The Demon of Dakar - Kjell Eriksson [103]
She stopped and Manuel saw a blush spread across her cheeks. He placed several plates in the dishwasher and saw out of the corner of his eye how she closed her eyes and brushed her forehead with the back of her hand.
“Are you tired?”
“Yes, it is starting to get late,” she said.
“It would be nice to have a visitor,” Manuel said.
He could be generous, he thought, especially as he sensed that such a visit would never take place. But then it struck him that he was very far from his homeland. Why wouldn’t Eva also be able to cross the Atlantic.
He halted his movements, inadvertently shifting a tray of glasses in toward the wall and studied her more closely. At first she did not notice that he was looking at her, but when she was done putting glasses into the dishwasher and had closed the door she saw that he had stopped working.
“What is it?”
“Nothing,” Manuel said, but he did not take his eyes off her face even though he realized that she thought this close scrutiny was, if not disconcerting, then at least somewhat unorthodox.
“It would be good if you came to my country. The tourists who come to Mexico are different from you. They walk across the plazas, into the churches, and sit in the outdoor cafes without really seeing us. If you only knew how we felt—”
“Mexico? You said Venezuela.”
“I was lying,” Manuel said and only now did he avert his gaze. “Don’t ask me why and don’t tell anyone.”
“No, why should I,” Eva said simply, “and I’m just as happy to go to Mexico.”
He joined in her laughter and thought that it was the first time he laughed in Sweden. Manuel felt how his joy, bolstered by Feo’s humming from the kitchen and the warmth of the dishwasher filled him and gave him several seconds of optimism. It was as if the release from his lie reconciled him to the events of the past few days. It did not even occurr to him that Eva could betray him, and it was perhaps this trust in another human being that allowed him to simply exist and speak freely for a moment, as he was when he was home with his own kind.
He began talking about California, about the work of harvesting, about the barracks that he and his brothers had lived in, about the sun that at first made them sweaty and tired, then agitated and bad-tempered. He told her about the water faucet in the yard that some days only yielded a few drops, while the crops were irrigated with large water canons that wandered the fields like primeval animals.
He took Eva to Orange County, because he could tell that she enjoyed the details. She also followed the trio of brothers back to Oaxaca. He described the village as if it were a paradise, he found himself beautifying it and corrected himself by describing the poverty, the bad roads, and how divided the villagers were.
Eva sat on a stool with her hands clasped in her lap and listened.
Occasionally she asked a couple of questions, otherwise she sat quietly for long periods of time and watched him. A quarter of an hour went by. When the roar of the dishwasher came to an end and was supplanted with a ticking sound, Manuel also grew silent.
“It is my country,” he concluded his tale, and felt as if it had been accurate, but also knew how much had been left out. He felt uplifted and appreciated the fact that she had listened with genuine interest. Even so, the emptiness and upheaval that he had felt ever since he heard of Angel’s death in Germany and the imprisonment of Patricio returned at the same moment that Eva stood up and said she should get back to work.
She left the kitchen and Manuel watched as the door to the dining room swung back and forth until it reached a point where it was definitively closed.
The next moment, Slobodan Andersson stepped into the room.
Forty-Four
“Who are you?”
Slobodan Andersson stared at Manuel, who unconsciously raised the blue dish rack that he was holding in his hands.
It was as if the proprietor was unable to take his eyes off the new hand in the dishwashing area. Manuel was forced to look down, he turned and pushed the tray