Pathway to Japanese Literature

The Murderer's Memoir “Defendant! Do you wish to make any final statement in your own behalf?” The Presiding Judge provided me with paper and pen, granting me this opportunity for a last statement. Now I put pen to paper by this prison window, seizing that opportunity—but whether this constitutes my confession before the court, my repentance for crimes committed, or my challenge to the general society that will read these words after my death, I shall leave to the judgment of those who behold them.

Yet however much I might shout myself hoarse in protest, none would deign to believe this most bizarre fate of mine in earnest—therefore, to properly chronicle these matters, I must first present the series of contemporary newspaper articles detailing my case, thereby clarifying why I am now confined in prison. All these were smuggled in discreetly by Warden Don Carlos at my request, but first comes the April 23rd issue of Excelcior.

“Bizarre Murder Case at Tycoon’s Mansion! The Naked Young Beautiful Wife Brutally Murdered Upon Her Bed, Drenched in Blood”—so proclaimed their sensational opening lines, which then courteously added: “The Culprit Is Her Husband, Banker Mr. Rodriguez Alessandro! Exposing His True Nature as a Sadistic Sexual Maniac?” even appending this subheader. Of course, this went without saying. That Rodriguez Alessandro had been my true name.

"On the dawn of the 22nd, from the residence of Mr. Rodriguez Alessandro, bank president on Plaza Avenida Florida Street, a woman’s piercing scream suddenly rang out, followed immediately by three gunshots that reverberated through the air." At that very moment, Officer Pedro Duyugo—on patrol in his assigned district—immediately blew his whistle to summon his colleague Geraldo Nieto for assistance while simultaneously scaling the firmly locked front gate of the residence. Forcing entry into what appeared to be the crime scene—a second-floor eastern room of the main building—he discovered Dolores, the bank president's wife long renowned for her beauty, lying supine on a bed placed before the northern dressing table. Her body arched backward toward the left window as she had been shot twice in the cardiac region and once in the lower abdomen, dying instantly.

And thus occurred an incident of rare brutality even for these times: beside her stood her husband, Mr. Alessandro, clutching a pistol still smoking from discharge, staring vacantly at his wife’s corpse—so transfixed he failed to notice the police officer bursting into the room. The atrocity had been committed by Mr. Alessandro—the victim’s husband—beyond a shadow of doubt, and he himself showed not the slightest hint of guilt. Upon noticing Officer Duyugo’s presence, he discarded his pistol and declared, “As you can see..." “Now then, please take me away,” he reportedly declared with a bitter smile, submitting calmly to arrest—and thus the case seemed unlikely to develop further at present. Yet considering that Mr. Alessandro was not only a foremost financier as president of Barcelona Bank but also a prominent socialite as chairman of the Barcelona Speedboat Club, while his murdered wife had been hailed as an unparalleled beauty whose charms knew no contemporary equal, the incident ignited widespread morbid fascination from that dawn onward. An unbroken stream of gawking spectators thronged before the mansion’s main gate, profoundly shocking all strata of society.

The Public Prosecutor’s Office promptly dispatched Prosecutor Carbajal and Assistant Prosecutor Hernandez under Deputy Prosecutor Rayas’s command while requesting Judge Oliveira’s investigative team to mobilize. In cooperation with jurisdictional police authorities, they solidified corroborative evidence for the case. Thus it seemed only a matter of time before the full scope of the incident would be brought to light once they obtained the perpetrator’s confession. From what our newspaper had swiftly uncovered, it appeared to stem from a passionate entanglement surrounding the young and beautiful wife—nothing more than a commonplace scandal among the wealthy class that merely escalated into a criminal case by chance. This was made abundantly clear by the unanimous testimony of the household servants regarding Mr. Alessandro’s recent displays of abnormal jealousy.

The atrocity showed no signs of being impulsive; rather, it appeared meticulously premeditated. That very night, Mr. Alessandro had granted all servants—from the parlor maids and head butler down to the lowliest housemaids and cooks—a single night’s leave, leaving none in the vast mansion save for the victimized wife and her assailant husband. More shockingly still, within this deserted estate, Mrs. Dolores had endured what seemed a nightlong ordeal of cruel torture and abuse at her husband’s hands before being fatally shot—evidenced by three abrasions stretching from her forehead across her face. These injuries appeared to have been sustained when her hair was seized and she was dragged across the bedstead. Both sides of her neck bore ligature marks, with additional abrasions—one each on her right wrist and left flank. Concurrently, fractures were observed in her left pinky and ring fingers, while minor bleeding on her lower lip suggested she had bitten it during resistance. Coroner Mahimiano Eraslis inferred that these wounds likely resulted from her being pinned face-down on the bed with hands twisted behind her back as she struggled against the assailant.

Moreover, beyond these abrasions upon the upper body, multiple areas of subcutaneous bleeding were observed on both thighs. What strikes one as most perplexing is that despite such savage torture having been inflicted, traces suggest the victim was forced into violent carnal relations by the perpetrator immediately before death—undoubtedly a consequence of jealous passion. Yet Mr. Alessandro, the husband and assailant, stands revealed as no ordinary deviant; the coroner speculates he was likely a schizophrenic bearing pronounced sadistic-sexual tendencies. As if substantiating this coroner’s conjecture, the wife’s corpse lay supine in utter nudity, bearing upon its voluptuous form the countless wounds described above—while from three bullet wounds, fresh blood spurted across snow-white sheets—so grotesque a spectacle that the attending officers confessed they could not help but avert their gaze.

“Whether born from scandals entangling high society or revealing what might be deemed a deviant sexuality of unimaginable depravity—these details would likely unfold before readers’ eyes as interrogations progressed. Yet regardless, public sympathy had already coalesced around the beautiful wife who met such a cruel fate, while voices of hatred rose through the streets demanding, ‘Let this beast-like banker face severe punishment—circumstances be damned!’”

Next is the August 29th issue of La Nación. August 29th marked the fourth month since my arrest. During that period, my preliminary hearing had concluded, and eight public trial sessions had been held. Though I had undergone psychiatric evaluation three times already, judging by this newspaper, society's attention toward my case—nay, its outrage—still appeared to burn with considerable intensity. "As previously reported: The hallucinatory killer of utmost grotesquery who startled the world." The courtroom testimony of Mr. Rodriguez Alessandro, former president of Barcelona Bank, grew increasingly bizarre with each proceeding, plunging judicial authorities into confusion over this unprecedented murder case. The prosecution authorities temporarily seized the ledgers of dog dealer Julio Benavides based on his statements and investigated the sales destinations of the animals. Though merely five had been sold, it was confirmed that Mr. Alessandro's testimony aligned perfectly with these ledgers regarding every purchaser being exclusively young and beautiful wives. Yet whether out of concern for their reputations, these affluent families resolutely denied the facts while hastily disposing of evidence; not a single one of the animals in question was ever found, leaving the prosecution authorities completely confounded in their efforts to secure material proof.

Particularly since Benavides the dog dealer himself had already been murdered, and every last one of the animals that could be presumed as such had been shot dead by the culprit Mr. Alessandro’s own hand, even if the culprit’s testimony were true, it was as though he himself had destroyed all materials that could corroborate his own statements—in this regard, Mr. Alessandro had brought grave disadvantage upon himself. To say nothing of authorities like Dr. José Ferín Aramburu, Professor at the University of Granada; Dr. Leopoldo Mero, Professor at the University of Seville; and Dr. Mario Rivalotzla—eminent scholars in their fields who had been summoned by the court’s inquiry—all uniformly denied the culprit’s fantastical and bizarre claims. While they conceded such matters were not evolutionarily impossible, they declared in unison that if these statements were factual, it would constitute an academic crisis so monumental as to stagger the world—far surpassing in significance such a trifling murder case as this—and thus dismissed the culprit’s testimony with derisive laughter. This further compounded Mr. Alessandro’s disadvantage.

However, on the other hand, the defendant himself had unwaveringly maintained his statement from the very beginning—consistently and logically persisting in this bizarre and unfathomable motive for murder—such that it could not be dismissed outright as mere delusion; indeed, it appeared the court had found itself considerably vexed by this unprecedented murder case of late. As the court struggled with this dilemma, the bizarre murder case now fueled curiosity across all social strata. In the streets, two factions clamored noisily—those who accepted the facts and those who denied them—and of late, public discourse was dominated entirely by talk of the Alessandro case.

However, given the nature of this scandal involving upper-class boudoirs—with its inherent risk of moral corruption—the authorities found themselves at a loss in handling it, while parents of marriageable daughters were utterly confounded. "It had been arranged that the authorities would soon summon Dr. Mariano Fontesilia Varas, a renowned psychiatric expert from the University of Bilbao, at the defense’s request, to order a fourth psychiatric evaluation of the defendant."

Let me state this plainly. That I inflicted every manner of torture and abuse before firing three bullets into my wife and killing her is indeed exactly as these newspapers report—there can be no mistake. It is often said that newspapers brazenly fabricate outright lies to enhance their news value and boost sales, but whether we speak of La Nación or the aforementioned Excelcior, being first-rate publications as they are—though they may exhibit some degree of misjudgment—they contain neither falsehoods nor traces of artifice. As far as I am concerned, their reporting appears to achieve such accuracy that not a single detail has been added or omitted. Therefore, society brands me as a rare breed of killer—nay, even a sadistic sexual deviant—and in their zeal to purge social unrest, they demand that this beast of a husband be sentenced to death! That they have become enraged to such an extent is, I believe, a fact that can be fully trusted.

A trial that reflected such public opinion and the people’s fury could never have considered imposing a lenient punishment upon me.

It was beyond any doubt that I would soon be sentenced to death through society’s discipline and laid to rest in Ubenia Hill Cemetery where my wife Dolores—whom I both hated most bitterly and loved most profoundly—lay buried. And I myself felt not a particle of fear toward this fate, nor harbored even a dewdrop’s worth of regret. Just as night yields to dawn and winter’s passing awaits spring’s arrival, with utmost naturalness I awaited the inevitable requital for my deeds.

Therefore, in my present being exists not a shred of desire to embellish or conceal the traces of my crimes. I am precisely one who fully merits execution under current murder statutes—a man who considers it both absurd and unnatural should the law show even marginal leniency toward one such as myself. Thus in this regard, I pride myself as being perhaps the most unreserved criminal—one wholly unsparing in acknowledging his deeds—to have ever existed.

And now I, on the verge of condemnation, compose this memoir—in compliance with Presiding Judge Zolf Mara’s inquiry, “Does the defendant intend to make some self-serving statement?”—I write this final testimony. Those who read this memoir after my death will undoubtedly be struck by a strange sensation. And they may scoff—these pitying mockers—believing that even Alessandro, who so haughtily clung to his convictions, must have writhed in desperation at death’s threshold, seeking some mitigation for his crimes out of terror of the end. Moreover, I consider it only natural that they would think so—judging from the confessional records left by countless death row inmates of the past.

Indeed, within the narrow scope of what I had read, among all death row inmates who ever left behind such confessional writings or records, not a single one existed who did not attempt to mitigate their own crimes. Some schemed to obscure their crimes through such writings; others sought cheap repentance in shallow religions; still others plotted to flatter judges and the public for posthumous reputational gains—yet not a single confession failed to reflect on paper the pitiful desperation of cornered rats. Therefore, I myself consider it unavoidable that this memoir I now attempt to write will likewise be regarded as belonging to that same category.

Yet how much contempt and derision have I cast upon those pitiful writings—those fleeting struggles of wretched death row inmates—up until this very day? If one must resort to pitiful supplications or writhe to obscure their crimes at the final hour—why commit such sins in the first place?! I had felt such abhorrence verging on revulsion that I wanted to roar. And yet why is it that I—I who felt revulsion toward such documents and contempt for their authors, I who harbor not a shred of regret for my crimes nor fear of their punishment—why do I now risk being equated with those inferior imitations of confession, yet still seize this final granted opportunity to take up pen and paper?

Let me speak frankly. Let me state this clearly once more. I am by no means seeking to curry sympathy or pity from judges or the public. Much less do I have any intention whatsoever to distort or defend the crimes I have committed through this account. Let God bear witness! What I intend to assert is rather the contrary—that any man placed in my position, any man who loved his wife as fervently as I did, could not have helped but tread the same path as I! That he would have stripped her naked and bound her hands behind her back; dragged her down upon the floor until her body bore abrasions from head to toe; and finally, unable to resist, fired a pistol into that lushly beautiful flesh which was never truly granted to him—this is what I wish to scream aloud!

That is to say—though the court and the people unite in deeming me deserving of death for my cruelty, that very cruelty stands as irrefutable proof of how ardently I loved my wife. And even should current laws or the masses brandish capital punishment against me, so long as Dolores might revive and I live again, I wished to prove with my very being that this represents the manifestation of my boundless carnal love for Dolores—a love I would enact countless times over. And at the same time, it was solely because I wished to proclaim—through this final statement granted to me—that one such as myself, whose existence had been tossed about by a grotesque and horrific fate unheard of in this world, could find no path to survival other than this course of action even through countless rebirths.

And furthermore—I wished to proclaim at the top of my voice—how utterly powerless are the laws and order of modern states that pride themselves on perfected civilization and systems! Powerless to wield any punitive authority against those like dog dealer Benavides: destroyers of humanity, violators of moral laws, desecrators of nature—beings truly dreadful to behold. And yet another reason: should they brand me—a victim of such phantasmal fate—as slaughterer and sadistic sexual deviant, then I compose these words while calmly awaiting the day I sit upon the electric chair, that I might cry out—who among humanity is not a slaughterer? Who is not a sadistic sexual deviant?

I speak neither lies nor pretenses. Sing your condemned man's dirge and revile me if you must! Mock the daylight hallucinator if it pleases you! With these purposes and convictions do I set down this memoir. By the time these words see print, I shall likely have long departed this world—my corpse charred black by eight hundred fifty volts coursing through this flesh, lying beneath a tombstone in Ubenia Hill Cemetery where gardenias fall, resting eternal beside my wife.

Should fate decree that one pass by this moss-covered graveside—let them reflect! Having lived such a phantasmal existence in this world—unable to endure the clashing fury verging on madness, jealousy, love, and hatred—this broken remnant who became a murderer of such bizarre extremity now takes eternal rest...

The Cripple's Lament People may perhaps regard me as having ruined my own life solely because I married a wife whose character stood diametrically opposed to such an embodiment of vanity. However, as one who loves my wife utterly, though I killed her with my own hands, I cannot bring myself to lay all responsibility upon Dolores alone. Having examined every cause within myself, I cannot help but think that had I not been such a disabled person, this incident might never have occurred.

For had I not been a disabled person, I likely would not have needed to grovel so abjectly before my wife—and had I not groveled, I probably would never have been reduced to inviting such devilish forces into my home. And had I not invited even those devilish forces into my home, I believe I would not have come to end my life in such wretchedness—this was the reason. However, no matter how much I repeat these unchangeable grievances, it will make no difference. I have no choice but to write things as they are; yet I believe there has never been another human being who has tasted the suffering of a disabled person as profoundly as I have.

I believe it was around the age of fourteen or fifteen when I first keenly felt the wretchedness of my own body. At that time, there lived nearby an adorable girl named Flor Esvina—my classmate. She possessed flaxen hair and clear eyes, excelling in her studies with a gentle disposition; perhaps because she ranked first among the female students while I led the male cohort, we became inseparable companions both at school and after returning home. When we studied side by side at the same desk, when we swung together across the vast lawn of my home, when we conversed merrily beneath blooming oleanders—I, who had no siblings, grew as close to Flor as to a sister.

I remember that whenever my mother—still alive at that time—saw us playing beneath the window where she played the piano, spinning tops or picking milk vetch flowers, she would stop her playing to gaze at us through the window with a smile, or sometimes wrap sweets for us. While tying a ribbon into Flor’s hair, "Our Rodriguez here, Miss Esvina, used to be a child who hated going outside to play and would always have his nose buried in books—but it’s only because you became his friend that he’s come to play so cheerfully like this. Please always stay good friends with him, Miss Esvina," she said tenderly while kissing the tied ribbon. Seeing Flor nod earnestly with dimpled cheeks, even I became happy. Though mocked as a cripple since childhood and hating to go out, I resolved to live in harmony with this Flor for all my days.

And whether through my own wishful thinking, Flor too seemed to like me more than anyone else. Whenever Father brought me books, I would plead, "Father, since I'm giving one to Flor too, please buy another copy!"—persuaded him to purchase two identical copies—then rush off to Flor's house clutching them.

“Flor! Flor! I brought something good! Father bought them for us!” I gasped breathlessly. “Oh really! Thank you, Rodriguez.” When I saw Flor’s delighted face, I felt happier than when receiving the books myself. At times, solely to relive this joy, I would have two copies purchased of my most cherished toys and bring them to Flor. Flor this, Flor that! Flor! I would call her name like a habitual refrain,

"You truly do get along well with Miss Esvina, don’t you? How about it? If you’re so fond of her, shall I have her made your bride someday?" Even Father—a man of few words—had once teased me thus.

“I don’t want that, Father! We’re like brother and sister—I don’t want Flor as a bride!” I protested, only to be heartily laughed at by him. Yet how profoundly both Father and Mother must have cherished Flor’s kindness—this girl who befriended a child mocked as “cripple” since infancy, who kept company with one returning home in tears. Though I never knew what lay wrapped within during Christmas, New Year’s, or Easter, “Come now, Rodriguez! Take this to Miss Esvina—the one you adore so much,” he said with a laugh while patting my shoulder.

Even before meeting her, Flor’s smiling face would flicker before my eyes, and I would burst outside without waiting for Mother to fasten my collar or comb my hair. There were moonlit nights when I went, and snowy mornings when I went. On rainy evenings when showers pattered down, there were times I brought along Alonzo Majardo—now serving as bank manager—and we went drenched together. Yet moonlit nights remained moonlit nights, rainy days stayed rainy days, snowy mornings kept being snowy mornings—each with their own particular joys. That path never failed to set my heart racing as I walked it, and I remember it now as a nostalgic path of memories.

Flor and I had been that close—yet it happened around the time of a certain year’s Carnival. The school decided to hold an academic performance for that year's founding anniversary celebration, inviting town dignitaries and students' parents while selecting high-achieving students to participate. Flor and I were assigned by our homeroom teacher to perform a dialogue in Latin about Diogenes or some such figure. When the names of students participating in that academic performance were announced one after another in the classroom, and at last my turn came—how I directed my gaze toward Flor with such awkwardness yet a measure of pride! I still remember the pounding of my heart at that moment. I distinctly remember Flor returning my gaze with a bashful yet delighted expression—or at least, that was how I perceived it—just before school let out that day. Having noticed a questionable passage in that dialogue, I searched throughout the school for our homeroom teacher to inquire about it—looking here and there until at last I found him standing by the door of the physics classroom across the way.

“Teacher!” I gasped breathlessly, about to rush in—when suddenly—oh! I involuntarily strained my ears. A familiar voice had reached me—Flor must have come to clarify her doubts too, I realized in that instant, and an indescribable happiness burned through my chest. For I already felt piercing through my heart the imagined delight of walking home with Flor after consulting our teacher, discussing the assigned dialogue along the way.

“But isn’t this absurd!” “After all, you were supposed to be close with that child—why would you suddenly suggest such a thing?”

Hidden behind the half-opened door, Flor’s figure remained unseen, her voice too faint to reach my ears. "I see... So you’ve been kind to that poor child out of pity, but standing side by side with him before a crowd of distinguished guests would be too much for you—is that what you’re saying?" “So you’re asking me to change the pairings through my intervention—without that child noticing—is that what you’re saying?”

“But Teacher! He’s a cripple! I’m ashamed!” came Flor’s unmistakable voice. My vision blurred violently that instant. I had no awareness of where or how I ran; the path home along which I fled remained unknown to me. In a frantic daze, I reached my second-floor room, threw myself onto the bed, clutched the futon, and wept with all my voice. Tears gushed forth endlessly without restraint. If only she had told me those words before speaking to the teacher—I’d never have stubbornly insisted on participating in that festival—yet this bitter realization made fresh tears surge. Had I been top of the school, I thought, they’d have stopped calling me cripple. The shattering of this dream proved so mortifying that I wept anew. When I believed all tears spent at last, I felt Mother’s gentle hand upon my back.

And finally, when Mother lifted me up, I told her everything between sobs. “And then… what did you do next?” Mother urged repeatedly while holding me, wiping the tears that kept spilling from my eyes—but suddenly she stopped wiping. She embraced me so tightly I could scarcely breathe, and when I looked up in surprise, her body trembled violently, lips twisted strangely into a face that seemed ready to burst into tears at any moment.

At that moment, the bank had closed, and Father entered as usual, smiling gently. He had been asking Mother something with a puzzled look, but suddenly darkened his face, abruptly stood up, went to the window, clasped his hands behind his back, and remained standing there indefinitely, gazing down at the garden below. I, still held in Mother’s arms, raised my tear-dried face and gazed at the wall-mounted lamp, thinking in a dreamlike state. "Study," they urged. "Devote yourself entirely to your studies. If I studied and maintained top grades at school, would there be anyone who would mock a mere deformed leg? That everyone would respect you and wish to be your friend—this was what both Mother and my schoolteachers had tirelessly impressed upon me until today. But all of that had been nothing more than mere words of comfort and encouragement meant for me. No matter how well I excelled at schoolwork, who would ever want to be friends with a disabled person? Even Flor… Even Flor, who had been so close to me, said she was ashamed to appear at the school festival with a cripple!

“I don’t want to go to school anymore, oh Mother,” I said,

“Oh… Mother too,” she sobbed again.

Father cleared his throat repeatedly—ahem! ahem!— While clearing his throat, he remained standing like a statue, not moving an inch. I do not know how much time passed after that. Even when the light in the wall-mounted lamp I was gazing at grew dim, I still remember us all remaining like that.

“Come now, cheer up. Let’s have dinner.” “I’m starving!” Father said with deliberate cheerfulness.

Urged by this, we went down to the dining room—but how desolate that evening’s meal proved to be! Not a single person spoke. In silence, Father did nothing but pour drinks back and forth with Majardo and wipe his beard with a napkin. Mother too sniffled in silence and did not utter a word. Moreover, when I awoke in the middle of that night, Mother was sitting there peering despondently into my face. “What’s wrong, Mother?” I said, sitting up,

“It’s all right, it’s all right—God is watching over us,” she said, adjusting the hem of my futon. “And then,” “Father said as much too—if going to school has become unbearable, you needn’t go anymore,” she said in a small voice. “But if you don’t study at all, you’ll never become someone great. From now on we’ll have a teacher come and study at home.” “It’s all right now, Mother! I don’t care about any of it anymore,” I said, whereupon her face twisted as though about to cry again and she silently took my hand beneath the futon and held it.

Memories of my boyhood past rose vividly before my eyes. And what came to mind most vividly was the unseen reality of my own legs—said to have undergone surgery for clubfoot—which I intently examined that night upon my bed after Mother had left. Though they were a part of myself I had grown accustomed to seeing every morning and evening, tonight they appeared before my eyes as if they were a pair of living creatures. The stitched scars twisted grotesquely in multiple layers, wrinkles sagging loosely from the bent ankles to arches that swelled like tumors—they took on an indescribably grotesque and eerie shape, as though staring at the belly of a dead shark. The moment I absentmindedly flexed my big toe with a twitch, I instinctively covered my face, overwhelmed by such despair and anguish that I wished to sever everything below my knees in one swift motion—yet when I close my eyes, I cannot help but feel that agony, transcending twenty-seven years, still piercing my heart with undiminished poignancy.

But of course, I did not take up this pen intending to indulge in such trifling childhood memories. Beginning with Flor's story, I found myself recalling the wretchedness of disability carved into my boyhood's soft mind—though society claims the disabled are prone to resentment. While I do not wholly deny this truth, I cannot help but wonder why society fails to better comprehend the suffering harbored by the disabled—an anguish surpassing mere resentment. The agony of disability was something no able-bodied person could ever truly imagine or understand.

Under the loving care of my kind father and mother, I studied every subject—mathematics, Latin, history, physics…—with private tutors. Following my parents’ wishes, all those tutors redirected my heart toward life’s brighter surfaces until I immersed myself entirely in study once more—and though I no longer faced opportunities to be called a cripple by others, the wound from having glimpsed the darkness in human hearts never faded from my mind for a single day thereafter. In everything I did or thought, the conviction that I was a disabled wretch despised by others clung suffocatingly to my heart. And day after day, month after month, it grew within me, withering my own feelings and rendering me needlessly servile.

“Well, that should do. Now that you’ve completed your basic education, continuing university studies with a home tutor just wouldn’t be feasible,” Father urged me to enroll. Since I still maintained an interest in scholarship alone, I obeyed his advice and entered university—yet throughout those three years of university life, I ultimately failed to make a single close friend.

It was because the bitter experience with Flor kept flashing through my mind incessantly; I could neither accept others without malice nor approach them without ulterior motives, and thus I remained unable to frolic cheerfully beneath youth's azure skies like my peers. No—had I attempted to frolic, it might not have been impossible. But even as they played carefree on the surface, when I imagined how my friends must surely be inwardly wryly amused at themselves for sporting with a disabled companion, terror of enduring another Flor-like humiliation would rise foremost—rendering all human interaction ever more agonizing.

My friends would shout, "One!" they would shout. Friends without reservations in their hearts would respond "Two!" they would respond straightforwardly. However, I alone would suspect that behind each 'one' lay another hidden 'one' with a dash, would feel jealousy, would harbor apprehensions... and unable to endure the suspicions, fears, and jealousies fermenting within me—from self to self—I would come to feel a desire to avoid social interactions altogether, both within myself and toward others. And so I drove myself into the loneliness I never desired, seeking solace solely in books and research.

Lying in the overgrown summer grass of the schoolyard, reading Marx and Adam Smith, how intensely must I have envied my friends laughing and playing on the athletic field. Groups of three or four classmates whistling as they hurried toward the school gate... Friends swinging rackets to send balls soaring high into the air with resounding cracks... Friends clad in swimsuits heading to the pool, and friends sitting in a circle on the clover over there, debating Engels—there was not a single one among them that I did not envy. What particularly stimulated my senses and rendered my starved self unable to endure were the female friends scattering the fragrance of youth about them and the classmates flocking together.

Women... women... Ah, beauteous women! How sweet they must have been, how elegant—the very melody of life, a man’s strength… a living man’s very life force itself. Yet even Flor, with whom I had been so intimate—this intimacy I perceived was but my own conceit—had merely bestowed pity and sympathy upon a cripple. Where in this world could there possibly exist a curious woman who would love a cripple! In interactions with women—let alone such matters—there existed two worlds as there had been in the world with Flor long ago: the worlds of dance and socializing that were beyond reach. With one step high and one step low, this body sways its shoulders like an ape’s as it walks; clad in a tailcoat, dragging its lame leg across the dance floor’s parquet—the laughingstock of high society… this grotesque clown of a cripple!

As if waking from a dream, I bit my nails desolately and once more cast my eyes down upon the books. In the end, in the world of a cripple, there remained only the path of longing for friends through books and longing for women through books. Thus, while intensely yearning for people and for women, throughout my three years at university I poured all my excess passion solely into books, and my sole conversational partner remained—just as in my boyhood days—the aged manager Alonzo Majardo. But no—it was not merely my three years at university that were so. In time Mother passed away and Father died; even now when I have inherited vast wealth and my father’s enterprise to become president of Barcelona Bank and stand before the world as a young economist, my sole friend remains Alonzo Majardo alone—and even today, having passed through life’s midpoint to find white threading my temples, still I persist in yearning through books for unknown women with all the passion of my maturity.

I repeat. People call this the resentment of the disabled. I call this servility beyond necessity. And I had come to believe that this very servility of mine had finally plunged my life into the abyss of ruin. Since I have recalled this, I shall add that in later years, Flor—abandoned by the man she married—came to my bank clad in tattered rags and begged for reasonable assistance. Stopping Majardo as he tried to berate her, I gave her a modest sum, but of course even then, I never harbored hatred toward Flor. What I hated was my own legs, not Flor herself. Rather, as she was the one who had added some substance to my drab boyhood, I did everything I could for her—but she surely never dreamed in her wildest imaginings that her careless remark would come to dominate my entire life.

Moreover, while she hungered for money and I was awash in it, what the president of Barcelona Bank—with its capital of eighty-six million pesetas—desired at that time was neither money nor honor. To converse freely with others about love and walk briskly home along the streets—all I desired was simply to possess ordinary legs like Flor’s.

Dowager Countess When my long-cherished dream was realized, what I first obtained was my wife Dolores. At forty-three years old... she became my first female companion bearing the title of wife—moreover, one who radiated twenty-six-year-old youth through every inch of her supple, perfectly proportioned limbs—a beauty so luminous it seemed water might drip from her jade-like form. How I had knelt at my wife's feet in ecstatic fervor with youth-like passion and caressed her with the insatiable tenacity of a disabled man would likely surpass even halfway what readers of this memoir might conceive.

