was Ainsley, who was hurriedly applying last-minute touches to her makeup. She hadn’t had any time, not after spending nearly an hour and a half doing an emergency shopping session for a new outfit.

“Paraná is the street?” the cabbie asked.

“Yes,” she replied.

Earlier, she’d walked from her hotel to Calle Florida, a distance of only four blocks, but the crowds announced it before the pavement did. Unknown to her, Calle Florida was the busiest pedestrian street in all of Buenos Aires. There were thousands of bodies in motion, shoppers, commuters, and tourists, most wrapped in dark coats and scarves, hunching under mops of dark hair.

She dodged the crowds and scanned the neon street. There were leather shops, pizza shops, athletic shoe shops, and book shops. Ainsley did love the prospect of shopping for Argentine leather at a 4-to-1 exchange rate, but at this moment she had only needed something fairly nice, really quick.

At the end of the street she’d stumbled upon the most opulent shopping mall she’d ever seen: the Galeria Pacifico.

Inside, were fluted stone columns, extravagant lighting, even an art museum on the top floor.

But Ainsley hadn’t had time to dally. Instead, she’d ducked into the first boutique, bam, a pretty purple shirt on the rack nearest the door, bam, quick try in the fitting room, bam, cash to the salesgirl, bam, out the door. Seven minutes total.

Now she was arriving at the party in that very same purple top, trying to tear off the price tag with her teeth.

“What number was the house?” said the driver.

“1408.”

He looked up. “That’s not a house. That is
Milion
.”

“What’s Milion?”

“The best club in Buenos Aires. The owner bought it from an opthamologist for a million U.S. dollars after the economic crash. That’s how it got its name.”

“Why is it so special?”

“You’ll see.”

He stopped the cab. Ainsley paid him and popped out. She was standing in what appeared to be a rich residential neighborhood. The block was lined with enormous four-story French Renaissance mansions, all products of enormous Argentine wealth of the early twentieth century.

The most opulent was straight ahead, and on the ground floor an old-fashioned carriage door stood open. A discreet bronze sign simply stated the word Milion. Two men in black suits were standing just inside the door.

Ainsley approached them. The security seemed much more serious than usual, far elevated above the run-of-the-mill neighborhood dopes. Then Ainsley recognized them. These were the same guys from the Alvear Palace Hotel.

“Remember me?” she said.

“Identification.”

“We met at the hotel?”

“Identification.”

Miffed, she dug around in her purse. There was no sweet talking these guys. She’d have to remember that later.

She handed them her passport—again—and waited for the reply.

They looked at her picture and then back at her. She drew a circle in the air around her face. “Still the same,” she said.

Didn’t matter. They checked her name against a list, then handed her the passport back, and stepped aside.

Ainsley stepped between the men and found herself at the beginning of a long cobblestone hallway. Antique sconces lit the walls. This was a rich person’s garage from the early twentieth-century
porteño
past.

Ainsley walked down the hallway, planting her heels carefully in the center of each cobblestone. Wooden tables and fancy chairs lined the walls, awaiting diners on some other night. She could feel her heart racing. She felt like she was stepping onstage, into a role that she had barely prepared for.

At the end of the hallway was an ornate wooden door. It was a real museum piece, chiselled in a perpendicular pattern. Iron scrollwork decorated the edges.

Ainsley adjusted her new top one last time, clutched her bag, and lifted her chin up. She knew how to impress men. And she would need to impress here, if she was going to get people to talk about Ovidio’s rhodochrosite.

Her task was obvious. She needed to meet and impress as many members of Ovidio’s entourage as possible, all while pretending to be a journalist.

It was a tall order. Nearly impossible, in fact. But Ainsley had to stay hopeful.

She approached the door, placed her hand on the iron scrollwork, and pushed it open.