by Gayl Jones
I said that there was nothing wrong with me and tried to hold my head as high as the wife of Martim Aprigio.
“We’re none of us able to have children,” she explained. “It’s either from mutilation or nature or age.”
I was silent, then I looked at her.
“My reason is the first one,” she said solemnly. “But I won’t tell the story. It’s a horror and I refuse to tell horrors to anyone. There are enough of those in this wicked world.”
I said nothing. I noticed how small the steps were she took, as we walked behind the other women. She had a very tall and slender body and she stooped to enter the low door of the hut when we arrived there.
As soon as we were inside, she raised herself onto her hammock and closed her eyes.
“Almeydita.”
I’d not been called Almeydita for a very long time. I turned and the old woman Vera was looking at me. “I hear you’ve dreams to tell,” she said.
I’d told no one of the dreams and daydreams I used to have. In fact, I’d had no daydreams here.
“I’m the one you come to if you’ve dreams to tell,” she said, then she climbed into her hammock and slept.
I climbed into my hammock and went to sleep and dreamed.
In the morning, a Sunday, I followed her into a low doorway. There was the smell of wood burning. She said that white men were in the forest making a canoe. I started to say that the smell came from inside the place she’d brought me to, but she looked at me, and I did not speak. She sat on a mat and gently pulled me down beside her.
“Almeydita,” she called the old name again.
I looked at the gray in her hair and the gold rings in her ears. There were small brown specks in her eyes. Her cheekbones were high and her eyes were like almonds. There were wrinkles in the corners of her eyes and on her forehead. She looked at me with her lips pressed together, then she smiled.
“Tell me your dreams,” she said. She was solemn again.
“Is Vera your real name?” I asked.
She raised her eyebrows and made the wrinkles in her forehead deeper.
“And what does the real name of this woman have to do with you?” she asked.
“Because someone told me that your name was not your own.”
“Is anyone’s?” she asked.
She felt the upper part of my arm for no reason I could see, except that it was very thin, then she removed her hand.
“And will you refuse to tell me the dream without the name?” she said, and smiled.
“No,” I replied. “They were wearing feathers on their heads and blowing horns.”
“Who?”
“Black men. Pretos. They came down from the top of the mountain on two sides and they were wearing white trousers and no shirts and their heads were full of feathers. Some had feathers on their hats like the white man and others had bands around their heads and feathers sticking out of their bands. There was so much noise and shouting. Some were beating drums, some were blowing horns, some were playing flutes and trumpets. They had swords and bows and arrows, torches, axes.”
“Were there rifles?”
“No. Not even the white men. The white men had swords too.” I stopped and looked at her. She nodded for me to go on.
“On the top of the hill there was a fence surrounding it made of wood with sharp points. I only saw part of the fence. I couldn’t see what it was surrounding. But the men. All these men coming down from both sides of the mountain. They were preparing for a great battle it seemed. The white men were afraid and turned back.”
“What was certain?”
“What do you mean?”
“Which men were certain?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
She didn’t explain. She stood and pulled me up.
“As long as you’re here, you must tell your dreams to me.”
She had branches on her head and flowers. Flowers and leaves on the branches. A branch on each side of her head. Two bands wrapped around her head to hold the branches, and she was wearing a wide necklace with many colors. She’d grown into a beautiful young woman dressed this way, and there were moons painted between her breasts.
Painted with red paint, red moons facing each other. And her breasts were large. I’d never seen breasts so large. The breasts were large and there was a big space between them that the red moons filled. She wore bracelets on the upper parts of her arms, and there were little branches hanging from the bracelets. These branches had leaves but no flowers.
And her eyes, her eyes were bright and looked as if they were slanted all the way up to the sky.
“You’ve not forsaken the principles of your religion,” she said.
I didn’t understand her. It was dream language that I didn’t understand. She took my arm and we sat down on the ground again. She was old Vera again.
“You’re a woman,” she said to me softly.
Then she wasn’t there and I was sitting in the doorway of a house that wasn’t my own. There were red lines on my forehead and cheekbones. I was within myself and outside as well. I was weaving something. A blanket? Yes, I was weaving a blanket with many colors in it. My shoulders were round and not sharp and awkward and angular. My breasts were round. I was wearing a wide necklace and bracelets on my arms. I was wearing earrings and my eyes were painted, dark lines around them. There were two baskets and a big shell for cigarette smoke, but I was not smoking. There was a guitar and a mandolin hanging in the doorway. I looked up at a man who was carrying a sheaf of arrows, a very tall man. We were not talking. I watched him remove his jacket.
“Now you’re dreaming the dream of a woman,” she said, an old woman standing in front of me, touching my upper arm.
I said nothing.
“Grandmother,” I whispered. “Is this the Negro asylum?”
“It is Ituiba,” she said quietly.
“What?” I asked.
“My real name. It is Ituiba,” she said. “That’s my real name, not Vera. Come.”
I followed her outside where there were white men carving a canoe.
It was the morning of the next day and I followed her into the cassava barn. I kept waiting to grow tired, but I felt through the day as if I’d rested the whole night.