The more I became obsessed, the more my wife would furrow her brows in detestation of me, until recently she had grown nearly unapproachable in her frigid severity. It was a radiance as though encased in ice. Moreover, the radiance of that ice-pillar beauty became an even greater temptation to me, fanning the flames of carnal desire until my very flesh was scorched and ravaged by a love bordering on madness! Of course, the primary reason my wife detested me should likely be attributed to my being an ugly disabled person with coarse features, and—as is typical of those burdened by profound anguish—the gloomy overall impression I projected being one of austerity and smoldering inarticulacy... In short, I utterly lacked those sparkling social refinements one might call elegant or refined, agile or lively—nay, witty sophistication. But as for an even greater fundamental reason—from the very beginning, my wife had utterly despised someone like me as a being several strata beneath her in social standing.

That our marital life could be maintained for six months or a year at all was due to me—who had utterly resigned myself to never acquiring a wife in this lifetime—being satisfied and grateful at having married such a beautiful woman of superior standing, submitting to her every command in all matters and enduring the humiliation of a menial servant. To put it more bluntly: speaking of Count Don Alvaro Messalino, he belonged to one of our nation's most prestigious lineages that prided itself on first-class pedigree; speaking of Countess Dolores, she was a renowned beauty of spectacular countenance who spared no expense on single evening's banquets—a woman celebrated for the opulence of her lifestyle.

Even after her husband the Count perished in a car accident in the Sierra Nevada mountains, the Countess’s peacock-like status—supported by her exquisitely polished jade-like beauty—remained unshaken by so much as a hair’s breadth; yet in the hidden life concealed from society, years of extravagant living during the Count’s lifetime had amassed debts as towering as mountains. Both the mountain villa on Paseo Colón and the main residence at Plaza Punta Arenas had been mortgaged to my bank—even their interest alone amounted to no trivial sum. Moreover, several utterly disgraceful dishonored bills issued by the Count had circulated through the city’s financial veins—through her husband’s death she inherited not an estate but— She had been cast instantly into circumstances where even tomorrow’s bread became uncertain.

At that time, public rumors claimed that the Countess' bottomless extravagance had bankrupted her adoring husband the Count—with his death likely being suicide—and though this conjecture might have been excessively cruel, given her temperament as an ostentatious woman of exceptional pride and status-consciousness, half of it may well have struck true. For if one were to say that while the Countess in mourning attire lamented her late husband’s death yet secretly yearned for a marital partner to rescue her and guarantee her queenly social standing—while I remained ignorant of feminine charms despite being awash in wealth, lamenting life’s solitude—then one could readily discern what fateful circumstances had forged this marriage.

Even in what should have been the joyous occasion of our engagement—when faces should have flushed with delight and honeyed whispers been exchanged—how supremely haughty were my wife’s words! No doubt she had already considered the mere fact of receiving a marriage proposal from someone like me—a person she had never before deemed worthy of notice—to be the ultimate insult and source of outrage to herself. Her face instantly turned pale; for a while she stood motionless with eyes closed, seemingly unable to suppress the turmoil within—but were she to refuse, she would have to sign the bankruptcy petition I held and stand before the court. While my wife kept her eyes closed, with restless agitation I circled before her and behind her; dragging my lame leg as I awaited her response, I crawled about the room like the hunchback of Notre Dame.

“Very well, Mr. President!” declared my wife—penniless yet never relinquishing her countess’s pride and dignity—her pallid face growing colder even as it acquired the jade-like radiance of a flawless gemstone, accepting my meticulously courteous marriage proposal. Then, removing her glove and extending one hand to receive my kiss while lifting the mourning veil, she declared with dignity: “I shall accept your proposal of marriage.” “Differences in social status or lack thereof… I do not concern myself with such trivialities in the slightest.” “But there is just one thing I must have you swear to by your esteemed character, you know.”

“Whether I cried ‘Ha, Madam!’ or groaned ‘Oh, Madam!’, I can no longer recall what reply I gave in my ecstatic state at that time.” That such ready acceptance could be obtained from this flower-like beauty of a wife... from an upper-class noblewoman whom one such as myself could never hope to glimpse in my lifetime... struck me as utterly, utterly unexpected! I became pure joy incarnate—so overwhelmed I knew not where to place hands or feet. “To speak plainly, I have not yet come to feel love for you, you know.” “Though I do hope to somehow develop such feelings and intend to strive toward that end.” “Just... not quite yet, at present...”

“Madam, any conditions... any conditions at all... please do not hesitate... do not hesitate to impose them. “If I can be of service to you, I will do anything… I… that Madam…” “Conditions and such... It’s hardly something requiring such formal language.”

My wife smiled briefly with a perplexed look. Her white teeth glinted, and at the temples of her smiling face, soft black-brown hair swirled. That profile noble as ancient Greek sculpture... those lapis lazuli eyes of piercing beauty... that elegantly full chin... and those breasts voluptuously swelling beneath her gauzy blouse... I sat leaning against the chair, stealing glances with a sensation that sent my very flesh into throes of agony.

“Well then, I shall muster my resolve and speak plainly.” “I would be troubled if you were to take offense... but until I can come to love you fully... even should we marry, I wish you to swear upon your honor to keep this promise.” “Otherwise... that... a relationship without love would be a sin, I believe.”

“What are you saying, Madam—such an utterly reasonable matter… Perfectly reasonable… Perfectly reasonable indeed, Madam!” “I myself must swear to that.” “It is I who should… For Madam’s happiness… If only Madam would believe me… Ah, if Madam would but believe me—” I myself could scarcely comprehend what I was saying. I felt as though I myself were a sleepwalker muttering incoherently. In any case, for someone like me who had never spoken to women before, even articulating this much proved an immense struggle, and in the end I could only endlessly wipe away sweat while repeating, “Happy… Happy…”

At that time, I was single-mindedly determined to make her my own as quickly as possible—enduring any humiliation before my wife’s feelings could change—but what meaning did happiness or shit hold then?... Now that I reflect upon it, my wife’s argument from that time contains a logical cunning. If one claims that such relations without love are sinful—and since marriage by its very nature must encompass those relations—why then did my wife agree only to a marriage that was merely cohabitation in form, having severed that aspect? Was it not that she, compelled by circumstance to exploit my financial resources as swiftly as possible while finding my crippled self utterly repulsive to the point of shuddering, had concocted this specious logic that feigned reasonableness?! Were my wife alive today, I would wish to berate her until my words pierced her very bones—yet I had resolved never to let her want financially. Of course, had I done so, this self called "I" would have become utterly worthless in her eyes—but as wedding gifts I purchased the latest Hispano-Suiza, built a new villa on Santa Lucia Hill, bestowed gratuities upon bullfighters, hosted nightly banquets for her friends, and likely squandered seven or eight million pesetas in the blink of an eye.

The first to frown at this drastic transformation of lifestyle was the elderly Alonzo Majardo. This elderly man—who had shown little favor toward my wife from the very inception of our marriage—being a banker who prized prudence, declared that no matter how dear she might be, such foolish expenditures should be moderated! Thus he had come to advise. "If you could believe for a moment that that wife married you out of genuine affection, you're gravely mistaken. At best, she's scheming to take you to court for divorce or target your inheritance—aiming to seize half your fortune given the chance. That's why I'm telling you to somehow reconsider and put an end to this while you still can! The fundamental issue is that you demean yourself excessively regarding your physical condition, which is why people underestimate you. What's a bad leg? With your social standing, if you sought women, you could sweep them up by the broomful!" Such was the argument of this loyal manager, but Majardo naturally could not know what means I had used to acquire my wife Dolores; nor was such a detailed account—regardless of how unreserved our relationship might be—the sort of thing that could be confided to this old man. Yet I could not directly oppose this old man—who had served since my father's time, who had been earnestly entrusted with assisting me upon my father's death, and who even in old age still spryly managed all bank affairs—

“Come now, Majardo—it’s just a trifling sum!” I remarked, grinning as I polished my pipe. “I fully appreciate your concern, but I’m no child. What may seem perilous through your eyes—well, leave my household affairs to me.” With this perfunctory appeasement, I sent the meddlesome old man on his way.

I well understood there were aspects in Majardo’s admonitions worth heeding—yet these were matters I had steeled myself for from the outset. Moreover, having now become so utterly consumed by Dolores that I could barely exist without this wife of mine, material concerns like those Majardo dreaded held no interest whatsoever for me. What tormented me most now—far beyond such trifles—was how Dolores, despite all her haughty proclamations, had upon marriage betrayed my optimistic presumption that her body would naturally become mine as envisioned, instead commencing to enforce our initial pact with relentless rigor.

Before the servants she maintained the outward demeanor of my wife—yet inwardly never permitted me, perpetually revealing through her countenance the contempt reserved for a husband beneath her station—and even that surrender of her voluptuous body had occurred merely once or twice on our wedding night; though we inhabited the same mansion, she would rigorously lock her bedroom door each evening and never allow my approach. When circumstances compelled her to attend banquets or soirées with me, even within the automobile she maintained an interval of some thirty centimeters between us, taking seats separated at opposite windows—she at the right, I at the left. And were I to carelessly brush against her form even slightly, she would furrow her brows as though touched by a coffin-bearer or road-mender.

However great the disparity in our ages might have been, for a healthy man like myself—one who had not yet suffered the slightest physical decline—to maintain indefinitely such an unnatural state of abstinence enforced by my wife was utterly impossible. When the time finally comes, then I shall fully vent this pent-up fury raging in my breast! I had been secretly biding my time for such an opportunity to arise, but my wife only grew more vigilant in keeping me at bay, and by this point I had become thoroughly frayed. Though I was a man in my prime of discretion, my wife’s flesh alone flickered ceaselessly before my eyes, waking or sleeping.

There were times when violent blood I could not restrain would surge through every vessel of my body like a youth’s, shattering all reason; and times when, knowing full well the door remained locked through sleepless nights, I would remove my slippers and steal across the carpet to stand before my wife’s bedroom door in the dead of night. There were mornings when I forgot to attend the bank altogether, entranced as I gazed through my study window at my wife’s silk-clad form strolling through the garden; but what proved utterly unbearable was when passing by the evening bathroom, catching faint wafts of her beloved Alexandrian violet perfume while hearing splashing sounds from behind the door! The fact that she bathed with such clamor! Even after returning to my room, my wife’s rosy-hued skin would rise before me vivid as a painting, and I felt bath-warmed blood coursing through even my own veins. Had we lived a poor life away from prying eyes at such times, I would have smashed down even one such door! How infuriating I found this helpless situation—surrounded by a multitude of servants whether I sought to emerge or retreat! And so each night I would take sleep after forcibly suppressing my irrepressible emotions, drowning my anguish in a self-prepared glass of mixed liquor—though had Majardo heard of this, he would surely have clicked his tongue in disapproval, resenting his master’s carnal obsession. Whether I was a fool or not remained unclear, but what I did know was that for me now, this torment far outweighed any material concerns Majardo might harbor.

Dog Show Whether Majardo knew these circumstances or not, his admonishments toward me during this period had grown increasingly severe.

Any proper wife would never make you spend such an enormous sum so soon after marriage—no matter how insistently you declared your intent to provide for her. It shows complete lack of restraint. The financial aspect is one thing, but what I find particularly intolerable is how she leaves you utterly alone whenever I visit, while Madam herself goes out gallivanting around town. When she does happen to be home, she abandons you like that and merrily amuses herself with her friends. She goes too far in trampling upon you. Even so, Rodriguez! Does this not strike you as outrageous? Such was his rhetorical approach.

Had Majardo detected even the slightest shift in my resolve, he likely had more admonishments to voice—yet as I showed no receptiveness, even displaying some semblance of annoyance, he must have hesitated to intrude further upon my private affairs. Though my junior in years, even he dared not overstep bounds with presumptuous meddling toward his superior. Casting a resentful glance toward the lively laughter wafting up from the parlor below, he withdrew with evident discontent.

Majardo likely did not wish to meet my wife face-to-face either, but my wife too, when Majardo came to visit, would never once show her face outside the parlor even if she was home. Though one could hear the lively footsteps of guests laughing and chattering as they departed from the reception hall to the entrance, followed by the sounds of numerous automobiles gliding away one after another, she would withdraw directly to her parlor, never once showing herself even in the waiting room.

Around that time, I found myself subjected to severe reprimands from my wife that were no less harsh than those from Majardo. With its current servant arrangements for receiving guests, our household lacked any semblance of social standing, she declared. She demanded we install a butler above the head waiter, establish a dedicated doorman at the entrance, increase footmen and parlor maids, replace Spanish-style uniforms with British-tailored tailcoats bearing gold trim, and adopt customs befitting highborn old families—for otherwise, she insisted, I would be left utterly humiliated whenever her friends visited. And while that might hold some truth, first and foremost—why should someone like Majardo presume to meddle in household affairs when I reside here as mistress? Before reforming servant systems, you must absolutely forbid that Majardo creature from entering this mansion! I’ve been vehemently demanding this—how can you still hesitate? Such was her imperious ultimatum.

“It’s not that I’m particularly hesitating… But given our family isn’t of such lofty standing, I simply find gold-trimmed uniforms too vulgar.” “Moreover, since my household has preserved this modest way of life since my father’s time, I deemed it imprudent to abruptly discard longstanding customs.” “And consulting Majardo about such matters proved somewhat delicate, you understand.” “You consulted… Majardo?” Anger flashed across my wife’s beautiful countenance.

It seemed the final remark had terribly grated on her nerves. “So… you consulted Majardo. Then I shall say no more.” "I requested this thinking to at least give your household some pedigree—if not actual lineage—so it wouldn’t shame us in society... But if you cannot reform even this much out of consideration for some mere bank manager like Majardo, then I shall make no further requests." “...However, I must decline,” she said in a tone that layered scorn atop her inherent coldness.

“Since your father rose from a day laborer to become a bank president, I suppose you needed the assistance of clerks like Majardo—but I have no use whatsoever for Majardo.” “From now on, kindly cease discussing Majardo in my presence.” Was this what they called refined social graces? In any case, my wife contained whatever anger lay beyond this point within herself, never allowing it to surface. However, to my willful and strong-willed wife, this must have seemed like the ultimate insult against herself. She never again demanded reforms to the mansion’s interior, but in exchange adopted an overtly confrontational attitude toward me, persisting even more obstinately in her silent conduct than before. And even when I relented and suggested reconsidering the matter, she would have none of it.

“No, that will not be necessary… I merely suggested it for your own good… But what might Majardo think were you to do such a thing?” she said, then added in a tone that implied, “Why not condescend to consult Majardo just once?” Though I had ostensibly yielded, this matter was neither consultable with Majardo nor required consultation in the first place. Yet I remained shackled by societal perceptions, finding myself incapable of mustering resolve to alter longstanding customs. I could tolerate my wife expending whatever funds I possessed—even hundreds of millions of pesetas—but when contemplating my father’s life journey from day laborer to stockbroker’s clerk, then stockbroker himself, until finally attaining presidency of a modest bank… However substantial our wealth might be, for this parvenu household of mine—let alone one headed by a cripple like myself—to suddenly affect the grandiose airs of some marquisate or time-honored aristocratic family struck me as profoundly distasteful, an endeavor I found impossible to countenance. Moreover, demanding that Majardo—who had served blamelessly with diligent devotion through the years—cease visiting our residence was something I could not possibly bring myself to utter.

Nevertheless, since that incident my wife had seemingly taken offense and endeavored to avoid meeting me whenever possible; though I had agonized over how this issue must inevitably be resolved sooner or later, I kept postponing it day after day—when suddenly, this very wife called me out of the blue in an uncharacteristically gentle tone, precisely during this period of strangely strained relations between us.

“President! “…You have a call from Madam.” When the female secretary handed me the receiver, I started—given the circumstances. Was this to finally settle matters from before? Or given her selfish temperament, might she have stopped by a law office on her way here—could she possibly be initiating divorce proceedings? I could not suppress the thunderous pounding in my chest. But, “Ah, hello… You’re Rodriguez? Huh? “Is this Rodriguez?”

The voice coming through the receiver carried my wife’s soft, gentle tone—nearly mentioning Majardo yet stopping just short of asking “Who could possibly have taken offense?”—such was her manner.

“I say… I’ve come to Hotel Albehar Palace now.” “Have you dined yet?” “Not yet?” “Oh… If you haven’t, how would you—” “Why don’t you come here at once and join me for dinner?”

The moment I thought the winds had shifted for some reason—though I couldn’t fathom why—relief surged up in my chest. The obstruction in my chest—that instantaneous resolve to finally confess even the most difficult matters to Majardo today depending on how this call went, to ask him to refrain from visiting the house for some time—vanished without a trace, and pressing the receiver to my lips, I let out a deep sigh. “And on my way back, there’s something I want to buy at Plaza de Cataluña… I do hope you’ll help me with it.”

“Of course, of course! I’ll help you with anything!” “Well then, shall we leave right away?” “Just as I was about to mention bank matters...” “Hello… Is this Rodriguez?” “Yes… The line keeps crossing… Today I met Baroness Leroy Soler… I’m simply mortified—utterly mortified… I’ve resolved that you simply must help me put that woman in her place!” Yet my wife paid no heed whatsoever to what I was saying. Her tone suggested she was engaged in some fierce competition.

“...Ah, hello?... The line’s acting up again... So wouldn’t you come with me to Plaza de Cataluña?” “There’s something I simply must have.”

“Of course, of course! “No trouble at all! “I’ll head over right now. “That Baroness Leroy Soler isn’t just your problem—truth be told, I’ve never liked her either from way back. “Her face may be beautiful, but she’s high-handed, haughty, and pretentious…”

I began to say, then hastily closed the transmitter’s lid once more. This felt exactly like taking inventory of my wife. “Anyway, I fully agree about putting that Baroness in her place. Then wait there! I’ll come right away.” With this the call ended. Swiveling my revolving chair toward the secretary who had been tidying documents in the corner while apparently eavesdropping on my conversation, I puffed out a smoke ring from my cigar with a feeling as if gazing at a clear blue sky for the first time in ages—yet this time with a different flavor, I felt my chest rumble anew. There was no longer any question of settling or not settling our previous dispute. That she had spoken to me in such a gentle, unreserved tone was nothing short of an unprecedented event since our marriage. I chuckled darkly within myself, thinking matters were finally taking a favorable turn—yet through her tone in this telephone exchange, I could vividly imagine my capricious, competitive, ostentation-loving wife who could never bear being second to anyone, now utterly agitated at having been outdone by Baroness Leroy Soler in some matter. That our mutual feelings had softened seemed to me entirely owing to that Baroness’s unwitting benevolence. And I found myself feeling such gratitude that I could have pressed my hands together in prayer—“Madam, how splendidly you’ve managed to kick my wife down from her pedestal.”

Outside the dimly lit bank’s wire mesh—as morning trading closed at the stock exchange—people withdrawing and depositing money swarmed chaotically. And when I stepped out into the brighter street, there too bustled a vortex of fortune-seekers dreaming of sudden wealth. Through these human tides darted errand boys and clerks from brokerage houses, eyes blazing as they rasped hoarse shouts while scurrying about. Yet within the car slicing through this bedlam, I alone reclined against the plush seatback with such carefree ease that I might have whistled a tune, my face having relaxed into a smile as I envisioned the joyful world akin to my wedding night soon to unfold before me—a mental state which, I trust, any reader of this record might readily infer. And simultaneously, I imagine one could conjure the scene where—my heart leaping with joy that tingled through every fiber of my being—I sat facing my wife in Hotel Albehar Palace’s opulent private suite. There she stood arrayed in that rarest attire: swathed entirely in diaphanous black silks, a towering tortoiseshell comb crowning her head, a black lace mantilla cascading down her back—a vision of quintessential Spanish elegance. Amidst rose and carnation shadows dappling our table, we conversed, drank, dined, and smiled—a tableau where I at last reclaimed the magnanimous dignity proper to a bank president.

My wife's errand consisted of a request that after finishing our meal, I drive with her to Plaza de Cataluña Street where she wanted me to buy her a dog from Julio Benavides' shop—he being a dealer of dogs. One might think that the urgent matter over which she had become so utterly agitated and called me in such a frenzy was but a simple, trifling affair. Yet for my wife—who in high society could never countenance being anything less than perpetually dominant—this situation had fermented no ordinary competitive spirit, mingling hope and unease in equal measure.

What set aristocratic ladies' blood racing was the All-Spain Distinguished Families Dog Show—held annually each spring in the capital Madrid. The grand prize carried a 250,000 peseta purse, with supplementary awards from British, French, and other national kennel clubs fueling its notoriety—an event that, for wealthy noblewomen of leisure, stirred greater passion than Andalusian highland ranchers exhibited when dispatching their painstakingly bred fierce bulls to the bullring.

Of course, acquiring and raising a pedigreed dog worthy of being judged at such a show required far more than 250,000 or 300,000 pesetas—thus the prize money itself served no real purpose—but the mere qualification to exhibit at this event already demonstrated that its owner belonged to the moneyed elite, while undergoing the judging process proved they had invested extraordinary sums to obtain such luxurious objects of affection. For those who achieved selection, it meant monopolizing both envy and conversation within the season’s social circles—so thoroughly did this stimulate ladies glutted with wealth and leisure that during the exhibition, rather than appraising dogs, it became whispered they were really judging the attendees’ attire swathed in opulent furs; such was the spectacle that drove upper-class women to frenzy.

My wife, true to form, had been submitting entries every year since her days as Countess Messalino, yet she had never once been selected.

The canine trends recently favored unusual breeds like Pomeranians, Pekingese, and Cairn Terriers—exotic companion dogs welcomed into the selections—so noblewomen spent these past four or five years scouring for such rarities with eyes ablaze. Yet Baroness Leroy Soler, wife of the senator elected from Barcelona, was already selected twice consecutively—the year before last and last year. It was the widespread rumor that this Baroness had once again obtained a rare and unusual breed from somewhere in South America and was likely to achieve her third consecutive selection come next spring.

The Baroness Leroy Soler—who along with my wife had been celebrated as one of social circles’ twin jewels and who at every turn fanned my wife’s competitive fervor—had her secret canine source finally revealed today through a whisper from her friend Madame Macías Molinare: Far from some South American connection! Right beneath our feet! From that eccentric Julio Benavides—operating a modest dog shop in Barcelona’s back alleys while obsessively breeding peculiar hybrids—she had procured those prized dogs through exorbitant hush payments! Instantly vanished were all concerns over servant reforms, family pedigree, social standing—even the Majardo predicament—as my wife’s heart became wholly occupied by next spring’s competition and those freakish breeds. This elation lifted my wife’s spirits to such delirious heights that she forgot her customary scornful glances and had someone telephone me instead. With confidentiality fees binding him, Benavides wouldn’t sell readily—hence her demand that I deploy the bank’s influence to somehow secure one.

While nodding magnanimously and listening with attentive ‘Hmm, hmms,’ deep within I felt compelled once more to press my hands together in prayerful gratitude toward Baroness Leroy Soler and Madame Macías Molinare.

Julio Benavides, the dog dealer “Just imagining how relieved I would feel to put that haughty Baroness Leroy Soler in her place...” “That’s why I made an agreement with Madame Macías Molinare.” “If the dog dealer will sell to us, we’ll both acquire the same specimen to enter in the competition and give Baroness Leroy Soler a proper shock!...” My wife set down her chocolate cup and lit a thin cigarette.

“Wait—so you hadn’t actually met Baroness Leroy Soler yourself?” “So you met Madame Macías Molinare then.” “I thought—again—because you kept saying ‘Baroness Leroy Soler’ over and over on the phone...” “Either way—isn’t that utterly trivial?” “I want a dog—isn’t it enough if I just get one?” My wife replied irritably, her characteristic impatience surfacing between her brows as she clattered the delicate ivory ribs of the fan she’d been fluttering at her chest. Were I to remain oblivious and repeat such inquiries, she would next curl her lips in that scornful smile and begin tap-tapping her heel against the floor.

“Th-that’s right. Never mind all that… So then, what kind of dog is it?” I hurriedly tried changing the subject. “It’s apparently some sort of cross between a Wolfhound and Dachshund—a terribly ugly-looking large dog, Madame Molinare said.”

The moment she mentioned an "ugly-looking dog," I felt my wife's gaze battering me from behind the fan she held to her lips—instinctively, I withdrew my legs beneath the table. "I'm perfectly willing to cover something like a confidentiality fee myself." "It's merely a dog—surely he wouldn't refuse to sell one." "I've told you countless times—the problem isn't money but convincing him to sell! Why can't you comprehend this?" "I keep explaining—if he dislikes you, he won't sell even for millions of pesetas piled high!"

“If he won’t sell it for money, then what does he sell it for?”

“That’s exactly what I’ve been telling you!” “He sells them based entirely on his own whims!” “Why on earth is your perception so poor?” “They say ‘hear one and understand ten,’ yet with you it’s hearing ten to barely swallow down one.”

“Anyway, let us go.” “Let us simply go and see,” I said, discarding my cigarette as I rose.

For a man like me—socially inept and poor at conversation—prolonged discussions with my wife were absolutely inadvisable. The best course was to act swiftly on all matters.

“I don’t know what manner of difficult master he may be, but should I go and make a proper entreaty, he surely wouldn’t dismiss us outright.” “I know mentioning money again might earn me your reproach, but if it can be settled with money—whether 200,000 or 300,000 pesetas—I don’t care… I’ll make sure to get it for you.” “Hey now—rest assured and let’s just go out and see!” My bold-sounding words must have stirred my wife’s spirits. Finally, my wife also cheered up and stood up.

And so we left Hotel Albeal Palace side by side for the first time in ages—on this day alone maintaining an uncharacteristically close distance of not even a foot apart—as I sat satisfied feeling my wife’s proximity beside me in the car. Of course, while I knew nothing of what manner of difficult dog dealer this might be, I took it for granted that surely a single dog couldn’t be beyond purchase with money. And with a buoyant heart, I had been thinking that once I obtained the dog and things between my wife and me improved, I would invite my now good-humored wife for our first yacht ride in ages—though of course, I no longer remember whether we actually boarded that yacht together that day. Even now, all that remains in my memory are the face and form of Julio Benavides—the dog dealer who sold us the hound but in exchange engraved upon my mind an indescribably gruesome impression.

Benavides’ shop was located on Plaça de Catalunya Street, but this town was indeed a slum among slums—an appallingly squalid place. Though whether we would buy the dog remained naturally important, I myself felt greater joy in using such business as a pretext to be driving through the city like this with my wife—yet even this secret pleasure of mine gradually lost its charm as our car advanced, waning with each passing moment.

The cramped street was lined with buildings whose every bay window had laundry lines crisscrossing above the thoroughfare, hung thick with tattered garments resembling swaddling cloths. Even our driver—who through long years of service at aristocratic residences should have known every corner of the city—had to halt the steering wheel two or three times, searching sweat-drenched, before we could locate our destination at Plaça de Catalunya Street.

“There’s no need to trouble yourself coming all the way to such a place! If you want a dog, you could’ve simply ordered the head steward to purchase one for you—what a nuisance! Is women’s competitive spirit truly this ferocious?!” I muttered in utter astonishment. My wife—her entranced eyes dewy yet alternately glinting with passionate intensity or vehement hatred, those beautifully nuanced orbs opened wide and round—gazed spellbound at the squalid houses encroaching upon us with their grim novelty. There clustered women dressed in rags beyond even Barcelona’s meanest quarters—matrons dangling rope-bound fish while shrilly berating children at ear-splitting volume, those same scolded urchins fleeing barefoot with snot-smeared faces to swarm about our automobile. Such was Plaça de Catalunya Street—this wretched alley—yet Benavides’ canine emporium proved relatively simple to locate.

Near the square of this impoverished town stood a two-story house with crumbling bricks, its entrance flanked by cages containing two or three Poodles and Harriers. From inside the house as well came the cacophony of various dogs barking raucously, while a pungent animal stench assailed our nostrils. And yet despite being merely the proprietor of a small dog shop in this filthy town, our driver's repeated requests for guidance were met with nothing but empty replies, leaving us waiting for some fifteen or sixteen minutes. Moreover, the proprietor who finally appeared before us was a figure perfectly suited to this grim dog shop—an eerily gloomy man who might have been born from shadows. Without uttering a word, he stood rigidly in the dim light, staring intently at us who had entered as though conducting an inspection.

Exuding a musty, rancid odor from his body—this frail little man who appeared so sickly—could he have been barely forty years old? From deep within his wrinkled face, his gold-rimmed eyes glinting behind glasses, wearing a Jewish-style brimless cap and a coat riddled with hook-shaped tears, being observed by such a man from the dim earthen-floored interior was by no means a pleasant sensation. “We were referred by Madame Leroy Soler.” “Might we perhaps see that... um... unusual breed you sell here?”

“That’s strange. “Madame Leroy Soler would never say such a thing…” “But she did tell us,” my wife replied with a composed smile. “I don’t want this getting around… but since I’ll tell you alone… well, go ahead and ask. “If it’s just one dog… I’m sure arrangements can be made.” “Hmm... That lady herself said such things?” “…Hmm…!” “This is utterly preposterous!” Not merely voicing his astonishment but manifesting it physically, the man kept scrutinizing my wife’s face with intensifying focus, while I too stood transfixed, gazing dumbfounded at her starkly defined profile floating pale in the dimness. When it comes down to it, can women really lie this boldly and effortlessly? I wondered dumbfoundedly, merely gazing at her profile.

“……Might I see it?” “Hmm… Showing it is certainly possible… But might I ask where you both have come from?” “We’ve come from Paseo de Colón,” my wife uttered another effortless lie with perfect composure. “We heard there were unusual hounds… from Madame Soler, so we rushed right over. Are there none left now?”

