The Black Minutes by Martín Solares Page A

meditate on my mistakes, and for that one must be alone.”
    My answer succeeded in making him uncomfortable.
    “Fritz, you’re not a little boy anymore. Come along and eat that stuff. One of the women from the Church Council brought us a case of that German beer you like so well. If you don’t come, I’ll drink every bottle all by myself.” And he wasn’t joking.
    “The Lord punishes excess,” I said to him.
    “Whatever you please.” And he closed the door.
    For twenty minutes I listened to the noise of the dishes. I thought I heard him opening one, maybe even two of my beloved beers. It would have been the ideal time to make the call, but I hadn’t yet come to my decision. When I was at my most anxious, I went to my desk. I took out my copy of
The Exercises
and opened it at random. Christ Jesus never preached divination by the book, but it never fails me. Loyola seemed to advise: “Be ye therefore wise as serpents and harmless as doves.” Speed and agility, my holy patron was telling me that if I wanted to overcome this problem I’d have to act without the bishop finding out, and to conceal my role in the case.
    I looked over the names in my address book and in less than a minute had selected one. I mentally sketched out a plan and achieved a moment of inner peace, in which part of my mind went in one direction and another part in another. When at last these parts met up again, in some surprise, one asked the other, Fritz, you scoundrel, I’d like to know what’s on your mind. Right this very moment, I said, I’m thinking of
chucrut
for dinner.

    So I waited until the bishop had got up from the table and gone into his studio. I have to put an end to this, I said to myself. I went out to the hall and picked up the phone. I was startled by a horrible noise, a resonant shriek, and understood he’d used his modem and dialed on to the Internet, as he did every night. I’d have to wait half an hour at least, while His Excellency communicated with his colleagues all over the world, so I returned to my cell to listen to the sounds my stomach was making. As I sat at my desk, I heard the voice of my moral conscience: “It smells like food. Aren’t we going to take a break?” Not now, I told it, we have work to do. “That’s a shame,” it said to me, “the sisters spent all that time preparing cabbage . . . and the German beer, brewed strictly in accordance with the Treaty of Bavaria—” I was about to come up with a smart retort when I heard the bishop hanging up and darted to the phone at the end of the hallway. There, I dialed El Chícharo’s work number.
    “La Tuerca here.” La Tuerca is the hardware store where he works.
    “
Carnál?
” Speaking in
Caló
street slang doesn’t come easy to me, but Chícharo won’t understand you otherwise. “I got a fourteen for you.”
    He took a while to respond and I deduced that he was dragging the phone to a secure corner.
    “What’s up,
vato?
Another fourteen?”
    “Yes,” I said. “This one’s more complicated.”
    “That’s what you said about the last one, and look what happened. Did you see his picture in
El Mercurio?
”
    I felt insulted. “Can you do it or not?”
    “Right now I don’t know. It’s gonna be tougher, ’cause they’re gonna be tailing him.” He went quiet, before adding, “I think we’re out of those size-nine washers.”

    “Ah, you can’t talk, I see. Will you do it? Answer yes or no.”
    “I couldn’t tell you. I gotta check the invoices.”
    I should’ve known. “Is it a matter of twenties?
Du willst das Doppelte, oder?
”
    “Wha’?”
    “You want double, right?”
    It seemed that El Chícharo had covered the receiver with cellophane; it was clear they were keeping an eye on him. And I was sweating. The bishop could pick up the phone any time.
    “
Carnál?
” I pushed him.
    El Chícharo removed the cellophane or whatever it was from the receiver and finally answered. “It’s just we’ve got an order