Читать книгу Chronicle of the Murdered House - Lúcio Cardoso - Страница 18

7.

The Pharmacist’s Second Report

It was around this time that the most disparate and divergent rumors concerning the Chácara began to circulate. Nobody knew for certain what was going on, but all manner of things were suspected, even an actual crime. (Dr. Vilaça, the doctor who attended the Chácara, had even let slip something to that effect . . .) It has to be said that the general atmosphere was highly conducive to such gossip, and the more intrepid of the local busybodies even took to strolling along by the fence surrounding the grounds, in the hope of seeing something. In vain: the trees filling the garden prevented any clear view of the Chácara, and the most they could report was that they had seen Dona Ana, or even Senhor Demétrio, strolling along the avenues. Any mention of the Meneses was accompanied by a wry smile, a shrug of the shoulders, a knowing shake of the head; and the old house that had for so long been the pride of the whole municipality soon began to be tainted by that aura of suspicion and drama. Despite this, less and less was seen of its inhabitants. At one point, it was said that Dona Nina had been spotted with a stranger, close to the old slave cemetery on the road to the Chácara; then it was reported that Senhor Demétrio had his bags packed ready to go traveling, that he was going abroad and that no one knew when he would be back. However, none of these reports was confirmed, for the Meneses kept themselves to themselves and rarely called on any of their neighbors. Even so, it is fair to say that they remained immensely important in the locality, and there were no festivities, charitable occasions, or public ceremonies to which they were not invited. In short, while they were neither friendly nor kind, they were, nonetheless, indispensable to the life of the town.

Now, it was in this climate of high drama that Senhor Valdo one day appeared at my pharmacy, even though the shop was having work done to it and was partly closed to customers. He came not once, but two or three times, always trying to look as nonchalant as possible and pretending there was nothing he was looking for, but all the while paying close attention to everything around him. I was not surprised by this, not least because I was accustomed to that family’s curious manners. His pretext for coming was in order to have a wound dressed, for he had sustained a gunshot wound to his chest, which was not healing well. (I believe, moreover, that this was the origin of the rumors filling the town.) As discretion required, I asked no questions, but he told me he had wounded himself “accidentally.” I said nothing, even pretending that the story did not interest me in the slightest. It was, I believed, the only way of putting him at his ease, and thus more inclined to talk. On the other hand, it occurred to me that he may simply have been sounding me out, as a way of gauging the extent of the townspeople’s curiosity. In any event, I kept my silence, which is another way of saying that I asked nothing and presumed everything. Since they were in the habit of summoning me whenever they needed anything, I assumed that, this time, they wanted to keep me away from the house precisely so that I would not see whatever it was they wanted to hide from me. I have no idea what it was, but it clearly existed, and those visits to the shop by Senhor Valdo were the proof, breaking as they did with such a well-established modus operandi. There was also, I must say, a certain nervousness about his movements, and he, unaccustomed to my cool demeanor, occasionally shot me a worried, searching glance.

On his last visit, he unceremoniously sat down on a pile of bricks next to the counter, resting his hands on the crook of his umbrella. (He had come on foot from the Chácara, even though a storm was brewing; to the south where the railroad tracks stretch off into the distance, thick black clouds were gathering.) As I’ve already mentioned, his wound was a minor one, and the dressings could well have been changed at the Chácara itself. Perhaps, since the departure of Dona Nina, he was unable to find anyone there to help him, and it was this, among other things, that had brought him to the shop. He was, like all the Meneses men, a man of few words, but on this occasion, so as to break the silence into which we were gradually sinking, he let out a sigh and said:

“Ah, yes, the good old days.”

