The Tunnel

The Tunnel

I

It should be sufficient to say that I am Juan Pablo Castel, the painter who killed María Iribarne. I imagine that the trial is still in everyone’s mind and that no further information about myself is necessary.

Granted, it is true that the devil himself cannot predict what people will remember, or why they remember it. I for one have never believed there is such a thing as a collective memory – which may be one way humans protect themselves. The phrase ‘the good old days’ does not mean that bad things happened less frequently in the past, only – fortunately – that people simply forget they happened. Obviously that view is not universally accepted. I, for example, would characterize myself as a person who prefers to remember the bad things. I might even argue for the past as ‘the bad old days,’ if it were not for the fact I consider the present as horrible as the past. I remember so many catastrophes, so many cynical and cruel faces, so many inhumane actions, that for me memory is a glaring light illuminating a sordid museum of shame. How often have I sat for hours in some dark corner of my studio, driven to despair by reading an account of some crime in the newspaper. Even so, it is not always in accounts of crimes that we find the most reprehensible acts of humankind; to a degree, criminals are the most decent and least offensive people among us. I do not make this statement because I myself killed another human being; it is my profound and honest conviction. Is a certain individual a menace to society? Then eliminate him and let that be an end to it. That is what I could call a good deed. Think how much worse it would be for society if that person were allowed to continue distilling his poison; think how pointless it would be if instead of eliminating him you attempted to forestall him by means of anonymous letters, or slander, or other loathsome measures. As for myself, I frankly confess that I now regret not having used my time to better advantage when I was a free man, that is, for not having done away with six or seven individuals I could name.

It is a terrible world; that truism demands no demonstration. Nonetheless, I will offer a single example as proof. Some years ago I read that in one of the concentration camps when a former pianist complained of hunger he was forced to eat a rat – a live rat.

However, that is not the subject I want to discuss now. If the opportunity arises, I will have more to say on the subject of the rat.

II

As I was saying, my name is Juan Pablo Castel. You may wonder what has motivated me to write this account of my crime (I may not have told you that I am going to relate all those details) and, especially, why I want to publish it. I know the human soul well enough to predict that some of you will believe it is from vanity. Think what you want, I don’t give a damn. It has been a long time since I cared a fig for men’s opinions or their justice. Go ahead, then, believe if you wish that I am publishing this story out of vanity. After all, I am made of flesh and blood and hair and fingernails like any other man, and I would consider it unrealistic for anyone to expect special qualities of me – particularly of me. There are times when a person feels he is a superman, until he realizes that he, too, is low, and vile, and treacherous. I do not need to comment on vanity. As far as I know, no human is devoid of this formidable motivation for Human Progress. People make me laugh when they talk about the modesty of an Einstein, or someone of his kind. My answer to them is that it is easy to be modest when you are famous. That is, appear to be modest. Even when you think a person hasn’t the slightest trace of vanity, suddenly you discover it in its most subtle form: the vanity of modesty. How often we see that kind of person. Even a man like Christ – whether real or symbolic – a being for whom I have always felt, indeed, still do, the deepest reverence, spoke words that were motivated by vanity – or at least by arrogance. And what can you say of a Leon Bloy, who defended himself against the accusation of arrogance by arguing he had spent a lifetime serving people who did not deserve to lick his boots. Vanity is found in the most unlikely places: in combination with kindness, and selflessness, and generosity. When I was a boy I used to despair at the idea that my mother would die one day (as you grow older you learn that death is not only bearable but even comforting). I could not imagine that she might have faults. Now that she is dead, I can say that she was as good as a human being can ever be. But I remember in her last years, when I was a grown man, how at first it pained me to discover a very subtle trace of vanity or pride underlying her kindness and generosity. Something much more illustrative happened to me personally when she had an operation for cancer. In order to arrive in time I had to travel two full days without sleeping. When I reached her bedside, a tender smile lighted her face as she murmured a few words of sympathy (imagine, she was sympathizing with my fatigue!). And in the obscure depths of my being I felt the stirring of vain pride for having come so promptly. I confess this secret so that you will see I am sincere when I say that I am no better than any other man.

No, it is not because of vanity that I am telling this story. I might be willing to concede some degree of pride or arrogance. But why do I have this mania to explain everything that happens? When I began this account I had determined not to offer explanations of any kind. I wanted to tell the story of my crime: that and nothing more. Anyone who was not interested did not have to read it. Although I would be very suspicious of that person, because it is precisely people who always demand explanations who are the most curious, and I am sure that none of them would miss the chance to read to the very end the story of a crime.

I could withhold the reasons that motivated me to write these confessional pages, but since I have no desire to be considered an eccentric, I will tell the truth, which is simple enough anyway: I thought that what I wrote might be read by a great many people now that I am a celebrity, and although I do not have many illusions about humanity in general and the readers of these pages in particular, I am animated by the faint hope that someone will understand me – even if it is only one person.

‘Why,’ someone will surely ask, ‘such a faint hope if the book will be read by so many people?’ This is typical of the kinds of questions I consider absolutely pointless; nevertheless, I must be prepared for them, because people constantly ask pointless questions, questions the most superficial analysis reveals to be unnecessary. I could speak until I dropped, yelling at the top of my lungs before an assembly of a hundred thousand Russians: not one would understand me. Do you see what I am saying?

There was one person who could have understood me. But she was the very person I killed.

III

Everyone knows that I killed María Iribarne Hunter. But no one knows how I met her, exactly what our relationship was, or why I came to believe I had to kill her. I will try to recount all this objectively. I may have suffered great pain because of María, but I am not stupid enough to claim that my behavior was exemplary.

In the annual spring art show I had exhibited a painting entitled Motherhood. It was painted in the style typical of many of my earlier works: as the critics say in their unbearable jargon, it was solid, soundly architectural. In short, it has all the qualities those charlatans always saw in my canvases, including a ‘profoundly cerebral je ne sais quoi.’ In the upper left-hand corner of the canvas was a remote scene framed in a tiny window: an empty beach and a solitary woman looking at the sea. She was staring into the distance as if expecting something, perhaps some faint and faraway summons. In my mind that scene suggested the most wistful and absolute loneliness.

No one seemed to notice the scene: their eyes passed over it as if it were something trivial, mere embellishment. With the exception of a single person, no one seemed to comprehend that the scene was an essential component of the painting. It was the day of the opening. A young woman I had never seen before stood for a long time before my painting, apparently ignoring the large figure of a woman in the foreground, a woman watching her child at play. Instead, she stared at the scene of the window, and as she did, I was sure that she was totally isolated from the world: she neither saw nor heard the people walking by or pausing to view my canvas.

I watched her nervously the whole time. Then she disappeared in the crowd, while I struggled between a crippling fear and an agonizing desire to call to her. Fear? Of what? Perhaps the same fear you feel when you bet every penny you own on one spin of the wheel. After she was gone I felt irritable, miserable; I was convinced I would never see her again now that she was lost among the millions of anonymous inhabitants of Buenos Aires.

I went home that night feeling nervous, discontent, dejected.

I went back every day until the show closed, stationing myself close enough to see everyone who stopped before my painting. But she never returned.

Throughout the months that followed I thought only of her and of the possibility that I might see her again. And in a way I painted