Mr. Polk

Mr. Polk is Rafo’s father, and his decisive appearance comes not in person but through a late-night telephone call. When the sergeant reaches him, Mr. Polk denies knowing anything about what has happened to his son; the sergeant then tells Rafo that his father says no when Rafo insists he had been sent for. The exchange makes Mr. Polk’s absence an active force in the scene: his refusal to acknowledge Rafo’s account leaves the boy facing the possibility that the father he expected to want him has disowned him.

Identity and Introduction

The scene identifies Mr. Polk through his relation to Rafo and the sergeant’s attempt to contact him. The call comes only after hours of waiting, during which the sergeant also tries the national police and Rafo’s mother. His conversation with Mr. Polk grows angry enough that the sergeant raises his voice, but he quickly regains control and addresses him with calculated formality. The exchange is therefore presented as tense even before Rafo learns its substance.

The reader receives no direct account of Mr. Polk’s surroundings, intentions, or earlier history. His position in the story is defined by what he says over the phone and by what the sergeant subsequently tells Rafo. That limited, mediated introduction matters: the father’s words arrive after a delay and through an official intermediary, while Rafo must decide what they mean without being able to question his father himself.

The Telephone Call and Denial

The sergeant tells Mr. Polk that he has called for information, not to quarrel, and asks what he wants done about his son. After listening briefly, he ends the call. The phone rings again almost at once. The sergeant answers in Spanish, privately, and when he hangs up he carries himself with an air of finality before beckoning Mike Milo to sit beside Rafo. The sequence implies that the second call has settled what the first left unresolved, though the narrative does not disclose who called back or what was said.

The sergeant then gives the boy an account of his inquiries. The police are looking for Rafo in the Distrito Federal to arrest him for truancy, petty theft, and resisting arrest. Rafo’s mother, he says, will not defend her son because she does not know how, and thinks perhaps he should learn that the law is the law. About the call to Mr. Polk, the sergeant says he does not know what to tell Rafo: his father says he knows nothing about this. The official report is blunt, but it does not resolve the specific claim that Mr. Polk had sent for Rafo.

Rafo’s Claim and Mr. Polk’s Refusal

Rafo begins to speak, falters, and tries again. His response is not a general protest but a precise contradiction: “But he . . . sent for me.” The sergeant answers, “He say no.” Rafo insists, “But he did!” and points to Mike, placing him in the position of a witness who might confirm the account. The moment leaves Mr. Polk’s denial opposed to Rafo’s certainty, with Mike’s testimony suddenly carrying the weight of deciding which account the boy can believe.

Mike does not answer at once. The narration suggests that, had either the sergeant waited longer or Rafo waited, Mike might have found something to say. That pause does not establish what Mr. Polk actually knew or why he denied the claim; it does show that Rafo receives no immediate reassurance from the adult who accompanied him. The father’s refusal consequently reaches the boy not as an explanation but as a bare negation.

Consequences for Rafo

Later, Rafo asks Mike what Mr. Polk had wanted and whether it was money. Mike says yes when Rafo asks if it was money from his mother. Rafo then frames the events as a joke and a lie: he had always thought his mother would never give one peso for him, but had begun to wonder whether she had changed because she sent the police after him. The police, rather than either parent, now seem to him to be the only party that wants him.

Rafo also asks whether his father ever rode a wild horse. Mike says no. The question shifts the exchange from the disputed errand to the father Rafo had imagined and the qualities he associates with him. His eyes fill after he tries and fails to laugh; then he begins to say that if his father does not want him and Mike brought him only for money, before leaving that thought unfinished. He concludes that only the police want him. Mr. Polk’s denial thus has consequences beyond the call itself: it helps collapse Rafo’s expectation of his father into rejection, while Mike’s silence makes the boy question the purpose of their journey too.