the quest through la boca proved vain. no one would give him any information. but he was sent hither and yon, serving now as a joke and now as a prey to robbers. he was always assured that such and such an individual could no doubt tell him what he wanted to know, and monsalvat would run this clue down, from café to café, from tavern to tavern. in this fashion he traversed the entire district of la boca, that sinister "tenderloin" of buenos aires. he went to gaming houses, lupanars, saloons. he entered cheap hotels and lodging houses.
here english or german phrases fell on his ear; there he heard norwegian, russian, or finnish. in another quarter he found a medley of balkan tongues, and in yet another he recognized the barbarous arab dialects of northern africa. one day he found himself at a korean bar; on another in a chinese eating house. once he made his way into a gathering of turks. in the course of one month he encountered all kinds of people. a motley throng of gamblers, down-and-outs, and criminals passed before him: yet all was useless. he learned nothing of nacha.
he went back one afternoon to the house where she had been kept a few days, and wondered why he had not thought of doing so before. instead, however, of questioning the girls, he interviewed the proprietress in person, and offered to give her a thousand pesos if she could provide him with reliable information concerning nacha's whereabouts. the woman was an old creature full of cunning and lies, hard to understand because of her mumbling and her odd use of words. she was smoking stubby cigars which she made herself, from paraguay tobacco. but the sum this caller offered for a little information made her open her wrinkled eyelids wide. she began to tell him all she knew.
it so happened also that she detested pampa. he had treated her badly on various occasions, using her for the accomplishment of his crimes, and then failing to pay for her services. with the help of his patota, and mauli, he had brought nacha to her house where she was kept locked up like a prisoner. she would not allow any man to come near her, however, screaming, scratching and biting like a fury. finally arnedo, revolver in hand, made her write to monsalvat, thinking to tame her in that way and show her how useless any resistance was.
"how did she receive arnedo's attentions?" monsalvat asked.
"you ought to have seen her!" the old woman replied, drawing at her cigar butt. "she called him names, just the way she did me, and everyone else she could think of. what words she used! and he didn't run after her much either! i guess he brought her here to get even with someone. with whom? how should i know, son?"
"and you don't know where nacha is?"
"yes. she's...."
she moved her cigar stump to the other side of her mouth.
"see here, young man, if you put down fifty pesos of that thousand now, i'll give you a pretty little piece of information. true as i'm telling you! this old body wouldn't lie! i was raised to speak the truth, and i'll die doing the same!"
monsalvat handed her the sum she asked, and the old creature gave him two bits of advice. he was to talk to a certain amiral, a poor wretch who was a friend of arnedo's, and who, for money, would get the truth out of pampa. however, the other, and the better course to follow, in her opinion, was to see a washerwoman named braulia, who knew all the vicious resorts of the district for she kept them "stocked" with girls.
braulia proved to be a negress, who lived in a shanty, at the back of a vacant lot. after much chattering she told him that she would answer his question the following night, when he was to meet her at a certain café, on the river bank. fearing a decoy, for he had learned to be mistrustful, he asked her why he could not wait on the street corner, or in some café he knew. the negress replied that he would have to go where she told him, and if that didn't suit him he could go without what he was looking for.
the next evening he went to the café designated. his entrance there appeared not to attract attention. as a matter of fact its patrons had instantly spotted him, but they pretended not to notice his presence. the place was a foul den, much like a cave, so low was its roof. the chairs, benches and tables were greasy and ill-smelling. a mulatto in his shirt-sleeves was waiting on the customers. three north american negroes, so drunk they could not stand, were singing something with a cakewalk rhythm. opening their mouths wide, they stretched their thick lips from ear to ear, showing their red gums and gleaming white teeth. one of them was playing a large accordion. from the table where monsalvat was sitting he could see the port light of a boat, and above, the starry sky. every few minutes a drunken man staggered up the street.
while he was waiting for some message from the negress, a man came up to him, and, telling him he belonged to the secret police, advised him to leave. "this is no place for you," he said. "whoever it was told you to come here is just planning to rob you." monsalvat left the place, and never returned to it.
he decided to see amiral; but this turned out to be more easily planned than done. amiral apparently never ate at home and rarely slept there; and it was of course useless to write to him since he was quite likely to show the communication to arnedo. so, while trying to find the elusive amiral, monsalvat continued his seeking of nacha. he was beginning now to absent himself from his office for entire afternoons. list in hand, he went about stirring up all the back waters of this dismal slough of despond.
"she is not here. we don't know her," they would tell him.
then he would go to another house, and another, and yet another. he would explain his object, argue with the unfriendly "madames," give countless details about nacha. at times he begged for help; but at others, he would become enraged and insult the woman who told him "she is not here." exasperated, maddened, he would rush out and stumble into the first taxi that passed, giving addresses of yet other houses. for he could think of nothing but this purpose. he came to the point of believing that everyone was in league to outwit him. but he would succeed yet! he had one irresistible ally: the will to find her!
"she is not here. we don't know her."
"what? not here either?" then the earth must have swallowed her! they all knew nothing about her, these people? that was a lie! they wanted to lead him on, exploit him, as they had done countless times. there was nothing but lies and hypocrisy and evil in these women. and he had defended them, ruined himself for them! ah, nacha! nacha! what had her unhappy destiny brought her to? she asked him not to look for her, since she was destined to a bad life! but all the more would he persist, with all the more eagerness, all the more desperation! he would seek her, not for love, but to save her from those stagnant waters on whose brim ill-fated women and girls lurched and staggered, dizzy with the poisonous gases of that loathsome morass!
