The Revolver

~ Nina Zumel ~ Leave a comment

The Revolver
(El revólver)
by Emilia Pardo Bazán

In an outburst of confidence, of the type brought about by the familiarity and conviviality of health spas, the woman with heart disease recounted her illness to me, with all the details of shortness of breath, violent palpitations, vertigo, fainting, collapses, in which one could see the approach of one’s final hour. While we spoke, I watched her attentively. She was a woman of about thirty five or thirty six, worn out by her ailment; at least so I believed, although, on examining her longer, I began to suspect that there was something beyond the physical in her decline. Indeed, she spoke and expressed herself like someone who had suffered much, and I know that bodily afflictions, when they aren’t immediately pressing, are generally not enough to produce that wasting away, that radical depression. And noticing how the broad leaves of the plane tree, touched with crimson by the artistic hand of autumn, fell to earth majestically and lay stretched out like severed hands, I called her attention, in order to draw forth more confidences, to the fleetingness of everything, the melancholy passage of all things…

“All is nothing,” she answered me, understanding instantly that I knocked at the doors of her soul not out of curiosity, but out of compassion. “All is nothing…unless we ourselves transform this nothing into something. If only we regarded everything with the gentle, but sad, emotion caused by the fall of those leaves on the sand.”

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The Rearisen

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The Rearisen
(La resucitada)
by Emilia Pardo Bazán

The four tapers burned, dripping droplets of wax. A bat, dropping down from the vaulted ceiling, began to describe awkward curves in the air. A compact, shadowy form slipped across the flagstones and climbed with somber caution over a fold of the pall. In the same instant, Dorotea de Guevara opened her eyes, recumbent in her tomb.

She was well aware that she was not dead; but a leaden veil, a bronze padlock prevented her from seeing and speaking. She heard, yes, and perceived–as one perceives within dreams–what had been done to her when they washed and enshrouded her. She heard the sobs of her husband, and felt her children’s tears on her rigid white cheeks. And now, in the solitude of the closed up church, she had recovered her senses, and was overcome with great fear. This was no nightmare, but reality. There, the coffin; there, the candles… and she herself wrapped in a white shroud, with the scapular of Our Lady of Mercy on her breast.

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The Ghost of a Grudge

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The Ghost of a Grudge
(El fantasma de un rencor)
by Juana Manuela Gorriti

Translator’s note: this story directly follows “El emparedado” (In the Wall). Canon B. contributes his own story of a coincidence to the group of ten people trapped together by a winter storm.

Eight years ago I was the curate of Lurin, and I was called to administer the sacraments to a young woman dying of consumption. They had brought her to Lima in the hope of a cure; but the inexorable illness continued its fatal course, and carried her away.

Such an angel of candor, virtue, and resignation! She withdrew from life with a serene spirit, regretting only the pain of those who wept over her.

But there was one black spot on her immaculate soul: resentment.

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In the Wall

~ Nina Zumel ~ Leave a comment

In the Wall
(El emparedado)
by Juana Manuela Gorriti

There were ten of us. The strongest downpour of last winter had brought us together by chance, trapped in a parlor around an improvised stove.

In that heterogenous circle doubly illuminated by gaslight and the embers of the fire, time was represented in its broadest sweep. Antiquity, the Middle Ages, the present, and even the promises of a smiling future, in the lovely eyes of four pretty and restless young ladies, who grew impatient, annoyed with the monotony of the evening.

The piano actually stood open, and the music desk held lovely sheet music and waltzes to choose from; but we had among us two men of the church; and their presence intimidated the young women, and prevented them from surrendering to the rhythms of Strauss and the melodies of Verdi. Nor did they even dare appeal to the supreme recourse of the bored: to pass arm in arm along the length of the room; and so they whispered among themselves, smothering prolonged yawns.

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The Nocturnal Laundresses or Washerwomen of the Night

~ Nina Zumel ~ 2 Comments

The Nocturnal Laundresses or Washerwomen of the Night
(Les Laveuses de Nuit ou Lavandières)
by George Sand

During the full moon, we see, on the path to the Font de Fonts (Fountain of Fountains), strange washerwomen; the spectres of sinful mothers who are condemned to wash, until Judgment Day, the swaddling clothes and corpses of their victims.

— Maurice Sand

This is, in our opinion, the most sinister of the visions of fear. It is also the most widespread, as I believe it is found in every region.

Around stagnant pools and limpid springs, in the moors and on the edges of shaded founts; in the sunken paths below the old willows or on the sun-scorched plains, during the night one hears the hurried beating and the furious splashing of these fantastical washerwomen. In certain provinces it’s believed that they evoke rain and attract storms by making the water of the springs and swamps fly up to the clouds with their agile laundry paddles. But here there is a confusion. The evocation of storms is the monopoly of witches known as “cloud herders.” The authentic washerwomen are the souls of infanticidal mothers. They beat and wring incessantly an object that resembles wet laundry, but which, seen up close, is nothing other than a child’s corpse. Each one has her own child, or children, if they have committed the crime multiple times. You must avoid observing them or bothering them; because, though you may be six feet tall and muscular, they would seize you, pummel you into the water and wring you about as if you were no more and no less than a pair of stockings.