Which probably meant nothing at all, or at least, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t see what he was referring to. He said it several times, though, and hearing the words repeated so often, I ended up thinking that they must contain some deep meaning, which I, in my ignorance, could not apprehend. He spoke with his chin resting on his hands, which were, in turn, resting on the handle of his umbrella in a pose that struck me as particularly characteristic. He was gazing into space, as if he really was traveling incalculable distances. Such theatricality, whether feigned or not, must have concealed some purpose, and I waited patiently for that purpose to become apparent. But looking at him, I felt troubled—his suffering seemed so disturbingly real. I had often seen the suffering on men’s faces, but nothing like that, hemmed in by so much reticence and scruple. It must be said, however, that there was a certain dignity in everything to do with Senhor Valdo, and at the same time, a feeling of such sadness, such constant loneliness, that those attributes, by their very force, became factors of indisputable prestige. Women, who are particularly sensitive to such refinement, can sense it from a distance, and never fail to be captivated: “How manly, how romantic, such refined manners!” And it was undoubtedly the case that almost all of them considered him their very own small, personal god.

I always hoped he would tell me some clear, concrete fact about the Chácara and its goings-on, because it was precisely those facts, and the enigma surrounding them, that most interested me and the rest of the town. Even the most restrained of men have their moments of weakness, but during all those visits (for I deliberately lengthened the period of his treatment, and the visits lasted for over three weeks), he was always very discreet, and I never heard him utter a single word to deny or confirm the myths swirling around the Meneses.

He did speak to me once, on one single occasion, and with the exuberance and emotion of the very timid, who, in the depths of their heart, feel the wall of ice imprisoning their most cherished feelings suddenly break. He spoke to me not because it was me, but merely because he had a need to speak to someone, indeed anyone. Listening to him, the story seemed so much his own and so disconnected from any Meneses family business, that I wondered whether that wasn’t his real reason for coming to my pharmacy: an excuse to relive those events, to ponder them in the presence of someone else, and thus escape from the siege and isolation imposed on him by the other inhabitants of the Chácara. I must stress that this was the only time I saw a Meneses in a confiding mood, and what he did confide to me was only remotely connected to the Meneses. (Indeed, perhaps before telling you what he said, I ought to revive an old recollection of my own, for it fits with everything I heard later on, and agrees with what is known of the person in question. I cannot emphasize enough the impression that Senhor Valdo’s unexpected marriage caused in Vila Velha, and the excitement with which the first news of his wife-to-be was received. It isn’t easy, however, to gauge the impact of this without bearing in mind the almost universal esteem in which Senhor Valdo was held and the deep interest felt by everyone regarding the Meneses. By the time he married, he was no longer what could be termed a boy; saucy tales and anecdotes abounded concerning him and his adventures, whether true or not, with all sorts of women. There was even one, a certain Raquel, who worked at a place called “Half Past Midnight” and who was said to have received a large sum in payment for several hours of her favors. Indeed, to put it plainly, he was assumed to be an accomplished womanizer: silent and arrogant, of a kind very common among wealthy provincial folk. His manners, his noble bearing, his immaculate elegance, albeit somewhat old-fashioned, contributed greatly to this reputation. Half of these affairs were quite possibly invented and he may never even have set foot in that place called “Half Past Midnight,” such were the tales and imaginings the Meneses men aroused. But then, as they say, there’s no smoke without fire. To the outside world, Senhor Valdo, with his faintly supercilious air, cut a figure that perfectly fitted the legends that circulated about him. On many occasions I saw young girls of marriageable age leaning out of their window whenever he passed by, flashing him sly looks or giggling, and this trail of excitement would last at least as long as his stroll around the town.

When it was finally announced that he was to marry, there was general excitement, and the only topic of conversation was who the lucky woman might be. It was said—by those recently returned from Rio de Janeiro—that she was the most beautiful of women, rich and endowed with all the attributes one might expect in a wife chosen by a Meneses. Someone who swore he had seen them together in a smart coffee-house in Rio, said: “They make the perfect couple.”

So there was great expectation when Senhor Valdo left to bring her back to the Chácara: for days and days, when the train from the capital was due to arrive, our little railroad station was packed with people. And this expectation turned into a great torrent of whisperings and mutterings when he returned alone after several days in the city. It was reported that she did not want to come to such a backwater and that she hated the thought of leaving Rio de Janeiro.