“There’s just one more left… Well, there is one, but…” The old man mused while scrutinizing my wife’s face once more with such intensity it might have bored holes through her flesh. “...Madam—do you actually like dogs?” "...Well, I suppose," my wife smiled. “I might even say I’m more fond of them than most… Is this the one?”

She pointed to a dog lying in a cage right beside where she stood, but the old man shook his head wordlessly with an air of indifference.

“Where is it?” "Now there's no need to rush yourself like that," he said with an arrogance so perplexing it blurred whether he was customer or seller. “It’s a valuable dog indeed.” “We ourselves rarely bring them out to such places.” “...If you insist on having it though—I suppose we could sell that one...” “And Madam—which might you prefer? Male or female?” “We ourselves currently only deal in males—but if that suits your needs...”

This brusque, utterly charmless manner was essentially his standard mode of interaction. Though I had gone to the trouble of being dragged out from the bank, even reborn I could never have engaged in such deceitful banter with the old man—hence why my wife had been conversing with him all along, while I merely stood like a fool behind her, clutching the check in my coat pocket. Repulsed by the foul stench permeating the shop, I listened to this exchange while rhythmically tapping the earthen floor with my cane's tip. Yet I couldn't help thinking that had I not come here under such circumstances with my wife, I would have abandoned this repulsive establishment and its equally repulsive proprietor without hesitation. There existed nothing but a truly grim arrogance.

Moreover, the more the shopkeeper feigned reluctance to sell, the more my wife’s curiosity seemed to ignite, her face now alight with fervent determination. However, all the while, the shopkeeper continued to stare brazenly—without the slightest courtesy—from the crown of my wife’s head down to the tips of her toes, occasionally even directing that piercing, probing gaze toward me. Had he finally determined that these buyers were no mere window-shoppers? He retreated wordlessly into the depths of the shop with apparent reluctance, only to reemerge after an interminable delay—whether he had staggered up a ladder to some attic or dragged it out from a cellar, I could not tell. When he finally returned, cradling a crude cage in both hands as though it held a family heirloom, what squirmed within proved indeed to resemble a cross between a Dachshund and Wolfhound. Though fully grown at five or six months old and bulging with fat, it matched my wife’s description… no, surpassed it—a hundredfold, a thousandfold more grotesque in appearance. And as for its appearance squirming in that narrow cage—truly, squirming would be the most apt description rather than walking or moving—it staggered unsteadily with massive hips and splayed legs, its face bearing not a canine resemblance but rather the exact visage of a baboon from the zoo. Had my wife and I possessed even the slightest knowledge about the vicissitudes of canine fashion trends, we likely would never have brought home such an ugly creature—not even if offered for free, let alone for a thousand pesetas—so utterly bizarre were this dog’s countenance and form. However, though we lacked deep knowledge about dogs themselves, we as affluent individuals did possess a certain degree of experience regarding the vicissitudes of canine fashion trends. That experience compelled us to consider that a dog with such a face and form might indeed become this year’s trend in lapdogs, while simultaneously leading us to conclude that for a dog of such bizarre appearance—whether the shopkeeper’s quoted price was reasonable or not—a sum of at least 100,000 pesetas would be only natural.

And so I obediently wrote out a check for 190,000 pesetas as instructed, had the driver carry this filthy dog released from its cage, and directed the car back toward Rambla del Centro Avenue—yet what remains etched in my memory to this day is that dog dealer's obstinately peculiar way of conducting business. Unlike other dog dealers who would show two or three dogs for customers to choose their favorite, he presented only a single one—a practice that even ordinary dog dealers would consider extraordinary—though admittedly, this was because we hadn’t gone to purchase just any dog but had specifically sought out that particular one, and if only that single dog had remained in the dealer’s possession, perhaps it was only natural—though I cannot say for certain. But what made this dog dealer even more extraordinary was that even after receiving such an exorbitant sum for the dog’s purchase, he showed no merchant-like delight—no, far from showing delight! On the contrary, he made a sour face as though greatly inconvenienced, declaring, “We too are parting with something precious here. Apologies for the inconvenience, but I must make a formal visit to your residence,” he declared with an expression that all but proclaimed this his rightful due, producing a large ledger.

“Madam, would you yourself be keeping it? And might I confirm that you are indeed the person in question?” After repeating this verification with tedious insistence, he subjected us to exhaustive interrogation about our address, full names, and even occupations before making us sign our own particulars—a procedure that left me utterly dumbfounded. For what should have been a simple transaction—purchasing a single puppy with cash—it became a spectacle akin to appearing at police headquarters to claim confiscated stolen goods. Yet how profoundly did even that bewilderment magnify our sense of having unearthed buried treasure, knowing we had wrested from the old man something he so begrudged relinquishing! Neither I—mere mortal flesh—nor my wife could have possibly fathomed in that moment that this creature would become the demonic appendage dragging us toward ruination, a horror destined to rattle civilization’s very foundations.

Two Sorrows ...The standard body specifications document that Benavides provided alongside the veterinary inspection certificate that day read as follows.

Troes Apirado Dog Breed Standard Body Specifications Document

In 1943, Julio Benavides first created and designated the Troes Apirado dog breed. Coat: Short, smooth, and dense overall, with long hair clusters growing solely on the loins.

Coat color: Silver-yellow-brown, apricot, or dark yellow-brown.

Eyes: Oval in shape and set obliquely; when excited, they burn like fire. Lips: Covering the lower jaw; not sharply defined. Olfactory sense: Extends several miles Forelimbs: Wide, splayed, bones exceedingly thick, outward-facing

Elbows: Well separated from ribs, parallel to torso, not bending forward Ribs: Deeply sprung, chest deep and broad Back: Horizontal, sloping toward loins, not curved Hindquarters: Buttocks round and broad, extremely robust.

Tail: Base set high, not long, curved, hanging low Weight: Male 110 fundo, female up to 80 fundo Height: 30 to 32 inches Temperament: Docile under intense petting yet ferocious when angered; fights to the death; absolutely unacclimated to strangers; suitable as guard dog despite being companion breed. Of course, had I scrutinized this so-called breed standard document thoroughly, I might have noticed the various secret characteristics hidden beneath its surface text or the cunning deceptions Benavides had woven there to beguile the world. But having no way of foreseeing this would later become an issue, I merely skimmed through it before curling it up and tossing it into the drawer. However, what caught my attention then were only the entries about eyes burning like fire when excited and the temperament description stating it becomes ferocious and fights to the death when angered. Among dogs that turn ferocious and fight to the death when provoked, there exist Wolfhounds; Bull Terriers and Bulldogs; Shepherds; and Dachshunds would likely fall into that category too. Moreover, as dogs generally possess this combative nature when angered—varying only in intensity—such descriptions could hardly be considered remarkable. Yet this particular creature appeared so sluggish and unsteady that I found myself intrigued: could such a beast truly harbor those very qualities?

Moreover, regarding the description of the eyes—as far as my memory serves—I recall that the breed specifications for Chinese Pugs, a type of lapdog, contained such an item. Could such pug-like passion truly lurk within the blood vessels of this dull, sluggish dog? I felt as though I were glimpsing some secret of creation, finding it rather intriguing—though that sensation lasted but an instant—for in truth, I held no particular interest in dogs to begin with. Solely driven by my desire to win my wife’s favor—having followed her to the dog dealer and procured this creature—no particular interest beyond that arose within me; upon finishing my cursory reading, I simply tossed it into the drawer. And though I had long since completely forgotten about this dog's peculiar habits, that evening—when we released it onto the Persian carpet beneath the grand hall's flower-like ornamental lamps, that carpet which shone so brilliantly under the electric lights it might awaken sleeping eyes—how grotesquely did that creature stagger about, sniffing its surroundings while writhing and squirming! And how the head butler, maids, and a crowd of housemaids—finally even cooks and gatekeepers drawn by the laughter—must have timidly come peeking near the hall's entrance! How they must have contorted their faces to stifle mirth while minding my wife's and my presence, straining every nerve to suppress their laughter! The more the servants laughed, the more my wife’s spirits soared—how utterly intoxicated she became by her sense of having unearthed a treasure hardly requires tedious elaboration here.

Depending on one's perspective, it was far from being a demon's tentacle! In our laughter-starved household where coldness reigned between my wife and me, this creature had brewed such mirth and vivacity that one might fancy an angel's tendril had swept in—yet the longer I observed it, the more unequivocally it manifested as a monster of incomprehensible essence. In its absurdly elongated torso and stunted limbs, it mirrored a Dachshund; through the sturdiness of forelegs and coat hue, an English Mastiff; and given how it would attain thirty-two inches in height and one hundred ten fundo weight when fully grown, it stood poised to become none other than an Irish Wolfhound—that titan among breeds. Truly a canine enigma—whatever it might become with maturity—but in its current puppy state, only the hindquarters had swollen disproportionately large. There alone sprouted tawny fur sheared like a cliff face, while the entire body lay sheathed in fur so short and sleek it evoked a drenched seal or slick fur seal pelt. Paired with its baboonish countenance and the geriatric splay-legged shamble it affected, the creature embodied pure absurdity.

Moreover, when I fixed my gaze and scrutinized it more intently, that sense of absurdity vanished entirely, replaced by something akin to a creature botched by the Creator... stirring an odd, indescribable sorrow—as though beholding living grief itself. This sensation had likely taken root not only within me but also in the heart of my wife, who laughed merrily. My wife gave this dog the name Sorrow. And surrounding Sorrow—who bore no resemblance to sorrow—she laughed delightedly at its appearance; but given her existence defined by cosmetics, social calls, theater visits, soirées... and little else beyond these pursuits, she must have found herself compelled to immediately boast to her intimate friends about the joy of acquiring this rare canine.

Of course, the dog show's selection criteria lay not in having acquired a rare breed, but in judging coat quality, coloration, and manner of care; thus while there existed no need whatsoever to conceal the obtained dog, from the very next day she promptly fitted this puppy with a silver collar and silver chain, taking it along without a moment's separation—both for morning and evening strolls, and when preparing the carriage to visit friends. Perhaps driven by joy and satisfaction, when I returned from the bank, she would appear even in my study—a place she had never before frequented—and recount how crowds had gathered around Sorrow during their walk that day, marveling at its strangeness, or how friends visited had burned with envy, probing relentlessly about where she had acquired it—

“Though it may seem spiteful, I didn’t tell them.” “After Lady Artes pulled such a malicious trick last time, I simply had to repay the favor this occasion…” She smiled with evident delight as she spoke these words. Yet she had apparently revealed the Plaza de Cataluña Street dog dealer’s location to three or four intimate friends—under solemn vows of secrecy—after their persistent entreaties…… Several days later, when I returned from the bank,

“I have an amusing story to tell you,” my wife said girlishly, her face aglow as she entered the study. She seemed to have just returned from an outing, today again clutching an ivory-handled ornamental fan, her attire meticulously crafted in pure Spanish fashion—how perfectly that delicate grace suited my wife’s form. “You’re familiar with Lady Rodes and Lady Granados, aren’t you? Even though those ladies went out of their way to purchase them, no matter how much money they offered, he absolutely refused to sell to them, I hear.”

“Since he said he only had one left at that time, hasn’t he sold them all by now?” “...That’s what anyone would think.” “However, that’s not the case at all.” “Even Mrs. Molinare and Mrs. Alberto who came afterward properly purchased theirs.” “Though it seems they spent quite a considerable sum...” “If he’s selling to so many now, then hasn’t someone like Mrs. Leroy Soler been made a fool for paying that retainer fee?” “Ha ha ha!” “Anyway, that dog dealer was quite the difficult character.” “He must have refused to sell due to some displeasure.”

Though there was nothing particularly amusing about it, I too forced out a laugh to humor my wife. "But isn't that actually a blessing in disguise? If this dog is such a difficult-to-obtain breed, then isn't it thanks to that old man that the value of your possession increases?" "That’s precisely right. So while I humor them when Lady Rodes and Lady Granados let things slip... deep down I’m really... Ohohohoho!" My wife covered her mouth with a heavy cypress fan adorned with earring-like ornaments, releasing the first resplendent laughter of our married life as the faint scent of aloeswood perfume drifted imperceptibly to my nostrils. And that possession of my wife's—whose value should have appreciated thanks to that old man—still swayed its hips grandly while frolicking like a puppy at her feet against the chaise longue where she reclined. Though its body had grown considerably larger after over twenty days in our home, the more it developed, the more sorrowful it appeared—showing not the slightest sign of increased worth.

In any case, this dog dealer’s peculiar business practices—selling or refusing based on his assessment of customers—resulted in the rejected ladies growing all the more envious of my wife’s bizarre possession, thereby inflating her sense of triumph. Yet what I had never considered then, but now realize upon reflection, was that those denied by this dealer—Lady Rodes and Lady Granados—were all amiable elderly women in their fifties or sixties, while those permitted purchases—Lady Molinare, a stately and taciturn beauty of twenty-seven or twenty-eight, and Lady Alberto, a similarly aged woman of voluptuous build—belonged to an entirely different category.

That is to say, whether this dog dealer sold or refused was never determined by how customers comported themselves, but rather by his own appraisal—specifically targeting not elderly ladies but exclusively young beauties. Had I realized this then, a strange sensation might have arisen within me—but how could such thoughts have occurred to a mere mortal like myself in that moment? Thus our household had lived with Sorrow at its center for some time, yet over two months had already slipped away like a dream since Sorrow's arrival. Had there been genuine affection for the dog itself, that would have been one matter—but with novelty of this degree, once its season of peculiarity had passed, it naturally became prone to being forgotten.

Moreover, my wife was of a fickle nature, with still eight or nine months remaining until next year’s exhibition… and furthermore, her daily life was not solely occupied by Sorrow. She now had to sponsor Blanca Luna—this newly popular Argentine tango virtuoso—and accept invitations to concerts, and attend Lady Rodes' cherished séances, and host dinner parties for friends at home, and go to the theater... soirées... jewelry shops... and dressmaker appointments! By this time, Sorrow’s name had all but vanished from conversation. Yet Sorrow himself had taken on the air of having resided in this house for over a decade already, slinking through mansion halls and gardens until he had seamlessly become—before we knew it—an indispensable member of my household. And of course, my wife had never personally attended to Sorrow's meals or detailed care from the beginning—having entrusted all matters to Garbo, the head butler. Thus Sorrow—no longer being tended to by my wife—now trailed persistently after Garbo who fed him, appearing more attached to this servant than to his mistress.

Now, it was a certain day during that time. To elaborate further—it occurred during those days when I was wholly consumed by strategizing how to broach the subject of removing the bedroom lock with my wife, perpetually weighing whether today or tomorrow might offer her most agreeable moment—that I found myself taking leave from the bank for tax office-mandated asset verification, sequestered in my study throughout the day. It seemed my wife had received a female friend’s visit since morning—from the parlor drifted sounds of a piano and phonograph records being played—and at noon, they had apparently set up a table beneath the ivy in the garden to take their meal there. Some two or three hours must have passed since then. I had another library outside my study, adjoining the Sun Room.

And having some books I wanted to consult, I climbed the stairs and set out for the library. Passing through the outer corridor while gazing at the veranda, I entered the inner corridor until I reached the area adjacent to the Sun Room where my wife sat taking tea with her friend. There I stood pulling volumes from the shelves, unaware that neither my wife nor her companion could have possibly imagined me lingering by the neighboring bookcase while turning pages. Through palms arranged in rows and orchids adorning every surface—amidst a profusion of tropical blooms crowding the Sun Room—their conversation came to me as clearly as if cupped in my palms.

“How obscene! How utterly obscene! How could such a thing be possible?” came my wife’s voice. “Even if you protest 'How could that be?', if it's the truth, there's nothing to be done about it,” her friend replied. “That’s why people say they’re pets for unmarried women and widows! Why, even dachshunds are like that—those long torsos and short legs… Ohohoho!” Her laughter rang out before continuing: “Oh my! How careless you are, Dolores! You!” “Oh hohoho! If anyone’s surprised by your carelessness, it’s me! Look here—you see how this part is shaped… don’t you?” Her voice then dropped into strangely hushed whispers. I kept my eyes fixed on the printed text while straining to listen—not truly meaning to eavesdrop—but once they lowered their voices completely, I could catch nothing more. Yet through the silence came canine snuffling sounds; Sorrow seemed to be sprawled nearby, making me feel privy to some unspeakable secret about dogs. I hesitated even to rustle the pages. Seeing no alternative, I gathered the necessary books and tried slipping away quietly—but froze mid-step when their whispers resumed amid laughter. The phrase “bank president” rooted me to the spot.

“Well… even a bank president looking like that… I can see why, Dolores.” “Wouldn’t you say? That’s precisely why I simply cannot go without locking the bedroom door at night. You do understand, Sirion! What about my feelings? It’s as if I’m keeping two Sorrows. A zoo—this house is a veritable menagerie!” In that instant, I felt all blood reverse course through my veins. My standing legs and book-clutching hands trembled violently—I could feel pallor spreading across my face and lips. I could neither remain nor flee! …Having forgotten even to close the door behind me, when I finally reached my study, my chest heaved as though I’d traversed a thousand leagues. I dumped the armload of books onto the desk with a thud before collapsing bonelessly into my chair.

It was that same feeling from twenty-seven years ago with Flor Esvina. Though I had graduated university, read books, aged into a bank presidency—though years had passed and constellations shifted—my heart had vaulted back to boyhood days, to that precise sensation from twenty-seven years prior when told "I refuse to stand on a podium with a cripple," when I wept my way home from school—not a shred of difference remained. Back then, after crying through one night, my tears would dry—but now even if I wept ten nights through, with these tears never drying, no fresh tears came to replace them. For the guileless trust I'd placed in Flor Esvina during youth lay shattered, leaving me trusting none and believing myself beloved by none. Just as I'd never hated Flor Esvina in childhood, neither did I now bear hatred toward my wife Dolores. My sole regret was this ceaselessly idiotic state of mind. Unaware we kept two Sorrows, I'd clapped and pointed at the dog's graceless gait to mock it with my wife—yet remained blind to my own sorrow while ridiculing only the beast's—this fatuousness of mine tormented me beyond endurance.

My father, out of pity for his crippled son, worked tirelessly until death to amass this fortune—which I squandered like water to buy my wife’s favor, all while remaining oblivious to her and the servants’ scorn. I even bowed before that dog dealer they mocked as a zookeeper, yet still could not abandon that woman—feeling neither anger nor hatred… no, far beyond either! That should my wife appear here this very moment, this spineless heart of mine would once again grovel before her offering up my father's inheritance—this feeling of mine that I could no longer control seethed with inexpressible frustration, regretful and unbearable beyond measure.

While clawing at my head, I collapsed onto the desk. There lay the estimate of my assets—filled entirely with Western-style ruled paper—on which I had been writing and erasing, erasing and recalculating up until just moments ago. Gazing at them, whether it was fifty centimos or a single peseta, I felt even my own feelings—which had been wracking my brains all day trying to evade taxes—rising up to laugh at me. For property that would ultimately be squandered on a woman who utterly detested me, whether they took a million pesetas or levied two million in taxes, it would all amount to six of one and half a dozen of the other—or so I had come to feel.

Unable to bear it any longer, I stood up and began pacing around the room. While stewing in frustration yet knowing nowhere to channel it, while seething with rage yet finding no target for that fury, I had no recourse but to pace about the room as though gasping for breath. And as I ceaselessly circled around my desk like a caged bear, a soundless shadow-like presence entered. It was Sorrow who had come down from the second floor. Had it lain sprawled in the sunlight so long that it now sought shade? Or perhaps, catching sight of the door left ajar as someone headed into the garden, it had casually slipped inside! It approached me with whimpering snuffles, staggering closer as if seeking affection, but its revolting form seemed to me nothing less than a mirror of my own gait—such loathing welled up within that I had to turn my face away. Unaware that I glared down with eyes full of loathing, the dog—perhaps craving affection—pressed itself closer still against me, as if declaring: "Come now, let us cripples get along!" It seemed poised to voice those very words—and out of sheer revulsion, I took a step back.

Moreover, as I withdrew this time, an even greater fury welled up within me—and the moment I saw those dull-witted eyes gazing up at me in dumbfounded bewilderment, hatred and rage surged into my skull with such force that I could scarcely breathe. I raised my leg and kicked with all my might toward what I took to be its flank.

“Yelp! Yow-!” With a scream that shook the entire house, the dog leaped up. As it leaped up, I raised my left leg and delivered another kick. My bad leg lost its balance, making me stagger and brace one hand against the desk, but with that same hand I frantically grabbed a book and hurled it with all my strength at the dog’s torso. The thrown book deflected and struck the open door with a crash! With a tremendous crash. Next I threw the ledger rod. Clang-clatter-crash! It seemed to have struck somewhere with an even more tremendous crash. The dog emitted a guttural growl. And yelp! Yowl! With another yelp, it leaped up—and this dog dashed out the door with such speed that one would wonder how it could be so agile. What I grabbed and threw, I no longer remember! The servants would come running. Footsteps came clattering in from all directions.

Late at night.

“Yowl! Yip-yip!” “Yowl!” With an unbroken stream of yelping cries, the dog fled in disarray and dashed into the grand hall. Just as I prepared to hurl another object in pursuit, I found myself face-to-face with my wife at the grand staircase connecting the hall to the second floor—she who had apparently rushed down in haste. “What do you imagine you’re doing?” My wife came to an abrupt halt, looking down at my upraised fist. We resembled nothing so much as a schoolmistress confronting an errant pupil.

“If you were to throw something like that, Sorrow will die.” "I don't care if it dies!" I shouted, only then realizing what I was doing as I lowered my raised fist. But what I had frantically grabbed was an elaborately carved silver ashtray—heavy and large. The dog had fled under the settee in the grand hall and continued whimpering pitifully without cease.

"What on earth did Sorrow do?" "What did it do? What could it possibly have done?!" I blustered, but immediately fell speechless. "That... This creature forced its way into my room!" "Good heavens!" my wife exclaimed in disbelief. "Just because it entered my room... you... you..." I panted. "Would you subject it to such cruelty?" "..."

“My, what a commotion you’ve been making since earlier.” “Aren’t you aware that my friend is here upstairs?” “I feel utterly ashamed.” And “Sorrow! Sorrow!” she called, but the dog, utterly terrified, merely continued whimpering and refused to emerge from beneath the settee.

“Poor thing! Come now, come out here at once! If you’re feeling unwell, perhaps you should retire for the night?” “I don’t feel unwell or anything. I just don’t want to become a zoo.” I’d carelessly let it slip out—what a blunder! I thought—but it was already too late. “Huh? What did you just say? Now you—”

“...” “This talk of a zoo... What could that possibly mean?” “I simply can’t comprehend it...” Now that matters had reached this point, there was no alternative left. The servants stood bewildered near the entrance... I had been swept up in an irreversible momentum. “I only meant I didn’t want our home turned into a zoo... It wasn’t directed at you.” “Though it may not concern me... What exactly do you mean by that?” “I truly haven’t the slightest notion what you’re referring to.”

“You understand perfectly well!” “I’m not particularly angry about such things.” “Not angry at all—I simply refuse to be grouped with Sorrow!” “Good heavens, you—!” “What sort of man are you?!” A flicker of panic darted across her cheeks, but my wife quickly cried out to mask it. Immediately, a fit of temper suffused her entire face, transforming her beautiful features into a deathly pallor.

“You were eavesdropping, weren’t you?” “How dare you! Eavesdropping is so unmanly.” “So you call yourself a gentleman?” “My… To think a gentleman would go about eavesdropping…”

“No! That’s not it! I wasn’t eavesdropping... When I went to the archive to consult some books... You mustn’t misunderstand this. I can’t have you misunderstanding... I was... conducting research...” “No, I shan’t hear your excuses. The very notion of a man making excuses—I couldn’t bear to entertain it... And should you persist in explanations, you’d only daub uglier colors upon your own deeds. So at last it’s fallen into place for me...”

“It’s not an excuse!” “It is absolutely not an excuse!” “I absolutely cannot have you misunderstanding this.” “…Really, Dolores, I was… for research purposes…” “Was it for your precious research that you came eavesdropping?” “I see now about your precious research.” “So... so you subjected poor innocent Sorrow to such a terrible ordeal?” “If you had something to say, why didn’t you say it to me face to face…?” “How pitiful! To take it out on poor innocent Sorrow, who’s done nothing wrong at all!” “Oh, what a coward you are!”

Sorrow, dragging her limp and looking terrified, slipped past my side and approached. “Poor thing! There, there, come here,” she cooed affectionately as she picked her up. “Dolores… I’m not good with words—I can’t express what’s in my heart—but I’m not angry with you… Not toward you…” “I simply cannot tolerate being scolded for your eavesdropping,” she declared sharply. Then she raised her hand and pointed upstairs.

“You!

“We have a guest here, you know.” “Doesn’t this strike you as shameful?” “To make such a spectacle… How utterly disgraceful…”

She drew herself up as if taking a deep breath, inhaled deeply—though this repetition seemed almost ritualistic—and with what might be termed consummate social grace, bearing the immense Sorrow that filled her bosom, quietly ascended the staircase once more. Left alone at the foot of the stairs—and there I stood, hair torn at, necktie twisted, clutching an ashtray amidst servants who feigned blindness—having been definitively convicted by my wife of eavesdropping, how utterly desolate and disgraced I had become was a humiliation too abject to warrant further elaboration.

No sooner did I return to my study and collapse into the chair before my desk than the sound of a car pulling up to the entrance reached me—and then came the voices of my wife and her friend, departing merrily with even Sorrow in tow, their chatter striking my ears as I wondered what they could possibly be discussing. As I followed the fading sound of the departing car—thinking nothing, contemplating nothing—I remained motionless, my gaze fixed on a single point in space. Far from possessing my wife’s body—! After all my painstaking efforts finally brought me this close to my wife, merely letting slip a single clumsy remark thrust us ten thousand leagues apart once more—contemplating my own stupidity, I felt utterly drained of all affection and resolve.

And now I sat devoid of even the vigor to tear at my hair, merely leaning limply against the chair—yet when envisioning my wife's current vivacity, that brisk efficiency with which she accomplished what I couldn't achieve even through reincarnation, my yearning for her company swelled until I found myself assailed by such wretched desolation that I wanted to wail aloud. But disregarding such feelings of mine entirely—did my wife perhaps fear that if she left Sorrow downstairs like this, I might someday seize an opportunity to kill it? From the very next day, she tethered Sorrow in her own parlor, never letting it roam free; ordered Garbo the head servant to have its three daily meals carried to the room, never permitting me to approach; thus clearly demonstrating how this latest failure had indeed proven utterly fatal for me.

And from then on, how utterly wretched my situation became! Particularly now that this obstructive presence called Sorrow had intervened between us, resolving matters had grown all the more difficult for me. Though nominally master of the household, I found myself so attuned to every subtle shift in the servants' expressions that it became impossible to distinguish who truly held mastery here. Moreover, though my heart brimmed with desire to apologize when occasion permitted, Dolores refused to countenance any such sentiment; even when returning from the bank at dusk, she ensured never to be present in the house where our gazes might meet. Night after night she attended theaters with friends, graced balls by invitation, and—it being the height of bullfighting season—daily occupied prime seats at the arena alongside like-minded noblewomen, parading these favored matadors at evening banquets; she scarcely deigned to take supper at home.

Of course, as for me—whether she might be angry or smiling—I felt at least a faint satisfaction in this beautiful wife continuing to cohabit with me in marital relations, even if only superficially; therefore I had neither the inclination to interfere with such trivial freedoms of hers and incur further wrath, nor any particular surprise left to feel about husband and wife dining apart—a circumstance I had already grown thoroughly accustomed to since our marriage.

Yet even so, there were times when I could not help feeling the desolation seep into my bones—sitting alone in that vast, serenely quiet dining room ablaze with ornamental lamps, its snow-white tablecloth strewn with stock flowers, tulips, and dahlias, wielding my knife in solitary silence. Even if she sat there without exchanging a single word with me—even if, should she speak, her second utterance would be accompanied by that cold sneer playing about her cheeks, that attitude of unapproachable wrath—if only Dolores had been seated amidst those flowers, I could not help thinking how this dining room would surely have become a warmer, more welcoming space.

And I could not help surveying anew the chillingly cold expanse of this dining room—bereft of its mistress—so vast it seemed to induce shivering through my very core; yet this warped emotional state between my wife and myself must have been swiftly perceived by the servants as well! Throughout my soup-sipping and fork-using, Garbo the head servant—who kept pacing restlessly between kitchen and dining room while attending me—and Teresa the housemaid, whom I encountered coming and going through the corridor, both had eyes filled with unmistakable pity. They seemed perpetually cowering as though my wife's outings were their responsibility, shrinking from my gaze as if dreading interrogation—yet this very behavior made me feel indescribably pitied and mocked by them, so much so that even when the question burned in my throat, I had never once asked them, "Where has my wife gone?"

…No! Far from even considering asking such a thing! Rather, it was I who sought to avoid encountering the servants; even in my own home, when passing through a hallway, I would slip through as though fleeing, seizing every moment they were absent. And for me in such a state, what became my most restful and settled sanctuary was my study located in the deepest recess of the ground floor. Here I would shut the door tight, draw the green window drapes deep, light the desk lamp, settle heavily into my chair, and while enjoying the smoke rising from my cherished Dunhill, take up some newly published economics volume—these moments now became when my heart found its greatest ease.

