Hypothermia

explained, who had not taken into account the locals’ habit of leaping to their deaths. I had to install the glass myself to avoid negative publicity when someone ended up jumping off. And there’s no built-in way for us to clean it; we’ve got to do it with scaffolding, every morning. It’s super dangerous. I told him about my vertiginous fascination with Lima’s penchant for flight. He made some rather nervous references to pre-Hispanic suicide practices, and mentioned aerial hara-kiri. He asked me if it was love-sickness that was tormenting me. Obviously, I said. It’s the Swiss woman, isn’t it? So she is beautiful, kind of lethal. It’s not the Swiss woman, I told him. It’s a long story, from a long time ago, and I really don’t feel like telling it. Nobody, I concluded, can get so worked up over a Calvinist, believe me. You never know, he told me. My wife is Danish and I think she’s sleeping with Terapia.
    Glancing at his watch, he stood up abruptly, saying that he’d lost track of time, that he had tickets to take his kids to the soccer match, and would I please excuse him and catch a taxi back to the hotel. We shook hands with the tenderness of brother exiles. I stayed and ordered another brandy: I’d left my suitcases at hotel reception and I had a little extra time before Mr. Hinojosa would be coming by to pick me up.
    I paid my bill, despite the waiter insisting that Pablo’s friends didn’t pay at his establishments. Walking out to the street I saw that on one of the shopping mall’s balconies the management hadn’t bothered to install any safety glass. A whole crowd of people was gathering there, looking down. Once inside the taxi I heard the ambulance sirens: another condor, the driver told me. On Saturday they finished work on the Suicide Bridge, so now they’re coming over here.

LAST SUPPER IN SEDUCTION CITY

    . . . and the siege dissolved to peace, and the horsemen
all rode down
in sight of the waters
    S T . J OHN OF THE C ROSS

    Friday, March 20 .
    As I saw the lights of Mexico City spread out below us before landing I caught myself mentally humming the tune of “Volver”—an unbearable affectation. Just as Carlos Gardel sings in that classic tango . . . the snows of time have silvered my temples . His turned silver because he was away for twenty years, mine because premature gray hair runs in my family: I’m condemned to suffer low-impact drama. I remembered my grandfather saying that Agustín Lara was a hick whose one single virtue was that he liberated us from the tango thanks to his impossible talent for composing boleros. Then I forced myself to think about Guadalupe Trigo, the later improviser of boleros, who says that at night the city dresses up like a mariachi. But that doesn’t really describe it: it’s more like the Milky Way, a sacred host of fire which you must swallow whole, without chewing.
    I wonder what Teresa would think if she could see me with so much gray hair. Since I bought a computer for my apartment and managed to get myself online, I’ve been back in touch with el Distrito Federal . They tell me that she’s been living in Mexico ever since she broke up with my student, that when she runs into one of our mutual acquaintances she always asks about me. I doubt that she’s weathered the silent ravages of time very well either.
    My mother and my sister picked me up at the airport. I will stay with them for the weekend and on Monday I’ll go over to Raul’s apartment: my family’s house is too crowded—there I’ll be better able to practice the monkish discipline to which I’m accustomed. They’re not happy with the idea, but they realize that it’s better than nothing. I’m going to stay with Raul through the week, then on Saturday and Sunday I’ll be back with them again.
    Monday, March 23 .
    Too much family. At my mother’s house I was able to stick to my schedule, but the demand for socializing there is heavy: my brothers show up every little while with their wives and kids, and then my aunts and uncles come around, and then the visits with Grandpa who’s been sick forever.
    I’ll be better here. I’m staying in a room that seems much more like my apartment in Mount Pleasant: a bed—iron, perfect for a convalescent like me—a table, and a wicker chair; it even has a window. The kitchen is an abandoned wreck—being a restaurant owner, Raul only uses it for making coffee—but I’ll see what can be done. At any rate, I have