With this unexpected capitulation, Pedro Orce, José Anaiço, and Joaquim Sassa found themselves occupying a room without any real struggle, and two days later they gave it to one of the needier families, with a paralyzed grandmother and wounded relatives requiring treatment. In the upheaval, the like of which had never been seen before, there were husbands who lost their wives, children who lost their parents, but the sequel of these traumatic separations, something no one could ever have invented, which, in itself, confirms the persuasive truth of the story, the sequel, as we were saying, was that members of a given family, scattered but driven by the same dynamism even when apart, ended up in rooms in different hotels, since it had proved extremely difficult to unite under one roof all those who had been demanding that everyone should be under the same roof, and people usually ended up choosing a hotel by the number of stars on its signboard. The police commissioners, army colonels, and captains of the guard asked for reinforcements, for armored cars, for instructions from Lisbon, the government, not knowing where to turn, gave orders and countermanded them, uttered threats and pleas, it was said that three ministers had already resigned. Meanwhile, from the sands and streets of Albufeira jubilant families could be seen at the hotel windows, on those fine, spacious terraces, with their breakfast tables and padded chaises longues, father was hammering the first nails into place and putting up a clothesline, while mother, singing to herself, was already doing her washing indoors in the bathroom. And the swimming pools were teeming with bathers and divers, no one had remembered to explain to the children that they must take a shower before plunging into the blue water, it is not going to be all that easy to make these people change their habits now that they have left their slums.
Bad example has always prospered and borne more fruit than good advice, and who can tell by what rapid means bad example is transmitted, for within a few hours this popular movement of occupation had jumped over the border and spread throughout Spain, you can imagine what it must have been like in Marbella and Torremolinos, where the hotels are like cities and three are enough to form a megalopolis. Europe, upon receiving these alarming reports, began shouting Anarchy, Social Chaos, Invasion of Private Property, and a French newspaper, influential in forming public opinion, prophetically spelled out in bold print across its front page, You Can't Change Human Nature. These words, however unoriginal, struck a chord in the hearts of Europeans, whenever they spoke of the former Iberian peninsula, they would shrug their shoulders and say to each other, What can you do, they're like that, you can't change human nature, the only exception to this accusing chorus came from a certain modest but Machiavellian newspaper published in Naples, Housing Problem Solved in Portugal and Spain.
During the remaining days the three friends spent in Albufeira, the riot police, bolstered by a special squad, tried to clear one of the hotels by force, but the joint and coordinated resistance of the new arrivals and the owners, the former resolved to hold out to the last, the latter fearful of the havoc usually caused by the so-called rescuers, resulted in the suspension of the operations, which were postponed until another opportunity might arise when time and promises would have weakened the rebels' vigilance. By the time Pedro Orce, Joaquim Sassa, and José Anaiço resumed their journey to Lisbon there already existed democratically elected residents' committees in the occupied buildings, with subcommittees responsible for such matters as hygiene and maintenance, kitchen and laundry, entertainment and recreation, cultural activities, education and counseling, gymnastics and sports, everything, in short, that is essential for the smooth and efficient running of any community. On their own improvised flagpoles the squatters hoisted banners and pennants of every conceivable color, they used anything that came to hand, flags of foreign countries, of sports clubs, of various associations, under the aegis, as it were, of the national colors fluttering at the top, there were even bedspreads hanging from the windows, in admirable imitation of these decorations.
However, an adversative adverb that invariably denotes opposition, restriction, or difference, and that, applied to this situation, reminds us that even the things that are good for some are precisely those that disadvantage others, the savage occupation of these hotels was the drop of water that caused the disquiet that from the outset gripped the rich and powerful to overflow. Many of them, afraid that the peninsula might sink, sweeping away their property and their lives, had fled at once during the exodus of tourists, which obviously does not mean that the former were suddenly foreigners in their own country, although people can belong in various degrees to the country that is naturally and administratively theirs, as history has shown time and time again.
Now, amid the general condemnation of these outrages, which was more universal than general, if we leave aside the incongruous attitude of that insignificant Neapolitan paper, there occurred a second emigration, so massive one feels justified in thinking that it had been carefully planned once it became clear to all that the wounds inflicted on Europe would never heal, that the physical structure of the peninsula had split, who would ever have believed it, just where it seemed strongest. The huge bank accounts suddenly dwindled, leaving a bare minimum, just a token sum, about five hundred escudos in Portugal, about five hundred pesetas in Spain, or perhaps a little more, current accounts were practically wiped out, time deposits were closed with some loss of interest, and everything, all of it, gold, silver, precious stones, jewels, works of art, bonds, everything was carried off by the strong gusts of wind that swept the fugitives' personal property over the sea, in all thirty-two directions of the compass, they hoped to recover the rest one day, with time and patience. Clearly, these great removals could not be achieved within twenty-four hours, but a week was all that was needed for the social physiognomy of these two Iberian countries to be transformed from top to bottom, from side to side. Any observer unaware of the facts and motives, and allowing himself to be taken in by appearances, would have come to the conclusion that the Portuguese and the Spaniards had been reduced to poverty from one minute to the next, when in fact all that had happened was that the rich had gone away, and without them the demographics soon showed a dramatic decline.
To those observers who can see an entire Olympus of gods and goddesses where there are nothing but passing clouds, or to those who have Jupiter Tonans before their eyes but refer to him as atmospheric vapor, we shall never tire of pointing out that it is not enough to speak of circumstances, with their bipolar division into antecedents and consequences, as one does to reduce the mental effort, but that one must rather consider what is infallibly situated between the former and the latter, let us spell them all out in the right order, time, place, motive, means, person, deed, manner, for unless we measure and ponder everything, we are bound to make some fatal mistake in the very first opinion we offer. Man is undoubtedly an intelligent being, but not as intelligent as one would like, and this is a proof and confession of humility, which should always begin at home, as one says of charity in the proper sense of the word, before you reproach us.
They arrived in Lisbon as night was falling, at that hour when the gentle light fills souls with sweet remorse, now one sees how right that admirable judge of sensations and impressions was when he maintained that landscape was a state of mind, what he was not able to tell us was what it looked like in the days when there was nothing but pithecanthropus in the world, with as yet scant soul, and not just scant but confused as well. Thousands of years later, and thanks to evolution, Pedro Orce can now recognize in the apparent melancholy of the city the faithful image of his own intimate sadness. He had grown accustomed to the company of these Portuguese who had come to look for him in those inhospitable parts where he was born and lived, soon they will have to go their separate ways, each man to his own destination, not even families can resist the erosion of necessity, so what are mere acquaintances to do, friends of recent vintage and delicate roots.
Deux Chevaux crosses the bridge slowly, at the lowest speed permitted, to give the Span
iard time to admire the beauty of the views of land and sea, and also the impressive feat of engineering that links the two banks of the river, this construction, we are referring to the sentence, is periphrastic, and is used here to avoid repeating the word bridge, which would result in a solecism, of the pleonastic or redundant kind. In the various arts, and above all in that of writing, the shortest distance between two points, even if close to each other, has never been and never will be, nor is it now, what is known as a straight line, never, never, to put it strongly and emphatically in response to any doubts, to silence them once and for all. The travelers were so absorbed in the wonders of the city, so thrilled by this prodigious achievement, that they did not even notice how the starlings suddenly took fright. Drunk on altitude, gliding dangerously close to the enormous pillars that rose from the waters to support the sky, on this side the city with its windowpanes aflame, beyond the sea and the sun, and below the great river flowing past, like a sluggish current of lava burning beneath the ashes, the birds abruptly changed course, with a rapid cascade of wing-flaps, and it was as if the earth were rotating around the bridge, the north becoming east and then south, the south west and then north, where in the world shall we end up when we ourselves are forced one day to move just as much or even more. As we have already stated, men, even when they see these things, fail to understand them, nor did these men understand what they saw on this occasion.
They were halfway across the bridge when Pedro Orce murmured, Nice city, words as amiable as these call for no reply, except perhaps for a modest, Yes, isn't it. There would still be enough timé to leave Pedro Orce settled in a hotel and continue their journey, at least as far as the town in Ribatejo where José Anaiço lives, and where Joaquim Sassa could if he wished spend another night beneath the fig tree, but it would have been impolite to abandon their visitor, so the two Portuguese had made a joint decision, they would remain there for a few days, sufficient time for the Spaniard to get to know the city and once back in Orce to make his own the words of that old saying that innocently boasts, Lisbon the lovely, Lisbon the fair, Never to see her's to miss something rare, praise be to God who has given us rhymes without denying us His blessings.
Joaquim Sassa and José Anaiço are not short of money, they had gathered what they had for their excursion across the border and back, and they had managed to economize, as we know, sleeping on one occasion under the moonlight, on another spending the night at the home of an Andalusian pharmacist, and, profiting from the anarchy and disorder in the Algarve, they received no bill for their stay in a hotel. Here in Lisbon, hotels have only been besieged and occupied on the outskirts of the city, the more central hotels were spared, two countervailing factors came into play, first, this being the capital, as in most countries you are likely to find the greatest concentration of the forces of law and order, or repression, here, second, that timidity peculiar to the city-dweller, who often becomes uneasy, withdrawing once he senses that he is being observed and judged by his neighbor, and vice versa, the protozoa in the drop of water certainly disturb the lens and the eye behind it that observes and disturbs them. Because of the lack of clients, nearly all the hotels had closed their doors, for repairs, this was their excuse, but some continued to function, offering low-season tariffs and special reductions, to the point where some large families seriously considered abandoning the houses for which they were being charged colossal rents, and taking up residence in the Méridien or some such hotel. The aspirations of the three travelers did not rise to so dramatic a change of status, which is why they decided to install themselves in a modest hotel, at the end of the Rua do Alecrim, on the left as you go down, the name has no bearing on this story, once was enough and perhaps even superfluous.
