Here, a comment of mine made the conversation shift toward the business of illegal adoptions. According to the chief, it began in the eighties and was linked to massacres in the countryside, especially in the western highlands. Although at first the normal procedure was to leave no survivors, later the soldiers began to leave the children alive, who were then taken to the so-called newborn shelters.

I asked if he thought that they stopped killing children due to some humanitarian scruple. He said he did not think so, that they had realized that “it could be very good business, putting them up for sale for adoption.”

After I updated him on my findings regarding the Identification Bureau, the chief told me that he liked the idea of focusing on a character like Tun instead of on a “psychopath” like Barnabas Linares (alias Linduras), of whom he had spoken—known as one of the biggest thugs serving Ubico and subsequent counterrevolutionary governments.

He also explained details of the “misunderstanding” that caused the suspension of my visits to the Archive. He spoke of resentments, of “channels”; issues of confidentiality and professional jealousy; security issues. It was not advisable, for example, when referring to what I was doing at the Archive, to use the word “research.” No one, other than the team from the Ombudsman’s Office proper, had the authority to carry out any kind of research there. Among the team members, there were students majoring in history, political science, and law who had requested permission to use documents from the Archive for their theses or fieldwork, and all requests had been denied by the chief. I enjoyed a simple privilege, he said, adding: “I granted it to you based on an intuition, and I may be wrong, since I don’t know you, and we are not friends.”

An intuition: that the result of my work as a writer could help the nonspecialized public to know about the Archive Recovery Project and allow them to realize the importance of such a find.

Wednesday the 28th, evening.

Strange day, empty.

Thursday.

An even emptier day, if that’s possible, than yesterday—due to last night’s excess of red wine and Spanish brandy. I took a nap at my parents’ house. While I rested, I thought about my mother, who is almost ninety years old and who spends a good part of her days sleeping in one of the rooms with large windows overlooking a large garden shaded by old trees.

At seven Magalí called. My mother must be hospitalized right away. She needs a kidney drainage. Apparently one of her kidneys had not been working for several months, perhaps years.

We accompany her to the hospital. My niece Claudia, Magalí’s eldest, will spend the night with her.

Saturday. I fly to Oaxaca.