Of course, though I kept my eyes fixed on such books—some part of my mind remaining preoccupied with my wife’s return—constantly straining to catch every sound of cars slipping into the entrance garden—I could no longer immerse myself body and soul in reading as I had during my bachelor years. Yet for someone like me—who neither drank nor gambled nor cared to visit clubs—this remained the most soothing method for my troubled heart. No matter how eagerly I awaited her return—of course—my wife would never deign to come greet me upon arriving home. Her footsteps alone—as if mindful of late-night propriety—would ascend with sharp clacks of high heels up the stairs before withdrawing straight to her own bedroom. Yet even so—for me—the mere knowledge that she now slept beneath this same roof provided neither reassurance nor composure—only a hollow simulacrum of domesticity. Once words from my book began seeping steadily into consciousness—I too could retreat upstairs to find sleep—but this very proximity—this daily vision of her vibrant form at dawn and dusk—rendered my unfulfilled torment ever more acutely unbearable in those days.

What remains carved into my heart and unforgettable even now is a certain evening from that time. A mist of fine rain hung thick in the unseasonably warm spring air that filled the room, while the sweet-sour scent of gardenias, beaten down by the rain, suffused every corner of the house in a choking embrace. As was my custom, I had read until late into the night before retiring to bed, but that sweet, nerve-soothing scent pierced my nostrils, making sleep utterly impossible; turning the lamp by my pillow off and on again as I tossed restlessly, my eyes only grew unnaturally keener—it became clear I would find no slumber like this.

Unable to bear writhing on the bed any longer, I finally thrust my feet into slippers and began pacing circles around the bedroom in my nightclothes—goddammit! I had even contemplated using my wealth to acquire some young beauty who might rival my wife and teach her a humbling lesson—yet no sooner did this thought arise than cowardly rising before my eyes came the beautiful form of my wife now casting me her scornful glare. My wife’s face—coldly composed yet framed by voluptuous flesh, that very voluptuousness paradoxically radiating unassailable dignity, her married woman’s allure wrapped in virginal modesty… even the solitary beauty mark clinging beneath her throat… all of it tormented me with ineffable fascination and anguish, making my very nerves ache.

“Ah, what I desire isn’t women who can be bought with money. "It’s only my wife’s noble flesh—she who would never sell her body for money—that I desire to possess!” For an instant I stopped, and with a stifled groan clawed at my head—never before had I hated my wife so profoundly from the depths of my heart. Yet simultaneously—if she would but permit it—I could not help feeling my heart overflow with such tormenting tenderness that I wanted to prostrate myself before her bed and plead, "Please torment me no further." And yet that hateful, tormenting, adorable wife of mine lay sleeping. She slept breathing deeply and steadily. Wrapped in soft bedding... in that bedroom just three rooms away from my own... I finally threw open my bedroom door and stood before it.

And there I stood glaring at my wife's bedroom door. It wasn't that I had any particular plan in mind. Nor did I understand why I kept up this charade - yet despite my incomprehension, I found myself compelled to stand rooted there. Oil paintings hung in niches along the long corridor, while a large vase overflowed with crimson and purple blossoms whose branches bent under their riotous weight. The scarlet carpet glowed under electric lights in this late hour, showing that even the servants had long since fallen into deep slumber, leaving the mansion so deathly silent one might hear a pin drop. As I gazed out at this immense midnight solitude, I remained standing for some time; but when I finally sighed and moved to close the door again, I froze mid-motion in sudden alarm.

It was because I thought I could hear people whispering from somewhere. If human voices were to be heard at this late hour, they could only have been coming from my wife’s room. The moment I rose onto my tiptoes and muffled my footsteps for a few paces, the voice became clearly audible this time. “Oh, that’s not it… Sorrow! “Oh, how dreadful… Hohohoho!”

Though it was a low voice, there was no mistaking it as my wife’s. Ah! So my wife too couldn't sleep and was playing with Sorrow—the moment this thought struck me, I found myself puckering my lips involuntarily toward nothingness. But in the next instant I slammed the door shut, clambered onto my bed, snapped off the light switch with a click, and pressed my hands over my ears as I collapsed facedown.

What a soft, so soft, melting voice my wife possessed! Never once since our marriage had I heard such a dreamlike, ecstatic voice escape my wife’s lips. It was a sweet, so sweet voice that could make one swoon—so incongruous coming from my prim and imperious wife—and a dissolvingly suggestive laugh. Moreover, I myself shuddered at the realization that should I hear that sweet voice once more, my reason—still clinging to longing for her—would instantly lose all restraint, driving me to bodily hurl myself against my wife’s locked bedroom door like some callow youth.

Intrusion. When that sleepless night too had dawned, my wife sat at the breakfast table, still exuding her customary cold, unapproachable dignity. With the air of one attempting to solve an insoluble riddle—wondering from what part of that face emerged such unearthly sweet, dissolving tones—I maintained my strained composure while sipping oatmeal porridge, cutting ham and eggs, tearing bread, reading the newspaper and shifting my gaze to the business section; yet my well-rested wife's youthful cheeks bore not the slightest shadow, radiating instead a beauty that shone with absolute brilliance. I too kept my words restrained before soon taking the car to work; yet when I left the bank and night fell, that gnawing torment would once again arise within me. Particularly, having heard those sweet words she spoke while playing with the dog last night had carved into my chest with leaping intensity; even as I thought that hearing that voice would make sleep impossible, I still found myself slipping from my bed to stand outside her door. But there were nights when the voice I so desperately awaited would reach me, and nights when it would not; hearing it left me sleepless, while not hearing it left me unfulfilled—my mind growing unnervingly sharp—until lately I had become utterly enslaved by violent torment. Now, how many such nights had I endured?

At last I could no longer be satisfied merely standing at my own doorway; before I knew it, I found myself muffling my footsteps for two or three paces... until finally forgetting even to suppress their sound, I could not help but advance all the way to the threshold of my wife's bedroom. And finally, it was a certain midnight.

“What’s the matter, Sorrow? Hohohohohoho! That won’t do! Hohohohohoho! Oh my!” “Ah—uuuuuuh!”

Amidst the lively laughter, my wife's ecstatic moan intertwined—I started in shock, my face paling. The one with her was no longer Sorrow. My wife's moans were low, so low, sweet, so sweet—so faint they were nearly inaudible, yet unmistakably a whisper. Though I couldn't hear their voice, of course it was no dog—indeed, the one with her was human! And now at last I understood—why my wife kept such a grotesque dog in her parlor... Now I had seen through the true nature of her shallow cunning. While making others believe she was playing with Tristeza, in truth my wife had brought a man into her quarters. And indeed, it was precisely because Dolores had such a man that I had been so thoroughly despised.

I had no choice but to conclude this with absolute certainty. Then surveying my surroundings and seeing how the deathly silent midnight corridor still had only electric lights blazing brilliantly, I confirmed that the intruding man had no means of escape except by breaking a window and leaping down from the second floor. With my pallid face stiffening, I forced an air of composure and knocked on my wife’s bedroom door. “Open up!” “Dolores!” “Open the door!”

For the first time since our wedding, I bellowed in a voice brimming with marital authority. There was no longer anything left to fear or hesitate about. I would exercise my rightful entitlement as a husband toward my unfaithful wife. Though my face contorted with such rage and resentment at my wife’s betrayal that I could barely speak, I summoned a voice brimming with a man’s powerful anger. Yet the door showed no sign of opening immediately. Whether imagined or not, I even thought I could hear low moans, plaintive and intermittent.

“Open up, Dolores!” “Open the door quickly!”

I knocked on the door with such force it might splinter while raising my foot—thud! I kicked it hard. From within came Sorrow's low growl; though she seemed to have finally risen and begun preparing herself, this nevertheless proved time-consuming, with no attempt made to readily open the door. Wondering if she might be scheming to let the man escape through the window, I pressed my eye to the pitch-black keyhole and strained to catch any signs from within the room.

"Open up now! If you keep dawdling, I'll kick this door down!" Did she know it was me?! Hadn't she realized?! In any case, she must have thought someone was causing commotion at her door. After an excruciating delay, there finally came from within the click of a light being turned on, accompanied by the dog's growls and the clatter of keys being turned. "Why are you making such a fuss... might I ask?" My wife appeared half-awake—less drowsy than moments prior—yet still addressed me with dreamlike sweetness as she opened the door. But since her opening it coincided exactly with my bursting in, she seemed not to recognize who had entered. Moreover, Sorrow—unchained and growling lowly, poised to spring—the instant it recognized me as the intruder, immediately tucked its tail between its legs and fled beneath the bed with a pitiful whine.

The moment I burst in, I swiftly pulled open the drapery behind the bed. Having done that, I immediately ran to the window and with a sharp motion yanked open the heavy drapes in two places. I flung back the deep feather quilt atop the bed, then pivoted to rush alongside it and threw open every door of the large wardrobe fitted with a full-length mirror. I tore open the double doors of the six-paneled mirror stand at the bed's headboard, then immediately darted into the passageway leading to the adjoining antechamber. In my haste, the sleeve of my nightgown must have brushed against the Chinese-made mother-of-pearl inlaid doll displayed there. Crash! Crash, crash, craaash! With a tremendous sound, the doll shattered into fragments along with its pedestal. Paying no heed—like a wounded boar—I charged through the properly locked door to the antechamber and threw open every last cupboard beneath the bookshelf, yet found no sign of anyone hiding.

“Hand over the key! Now, hand over the key—quickly!” Determined not to let the man escape, I completed these actions swift as a bird in an instant and thrust my hand toward my wife in fervor. She who until then had stood dazed near the open doorway, staring at my frenzied figure as though spellbound, must have finally shaken off her drowsiness. And she must have realized that it was I who had charged in like a madman and was searching the house.

“You!” she exclaimed, then suddenly whirled around and dashed to the head of the bed, reaching toward the small stand placed there. “What impudent behavior is this. “What do you think you’re doing! “What on earth is this?!” In what could be called an explosive startle, she was poised to press the call button beneath her finger at any moment. If she pressed the call button, housemaids or maids would come rushing up from downstairs without fail. “Hand over the key! “The key—”

Compared to earlier moments, I had regained some composure, but even so staring wide-eyed with my hand thrust forward in this furious manner must have terrified her utterly. Though displeasure and anger clearly flashed across her brow, my wife wordlessly held out the keyring she'd been clutching. With a metallic clatter I opened the antechamber door while simultaneously switching on the light. I then yanked back with full force the partition drapery separating us from the adjoining drawing room. Yet both this chamber and the neighboring parlor stood immaculately ordered, devoid of any trace of lurking intruders. Still I searched everywhere—behind settees, within ornamental cabinets, beneath the piano flanking the fireplace, through billowing window curtains, inside wardrobe doors—leaving no conceivable hiding place unexamined.

I felt the vigor gradually draining from my once-determined body. And my recklessness and failure—which had inflicted irreparable humiliation upon my wife—chilled my fervor moment by moment as they compounded within me. There remained no room there except the inlaid pathway leading to my wife’s small parlor. And now, I no longer had the energy to search that room! It was evident that my wife had no temporal margin to perform such preparations between when I kicked the door and when she opened it. Moreover, considering both her composed demeanor—as though freshly awakened from a dream—and the undisturbed state of her bedclothes, what conceivable alteration could one imagine had occurred here?

How excruciatingly awkward I must have felt—this crestfallen figure slinking back to stand before my wife, who remained as coldly imperious and queen-like in demeanor as when I had left—the reader can surely comprehend without need for tedious elaboration. At no time did I ever feel such unapproachable dignity emanating from my wife as I did in that moment.

“What has transpired here? What on earth—” “No, that is... I would be distraught if you misunderstood... It’s simply... I... that is...” “That... What precisely did you intend here?” “I... I am truly most apologetic about this.” “...What words could possibly atone... If any apology lies within my power, I shall make it... I...” “Though you speak of apologies and regrets, I cannot grasp their meaning in the slightest. Have you perhaps done something requiring you to apologize to me?”

“The truth is... I want you to forgive me... I have inflicted a truly grave insult upon you...” Now, with belated remorse over having committed such an act unbecoming of my age—as though awakening from a dream—this regret gnawed at my heart while something cold soaked through both my flanks. Moreover, my wife made no motion to take the apologetic hand I offered, her icy countenance gleaming colder still as she surveyed the scattered wreckage about us with a malicious sweep of her gaze. Everything was utterly cold—that single phrase sufficed.

Moreover, in an instant, the polished sanctum had been reduced to such extreme disarray that one might wonder who could have wreaked such havoc—leaving me wishing with every fiber of my being that the earth would swallow me whole... And in this moment, I could not help but feel an unbearable urge to leap at my wife and cover those eyes of hers. "...Considering your position, I'm holding back like this for now," my wife said, fluttering her slender, whitefish-pale fingers that rested upon the stand. "I won't press the matter. "And if Teresa were to come and see this state of affairs, what do you suppose she would think?"

“...I’m ashamed...”

“In other words, you cannot bring yourself to trust your own wife at all—is that not the case?” “N-No... I can’t have you misunderstanding me like this.” “It’s absolutely not that... Far from distrusting you!” “I love you profoundly, so profoundly... That’s precisely why...” “No, that will hardly be necessary. Without my needing to hear such explanations—should doubts assail you again, you may always indulge them freely!” “Now that your suspicions stand dispelled—perhaps you might consider withdrawing?” “I shall have this disorder rectified.”

“Th-that won’t do.” “Even though I’ve inflicted this grave insult upon you, this isn’t about whether my suspicions are cleared or not—it’s nothing so trivial.” “I want you to somehow forgive me...” “There is nothing to forgive or not forgive.” “If I, as your wife, were subjected to whatever treatment when doubts arose in my husband...” “Th-that’s not how I meant for you to take it! I’m truly at a loss if you think that way.” “Th-that’s not what I meant at all… You…” I stammered incoherently. “I want you to forgive me. “I want to hear you say you forgive me.”

“Oh, really now! Such trifles are hardly worth considering!” “Now that your mind is settled, perhaps you might withdraw?” “The night has grown rather late, and…”

In the end, my wife neither attempted to grasp the hand I had extended in apology nor offered the words of forgiveness I so desperately sought. Though her words remained impeccably smooth on the surface—always positioning herself beneath me—beneath that veneer lay a series of sarcastic remarks steeped in intense fury, and she refused to reach any accord with me until the conclusion. There, through this blunder of mine, a barrier had been erected—one that would forever prevent me from holding my head up before my wife or even approaching her—and beyond this barrier, my wife maintained her position with deliberate superiority.

Moreover, my wife—honed through years of social engagement—was an actress of incomparably superior caliber. For someone like me—blushing furiously and stammering incoherently—there was simply no possibility of holding my own. All my initial bravado having evaporated, I emerged from my wife's chamber in disarray—whether as one escaping a tiger's maw or a naughty boy fleeing his mother's grasp—and as I contemplated within this searing humiliation how tomorrow morning would find me once again unable to lift my head before her, a fresh wave of crimson shame blazed through my body.

Blackmailer

This grave failure had indeed compelled me to thoroughly contemplate both my position within the household and my advancing years, restraining me from ever repeating that humiliating disgrace of intruding upon my wife's bedchamber late at night—when perhaps a week or two had elapsed since that ill-fated incident.

“What shall I do with this letter?” inquired the female secretary one morning as she placed upon my desk a missive from a man whose name I had never known. The letter was unequivocally addressed to me as “Mr. Rodriguez Alessandro, President of Barcelona Bank,” yet bore the sender’s name of Geraldou Salvador—a man whose name I neither recalled nor had ever heard—with its return address on Vizcaya Street, an unfamiliar thoroughfare in what struck me as a seedy district.

The contents of that letter—which I picked up with suspicion—were scrawled in clumsy characters riddled with atrocious misspellings on extremely crude paper: *There is a grave matter I must bring to your attention in person. Kindly designate at once the date, location, and time for our meeting.* *Please designate a place as inconspicuous as possible.* The meaning conveyed through these clumsy characters—repeated over and over—was that this concerned a grave domestic incident affecting your household and your honor, and that meeting posthaste would assuredly be in your best interests.

I had indeed received letters of this sort before. Banks being institutions that must guard their public trust above all else could suffer considerable harm even from minor rumors. Exploiting such vulnerabilities, they would send these letters feigning grave importance. When met, they would inflate some needle-thin triviality into club-sized proportions to extort money from me. If I refused compliance, they'd turn aggressive trying to force payment through intimidation or else plead their desperate circumstances to solicit funds. Individually handling every such rogue would have required more bodies than any bank president could command.

Having grown weary of such nuisances, I had ordered that these letters be handled by having my secretary send appropriate responses, while those who persistently demanded meetings were to be dealt with by manager Majardo—but this matter concerning "grave domestic affairs of your household" and "issues affecting your honor" must have been too sensitive for even the secretary to resolve independently. And at the same time, those few characters made even me somehow sense that this was a matter of a different nature than ordinary business.

“Well now, this seems to require my personal attention,” I mused, staring intently at the clumsily written letter before resolving to meet with the sender regardless. The day was set for two days hence, the time from three in the afternoon... The location would be the special reception room on the third floor of the Bank Club in Rampleuth Backstreet—there I would wait... Clack-clack-clack went the secretary’s typewriter as she worked, “Shall I inform Guillermo as well?” she asked, rising from her seat.

"Yes... It would be good if you could inform Guillermo as well," I said. Guillermo—whom I employed as a bank guard in lieu of regular security—stood six feet seven inches tall, a former boxer with a flattened nose. Whenever meeting unfamiliar individuals like this, I always had him lie in wait in the adjacent room with a pistol. Moreover, this special reception room at the Bank Club—prepared precisely for such meetings—had been designed with a button protruding from the floor near where my left heel rested as I sat in the armchair. All I needed to do was step on it, and the bodyguard lying in wait next door would swiftly push open the door behind me and slip into the room.

On the appointed day, having concluded my work at the bank, I drove to the Bank Club in the Rampleuth backstreet. Though Dolores alone continued to vex me, being thoroughly accustomed to dealing with such riffraff, I felt no particular excitement about what manner of man might appear now. Taking small sips of a glass of manzanilla wine, I had a glass of wine brought for Guillermo crouching in the adjacent room, and was immersed in flipping through the provided newspaper—front to back—when the attendant came to announce the visitor's arrival.

“Very well, show him in,” I said as I set the newspaper down, but upon seeing the man guided in by the attendant, I couldn’t suppress an involuntary cry within my heart. The figure entering with awkward stiffness and visible discomfort was none other than Galiana Jose—the gardener, approximately twenty-two or twenty-three years old, who had been employed in my household until just two or three days prior.

“What! Was it you who sent the letter?” I involuntarily leaned forward. “If it’s you, there was no need for such roundabout methods—you could have simply spoken to me at home.” “But circumstances made that impossible... Master, I’ve already been sacked.” “Sacked? What do you mean by ‘sacked’?” “Like this!” Jose pressed his hand to his neck and mimed a sawing motion.

"I don't recall dismissing you, but who fired you?" "There ain't no need askin' such things!" "Who done it or he done it... Ain't nobody but Madam who'd pull that!" Jose spat with a half-desperate sneer. "Master can't even raise his head 'fore Madam, so you don't know squat 'bout what goes on in that mansion—but cross her even a hair, and wham! You end up like this!" Jose slapped his neck again. "Ain't just me neither. "That bastard Garbo got it too." "On top o' that, the cur got Sorrow set on him by Madam—the damn mongrel sank its teeth in his shin and cheek! Now he's moanin' an' groanin', laid up proper!"

I had thought it strange that head butler Garbo and gardener Jose had been conspicuously absent these past three or four days—only to discover they had both been summarily dismissed by Dolores’s hand. Moreover, to learn that Dolores had sicced Sorrow on Garbo, leaving him injured and bedridden, left me utterly dumbfounded—my gaping mouth refused to close. For a while, I remained stupefied, staring blankly at Jose’s face. "Master, there's somethin' I need to tell ya in private."

“...”

I nodded silently. Even if this man now claimed to have nothing left to say, unless I first heard his account of this unprecedented incident, I could not begin to comprehend it. “Well, have a seat... Though I do think we should get straight to the matter—what exactly is this about?” “I can’t make heads or tails of any of this...” However, Jose suddenly fell silent, squirming in a half-seated position on the chair as he merely crumpled his battered hat in his palms, making no move to begin his account.

“Actually was thinkin’ ’bout bringin’ that bastard Garbo along—but he reckoned showin’ up before you lookin’ like this’d be too shameful—so I got ’im waitin’ at my digs.” “...” I gave another silent nod—but no sooner had my chin dipped than Jose’s eyes sparked with panic and his mouth snapped shut again.

“And? Get on with it,” I urged. “Master, how’s this?” he blurted with sudden resolve. “If what I tell ya benefits you—and if you think it’s fair—could I have fifteen thousand pesetas?” “Naturally, should I find your information sufficiently valuable, I wouldn’t begrudge even twenty thousand instead of fifteen...” I smiled. “But I can’t possibly judge that until you disclose your tale.”

“Don’t be so stiff—why don’t you try speaking plainly? “…Or shall I fetch you a drink to brace yourself?”

“Master, I’d rather not... Not till this business is settled—” Jose waved his hands in a fluster. His hat was being crushed in his palms, on the verge of tearing apart. I couldn’t fathom how he had calculated this exorbitant price of 15,000 pesetas, but seeing the villain—who until mere days ago had plotted to blackmail his former master—display such an unexpectedly naive demeanor, I couldn’t help laughing inwardly.

“…And?” “So, Master—it’s about Madam,” Jose said in a voice as parched as a dried-up throat. He was mustering every ounce of resolve to make his testimony worth the demanded fifteen thousand pesetas. Of course, I naturally assumed this man—a mere gardener dismissed by my wife, likely coached by someone like the head butler—had come to whine about that haughty woman’s misdeeds. I even considered tossing him a hundred or two hundred pesetas once he finished his lamentations. This being the case, I hardly listened with any real attention.

“Master, Madam’s been holdin’ that dog in her arms,” Jose croaked out again in that parched voice.

“What of it?”

“Oh, Master don’t know nothin’. “Master, this ain’t no simple matter, I tell ya.” “Master, you’ll... you’ll flip clean over!” Jose fumbled for words, writhing as if in agony. "Since I know nothing of this matter, why don’t you lay it out clearly so I can grasp it? …I’ve already said I’ll give you the money if I’m convinced." "...So my wife dotes on Sorrow... I’m well aware of that. But what exactly are you trying to say about it?"

“Master, Madam ain’t just pamperin’ Sorrow. She’s embracing that dog in her arms.” “Madam ain’t just pamperin’ Sorrow. She’s embracing that dog in her arms.” In the end, I fetched one or two glasses of strong absinthe for this tiresome blackmailer. “And if you’ve something to say, don’t think of me as your former master—consider me a friend!” I had coaxed him gently, yet it was likely those one or two glasses of potent alcohol—which he gulped down with guttural swallows and lip-smacking relish even while grimacing as if drinking poison—that loosened the man’s stiffened tongue, for Jose’s account finally began cohering into shape. But simultaneously, I found myself dumbfounded anew—my gaping mouth refused to close.

What an utterly bizarre tale Jose had spun!

A tale so bizarre it defied comparison to mere horror—a story I had never heard from another soul nor encountered in any book of fiction! Moreover, this very act was what my wife Dolores was now performing with Sorrow.

“...” I continued staring fixedly at Jose’s face, momentarily robbed of speech—but ultimately doubled over with laughter at the sheer absurdity of it all. “Wh-what... Don’t spout such nonsense! “J-Jokes... Enough with your jokes already!” Rather than anger or mere displeasure, I found myself laughing until tears streamed down my face at the sheer absurdity of it all—an attitude that must have infuriated Jose, who had gone to such lengths to lay out his story.

“Master! This ain’t no laughin’ matter,” he scowled, his voice blurring the line between servant and master. “You can laugh and spout such carefree nonsense now—but why don’t you properly investigate whether what I’m telling you is baseless lies or truth? Master, you’ll roll your eyes and keel right over!”

And so Jose’s account grew ever more intricate, probing into the finest details... Night after unspecified night, he spun endless tales of what head butler Garbo had witnessed or recounted—stories that stretched on without end.

“...” Considering the earnestness of this man who spoke with such gravity, I couldn’t simply burst into dismissive laughter from the outset—yet his tale grew so grotesquely bizarre that I found myself forcing a grim expression, nodding and listening as attentively as I could manage. Still, by any measure, this was too utterly preposterous to believe. Could such preposterousness truly exist in the realm of human possibility? Let alone my beautiful wife who was a Countess... that proud wife Dolores... engaging in such an unsightly, grotesque act with Sorrow... To me, this was nothing short of sheer preposterousness—a tale beyond all expression.

“Madam went and named that dog ‘Sorrow,’ but what kinda sorrow? For Madam, that mutt’s pure damn delight!” With this, Jose’s interminably bizarre tale finally concluded. Though I kept bitterly smiling at its sheer preposterousness, the one thing I couldn’t laugh off was the dismissal of head butler Garbo—the sole credible detail in Jose’s account. Whether a mere head butler being dismissed for incurring my wife’s wrath was of little consequence to me; what I couldn’t dismiss was the reason behind his dismissal.

According to Jose’s account, within the mansion, only Garbo knew of the affair between my wife and Sorrow—and that very Garbo, having sniffed out this liaison as a golden opportunity, had done the unthinkable! Using this as leverage, he had attempted to blackmail my wife and demanded sexual relations. Moreover, my wife—a woman of extraordinary pride—would never deign to acknowledge such upstart blackmail. On the contrary, she brutally rebuffed it with a single word and summarily ordered his immediate dismissal. Yet when he stubbornly continued his advances, it grated on my wife’s nerves: ‘Sorrow! When she fiercely sicced the dog on him with “Sorrow! Bite this presumptuous fool to death!”—and upon learning this had caused Garbo’s grievous injuries—even I could no longer simply laugh off the preposterousness.

I couldn't discern whether this ignorant, illiterate gardener's words held truth or falsehood, but even granting them partial credence, the matter defied categorization as either grotesque or abhorrent. In such circumstances, the household of the Barcelona Bank President became precisely like a zoo. Though not my wife's own expression, one might indeed say our home had transformed into a veritable menagerie. Should the prying public have learned of such affairs, there remained no limit to the embellishments they might have appended in their gossip. Without bothering to verify truth from fiction, society would surely have proclaimed throughout all Spain that the Barcelona Bank President's mansion stood as a household plunged into utter depravity—a nocturnal procession of demons in complete disarray. The bitter conclusion forced upon me was that we endured these outrageous speculations precisely because my wife kept that worthless dog leashed and pampered in our parlor. Yet compared to these ignorant fools bringing forth such nonsensical claims, I found myself harboring far greater fury toward my wife herself—she who kept Sorrow in our living quarters and played with him in blissful ignorance, as though nothing were amiss.

“Enough... Enough... I’ve grasped the gist of what you all want.” At last I could bear it no longer—this utterly bizarre transaction compelled me to resolve to put an end to it. “Very well, let’s hand over 15,000 pesetas. “Let’s give it for your so-called kindness and compensation for Garbo’s injuries, shall we?” "But as far as I’m concerned, until it becomes clear whether this story holds any truth or is utter nonsense from root to branch, I can’t bring myself to hand it over." "If your claims turn out to be baseless lies, I won’t just withhold payment—!" "If I were to file a lawsuit, don’t you have some idea what would happen to Garbo and you instead?" “As the crime of blackmail that has gravely damaged the honor of a respectable household, you’d likely not escape about ten years’ imprisonment.”

“Th-that’s absurd! M-Master...” Jose stood blinking rapidly, his reaction defying expectations. “Whether absurd or not, the law remains!” I barked with finality. “But I won’t be so crass as to reject your... kindness. The money shall be paid gladly.” My tone shifted like mercury. “Yet not now. Payment follows verification of your claims. For now—” I let banknotes whisper against wood. “This suffices.”

and laid out only the three thousand pesetas he had on him before Jose. And so I dismissed this amateurish blackmailer—now deflated from his initial demand of fifteen thousand to a mere three thousand pesetas—with expedient brusqueness. Perhaps he considered even this reduced sum preferable to nothing, for he slunk away without mustering any real threats. As I watched his retreating figure vanish far below into the dusk-blurred cityscape, my face twisted as though chewing bitter insects while smoldering a cigar, what occupied my thoughts bore not the slightest relation to pondering whether Jose’s tale held truth or falsehood. I hadn’t believed a word of it from the start, but the very fact that I was being subjected to such nonsense from this contemptible wretch—a situation that ultimately stemmed from the discord between my wife and me—filled me with nothing but inexpressible irritation and exasperation.

And yet I had to gently tell my wife that it was all thanks to her I'd been subjected to such worthless tales from those worthless wretches—but how could one possibly phrase such things for that cold, imperious woman to thoroughly comprehend? The very thought made me feel profoundly daunted.