And so, before they even knew a single positive fact about her, the majority already felt hostile to the new bride, declaring her to be a conceited woman who would neither look at nor speak to anyone. However, this was all mere supposition, and it all changed on a certain afternoon when Dona Nina stepped off the train at our little station, which by that time was completely deserted. She may well have merely been waiting for interest in her to wane so that she could arrive peacefully and quietly. She arrived laden down with luggage and, I swear, I have never seen a more beautiful woman in my entire life. She wasn’t particularly tall and was perhaps slightly too thin, and she was clearly of a highly-strung disposition and accustomed to being treated well. The purity of her features—only her nose was perhaps a little too aquiline—combined to create a strange, tempestuous atmosphere that, even at first sight, made her an irresistible creature to behold. The whole town—for as news of her arrival spread from house to house like a lit fuse, every window filled up with onlookers—wondered what it was that simmered inside her to make her gaze so melancholy and her attitude so warm and irresolute. And everyone agreed that the delay, and her subsequent arrival when everyone had forgotten about her and the station was deserted, all worked in her favor. Many rashly proclaimed that she deserved an apology from Vila Velha, and since there was no means of delivering such an apology, they instead heaped her with exaggerated praise, declaring her “a queen who did not deserve to be exiled to this dull, dusty place.” So from the moment she set foot in the town, she became the focus of attention, driving the Meneses themselves discreetly into the background. Little by little, however, this interest, for lack of nourishment, became gradually corrupted—and what had previously been unalloyed praise turned into a game of doubts and probabilities. From calling her a queen, they judged her to be, rather, a failed cabaret singer, and there were even those who recalled seeing her face in certain “specialist” magazines. Others, more romantically, persisted in considering her to be a mysterious blue-blooded heiress.

But the majority obstinately countered with: “No, she’s a singer, and in a revealing pose that leaves little to the imagination . . .” The truth is that nobody really knew anything about her, and so it remained for a long time.)

“I can remember perfectly the moment I first saw her,” he told me, his chin still resting on the handle of his umbrella, eyes still gazing into the distance, as if pursuing a vision he feared might break up on the rocks of time. “It was a hot summer’s afternoon, and I was walking along the shore at Flamengo. I was looking for the address of a friend, who I was told was living in a luxurious guesthouse somewhere near Glória. But we country folk always seem to go astray when we get to the city. And so that’s how I came to be knocking at the door not of a luxurious guest house, but of a very modest hotel. It was situated in a vast old two- or three-story building with a wide, steep, dark staircase with wooden banisters. The doorman was half-deaf and pointed me in the direction of a room on the second floor, and as I went up, I was assailed by the characteristically tepid smell of food and ill-disguised poverty. I couldn’t find the room number I was looking for and was about to turn back, when I overheard the sounds of an argument coming from one of the rooms off the hallway. I stopped, out of curiosity and a desire to see for myself how people lived in such confined surroundings. They were discussing a marriage. One of the speakers had the hesitant, fitful voice of an elderly, ailing man, possibly an asthmatic. Each sentence was interspersed with gasps and coughs and choking. The other speaker was female, and she had the warm voice of a young girl. Listening to her replies I instantly wanted to know who she was, and as I stood there, I imagined her to be small, blonde, and blue-eyed. When the door was flung open following a particularly angry riposte, I saw just how wrong I was: she was dark-haired, almost a redhead, of medium height and with bright, shining eyes. I was immediately struck by her appearance, or rather, by her pallor and her nervous, pitiful tone. She wasn’t wearing any make-up and was dressed very modestly. My first thought was: ‘So beautiful, and yet she will never be happy.’ Why? What led me to prophesy such a dark future? Then I asked myself who she could be, and before I could answer, I heard the argument coming to an end. ‘I can wait until tomorrow,’ said the old man. I was hiding behind one of the newel posts on the staircase, and I peered around it to see who the speaker was. He was indeed an old man, his hair and moustache entirely white, and he had a very kind face, but he was, alas, sitting in a wheelchair. ‘Paralyzed,’ I thought to myself. There was still a glint of anger in his eyes.” (Ah, I thought, while Senhor Valdo continued talking: what a strong impression this incident must have made for it to remain so clear after all this time!) “I saw the woman turn around and say with extraordinary passion: ‘Never. I would rather die.’ The old man started to move his wheelchair, trying to catch up with her: ‘You’ve always done exactly what you wanted, you’ve never once considered your father. Perhaps now . . .’ She slammed the door shut without answering, rushed past me and went down the stairs. Suddenly everything in the old building went quiet. Cautiously, I followed, breathing in the trail of perfume she left behind. It was growing dark and the sky, still blue over toward the sea, was beginning to glow a fiery red. I walked along distractedly, thinking about what I had just heard, when I saw her standing beneath a lamppost. She must have been waiting for a bus or some other means of transport. I stopped and saw her take a handkerchief out of her handbag to wipe her eyes. I felt a searing pang of pity. I kept my distance, though, not knowing whether or not to approach her in her present distraught state. At that moment, a car stopped by the curb and I saw a man’s hand push open the door. She got in and the car drove off. I caught a sudden gleam of stripes on a uniform, shining in the darkness. I assumed therefore, with some disappointment, that she was the lover of some soldier.

