mischievous expression. He showed him the red file folder on his desk.
“Can you guess what I have here?”
“A week’s leave for me at the beach, Major, sir?”
“Your promotion to first lieutenant, boy!” His superior happily handed him the folder.
“I stood there with my mouth open, because it wasn’t my turn.” Salvador didn’t move. “I still have eight months before I can apply for a promotion. I thought it was a consolation prize because I was denied permission to get married.”
Salvador, at the foot of the bed, was ill at ease and made a face.
“Didn’t you know, Amadito? Your friends, your superiors, didn’t they tell you about the test of loyalty?”
“I thought they were just stories,” Amadito said with conviction, with fury. “I swear. People don’t bring that up, they don’t brag about that. I didn’t know. It took me by surprise.”
Was that true, Amadito? One more lie, one more pious lie in the string of lies that had been his life since he enrolled at the Military Academy. Since his birth, for he had been born almost at the same time as the Era. Of course you had to know, had to suspect; of course, in the Fortress at San Pedro de Macorís, and then, among the military adjutants, you had heard, intuited, discovered, in the jokes and boasts, in the excited moments, the bravado, that the privileged, the elect, the officers entrusted with positions of greatest responsibility were subjected to a test of loyalty to Trujillo before they were promoted. You knew very well it existed. But now Second Lieutenant García Guerrero also knew that he never had wanted to know in detail what the test involved. Major Figueroa Carrión shook his hand and repeated something he had heard so often he had begun to believe it:
“You’ll have a great career, boy.”
He ordered him to pick him up at his house at eight that night: they would go for a drink to celebrate his promotion, and take care of a little business.
“Bring the jeep.” The major dismissed him.
At eight o’clock, Amadito was at his superior’s house. The major did not invite him in. He must have been watching at the window, because before Amadito could get out of the jeep, he appeared at the door. He jumped into the jeep, and without responding to the lieutenant’s salute, he ordered, in a falsely casual voice:
“To La Cuarenta, Amadito.”
“To the prison, Major, sir?”
“Yes, to La Cuarenta,” the lieutenant repeated. “You know who was waiting for us there, Turk.”
“Johnny Abbes,” murmured Salvador.
“Colonel Abbes García,” Amadito corrected him with quiet irony. “The head of the SIM, yes.”
“Are you sure you want to tell me this, Amadito?” The young man felt Salvador’s hand on his knee. “Won’t you hate me afterward because you know that I know too?”
Amadito knew him by sight. He had seen him slipping like a shadow along the corridors of the National Palace, getting out of his black bulletproof Cadillac or climbing into it in the gardens of Radhamés Manor, entering or leaving the Chief’s office, something that Johnny Abbes and probably nobody else in the entire country could do—appear at any hour of the day or night at the National Palace or the private residence of the Benefactor and be received immediately—and always, like many of his comrades in the Army, Navy, or Air Force, he had felt a secret shudder of revulsion at that flabby figure stuffed into a Colónel’s uniform, the personified negation of the bearing, agility, martial air, virility, strength, and elegance that military men had to display—the Chief said it every time he spoke to his soldiers on the National Holiday and on Armed Forces Day—that fat-cheeked, funereal face with the little mustache trimmed in the style of Arturo de Córdoba or Carlos López Moctezuma, the most popular Mexican actors, and a capon’s dewlaps hanging down over his short neck. Though they said so only among their closest friends and after
“Can you guess what I have here?”
“A week’s leave for me at the beach, Major, sir?”
“Your promotion to first lieutenant, boy!” His superior happily handed him the folder.
“I stood there with my mouth open, because it wasn’t my turn.” Salvador didn’t move. “I still have eight months before I can apply for a promotion. I thought it was a consolation prize because I was denied permission to get married.”
Salvador, at the foot of the bed, was ill at ease and made a face.
“Didn’t you know, Amadito? Your friends, your superiors, didn’t they tell you about the test of loyalty?”
“I thought they were just stories,” Amadito said with conviction, with fury. “I swear. People don’t bring that up, they don’t brag about that. I didn’t know. It took me by surprise.”
Was that true, Amadito? One more lie, one more pious lie in the string of lies that had been his life since he enrolled at the Military Academy. Since his birth, for he had been born almost at the same time as the Era. Of course you had to know, had to suspect; of course, in the Fortress at San Pedro de Macorís, and then, among the military adjutants, you had heard, intuited, discovered, in the jokes and boasts, in the excited moments, the bravado, that the privileged, the elect, the officers entrusted with positions of greatest responsibility were subjected to a test of loyalty to Trujillo before they were promoted. You knew very well it existed. But now Second Lieutenant García Guerrero also knew that he never had wanted to know in detail what the test involved. Major Figueroa Carrión shook his hand and repeated something he had heard so often he had begun to believe it:
“You’ll have a great career, boy.”
He ordered him to pick him up at his house at eight that night: they would go for a drink to celebrate his promotion, and take care of a little business.
“Bring the jeep.” The major dismissed him.
At eight o’clock, Amadito was at his superior’s house. The major did not invite him in. He must have been watching at the window, because before Amadito could get out of the jeep, he appeared at the door. He jumped into the jeep, and without responding to the lieutenant’s salute, he ordered, in a falsely casual voice:
“To La Cuarenta, Amadito.”
“To the prison, Major, sir?”
“Yes, to La Cuarenta,” the lieutenant repeated. “You know who was waiting for us there, Turk.”
“Johnny Abbes,” murmured Salvador.
“Colonel Abbes García,” Amadito corrected him with quiet irony. “The head of the SIM, yes.”
“Are you sure you want to tell me this, Amadito?” The young man felt Salvador’s hand on his knee. “Won’t you hate me afterward because you know that I know too?”
Amadito knew him by sight. He had seen him slipping like a shadow along the corridors of the National Palace, getting out of his black bulletproof Cadillac or climbing into it in the gardens of Radhamés Manor, entering or leaving the Chief’s office, something that Johnny Abbes and probably nobody else in the entire country could do—appear at any hour of the day or night at the National Palace or the private residence of the Benefactor and be received immediately—and always, like many of his comrades in the Army, Navy, or Air Force, he had felt a secret shudder of revulsion at that flabby figure stuffed into a Colónel’s uniform, the personified negation of the bearing, agility, martial air, virility, strength, and elegance that military men had to display—the Chief said it every time he spoke to his soldiers on the National Holiday and on Armed Forces Day—that fat-cheeked, funereal face with the little mustache trimmed in the style of Arturo de Córdoba or Carlos López Moctezuma, the most popular Mexican actors, and a capon’s dewlaps hanging down over his short neck. Though they said so only among their closest friends and after
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