Mascara

  Here is proof of my trust.

  Here is your first face.

  Look at it carefully. You dimly saw it that day when the nurse brought you to the consulting room of a poor plastic surgeon. There it was, floating above your waters on the first day of your creation. Can there be more eloquent evidence of our partnership? That you should put on the only face I did not extract from nothingness, the only face that was given to me already made, that I inherited, and that now, thanks to you, I can bestow as a gift and someday recover for myself? My face.

  To whom else could I offer it?

  My son.

  A SORT OF EPILOGUE

  “Good evening, Mrs. Lynch.”

  “What are you doing in my house? How did you get in?”

  “You are Mrs. Lynch, aren’t you? Mrs. Maya Lynch?”

  “But what right do you—”

  “It’d be better if you sat down, madam. And please take off your raincoat. We wouldn’t want your rug to get ruined.”

  “Though it won’t be long. Just a couple of questions, ma’am, and we’ll be on our way. It’s about yesterday afternoon.”

  “But I just got back from the police. It’s the third time I’ve had to speak to …”

  “There are always odds and ends to clear up, Mrs. Lynch. You are Mrs. Maya Lynch, I take it?”

  “I’m Maya, but no longer Mrs. Lynch. My husband and I, we’ve—”

  “Two years ago, ma’am. We know that. But since your divorce still hasn’t come through, we’ll continue to call you by your married name, if you don’t mind. You are, at any rate, Doctor Mavirelli’s nurse. You’re not denying it?”

  “Why should I deny it? What I still don’t know are your names.”

  “You do not know our names, madam, for the simple reason that we have not told them to you. Not only doctors have the privilege of confidentiality.”

  “Doctor Mavirelli has insisted that I see an I.D. before talking about this matter. He doesn’t want journalists finding out about …”

  “When did the doctor tell you this?”

  “Yesterday.”

  “So you haven’t seen him since the incident?”

  “He gave me the rest of the week off. He asked me to cancel all his appointments.”

  “And he did not inform you that he was going to leave the city?”

  “Has he left the city?”

  “That’s what we wanted to ask you, ma’am.”

  “I hope that you won’t take this badly, but I cannot continue answering your questions until you two show me—”

  “It seems you’re going to have to accompany us, then, ma’am. A pity. Seeing as we’ve done you this big favor.”

  “I don’t see the big favor, if you pardon me.”

  “No big favor? My colleague thought it would be more comfortable for you to have a little talk at your own home. The rain, and your feeling tired, things like that. But I can see he was wrong. You can admit it, man. You made a mistake, right?”

  “Would you calm down, huh? The lady has never said that she wouldn’t cooperate. Isn’t that so, madam?”

  “What are you talking about? You think I’m deaf? She’s just said that she won’t answer questions, thinks we’re a couple of hack journalists. So you think we’re journalists, Mrs. Lynch? Into the car with her. Into the car and let’s get going. I’ll tell you one thing, though: I’m not bringing her back. Not me. She can spend the night back there.”

  “Could you do me a favor? Could you help the lady with her umbrella—look at it dripping there. Where do you put your umbrella, Mrs. Lynch?”

  “I can put away my own umbrella.”

  “You shouldn’t trouble yourself. We’ll take care of that. Yeah—put it in the bathroom, along with ours. Hey, you might as well take her raincoat, can you do that? She won’t be needing it. That’s right. Off you go … Let me explain, madam, just between you and me, that my colleague is not as brusque as he sounds. It so happens that he’s in a hurry. He’s always in a hurry, but today he has some additional reasons—let’s call them of a personal nature. He has to meet someone, you understand … So I’m glad that we won’t be forced to ask you to come along with us …”

  “Will it take long?”

  “Didn’t I tell you that the man’s in a hurry?”

  “I don’t know what else I have to add but—”

  “Good. We’re ready, then. And here he comes. No umbrella, no raincoat. So if you could do us the favor of sitting down. That’s fine. That’s the way we like it. Who’s asking the questions, who’s taking the notes?”

  “I’ll do the asking. Let’s begin with that phone call to the police, ma’am. Why did you make that call?”

  “I already told you people. I had the impression that the doctor—”

  “You mean Doctor Mavirelli?”

  “Yes, sir, that Doctor Mavirelli was in danger, that he was being threatened.”

  “But when the police came, you told them that it had been a false alarm, that everything was under control.”

  “They took quite a while to come, sir, a good half-hour.”

  “A good half-hour? Are you sure about that?”

  “Yes, sir. I was surprised, too. I hope you won’t take this badly, but the services are steadily getting worse in this city.”

  “So that so much time had passed that you thought everything was all right?”

  “That’s what I thought, sir. You couldn’t hear a thing from the doctor’s private operating room, so I thought that—”

  “And were you surprised when the police insisted on seeing the doctor and found the patient dead?”

  “I wouldn’t call him a patient, sir, if you’ll allow me, because the truth is that it was the woman who had come for the operation.”

  “He wasn’t a patient? How can you be so sure? Were you with them during the … let’s see, almost two hours they were inside?”