“On an impulse, I returned there at the same time the next day. Throughout the night, during which I endured the exhausting, sleepless rigors of a Rio summer, I could not drive from my mind the image of that beautiful stranger. I hoped to find her under the same lamppost, and sure enough there she was, clutching her handbag and waiting for the car. It did not take long to appear and everything happened exactly as before. It was clearly a regular occurrence, and, as if they were of crucial importance, the same questions kept going around and around in my head: Fiancée? Lover? Wife? I observed this same scene on the following three nights, prompted by an interest it seemed pointless to conceal. Then, on the fourth night, I finally resolved to approach her. I needed to act at once, before the car arrived. When I went over to her, she gave me a look more of sadness than surprise, and that impenetrable sadness, which seemed to have its origins in some unending inner agony, never failed to touch me. ‘I don’t know who you are,’ she said simply and in a formal tone that somehow in no way suggested rejection. I shrugged as if to say ‘what does it matter?’ while the girl glanced down the street, no doubt imagining that her soldier would appear at any moment. But that day, to my good fortune, he must have been delayed. ‘I need to talk to you,’ I insisted. She looked at me again, slowly this time, from head to toe, as if trying to determine exactly who I was. I surmised from her look that she had judged me rightly. Oh that wicked thing, female intuition! I must also confess that I had no intention of hiding anything from her. Standing there, already somewhat distracted, she was trying to contain the only emotion holding her back: a mixture of anxiety and irritation at the imminent arrival of the man whom I presumed to be her lover. At last, she reached a decision and, taking me by the arm, said: ‘Let’s go, before he arrives.’ She said this quickly and with evident relief, and we walked down to the beach so briskly that in no time at all we found ourselves some distance from the lamppost where they had arranged to meet. As we walked we exchanged not a single word, for we felt that no explanation was necessary; the impulse that had begun our friendship was explanation enough.

“That same night, tucked away in the corner of a bar in Copacabana, she told me everything: the soldier, an army colonel, was a friend of her father’s. Or rather, his only friend. Her father had also been a soldier, and had served in a garrison in Deodoro until a terrible disaster had befallen him—a grenade going off unexpectedly. He had then retired from the army and, being of an irascible, even violent temper, he had lost all his friends and acquaintances, driven away by his angry outbursts. His injuries made matters even worse, for he was still a young man, imprisoned in his wheelchair and seething with anger. His one remaining friend was Colonel Gonçalves, Amadeu Gonçalves, who endured his old comrade’s virulent mood swings not out of friendship exactly, but . . .

