In the morning, the poet prepared the horse, caressing its back tenderly while reassuring it that everything would be fine. He still had it borrowed; he hadn't been able to return it because he didn't know who it belonged to, and attempting to find out was too dangerous. He was sure that Sergeant Francisco was already aware of the theft, giving him another reason to pursue him.

He mounted the horse, and the Mermaid climbed up behind him. They rode several kilometers towards the entrance of a river named Guayas, where the city of Guayaquil was located on its banks. Here, the only theater in the coastal region, El Teatro Olmedo, stood.

They arrived at dusk. The city welcomed them with the fire of torches on the walls. The poet slowed his pace and proceeded cautiously, aware that while he had left his pursuers behind, this city was larger and had more patrols.

They tied the horse in a sparsely populated area and continued on foot. As they headed towards the city center, the poet noticed that the Mermaid was more nervous and alert than he was; it seemed as though she was the fugitive. But before he could try to calm her down, she took him by the arm and led him down another street.

"Let's go this way," she said with confidence. It was an almost empty street that served to bypass the main one, allowing them to relax their pace. Despite everything, the Mermaid remained uneasy. She glanced at and nervously observed the people passing by on the street, but when the poet looked at her, she pretended not to.

"I hope I didn't scare you with all that talk about the firing squad," the poet warned, at the same time she glanced at him sideways, as if withholding her thoughts. "You must be calm; nobody knows you. They're after me," he clarified.

"This street looked safer," she excused herself, remaining unflustered and turning her attention forward.

All of this struck him as very strange, but he didn't dare to ask.

 

The Mermaid and the poet sat together in a couple of theater seats, watching the play as it reached its climax. The poet turned to her to see if she was enjoying the show. The Mermaid's eyes were filled with fascination at everything she saw, which made the poet's heart light up with azure rhymes.

The lights were directed at the stage, depicting a house in the middle of the countryside. A police officer arrived and knocked forcefully on the door. A young man's face appeared through a crack.

"What can I do for you?" he asked.

"What else can you offer us but to surrender yourself and your prey?" the police officer responded firmly.

"My prey, sir?"

"As you heard. I am the police commissioner. And know that nobody mocks me."

"I haven't committed any crime."

"What do you mean, no crime? Isn't abducting a young woman a crime?"

"Commissioner..."

"Let's not waste time", he interrupted. "Hand over Miss Dolores V. immediately."

"Dolores? Has something happened to her? Has she disappeared?", the young man became anxious.

"Do you deny it?"

"Commissioner, I can swear to you that Miss Dolores V. is not with me," he said, opening the door wide.

"Bah! She's not here with you, but she's surely hidden somewhere in this house or in some hideaway," the commissioner responded, with intentions of entering.

"Not at home or in any hiding place," he confessed without resistance.

"And those horses? Weren't they meant for you and her to escape from the town? Haven't you come here from Cashapamba on them?"

"You may search my house. You may take my horses. But tell me, what has happened to her?"

The commissioner hesitated in his response as he looked at the young man's face, which appeared to be telling the truth. Unable to argue, he had to withdraw his gaze in silence.

"She has fled, hasn't she?" the young man inquired, releasing the door and seeking the commissioner's gaze. "If anything happens to her... there will be only one guilty party," he reproached, containing his fury.

The lights gradually dimmed, and Christopher looked at the Mermaid again. She was sliding to the edge of her seat, filled with anticipation.

The lights came back on, this time illuminating a simple room at the other end of the stage. A woman dressed in a skirt and shawl entered, crying, holding a tray with a teapot and a cup.

"¡Tú, dulce amiga!" she recited to herself, "que tal vez un día, al contemplar la luna misteriosa, exaltabas tu ardiente fantasía, y derramabas lágrima amorosa."

She arrived at the table, prepared a cup of tea, and pulled a small vial from her bodice. "Duermes también, tranquila y descansada, cual el marino después de la tormenta, así, olvidando la inquietud pasada, mientras tu amiga su pesar lamenta."

The woman poured the substance from the vial into the cup, stirred it with a spoon, held it in both hands, and, struggling to contain her nerves, brought it to her mouth, quickly drinking it with her eyes closed.

Within seconds, she began to feel dizzy. She searched among her writings on the table and found what she was looking for. She grabbed the pen from the inkwell with an erratic movement and began to write while holding her forehead.

"Déjame que hoy, en soledad contemple, de mi esperanza las flores deshojadas. Hoy no hay mentira que mi dolor temple."

She grabbed the written piece, squeezing it with all her strength, and stood up in anger. Her strength soon waned, and she had to lean on the back of the chair to sit on the bed. There she waited, enveloped in dark longing, gazing at the beam of light that illuminated her. "Ya se acabaron mis fábulas soñadas," she whispered. Suddenly, her eyes closed at the same time her heart was seized by a mortal trance, like an electric shock, and she collapsed onto the bed.

The poet watched the Mermaid from his seat, completely absorbed in the drama unfolding on the stage. He saw her enjoy it so much that it transported him, making him feel as he did the first time he had attended a play. He felt that this art possessed a purity he had never experienced before, elevating him to such an extent that his enthusiasm overflowed in a brilliant blue.

When the curtain finally closed, applause rang out in the theater. The Mermaid disconnected from the stage and returned from fiction, scanning her surroundings and suddenly taking Christopher's hand with an electric impulse. Without giving him time to protest, she dragged him through the seats toward the exit.

"Come on, let's go!" she exclaimed, while he tried to cover his head with his hat to go unnoticed in their haste.

 

The Mermaid led him by the hand, moving away from the crowd leaving the theater, until they reached La Catedral de San Francisco. It was a spacious square, illuminated by warm lanterns, and on the ground was a large star, from which straight paths extended in different directions.

She let go of his hand and ran into the area to scare away a group of pigeons pecking at the ground. She spun with her arms wide open as they took flight and waited for Christopher to approach.

"Why did you bring me in this direction? Did you see something?" he asked.

"No," she replied, turning her back to him. She moved a few steps slowly, strolling through the park and daydreaming.

"Then why are we here?" he asked when he caught up to her.

"I don't like crowds," she replied, looking ahead and hiding her lie.

After a few silent steps, Christopher decided to change the subject.

"You really enjoyed that play," he said, smiling as he observed the Mermaid by his side.

"They're all beautiful," she replied dreamily, as if she wanted to relive every moment of the performance.

"Is there theater where you come from?"

"Yes, but it's not like here. There, there are no rules."

"Is it better?"

"Different," she replied, looking at him sideways, afraid that the questions might lead to her past.

"Is that why you like coming to the city?" Christopher asked, curious to know more about her mysterious life.

"Partly," she replied evasively. "I'd like to be able to act," she added suddenly, and Christopher could hear the excitement in her voice.

"If you want, I could help you."

"Oh, really? How?" She stopped, crossed her arms, and raised an eyebrow.

"It was acting that led me to writing."

"Oh, really?" She raised the other eyebrow. "And what do you write?"

"Poetry."

"What you had on your desk didn't look like poetry at all." She forced a disappointed expression.

"Oh, really?"

"They're cold. You don't dive in; you just splash around," she said harshly, and Christopher could feel the tension in the air.

"I don't understand," he admitted humbly, trying not to offend her.

"Exactly, you don't understand."

"So...you know a lot about poetry."

"No, but I know about feeling. You need to feel the current of emotions in your veins, in your soul, and flow...subtle, like a wave."

If you had known about feeling, you wouldn't have made the decision you made.

"For me, art goes beyond experience or emotion. It's a challenge to human reason."

"I heard something similar from a critic once. They spend their time critiquing, not creating. They don't know what it's like. They don't understand either. Just rules, rules, rules... but there's something more...

You didn't know what you were talking about, but the passion with which you did it, I loved that.

"You're an artist," the poet told her with a smile.

"No, not at all."

"Then why learn to act?"

"Because I love acting."

"And doesn't that make you an artist?"

"No, just... a lover."

"And if it touched your heart?"

The Mermaid thought for a moment and changed her attitude.

"You can try. When do we start the lessons?"

"If you travel with me, you could become a great actress."

"Great actress?" She interrupted with a laugh. "Sure."

