Three concrete steps of indeterminate age, rusted and russet stained at the base of each baluster, led to a narrow stoop and a weathered six panel door, green faded into greyness, soiled, splotched, and chipped and splintered, whose knob rattled in the hand and turned this way and that without catching the latch until a push and twist just so opened to the lobby of a disreputable hotel.
Once just a hallway, now fitted with a counter tight against the left hand wall. A dimpled window opened to reveal what was likely an office of sorts, though only card board boxes heaped haphazardly could be seen, that and a card table with an old black bakelite phone squatting on it like some ancient toad.
A man stood behind the counter. A short man, rotund. His bulging eyes filled his face. Exophthalmos, he said, spittle running from the corner of his thin lipped mouth. Graves’ disease, my autoimmune system is on the blink.Once just a hallway, now fitted with a counter tight against the left hand wall. A dimpled window opened to reveal what was likely an office of sorts, though only card board boxes heaped haphazardly could be seen, that and a card table with an old black bakelite phone squatting on it like some ancient toad.
I had not asked. He had taken my money for two nights, handed me a pen, and began his tale of woe. My train, if the schedule was right, would leave the day after tomorrow; and I could leave this place. What money remained would keep me fed. I had no interest in his immune system.
“Key?” I asked.
He wrinkled his nose, swallowed what remained of his dissertation. A quick rummage below the countertop produced a key. He pointed to the stairway. “At the back,” he said.
The narrow stairwell and well worn, rounded treads led me upstairs. Thirteen steps each with its own creak and groan, none now square on its riser. I had only a small knapsack which contained a wool blanket from La Paz, three pocketbook copies of books by Jorge Luis Borges, and a leather folder with passport, tickets, toothbrush, and what remained of my money.
The stairs opened onto a long dim hallway, two lightbulbs without shades, linoleum floor covering and five doors on either side. Mine was at the back on the right. Through the window at the end of the hall, begrimed and appearing to be painted shut, came the skeletal outline of the fire escape; and beyond was the blackened brick of an old building that once housed an assayist and a mortician, with rooms above for those in need.
My door opened with the pressure of the key inserted into the lock. Faced with the straitened miasma the room presented, I nearly fled. Even the fire escape, dilapidated though it no doubt was, seemed preferable. A toilet and sink occupied a small room on the left. Beyond, no more than four strides, sat a single bed with its soiled bilious green coverlet with the lump of a pillow, a card table and chair, a lamp with a torn shade and a patch on the floor of the hallway’s linoleum. The room was without a window. A fixture of twisted rusted wrought iron hung from the ceiling with its naked single bulb, a pull chain hanging from its socket.
I would not be sleeping beneath the sheets tonight. No matter. There would be a roof over my head and a semblance of security.
I would spend the daylight hours elsewhere. Pulling the door closed, I turned the key in the lock, and left. Popeye was not at his post.
The heat outside had not abated. Down the steps, pack slung over a shoulder, I walked the street to the first intersection, then turned towards the harbor, the glint and blue of the sea beyond. A breeze would fill from the gulf as the afternoon heat rose and created a vacuum. Gulls mewed about the pier where the boats of the fishermen tied up. The hills above the town were sere, withered, and bare of trees. The town, rising gently from the sea, had taken its plan from Frenchmen come to mine copper, cobalt, and manganese; and was gridded in parallel streets that crisscrossed through a grid until the rising desert hills impinged.
A small stream of turbid water and a cemetery on its far side marked the town’s southern edge. A small cluster of palo verde trees shaded a cluster of mausoleums, crypts more like, unkempt but not unwelcoming. A disreputable footbridge without railings crossed the creek, and I made my way to the most imposing of the buildings. Sat, leaning against a column supporting the small portico, knee raised with arms encircling.
The usual gibberish marked the head stone. Born, died, loving son, caring father, rest in peace. And graffiti, done with a spray can of red paint: salsipuedes. I shook my head to see the word. As a boy I had played in a creek that ran from the brown bare hills of East San Jose, mudfights, and frog snatching, fist fights, cigarettes, and bad wine.
Get out if you can.
I had; or so I thought, but now knew better.
A breeze rose from the sea carrying a tang of salt while just below came the muted sound of wave lap and mewling gulls.
Somnolent, this town, moribund in afternoon heat. Sure, why not.
Along the creek a coyote passed quickly, head turning to see me, tongue hanging, loping away through the bunchgrass. Standing now, I could see the mounds of fresh dirt, the dark rectangle of a newly dug grave, and a row of weathered tombstones standing along that far edge of the cemetery, the creek bank just beyond. The stones stood askew, their inscriptions effaced save for the faint outlines of what would be numbers and letters. As I walked, drawn to the old burials, I swiped an arm across my forehead, eyes smarting with sweat, squinting, seeing now the man with his shovel, rising from the grave, swiping an arm across his forehead, squinting, who turned to me and said, salsipuedes.
Working an ebb tide, the cry of gulls.
There will be no respite.