“Every night they played interminable games of cards. They had started with simple games like escopa, rouba-monte, and ronda. But gradually they moved on to playing more seriously, for money, which, as the night wore on, left them flushed and excited. When the money ran out—for now they always played for money—they played for whatever was at hand: books, tables, chairs. They did this without a flicker of shame, and she allowed it to happen, because it was the only way for her father to forget his sorrows. ‘I’ll bet you this watch,’ her father would say, apoplectic with rage after a long-drawn-out defeat. The Colonel, who had more valuable items at his disposal, always kept his cool, hid his cards from prying eyes, and always won. The daughter, who was a witness to these daily spectacles, thought it would be better for her father to refrain from such unprofitable games, but she held her tongue, aware that he saw no one during the day, and that it was the Colonel who formed the only bridge between him and the outside world and kept him up-to-date on military matters with a meticulous detail that would be the envy of the very best gazettes. A judicious observer could not fail to notice a certain touch of sadism on the part of the Colonel. For example, when the subject matter was particularly thrilling, as was often the case, for the Colonel showed a truly histrionic talent—he was a man who reveled in farcical incidents, piquant details, unexpected discoveries—he would often stop suddenly and fall into a deathly silence. ‘What is it?’ her father would cry out anxiously. And slowly, rubbing his chin with his hand, the Colonel would say: ‘You know, I can’t quite remember what happened next.’ Her father would reach his hand across the table and touch his companion’s arm: ‘For the love of God, man, don’t stop now, not before you’ve told me the rest. Don’t just leave me in suspense!’ The Colonel would shake his head: ‘No, I don’t remember. It was a lance corporal who gave me that particular piece of information. I need to go and find him again.’ The father, distraught, tried to jog his memory: ‘Which lance corporal? Was it Mamede from Pernambuco?’ The Colonel smugly shook his head again. The old man spluttered: ‘In my day . . .’ And the Colonel interrupted: ‘In your day, Colonel, but these days it’s all very different. It wasn’t Mamede from Pernambuco, indeed, I’m almost certain it was Libânio from Paraná.’ ‘Ah!’ exclaimed the invalid, greatly relieved. And he would repeat, as if it were the most delightful thing in the world: ‘Libânio from Paraná!’ But the other man wouldn’t give in so easily and would once again shake his head: ‘No, no, I’m wrong, it wasn’t Libânio. Libânio was in the Third Division, and if I’m not mistaken, this story took place in São Paulo. Oh dear, this memory of mine.’ Then the father, bereft, his forehead dripping with sweat—the world, movement, the sensation of life itself were all disappearing before his eyes—would scan the almost bare room: ‘I’ll bet you that photo album over there—do you see it? It’s a family heirloom. Look carefully. It has silver clasps!’”—(At this point in his story, Senhor Valdo paused briefly. The silence was so great that we could hear the leaves rustling outside. Then he started speaking again, in a different, more emotional tone: “I well remember the last time I saw that room. It was after her father had died of a heart attack, shortly before the wedding. There was nothing left at all, and his corpse, far too thin for the uniform they’d forced his body into, lay stretched out on a mattress on the floorboards. You might say that after living so long in that cramped room, he had drained it of everything; he had gone and left nothing behind. And here’s a curious fact: it never occurred to Nina, who wept bitter tears, that she could not carry on living there after his death. She still hadn’t given me a definite ‘yes,’ and her life, seen from outside, resembled a strange, disturbing adventure. I should have mentioned that the window looked onto a stretch of the Glória seafront: through it wafted a gentle sea breeze and you caught glimpses of the unexpectedly blue water, the one luxury left to adorn that humble death.”)—Senhor Valdo went on: “On hearing the old man’s proposal, the Colonel deliberately played for time: ‘What would I do with an album with silver clasps? It’s the sort of thing that could only be of interest to your family.’ The father began to grovel and beg: ‘I’ll bet you that chair over there, then. It’s the last one, you know. Or that Panama hat you like. Or I’ll bet . . .’ (and his gaze ran desperately around the room, then returned to the table, stopping at his own hands). ‘I’ll bet my wedding ring!’ Sometimes, in the silence broken only by the ticking of the clock, the Colonel would give in and tell him the rest of the story. Then it was as if a river of light flowed invisibly through the room. At other times, though, hard, immovable and as silent as the grave, he would simply leave. On those occasions the father would sleep badly, tossing and turning, waking up shouting in the middle of the night: ‘What is it? Where’s the Minister? Who took the message?’ When he returned to his senses, he would apologize to his daughter, sip a glass of water and wash his face. ‘Colonel Amadeu didn’t tell me everything. Lord, what suffering. It’s like being condemned to death,’ he would say.

“Now, it was in the midst of one of these stories that the most incredible bet of all took place. Colonel Amadeu had stopped telling one of his tales at a key moment, just as he was about to reveal some great political intrigue in which government ministers and generals were implicated. An ex-Minister of War, plotting against the new government, had been secretly transporting arms to a far-flung region of Mato Grosso, where he was training a bunch of badly-paid half-castes and Indians to form a small rebel army who would trigger the revolt, in conjunction with key underground cells established at various locations across the country. It had all been carefully planned by many fine army men, Colonel Amadeu assured him, nodding his head mysteriously. In this intrigue, somewhat improbably, the father himself had figured, for according to the Colonel, ‘they needed him to provide certain reports, and to carry out certain checks that should properly be exercised outside the purview of the Ministry.’ The father was thrilled by this sudden possibility that he might be needed—him, a cripple!—and that he might, even at a distance, play a small part in events which proved, even after his long years as a retiree and an invalid, that he still existed and that in the world of his former comrades, where all that was meaningful in his life had occurred, they still remembered him and valued his contribution. Daydreaming and with his eyes half-shut, he could almost hear them: ‘General, it’s that colonel who had the accident—don’t you remember? The one who served for many years at the district headquarters. A splendid fellow; you couldn’t find a better man for the job.’ This, then, was the final, most diabolical and perfect part of the Colonel’s invention: suddenly bestowing on the poor old man a reason to live, implicating him in the most sensational intrigues of the day. ‘Don’t you remember?’ he would say. ‘It was back when they were repairing the tank at the regimental depot . . .’ Beside him, the old man was anxiously racking his brain, scarcely daring to draw breath: ‘Yes, I remember it well . . .’ ‘Moreover, the matter concerns a major, who was just a lieutenant back in your day.’ ‘Yes, yes,’ the father replied. ‘I remember that lieutenant very well. To judge from the sloppy way he saluted me, he seemed very full of himself.’ Sensing that the old man was hooked, the Colonel stroked his chin: ‘Indeed . . . But the damned thing is I can’t quite remember . . .’ The father cried out: ‘For the love of God, man!’ And the Colonel: ‘Quite. It’s a funny old business. It’s always at exactly this point that my memory seems to fail me.’ The old man shook him: ‘Please, please, carry on . . .’ But the Colonel had cruelly decided to stop. Suspended at its very climax, the story hovered in the air like a slowly evaporating cloud. Already on his feet and standing motionless before him, the Colonel said: ‘It’s late, my friend, and it’s quite a walk home.’ He was blinking as if struggling to pick up the threads of a memory. ‘For pity’s sake,’ groaned the cripple. But the other man, unmoved, was shaking his head: ‘It’s a terrible thing, unbelievable really, but I can’t remember a thing about what happened next.’ The father wrung his hands: ‘Not one more detail? Nothing?’ ‘Nothing.’ ‘A snippet? Anything at all?’ The Colonel was implacable: ‘Alas, I’ve completely forgotten—don’t know what’s come over me.’ And all just as the Colonel was beginning a tale about the regimental depot, at the time when the old man was still a serving officer. A deep sigh filled his chest, as if his own life were escaping him. And that night the Colonel rose and bade him a chilly goodbye, as if the father had mortally offended him. A great silence fell upon the room. Then the father began to shout and foam at the mouth. He was having an attack, just as he used to in his younger days. He spent the rest of the night in a bad way, his body rigid, his eyes bulging. The next day, his face pale and drawn, his very first question was: ‘No message from the Colonel?’ ‘No,’ replied his daughter, standing by his bed. ‘Oh God, I’m suffocating! I need some air!’ he exclaimed, and pressed his hands to his chest. The strange thing was that, for three nights, three interminable nights of permanent agony, the Colonel failed to show up. The father sniffled and sobbed over his misfortune. His daughter tried in vain to distract him, but he became even more irritated, calling her ‘lazy’ and ‘slovenly’ and any other insults that came into his head. ‘Calm down, father,’ she replied. He twisted and turned in his wheelchair, saying he was done for, abandoned by God and by man, one foot already in the grave. He stretched out his hands, examining them: ‘Do you see, Nina? This is what used to happen to me as a young man. I nearly died.’ ‘Hush,’ she consoled him, ‘I’m here beside you. Nothing’s going to happen to you.’ Then he told her she was just like her mother—a mediocre Italian actress who had run off back to Europe saying she was homesick—and that one of these days she, too, would abandon him. His was a terrible fate, and why? What had he done? Nothing, nothing at all. There he was, rotting away in that room, with no friendly voices and not knowing what was happening in the world, or even how his former comrades-in-arms were faring. Oh, it was all too much—what a miserable fate, what indignity! Finally, on the fourth day, the Colonel reappeared, and found a broken man, crushed by adversity. ‘I’m a dead man, my friend,’ the father declared as soon as he saw the Colonel, who went over to him, feigning complete ignorance. ‘But what happened? What can have brought you to this state, and so quickly?’ The old man smiled, the sad smile of a defeated man: ‘I’m a dead man, Colonel.’ The Colonel sat down then and whispered: ‘I’m sorry I haven’t been able to come for the last few days.’ Then added mysteriously: ‘Things have been happening at the barracks . . .’ This insinuating statement made the father’s eyes gleam. And reaching out one trembling hand, he touched his companion’s arm. ‘Shall we play today?’ There was a long, painful pause. Slowly, however, the Colonel’s features revealed his true feelings: ‘I’m sorry, my friend, but today is quite impossible.’ A kind of strangled cry rose to the father’s lips: ‘You mean you’re not going to tell me the rest of the story?’ ‘Please believe me, I’m very sorry, but it’s quite impossible.’ ‘Why?’—and the father, who for years had not risen from his chair, found himself almost standing, ready to prevent his friend’s sudden departure. ‘Because . . .’ He stopped, and for the length of that pause it really did seem that the very existence of a human being hung in the balance. ‘Because I don’t remember the rest of the story.’ He said this coolly, and it was clear from his wan smile that he had just told an enormous lie. At that instant, there must have passed before the father’s eyes, like a flash of lightning, the empty nights, the silence, the absence of any human companionship, nothing but those four walls, and, ashen-faced, he fell back in his chair. ‘What do you want?