An Obsessed Man
ONE DAY I SAW THE COVERED HAMMOCK. Two men carried it tied to a long pole, and there was a heavy rug of some kind slung over it, so that it covered him completely, and I wondered how he breathed, as I could not see the slit on one side. It left from the back of the mansion and traveled down to the little thatched house where I’d first stayed. Then it couldn’t have been but five or ten minutes before the hammock came out again. I’d felt faint and Vera had asked Mascarenhas to let me stand in the yard.
When the hammock left the little house, the men who carried it walked a few yards, and then stopped as if someone inside had commanded them to, although I, at a little distance from them, had heard no one. Then the men continued and carried the hammock into the back of the house.
I’d not been back inside for very long when Sobrieski came inside the cassava barn and said something to Mascarenhas. Then it was Mascarenhas who came to me and told me to go with Sobrieski. I handed him my knife and followed the slender and silent Polish shoemaker. It was into the back of the mansion that he took me, and through a long corridor.
The master sat on a hammock. There were ruffles around his collar and ruffles that hung from the sleeves of his dressing gown. Sobrieski left, closing the door. I stood in the center of the room and stared at hands that were as plump as sausages but as delicate as lace. His dark gray eyes were sunken in puffy jaws. He kept staring at me.
“Why do you look at me with your strange eyes?” he asked.
I didn’t answer. I was barefoot, and there was still cassava juice on my hands and dress and feet.
“Why do you look at me so strangely with those eyes? Come nearer.”
I walked nearer, but was still not very close to him
in the long room. “Why do you look at me so?”
I was still silent.
“I’ve not had a woman in this room for a very long time. I’m not a common man, you know. I’m a strange man, an unusual man.”
I still stood watching him.
“I haven’t dined with a woman in a long time,” he said.
I kept looking at him, his jaws and fingers uncooked sausages, his eyes hidden in his face. He called out a name that sounded like Pita and one of the men who’d carried his hammock entered and stood very stiffly, waiting for orders.
“Bring ham, coconut milk, sugar loaf, rice, pears, biscuits, wine, ah fish,” he said. “And tell Sobrieski I want him to fit the woman for a pair of shoes. Sandals. Any other kind will be difficult for her now. Have you ever worn shoes? Didn’t Father Tollinare ever put shoes on his little experiments?”
I shook my head.
“Sandals for now,” said Azevedo.
The man nodded and went out. He didn’t look at me at all. I remember only the wife of Aprigio had been wearing shoes—sandals. But I’m sure she hadn’t been barefoot in the courtyards of noblemen.
“A man should be with a good woman every now and then,” he said.
At first it had been curiosity that made me stare at him so, for I’d thought all masters were as lean and well-proportioned as Entralgo. Now I stared at him in fear.
“Sit down,” he said. “It’s been a long time since I’ve had a woman to look at me like that. Your eyes are lovely, my dear.”
He pointed to one of the many mats and huge many-colored pillows on the floor of the room. I remained standing.
“I’m not a common man, you know,” he repeated. “I’m an unusual man. I’ve kept to myself my whole life until now, not even servants in the house, no servants in the house, not a woman. I cleared all this ground myself, no help none, a man all alone, and planted the first cassava, sugarcane, bananas. No slaves for me. I built this house for myself, no help, by myself, all by myself. I’m not a usual man. You look at me now, eh? Well, I wasn’t the same man you’re staring at now, my dear, being carried about. No. And hiding from people? Well, they’d have hidden from me. But there was no one here but me then. Nobody. A man alone. I built this house by myself, cleared the forest. You’re not looking at a usual man, my dear. Sit down.”
I remained standing.
“I built all these grounds with my own hands.”
He waved his hands in the air. I couldn’t imagine him building anything with them.
“You’re not looking at the same man,” he said. “It was only after it was done, after everything was built, that you people came here. It was only after I got to be an old man that I needed servants in the house. And no woman. I didn’t need a woman here at all, not even a Tupi, and haven’t dined with a good woman in many years.”
Pita entered carrying a long tray which he sat on the floor. He left and came back with another long tray full of all the things that Azevedo had ordered him to bring. Pita left again, and returned with another man.
Together they arranged the long cushions and then lowered Azevedo’s hammock to the floor. They placed a mat and pillows for me, but I remained standing. This time Pita looked at me, and looked away.
“Sit down,” Azevedo said to me. Pita glanced at me again.
“Come, my woman,” Azevedo said, waving his hands across the tray of food.
I remained standing. Pita looked at me and kept his eyes on me. I went to the pillows that had been laid for me and sat down across from Azevedo.
“I’m done with you. I don’t need anyone else,” Azevedo said, and Pita and the other man left, closing the door.
Azevedo sat looking at me, then he waved his hand across the trays again. “Take what you want, my dear.”
I took nothing. I still stared at him, at his small gray eyes. He reached down and picked up a piece of smoked fish and held it out to me. He kept holding it out. Although I didn’t take it, he wouldn’t put it down.
There was something in his face that made me feel as if I should take it, but I couldn’t. He still held it out.
“I am not a common man,” he said. “You’re not looking at the man I was then. If you were looking at the man I was then, you’d not refuse me, not even you.”
