The Last Resort Read Online Free PDF Page A

“we have now arrived at the topic of the . . .”
    “The lover?”
    “Please, do not make me rush through this: For the moment, we have Isabella attending all the little parties in Madrid, pursued by all, everyone telling her how beautiful she is, giving her thousands of reasons to realize that her husband, poor old Steine, is really just a bore who can’t keep up with her—and this, of course, is her own fault. Because she very innocently married the first acceptable male that crossed her path, when in reality she could have done a whole lot better. And then, suddenly—abracadabra—the right man appears: Jaime Valdés, who is, of course, the husband of a very good friend.”
    “Typical.”
    “I know, I know, but just let me describe this new character. It’s a shame you never met him, because Jaimevaldés was one of those types that you would have just loved to dissect. He wasn’t handsome, exactly, but he definitely had a way with women. He must have been . . . forty-seven—somewhere around there. He went to the same elementary school as my brother Miguel. The Colegio del Pilar, in Madrid. We didn’t know him all that well, but he was a pretty popular sort of a person. Aside from being a real ladies’ man, he always hung around with the successful crowd, if you know what I mean. The kind of people who try to position themselves with the in crowd every chance they get—showing up everywhere with them, going to all the parties, etcetera . . .” Fernanda sighed, looking at her uncle. “Honestly, I will never understand why some people are so obsessed with being part of this in crowd. It’s so much
work:
First you have to freeze your ass off at, like, fifty fox hunts a year. Then you have to start playing golf. And then destroy your knees on the paddle-tennis courts. And be ‘beeeeest friends’ with so-and-so even though they put you right to sleep. And when someone ‘forgets’ to invite you to dinner, you have to casually call them up and ask how they are, for God’s sake. And then? And then, oh yes, you have to listen to opera day and night—even Wagner!—and swear that you absolutely adore it. All the classic tricks of social acrobatics . . . but anyway, enough with all these weaknesses. Suffice it to say that our newfound hero suffered through all these social requirements. But there is one other point I wanted to make: Jaimevaldés was an intelligent man: intelligent, a womanizer, and fatally flirtatious, I would say . . .”
    The Italians at the table next to them had asked for their check, which the maître d’ delivered right away, sending a crystal-clear message by carrying it directly over the heads of Fernanda and Molinet.
    “Perhaps you ought to get back on track, Fernanda dear. These British restaurants don’t have much patience for our Spanish-style post-meal chats.”
    “And it’s a shame,” said Fernanda, sighing again. “Because that means I will have to give you the official version, which is much shorter than my own.”
    “There are two versions of the story? I’d prefer the real one.”
    “All right, but please do let me just finish painting a picture of our dearly departed. Now, Valdés was married to a very good friend of Isabella’s, a good friend of mine too, for that matter. Her name is Mercedes Algorta. She is from Bilbao, a dyed-in-the-wool native of Bilbao.” Fernanda emphasized it as if it were some kind of special achievement. “Oh yes, I could tell you plenty about my friend Mercedes, plenty indeed. But I’d better just quickly tell you what happened that fateful day before they kick us out of here.”
    Molinet looked at his watch. It was twenty to four. As he signaled to the waiter for the check, he took advantage of the moment to ask Fernanda to speed things up.
    “Brevity, darling, does not mean going off on tangents.”
    “Oh, whenever I think of poor Valdés, may he rest in peace,” she said, a bit more hastily now, “I imagine him just as he was: