Martín Salcedo and I were having coffee at La Nueva Central in Cd. Juárez a couple of years back. The place is a landmark in the middle of downtown Juárez, where it opens its doors onto the main plaza between the cathedral and old customs house. Writers, artists, professionals, and workers have gathered there for decades. It is famous for its spacious dining room equipped with counters and booths from the nineteen-fifties and an exceptionally comprehensive menu featuring Chinese, Mexican, and American food. Someone once joked that you could eat there for a year and never order the same meal twice. La Nueva Central also serves good coffee with milk and sugar, which is always accompanied by a large basket of assorted pastries and sweet bread. You only pay for the bread and pastries that you actually eat, even if you choose to sit in your booth and sip coffee for hours on end.

My friend Martín was going on and on about his job at the university, where he worked as a grant writer. I was only half listening to his tangled account of flagrant financial misbehavior and endless bureaucratic bungling. He raised his hands to make some point—one of his trademark gestures—and an elderly gentleman who had just come through the door of the café thought he was waving him over. He walked to our table as fast as his stiff, aged legs permitted. When Martín saw him, he stood and gave him a warm embrace.

“Don Hipólito Salinas Ricalde, mi tío” Martín said with surprise, introducing me to the elderly man.

We shook hands and exchanged formal greetings. The old man explained that he was not actually Martín’s uncle, but a cousin of his father.

I asked him if he was meeting someone. When he told me that he was alone, we invited him to join us.

“Are you here for lunch?” Martín asked.

“No. Just a little coffee.”

I signaled our server to bring him a cup.

“Don Hipólito grew up in Tala with my father and his brothers,” Martín told me.

The old man nodded.

“And my compa Charlie’s family on his mother’s side are tapatíos.”

Don Hipólito brightened when he heard that my family were fellow jaliscienses.

“One day, we’ll all return there, to the land of eternal spring. I remember it all: the painted houses, the burning fields, pale donkeys and emerald hummingbirds; a town torn from the wilderness, from tortuous forests and ravines which were once home to jaguars and pumas, from that spectral morning haze. Because, you know, life is a dream. When you’re old you see it, that this life is just a dream.”

“I haven’t been to Guadalajara or anywhere in Jalisco for years. All the family I had there are dead.”

“You’ll see them again one day,” Don Hipólito assured me. “People sometimes see the dead, especially at night. I’ve never seen the dead myself, but once, when I was a boy, I saw the spirit of a xilotl.”

“Where?” I asked.

“In a corn field, of course.”

“Did you see him up close?”

“As close as I am to you. He was little, it is true, but he was only a boy like me. And he was not much bigger than your hand.”

I looked at Martín quizzically. His “uncle,” Don Hipólito, continued.

“That spirit, he had a white face and blue hands. It was only later that I learned he was the spirit of a xilotl (a small, tender ear of green corn).”

A woman sitting at a booth near the front window of the café coughed loudly. She looked as if she might be choking. A waiter approached her, but she waved him away.

“It was night. I spoke to the spirit as if he was just another boy.”

“What was that you were saying?” I asked Don Hipólito. Like his semi-nephew Martín, he seemed a bit of a xilotl himself. He wasn’t going to stop until he finished his story.

“The first time I saw the spirit, he was standing in a corn field. He wasn’t afraid of me at all—perhaps because I was a child. He asked me my name. But I didn’t give it to him. I was simply being shy, though now I think that an angel was looking after me. Who knows what a xilotl spirit would do if he knew my name! His little white face was dimpled as a dried-up quince, and his voice was exceedingly pleasant. His hair was gold in the shadowy moonlight, and it fell over his shoulders. His eyes were blue. I’m sure his family loved him very much.”

“And you spoke to him?” I asked.

“I didn’t know he was a xilotl spirit at the time because I had never seen one before. To me, he was just a tiny little boy with a dimpled face and bright blue hands. We shared our childish philosophies of life and talked about how strict our respective parents were. At the end of that first meeting, he asked me for money. I gave him a twenty centavo piece, one of those heavy coins that they used a long time ago. It was all I had.

“We met a few more times after that, and each time he asked for money. I would put him off by promising him all sorts of things: gold, real paper money, postage stamps. But each time we met he became more and more insistent. You know what they say, ‘The wrong company is a hangman’s noose.’ What did he want with money, anyway? I was beginning to get angry with him for pestering me about it and swore I would not go back to the field where he lived to see him again, but something made me return. It’s like people who attend cock fights. They know the ending will be horrible, but that doesn’t stop them from going back again and again. I finally snatched a bottle of sweet brandy from a table at my father’s thirtieth birthday party, and I hid it in the field where the little spirit lived.

“The following evening, just as a flake of moon was rising, I went to the milpa to meet my dimpled friend. He asked me about my horse, and about the party I had attended, and he asked me for money. I took him to the spot where the brandy was hidden, and I showed him the bright green bottle with a red seal on its neck.

“ ‘This flask contains something which gives more happiness than money,’ I told him, neglecting to mention that the happiness didn’t last. ‘Since I don’t have any money to give you, my little friend, I brought this for you as a gift.’

“The xilotl spirit was delighted with the brandy. He asked me to open the bottle for him, and to ‘baptize’ it by taking the first sip. I pulled out the stopper—there were no screw tops in those days—and pretended to take a drink from the bottle.

“ ‘Very tasty,’ I said, wiping my mouth. ‘I’m happy already.’

“The spirit grabbed the bottle and drank greedily from it.

“ ‘I’m happy, too,’ he said. He began to dance . . .

“He took another drink and launched into a song to accompany his dance. In a voice as sweet as raw corn milk, he sang this little song: “Wind in the leaves/agile as a deer/mild as an earthworm/fickle as a plague./The sailor always sleeps/on the day of a squall/a tempest always rises/as the temple catches fire. /Wind on the seas/cruel as a lion/steady as a bowsprit/fervent as a bee.

“He continued dancing—but lost his footing several times on the furrows of the field. A wide, flat road bordered the milpa. He staggered to the road on his tiny spirit feet.

“Dancing and carrying on in the middle of the road, the bottle of sweet brandy in his little blue hands, that drunken xilotl spirit seemed to lose all control. In the distance, I saw the lights of a truck, and I cried out a warning to him. But he was still singing and dancing and carrying on and probably didn’t even hear my shouts. There were almost no vehicles on the roads in those days, just an occasional rider or donkey cart, so I doubt that such a childish spirit had ever seen or heard of a motorized vehicle. A panel truck driven by a busy public carrier roared down on him. The hasty driver never saw the little spirit, and the spirit didn’t see the truck until it was too late. The vehicle never even stopped. When I came to the spot where my friend had been dancing, all I found was a soft, crushed corncob and a few fresh kernels of blue and white corn.”

“Did you ever run into him again?” my friend Martín asked skeptically, dipping the head of a marranito into his coffee.

“Never. After what happened, I had trouble sleeping. I was only a child and had seen something terrible. Had I killed him? I couldn’t understand it. Who was the strange little boy? I started paying attention in church, and even thought of becoming a priest for a while. When I grew up, I joined the postal service, which has a discipline and a loneliness of its own, you know.”

Don Hipólito smiled and sipped his sweet coffee.

“It happened long ago, but it’s a true story. Feel free to tell anyone you want about it, but don’t use my name until you’re sure I’m in the ground. And now I’m going to ask the waiter for a doughnut and a corn muffin, and a little chocolate pie. You know what they say, ‘Full belly, satisfied heart.’ ”