I suddenly reached out and took it. He smiled and reached down for another piece. He ate it in small quick bites. I held mine in my hand for a long time, and then ate it slowly. He held out other things to me, which I took. I’d never had so much food at one time, though I’d often seen the masters eat like that. Some things on the tray I’d never eaten before, and some things I’d never even seen before. I took what he handed to me until my stomach began to feel strange, and I held it. I wondered how the masters ate like that without their stomachs complaining.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“I’m not used to eating so much.”
“Mascarenhas doesn’t feed you?” he asked.
“Yes, but it’s mostly the same things again and again. Cassava bread and cassava pudding.”
He handed me a bowl of coconut milk. “Here, drink this. It will help,” he said.
I took it and drank and set the bowl back down on the tray. Then I wouldn’t speak again. I sat very still and wouldn’t speak or look at him. I felt ashamed for eating with him.
“Now you are fed, you would deny me.”
I pretended not to know what he meant. Perhaps I didn’t know. I wouldn’t look at him. My stomach felt very unsettled, and I held it. I wasn’t sure whether it was the shame or the food that unsettled it.
“Look at me. I want to see your lovely eyes.”
I looked at him. He put his hand under his coat and kept looking at me.
“I am not a usual man,” he said slowly. “Why are you watching me with such eyes? Speak to me. Say something. This isn’t an ordinary man that you’re looking at. No. I came to this place alone and cleared the land by myself.”
He stared at me with gray eyes deep inside his face. His hand moved back and forth and up and down inside his long coat.
“I came here alone and built this house for myself and alone, see how thick the walls are and how cool it is inside, it’s as big and good as any you’ve seen, alone, with nobody, I cleared and planted, a man alone, ah yes, I didn’t need a woman here, no, I didn’t need a woman in this place, ah yes, why are you looking at me with such lovely eyes?”
He kept his hand inside his coat and rose up slightly. Then he settled down in the hammock, and seemed to sigh. His gray eyes got wider, and looked at me fully.
“You’re like a woman who never moves. You never move and have stopped speaking. Are you of flesh and blood?”
Suddenly, here was a knock at the door and Sobrieski said his name.
Azevedo told him to enter. He came in and bowed to Azevedo, then began, without a word, to measure my feet for sandals. Then he left quickly without a word. He had light-colored flat hair, and was dressed in a white shirt and trousers more like a slave’s than a master’s, although the first time I’d seen him he’d worn expensive looking clothes, and I’d been certain he was my new master.
“The leatherworker claims he’s some kin to me,” Azevedo said with a smirk. “That we’re brothers by a different father but the same woman.” He laughed out loud. “We’re all brothers by the same father. Ha ha ha ha. Aren’t we all?” He paused. “Speak to me.” He waited. “Is your stomach still unsettled?”
I didn’t answer. He’d taken his hand from his coat and wiped it on a cloth. Now he put it back inside. “Speak to me,” he whispered. His eyes looked pleading. Then he stared out, expressionless. “You think I’m an ordinary man. But you’re looking at what I am now. Ask the old woman, ask Old Vera. Ask her what this man was then and that’s what she’ll remember, all she’ll remember, because I haven’t let her get a glimpse of me in years and so that’s all she’ll remember, because that’s all she’s seen. Ask her what I’m like, my dear, and she won’t speak t
o you of the man you’re looking at, because she’s never seen this one.” His hand went back and forth. “I built it by myself and I kept it, and then her with her slanted eyes, no, not like now, huge almond eyes, and her breasts like sweet cassava. In those days, mind you, I could eat cassava all the time. Old Vera. But it’s the same as me. All you see now is the old woman, afraid to show her bosom, but then, in those days she was too handsome, too handsome. I never needed any woman, and then I never needed any other woman.”
I stared at him and started to rise, but he waved his other hand at me while the one inside his coat moved up and down, then back and forth.
“When I first brought her here I had flowers everywhere, everywhere.
“And she’d put them all over. She’d put them all over her body, on her arms, around her ankles, around her head, flowers, banana leaves, cassava branches.”
I looked at him, my eyes wide, for he was describing the woman I had seen.
“She wasn’t afraid of her bosom then. Sweet, ripe cassava. She was too handsome. And I was no ordinary man myself then. You look at me now, but you don’t remember what she remembers. When I first came here, I worked like a slave myself, a slave and more, cleared my own land, built this house. I went for years without the touch of a woman. No, you’re not looking at the same man she remembers.” He stopped moving his hand and stared at me, then he began to move it again. He raised himself up and seemed to stay there, almost floating atop his hammock, his hand still inside his long coat.
“She said that it was I who made cruelty here. That it was I who made it, as if it didn’t already exist in the world. I who made it . . . There’s a code of silence between us now. But she’ll know. She’ll know that I’ve been with a good woman. She’ll know it. She has her ways of knowing such things.” His whole body seemed to settle again.
He removed his hand from his coat and wiped it on the cloth.
“What did you do?” I asked.
“What?” He spoke quickly.
“What cruelty to her? What did you do to her?”
“Cruelty? Me? What did I do to her? It’s what she did to me is more the question.”