  “Of course not. I was outside. But there’s no plastic surgeon like Doctor Mavirelli in the country. Maybe in the world. There was time for an operation, I’ll admit that. Because what the papers say, sir, that’s the holy truth. In fifteen minutes, at times twenty, he can alter a face so that you—”

  “It’s clear you’re loyal to your employer, madam. We like that.”

  “Yeah, we really like to see loyalty in times like these, ma’am, but we don’t need you to sell us the merchandise, you know. We understand the doctor’s famous. But I don’t intend to have an operation, so you can spare me the propaganda.”

  “It’s not propaganda, sir. I was saying it because if the doctor had operated on that man, I can assure you that some improvement of his face would have been noticeable. He would have made it at least a bit more … well, flashy. Showy. And this man, the holy truth is that I had never seen a less important face. To the point that when he came yesterday after lunch, I almost didn’t let him in. The doctor had canceled all his appointments, so I thought it would be somebody more—well, at any rate, not a man so, I don’t know, common. He was Mr. Nobody. Not like the doctor’s usual clients.”

  “And how do you explain, then, that they spent so much time, both of them, inside Doctor Mavirelli’s operating room?”

  “You’d have to ask the doctor that.”

  “We’ve already asked him, ma’am. He invokes his right to confidentiality, won’t comment on the matter. And today we haven’t even been able to find him. That’s why we’d like to know your version of the whole thing.”

  “The doctor was worried by a car crash he had been in, Christmas Eve it was. I don’t know the details, but he was awfully glad when that man called up and asked to see him. It seems he was ready to take the blame if the doctor did a favor for the man’s girl friend.”

  “And that wasn’t unusual, that sort of swap?”

  “The doctor says that you don’t always have to demand payment in money. He says that people have a lot of other services to offer. And if they took their time, it must have been because the man w
as the jealous type, maybe he wanted to know each particular of the operation.”

  “But the doctor never operated on the girl.”

  “The girl?”

  “The girl, ma’am, the woman who was to be operated on, the woman with the bandaged face.”

  “Oh, you mean the woman. She didn’t move an inch, during those two hours, from the window. The only thing she asked me was if there was an emergency exit. I told her yes. Even added that this business couldn’t be run without an emergency exit, hoping that maybe she’d answer and that way we could pass the time with a little talk, but she didn’t say another word and I left her alone. I’m used to being absolutely discreet.”

  “So you don’t know the names of Doctor Mavirelli’s clients.”

  “No, and if I did, I wouldn’t give them to you. But I do happen to know that they are influential people. Very influential. The doctor has always told me that if I ever need any—”

  “And she did not move from the window during the whole time?”

  “No, sir.”

  “So the doctor could not have had occasion to change her face?”

  “I already told you it could not have happened.”

  “And you never saw her face? The doctor never saw it?”

  “No, sir. I already told you that—look, quite frankly, I do not see that I am adding anything new to the deposition I already gave yesterday and this morning and now, this afternoon.”

  “What if you let me decide what matters and what doesn’t, huh, lady?”

  “You’ll have to pardon my colleague’s brusqueness, madam, but what he’s saying is true. You call the shots in the doctor’s consulting room, we call the shots in what we ask here. Just keep on telling the story.”

  “All of a sudden the bandaged woman stood up. She had seen something through the window—or so it seemed.”

  “You saw what she had seen?”

  “No, sir, I was behind the desk.”

  “How do you know what she saw, then?”

  “I don’t know, sir. I only know that it was something that struck … terror in her heart. Yes. She was terrorized.”

  “And it had to be something she saw through the window.”

  “I don’t know what else it could have been. She was looking at the street without a peep for two hours. Suddenly she gets up and tells me that they’re coming.”

  “They? You’re sure?”

  “She said they, sir. So it must have been more than one man, at least two. She rushed to the emergency exit, and I—well, I was really astonished, but I managed to ask her if she wanted to leave a message for the doctor or the gentleman—I called him that, though the truth is that I don’t think he was any gentleman at all—if she wanted to leave some sort of message. And she answered, ‘He won’t be needing me, anymore.’ ”

  “That he wouldn’t be needing her, anymore? Which of the two?”

  “I beg your pardon, sir?”

  “Which of the two, the doctor or her friend—which one was she leaving the message for?”

  “Which of the two? The truth is that I didn’t think to ask that question. I supposed it was for her friend. She didn’t even know the doctor.”

  “And she took off the bandage?”

  “No, sir. Though in the street she must have, because otherwise she would have attracted everybody’s attention. You can’t go far with a bandage like that on, sir.”

  “And you haven’t seen her since then, ma’am?”

  “No, sir. Why should I see her? Has she done anything wrong?”

  “What she’s done or not done is not a matter that should concern you. What we’re interested in is why you called the police.”

  “I’ll tell you, sir. When the doctor came out with that man and they didn’t find the woman, the truth is that—the man turned violent. Agitated, I believe that’s the word I used originally, but I wouldn’t be wrong to call it violence. He ran to the window to see if the woman—”

  “Ran?”

