Imagining Argentina

During his usual garden session, Carlos helps Hermione Benveniste hope for her sons’ future. When another attendee approaches him, Carlos announces that the time has come to imagine Cecilia. Martín supplies a few details to encourage Carlos’s vision. 

In Carlos’s imagination, Cecilia is moved from place to place. At one point, her guards drive her out to a farm in the pampas, boarding her in a clean, white room. Teresa is nearby, and she and Cecilia are permitted to meet a handful of times. As a game, the guards force Cecilia to choose which of them will rape her daughter. 

Each visit, a guard escorts Cecilia down the hallway to Teresa’s room. Mother and daughter weep in each other’s arms, and Cecilia regrets that she cannot shield Teresa from the guards’ attacks. Cecilia closely monitors Teresa’s stomach in case she is impregnated.

Suddenly, the visits stop. At first, Cecilia does not realize that Teresa has been murdered and speculates that the guards have forgotten. Left alone, Cecilia regrets that she does not have a pen and paper with which to record her experience; writing, for Cecilia, is an extension of her soul. Instead, Cecilia builds the narrative in her head, intending to commit it to memory.