Abismo de pasión, #96 7/26/12: Hey Alfie, Gweedo may be free but Gabino’s gonna cost you.

Memorandum

To: the writers of the Pit

From: Novelamaven

Cap’n Sylvia went to sea / In a beautiful pea green boat / She took her honey and plenty of money / And asked me to give you this note:*

“When I return in two weeks I expect to find these folks alive and kicking: Don Lucio, Dolores, Padre, Ramona, Maru, Braulio, Enrique, Doc Tovar, Paloma and Gael.

Feel free to smite and blight as you see fit any of the following: Gabino Mendoza, Paolo “the momzer” Landucci, Alfabitch, OmegaBitch (aka the Killer Orange) and Chente.

Use these characters however you wish to keep the story moving along: Elisa, Damián, Flor, Guido, Begoña, Toña, Sabrina and the old lady** who was whispering “Hush mah mouth – I bet I can squeeze that old Arango broad for enough pesos so I can ditch the asilo and retire in St. Tropez.”

Love,

Sylvia

*With apologies to The Owl and the Pussycat and **Goodnight Moon.

Tonight:

Dolores stares, incredulous, as Horacio is taken away in a squad car. A wanted criminal – this is the man she chose as her life partner? Gabino watches the show. From his expression, you’d think he was at a cockfight and he’d put his bet on the winner. (Are those bloody feathers on his chin? Nah.)

Outside the bank in Mérida, Don Lucio kvetches that Dam is forcing him to lie. He’ll have to go along with the story that before he died, Augusto set up an account for Elisa. Although both men suspect Gabino pocketed the Cielo Abierto money, proving that will take time. Right now, Elisa needs cash to pay off her loan to Alfie. Otherwise Alfie will seize the greenhouse and the harvest.

Doc Tovar’s office

Elisa stops by to ask Paloma to attend tonight’s mass for Augusto. Why does Paloma seem so distant? Elisa needs her more than ever right now. Paloma starts to say she has her own tsuris but then, remembering who the protagonista is, apologizes.

Paloma’s not buying Flor’s pregnancy story and thinks Dam has his doubts as well, official blood test or no.

The Killer Orange is seen deftly driving a pickup truck down the highway and thought-bubbling: “Gabino’s got the Horacio problem covered. Now I’ll dispose of that bastard Guadalupe.”

[Audible gasps from the Lupe table.]

Braulio comes upon the desolate Dolores, and offers a shoulder to cry on when he hears about Horacio.

[The Braulio and Lolita tables edge closer together on the patio.]

Hacienda Harango: AlfaBitch, her fan (I mean abanico, not fanático, and Flor.

Flor announces she is going to Mexico to pick up her wedding gown. Alone. AlfaBitch really wants to go along. She would handcuff herself to Flor if she could, but she is handicapped by the need to flick and fan at dramatic moments.

Enter Dam. He -- and he alone -- will accompany Flor. ”¿Sabes qué?” he says brightly. “Creo que también podríamos aprovechar para ver a un ginocólogo. Quiero ver el primer ultrasonido de mi bebé.” (You know what? I think we could take advantage of the occasion to see a gynecologist. I want to see my baby’s first ultrasound!)

Alfie fans, smiles approvingly. Flor looks haunted. (Oh honey, this is just the opening salvo.)

Knock knock. Who’s there? Gweedo. Gweedo who? Gweedon’t think you’re innocent. Gwee just dropped the charges ‘cause gwee don’t want a scandal in the family.

Gweedo maintains he is innocent – it’s that rotten creep Gabino that Alfie should be accusing. Dam is in his corner. Alfie sighs and fans.

[Some at Gweedo’s table begin to take heart. Maybe, just maybe ...]

Hacienda Beltran -- where a deal is a deal

Smarmy Gabino is no more. This is rabid stick-waving, frothing at the mouth Gabino. And he has no intention of letting the señora cancel the sale of the hacienda just because Alfonsina Arango has outbid him.

“¡Ahora me viene con el domingo siete, ruca!” (I’m pretty sure she’s not pregnant so here our familiar idiom means: Now you’re springing this on me, old lady!) He orders her to vacate his property.

She tries to give him back his check. He tears it up and grabs her from behind, pressing his forearm up against her fragile throat. “Now you have no check, no hacienda, nothing!” She gasps and then goes limp. Is she ... ? Yes, she is dead. And Gabino – with no remorse, with no sign of panic -- digs her grave and buries her body. She won’t have to leave her hacienda after all.