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Juan Holgado and Death

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Juan Holgado and Death
(Juan Holgado y La Muerte)
by Fernán Caballero (Cecilia Böhl de Faber)

Once upon a time there was a certain man named Juan Holgado (i.e., John Well-off); and truly nobody could have less deserved such a name, for morning nor evening, as a rule, could the poor fellow get enough to satisfy his hunger. Moreover he had a heap of youngsters with gullets like sharks.

One day Juan Holgado said to his wife:

“These brats are a pack of gluttons, and are capable of swallowing oilcloth itself. I should like to eat a hare by myself, at my pleasure, and without these young mastiffs to take it out of my mouth.”

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The Stickpin

~ Nina Zumel ~ Leave a comment

The Stickpin
(El alfiler)
by José María Barreto

It was ten at night. With the raised collars of the elegant capes that hid our broad and immaculate shoulders, and irreproachable tailcoats with large silk lapels, we waited impatiently in the newsroom for the typesetters to bring us the final proofs of the articles that were to go out the next day in the newspaper columns, so that we might leave immediately for the dance being given that night in the aristocratic salon of a notable public figure.

With us was Bonardi, a valiant soldier who from time to time contributed to the paper scientific studies on the organization of the military, and whom we loved dearly, for his wit was matched by few people, and his exceptional memory by none, and he always had something new and entertaining to relate to us.

That night, he had a tale to tell.

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Lines

~ Nina Zumel ~ 2 Comments

Lines
(Las rayas)
by Horacio Quiroga

“I will tell you the story,” he began, “because it is the best way to make my point.”

With his promise to tell us the story, we quickly drank down our coffee and settled ourselves comfortably in our chairs to listen for a while, our eyes fixed on Cordoba’s.

* * *

You all know that I have been in Laboulaye for some time. My partner travels through the colonies on behalf of the firm all year; while I, being quite useless at that, attend to the warehouse. As you might imagine, for at least eight months of the year my duties are nothing but paperwork, and two employees–one working with me on the books and the other at the counter—are more than enough for us. Given the scale of our business, neither the daily transaction records nor the accounts are onerous. We still maintain, however, a morbid vigilance over the books, as if this dismal thing could repeat itself. The books!… Anyway, it’s been four years since this adventure, and our two employees were the protagonists.

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Dotty

~ Nina Zumel ~ Leave a comment

Dotty
An English adaptation/loose translation of Las rayas
by Horacio Quiroga

“To sum it up, I believe that words are worth as much in themselves as the concepts to which they refer, and are even capable of creating those concepts through the simple mechanism of euphony. This requires special conditions; yet it is possible. But something that I’ve experienced made me reflect on the danger of two different things having the same name.”

You know, one doesn’t often hear such marvellous theories as that. Curiously, the one expounding it was no old and subtle philosopher, steeped in scholasticism, but a man hooked by commerce since his youth; he worked in Laboulaye, dealing in wheat. With his promise to tell us the story, we quickly drank down our coffee and settled ourselves comfortably in our chairs to listen for a while, our eyes fixed on Cordoba’s.

“I will tell you the story,” he began, “because it is the best way to make my point….”

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Bellamore’s Triple Theft

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Bellamore’s Triple Theft
(El triple robo de Bellamore)
by Horacio Quiroga

Some days ago the courts sentenced Juan Carlos Bellamore to five years in prison, for robbing several banks. I have some relationship with Bellamore: he is a thin and serious young man, carefully dressed in black. I believe him quite incapable of these deeds, of any deed whatsoever that requires keen nerves. He knew that he was an eternal bank employee; I heard him say so many times, and he even added sadly that his future was a dead end; there would never be anything else. I also know that if there is an employee who is punctual and discreet, it would certainly be Bellamore. Without being his friend, I held him in esteem, regretting his misfortune. Yesterday afternoon I discussed the case with a group of acquaintances.

“Yes,” one of them told me, “they have given him five years. I knew him a little; he was quite reserved. How did it not occur to me that it should be him? The accusation was prompt.”

“What?” I asked, surprised.

“The accusation; he was denounced.”

“Lately,” someone else added, “he had lost a great deal of weight.” And he concluded gravely: “Me, I no longer trust anyone.”

I quickly changed the subject. I asked if the accuser was known.

“It was made known yesterday. It’s Zaninski”

I very much wanted to hear the story from Zaninski’s lips. First, the peculiarity of the denunciation, with absolutely no personal interest; second, the means that he used for the discovery. How had he known it was Bellamore?

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