"she is not here. we don't know her."
every word fell on him like a whip-lash. he would come out of these accursed houses, sick, in physical pain; and he could not grow used to disappointments. at first his heart had been high with hope. but now his step was beginning to falter, and a strange expression had come over his face. his eyes glanced nervously about at people and objects in the room, or stared at the woman he was questioning. he knew that she too would say, "she is not here." yet he went on to the next house and to the next, repeating his frantic question. then, almost invariably, without a word more he would rush out; though once, to the stupefaction of the women, he uttered an exclamation of anguish, and staggered to a chair.
"she is not here. we don't know her," was the unvarying reply.
at the thought that she might be dead his throat tightened and closed, while the rest of his body felt the oppression as of a great weight of earth upon it. nacha dead! what was he to do in a world without nacha? should he return to the place he had formerly occupied in life? or consecrate himself to those other wretches of the underworld? but then nacha could not have died without his feeling it, without his knowing it! no, nacha could not be dead! she was alive! she loved him! she was waiting for him!
"she is not here. we don't know her."
well, didn't he know that nacha wasn't there? nacha loved him, and was expecting him, somewhere. that much was sure! if he had come to this particular house to inquire it was merely to be thorough. the people there could all go to the devil for all he cared! he wasn't going to ask any favors of them! nacha was waiting for him.... what did the rest of the world matter ... society, or its victims, or the cabaret, or the workmen murdered in the square, or his mother's death, or his sister's! nacha was expecting him! his heart, where a sweet, incessant song was singing, leapt, mad with joy, like the throbbing breast of a bird! nacha was expecting him....
but where?
meanwhile monsalvat was not altogether unmindful of himself. he noticed that at times his mind became blank, and that at such moments he would turn deathly pale, and be unable to walk. then again he suffered from pains at the base of his brain, as if a wedge had been hammered into his skull at that point. he wondered if this presaged mental derangement. was he going mad? he ate next to nothing, and slept little. worried about his condition, he spent a week in bed.
one afternoon a letter came from the ministry. it contained his dismissal. monsalvat read the document, smiling. with it was a letter from the under-secretary who expressed his chief's regrets at being forced to take such action; but monsalvat's frequent absences from the office, his lack of attention to his work, which, of course, might result in serious consequences, left the minister no choice in the matter.
monsalvat tossed both communications to the floor. "what does such nonsense matter to me? nacha is waiting for me!"
the "nonsense," nevertheless, had serious implications. november was upon him and he had paid only a third of the interest on the mortgage. the bank was insisting on payment, but he had no idea where to get the three thousand pesos needed. moreover he was constantly giving away more than he could possibly afford, and na?vely letting himself be robbed on every hand. he had borrowed at high rates and had never paid any of the accumulating interest. the bank, however, came to his rescue by selling the tenement, obtaining scarcely sixty thousand at the auction, which occurred on an oppressive november day. very few bidders appeared; for it was just the beginning of that financial crisis which was to come to a head some fifteen months later, in 1913. property values were going down. money stringency was acute. no one was risking investment in real estate except at a bargain. the bank recovered its forty thousand pesos with the interest. monsalvat paid his minor borrowings and in the end found himself possessed of some ten thousand pesos. he now felt quite at ease. on that sum he could live two years in case he found no work. but it was written that bad luck was to pursue him. the bank in which he deposited his money failed within three months!
he met amiral one morning, and, without preamble, told him that he wanted him to find out from arnedo, as skillfully as possible, where nacha was. amiral, at mention of this name, smiled understandingly. he stroked his long brown mustache, and stretching out his thin arms, he exclaimed:
"just what i always said! of course a man like you who has lived in paris—why, when they told me you were trying to reform our girls over here, i wouldn't believe them, for i felt sure you knew better.... well, i'm glad to see i was right!"
monsalvat wanted to knock the fellow down but contained himself. amiral, thoroughly pleased with his penetration, added, in a confidential tone:
"it was clever of you to think of this disguise; because here in buenos aires, alas! there is no atmosphere.... one has to provide it ... ha! ha! ... provide it!"
monsalvat wasted no time trying to correct amiral's interpretation of his conduct, but with brutal directness offered him a thousand pesos to find out where nacha was. amiral staggered back dramatically. he thought that it perhaps became him to be angry; but, having consulted his conscience, he decided to accept. there was no need of being offended for so small a sum! had it been fifty or a hundred thousand...!
several days passed. monsalvat was frightened by a rapid change for the worse in his nervous condition. one afternoon as he was drinking some coffee in a pastry shop near the business centre of the town, the mental blankness he knew and dreaded came upon him. his hands trembled, and he broke into a cold sweat. a waiter helped him into a cab. when he reached his room he found he could neither read nor write. his mind seemed scattered, broken into bits. all his strength was gone. from day to day his organism seemed to lose coordination, as if all the parts of his being had escaped the control of his will. different men seemed to manifest themselves within him; as he wonderingly observed them, he found the acts and thoughts of these other monsalvats quite inexplicable.
finally, one december morning, amiral told him that arnedo knew nothing about nacha. after keeping her several days locked up in a certain house, he had taken her to another, from which, after a week or two, she had run away.
monsalvat believed her lost forever. at the same time he was astonished at the slight impression amiral's words seemed to make on him. he stood motionless for a long time gazing blankly into the distance, but he felt so ill that he yielded to a desire to go to some friend. he called on de castro, preferring not to see torres, who might think him either sick or insane. ruiz was profoundly distressed at sight of him. monsalvat noticed his friend's pitying expression and stammered some incoherent words. then he collapsed.
a deep, painful night had settled on him, body and soul, nor could his mind see in that sudden darkness. his whole being had become insensible. for him now there was no longer either nacha or monsalvat; nor struggling nor rest; for him there was neither truth or beauty; the world had been blotted out.
