FOLLOWING MY INSTRUCTIONS TO THE LETTER, the steward woke me at six in the morning. I performed a few brief ablutions with the remainder of the bottle of Villavicencio water that I had requested before retiring the night before, took ten drops of arsenic, dressed, and went to the dining car. My breakfast consisted of a fruit salad and two cups of café con leche (it’s worth remembering: the tea on trains is from Ceylon). I was sorry not to have the opportunity to explain a few details of intellectual property law to the couple with whom I’d eaten dinner the previous evening; they were going much further than Salinas (known these days as Colonel Faustino Tambussi), and, undoubtedly intoxicated by the effects of an allopathic pharmacopoeia, they were giving over to sleep these liminal morning hours that are, thanks to our own indolence, the exclusive province of country folk.
Running nineteen minutes behind schedule—at 7:02—the train arrived in Salinas. No one assisted me with the luggage. The stationmaster—who was, as far as I could tell, the only person awake in the entire town—was too engrossed in a childish game of tossing wicker hoops with the engineer to help a solitary traveler, oppressed by time and luggage. At length he finished his dealings with the engineer and walked over to me. I am not a resentful person, and had already arranged my mouth in a friendly smile and was reaching for my hat, when, like a lunatic, he set upon the freight-car door. He opened it, lunged inside, and I saw five clamorous bird cages fall out into a heap on the platform. I was choked with indignation. I would gladly have offered to take charge of the hens in order to save them from such violence. I consoled myself with the thought that more merciful hands had wrestled with my suitcases.
I turned quickly toward the station’s rear courtyard in order to confirm that the hotel car had arrived. It had not. Immediately, I decided to question the stationmaster. After looking for him for a while, I found him sitting in the waiting room.
“Are you looking for something?” he asked me.
I did not disguise my impatience.
“I am looking for you.”
“Well, then, here I am.”
“I am waiting for the car from the Hotel Central, in Bosque del Mar.”
“If you don’t mind a bit of company, I suggest that you take a seat. At least here there’s a bit of a breeze.” He consulted his watch. “It’s 7:14 and already this hot. I’ll be honest with you: this will end in a storm.”
He took a small mother-of-pearl penknife from his pocket and began to clean his fingernails. I asked him if the hotel car would be much longer. He replied:
“My forecasts do not cover that issue.”
He continued his work with the penknife.
“Where is the post office?” I asked.
“Go to the water pump, beyond the railcars on the dead-end track. Leaving the tree on your right-hand side, turn at a right angle, cross in front of Zudeida’s house and don’t stop until you get to the bakery. The tin hut is the post office.” My informant traced the details of the trajectory in the air with his hands. Then he added: “If you find the guy in charge awake, I’ll give you a prize.”
I indicated where I’d left my luggage, begged him not to allow the hotel car to leave without me, and set forth into that wide-open labyrinth, under a blazing sun.