I glanced at my face in the mirror. My eyebrows were thick and if I didn’t pluck them for a few days, they might look more masculine. My nose was perky and small, but I could use Cristóbal’s spectacles to cover it. After all, my father had had the same nose. I rubbed my smooth chin. I needed something to cover up the fact that I had no facial hair. Beards always made men look older. I thought of the vaudeville circus’s members with those goatees and mustaches. The hair was fake—I’d seen them without beards the other day when they stepped out of their changing room to go to lunch. Perhaps I could sneak in there and take them? Maybe I would leave some money there for the trouble.

My long mane, Cristóbal’s adoration, well, that would have to go. And what about my voice?

The advantage was that I didn’t have a high voice. In fact, one of La Cordobesa’s grievances, when I attempted to sing, was that I was trying to perform like a soprano when my voice was naturally low. Cristóbal told me once that he found my throaty voice sensual. It was ironic how the physical traits that had once been a source of shame for me—my thick wrists, my nearly flat chest, my angular hips—might help me now.

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 5

April 1920

As Aquilino put his spectacles on, he informed me that there had been a previous reading of the will in front of this group three months ago, but he was required to read it again “to avoid any misunderstandings.”

All hushed conversations ended and a tense silence followed.

Aquilino read a long and tedious document which stated that all of my father’s worldly possessions were to be divided in four parts: one for each of his children. But there was one caveat, one small detail I wasn’t expecting.

My father, the man I’d never really known and who, according to the will was “in full possession of his mental faculties,” had left me in charge of his most prized possession: his cacao plantation. As things stood, I held 43 percent of his assets, and the other 57 percent was to be divided among my three siblings, giving each one of them 19 percent. Since Alberto had renounced his part, his portion was to be divided among the three remaining sisters, giving me close to 50 percent of my father’s estate.

I was the majority holder and the one who would run the plantation.

My shoulders were so tense I had to make a conscious effort to relax them. Why had my father left me in charge when he hadn’t seen me since I was two? Why not leave it to Angélica, the eldest of the Ecuadorian children, or Alberto, the only male in the family?