The Spanish Bow by Andromeda Romano-Lax Page B

fraud, I was even more afraid he'd discover
my
fraudulence. I knew nothing about the cello repertoire.
    But self-doubt didn't stifle my appetite. As Alberto talked and whistled and finally sang, my stomach grumbled with mounting insistence, until my new tutor finally paused to say absentmindedly, "Yes—we should eat something," as if he'd been waiting days for someone to help him reach that conclusion.
    Since we 'd moved in, Mamá had tackled the mess in Alberto's kitchen, clearing away stacks of dirty plates and black-bottomed cups. That morning, Señora Pacheco, the old lady from downstairs, had dropped off some meat and produce, which she purchased for him twice weekly, saving him the trouble of going out. Instead of cooking, though, Alberto shaved and changed into a fresh, collarless shirt and shapeless jacket, and stood by the door, his hand on the knob. He cleared his throat a few times, then finally said, "Well? Are you coming?"
    I did not know this was a momentous occasion for him. It seemed a momentous enough occasion for me. I hadn't left Alberto's building in three days. As it turned out, he hadn't left it in three weeks. He wasn't truly phobic of the outside world, only melancholic, we would have called it then.
    Alberto took me around the corner to a café. At a crowded table in the rear, surrounded by mirrors, five men in wool watch-caps and berets hailed my tutor and slapped me on the back and ordered me a shot of anisette in a frosted shot-glass that burned my fingers. Talk quickly turned to politics—"It usually does," Alberto said with a puffy-eyed wink. But when the conversation lagged, a burly, dark-skinned man named Cesar said, "We thought your maestro was rotting in a hospital room somewhere, or in some jail. It looks like you've resurrected him."
    I shrugged and smiled.
    "So you want to be like your teacher? Play where he played, that sort of thing?"
    I shrugged again. "I don't know where he played."
    "Doesn't know where he played!" howled a thin man named Ramón, whose too-short jacket exposed bony wrists and hands covered with shiny ribbonlike scars.
    "The perfect match," laughed Cesar. "A student who doesn't ask too many questions and a maestro who doesn't like to answer them."
    It hadn't occurred to me to ask any questions. A boy didn't ask a grown man for his credentials. I tried to look away, to avoid all the laughing men's stares, but with the mirrors all around us, I couldn't evade anyone's stare, even my own. Three versions of my own boyish face—round cheeks, high forehead—taunted me from all directions.
    "You were born when?" Ramón asked.
    "December 29."
    Ramón found this hilarious. Still laughing, he shoveled a handful of almonds into his mouth. When he chewed, I could see the bones moving at his temple and in the shadowy depression between his jaw and ear.
    "The year, boy," he said as he scooped another handful of nuts. "Ninety-four? Ninety-five?"
    "Eighteen ninety-two," I said.
    "He's not young, we're just old," Cesar said, in a voice that was friendlier than the others'. "We're still arguing about things that happened before he could walk."
    I looked to Alberto, but his face was placidly unrevealing, his eyes twinkling above their pouchy bags.
    We ordered
bocadillos
filled with potato omelet. Ramón bought me a second anisette. The thick sweet liquid went down easily, but within minutes my head was spinning. The mirrored reflections all around us—on the ceiling, behind our table and behind the bar—amplified my dizziness.
    Alberto must have noticed my expression. "Time to get this one home. Lessons in the morning," he said—though it was scarcely midday now.
    We 'd all been wedged around the back table, so our exit was cause for a deep chorus of shuffling, chair dragging and table bumping as we worked our way free. Ramón knocked his ebony-handled cane onto the floor, and when I bent to retrieve it, his face met mine.
    "If it's lessons you want, you should visit the wax museum