  “Yes, sir, he went running.”

  “Not limping?”

  “The one who was limping, it seems to me, was the doctor. Due to the accident. But I may be confused.”

  “You may well be. And so the man …”

  “I was alarmed, sir. I thought he was going to throw himself out the window. And then he turned, and without a word he looked at the doctor as if asking him where the woman was, as if the doctor had stolen her. I felt scared.”

  “And why were you so scared?”

  “Because of the eyes, sir. They were, I don’t know, sir—it’s as if they were dead, sir.”

  “Dead? Did you say dead?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And you read a lot of horror novels, huh, lady?”

  “I would ask you, sir, that you keep to yourself any snide comments you may have. If you’re interested in continuing this conversation …”

  “And through all of this, the doctor …”

  “He was pale. Breathing with his mouth closed. I know that he says that the whole affair did not affect him at all and that it is quite normal in his sort of work that people should just up and go, disappear before an operation. But in spite of what he says, he seemed very—dismayed, I would say. Beside himself, almost. Calm, though. As if some tragedy had fallen upon him, the funeral of someone dearly beloved.”

  “And that’s why you called the police?”

  “No, sir, not yet. He stayed there—”

  “The doctor?”

  “Yes, sir. The doctor stayed there as if rooted to the floor, watching that man striding up and down, up and down, and then, all of a sudden, as if he were wakening from a nightmare—”

  “Definitely too many novels, ma’am.”

  “You heard what Mrs. Lynch said. Those sort of remarks bother her.”

  “But she should know that I’m not to blame. Yes, ma’am, it’s not me who’s saying this about you. It’s the doctor himself. He’s the one who says that you’re exaggerating all the time, that your only defect is an excess of imagination.”

  “The doctor said that? About me? I have never in my whole life heard him make any comment of the sort about me or about any—”

  “We’ve heard all this before. What you still haven’t been able to explain, ma’am, is why you called the police.”

  “Well, this man began to act unpleasant. The doctor suggested they go talk inside and the man didn’t want to, and then he said something about there being nothing more to talk about.”

  “And what do you think he was referring to?”

  “I thought that since the doctor hadn’t been able to operate on his girl friend, the man was no longer willing to take the blame for the accident. At any rate, they finally went in and then … well, inside, the doctor, or the other one, bumped into some test tubes and they fell and I heard the noise and I thought there was a fight going on and that the Doctor was in danger, and then, I know it was silly of me, but I called the police.”

  “Without asking your employer’s permission?”

  “I was scared, sir.”

  “And you don’t think that there could indeed have been a fight and that your employer killed that patient?”

  “How could I possibly think such a thing? He died of cardiac arrest. When we went in, he had just expired. The doctor was trying to revive him. There he was, crouched over the body, trying to return it to life. It made me afraid at first, because it was as if his hands were coming out of the dead body, as if they were coming from deep inside. It took him a good while to lift his eyes. And he was very distressed.”

  “Crying?”

  “I couldn’t say, sir. Distressed.”

  “And why did you declare, the first time, that he had something strange in his eyes? That he had, that his eyes were … burned out, you said.”

  “That was a mistake on my part, sir. I was talking about the other one, the dead man.”

  “We rather doubt it, ma’am. You were talking about the doctor. ‘He was?
??unrecognizable.’ That’s what you said at your first interrogation. ‘It made me afraid, that’s the holy truth. When I saw his eyes. It was as if they were burned out, the color of ashes.’ ”

  “That’s impossible, sir. Doctor Mavirelli—look, if I had to describe the doctor’s eyes, I’d describe them more like burning coals. Full of fire, of life.”

  “But your first impression was not quite that, was it?”

  “I didn’t look much at him, sir, if you want to know the truth. I was more interested in the fact that the dead man was smiling.”

  “Go on. Why are you stopping now?”

  “You’re going to make fun of me again.”

  “Madam, I can promise you that my colleague will not make fun of you because of anything that you say.”

  “He’ll say I have too much imagination and that I read too many novels, that’s what he’s going to say.”

  “A promise is a promise, madam. Tell us about the smile.”

  “You can see it for yourselves. You have the body, don’t you?”

  “No, ma’am, we don’t have the body.”

  “It was returned to Doctor Mavirelli, Mrs. Lynch.”

  “It was returned to him? I thought that first an autopsy had to be performed.”

  “The doctor called up a couple of his friends and orders came from above that the body was to be turned over to him. He said he was in a hurry. That there are certain delicate tissues that can be ruined in an autopsy and that this was a case of great scientific interest and … well, you can understand that we were surprised. Because we weren’t aware that doctors have now become the owners of each patient who dies in their operating room, nobody had told us that was the law.”

  “But somebody must have come forward to claim the body.”

  “You want to know something, Mrs. Lynch? Between you and us? You want to know? Nobody came forward for that body. No family, no friends, nobody. Because we don’t even know who the man is. The slightest notion. There’s not a reference in the files, not a photograph, not a clue.”

  “But Doctor Mavirelli must have some idea.”