Detective Marcel Monès Turning these thoughts over in my mind, I returned home and—as had become my habit—avoided the servants' gazes before hurriedly retreating into my study, where I sank into deep contemplation. Yet try as I might, I simply could not bring myself to believe a single word of that gardener's story. Moreover, though it was fortunate I had narrowly prevented these disorderly household rumors from leaking to society, I found myself thinking that going forward, I must speak to my wife and ensure she takes sufficient care to prevent such abominable rumors from arising again.

Yet even as I thought this, another notion arose: no matter how ignorant those wretches might be, they surely wouldn't bring something entirely baseless to their master's doorstep. Could there be some truth to it after all? Such doubts too began to take root. It was true I hadn't noticed until now, but evidently my wife had dismissed Garbo—for when I returned home, it was always the butler Juan who opened the door to greet me, and again now, Juan who had brought the coffee. Then did this mean there might be some truth to Jose's story about Garbo after all? I couldn't entirely suppress the creeping sense that there might indeed be substance to it.

And even I—who would normally have averted my gaze from the servants—found myself suddenly gripped by an irrepressible urge to make inquiries. The garden beyond the window had long since dissolved into complete darkness. Motionless in my chair, still gazing through the glass at the pitch-black grove of trees, having forgotten both to switch on the lamps and draw the curtains—I remained thus when Juan entered and announced, "Master, dinner is served."

“Where is Madam?” I asked.

“Madam has... gone out,” Juan stammered awkwardly. And as he tried to flee the room, I called out to stop him, “I haven’t seen Garbo around—has something happened?” I inquired casually. “He has been on temporary leave since about three days ago,” came the reply. “Why…?” “Why... might that be...? I’m afraid I don’t know the details either...” Juan stammered with increasing discomfort. “...It seems there was some incident where he was bitten by Sorrow, which may have led him to take temporary leave.”

“……I see.” “...Dinner is ready.”

“Very well… I’ll go right away!” With this, Juan left the room as though fleeing—but whether I should speak to my wife and urge caution... I still found myself unable to reach any decision. And so, with my decision still unmade, I went to the dining room and—as ever alone—ate my supper in muttered silence. But how particularly wretched that night’s meal tasted—as though chewing wax. I would take a bite and ponder, then ponder while moving my fork, wrestling endlessly with how best to proceed—yet it turned out that at least part of Jose’s claims held truth.

Garbo had been bitten by Sorrow. That Garbo had been bitten by Sorrow could only mean my wife had undoubtedly set the dog upon him in her fury; her being driven to such anger implied Garbo had forgotten his station and acted improperly toward her. Thus, while Jose’s account had been crudely phrased, it could not be dismissed as entirely baseless fabrication. If this proved not entirely false... then my wife... after all... with Sorrow... some manner of relationship...?

I threw down the fork and knife with a clatter. That icy yet alluring wife of mine—to think she—that she could—! When I imagined her engaging in such vile acts, darkness seemed to engulf my vision, and I found myself reeling dizzily. I could no longer endure it—I couldn't maintain even the pretense of eating. The moment she returned home, a cruel impulse seethed within me—to berate and berate and berate my wife without respite, to force from her lips a confession of that ugly truth in one merciless onslaught. Yet simultaneously, when I envisioned that aloof, imperious countenance of hers—should this prove unfounded—the already fractured bond between us would plunge into eternal despair. I would be delivering the ultimate insult to my wife, who would promptly file for divorce against me, compelling me to lose this spouse whose worth transcends all monetary value.

Yet when I imagined my own desolate existence after losing that wife forever, another species of black despair assailed me... I clutched my head and could not suppress a groan. But within that anguish flashed a sudden thought—rather than tormenting myself thus, I might as well go to the detective agency, lay this matter bare openly, and have them resolve it.

And unable to wait until tomorrow, I had the car ordered that very night and raced off to Isla Cristina Street. Though our interactions had never been deep, through my position as chairman of the Speedboat Club where he maintained membership, I knew of Marcel Monès—the private detective who kept his office there. And I had long heard that this Detective Marcel Monès ranked among Spain’s most renowned and skilled investigators. At present, I knew no method to soothe this unbearable agitation other than commissioning a detective to solicit his judgment.

I parked the car before the Cáceres Building that housed the detective agency and was climbing its steep stairs when I saw the light in the upper room visible from the staircase go out just then, passing a group of four or five dark figures descending from there.

"Excuse me," said one of the portly men from the group of four or five in a rusted voice as we passed each other. "Might you be here to see Marcel Monès?" "Yes, I intended to visit the Marcel Monès Agency, but..." "I must beg your pardon," the hoarse voice repeated with solemn courtesy. "Due to present circumstances, we have resolved not to accept new requests... Particularly tonight, as we've already shuttered the office."

“I see… So you can no longer handle my request…” “I’m truly sorry.” “Well… It can’t be helped.” Inexpressibly dejected, my strained emotions had nowhere to direct themselves—but having been refused, there was nothing to be done! I bowed politely and, adjusting my lame leg, had just begun clattering down the stairs when that hoarse, rasping voice—which had seemingly been seeing me off—called out once more.

“Would you happen to be Mr. Rodriguez Alessandro?” “Yes—I am Alessandro.” “Ah! My deepest apologies.” “I am Marcel Monès.” “I thought your bearing resembled our Chairman’s—and indeed it does! ...Might you require assistance?” “There is a matter I wish to entrust... truthfully—” “Ah!”

“I see… In that case…” The detective stood there, surveying the surrounding shadows as if pondering for a moment before declaring: “Then, Mr. Rosario—you alone shall remain for a moment! The rest of you gentlemen may leave. Tonight, you’ve all worked quite late. You’ve done well.”

After seeing off what were presumably all employees of the detective agency—they bowed to me and clomped away—the detective bustled about, relighting lamps he had extinguished and unlocking doors he had secured, then welcomed me in with: "Now then, please come inside. Had I known it was the Chairman, I would never have spoken so discourteously earlier." "I must apologize for detaining you as you were departing." "The truth is, there is a matter I must urgently entreat of you, and I profoundly regret troubling you at this late hour."

“Not at all, not at all—there’s no need for such consideration,” the detective amiably responded, adjusting the drawn curtains.

From where I sat, the full panorama of Barcelona Harbor, its lights twinkling, could be taken in at a single glance. "Had I known you were Mr. Chairman, I would never have said such a thing... Well, I beg your pardon! We've been working late every day recently, so I thought I'd wrap up a bit early today and relax for once—ha ha ha ha ha!" The detective laughed unreservedly. As I observed his stout, well-nourished frame—that of a ruddy-complexioned man in his forties now wreathed in cheerful mirth, those robust features from which emanated a gentle yet occasionally sharp gaze—I felt an indescribably powerful sense of trust welling up in my chest: that this was precisely the man to whom I could lay bare my troubles and have them resolved on the spot.

“Now then, please state your business.” “I shall assist you to the utmost of my ability,” urged the detective—though ultimately, this matter concerned my wife’s bedchamber. I found myself utterly unable to voice it. Though my heart swelled with unspoken grievances, when the detective observed me faltering as those words refused to pass my lips, he smiled silently and gazed up at what appeared to be several framed legal statutes hanging on the wall.

“Given those circumstances, you need not have any concern. Whatever secrets you may hold, you need have no apprehension whatsoever that they will leak from this office unless you yourself disclose them.” The framed legal provisions indicated by the detective’s gaze contained an excerpt from Article 178 of the Penal Code: “When a physician, pharmacist, midwife, lawyer, defense attorney, notary, detective, or those formerly in these positions unjustly disclose secrets learned through their professional duties, they shall be punished with up to two years’ imprisonment or a fine not exceeding thirty thousand pesetas.” Moreover, when this seasoned detective saw me still hesitating as I gazed at it, he offered no further unnecessary remarks for my sake. Instead, he silently stood up, pulled out a thick notebook from the desk, and shifted his gaze from my face to the notebook to begin jotting down key points. And how much did this act of keeping my gaze averted from the detective’s direct line of sight—focusing instead solely on those pen-clutching fingertips—allow my heart to spill even these unspeakable words so effortlessly from my lips?

Haltingly, I laid bare to this detective every last detail—the entire course of events since my marriage to Dolores; how purchasing Sorrow had given rise to that very sorrow, provoking my wife’s displeasure; and even the matter of the servant gardener who had come earlier this evening with his insinuations. And while I myself did not believe a word of what the gardener had said, there were aspects that I could not simply laugh off either, leaving me utterly at a loss. Yet I managed to fully entrust the detective with my request: to investigate whether such a shameful relationship truly existed between my wife and Sorrow, all while ensuring she remained unaware.

I too had finished speaking, and the detective had completed jotting down the key points. "I shall of course spare no effort to resolve your troubles as swiftly as possible without tarnishing your honor—though you’ve endured quite an ordeal," he commiserated with deep sincerity. At these words of sincere commiseration—"I can well imagine"—it felt as though the suffocating weight that had constricted my chest since marriage was finally lifting, as if some departed parent were warmly embracing the very site of my wounded pain, allowing my spirit to soar freely for the first time. Of course, what required requesting from the detective was solely determining whether such a relationship existed between my wife and Sorrow—the entire history of our marriage being entirely unnecessary to relate. Yet having no one else to confide my heart's troubles in, as I observed this detective, I found myself inevitably compelled to speak of those matters as well.

When I had finished speaking in general terms, two or three supplementary questions were posed by the detective. For instance—since my wife began keeping the dog tied in her parlor—whether I had noticed any suspicious points or not; questions of that nature. This was something I once heard late at night—my wife, unable to sleep, playing with Sorrow—and then, mistaking the situation for a lovers' tryst in the aftermath, I barged in and made a grave blunder... Of course, I myself do not take any of these matters as fact, but when asked if there had been any unusual occurrences, I added that only those incidents came to mind, and so I recounted them for reference.

He had been listening with his arms crossed and nodding along when suddenly— “Mr. Rosario! Mr. Rosario!” he called out through the adjacent room, summoning the young man he had earlier ordered to remain. Then, as the youth of about twenty-five or twenty-six entered with a gracious smile, bowed to me, and stood waiting, the detective looked at him and explained, “This is Mr. Luca Rosario, my most trusted associate, so you need have no concerns whatsoever.” He then inquired whether there existed someone of similar height and build to this young man who frequented my residence. he asked. He was jotting down my response about having a certain servant among my household staff, then instructed me to have ready for handover tomorrow morning—when he would send this young Rosario—the address of the gardener who had come to blackmail me, and finally the breed specification document Julio Benavides had provided when I purchased the dog.

With this, the detective heard what he wanted to hear, and I said all there was to say. When I asked approximately how much it would cost, he replied that since it involved delving into family secrets and was a rather complicated job, he would take on the case for 60,000 pesetas. And he promised that within two weeks from now, he would investigate thoroughly and report definitive findings to me.

Two Juans

“It need not be such a short period as two or three weeks. If receiving uncertain information would only introduce cracks into my household,” I fretted, “I would much rather wait a month or even two months. There’s truly no need for you to rush so urgently.” To this, the detective responded with a gentle laugh. “The truth is, circumstances on my end necessitate hastening this work even more urgently than yours. I’ve been summoned by the Buenos Aires Police Department and will be taking Rosario here... We’re scheduled to depart for Argentina for approximately one year.” He added quietly: “To be perfectly frank, I’ve been avoiding new commissions—hence my earlier discourtesy.” “This will likely be my final case here.” His pen tapped the legal code framed on the wall. “Marcel Monès’ Agency adheres to a credit-first principle—we’d sooner detail impossible outcomes than deliver uncertain reports. Should this singular case defeat us, we’ll candidly apologize while surrendering. You may rest assured on that count.” “B-but...has this ever occurred before?” My voice cracked. Detective Monès’ smile deepened as he answered:

“It has been exactly fourteen years since I opened this office here, and fortunately, there has yet to be a single instance of such a thing…”

Having thus concluded the meeting, I drove back along the bustling Rambla de San José toward Ferva Street. But as I passed through Almerda Street and approached Plaza Avenida Florida Street where my residence stood, this district of grand mansions encircled by expansive gardens revealed a place where streetlights cast sparse shadows through lush hedgerows, leaving only the pallid moon to cast its faint light upon the road.

In the car racing through that desolate residential district, what flowed through my now-refreshed mind after confessing everything to the detective was, contrary to earlier, a vague sense of having wronged my wife—a feeling akin to remorse. Though my wife was haughty and willful, filled with vanity that made her utterly pitiable in my eyes, she remained a virtuous woman who had not yet fallen to such depths. Yet here I stood—casting these unspeakably filthy suspicions upon her unsuspecting purity, commissioning a detective during her absence to unearth secrets she likely never possessed. This made me feel myself possessed of baser character than any beast, committing an indescribable defilement against her... Even as I entered my own home through its gates, I felt an inexplicable guilt weighing upon me.

And so from that day onward, how I did nothing but wait and wait and wait for the arrival of the two-week mark that Detective Monès had promised me! I had grandly declared to the detective that I could wait a month or even two for him to investigate at his leisure, but such words were mere rhetorical flourishes—in truth, I found the waiting utterly unbearable. Even if my wife were treating me with cold indifference, I could not help but feel deeply—agonizingly so—how heartrending it was to dwell under the same roof while doubting the very wife to whom I had devoted all my love, all while having her every move surveilled by a detective.

I endured the first night or two, but by the third night, I could no longer bring myself to retire to my bedroom on the second floor—three rooms removed from my wife’s—to sleep. In the end, I spent that next night and the night after on the chaise longue in my study; yet even as I slept downstairs, the torment became unbearable—perpetually straining to hear whether Sorrow’s cries might still reach me from somewhere, my ears attuned only to sounds from the upper floors. By the fifth and sixth days, I began to regret having entrusted such family secrets to Detective Monès. If only I had never involved the detective, I could have at least spared myself these pangs of conscience—this sense that I myself had betrayed my wife. Yet having once made this request as a man, I could not now retract it. I spent my days clinging to the conviction that peace would return to my heart only when that promised day arrived—willing today to end swiftly and tomorrow to darken quickly, yearning for the detective’s appointed date to come even a day sooner, when my wife’s innocence would be proven and my joy made complete.

Previously, it had been my wife who avoided meeting my gaze. But now it was I who feared that. Thus another two or three days passed, but when the tenth day arrived, I could no longer endure the anguish of dwelling under the same roof with my oblivious wife—though our eyes never met—no matter how I tried. And I summoned the servant Juan and had him pack my personal effects into a travel bag. I intended to go to the villa on Santa Lucia Hill and spend the remaining four days there.

Books, toothpaste, towels, sleepwear, brushes... As Juan deftly packed the suitcase with the items I threw out and carried it down, I tried to follow the driver who had gone out—when snap! Juan locked the door. “Wh-what are you doing?!” I stammered, stunned, but Juan winked at me and pressed his index finger to his lips in a gesture that said, “Be quiet.” With one hand he pushed me back toward the desk. Though reeling from shock—was even this wretch making sport of me?!—I retreated before his pressure until I stood before the desk, my body trembling with violent rage. Juan glanced around furtively before leaning close and asking in a low voice:

“Are you departing for the villa on Santa Lucia Hill, sir?” “Do I... Do I need to explain myself to you?!” I shouted. “Shh! Quiet.” And Juan’s right arm rose. This bastard! He’s going to pull a gun on me! This I had intuitively sensed. Though twilight lingered, I glared at Juan’s face in astonishment at his boldness to threaten his master within these walls—yet he produced no pistol. Instead, he turned his left cheek toward me and indicated his temple with a finger. On Juan’s left temple lay a red birthmark the size of a one-centimo silver coin. He pointed directly at it.

“I am not Juan.” “What nonsense are you spouting?! If you’re not Juan, then who would be Juan?” “The real Juan has been visiting his mother in Valencia for about a week now.” Then Juan grinned sharply and peeled off the birthmark on his temple to show me. “Gah!” I gasped, my eyes widening—and in that instant, Juan proceeded to tear off the sideburn on his left cheek. In place of the long sideburn that had grown down below his ear, there now appeared the smooth, beautiful skin befitting a young man.

“Haven’t you realized who I am?”

“Gah!” This time, I nearly cried out. Hair... birthmark... voice... gestures... facial expressions... build... habitual stoop... every last detail was unmistakably Juan’s—yet as I stared, only those eyes gradually transformed into those of a different man.

“Ah! You are…” “You mustn’t raise your voice,” he hurriedly pressed his finger to his lips again. “You understand now?” “I am Luca Rosario of the Marcel Monès Agency.” The young man’s eyes blinked two or three times as they brimmed with a smile. “We met the other evening.” “You’re going to the villa on Santa Lucia Hill?” “Yes… but by the promised day… by the morning of the twentieth… I intend to return.”

“Forgive my impertinence, but when you arrive at the villa, might I trouble you to devise some pretext and summon the housemaid Teresa? I would like to have that woman absent for three or four hours.” “Teresa?” “Yes. We’re on the verge of completing our final preparations, but that woman keeps such a close watch that it’s proving quite troublesome. Just three or four hours would suffice.” “Understood. I’ll think of something… Let’s leave it at that… And was my wife truly innocent? My wife…?”

"As the investigation is progressing smoothly overall, Mr. Monès will provide you with a complete response by the promised date." "Then I leave Teresa's matter in your hands... preferably tomorrow morning would be most convenient," he answered briskly, before reverting to servant Juan with a "Now then, Master, let us depart!" and lifted my travel suitcase. I boarded the car under the counterfeit Juan’s send-off, but to debate whether he resembled [the real one] or not would have been utter folly.

How masterfully had that twenty-five- or twenty-six-year-old youth transformed himself into the visage... into the very voice of Juan, thirty-eight years of age? Even I—his master who had interacted daily with Juan for five or six years—had been so thoroughly deceived that now one could only say his disguises had attained divine perfection, leaving me utterly dumbfounded. Recalling the detective’s words from that time—that he had maintained his office here for fourteen years without ever abandoning a case—it became clear that Detective Monès operated externally while that astute assistant worked internally, deploying their meticulous intellect through coordinated efforts; I could not help but deeply feel that with such strategies, no matter how insurmountable a problem might appear, there was scarcely any that could not be resolved.

And recalling too the detective’s words from that time—that once this job commissioned from Argentina through me was completed, he would depart for Buenos Aires—I could not help but feel profound regret at these people’s impending absence from the homeland, even if only for a year, thinking how terribly perplexed those who, like myself, found themselves desperately in need of detectives while burdened with such troubles would become hereafter; for how could they not be, bereft of individuals possessing such magnificent skills?

And simultaneously—though until now I had regarded professions like private detective as something akin to childish games, bearing little significant relation to real worldly affairs—I abruptly came to consider them life's most essential presence... Throughout that carriage ride until we reached the villa on Santa Lucia Hill, entranced by young Rosario's astonishingly masterful disguise, I could do nothing but turn these thoughts over endlessly in my mind.

Of course, following the young man's request, I immediately summoned the housemaid Teresa by telephone upon arriving here, assigned her some plausible task, and had her vacate the main residence for a good half-day—but as for how utterly I spent these four days at the desolate villa on Santa Lucia Hill, bored beyond measure and restlessly idle in body, to speak of it now would be nothing but futile.

At last, the promised day—the twentieth—had arrived. The thought that today would finally bring clear resolution between guilt and innocence left me assailed from morning by indescribably complex emotions—wishing this decisive day were still two days away... wanting to postpone meeting the detective a little longer... yet simultaneously craving to see him this very instant and conclude the matter rather than remain suspended—all this left me utterly unmoored. But what drew a wry smile I could not suppress was the moment when, having resolved first to return to the main residence before proceeding to the Monès Agency, I had the car drive me back to the mansion on Plaza Avenida Florida Street.

Juan, who had greeted the car and opened the door, soon carried the travel suitcase into the study; but as he tried to leave, I stopped him with a polite bow. "I was thinking of coming to your office now—" Before me—having anticipated a response like "Very well, we await you"—the man appeared utterly abashed, "Ah, Master!" he exclaimed, bowing his head as though about to prostrate himself. "...Perhaps it's still somewhat too early?"

“Ha, Master!” he exclaimed in perplexity, bowing his head even lower. Once again dumbfounded, I found myself watching this figure with his lowered head. “Master, what could be the matter? “I’m afraid it quite escapes my comprehension.” The moment my eyes met those of Juan—now timidly raising his face—I couldn’t suppress a bitter laugh within my heart. Visage... birthmark... sideburns... stature, build... age—not the slightest discrepancy existed from head to toe. Only the eyes differed entirely.

“It seems I have Master’s permission… and as you commanded that I disclose nothing to anyone, I have kept absolutely silent,” said Juan, bowing once more with an air of wringing his hands. “Thanks to your kindness, I was able to visit my mother in Valencia for the first time in ages… She asked me to convey her deepest regards to you, Master.”

Juan was likely expressing gratitude for being granted seven or eight days' leave to visit his mother in Valencia—though this entire affair stemmed from Detective Monès' ingenious scheme, with no participation on my part. The servant's effusive gratitude discomfited me; letting his tedious thanks fade into the background, I sank into the armchair before the hearth. Maintaining an inner smirk all the while, I waved my hand two or three times in quick succession to dismiss the oblivious servant. Such was the perfection of young Rosario's disguise that Juan must have been staggered to receive courteous bows from me after his supposed vacation—and I found myself equally dumbfounded.

And without even pausing to smoke a cigarette before the fireplace, driven by my impatience, I once again ordered the carriage and set off for the Caceres Building housing the detective agency. With the trepidation of stepping into a tiger’s jaws, I ascended those stairs—only to find that by the time I knocked, their work had already been fully completed. The one who opened the door from within was none other than young Rosario, who had presumably shed his counterfeit Juan identity and returned to his original form—the very same young man I had mistaken just moments before.

“We have been expecting you.” “Marcel Monès has also arrived.” “Now then, please come in!” With a gracious smile, he guided me in—a figure now devoid of birthmark or sideburns, his youthful, refined face smiling as he stood there in a crisp pinstripe suit, every inch the intelligent young man. Monomaniac

And then, some minutes later, I found myself facing Detective Monès in that room overlooking the harbor, bathed in radiant morning sunlight. "The investigation has been fully completed. We have been awaiting your arrival since earlier today," the detective began with his customary gentle smile, yet whether real or imagined, I could not help but sense a shadow of unease lingering about his tranquil brow. Moreover—whether this was my own paranoia or not—even as he flipped through the investigation documents brought by young Rosario, I could not escape the sense that he seemed reluctant to meet my gaze, appearing hesitant to broach the crucial matter directly. And I too, feeling as though broaching the subject myself would be like handling something delicate, fixed my eyes upon the dazzling morning light playing about the detective’s hands.

“Are you aware of an actress named Sirion Arosemena among your wife’s acquaintances?” the detective asked without looking up from the documents. “I know only the name,” I responded. “I was never formally introduced by my wife.”

The detective nodded silently and returned his gaze to the documents. A few seconds, a few minutes of suffocating moments passed. “...How about it?” Unable to bear it any longer, I finally ventured. “If your investigation appears to have reached its conclusion, might I trouble you to share those results with me?” “Understood,” came the unexpectedly clear reply. And as if having steeled his resolve, he pushed aside the documents and gazed intently at my face. “I was in fact considering how best to have you comprehend the sequence of events.” “Then I shall now proceed to present the findings.”

Moreover, the detective still did not readily open his mouth, all the while maintaining an intent gaze directly into my eyes. Though his face had a gentle quality that even women and children could find approachable, as I watched those eyes that occasionally flashed a sharp, piercing light from their hidden depths, I found myself thinking how such a man's features must surely transform into an expression of solemn dignity when tension gripped him.

“From my demeanor since earlier, you must have formed some general conjecture about the results by now, I presume?” His tone was piercingly direct. “I’m truly sorry to say,” Though I had anticipated this outcome, the instant it came, I couldn’t help but feel the blood drain from my face. “I’m truly sorry to say,” he continued, “but I must inform you that all your suspicions have proven true.” "It has been ascertained that José—the individual who blackmailed you—never intended to employ fabrications or anything of the sort in his scheme to extort you." "I will now explain everything in detail... As I intend to report without reservation, I must ask for your understanding regarding any unpleasant aspects you may hear." “While this does not lie at the direct core of the incident, it is intertwined with crucial causal relationships that might well be called the very theme of this case. Therefore, I shall begin with Julio Benavides—a dog dealer from Calle Cataluña.” The detective began speaking while skimming through the key points of the documents he had pushed aside.

“This is an individual of a most dangerously unpredictable nature. From an altered perspective, one might say your wife fell into a trap laid by such a man... that is to say, it could be considered her martyrdom. However, in any case, Benavides is a truly fearsome monomaniac and possesses an exceedingly perverse psychology. While possessing a keen intellect and considerable research acumen—a man too valuable to be left buried as some back-alley dog seller—his character remains that of a truly base individual devoid of social graces. First, allow me to briefly outline his background. Until 1922, this man had been a student in the Department of Zoology at the National University of Salamanca. He had apparently continued his studies through considerable hardship, but two years before graduation developed an ardent affection for a fellow student—a young woman whose full name remains unclear, referred to as a certain Angelica—though given his impoverished circumstances and unimpressive appearance, she naturally never considered him worthy of serious attention. The object of this man’s unrequited affection was said to be a young woman of considerable beauty—the beloved daughter of an art dealer who ranked among Salamanca’s top two wealthiest families. For someone like him to have fallen for such a person was likely a mismatched error from the start, though such considerations amount to unnecessary meddling. In any case, the young woman paid no heed whatsoever to this man’s affections, ultimately marrying another university student—the son of a Bilbao industrialist of comparable wealth. And while that may not have been the sole reason, shortly thereafter this man Benavides withdrew from university. The wound from this first love—though perhaps compounded by certain monomaniacal tendencies he may have harbored—nonetheless remains the undeniable fact that trampled the life trajectory of this once earnest, struggling student into utter chaos.”

From that point onward, Benavides appears to have drifted from one occupation to another in his struggle to survive. It appears he worked as a waiter at a restaurant in Burgos, served as an elementary school teacher in a village near Valladolid, and was even reduced to working as a graveyard cleaner in Almadén for a time. During this period, it appears he lived with women he called his wife once or twice, but neither his occupations nor these marital relationships lasted particularly long. Given that he had originally studied zoology—a discipline with little practical connection to society—had he continued along that path to become a schoolteacher or such, matters might have turned out better. But having entered society with half-measures, no occupation ever truly suited him. Perhaps he himself no longer possessed the will to work earnestly—in any case, the path this man had trodden appears to have descended step by step into life's uttermost depths. Now had this been an ordinary man, no matter how deeply he had felt for the woman of his first love—given that the world holds no shortage of other women, and given that feeling affection imposes no moral obligation upon its object—he would never have clung so persistently to one who had become another's wife. Yet this very fact demonstrates both why this man is fundamentally monomaniacal and how tenaciously serpent-like his nature proved to be—for the further he fell in society, the more his curses and resentments fixated upon that Salamanca-era maiden of his first love who had spurned him.

The further he slid down the social ladder, and the more his relationships with his second and third wives deteriorated, the more the focus of his curses and resentment appeared to fixate upon Angelica—that woman of his first love who had never granted him even a glance. Eventually, several years into such a life, he must have gone to Bilbao City to prowl around that woman’s residence or engage in persistent stalking. He was sued by the woman’s husband, sentenced in 1931 by the Bilbao Criminal Court to three years of hard labor for combined charges of defamation and extortion, and served his term at Cordovense Prison.

After his release from prison, he appears to have spent five or six years in America, though what exactly he was doing there remains unclear. “As this matter held no particular relevance to our investigation, we did not pursue more detailed inquiries. However, the above constitutes the general biographical details we have compiled regarding Julio Benavides.” “You may wonder what necessity compels me to expound at such length upon this man’s circumstances,” Monès continued, “but as I previously stated, this man’s serpentine persistence—that insidious, clinging nature of his—bears such profound causal ties to your wife’s case that I must ask for your patience a while longer as you hear me out.”

It appeared that this man first emerged as a dog dealer when opening his business in Querétaro City in 1936. He moved from Querétaro City to Jalisco City. “However, for reasons unknown, he remained here for only about half a year before relocating to Murcia City.” “And his relocation to Barcelona City dates back approximately three years—since 1942.” “While the precise motivation behind his entry into the dog trade remains unclear, as a breeder he has achieved considerable success to date.” “It was estimated he possessed assets amounting to six hundred twenty or thirty thousand pesetas—all safely regarded as profits accrued since commencing his dog trade.” “This is my conjecture: given his former academic specialization in zoology, I believe he found considerable advantage in breeding dogs, appraising them, or pursuing crossbreeding of novel varieties to follow trends.” Moreover, he himself appeared to harbor considerable interest in this trade—yet as previously mentioned, his nature remained truly insidious and taciturn. Despite amassing such wealth, he had not taken another wife and continued living alone in the back alleys of Plaza de Cataluña. Perhaps due to wallowing for years in wretched poverty, even after acquiring wealth he remained deeply suspicious, retaining the disagreeable habit of peering at others from under his brows during conversations. His lifestyle exhibited extreme parsimony and aversion to social interaction—few neighbors maintained dealings with him, and none believed he possessed such fortune. As if terrified of others discovering his wealth, he managed the shop alone without employing a single servant. “And though unclear what exactly he researched after closing shop, he peered into microscopes and conducted investigations diligently until midnight.” This constituted the full portrait of Julio Benavides—the dog dealer serving as principal architect of this incident. To summarize: imagine an individual of profoundly sinister disposition, morbidly gloomy temperament, tenacious persistence, miserly habits, and deep suspicion—devoid of any endearing quality—and you would reconstruct the essence of Julio Benavides himself. “From our perspective, such individuals often prove capable of conceiving heinous crimes—and true to form, this Julio Benavides has indeed committed dreadful acts.” “Given these dreadful acts’ critical connections to Madam’s case—though my exhaustive examination may appear superfluous—I trust you’ll comprehend why I began with this extended discourse when cross-referenced with my forthcoming account.” “Then let us move on from this man,” said the detective, moistening his throat with coffee brought by young Rosario. With an intensely focused gaze, he flipped through documents while scanning pages rapidly.

