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“That's it,” he said.
Eso es todo ,” said Roberto. (That's all.)
We all assumed expressions of extreme satisfaction, as if we'd formulated an obscure
mathematical equation or Mastered the Art of French Cooking. Jane even patted me on the
back, presumably for managing to keep quiet for ten whole minutes.
There was a general movement towards the lower veranda. It had been intensely hot
standing in the side yard in the mid-day sun, and I thought maybe I'd serve some iced tea
to cool everyone down.
That's when we noticed that Humberto wasn't with our little group. In fact, when we
looked back he was standing exactly where he'd been standing the whole time, staring in-
tently at the side of the house, sweat streaming down his face.
Without a word, Jane doubled back to his side, smiled beatifically, and said, with a flir-
tatious toss of her head, “ ¡Vamanos!
His expression never changed.
“How about the windows?” he said in perfect English.
Oh God! I thought. Meanwhile, some other lobe of my brain screamed: he speaks Eng-
lish!
To her credit, Jane didn't miss a beat.
“Hey, amigo, we already discussed the windows. That's not going to happen.”
Like him, she appeared to have forgotten that he wasn't an English-speaker. Humberto
cocked his head slightly, expelling air through his teeth. Michael and I looked at each other.
What was coming?
Pointing to the most decrepit of our windows, Humberto let loose a volley of com-
plaints, laments and warnings, all in perfect English.
“You are wasting your money and my time asking me to work around those old-time
windows, which are crap ,” he said, addressing Michael. “They are rotten. The plaster that
I apply around them will fall away from them and you will blame me. This is a bad invest-
ment. You must buy new windows.”
Who knew the subject of windows could stir such depths of emotion?
Jane had entreated us to ignore Humberto if he mentioned windows, but ignoring this
particular verbal eruption was like asking the citizens of Chernobyl to ignore that pesky
little explosion down the road.
“And where would we buy these windows?” I asked.
Jane stared at me for a moment in stunned silence, then threw up her hands and walked
away.
“From me, of course,” was Humberto's straightforward answer.
“And how much would they cost?”
“$800 each,” was his excited reply.
“Excellent price.” Roberto chimed in.
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