 

They stopped a few blocks from the deserted street where they had tied the horse. The poet took the Mermaid's arm and led her around the corner so they could spy on what was happening. Several civil guards were interrogating a couple of people about the abandoned animal. Christopher recognized Sergeant Francisco and his corporals by their profiles.

"What's going on?" asked the Mermaid.

"It's them, my pursuers. I could seek refuge at a friend's house, but it wouldn't be fair to him."

Sergeant Francisco let go of the people, and as he adjusted his belt, he looked around. At that moment, he noticed something moving in the darkness of the corner and approached to investigate.

The Mermaid and the poet hid their heads behind the wall again.

The sergeant saw the suspicious movement, drew his weapon, and began to run toward the corner.

But there was no one there anymore.

A few meters away, two people were hurrying away. They had to be them.

"Halt!" he ordered, aiming his gun.

The corporals heard their superior's shout and took up their rifles as they ran to support him.

The Mermaid and the poet stopped in the middle of the arcade corridor. The Sergeant began to approach. Christopher couldn't allow himself to be caught, especially not with her. They would shoot him, but the Mermaid's fate would be terrible; he couldn't imagine what the military could do to her. With determination, he held the Mermaid's hand, and together they fled.

Sergeant Francisco abruptly stopped, his boots almost slipping on the floor. He aimed with one eye and fired. The bullet struck the wood of the arcade through which the fugitives were passing, and the edge exploded into splinters as they instinctively ducked. Another shot rang out from Sergeant's rifle, but the bullet passed through the arcade corridor without finding its target.

At that moment, the corporals arrived.

"He's with a woman," the sergeant said, exchanging the rifle with one of them. "I want him dead," he ordered, and they set off in pursuit.

The fugitives reached an intersection of streets. The poet was about to cross when the Mermaid stopped him, pulling him in the opposite direction to hide behind a corner. At that precise moment, a shot rang out, and the bullet split the base of a nearby torch, causing the fire to fall to the ground.

When the officers reached the intersection, the fugitives had already run half a block down a narrow, winding street. The soldiers aimed and fired as Christopher and the Mermaid moved quickly, with bullets impacting behind them, sending sparks and dust flying from the rocky ground.

"This way, this way!" the Mermaid said, pulling on Christopher's coat tails as they kept running until they turned a corner and disappeared from the soldiers' view.

The officers hurried to reload their weapons and resumed the pursuit, but they found the street empty. They advanced slowly, cautiously examining every meter of the narrow street.

Meanwhile, Christopher and the Mermaid took refuge inside a house, leaning against the front door, which the Mermaid managed to open somehow. They tried to control their rapid breathing as the shadows of the soldiers moved in front of the door.

The Mermaid signaled for Christopher to follow her and led him through the hallways of the house, climbing some wooden steps until they quietly exited through the open door of a balcony. That's where they encountered the civilian infantry, still searching for them in the street.

"They disappeared like ghosts," the Second Corporal fretted as he couldn't find them.

"Is it true what people say, Sergeant?" the First Corporal asked.

"What do they say?" the Second Corporal wanted to know.

"That he drowned, but his soul roams the coast looking for victims," he murmured.

"Silence!" Francisco ordered indifferently, dismissing the village superstitions.

The Mermaid picked up a stone from a nearby flowerpot and tossed it into the air towards the corner of the next block, making some cans rattle and alerting the soldiers. Francisco ordered his men to follow him, and they advanced down the next block.

"Thank you," Christopher said to her, looking at her with a mixture of admiration and fear.

 

The Mermaid opened the door to a room and led the poet inside. She began to light the candles, gradually revealing that it was a spacious apartment, filled with canvases, tables with brushes, color palettes, and containers of paint on shelves. She opened the window to let in the soft moonlight, which illuminated the studio like a dream among the stars.

"Do you live here?" Christopher asked, admiring the place he found himself in. It meant that the Mermaid had the habit of visiting land, and not only that, but she led a double life, one on land and one in the sea.

"That's right, Captain Obvious," she replied with a smile, suggesting that her life was the most natural thing in the world, as she walked among her canvases and work tools.