Free The Seamstress and the Wind by César Aira Page B

glasses of wine in a row. Miss Balero remained immobile, unblinking, and completely covered in that bruised black color. Th e truck driver finished his dinner, peeled an orange and threw the skin carelessly on the floor, and finally lit another cigarette. Th rough all of this he’d been talking to his guest, but with guttural, incomprehensible words. Th e black woman shook herself at intervals and let out some senseless phrases. It was incredible that a natural blonde with such a white complexion had taken on that dark veneer overnight. Chiquito, his accident already forgotten, was roaring with laughter; he seemed happy, not a care in the world . . .
    Until he lit his third or fourth after-dinner Brasil cigarette and Delia, behind the armchair, couldn’t help a sigh or little cough of irritation (the air was becoming unbreathable): Chiquito heard her and turned his formidable bulk in a violent twist that made his chair creak as the legs scraped together. How strange that someone so solid had gotten that diminutive nickname: Chiquito. Surely they’d given it to him as a child, and it had stuck. To think of antiphrasis or irony would have been out of place given his background.
    Delia crawled backwards to the closest door, and as soon as she thought she was out of sight she ran. Luckily there were exits everywhere . . . But that very extravagance only contributed to her running around in circles within the labyrinth, and increased the risk of running straight into the hands of her pursuer. Delia had abandoned any idea of asking for refuge or help in getting home. Not from him, at least. She hadn’t had time to think, with all the surprises and fear, but it didn’t matter. She was discovering that one could also think outside of time.
    Chiquito was bearing down on her, shouting:
    “Who’s there, who’s there . . .”
    “At least he didn’t recognize me,” Delia said to herself, hoping even in her desperation to preserve their coexistence within the neighborhood . . . if she ever got back there.
    She was looking for the bedroom she’d first come in through, to get out by way of the hanging screens . . . but she came out somewhere completely different, in a dark and intricate jumble of metal. She was helplessly caught in its twists and turns. As if the inertia weren’t enough, she insisted on continuing forward, sticking a leg in, and then another, an arm, her head . . . It was the truck’s engine, asleep for the moment . . . But what if it turned on? Th ose iron pieces, in motion, would grind her up in a second . . . She felt something sticky on her hands: it was filthy black grease that covered her from head to toe. It was the finishing touch. She could hardly move, neither backward nor forward, caught in the machinery from all sides . . . And Chiquito’s shouts and footsteps were getting closer, they boomed in the mastodonic pistons . . . she was lost!
    At that moment a great jolt shook everything. For a moment Delia feared the most horrible thing had happened: the engine was starting. But it was not that. Th e agitation multiplied, and the whole truck danced clumsily on its thirty wheels. A deafening whistle enveloped it and passed through the metal walls. All the smells came back to her, and then vanished. A current of cold air touched her.
    “ Th e wind has picked up,” she automatically thought. And what a wind!
    Chiquito’s reaction was surprising. He started to scream like a lunatic. It was as if his worst enemy had appeared at the very worst moment.
    “You again, damn you! You damned wind! Son of a thousand whores! Th is time you won’t get away! I’m going to kill youuuuu!”
    Th e wind’s response was to increase its force a thousand times. Th e truck shuddered, its metal walls rattled, the whole inside crashed together . . . and, most importantly, it seemed to expand with the air forced in under pressure — into the engine parts too . . . Delia felt herself get free, and immediately a current of