"To explain what constitutes Benavides' extraordinary scheme—it lies in his breeding and marketing of a remarkably altered canine breed called Troes Apirado." "How has it been altered?" "To explain this properly requires beginning with the dog's history. The breed specification document we borrowed from Benavides when you commissioned this investigation states that Julio Benavides first created this breed in 1943—but this constitutes an outright falsehood, for it was never a breed originated through Benavides' own foundational crossbreeding." Our investigation revealed that this dog's original breed—apparently kept as pets by Egyptian nobility of antiquity—originated near Benghazi in Cyrenaica. In its native region's vernacular, it was called Tras Sapido... This being its true name, what Benavides dubbed 'Troes Apirado' appears to be nothing more than a willful distortion he contrived from that original designation. In the 1890s, these dogs became extensively bred among Egyptian noblewomen in Alexandria until their corruptive influence on public morals grew so pervasive that the then Governor prohibited their keeping and ordered their wholesale extermination. Today, purebred specimens are said to have gone entirely extinct even in their native regions, rendering them virtually unobtainable. Yet through means unknown—by what clandestine channels one can scarcely imagine—this doubly ill-fated lineage resurfaced in the 1910s within the inner chambers of Constantinople’s Dolmabahçe Palace, where harem attendants lavished affection upon them until provoking the Ottoman Emperor's wrath, resulting in immediate executions for any keeper and slaughter orders for the dogs themselves. Thus does this breed bear no relation whatsoever to anything Benavides might claim to have originated." "However, I suspect Benavides may have introduced certain modifications to contemporary specimens." "In any case—though lacking expertise to determine through what channels he acquired them or how his crossbreeding manifests—this raises the essential question: why do women dote upon these dogs so excessively?" "The explanation proves delicate to articulate, but to state the unvarnished truth: it lies in this dog's capacity to prolong feminine carnal indulgence beyond all natural limits, coupled with providing pleasure so monstrously obscene it dwarfs anything men might experience." "This constitutes a special-purpose breed—one seemingly born into existence solely for such objectives, then further refined through crossbreeding precisely for those ends." "Therefore you may now comprehend why decadent Egyptian noblewomen immersed in extreme licentiousness raised them so affectionately, and why disgraced harem attendants cherished them..."

Majardo's Visit

“Given that, what exactly are this dog’s behavioral traits?” If we provisionally examine its characteristics based on Benavides’ breed specification document—though this document, which Benavides had painstakingly and ingeniously obscured—it appears utterly unremarkable at first glance. Yet when cross-referenced with the dog’s behavioral traits, one can reconstruct the full visage of an unimaginably lewd beast simply by extracting the peculiarities concealed beneath its ostensibly ordinary descriptions. Take the coat, for instance—Benavides writes here: “Short, smooth, and dense overall, with long hair clustered solely at the loins.” Yet this massive canine’s upper body—proportioned to fit snugly against a mature woman’s torso—was entirely sheathed in sleek fur so thick it might evoke a fur seal’s pelt. “And yet long hair clusters densely only at the loins... Of course this canine variant—resembling some deformed monstrosity—was created through repeated crossbreeding with other breeds, but to what purpose would he craft such an aberrant coat pattern?” “Even without explanation, you can likely imagine this as well.” “All exist solely for carnal indulgence.” The eyes—oval and slanted, burning like fire during arousal—this phrase “burning like fire” served as a euphemistic expression meaning that when in heat, the animal transformed into a creature of passionate flames. It signified nothing less than its metamorphosis into a beast of lust. Taken literally, one might interpret this to mean the dog’s eyes turned crimson when enraged, but it in no way indicated that the eyes themselves physically reddened. This deception presented itself as if connecting to subsequent clauses about behavioral traits—that when enraged it became ferocious and fought to the death, and that it absolutely never acclimated to strangers—but this was merely Benavides’ cunning artifice. As you know, under World Canine Association regulations, each breed must be accompanied by specification documents standardizing distinguishing features and physical conformation. Without these, customers would not pay exorbitant sums for dogs—a point upon which Benavides had expended considerable effort. “First-time customers who know nothing buy this dog reassured by the literal meaning stated in the Breed Specification Document.” “Moreover, those who do not put this dog to its intended use cannot fathom the meanings concealed beneath these clauses. But for those who have conducted even a single experiment—if I may make bold to cite Madam’s case as an example—though this document appears superficially written, it is engineered so that one immediately realizes it simultaneously articulates with perfect fluency the secret habits inherent to this dog.” “Therefore, it constitutes neither falsified documentation nor fraud—no crime whatsoever.”

“Olfactory range extending several miles…” This too did not mean the dog’s sense of smell actually spanned such distances in practical terms. Even among dogs with the most acute ordinary senses—such as police dogs or military specimens—their olfactory range extended at most from one and a half to two and a half miles. There could be no such thing as a sense of smell reaching several miles. “Therefore, this phrasing merely indicates possession of an extraordinarily specialized olfactory capacity—to take your own dog as an example, this animal maintains a unique sensory focus directed solely toward Madam.” “In other words, Madam’s particular body odor exerts a unique stimulant effect—the power to induce arousal—in this dog, while demonstrating its absolute incapacity for such response toward any other individual.” “This does not mean—not in the slightest—that Madam’s secret remains safeguarded by this mechanism.” “As you know, unlike humans, animals experience specific estrus periods when arousal becomes possible—outside these intervals, they remain utterly incapable of excitation. Such limitations would render them unsuitable as playthings for human purposes.” Thus, through repeated refinements, this dog alone had been artificially endowed with an instinct to become aroused regardless of season whenever exposed to the specific body odor that first triggered its excitation. This trait had been engineered to interconnect with another clause: its absolute refusal to acclimate to unfamiliar individuals, and its paradoxical suitability as a guard dog despite being marketed as a companion animal. “In essence, within your household, supreme authority over this dog resides solely with Madam—she who has imbued it with this specialized olfactory programming.”

“You may no longer recall,” Monès continued, “but according to testimony from that gardener Galiana Jose who extorted you, Head Butler Garbo sustained grave injuries from this dog after being incited by Madam—an occurrence absolutely impossible with any other breed.” He leaned forward, fingers steepled. “By your own account, Madam never personally attended to its feeding—Garbo handled all such care. Yet dogs instinctively cherish those who directly provide their meals. That a hound would bite the very servant who nourished it under its mistress’s orders defies every principle of canine nature.” The detective’s voice dropped to a forensic murmur. “Far more plausible would be Garbo inciting it to attack Madam—yet your household inverted this natural order. This inversion proves conclusively that your dog alone possesses the aberrations I’ve described.” When I remained silent, he pressed on: “You may have dismissed these anomalies, but when I first heard your testimony, its peculiarity struck me profoundly.” “Only after personally examining the beast,” he concluded, rifling through Rosario’s field notes, “cross-referencing every detail with Benavides’ breeding documents, and collating my assistant’s observations, did this grotesque puzzle finally cohere.”

When we first met, I had of course confided every particular of the matter to the detective. While humming absently and nodding, this detective had nevertheless properly grasped all essential points. And as I mentioned before, when I too saw this breed specification document, I felt nothing particular and simply tossed it into my desk drawer—yet to seeing eyes, even from this seemingly ordinary document they could discern the inexhaustible stench of secrets. I marveled at his penetrating insight, yet simultaneously found myself profoundly reassured—such an investigation by a detective of this caliber would surely prove trustworthy. But even so, one thing eluded my comprehension. The detective had said 'having personally seen it with my own eyes'—yet this detective had never once visited my residence. Where then could he have seen my Sorrow?

“Did you just... state that you had seen... Sorrow?” “Where on earth did you see it?” “By calling upon your residence, naturally.” The detective answered with a faint smile playing about his lips, but upon seeing my still-suspicious countenance, he abruptly changed tack and broached this unexpected matter.

“From late last week through this week… Let me see—just before Your departure for Santa Lucia Hill, You are aware that Manager Alonzo Majardo called at Your residence approximately three times in succession, are You not?” “I am aware of that, but…”

"On all three occasions, Mr. Majardo did not speak with you, but merely gave some instructions to the servants before departing, correct?" "Ah... That's correct." "Mr. Majardo’s conduct in these matters isn’t particularly unusual, is it?" "That's correct—you are well-informed." As the detective had said, there was nothing at all unusual about Mr. Majardo’s conduct in these matters. That was precisely why Dolores so detested this—

“It’s not an unusual matter… but Mr. Majardo’s visits always occur at night—he doesn’t call during banking hours, does he?” “Tha...t’s correct. “I wondered what business he had come for, and found it truly strange, but—”

“Therefore, the Mr. Majardo who visited those three times was none other than myself,” the detective stated without a trace of a smile. “Gah!” I stood there, my gaping mouth frozen agape. That this portly forty-year-old detective had disguised himself as that gaunt and wiry Majardo in his sixties! To me, this was no less astonishing than young Rosario’s impersonation of Juan. For a while, I remained dumbstruck, wordlessly staring fixedly at the detective’s face. To debate whether it resembled him or not was pure folly! I myself—who met face-to-face with Majardo daily at the bank—had until this very moment firmly believed it was none other than Majardo. At this point, it became less a marvel of skill than a bone-chilling terror that made one shudder. The detective gazed fixedly at my foolish-looking face, but—

“Therefore,” he added, “every detail in my report comprises solely those matters I have personally verified with these eyes and confirmed as truthful—thus you may bestow your full confidence upon it without hesitation.”

“However,” he continued, “our purpose lies not in explaining investigative methods, but in presenting verified results—that constitutes our professional duty. Let us therefore conclude our current discussion.” He tapped the document. “Regarding standard breed specifications: forelimbs widely spaced and turned outward—note this—forelimbs widely spaced and turned outward.” The ribs are broad. “The back remains horizontal while sloping toward the loins…the tail hangs low from a high-set base.” “Considering these key traits alone”—his finger traced the text—“though they match your household dog perfectly—you can readily infer what such physical characteristics signify.” His voice lowered. “It means nothing less than this creature was engineered into a form supremely suited to elevate feminine pleasure—to guide those women who crave such experiences toward ecstasy’s pinnacle.”

“In other words—through its habits, instincts, and physical form—this dog had been perfected through relentless refinement to suit that very purpose... To state it plainly: even without provocation from women, once aroused, this creature possesses an instinct to actively initiate pursuit on its own accord.” “If we might crudely compare—were there such a thing as molesters in the canine world—every action of this dog would likely resemble those acts.” “It remains utterly silent.” “It never barks nor howls.” “And no matter how many times you push it away, it will repeat that behavior dozens upon dozens of times.” “As an animal driven solely by sexual instinct, you can imagine how blatantly and persistently it would press its body against its target.” “And once engaged—even if initially done in jest or amusement—the moment she permits physical contact even once... From that point onward, escape becomes impossible from these shameful bonds between human and beast.” “Since this dog provides sensations beyond any man’s capability, women who taste this forbidden fruit become akin to opium addicts.” “Though their hearts burn with shame at this depravity, they find themselves powerless to sever this vile connection.” “Why do you think Turkish emperors ordered these dogs slaughtered on sight?” “Why were palace maids who kept them immediately executed?” “Why did Alexandria’s governor command their extermination?” “The reason should now be clear to you.” “The dog Sorrow you kept belonged precisely to this breed.” “And Julio Benavides—that dog dealer—devoted his paranoid and wretched existence to perfecting these creatures, selling them in secret.” “Why would he dedicate himself to such abhorrent work?” “Of course I never heard this directly from Benavides—even had I done so, he’d deny it outright, for both society and law would accept his word as valid—but this is my interpretation.” “His primary motive was exploiting human weakness through these dogs, reaping profits as easily as scooping grain from water.” “Need I remind you? Even ignorant of its true nature, didn’t you and your wife pay that man 190,000 pesetas simply for its unusual shape?” “Consider a woman who’s fully experienced this dog then loses it.”

“Women whose humanity has been numbed through intoxication by this poisonous dog will inevitably seek to obtain another of its kind at any cost.” “Having fully comprehended the dog’s value, they would desperately pursue its acquisition within their financial means—even if 190,000 pesetas became 300,000.” “It differs not at all from opium addicts exhausting their fortunes to procure opium or morphine.” “This constitutes Benavides’ foremost objective.” “In such instances, this man demands prices so exorbitant they defy rational judgment.” “Though professional ethics prevent me from naming them, our investigation revealed he extracted outrageous sums—430,000 pesetas from one lady purchasing a second specimen, 320,000 from another.”

The extortionist was indeed an extortionist, but the ladies who paid were equally complicit... One could only stand aghast. Therefore, while this man's primary objective undoubtedly lay in amassing enormous profits through creating and selling such dogs, if my conjecture might be permitted, I considered that within his purposes there likely lurked another intention no less formidable than this first scheme. Namely—he infiltrated households blessed with wealth, honor, and beautiful young wives—families lacking nothing in happiness—and through peddling these dogs, utterly destroyed their domestic bliss by the most insidious means… All while sneering demonically at the impending ruin of those upper-class women—women who had once scorned him in his poverty—as they inevitably plunged toward destruction………

That for this man today, this had perhaps become a greater purpose beyond mere financial gain—this was the conjecture I held, though considering it so might have been reading too deeply into the matter. Yet when I analyzed this man’s past—when I inferred his transition from zoology scholar to dog dealer—when I deduced how the agony of brutal heartbreak had forged him into this paranoiacal misanthrope steeped in gloom—and when I concluded from the fact that even now he remained unhealed from that romantic wound—I found myself compelled to arrive at this conclusion. Moreover, given that he himself bred these socially malignant animals and secretly poisoned society’s underbelly, I believed there could be absolutely no justification for him—even were such deductions made by me—to offer any defense. Because... you see, animals cannot be held criminally responsible. Therefore, no matter how extensively this man disrupted society and amassed fortunes through these acts, he bore no criminal liability whatsoever. Were he simply to declare—“I never intended to breed these dogs for such purposes; I merely sought to provide novel companion animals. Any descent into depravity lies solely with the noblewomen themselves”—the law could not touch him. Do you remember? When you and Madam first went to purchase that dog, did he not interrogate you exhaustively—even extracting your full names and address? And did he not grill her relentlessly about whether she liked dogs or would keep it herself, recording every detail in his ledger? If his sole aim were selling dogs as merchandise, what need existed for such meticulous measures? I naturally surmised this preparation served both anticipating Madam’s return for a second purchase—requiring thorough investigation of your household—and enabling observation of how such homes would unravel thereafter. And though this remained conjecture, I was firmly convinced it struck true.

Furthermore, as if to corroborate this conjecture of mine, he absolutely did not sell female dogs of this breed. Of course, while female dogs of this breed—unlike males—were said to have no demand for such purposes and had been discarded as worthless since ancient times even in their native Ben Ghazi region, being a dog dealer meant females must inevitably have been born in his kennels. Yet despite this, the man had not sold a single female dog. He sold exclusively male dogs. Moreover, the buyers of these males were invariably young, beautiful married women… He did not sell them to men, nor of course to unmarried girls. Could this truly be interpreted as the conduct of a mere dealer peddling companion dogs? Even when considering this point, I firmly believed my conjecture was fully accurate. In any case, though this explanation had grown quite lengthy, I believed he now fully comprehended what manner of fearsomely cunning man Benavides was, and the utterly obscene nature of that freakish breed he sold—the Troes Apirado. Though knowing nothing of this at the time, your wife had purchased this dog from such a dealer... And though ostensibly to protect it from being killed by you, she had kept this most indecent creature in her own bedroom. "What consequences were thereby brought about," I concluded, "requires no further elaboration from me."

The detective sighed with apparent pity, turning a document page to proceed. As I stared at those hands, I sat dumbfounded, exhaling faintly. T·L2317-B "I personally handled the investigations into matters discussed thus far, while Madam's movements were primarily investigated by my assistant Luca Rosario." "However, fearing any preconceptions might distort Rosario's fact-finding, I kept my own inquiries strictly confidential from him. I adopted a method of cross-checking his findings against mine personally. Regrettably, both results yielded most unfavorable conclusions regarding Madam."

That is to say, I had Rosario investigate the background of Miss Sirion Arosemena—this friend of Madam’s who was said to have conversed with her in hushed tones within the sunroom initially. This friend was employed as an actress at the Iberian Theater, appeared to have been quite intimate with Madam since childhood, possessed extravagant tastes, and had been receiving substantial material assistance from Madam. “However, while that matter holds no particular relevance to this case and may be disregarded, what cannot be dismissed here is the information we obtained that this actress too was doting excessively upon the same breed of dog as Madam.” “We could not carelessly dismiss this information, so we immediately extended our efforts to investigate further, and discovered that this actress had purchased the dog from Benavides through an introduction by a Mrs. Torres Narló.” “And Mrs. Narló had also sought the dog through an introduction by a friend named Mrs. Leviata Clemente—though these ladies bore no particular friendship with Madam whatsoever.” “Though completely unrelated to Madam, they too appeared utterly intoxicated by this dog’s pleasures. However, as an incidental discovery from this investigation, Rosario ascertained—though it may seem entirely superfluous—that two or three names among those Madam presented to you as her friends were in fact complete fabrications—improvised fictions conjured from thin air.” “For instance, we discovered that both Mrs. Marina Artes and Mrs. Agueda Elcia—whom Madam claims as longtime intimate friends she frequently socializes with—are entirely fictitious names. Not only does Madam have no such friends whatsoever, but first and foremost, no ladies bearing those names exist at all within Barcelona’s social circles.” “This fact holds no particular relation to the essence of the case you commissioned, nor do I know what necessity compelled Madam to tell you such falsehoods. Nevertheless—and I must beg pardon for young Rosario’s impertinent phrasing—we have been compelled to deepen our suspicions that significant portions of Madam’s life appear fortified with falsehoods before your very eyes.” “Having confirmed that Miss Sirion Arosemena—who once whispered with Madam about dogs—is likewise an enthusiast of this breed, I felt it necessary to discontinue external investigations into Madam and instead directly surveil her domestic life. Thus I promptly resolved to station young Rosario at your residence.” “Having previously obtained information that your servant Juan had been constantly telling his colleagues of his desire to visit his ailing mother in his hometown of Valencia—when I first visited your residence disguised as Mr. Majardo—I took it upon myself—though acting on my own judgment—to provide him with a modest sum and inform him to go pay his respects to his mother.” “And having disguised the young man as Juan to station him at your residence, we were compelled to conclusively prove that everything stated by gardener Galiana Jose and head servant Garbo was indeed true.” “In other words—those midnight moans and laughter you heard during your sleepless nights were not merely Madam amusing herself with the dog out of insomnia—nothing so simple—but rather… we have conclusively proven that she was indeed intoxicated by this poison.”

“Excuse me… most inexcusable…” I wiped the sweat seeping from my brow. “Could you wait there for a moment… Just there…” My throat parched; no sound would emerge. I urgently raised my hand to halt the detective. Then rigidly bowed my head. Betrayal’s fury and bitter futility surged with such violence they nearly blinded me—had no witnesses been present, I would have gnashed my teeth raw. I could feel—could physically sense—the blood draining from my face. My fingertips quivered uncontrollably as icy sweat oozed without cease.

"Just... just... there... could you wait there for a moment..." The detective stared at my face—still bowed as I wiped sweat—with bewildered eyes, then crossed his arms on the desk and averted his gaze with pained sympathy. "By professional obligation alone did I accept this investigation at your request—yet these findings bring me profound distress to disclose... From my soul's depths, I commiserate," he uttered in sepulchral tones. "To have bred such depravity within my own household... I burn with shame..." Again I mopped my damp forehead.

"To have even requested such an investigation in the first place... Though it feels as though my very flesh were being flayed by this shameful matter... To have such unspeakable disgrace laid bare before me... I am utterly mortified..."

“No—rather than your wife, I feel profound indignation toward this man Benavides who preys upon human weaknesses to commit such utterly despicable acts." “Madam simply fell prey to Benavides’s machinations… one might even say she was a victim of sorts…” said the detective in a halting tone, still keeping his face averted—perhaps feigning this charitable interpretation. “As I have been stating all along—since this dog itself functions like a narcotic—its effects are not confined solely to Madam.” “Given that multitudes of women have fallen into this paralyzed state, I consider Benavides himself rather than any other to be the true object of condemnation. As I previously stated, I shall depart for Algeria following this final case... In fact, I have already reserved a cabin on the Santa Cataheña departing the day after tomorrow... Once arrived there, I intend to confer with you within reasonable bounds of propriety... Though this remains merely my personal opinion, I plan to formally submit my views to the authorities regarding...” "I intend to emphatically point out that this constitutes a fundamental destruction of humanity and morality - how one who corrupts upper-class women and undermines moral principles by peddling these creatures under the pretext of research remains exempt from any criminal charges reveals a grave defect in our legal system - and to demand immediate prohibition through law of breeding and selling such dogs." “…It appears this corrupt practice has already become quite widespread among the women of our city as well, and during my investigation of this case, I was struck by that fact with particular intensity.” "I intend for that matter to be settled only after we have thoroughly discussed it when the time comes—"

The detective was likely speaking to console me, but not a single one of these words reached my ears. More than anything else, I felt an emotion beyond all description—whether futility, indignation, degradation, wretchedness, shame, or humiliation—until nothing remained but this desperate urge to vanish from the detective's presence that very instant, abandoning all formalities, surging up until it filled my chest to bursting.

Because I kept my head bowed, the detective too fell silent, restlessly shifting his gaze out the window or flipping through documents with an air of idleness. "To have commissioned your investigation only to interrupt your account... It must appear intolerably self-indulgent of me... But let this suffice... I've already understood more than enough without hearing further details."

“…………” “There’s just one thing I wish to ask you—” I stammered, wiping the area around my neck once more. “Given your thorough investigation of this matter—and I apologize for pressing this point so presumptuously—should I resort to such measures, would you be capable of providing legal testimony as a witness?” “That requires no explanation,” he replied. “Should I be unavailable to respond to a court summons abroad, I would naturally substantiate the matter through documentary evidence.” “The evidentiary weight remains equivalent... An investigation like this—if mishandled even slightly—transcends merely sowing discord between spouses.” “We would inevitably face grave defamation charges from those investigated.” “But rest assured—we hold sufficiently conclusive materials to warrant your trust.”

"I would never presume to doubt you, but might I trouble you to show me just one piece of this evidence?" "...While I fully trust your investigation...given my wife's usual disposition, this account strains credulity...The truth is, I remain utterly stupefied." "I would never question your word...but if you could find it in your heart to save this pitiful, foolish husband..."

The detective watched my face without blinking, having discerned that I harbored no doubt toward his words—that while I believed them, my sincerity lay in being utterly confounded by this collision with an unbelievable reality. "We preserve these materials as evidentiary documents, providing only copies to clients when necessary—if this arrangement meets with your approval." "I shall show you." "But only one—would that suffice?" "However, I fear viewing multiple items would only worsen your state of mind."

“That will suffice. If I might have the honor of viewing just one…” I was gazing fixedly at the documents, “T·L2317-B,” he instructed the young man standing behind him. Then he said, “Please examine this—Madam’s own handwriting,” pointing to the paper fragment brought by young Rosario, and indeed it was unmistakably my wife’s hand. Moreover, it was a letter addressed to the actress Miss Sirion Arosemena, written on my personal stationery that bore my household’s crest in precise embossing.

Dear Madam, I have duly received the invitation you kindly sent via your messenger yesterday. Your performance at the Sarsai Theater has been met with acclaim; the extension of its run is truly splendid. I am most delighted above all. I shall endeavor to adjust my schedule and attend within the next two or three days. Furthermore, regarding the blended perfume you had your messenger deliver... I tried it immediately, and I must say without flattery that I was astonished by how effective it truly was, just as you had described. No matter what perfume I used before, Sorrow would always flee, but with this one alone, he sniffs eagerly and comes rubbing himself against me. He seems to like it very much. With this, there’s no need to make a commotion by having him use hot water, and I am truly delighted that you taught me such an excellent method. The dog breeder never provides reliable guidance, but this time alone I consider it a one-in-a-thousand triumph.

While we're on the subject, if you could teach me some method to dispose of this other Sorrow as well, nothing would be better—but since even the Master Breeder seems devoid of wisdom regarding this one, it's positively disheartening. Do conjure up some ingenious plan quickly, I implore you! Otherwise I might well lose everything and flee outright. Just gazing at that bloated, bluish-insensitive face these days leaves me suffocating. That very insensitivity makes it absurdly comical—how he cowers as if wanting to apologize each time he looks my way. Every trick in the book has lost its effect on such insensitivity, I assure you. If that fool had mastered submission to such a degree, he'd be utterly invincible. No matter what stratagems I employ, it's water off a duck's back—utterly useless.

Even if you save just one Sorrow, it won’t do any good. Keep that well in mind, I beg you! Those who pray for death roll in money, while those who pray to grow old together have none... Stop spouting such trite sympathies and I beg you to devise a solution quickly! This is a matter of utmost urgency that brooks no delay for me. ...As usual, a bit of complaining... since you seem to be quite in demand.

I shall most certainly attend Wednesday’s dinner party. Please prepare an abundance of reserved topics especially for me! And between the novelist Carsas and the music critic Angeles, do invite just one of them. While both carry some reputation for vulgarity, in my experience, when hosting dinners exceeding ten guests, adding those sorts tends to make managing the company flow more smoothly. Sandino is out of the question—I’d sooner invite our household Sorrow than someone of that ilk.

If I were to say that I've lately come to keenly desire reading books on toxicology, might you perhaps sympathize even a little with how I feel? If you could truly sympathize, that would be reassuring... Well then, let us meet on Wednesday... I've enclosed the promised check for eighty-six thousand pesetas here. March 18 Your unchanging Countess Dolores Messalino

Murderous Intent "...your unchanging Countess Dolores Messalino... Countess Dolores Messalino..." The detective kept his eyes fixed intently on me as I read the words aloud two or three times in a daze, repeating them over. "How does this strike you? Have you grasped the situation... Should you require it, I can prepare a copy at once."

“No... That won’t be necessary... I’ve come to place full trust in the reliability of your investigation.” “Truly, you have been most helpful in every regard...” I said as I stood up and extended my hand.

I knew full well that Dolores utterly detested me. I understood completely that her pride was so towering she regarded someone like me as mere dust and debris. Yet I had believed this contempt confined to our domestic sphere; never in my darkest dreams had I imagined she harbored such absolute hatred and scorn for me even beyond these walls. That she became my wife... That she became my wife while squandering twenty-five or twenty-six million pesetas like water in this brief span, while crying out her desire to poison me... That she became the wife of Spain's foremost banker—however grotesque a cripple he might be—while still styling herself as the former Countess... This I had never conceived even in nightmare. If you despised me so utterly and hated me to such extremes, why did you consent to become my wife?! If you would marry me... if you would marry me, then why didn't you seek divorce? Like a child stripped of both desire and gain, I felt like howling in anguish. I felt as though struck across the skull with a bludgeon; even keeping my eyes open seared with light.

“Then please… state the remuneration… I would like you to specify it now.”

Staggering to my feet, I closed my eyes and extended my hand—and the detective firmly grasped it. "I fully comprehend... I do comprehend your situation... but given your standing... I sincerely pray that you may resolve this matter peacefully." And so I paid the detective agency's requested fees—settling both their remuneration and expenses by check—before being seen off by the pitying detective and young Rosario. Though I eventually steadied my staggering legs against the staircase steps, my ears rang and my head burned, utterly devoid of any capacity for coherent thought.

If only I could go somewhere, cling to someone, and weep and wail like a child until I’d cried myself out over this utterly cursed body of mine—then surely my chest would feel unburdened, I thought. And yet simultaneously, while I had endured every humiliation until this day on one front, the thread of my endurance had finally snapped on the other—I found myself hating my wife with unbearable intensity. If only they would seize her by the collar, throw her down, and trample her body without mercy—then perhaps this heart of mine might find some semblance of healing. Whether it was frustration, hatred, anger, or pity—all these emotions surged through my chest at once, leaving me in such a tumultuous state that my vision nearly blurred.

When the driver saw me emerge, I waved him off as he hurriedly opened the car door and sent it home—now left without any destination in mind. I simply let my feet guide me, stumbling along the sidewalk with no awareness of where I walked. I walked and walked and wandered without purpose. At times during this exhausted wandering, I half-believed I'd stopped once or twice at coffee shops along the way—yet equally doubted I'd done any such thing.