At Casa Bien Castigado, Elisa assures Lucio that they can speak freely. The aunt is out, she took the truck somewhere ...

And the aunt has trucked right on into an audience with the Bishop – she has something very grave to tell him about Padre Guadalupe Mondragón!

[On the patio, there are murmurs of dismay: How much weight will the words of a Godless Orange carry?]

Elsewhere in the big city, Dolores visits Horacio in jail. She wants a divorce and an annulment. Horacio will not oppose her. Braulio (sort of the anti-Gabino, no?) waits outside. He hugs her reassuringly.

He loved me. He really loved me.

Back at Casa Castigado, Lucio tells Elisa about the account her father set up for her (¡sí, me querías!) and explains she can use the money to save the greenhouse. She may have to cede half of Cielo Abierto to Gabino though.

Honey, I’m home! Gabino strides into the Blue House, and thwapppp – he slams Irritating in the kisser. “That’s for telling that bastard Gael that I beat you – now you have something to complain about for real. Get out!”

But Ing’s not leaving without her money – and didn’t he say he loooved her?

Love? Hah! “¡Eres un premio de consolación!”

“If I leave”, says Ing, “I go straight to Alfie and I tell all – how you defrauded the ProCe, how you covered for Carmina all these years.”

“Now” leers bandanahand, “I can’t let you out of this house – alone or ... alive.”

[Someone on the Patio hisses: “Do it, Gabino. You’re already going to hell ... JudyB looks sternly at her tablemate and silence is restored.]

Ing keeps braying, alternately taunting and wheedling, claiming she was just playing on Gael’s sympathies. Gael is the key to the Arango fortune. Their only obstacle is Alfonsina. (Dam would give Gael his share, she is sure.) Would Gabino have the guts (agallas) to kill that woman?

At Hacienda Arango, “that woman” affects surprise at Gweedo’s vigorous defense of his dignity and innocence. He’ll be living in the hotel in town, he says, not in the hacienda. And he, in turn is amazed at how vigorously Alfie defends a momzer like Gabino Mendoza. Nor is Gweedo any too happy about Flor and Dam getting married.

“But Gweedo” counters AlfaBitch, “Flor is knocked-up! We’re gonna be abuelos!”

In the Blue House of Shame, Ing presses on, calling Gab a coward, all bark and no bite (perro que ladra no muerde). He’s never bloodied his own hands with murder.

Has she? She doesn’t answer.

Then she asks what some on the Patio have wondered: If Ing is the runner-up, is Alfonsina herself the Grand Prize? Not at all, answers Gab. “Alfonsina Arango is the most despicable woman (la mujer más despreciable) in the world”.

Ingrid thinks he should take that thought and run with it ...

Carmina gets back home just as Lucio and Elisa are leaving for the special mass. Would the aunt like to join them? Nah. The rotten orange has no use for churches and souls or eternal life.

Elisa and Carmina agree to talk later about the check that Gabino supposedly gave Augusto as an anticipo for Cielo Abierto. It must be somewhere in the hacienda because it’s not in Augusto’s bank account.

At Hacienda Harango, Gweedo asks if Dam is marrying Flor only because she is pregnant. Or does he love her?

Dam does some awkward tap-dancing around the question. He truly cares for Flor, he says, and he promises to be a good husband and father.

Gweedo notices Dam is wearing black. “Why are you in mourning? Who died?” Dam explains that he is going to a funeral mass for Elisa’s father, Augusto.

Rural Health and Organ Transplant Center

Toña is feeling well enough to nag at Braulio for spending time with Dolores. “You never stopped loving her, did you?”

Braulio says he never regretted his marriage until he found out how Toña had deceived him.

[Some on the Patio whisper that Braulio is fibbing here, but no one seems to hold it against him.]

But now Toña hits him back with a big fat whopper of a lie: She never told him about Gabino because ... sniff sniff snivel ... Gabino abused her ... he took her by force! If Braulio doesn’t believe her, ask Alfonsina!

And right on cue – there is the black widow herself. “Tu mujer está diciendo la verdad” she lies.

In the vestry we see Dolores, Elisa and Lupe. Each is weighted by grief. All mourn Augusto. But Dolores has also lost her dream of marital happiness. And Padre? He looks more despairing than we have ever seen him. Of course he will help Lolita with the annulment. “But what crimes exactly was Horacio accused of? Anything here, in La Ermita? “No, padre” answers Lolita.

Avances: Alfonsina and Florencia put on their little black dresses and go crash a funeral mass. Elisa is not amused.