Hello, my name is Elena Vargas, and I'm 94 years old. I know that at my age I should be peacefully enjoying my last days, but there's something that has haunted me for 70 years. Something I've never told anyone, not even my children. It's a story about the most famous man in Mexico, the comedian who made millions laugh, Cantinflas. But I'm not going to tell you about the Cantinflas you know. I'm going to tell you about the man I knew.
The man who cried at night, the man almost no one truly saw. My name is Elena Vargas. I was born in 1931 in a small town in Guanajuato. I grew up in poverty, like so many others at that time. My father was a farmer, and my mother worked washing other people's clothes. There were six of us siblings, and I was the oldest. From a very young age, I learned to cook, to clean, and to take care of my younger siblings. School was a luxury I could only afford until I was twelve.
After that, I did nothing but work. When I was 19, in 1950, my mother became seriously ill. The doctors said she needed expensive medicines, treatments we couldn't afford. My father worked from dawn till dusk. But it wasn't enough. My siblings were too young to help. So I made a decision. I went to Mexico City to look for work as a domestic servant. The capital was enormous, noisy, and terrifying for a country girl like me. I arrived with a cardboard suitcase and the address of a distant cousin who worked in a house in the Roma neighborhood.
She let me stay in her maid's quarters while I looked for a job. For weeks I knocked on doors, offered my services, but no one would hire me. I was very young, very inexperienced, very provincial. It was in October 1951 that everything changed. My cousin told me that a lady she knew was looking for a maid for a very important house. She didn't tell me whose house it was, only that they paid very well and needed someone discreet and hardworking who knew how to cook traditional Mexican food. I dressed as best I could in my most decent clothes and went to the interview.
The house was in the Nápoles neighborhood. It was enormous, elegant, with beautiful gardens and a fountain at the entrance. I rang the doorbell, trembling with nerves. A woman of about 40, serious and well-dressed, answered. She was the house manager. She led me into a small room and interviewed me for almost an hour. She asked me where I was from, what skills I had, if I had family in the city, if I could read and write, and if I could keep secrets. That last question seemed strange to me, but I answered yes, that I was very discreet.
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