Starlings are starlings, and the word is also used for people who are frivolous and giddy, in other words people who rarely reflect on their actions, who are incapable of foreseeing or imagining anything beyond the here and now, which is not incompatible with certain acts of generosity, even the sacrifice of one's own life, as we saw in the episode at the frontier, when so many tender little bodies dropped dead, shedding their blood for the sake of others, remember we're speaking about birds, not people. But frivolity and giddiness are the least one can attribute to these thousands of birds who foolishly go and perch on a hotel roof, attracting the attention of the crowd and of the police, of ornithologists and of gourmets who relish a tasty meal of little fried birds, and thus betray the presence of the three men who, with no guilt weighing on their conscience, have nevertheless become the target of some unwelcome attention from the authorities. For unbeknownst to the travelers, the Portuguese papers, on the page that regularly features unusual events, had reported the irresistible attack the starlings waged on the unsuspecting border guards, invoking, as one might have expected, though with scant originality, the Hitchcock film we mentioned earlier. Now the newspapers, the radio and television stations, informed promptly about the strange happenings at the Cais do Sodré, sent reporters, photographers, video technicians to the scene, which might have had no consequences beyond enriching the Lisbon folklore, if the methodical and, why not say it, scientific mind of a certain journalist had not led him to consider a possible connection between the starlings outside on the roof and the guests inside the hotel, either permanent or simply passing through. Unaware of the danger literally hovering over their heads, Joaquim Sassa, José Anaiço and Pedro Orce, each in his own room, were unpacking the little luggage they were carrying, within a few minutes they would be down on the street, having decided to take a quick look around the city, until it was time for dinner. But at this precise moment the quick-witted journalist is consulting the guest list, running through the names of those registered, and suddenly two of those names begin to set the wheels of memory in motion, Joaquim Sassa, Pedro Orce, he would not be much of a journalist had those names escaped his eye, the same thing might have happened with another name, Ricardo Reis, but the book where that name was once registered, many, many years ago, is stored away in the archives, covered with dust in the attic, written on a page that may never come to light, and if it should, most likely the name will be illegible, the line will be faded, or even the entire page, that's one of the effects of time, to blot out everything. To this day there has been no greater achievement in the art of hunting than killing two rabbits at one blow, from now on the number of rabbits within the scope of the hunter's skill will be increased from two to three, this will mean reversing all the books of proverbs, so where you see two, read three, and perhaps we won't stop here.
Requested to come down to reception, then installed in the lounge before the great mirror of truth, when pressed by the journalists Joaquim Sassa and Pedro Orce had no choice but to confirm that they were, respectively, the one who threw the stone into the sea and the living seismograph. But there are the starlings, it's surely not by chance that so many starlings have gathered here, the observant reporter remarked, whereupon José Anaiço, loyal to his friends and true to the facts, made a statement, The starlings are accompanying me. Most of the questions addressed to Joaquim Sassa, and the corresponding answers, coincided with the dialogue he had imagined between himself and the civil authorities, which explains why they aren't repeated here, but Pedro Orce, who hadn't exactly been a prophet in his own country, talked at length about the recent events in his life, Yes sir, he could still feel the earth tremor, deep and intense, as if his bones were vibrating, and in Granada, Seville, and Madrid he had undergone multiple tests to check his emotions and intellect, his sensory reactions and movements, and here he was, prepared to subject himself to similar or different checks if the Portuguese authorities should consider them necessary. Meanwhile, darkness had fallen, the starlings responsible for this investigation had dispersed into the trees of the nearby gardens, the journalists, having run out of questions and slaked their curiosity, departed with their cameras and flashlights, but this did not restore peace in the hotel, waiters and porters invented excuses for c
oming to the reception desk and looking into the lounge to see what these freaks were like.
Worn out by the endless upheaval, the three friends decided not to go out but to dine in the hotel. Pedro Orce was worried about the consequences of having allowed himself to get carried away and of having talked so much, After they warned me over and over in Spain not to say a word about my situation, they won't like it when they find out, but perhaps if I stay on here for a few days they will forget all about me. José Anaiço was doubtful, Tomorrow our story will be in all the newspapers, they might even have it on television this evening, and those newscasters on the radio won't keep their mouths shut, they never get tired, and Joaquim Sassa retorted, Even so, among the three of us, you're the best off, you can always argue that you're not to blame if the starlings follow you, you don't whistle to them or feed them, but we're both in a tight spot, people stare at Pedro Orce as if he were some crank, the Portuguese scientists won't want to lose this guinea pig, and they won't let up on me with this story about the stone, You two have the car, Pedro Orce reminded them, you can leave at the crack of dawn, or even tonight, I'm staying on, if they ask me where you've gone, I'll say I don't know, It's much too late now, the moment I appear on television someone will telephone from the town where 1 live just to say that they know me, that I'm the local schoolmaster, and that they've been suspicious for some time, some people thirst for glory, this is what José Anaiço had to say, and he added, It's better for us to stick together, we just won't say very much and they'll get tired pretty quickly.
As predicted, there was a full report on the final news bulletin on television, they showed the starlings in flight, the façade of the hotel, the manager making statements we know to be false, as will soon become clear, These events are without precedent in the history of this hotel, and the three prodigies, Pedro, José, and Joaquim, answering questions.
The Collected Novels of José Saramago Page 130
