A Heart So White by Javier Marías

shock), I waited for her to intervene and denounce me, to correct or reprimand me, or rather for her, the "net", to take over from me at once, that's what she was there for. But those few seconds passed (one, two, three, four) and she said nothing, perhaps (I thought then) because the high-ranking British politician didn't seem in the least offended and replied at once, with a kind of contained vehemence:
    "I often wonder the same thing myself," she said, and for the first time she crossed her legs, forgetting about her sensible skirt and revealing two very square, white knees. "The people vote for one, indeed they do so more than once. One is elected, again more than once. And yet, it's odd, one still doesn't have the feeling of being loved."
    I translated very precisely, only leaving out part of the first phrase in my Spanish version so that her words would appear to our high-ranking politician to be the product of some spontaneous thought which, it must be said, seemed to please him as a subject of conversation, since he looked at the woman with very little surprise and a great deal more sympathy and replied, gaily jingling his many keys:
    "You're quite right. Votes don't give you any reassurance on that score, however much we need them. Do you know what I think? I think that dictators, rulers in countries where there are no democratic elections, are more loved than we are. And more hated too, of course, but they're still more intensely loved by those who do love them, whose numbers, moreover, are always on the increase."
    I considered that this final remark was a little exaggerated, not to say inaccurate, so I translated everything except that phrase (I omitted it, in short, censored it), and I again awaited some reaction from Luisa. She quickly crossed her legs again (her knees were rounded, golden), but that was the only sign she gave of having noticed the liberties I was taking. Perhaps she didn't in fact disapprove, I thought, although I believed I could still feel her stupefied or possibly indignant gaze fixed on the back of my neck. It was just a shame that I couldn't turn round to look at her.
    The British politician seemed to brighten up: "Oh, I agree," she said. "People love one in large measure because they're obliged to. That happens in personal relationships too, don't you think? How many couples are there who are only in a couple because one of the two, and only one, insisted that they become a couple and obliged the other one to love him or her?"
    "Obliged or persuaded?" asked the Spanish politician, and I saw that he was pleased with the subtlety of his question, so I simply translated exactly what he'd said. He was still jingling his innumerable keys, making far too much noise — he was a nervous type - so that I couldn't hear very well, an interpreter needs silence to carry out his work.
    The lady politician looked at her long, manicured nails more with unconscious coquetry than with unease or distrust, as she had done before when she was pretending indifference. She tugged vainly at her skirt again, her legs still crossed.
    "It comes to the same thing really, don't you think? There's just a difference in chronology, which comes first, which comes before, because, inevitably, one becomes the other and vice versa. It's what the French call a
fait accompli
. If you order a country to love its rulers, it will end up convinced that it does love them, at least much more easily than if you didn't order them to do so. We can't force them to, that's the problem."
    I was in some doubt as to whether her last remark was not perhaps too extreme for the democratic ears of our high-ranking politician and, after a moment's hesitation and a glance at the other, far superior legs watching me, I decided to suppress "that's the problem". The legs didn't move and I immediately realized that my democratic scruples were entirely unjustified, because, banging the keys down assertively on the low table between them, the Spanish