The Delicate Prey: And Other Stories

On the train as it wound through the mountains toward tierra caliente she had suddenly said, apropos of nothing: “Black doesn’t become me.” Really upsetting to Lucha was the fact that in Puntarenas she had gone off and bought some crimson nail polish which she had painstakingly applied herself in the hotel room.

“You can’t, Chalía!” cried her sister, wide-eyed. “You’ve never done it before. Why do you do it now?”

Chalía had laughed immoderately. “Just a whiml” she had said, spreading her decorated hands in front of her.

Loud footsteps came up the stairs and along the veranda, shaking it slightly. Her sister called: “Chalía!”

She hesitated an instant, then said, “Yes.”

“You’re sitting in the dark! Wait. I’ll bring out a lamp from your room. What an idea!”

“We’ll be covered with insects,” objected Chalía, who, although her mood was not a pleasant one, did not want it disturbed.

“Federico says no!” shouted Lucha from inside. “He says there are no insects! None that bite, anyway!”

Presently she appeared with a small lamp which she set on a table against the wall. She sat down in a nearby hammock and swung herself softly back and forth, humming. Chalía frowned at her, but she seemed not to notice.

“What heat!” exclaimed Lucha finally.

“Don’t exert yourself so much,” suggested Chalía.

They were quiet. Soon the breeze became a strong wind, coming from the direction of the distant mountains; but it too was hot, like the breath of a great animal. The lamp flickered, threatened to go out. Lucha got up and turned it down. As Chalía moved her head to watch her, her attention was caught by something else, and she quickly shifted her gaze to the wall. Something enormous, black and swift had been there an instant ago; now there was nothing. She watched the spot intently. The wall was faced with small stones which had been plastered over and whitewashed indifferently, so that the surface was very rough and full of large holes. She rose suddenly and approaching the wall, peered at it closely. All the holes, large and small, were lined with whitish funnels. She could see the long, agile legs of the spiders that lived inside, sticking Out beyond some of the funnels.

“Lucha, this wall is full of monsters!” she cried. A beetle flew near to the lamp, changed its mind and lighted on the wall. The nearest spider darted forth, seized it and disappeared into the wall with it.

“Don’t look at them,” advised Lucha, but she glanced about the floor near her feet apprehensively.

Chalía pulled her bed into the middle of the room and moved a small table over to it. She blew out the lamp and lay back on the hard mattress. The sound of the nocturnal insects was unbearably loud—an endless, savage scream above the noise of the wind. All the vegetation out there was dry. It made a million scraping sounds in the air as the wind swept through it. From time to time the monkeys called to each other from different sides. A night bird scolded occasionally, but its voice was swallowed up in the insistent insect song and the rush of wind across the hot countryside. And it was absolutely dark.

Perhaps an hour later she lit the lamp by her bed, rose, and in her nightgown went to sit on the veranda. She put the lamp where it had been before, by the wall, and turned her chair to face it. She sat watching the wall until very late.

At dawn the air was cool, full of the sound of continuous lowing of cattle, nearby and far. Breakfast was served as soon as the sky was completely light. In the kitchen there was a hubbub of women’s voices. The dining room smelled of kerosene and oranges. A great platter heaped with thick slices of pale pineapple was in the center of the table. Don Federico sat at the end, his back to the wall. Behind him was a small niche, bright with candles, and the Virgin stood there in a blue and silver gown.

“Did you sleep well?” said Don Federico to Lucha.

“Ah, wonderfully well!”

“And you?” to Chalía.

“I never sleep well,” she said.

A hen ran distractedly into the room from the veranda and was chased out by the serving girl. Outside the door a group of Indian children stood guard around a square of clothesline along which was draped a red assortment of meat: strips of flesh and loops of internal organs. When a vulture swooped low, the children jumped up and down, screaming in chorus, and drove it into the air again. Chalía frowned at their noise. Don Federico smiled.

“This is all in your honor,” he said. “We killed a cow yesterday. Tomorrow all that will be gone.”

“Not the vultures!” exclaimed Lucha.

“Certainly not. All the cowboys and servants take some home to their families. And they manage to get rid of quite a bit of it themselves.”

“You’re too generous,” said Chalía. “It’s bad for them. It makes them dissatisfied and unhappy. But I suppose if you didn’t give it to them, they’d steal it anyway.”

Don Federico pushed back his chair.

“No one here has ever stolen anything from me.” He rose and went out.