“Excuse me,” someone called out from behind, At times I felt as though a voice had demanded, “Sir, we must collect your payment,” yet that too seemed directed not at me, but at some phantom patron. As I wandered through the sunlit streets, everything dissolved into an imbecilic haze. Though I crossed tram lines and sidestepped motorcars without being struck, each moment evaporated from my mind—I retained no memory of paths taken nor vehicles dodged, their trajectories erased like chalk from slate. The sole tempest raging through my skull was this: how might I make my wife pay? No matter how far I trudged, Dolores’ visage—eternally sneering—haunted my vision. Gnashing my teeth at this specter, I wandered without purpose or respite.

I could no longer recall what time it had already become. I could no longer recall how I had walked where, or why I had come to the bank.

All I could recall was mechanically returning my customary gracious bows to the guards... the elevator operators... the errand boys... and to several bank employees who passed me with polite salutations along the staircases and corridors leading here—this hollow courtesy was all I could remember. And when I came to my senses, I found myself sitting at the desk in the third-floor president’s office of the bank, having arrived there without realizing how. By nature being ill-suited to indulgence, I had until now generally maintained punctual attendance. Yet as bank president, there were inevitably mornings requiring external visits or home research that delayed my arrival. My secretary had long grown thoroughly accustomed to these irregularities. Upon seeing me enter, she stopped typing and—bending slightly at the waist—began separating and arranging into two parts the stacked wicker baskets atop the desk. As usual, she retrieved thick documents from the steel filing cabinet in one corner of the room and piled them into one basket. The established procedure dictated that signed documents awaiting my approval be thrown into the remaining empty basket, whereupon the secretary would summon an attendant at the opportune moment to distribute them across departments.

I was never quick to approve documents by nature. Only after scrutinizing them until not a single character or mark raised doubt would I finalize my signature - a process that sometimes left papers languishing for ten days or more. What thoughts lay hidden in her heart I cannot say, but without showing the slightest displeasure, the secretary repeated this mechanical routine each day: retrieving documents from the cabinet each morning only to return them each evening, as tirelessly as a machine would.

But today alone, though my mind had lost all capacity for thought, I couldn't help feeling there was a mountain of things I needed to consider - and that I had to consider them quickly. Strangely, I found myself unable to stop fixating on the thick stacks of unapproved documents heaped within this pending basket. Unless I tidied this up and cleared my desk completely, I felt I wouldn't be able to settle down and think calmly and intently.

I stretched out my hand and took one of the documents. I tried reading it, but though the printed characters entered my eyes, their meaning fragmented into scattered pieces that refused to cohere. Just as always, my wife's spitefully mocking face kept dancing before my eyes. I signed and threw it into the empty basket. The next document's characters too danced meaninglessly across the page. I signed this one as well and tossed it into the basket. The remaining documents—I no longer felt any desire to examine them. I mechanically stamped approvals and hurled them into the basket one after another. Gradually the pending documents dwindled to a mere handful while approved ones formed towering stacks, yet with each signature came the crushing sensation that my father's life work—the banking empire built grain by grain through decades of painstaking effort—was collapsing with thunderous crashes under these reckless, chaotic approvals.

I had finished processing all the documents before me yet remained seated with my cheek propped on my hand, staring vacantly at the now-empty pending basket through void-like eyes—when the secretary reappeared before me, having stopped her typewriter. She showed me her profile as she busied herself arranging the signed documents, and I saw her. As ever, I maintained the same posture. Though aware this woman must find my state peculiar, everything felt burdensome—I couldn't muster even momentary will to change position.

A girlish "Oh!" of mild surprise escaped most naturally from the secretary's lips. A single sheet of paper was plucked from slender fingertips arranging documents.

“May I take this one down as well?” Her eyes sparkled. “Yes…” A look of momentary bewilderment must have flashed across my face—this face that since morning had lost any semblance of human expression. “Oh! I’m sure everyone will be overjoyed!” It was only natural that joy had spread across the secretary’s face. Now that she mentioned it, I did recall this particular document. The young bank employees—both men and women—had long cherished their ambition to renovate a small repossessed dance hall on Cristina Coastal Avenue into a staff ballroom. They intended to establish a bar in one corner and equip bedrooms too, hoping to create a social venue for young employees from Saturday through Sunday—though this would require the bank to allocate approximately 1.7 million pesetas for staff welfare facilities. They had repeatedly petitioned Majardo, but that dutifully single-minded man had stubbornly refused to nod his approval. The document had finally reached my desk after progressing through all channels requiring only the president’s endorsement, but since I had entrusted all matters to Majardo, I couldn’t simply approve this one document independently. Thus, for about twenty days now, morning and evening, the secretary had been transferring these papers back and forth between the file cabinet and pending basket—from cabinet to basket, basket to cabinet—in endless repetition.

I had now signed it with torrential momentum. This must have delighted the young secretary. "Go tell the manager I've approved!" "You're young...and healthy." "Enjoy life while you still have this youthful health!" Having received this casual speech from me—words never before directed her way— "Yes," the Secretary fidgeted uneasily, but upon seeing me resume my cheek-propped posture, she abruptly gathered the documents and departed.

I had been intently watching her retreating figure, and once I ascertained that the sound of her footsteps had faded away down the corridor, I hurriedly unlocked the lowest right drawer on the desk's right side. For I had suddenly remembered that in the very back of that drawer, stuffed with documents, lay the new model pistol Majardo had given me some time ago. It was about two years prior, around the time of the Algiers Uprising's outbreak. At the government's request, a syndicate organized by Spanish banking groups had purchased large quantities of machine guns, rifles, pistols and other firearms from Czech and Skoda companies to send to the Algiers government forces. Among these were several rare silenced pistols. It was an extremely compact, latest-model weapon—so small it could be completely concealed within a right palm.

"You'll likely never have occasion to use such things, but since they're exceptionally well-made, I obtained two pistols from the inspector. What do you say? Why don't you keep one for yourself?" Majardo had said with a laugh when bringing it to me. I now recalled how I, treating it as some novelty, had stuffed it into my desk drawer like a child fiddling with a toy. Of course, since he had likely given it to me with the intention of testing it on garden trees or such, the bullets weren’t exactly plentiful. There were at most about fifteen bullets wrapped in paper and included, but while surveying my surroundings, I swiftly loaded them into the bronze-colored steel frame. And faintly, while intently gazing at the cold metal emitting a dull glow under the spring sunset streaming through the window, I slipped it into the pocket of my Western-style trousers; though of course, no coherent thought of resolving the fury and frustration now seething through my entire being solely with these bullets had flashed through my mind. That I carried this silenced pistol—a weapon capable of instantly felling any opponent at any moment—did nothing more than inject a breath of refreshing clarity into my frustrated state of mind, which had lost all means of communication since earlier.

After tucking the pistol into my waistband, I reached out to press the call bell. I had thought to call Cesare Albarado, the lawyer serving as the bank's legal advisor, and consult him thoroughly once more about means of exacting revenge against Benavides. Against this schemer who had conceived such cunning crimes—this disruptor of society and destroyer of humanity—whether current laws truly proved as powerless as Detective Monès claimed, whether there existed no way to make him endure prison's torments—I felt compelled to consult repeatedly on these points. Yet my hand remained frozen against the call bell as I contemplated this intently. To consult Lawyer Albarado would require personally disclosing every sordid detail of my domestic affairs to this attorney. That was beyond what I could endure. Moreover, my mind was now utterly exhausted—such meticulous consultations had become unbearably tedious.

Rather than tediously rehashing the unbearable details of my circumstances, I would rather take matters into my own hands and punish those scoundrels and traitors myself until my rage subsided. And I myself—I considered how much more purified my spirit would feel, how cleansing for my heart, were I to cast myself—this accursed body and its fate—into prison through legal judgment in one decisive act. At the root lay this fundamental error—that a man born with such a cursed body as mine could presume to occupy the station of bank president and stand at society's forefront. This error I would sever in one stroke, casting my fate back onto the hellish path befitting this body... but in exchange... in exchange I swore to vent this resentment—this fury, this bitter regret, this seething wrath—without fail! For thus had I resolved. And in that moment of resolve, the hatred and fury that had been boiling within me since earlier settled as if doused with water, while a cool breeze seemed to sweep through my chest. To put it plainly—until that moment I had lacked true murderous intent, merely playing sleepwalker by loading the pistol and concealing it in my pocket—but now I conceived full murderous intent toward Benavides and my wife. And with this intent's birth, my raging emotions subsided at once, leaving in their wake an indescribable cold clarity.

And this bracing clarity—what boundless joy it was, one I had never before known in all my worldly existence! There remained nothing left to compel my submission, nor any humiliation left to endure. No need for servility, nor any cause to bend myself bowing before others. Precisely because a man despised by others strains to avoid their contempt—struggling to join human society and dwell within social bonds—there arises pretense and cosmetic artifice, shame and endured degradation; there accumulates the sediment of my forty-odd years of supremely melancholic existence, there lies the cramped confinement of emotions. But once resolved to destroy my adversary even at the cost of self-destruction—what pent-up sediment remains? What cramped confinement persists! All that exists is the free heavens and earth; it is breathing chest-out upon the earth toward the firmament; it is the soul's grand soaring—no pretense, no falsehood, much less endurance or servility.

What a grand soaring of the spirit this was! Never before had I experienced such unprecedented refreshing clarity opening within my heart as when this murderous intent arose within me. Never before in my forty-two years of life had I felt the joy of breathing such free and bracing air as at this moment. And at this very instant, though a disabled man, I could not help but feel my legs standing straight and steady upon the earth as if planted in a wrestler's stance, my arms swinging freely as I strode unhindered, sensing raw power coursing through my very being. Never before had I felt such profound empathy with every murderer in this world - with all criminals - nor cast aside everything that binds one to this world: property, mansions, social status, scholarship, cultured manners; and cried out to all criminals, all murderers: Friends! Never before had I felt such intimacy that I could address them as friends. The pistol that until moments ago I had unconsciously loaded and carried at my waist - I now deliberately drew out once more, unable to resist feeling both profound nostalgia and trust toward it. Never before at any moment had I felt so acutely that all I had accumulated in my mind - hundreds of volumes on finance, thousands of tomes on economics, every field of scholarship and philosophy - fell so utterly short before this dull-hued pistol's power to conquer life and make me rise in this world.

Reckoning with My Wife All workers find Saturday night before Sunday more enjoyable than Sunday itself, or so it is said. Moreover, through my own experience, I recall how when my father promised during my childhood to take me somewhere, the preceding night would fill me with such excitement that I couldn't sleep, tossing and turning beneath the covers. It could be said that my current state of mind after conceiving this murderous intent was precisely akin to that.

I will state this clearly... I will repeat it clearly as many times as necessary: my murderous intent was neither coincidental nor impulsive. I have not an iota of intention to spout such lies and falsehoods to elicit people's pity. I indeed savored to the fullest this foretaste of crime. Let me make this perfectly clear. And I - savoring this heart-pounding exhilaration of murderous intent - remained leaning motionless against my desk like a statue, deep in thought; yet had some stranger observed me, they might have thought that even as I harbored this intent, I still wavered inwardly. Or perhaps some perceived I was devising an even more meticulous criminal plan. However, none struck true in the slightest. I neither wavered nor felt remorse. Once resolved, there was no hesitation - yet neither was I contemplating any elaborate scheme. When one commits crime while seeking to evade detection, meticulous plans become necessary - but for one like myself, resolved to discard self-preservation, such things held no purpose. That is to say, I neither contemplated retreat nor advance; like a guileless child, simply repeating, I relished murder's pleasure - that which would transform forty-two years of humiliating existence into soul's ascension in an instant - and in this posture, having long dismissed the clerks, I heard the large clock in the deserted downstairs office boom five o'clock with lonely resonance. I heard six strike. I heard seven strike. I counted eight striking. The mild spring evening finally darkened, countless stars glittering brilliantly in the vast black sky beyond the window. Beneath that firmament, Barcelona's lights glowed resplendent, neon signs and electric illuminations coloring high-rises and bustling districts. The city's spring night revelries had likely just begun stirring. By then I'd forgotten to turn on lights, forgotten even coffee or bread, forgotten the room's stifling heat as I remained motionless against the desk. I must have sat thus five or six hours already. Feeling neither night's chill nor thirst nor hunger - only a leaping lightness... The joy of firing bullets into my wife's snow-white flesh and aiming at Benavides' cunning face with my pistol surged tingling through my breast.

The night patrol must have begun. Around that time, stealthy footsteps began echoing near the stairs and through distant and nearby corridors. While I remained dazedly still, some indeterminate span of time must have slipped away. Suddenly, the room's silence shattered. At the very instant the doorknob clattered in the pitch-dark doorway, a black shadow leapt inward like a swooping bird. The moment it bounded inside,

“Who’s there! Don’t move or I’ll shoot!” The switch clicked and light flooded the room. The moment I raised my head from where it had been propped on my hand, there stood a burly security guard with a time recorder slung over his shoulder, pointing a pistol while wearing a bewildered expression. “I—I truly didn’t realize… I had no idea the President was here… no idea at all…” “Patrol duty?” “Yes, sir…”

Just as I was about to assume this very posture myself, I couldn't suppress a bitter smile at having been preempted.

There still remained time before the hour I was waiting for. Leaving now would be somewhat too early, but under these circumstances there was no alternative. I reluctantly began to rise. "...Well... I suppose it's about time to head back." "Shall I summon your car?" "Oh... That won't be necessary." "I truly had no inkling... It never once occurred to me you might still be present... As the general affairs department hadn't informed me... I was completely unaware... Ah—the main gate has already been secured, but I'll unlock it immediately."

“No, I’ll be leaving through the back gate. Don’t bother.” And wiping away cold sweat, I stepped outside through the wicket door opened by the guard who had hurried ahead—but outside seethed jazz’s frenzy, phonographs’ rhythms, stomping castanets, women’s choruses; automobiles raced past and lights blazed gloriously as the streets now sought to whirl madly through this spring night’s fleeting hour of revelry. And I too, swept into that vortex, refused the beckoning taxis and let my feet drift aimlessly through the clamorous streets toward Calle Cataluña—

When I arrived, Calle Cataluña - its cramped streets overflowing with the clamorous din of spring night revelry and jostling crowds - held only Benavides' shop lying sunk in utter darkness, shutters drawn and lights extinguished. I rang the iron knocker beside the heavily reinforced door's side entrance. How many tens of minutes must have dragged by before a peephole slid open to reveal watching eyes?

"Who are you?" he asked, his eyes blinking suspiciously. "I am Alessandro, who purchased a dog from your establishment some time ago. I've come to discuss a matter with the proprietor."

“What business brings you here at this hour? We’ve already closed for the night—could you not return tomorrow morning?” “That won’t suffice. My wife insists on having words with you tonight—she’s waiting at home this very moment. It shan’t take long—just a brief discussion.” “Might I inquire as to the nature of this business? Can you not state your purpose here?”

“I’m telling you I won’t take up your time… But this isn’t something we can discuss out here.” “I see… Well then… What name did you say earlier?” “Rodriguez Alessandro of Avenida Florida Street… I bought a dog from you before… Check your ledger and you’ll see…” “Very well… Wait here a moment…”

And inside, they were no doubt cross-referencing my words with their ledger. Whether they had finally concluded I posed no threat after their interminable delay, this time they didn’t open the small window but instead turned the key with a clatter and opened the main door. "Is Mr. Julio Benavides here?" “I am Julio… And what business brings you here?” Benavides was standing rigidly on the other side of the battered desk, just as he had that time. Bathed in the shadows of a dim bulb dangling from the ceiling were squalid animal cages stacked on both sides... a narrow earthen floor damp with moisture... a ceiling too high for light to reach... and above all, the rancid stench peculiar to beasts stagnating in this tightly shuttered room—exactly the same grimness as before. Moreover, in this shuttered room, had he still been awake recording entries in his ledger? A gaunt face riddled with uncannily deep wrinkles, golden jar-like eyes glinting behind glasses... This shabby little man in his forties wore a jacket studded with hook-shaped tears, staring holes through my face as if to bore into it! There was no mistaking that this was indeed Julio Benavides himself.

“Would you be needing another dog, perhaps?” “Do you recognize my face?” “Some time ago, your wife accompanied you as well... You mentioned it was through an introduction from Madame Leroy Sorel...” “That’s right! You remembered, didn’t you? … Actually, I’ve come to discuss a matter regarding that dog I purchased from you at the time.” “Is there something wrong with that dog?” “Yes… Regarding that dog—my wife says she wants me to convey her deepest gratitude to you.”

“................” “Hands up! Benavides.” Suddenly I thrust the pistol right before his eyes.

“Gah!” “Get away from the desk! If you keep dawdling, a bullet might fly!” With both hands still raised, Benavides reluctantly moved away from the desk. Now he could no longer find an opening to kick the desk toward me, nor retrieve any weapon hidden beneath it. “I am none other than Rodriguez Alessandro. My wife says she’s profoundly indebted to you because of that dog… She insists I must thoroughly convey her gratitude… And I too offer my deepest thanks. You should fully grasp the meaning of what I’m saying. You’d do well to keep those hands up, Benavides. Since I’m a coward… wouldn’t want a bullet to go off…” I let slip a faint smile. Benavides’ hands, which had begun lowering, shot back up in panic.

“I’d like to properly express my gratitude from now on… but before that, let me ask you one thing—do you still have any unsold stock of that dog?” “Th-they’re… downstairs… They’re downstairs.” “I want you to guide me there—turn around now! Raise your hands higher now!” Reluctantly, Benavides turned around and began walking forward with his hands still raised. Cages stacked high loomed precariously from both sides as if about to collapse, forming an exceedingly narrow passage. When we had proceeded five or six yards further, on the left side lay what appeared to be Benavides’ living quarters—a pitch-dark room with its light extinguished that seemed poorly ventilated. Following along this room’s wall, the right side at the end became the staircase leading up to the second floor. Beneath the trapdoor at the top of those stairs lay another staircase that led down to the basement.

“Turn on the light!” “It’s under the stairs.” “Now… go down first and turn it on!” I descended two or three steps of that ladder and took aim with my pistol. An insidious stench assaulted my nostrils with renewed violence. This was less a basement than a subterranean pit. Suddenly, light burst upward from below. On both sides, stacked three and four tiers high, stood countless old dog cages identical to those in the shop above. There were empty cages and cages holding dogs.

“Why are you lowering your hands! Benavides! Take a good look at this pistol—it’s silenced! Listen well—even if a bullet flies and you fall, there won’t be a single soul who hears the noise and comes to save you!” At the end of the central passage flanked by stacked cages on both sides, near what appeared to be a window facing the street, stood a rickety-legged table—just as Detective Monès had described—upon which a microscope, medicine bottles, test tubes, flasks, and such lay scattered in disarray.

“Where are the dogs?” “Th...they’re th-there... th-there and there...” The dim electric light barely reached into the cages. Though unclear in shape, they all resembled dogs. One lay curled in deep sleep, while another stood restlessly sniffing about its enclosure. “Now... one more question—where’s your most expensive dog?” “Speak plainly!” “Lying would be unwise.”

“Th-that’s… that’s all there is!” Though the obstructed light made it impossible to discern clearly, one appeared to be a Cairn Terrier and the other a purebred Pekingese. Moreover, Benavides seemed to abruptly find reassurance in my having posed these questions—perhaps taking comfort in the notion that my purpose for breaking in was to seize these dogs, and that his life was therefore not in danger. He must have arrogantly assumed that even if they were taken away, he could safely retrieve them later. Though he kept his hands raised before the muzzle, he began to display an audacious composure. His cunning eyes suddenly began darting about restlessly.

“Step back further! “Further back!” I first approached the two cages Benavides had pointed out. “This one?”

“…………” Benavides nodded insolently in a defiant tone. "I see, they do appear to be of the same breed."

As I pulled the trigger with a click, the pistol emitted a sharp hiss accompanied by a flash, and the dog's torso produced a dull thud. Though touted as silent, the muzzle flash and impact noise must have been unavoidable. Without a death cry, the dog—still curled as if sleeping—twitched its hind legs spasmodically two or three times before breathing stopped.

“Ah! You—!” “You—!” “Don’t raise your voice, Mr. Benavides! “If you make a fuss, a bullet might hit you too!” “So this was it, the other one!”

Click! With a hiss came a flash; this too produced a dull thud as the dog that had been sniffing around inside the cage stretched its front legs in a leaning posture, growled low in its throat, then collapsed forward in a heavy heap. Its belly still pulsed faintly. An acrid gunpowder stench filled the damp cellar air, so thick it seemed to physically assault the nostrils. "Mr. Benavides! "Step back further! "Make noise and a bullet flies instantly.... Well then, do you understand?" "Taste this pistol!" I faced Benavides across eight feet of dank air. He must have finally sensed death's shadow veiling those calm words. Even in the gloom, Benavides' face shone corpse-pale. His upraised hands and legs now shook like saplings in a storm.

“Mr. Benavides! “Answer me! “What grudge made you sell those dogs and destroy my family? “Tell me why you did it!” “…………” “Can’t speak? “Shall I shoot if you stay silent?”

I slightly raised my aim and steadily directed the muzzle toward what appeared to be Benavides' heart. "I-I'll t-tell... I'll tell... Have m-mercy—spare me... I'll make any apology... a-any apology at all... j-just wait—p-please wait!"

His teeth chattered uncontrollably from violent trembling. I lowered my aim a little more. "What sort of apology will you offer...?" "Two million pesetas... Three million... Six million..." He babbled incoherently. He likely no longer comprehended his own words. "I'll give you everything... I'll make any apology... I-I beg you... just... spare my life!"

“Is your life truly so precious to you?” “I-I beg you... this lifetime’s plea—spare just my life... If you spare me, I-I’ll... comply with any demand... p-please... I’m begging you, spare me... I implore you!” “I too once clung to life! “But today I came to discard my own—and in exchange, I intend to claim yours. “Now, we’ve tarried long enough. “Shall we proceed to shooting?” I readjusted my aim.

“Y-you… Mr. Benavides’s l-lifelong plea… p-please forgive me… I-I was wrong… I’ll b-be eternally grateful… a-anything you say… I-I’ll do anything…” At that very moment, had I not twisted my body aside, I would have taken that heavy object hurtling through the air full-force to my front and been knocked backward before it could even reach me. Benavides swiftly extended his simian-like arm, grabbed the microscope from the desk behind him, and hurled it. The microscope spun wildly and struck the empty cage behind with a thunderous crash.

“Mr. Benavides, keep those hands raised... You’re precisely the sort of man one must never lower their guard around... A creature wholly devoid of sincerity!”

“Ah, what should I do now?!” Benavides writhed in agony and cried out. “I’m losing my mind! Y-you… I’m begging you—save me! I’ll do anything—anything at all—just save me!” “Does it pain you to have the sights trained on you?” “I’m going mad… I-I implore you—on my knees—I’ll do anything… p-please… spare me!” “And will you throw the microscope again?” I laughed aloud, keeping my aim steady. “I too suffered agonies multiplied when you held me in your sights. Now do you comprehend that torment?”

“H… H… Murderer!” “H… H… Someone help me!”

He must have lost all sense of consequence. A violent scream erupted. There was no alternative! Driven by his shrieks, I had to act. Click, whizz! Click, whizz! My pistol spat sparks in rapid succession. "Help... me...!" Click! It hissed and sparked again. Benavides' body thudded face-down. I took aim and fired another shot! Again—another shot! The raised leg dropped lifelessly. One final shot! I fired into the motionless corpse. Six bullets total! I remember distinctly. Six bullets I'd lodged in this man's body.

Next, I loaded every last bullet from my pocket and fired into the cages of the Cairn Terrier and Pekingese from earlier, taking careful aim. By now, every last dog in the room had been roused by the overwhelming stench and cacophony that filled the air—a stench so pungent it assaulted the nostrils, noises so strange they pierced the skull. Driven perhaps by their animal instinct sensing mortal danger, the precariously stacked cages began to shudder violently, threatening to collapse under their frenzied thrashing, while their earsplitting howls rose to a deafening crescendo. Another shot! And another! Another shot! Without discrimination, I took haphazard aim at dog cages and fired as I climbed the ladder steps. Upon reaching the top, I shut the raised lid with a clatter. The underground clamor and roars instantly receded like a tsunami, and the shop dogs began yelping shrilly once more. I attempted to fire another shot at these as well, but whether I had already emptied the chamber or not, pulling the trigger yielded no bullets. Taking aim at the stacked cages, I slammed the pistol into them. Spinning wildly, the pistol must have fallen behind the cages—Crash! It made a deafening noise. Driven by the violent footsteps pounding against my ears and the howling of dogs all around me, I rushed out to the street. And I melted into the murmurs of a spring night lit by a hazy moon.

Will

The next morning, when I awoke in the second-floor bedroom of the villa on Santa Lucia Hill around five o'clock, the nearby forests and groves were still shrouded in a milky morning mist, immersed in the deep slumber of predawn. Though even for a villain, sleep after killing a person could hardly be called comfortable, not a trace of that haunting aftertaste people so often speak of following murder remained in my heart. My memory held not the slightest haze—from how I had exited Benavides’s shop last night, where I had hailed a taxi, to the exact route taken back here—every detail remained vivid as daylight: the precise angle at which Benavides’s shop door had been left ajar, even the wrinkles on the taxi driver’s forehead. Yet my sole regret lay in having dispatched him too swiftly. How I wished instead to prolong it—to toy with the pistol’s sights, shifting aim from target to void and back again, savoring Benavides’s cold sweat until it drenched him; to spend far greater time making him writhe in agony, riddling his limbs with bullets one by one before finally tormenting him to death.

However, reconsidering that in that situation—with Benavides shouting frantically—had I continued such leisurely conduct and someone entered through the open front door, I would have ended up empty-handed, I came to find some consolation and satisfaction in the measures I had taken. That morning upon waking, only those thoughts rose to the surface of my mind; feelings like regret or remorse I did not feel even a feather's brush of.

By around seven o'clock I had shaved my face, taken my morning shower as usual, tidied myself up neatly and come down to the dining room where I ate my morning meal just as routinely and satisfactorily as ever—yet as I broke bread and scanned the newspaper, not a single line about last night's incident was printed. Even had it been reported, I wasn't contemplating flight or concealment. So long as I retained this single day and night of freedom to kill my wife, I cared not what fate might assail me thereafter—thus no cause existed for such apprehension. Yet despite this resolve, the absence of any report about last night’s events still made my pulse quicken.

Eventually I went out to the veranda surrounded by forests of young leaves, enjoying a post-meal cigarette, strolling along the pond edge where sweet flags grew, leaning against a rattan lounge chair to drowsily replenish last night's insufficient sleep—to any outsider's eyes, spending a quiet late morning at the villa no different than usual—but try as I might to remain composed, now that I had killed a man, I couldn't even bring myself to glance through a book to kill time. Having no alternative, I decided to draft a will in the gazebo shaded by grapevines while passing the hours, ensuring there were no loose ends.

I had not particularly considered killing myself after murdering my wife. It was absolutely not because I feared death or entertained thoughts of escape. I knew full well that even were I to flee after committing murder, I could never successfully evade the authorities' eyes and live out my days in peace—thus I never once considered such troublesome measures. Yet neither had I solidified any definitive resolve to commit suicide. For me now, my deeply resented wife—if she disdained being called my wife and insisted on being addressed as Countess, then so be it. That deeply resented Countess—the sole all-consuming problem for me now was how to torment her to death until my feelings were sated; what became of me after killing such a wife was something that could be handled as circumstances dictated. If I felt inclined to turn myself in, that would suffice; if I failed to surrender in time and was arrested instead, that too posed no trouble; and should circumstances drive me to desire death, I wouldn't mind committing suicide either... I intended to leave everything to the unfolding of events. For whether I turned myself in or was arrested, seeing as I could not ultimately escape execution sooner or later in either case, I felt there was no need to hastily press the pistol against my own throat when death would come regardless. However, despite all this, I wanted to prepare my will now. For I believed that whether I died—or even if arrested and confined to a prison cell—having prepared a handwritten will would eliminate lingering concerns and let me maintain constant peace of mind. The will I had drafted under the grape arbor at that time was as follows.

Will

1. This Last Will and Testament, declared on April 21, 1945 at the Santa Lucia villa by I, Rodriguez Alessandro, through free will unconstrained by any person, constitutes my sole testamentary instrument. I hereby clearly state that I have created no other will or codicil beyond this document.

1. I wish for Mr. Cesare Albarado, legal advisor to my bank, to undertake the legal procedures necessary for this will to take effect immediately upon my death. 1. All properties I own—including but not limited to Barcelona Bank and its affiliated assets; my primary residence on Avenida Florida and its appurtenances; my Santa Lucia villa and its dependencies; my agricultural estates and ranches; rental buildings scattered throughout Barcelona; indeed every earthly possession and proprietary right I hold—down to the last of the two speedboats I possess through the Barcelona Speedboat Club which I preside over—shall be entirely bequeathed to Mr. Alonzo Majardo, my faithful aide since childhood and sole intimate friend. In the event of Mr. Majardo’s death, the aforementioned assets shall be inherited by his legal heirs.

1. It would be my sincere wish if Mr. Majardo were to set aside a portion of the assets received from me for donation to public organizations dedicated to the relief of cripples like myself. The amount and recipients thereof shall be entirely at Mr. Majardo’s discretion. As there is none like Mr. Majardo who knows my heart and mind, he will surely fulfill my wishes appropriately. I entrust all discretion to Mr. Majardo.