What do you want of me?’ he groaned. The Colonel shook his head without saying a word. ‘Just say it. Take whatever you want, but don’t treat me like this: have some pity on a poor old man.’ His voice trembled, his eyes filled with tears. The Colonel, a few feet away, looked impassively down at the broken man before him. ‘To tell the truth . . .’ A faint warmth seemed to revive the old man’s exhausted body. ‘Yes . . .’ The Colonel leaned over the table, ready to play his winning card. ‘I’ve been thinking . . .’ The father waited silently, his eyes fixed on the eyes of his friend. The other man, sighing, as if removing a great weight from his soul: ‘We get on so well with each other—I tell you my stories and you listen.’ ‘Yes, yes,’ the father stammered, like someone who can hear joyful ringing deep inside him. Then the soldier, his mind made up and with an impudent gleam in his eye: ‘Well, then, we could be friends, we could even be relations!’ The astonished father merely repeated: ‘Relations!’ as if he suddenly saw the possibility of supreme happiness in this world. ‘Relations . . .’ he said again. Then rapidly recovering himself: ‘But how?’ ‘Well, for example . . .’ the Colonel hesitated, looked at his friend as if not yet entirely sure of victory, then a confident smile reappeared on his lips: ‘For example, here we have a pretty young woman of marriageable age.’ ‘She’s my daughter!’ exclaimed the father outraged. ‘Yes, she’s your daughter,’ repeated the Colonel coldly, realizing that he had gone too far now to turn back, ‘so what if she’s your daughter? Your daughter also needs to marry, and if we agree . . . In any case, I think I have all the necessary qualities. Or do you have some objection? I may not be exactly young . . .’ The father interrupted him impatiently: ‘But . . .’ The Colonel continued unabashed: ‘There are no ifs or buts about it. Unless, of course, you can think of a better suitor than me? I’m not some down-and-out, I know a thing or two, and, what’s more, there’s my position in the army.’ ‘And you want me to gamble away my own daughter?’ The Colonel stood abruptly to attention: ‘It is not your daughter you are gambling away, it’s her happiness. And I think we can agree it is a bet you are sure to win.’ This argument seemed decisive. The old man tried to resist, wrung his hands and muttered something inaudible, but, seeing the Colonel about to leave, he bowed his head. ‘It’s true,’ he said, ‘but I don’t know . . .’ ‘Don’t know?’ The Colonel loomed forbiddingly over him. ‘You don’t know what? Because I do know: girls of that age have no right to want anything; they must do what their father decides.’ The old man tried one last time: ‘That’s exactly what I was going to say. She . . .’ The Colonel gave a contemptuous snort: ‘She? I’ll take care of that. Once I have your consent . . .’ The father thought it over for a minute and came to the conclusion that the request was not so unreasonable after all, and that they could very well come to an agreement, given that the Colonel himself was offering to speak to his daughter. When he heard the old man’s answer, the Colonel sat down again, pulled his chair closer and picked up where he had left off: ‘So then, my friend, as I was telling you the other day, you were unwittingly at the very fulcrum of the story. At the time, the district headquarters . . .’ The details poured forth and multiplied, but for the entire duration of the Colonel’s report, the father’s eyes remained inexplicably wet with tears.”

