turn our full attention back to the sexual, for that’s what really matters. Let’s, however, quickly assert that Demetrio Sordo had nothing to do with marketing the harvest: where it should go: near or far—no, never that! nor the renting of trailers, none of that tedious stuff. On the other hand, he was responsible for the drainage ditches; yes, and for all things related to the purchase of fertilizers and amendments, as well as the best insecticides to prevent plagues and other evils; and the manual work: the making of furrows, ridges, ditches, rows, and even terraces; as well as the rest: breaking clods, hoeing, plowing, grading, mowing, sifting, and threshing, in concert, needless to say, with the peasantry. All of which he carried off with great aplomb, which led the landowner to give Demetrio full jurisdiction over the orchard. Trust. Respect. He visited twice a week. He wanted results and that’s what he got. At a serene pace that others might find torturous. But let’s leave this for now and turn to the recently sexual. Before, as we said, the agronomist would make his way directly to the lodging house after the day’s work; he would arrive beat, to bathe, to rest: seclusion, a clean break, the radio, waiting for dinnertime. Monotony. But ever since he’d met Mireya he made his way straight to the brothel: by taxi: a dirty and desperate dash, only the second time, for by the third, alas, a bath in the orchard, or rather: washing by bucketfuls. As far as that went, we must consider the time it took to heat the water to an optimal temperature. On a stove in a kitchen—of which there were both—though the distance between the bath and the kitchen exceeded 150 feet and counting. Further delays, but that’s what Demetrio did the third time and thereafter: quite a chore this coming and going with buckets: four in all: slow considering what preceded and followed: stealing an hour from the workday—indeed! because if the agronomist didn’t make it to the brothel on time, Mireya might be occupied with another client, a circumstance he wished to avoid by all means. Those first few days he was, mercifully, spared. Another option was to go to that aforementioned hell and wash there: in her room, before the screw. He asked, fearful of eliciting a negative response … No, on the contrary, Mireya said that as long as he did it quickly … Well, to clean off the dust of the fields was not a matter of a simple dousing, you had to stand under the water for a long time and thoroughly soap yourself, a privilege for which, Demetrio told her, he would be willing to pay an additional fee. Money for Mireya, secretly—really? and she agreed with a smile.
This mischief, nonetheless, carried a slight risk. Mireya’s argument for compliance stressed that the arrangement would end when someone of ill will informed Madam of what they’d chanced to see. An improbable peril, for lovers could always choose to screw under the shower. We mustn’t forget that the madam was an odd bird, piling ploy upon ploy: shadows within shadows. True, there’d been no hitches on any of the previous days, no undue attention paid. Though Mireya had a surprise for Demetrio on his tenth visit. She blurted it out with dread, fearing that something so beautiful would end ugly and sad.
One might harbor hopes for good tidings in the wake of that ominous periphrasis “I have something to tell you.” Only trembling and silence, however, followed. Mireya looked down at the ground: the rug crisscrossed with arbitrary lines must have given her an idea: a hint of caution: then—what?—and she muttered an utterance and then one more, and a third that barely made sense at all. In the face of such dread, Demetrio turned to his most vulgar memories from their numerous copulations, including a sequence of voluptuous insults that rose spontaneously from the depth of his soul, verbal sputum such as (we will quote but three): While I’m pounding you with my cock, I want to stick my left index finger up your ass …; Give it to me, baby!; or: I want you to be even more of a whore than you were yesterday; I want you to scratch my balls. But what I really want is for you to understand me. Sexual depravity could go even further: diabolical sex; sexual impudence, a subsequent outburst, but the nature of these