1. However, I hereby exclude solely the Employees' Dance Club approved on April 20, 1945—being my final day presiding as bank president—from the assets bequeathed to the aforementioned Mr. Majardo, designating this building instead as collective property of those who were Barcelona Bank employees as of said date, in accordance with my prior stipulations. 1. Dolores was my lawful wife. Even now, I love her without limit. Yet toward her I feel no obligation to bestow even a single thing. For I know I have already bestowed in full all that ought to be given. Furthermore, I intend to bestow upon her death either tonight or by tomorrow as the supreme gift born of my love for her.

1. After Dolores's death, it is certain that individuals will emerge from among her relatives claiming inheritance rights to my estate as blood relations of Dolores, who was my lawful wife. 1. In such event, I particularly wish to request that Mr. Cesare Albarado, legal advisor, join forces with Mr. Majardo and others to contest the matter in court to the fullest extent, exert their utmost efforts on my behalf, and ensure not a single item falls into their hands. 1. Should we be compelled to lose said litigation, I reiterate my request that Mr. Albarado ensure only the legal minimum permitted by law be transferred to them.

1. Regardless of whether Mr. Cesare Albarado serves as legal advisor or not, for as long as he lives, Barcelona Bank shall grant him no less than an annual amount of 300,000 pesetas as a lifetime pension. This constitutes my sole and singular hope regarding Barcelona Bank. 1. On the eve of drafting this will, I killed Julio Benavides, a dog dealer of Catalonia Street. Furthermore, if possible, I intend to bestow death upon my wife Dolores as a gift of my love, likely tonight as previously stated. By carving out the brief time available during that interval, I prepared this will. Therefore, anticipating that my mental state at the time of preparing this will may be called into question after my death, I hereby attest in advance with this statement.

Each and every one of these murders of mine constitutes an act of homicide based upon my own free will, uncoerced by any person, being neither the result of a fit nor of mental derangement. They are thoroughly premeditated. Therefore, this will was prepared while my mind was in a calm and normal state.

April 21, 1945

At Santa Lucia Hill Villa Rodriguez Alessandro Having completed drafting it, I placed this into a secure double envelope and addressed it to lawyer Cesare Albarado. After safely storing it in my inner pocket, I had now completed all necessary preparations. All that remained was to idle away time until sunset, though before Dolores returned late at night, I needed to settle matters with the servants. Since Dolores would likely lunge for the telephone should I burst in during a critical moment, I required prior disconnection of the phone line; moreover, I possessed another pistol in the main residence's study. As it had never been used, this too needed thorough cleaning and proper loading with bullets. Having instructed someone to inform the bank of my absence today, by three o'clock that afternoon I had returned to my Avenida Florida Street residence via the car sent to fetch me. Though evening papers' first city editions already filled every street corner by this hour, even when stopping the car to have the driver purchase them, not a single line reported last night's events. Neither El Comercio, La Prensa nor Universal contained even one mention. Presuming it remained unnoticed as an incident within a sealed underground chamber devoid of witnesses, I found this supremely satisfactory regardless. Returning to the main house where servant Juan greeted me, Dolores naturally remained absent as expected. Moreover, on this day alone I inquired without reservation about my wife's whereabouts through Juan's account, confirming she would proceed from Duchess Isabel de Izla's tea party to Madame Deimna Campeador's evening reception, likely not returning until around half past ten or eleven o'clock.

"Half past ten or eleven... Very well, let us say eleven o'clock." I gave a casual nod.

“Now then, Juan! I’m sorry to trouble you, but go to the Santa Lucia villa and retrieve the book titled Velázquez’s Christ from the bookshelf in my bedroom.” I named a suitable book that was at the villa. “I want you to bring it for me… but since I won’t be needing it tonight, there’s no need to hurry back. Let it be known that I assigned you this errand—you may freely stay out tonight. Truth be told, I’ve been meaning to secretly give you a night off for some time now—just you, without my wife’s knowledge—so take this chance to enjoy yourself… Bring the book tomorrow. This is but a small token of my feelings.”

“No, Master! This is too much!” “To receive such a generous gratuity from you would be unthinkable!” “No... No,” I forced the money into Juan’s hands as he pushed back with an uneasy look. “But make absolutely certain this remains secret from the other servants!” “Because it would be troublesome if it were seen as unfair.” And having sent Juan rushing out with a face beaming with joy, I next summoned the head butler. My wife had dismissed Garbo from his position as head butler and, through a friend’s introduction, newly hired someone named Sancho.

“Sancho,” I said to the head butler. “You likely already know this, but my wife has gone to Madame Campeador’s banquet tonight, and she called to make a request.” “It appears she’ll return tonight from Madame Campeador’s residence with seven or eight friends.” “Since they plan to stay up all night reveling without formalities, she asked that all servants be given a night off.” “She said it would be more convenient if none of you remained here tonight.” “If you would simply prepare my dinner, you may all go out.” “I want you to inform everyone they’re each granted a night’s leave and must return by around eight tomorrow morning.” “As it’s my wife’s instruction, distribute thirty pesetas to each person.”

“Understood, Master.” “I shall convey that promptly, Master.” “They will surely be delighted.” “Oh yes, my wife did say that.” “Since Teresa is holding the bedroom keys, it was said that you should receive them.” “I want you to have her deliver them to me later.”

“Understood, Master.” “Master.”

Head butler Sancho promptly carried out these instructions, notifying all the servants and distributing the money. From various corners of the estate, voiceless cheers seemed to well up like subterranean springs, and whether it was my imagination or not, I felt as though restless footsteps were scurrying about in disarray. After making their preparations, they would likely depart through the back gate like birds abandoning their roost. Even Teresa - Dolores' most trusted chambermaid - never dreamed that my words had been a complete fabrication from start to finish.

“Then Master, I shall place Madam’s room keys here,” he said, setting the key bundle on my desk. “I will return without fail by eight tomorrow morning.” “Ah, certainly… certainly.” The mansion grew increasingly silent with each passing moment. When the head butler entered for the final time, he had discarded his familiar livery and now wore a smart going-out suit. “Master… I have executed everything precisely as ordered. The staff were all delighted—but what shall be done about the gatekeeper couple?”

"Hmm, since they're responsible for gate operations, it would be inconvenient if they left. Just give them the money instead." The gatekeeper couple were both elderly and hard of hearing. Moreover, residing in a small hut beside the main gate beyond the hedges, their presence would pose no hindrance whatsoever. "Understood, Master. Then I shall gratefully accept your permission and return without fail by eight tomorrow morning. However, this means until Madam returns, you'll be alone in the mansion, Master. Should anyone come again—even through the back gate—it might cause you trouble. I've locked both the kitchen entrance and back gate with my own keys. Does this arrangement meet with your approval?"

“Ah, that arrangement works well. Now then, I don’t want to detain you any longer—though it’s somewhat early, let’s have my dinner prepared!” Thus, once I finished dining, the head butler too eventually departed with restless haste. Afterward, within the vast hollowed mansion, I stood utterly alone until my wife’s return—though should she wield pistol or blade against me when the moment came, it would prove most grievously troublesome. I needed to secretly verify whether such weapons lay hidden in her chambers, load bullets into my own pistol, and above all else sever her bedroom telephone line beforehand. Feeling myself grow abruptly busier in solitude, I finally lifted the bedroom key Teresa had earlier placed upon my desk—though this eluded my own awareness… Unbeknownst to me entirely, yet I considered: had any glimpsed my face through a window then, they’d surely have sensed murder’s spectral miasma lingering there…

A Wife Without a Stitch

After Head Butler Sancho too had departed, leaving me completely alone in the vast mansion... I spent the hours in my study, taking small sips from the glass of Manzanilla I'd brought from the dining room. But as nine o'clock... ten o'clock... approached, my heart quickening all the while, I strained to catch the sound of an automobile approaching from afar. But at eleven o'clock, my wife's long-awaited automobile finally slid through the gate, crunching over the gravel. My wife had likely not noticed in the slightest that my arrangements had extended this far during her absence. The click-clack of high-heeled shoes stepping on the carpet as usual, ascending to the second floor, assaulted my ears. Gauging the moment when those sounds had completely ascended to the upper floor, I stealthily rose from my study. Even though no servants were visible in the vicinity—perhaps someone had assumed they would eventually secure the doors—the front door had been left wide open. I closed the door loudly, as though an entrance hall attendant were securing it, turned off the lights, and then slipped out stealthily from that corner to the outside. Though it was called a spring night, the chill air seeped into my collar, and a fearsome waning crescent moon like a sharp sickle hung at the edge of the plantings. After putting the car into the garage, my wife’s driver was just coming out.

“Hey, Bordalo!” Realizing it was I who had called, he stiffened with a puzzled look,

“Ha!” Bordalo halted. “You probably aren’t aware, but tonight a considerable number of my wife’s friends have come to stay at Daibun House. “Since I’ve decided to give all the servants a night’s leave until eight in the morning, I’m giving you that leave as well.” “Yes, sir!” “This is only a small amount... but I’ve given it to the others as well.” “Ah! “Thank you for that…” The driver removed his hat.

“The front entrance has already been locked, so you may leave immediately as you are!” “Ha!” No matter what I said, this fellow kept responding with “Ha! Ha!” and showed not the slightest intention of leaving. “You don’t need to stand on ceremony and can leave right away. If you go through the trouble of changing clothes and end up catching the guests’ attention, it might cause complications, so you’d better leave immediately. Barca has already left.” Barca was the other driver.

“Are you perhaps going out somewhere, Master?” “Oh, it’s nothing—I’m just strolling about the garden.” “If that’s the case… may I truly take my leave as I am now?” “Never mind, never mind! In fact, that would be preferable.” Though this driver alone seemed somehow reluctant and ill at ease, I practically seized him by the hand and frantically rushed him out. And after waiting for the driver’s figure to disappear beyond the gate, I promptly entered the gatekeeper’s hut.

“Oh, is this Master? You gave us such a large sum earlier,” the gatekeeper couple said in astonishment. “We are most grateful.” “There’s a small celebration tonight… I gave everyone something small. Since the house is empty now, I want you to close the gate immediately. Should anyone come tonight—even if servants return—you must not open it until morning. Tell them I ordered it! Never open that gate!”

"As you command... But might there be something occurring at the residence, Master?" "Oh, there's nothing at all... Just thought I'd let everyone have a breather for once. Ha ha ha..." I concealed my true intent with laughter, but the kindhearted yet hard-of-hearing gatekeepers - "That is most generous... Everyone will surely enjoy a fine respite," they said, crossing themselves. They immediately began closing the gates. As I retraced my steps along the gravel path beneath the trees toward the carriage porch, behind me echoed the heavy metallic groan of iron gates sliding along their rails through the ink-black night.

I returned to the entrance and immediately secured the heavy lock upon the door. Now within this vast building, all that remained were finally reduced to just my wife and myself alone. Though she had withdrawn to the living quarters, finding no servants ascending to attend her must have tried her patience, for from my wife's bedroom above came ceaseless summonses to the maids—the relentless ringing of the bell echoing from the distant kitchen conveyed her agitation as vividly as if witnessed directly. Disregarding this clamor, I withdrew once more to my study. From the desk drawer I retrieved both the prepared pistol and the key Teresa had left behind earlier. Then with a sense of triumph finally crystallizing this very night, I began my ascent upstairs. And though dragging my lame leg—when had it last been, how many months since I had mounted these stairs with such purposeful strides, planting each foot firmly and moving with such deliberation? However she might scream or wail tonight, not a single hired soul remained to hear. The bell continued its unrelenting peal.

“Ring it... ring it... ring that bell with all your frantic desperation! Someone will come up once morning breaks,” I sneered mentally as I approached the bedroom. As expected, the bedroom door was locked. Yet I felt no surprise whatsoever. With deliberate calmness, I turned the key and entered. The instant I stepped inside, a piercing shriek assaulted me. “What were you doing when I’ve been ringing this long? You too mean to mock me now?” My wife remained seated with her back turned, shrill voice cracking with irritation as she kept ringing the bell rather than face me. She’d removed her evening gown but—with no maid appearing—seemed content to stay half-dressed in chemise and stockings, fixated on summoning help that wouldn’t come. She clearly thought a servant had entered—never imagining it could be me standing there. Her shoulders and bare skin glowed exposed through flimsy undergarments... The continued silence only stoked her fury further,

“Why didn’t you come out all this time?”

she demanded in an even shriller voice. “You think I’ve been giving you special treatment, but if you get too carried away… I’ll have my own considerations.”

Still I remained silent, leaning against the door. Having removed the relocked latch, I toyed with it like a beanbag.

“Well, what’s the matter? Why are you silent? Answer me! How about you manage some sort of reply?” Letting out a harsh, grating voice that seemed to reach the peak of her fury, when she suddenly turned around—even now I cannot forget the utter absurdity of that moment… nor that memory of piercing clarity that brought me incomparable delight.

“Ah!” she let out an unnatural shriek, forgetting the disheveled state of her chemise as she stood rigid like one struck by lightning. “You... you... where did you come from?” “Know your shame!” “Rodriguez!” “Shame!” Her face flushed crimson with indignation that burned with hatred. Yet still leaning against the door, I remained smirking without changing my posture.

“Leave… Get out this instant! For a gentleman, to break the lock and come barging in...! What utter contempt! Vulgar...” Clicking her tongue, my wife pressed the call bell with both hands as if lunging at it.

“You still refuse to leave! Fine—Teresa will come up here then! Go ahead and stay there forever flaunting your shame!” “But HA HA HA HA HA! How unfortunate—that Teresa is likely strolling down Paseo de Colón with some man by now……? Can’t you see this? This!” I said, swinging the key before my nose. “She entrusted this key to me before leaving. …Doubt me if you will—ring that bell all night long… Perhaps by morning someone might deign to come up.”

"You shameless wretch... So you finally plotted this! You plotted this!" my wife shrieked, writhing as though she might grind her teeth to splinters. She whirled around and snatched up the bedside telephone.

“Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!” I roared with laughter once more.

“Go ahead and call. Call all you want! If you can make calls with a disconnected phone, then call until your throat bleeds!” "You good-for-nothing... cripple! Pervert!" My wife, inflamed by furious indignation, finally spat words too vulgar for the Countess she so proudly claimed to be. She thrashed her legs and glared upward with wild eyes. With no servants answering and telephone lines severed, she must have resolved to deploy her last resort; pointing violently at me, she shrieked: “Sorrow!” The dog rose with a muffled thud as if awaiting its mistress’s next command, front paws drawn together while gazing up at her face.

“Dolores! Open your eyes and look properly! Can’t you see this? This!” I said, stepping away from the door for the first time and aiming the pistol at the dog. “Go on, set it on me! Just give the command! I’ll blast you both to hell with one shot! Look closely! Look at this face tonight! If you’ve no care for your life, then try ordering that beast!” My ferocious expression must have finally registered. Her crimson-flushed face turned deathly pale in an instant. The rigidly standing body began trembling violently.

“There’s not a single servant left! The only ones here are those half-deaf gatekeepers! If you doubt me, scream for help that’ll never reach! Do you think your voice could carry to the gatehouse?! Both front and back gates are locked tight! Try escaping if you can! Let’s see the Countess in her chemise make a run for it! I’ll fill you with more holes than a honeycomb! Dolores! Why won’t you set the dog on me?”

She remained wordlessly pale to a terrifying degree... Her body simply trembled violently.

“I’ll kill you! “I’ll kill you tonight no matter what! “Everything’s set for the kill! “No attachments left—no love at all! “I don’t want your pity—tonight I’ll repay every scorn, every contempt, every beastly treatment you’ve shown me till now! “Open your eyes and look close! “This pistol’s loaded!”

I gradually lowered the pistol and, just as with Benavides, aimed at Dolores's heart.

………… “Tonight I will kill my unfaithful wife who wrote letters to the actress Arocema about wanting to poison me!” “Wa... wait... please... It’s a terrible misunderstanding... Your misunderstanding! Let me explain now, ju... just wait... I beg you Rodriguez!” “Lower the pistol...”

But I did not lower the pistol.

"I will kill the Countess who became my wife yet still yearned for the Count... I will kill my wife who every night embraced this dog with skin she never permitted me to touch, letting herself be defiled by the beast!"

The instant I did, my wife let out a “Gah!”—a moan as though her heart had been pierced. Fear and despair rapidly drained the color from her face, leaving her gasping as if she might collapse at any moment.

“Please, let me say just one word Rodriguez! …Just one word!” “What terrible slander!” “It’s Sirion… Sirion… Only Sirion would spread such slander!” “It’s a dreadful misunderstanding—a dreadful misunderstanding on your part.” “Rodriguez… Oh what shall I do…?” she wailed, writhing in agony with a frantic, faltering voice. “That particular misunderstanding—I must clarify it without fail.” “Disgusting… How utterly vile!” “For someone of my standing to consort with such bestial riffraff!” “Ah, how mortifying!” “Sirion is a monstrous woman—ah, how mortifying!” “Rodriguez I beg you—just lower the pistol for a moment… Let me say one word—”

“Quit your excuses! I’ve collected all the evidence!” I roared in a voice like a cracked bell. “If I say I’ll kill you, I’ll kill you without fail. ...But if you swear to change your ways henceforth and obey me completely, I might yet spare your miserable life. Decide now—willing or unwilling—and answer!” “I’ll obey... I’ll obey anything... Rodriguez, save me! If only you’d save me... I’ll do whatever you ask... I beg you! Just lower the pistol!”

However, even then, I still did not lower my aim. "You said you'd obey, didn't you? Alright! Do exactly as I say while I count from one to three! If you don't, I'll shoot right now! Do you understand?! Dolores! If you understand, take off all your clothes! ...One!" "Rodriguez... I'll do anything you ask... but this... something so impossible..."

“... two...” She must have sensed there was no more room for hesitation! The chemise slid down with a whisper. Next, she bent down to remove her stockings. I remained silent, keeping my aim steady. “You still haven’t taken everything off! If you keep dawdling, I’ll shoot!” Finally resigned, she let the last garment slip off. Against the heavy emerald curtain partitioning the boundary with the living room, a startlingly vivid completely naked figure now stood before me. Behold! There she stood—that high-collared, willful wife of mine—trembling like a slave consumed by terror and desperation to preserve her life, now baring her voluptuous nakedness before me, this contempt-filled cripple.

Fate Ordained “Get on the bed!” “Climb up and lie on your back!”

As if fully resigned to obeying the command, my wife headed toward the bed. The sight of my wife's voluptuous naked body—a form I had never before witnessed in its entirety—perfectly proportioned, firm and supple—now ascending to the bed, her limbs' muscles quivering as shame flushed her entire body crimson! Her resplendent white form stood carved in relief as though escaped from ancient masterpieces and sculptures, dazzling my eyes even amidst this seething resentment and fury. What diabolical allure and beauty—this fleshly enchantment that threatened to overwhelm even my wrathful emotions. It should have been called the most beautiful and exalted thing ever created by God. And yet that beautiful, exalted thing—after infuriating me beyond measure, driving me to madness's brink with her provocations—had ultimately permitted her supreme perfection to be thoroughly defiled by such a grotesque beast. Hateful, hateful woman... Even devouring her flesh and tearing her to pieces wouldn't sate me! Yet the most beautiful, most tormenting thing in this world!

For an instant, I nearly leapt forward with the impulse to clasp her slender throat in both hands and strangle her unconscious—yet simultaneously burned with a passion so intense I wanted to seize her and caress every inch of her without mercy... Feeling this tangled knot of conflicting emotions within my own being, I stood rooted to the spot, scarcely able to contain the clashing love and hatred raging through me as I averted my eyes from this unearthly spectacle. And if you would give yourself to a dog, why did you withhold that body so stubbornly from me, a human?! Once again, rage overflowed, flooding my heart completely. In that instant, trembling uncontrollably with fury and feeling my vision blur, I glared down at my wife's figure lying before me.

“I’ll count from one to three again! If you don’t do exactly as I say by then, I’ll shoot you dead without mercy!” My voice trembled and cracked with rage at the ends of my words. But in that moment, my wife must have thought I was issuing these commands out of some unfulfilled desire. She must have expected me to approach her side as she lay on the bed. Just as Benavides had initially misread the purpose of my intrusion, my wife too must have made the same miscalculation. Having squeezed her eyes shut at this critical juncture, she must have naively believed that offering her body obediently would spare her life. A forced, rigid smile now floated across her face—pale to the point of lifelessness and trembling. And a strange coquetry began to tinge her naked form with alluring color.

“Hey... come on, Rodriguez... don’t point that pistol anymore... look... I’m... I’m doing exactly as you say, aren’t I?”

“Call the dog!” I roared. “Call the dog! Can’t you see how intently it’s watching?! I’ll shoot you dead along with the dog!”

Her coquetry and bewitching smile vanished abruptly, while despair and anxiety sent tremors coursing through her entire body. “Such... such an impossible thing, Rodriguez...” In the instant she frantically tried to twist her body around—thud!—I fired a shot at the large six-paneled mirror stand by the bed’s headboard. A terrifying roar crackled through the room’s air alongside white smoke—and then came a cacophonous shattering! With a crystalline crash, the mirror surface exploded into fragments. Her face turned pale,

“T-Tri...steza... T-Tri...steza!” my wife quavered. “Call louder! If you hesitate, I’ll shoot!”

“T-Tri...steza!” The dog, tucking its tail between its legs in fear at the deafening roar yet still pricking up its ears toward the bed from which its name was being called. “Call louder!” “Louder...” “Tristeza!” “I’ll shoot!” “Call louder and fiercer!” “One!” “Two!” “Tristeza! Come here!” Finally mustering her resolve, my wife called out clearly.

The dog, appearing perplexed as if unsure what to do, alternately peered at my face and my wife’s, but finally rose and approached the bed. And with one leap, it sprang onto the bed.

And such was the beast's wretchedness. The creature likely never knew that the one aiming the pistol there was this mistress's husband. Moreover compounding its wretchedness was how it showed no concern that a human here observed its every move. At last Detective Marcel Monès's words had struck true. My wife's peculiar body odor instantly drove the dog into frenzied excitement, and the beast began laying bare both its primal instincts and the thoroughly conditioned habits instilled until that very day.

“Don’t move! Move and I’ll shoot! Interfere with the dog and I’ll shoot! Now, Dolores! Whether your excuses are lies or truth, I’ll determine based on the facts from here on out! Don’t move!”

I repeat. The detective's words had contained not a speck of falsehood. That grotesque fact now stood proven clearly before my very eyes - vivid and indisputable. Yet even having anticipated it, when faced with this all-too-monstrous reality, I let out an involuntary "Gah!" and found myself covering my face. Moreover - moreover - I could no longer endure looking directly, not even for an instant. With one hand still shielding my eyes, I fixed my gaze with beastly intensity and pulled the trigger repeatedly. Amid deafening roars came the beast's death scream! Billowing white smoke filled the air - I lost count of how many shots I'd fired.

“Look! Look! Raise your face and look! You arch-liar, you grand harlot, Countess Messalino! Countess Troes Apirado! If you dare, raise your face and look at me! What fucking misunderstanding?! What possible excuse could you have before this glaring fact! If you can say anything, then say it! Look! This unsightly disgrace! So this is how a Countess presents herself?!” However, my wife hid her face with both hands and writhed in anguish. Her face—deathly pale moments before—now burned crimson up to the collar line she concealed, as if she’d gulped strong liquor. Eyes tightly shut, body contorting as much as it could contort, she wailed and screamed.

“Kill me... Putting me through such humiliation... I can't bear any more... I've had enough!” “…You must be thoroughly satisfied… Now finish me off once and for all… I want to die… Come on… Kill me quickly…”

“Even if you don’t beg me to kill you, when the time comes to kill, I’ll kill you!” “Quiet!” “If you’re going to cry and make a scene now, who the hell commissioned you to become a dog’s wife?” “Have you been weeping like this while serving as a dog’s wife all this time?” “Hey... Dog Countess!” “Raise your face!” “If you can endure seeing it... Hey, lift that face and look me straight in the eye!”

But by now, these words must have reached my wife’s ears no more.

“Kill me in one blow… Come on, quickly… Shoot me dead in one blow…” she kept screaming as if caught between dream and reality. As I gripped the pistol, determined to utterly humiliate my wife while looking down upon her, that uncanny temptation toward her came seething up violently within my heart once more. She was no longer my wife. Nor was she a countess... nothing but a beautiful, voluptuous mass of flesh squirming with snow-white limbs...

“This woman!” I shouted, and suddenly I threw down the pistol and lunged at my wife’s body. And there is no longer any need to dwell on what followed in tedious detail. The April 23rd issue of the Excelcior newspaper that I excerpted at the beginning has even kindly enumerated the locations of my wife’s wounds.

Indeed, it must certainly be exactly as the Excelcior newspaper wrote. I strangled her neck until nearly dawn, then recalling something would seize her hair to drag her about—after subjecting her to every conceivable torture and abuse—I forced my wife's flesh to serve me. Let me state this plainly. Not content with once, I made her perform that act twice over. After one such act, blinded again by rage and frustration and seized by another violent fit, I dragged my wife around the entire room. Moreover, each time she witnessed these fits of mine, my wife seemed to grow increasingly certain that tonight would finally be the night I killed her. Moreover, even as she exerted every ounce of strength to escape me—despite having already fainted into a half-dead, half-alive state of dim consciousness—she mustered every last bit of her seductive charms. And by luring me into that act, she made desperate efforts to somehow alter my state of mind.

If there are still those who would label me a degenerate and revile me as a sadistic pervert, then I shall proclaim once more with utmost clarity! Then I ask you—is there anyone in this world who is not a degenerate or a sadistic pervert?! Could there exist one such as I—one cast into such a fate—who would fail to make entirely their own so beautiful and willful a wife, yet could blithely deliver her unto death's grasp?! Moreover, after making my wife—who had employed every possible coquetry and every possible trick—exhaust all her womanly resources, I still pointed the pistol at her.

“After all this… after having your fill… you would still… kill me… P-… help! Someone... h-help!” my wife screamed as I took aim at her lower abdomen, laughing mockingly like a demon, and fired a pistol bullet into her. I aimed at that crimson-stained heart grasping at emptiness and fired two more shots in rapid succession. Triumphing again and again in complete victory, for the first time in my life letting slip an ecstatic smile of fulfillment while intoxicated by death’s euphoric conquest, I stood mesmerized by my wife’s corpse—until two police officers kicked down the door and arrested me. This outcome too matches what was reported in the aforementioned newspaper. But if killing my weeping, apologetic wife makes them see me as a beast of a husband, let me offer one clear rebuttal: Had I truly been such a beast, I would have cast aside this dog-defiled wife after sating myself.

However, I am not a beast. I may have played at being a beast, but ultimately I could not truly become one. Unable to abandon my defiled wife even beyond death, and to embrace her completely, I finally killed her.

With this, at Judge Zolf Mara's recommendation, I believe I have sufficiently written down everything I resolved to set forth. I intend to add nothing more beyond this; however, I shall conclude this lengthy memoir by supplementing just one thing I neglected to write.

At the third interrogation, the judge asked me this.

“The defendant’s statements are fantastical and bizarre to the extreme, containing elements that make it utterly impossible for this judge to accept your mental condition as being in a legitimate state.” “Now then, Defendant!” “I ask you again—if you assert with such conviction the legitimacy of your statements, do you possess any witnesses who can prove the justification of your actions?” “If you do, state their names.” “No matter how remote their location, this court shall summon such witnesses to re-examine the validity of your claims.”

“Of course there are!” “There are two.” “Marcel Monès, Barcelona’s renowned private detective, and his assistant Luca Rosario... Please summon these two.” “They should currently be in Buenos Aires serving as consultants to the Argentine Federal Police.” “These two will gladly prove my convictions are sound.” Yet when Marcel Monès’ name was uttered, the courtroom momentarily buzzed. The prosecutor sneered while glaring at me; the presiding judge, exasperated, huddled with adjacent judges in grave consultation.

“Very well! “Today’s proceedings are adjourned! “The court hereby determines that the defendant persists in contemptuously ridiculing these proceedings. “The continuation of today’s trial beyond this juncture is deemed futile. “Even when ordered to name a single witness favorable to your case, you mock this court with such derisive statements. “As for Detective Marcel Monès and his assistant—on the very day of your crime, they boarded the steamship Santa Catarina and departed Barcelona Harbor. Moreover, you—having orchestrated such a meticulously planned crime—can hardly feign ignorance of the Santa Catarina’s collision with and sinking alongside the steamship Prengaria off Gibraltar at dawn the following morning. “This court finds the defendant’s attitude—knowing full well these facts yet persisting in mockery—wholly irreconcilable with judicial understanding. “Defendant—answer this: if any method exists to summon two dead men as witnesses before this court, you will now specify it.”

To the readers of this record, I proclaim. There is no need to lament now, nor any need to be stunned. The world has always been thus. This is the true nature of life, and this is the reality of trials where one person judges another.

This is precisely the primary reason I no longer harbor the slightest desire to live in this world, and my greatest wish is to rest as soon as possible upon Ubeña Hill, where the remains of my most passionately beloved wife lie. To continue living a life of conflict between love and hatred with the wife I still love beyond death—this must be the ordained fate for one such as I.