Serenade - James M. Cain [9]
"This letter, big mistake."
She tore it up.
Well, never mind the fine points. The result of the big Socialist educational program is that half the population of the city have to come to these mugs to get their letters written, and that was what she had done. But the guy had been a little busy, and didn't get it quite straight what she had said, and fixed her up with a love letter. So of course, she had to go down there and get what she had paid for. I didn't blame her, but I still didn't know what she wanted, and I was still hungry.
"The auto--you like, yes?"
"It's a knockout." We were coming up the Bolivar again, and I had to keep tooting the horn, according to law. The main thing they put on cars for Mexican export is the biggest, loudest horn they can find in Detroit, and this one had a double note to it that sounded like a couple of ferryboats passing in an East River fog. "Your business must be good."
I didn't mean to make any crack, but it slipped out on me. If it meant anything to her at all, she passed it up. "Oh no. I win."
"How?"
"The billete. You remember?"
"Oh. My billette?"
"Yes. I win, in lotería. The auto, and five honnerd pesos. The auto, is very pretty. I can no make go."
"Well, I can make it go, if that's all that's bothering you. About those five hundred pesos. You got some of them with you?"
"Oh yes. Of course."
"That's great. What you're going to do is buy me a breakfast. For my belly--muy empty. You get it?"
"Oh, why you no say? Yes, of course, now we eat."
I pulled in at the Tupinamba. The restaurants don't open until one o'clock, but the cafés will take care of you. We took a table up near the corner, where it was dark and cool. Hardly anybody was in there. My same old waitress came around grinning, and I didn't waste any time. "Orange juice, the biggest you got. Fried eggs, three of them, and fried ham. Tortillas. Glass of milk, frió, and café con crema."
"Bueno."
She took iced coffee, a nifty down there, and gave me a cigarette. It was the first I had had in three days, and I inhaled and leaned back, and smiled at her. "So."
"So."
But she didn't smile back, and looked away as soon as she said it. It was the first time we had really looked at each other all morning, and it brought us back to that night. She smoked, and looked up once or twice to say something, and didn't, and I saw there was something on her mind besides the billete. "So--you still have no pesos?"
"That's more or less correct."
"You work, no?"
"I did work, but I got kicked out. Just at present, I'm not doing anything at all."
"You like to work, yes? For me?"
"...Doing what?"
"Play a guitar, little bit, maybe. Write a letter, count money, speak Inglés, help me, no work very hard. In Mexico, nobody work very hard. Yes? You like?"
"Wait a minute. I don't get this."
"Now I have money, I open house."
"Here?"
"No, no, no. In Acapulco. In Acapulco, I have very nice friend, big político. Open nice house, with nice music, nice food, nice drink, nice girls--for American."
"Oh, for Americans."
"Yes. Many Americans come now to Acapulco. Big steamboat stop there. Nice man, much money."
"And me, I'm to be a combination professor, bartender, bouncer, glad-hander, secretary, and general bookkeeper for the joint, is that it?"
"Yes, yes."
"Well."
The food came along, and I stayed with it a while, but the more I thought about her proposition the funnier it got to me. "This place, it's supposed to have class, is that the idea?"
"Oh yes, very much. My político friend, he say American pay as much as five pesos, gladly."
"Pay five--what?"
"Pesos."
"Listen,