“I don’t know,” said Senhor Valdo, finishing his story, “if that was the end of the matter. Colonel Gonçalves wasn’t at heart a bad sort. He helped Nina many times, but the truth is he never managed to master her. Nina wasn’t as needy as her father, although they both had the same lust for life. And as was to be expected, the Colonel ended by losing the bet—the only time he did.”

That was the report given to me by Senhor Valdo. Once or twice, he broke off in order to rein in some particularly strong emotion. Leaning on the counter and feigning an indifference I certainly didn’t feel, I repeatedly asked myself what it was that had made him go so far, what was the secret and pressing motive that had caused him to unburden himself to me in such a manner. Ah, how little we know of the human heart. Deep down, in that unfathomable place where the final scene of a comedy without spectators is played out, perhaps he was merely reacting against the wrath of the Meneses, their constant and oppressive tyranny.

He stood before me for some time, his head bowed, as if he had summoned up those memories purely for his own pleasure. However as soon as he raised his head, I saw his now shadowless face and realized that, during all that time, he had been speaking about someone who had already died, a being who had undoubtedly once been very dear to him, but whose irremediable absence had only be softened by the passing of time. I felt a shiver run through me, imagining the courtship that had preceded their nuptials: the Colonel, with no reason to come up to their rooms after the father’s death, pacing around downstairs waiting for Senhor Valdo to leave so that he could speak to Dona Nina—his pleas, his possible threats, his astonishing proposals—and then the final capitulation, the sublime flowering of that late passion, the wedding, and, at last, Dona Nina’s arrival . . .

And for all my digging into that past that did not belong to me, I learned nothing more than that Senhor Valdo spoke of his wife with all the indifference, gravity, and distance with which we sometimes interrupt our work to recount an anecdote about someone long since dead.