The Collected Novels of José Saramago

by José Saramago

  As everyone knows, our thoughts, both anxious and happy thoughts, and others which are neither one thing nor the other, sooner or later grow weary and bored with themselves, it's just a question of letting time do its work, it's just a matter of leaving them to the lazy daydreaming that comes naturally to them, adding no new irritating or polemical reflection to the bonfire, above all taking supreme care not to intervene whenever an attractive bifurcation, branch Une, or turning appears before a thought which is already ripe for distraction. Or, rather, you can intervene, but only to give it a gentle shove from behind, especially if it's a troubling thought, as if we were saying, Go on, off you go, you're fine. This was what Senhor José did when that mad, providential fantasy of the photographic wave and the scanner wave came to him, he at once abandoned himself to his imagination, let it show him those invasive waves scouring the whole room in search of those records, which he had not, in fact, left on the table, perplexed and ashamed because they could not carry out the orders they had received, Remember, either you find those records, read them and photograph them, or we go back to the old-style espionage. Senhor José still thought about the Registrar, but it was a purely residual thought, one that helped him find an acceptable explanation for his return to the Central Registry outside of normal hours, He must have forgotten something he needed, what other reason could there be. Without realising, he repeated out loud the final part of the phrase, What other reason could there be, again provoking the distrust of the passenger travelling next to him, whose thoughts immediately became clear and explicit when he changed his seat, The guy is mad, we're sure that he used these or similar words to think it. Senhor José did not notice the withdrawal of the man next to him on the seat, he moved seamlessly on to thoughts of the lady in the ground-floor apartment, she was there before him at the door, Do you remember me, I'm from the Central Registry, Of course I do, I've come here about that matter we discussed the other day, You've found my goddaughter, No, I haven't, or rather, yes, that is, I mean, I'd like to have a little chat with you, if you wouldn't mind, if you've got a moment, Come in, I've got something to tell you too. That, more or less, was what Senhor José and the lady in the ground-floor apartment said when she opened the door and saw him there, Ah, its you, she exclaimed, so he had no need to ask, Do you remember me, I'm Senhor José from the Central Registry, but despite this, he couldn't resist asking the question, so constant, so imperious, so demanding it would seem is our need to go about the world declaring who we are, even when we've just heard someone else say, Ah, it's you, as if just because they've recognised us, they know us and need to know nothing more about us, or as if the little that remained unknown wasn't worth the effort of formulating another question.

  Nothing had changed in the small living room, the chair where Senhor José had sat the first time was in the same place, at the same distance from the table, the curtains hung as they had before, in the same folds, the woman made the same gesture when she folded her hands in her lap, right over left, only the light from the ceiling seemed slightly paler, as if the bulb were burning out. Senhor José asked, How have you been since my last visit, and then he reproached himself for his lack of sensitivity, worse still, for the utter crassness he was revealing, he should know that you don't always have to Mow the rules of elementary politeness to the letter, you must take into account the circumstances, you have to weigh each case, let's imagine that the woman responds now with a broad smile, I'm very well, thank you, my health is excellent, I'm in good spirits, I haven't felt this fit for ages, and then he blurts out, Well, I'm sorry to tell you this, but your goddaughter has died, what do you make of that. But the woman didn't reply to his question, she merely shrugged indifferently, then she said, Do you know, for some days I've been thinking of phoning you at the Central Registry, then I decided not to, I thought that sooner or later you would come and visit me, It's just as well you didn't phone, the Registrar doesn't like us getting phone calls, he says it gets in the way of work, Of course, but that needn't have been a problem, I just had to give him the information I had, he wouldn't have had to call you over. Beads of sweat broke out on Senhor José's forehead. He had just discovered that, for weeks, ignorant of the danger, unconscious of the threat hanging over him, he had been living on the brink of absolute disaster, the public exposure of irregularities in his professional conduct, the continual and wilful affront he was in the process of committing against the venerable deontological laws of the Central Registry, whose chapters, articles, paragraphs and clauses, however complex, due to the extreme archaism of the language, had finally been reduced down by the experience of two centuries to nine practical words, Don't stick your nose in where it isn't wanted. For a moment, Senhor José hated and detested the woman before him, he insulted her mentally, he called her a feeble old woman, cretin, nincompoop, and like someone who can find no better way of overcoming some sudden, violent shock, he was almost on the point of saying to her, Well, try this on for size, your goddaughter, the one in the picture, has kicked the bucket. The woman asked, Are you feeling ill, Senhor José, would you like a glass of water, No, I'm fine, don't worry, he replied, ashamed of that wicked impulse, I'm going to make you some tea, There's no need, really, I don't want to be any bother, at that moment, Senhor José was feeling as base and humble as the dust in the street, the woman had left the room, he heard her rattling cups in the kitchen, a few minutes passed, first you have to boil the water, Senhor José remembers having read somewhere, probably in one of the magazines where he gets his clippings of famous people, tea should be made with water that has just boiled but is not actually boiling, he would have been quite happy with a glass of cold water, but the tea would do him far more good, everyone knows that there's nothing like a nice cup of tea for lifting the spirits, all the manuals say so, both in the East and the West. The lady of the house appeared with a tray, she had also brought a plate of biscuits, as well as the teapot, cups and the sugar bowl. I didn't even ask if you liked tea, it only just occurred to me that perhaps you would prefer coffee, she said, No, I like tea, I really do, Do you take sugar, No, I don't, suddenly he went pale and started sweating, he thought he should explain, It must be the remains of the flu I caught, So if I'd phoned, you probably wouldn't even have been there, and I really would have had to tell your boss what had happened. This time the sweat only dampened Senhor José's palms, but even so it was lucky that his cup was on the table, had he been holding it at that moment it would have fallen to the floor, or spilled scalding tea all over the wretched clerk's legs, with inevitable consequences, first the burn, then the return of his trousers to the laundry. Senhor José took a biscuit from the plate, nibbled at it slowly, listlessly and, disguising with chewing the difficulty he was having in formulating any words, he managed to ask the long-delayed question, And what was this information you had to give me. The woman took a sip of tea, reached a hesitant hand out to the plate of biscuits, but did not complete the gesture. She said, You remember that I suggested to you, at the end of your visit, just when you were leaving, that you should look up my goddaughter's name in the phone book, Yes I do, but I decided not to follow your advice, Why, It's rather difficult to explain, Well, you probably had your reasons, It's easy enough to give reasons for what we do or don't do, when we see that we haven't got a reason or not enough of a reason, then we try to invent one, in the case of your goddaughter, for example, I could now say that I preferred to take the longest, most complicated route, And is that one of the real reasons or one of the invented ones, Let's just say there's as much truth in it as there is falsehood, And which bit is the falsehood, Me pretending that the reason I gave to you should be taken as the whole truth, And it isn't, No, because I've left out the reason why I preferred that route and not another more direct one, You're bored with the routine of your job, That could be another reason, How are your investigations going, Tell me first what happened, let's pretend that I was at the Central Registry when you first thought of phoning me and that the boss does
n't mind us getting phone calls. The woman raised the cup to her Hps again, replaced it on the saucer without making the slightest noise and said, as her hands returned to her lap, again her right hand covering her left, I did what I told you to do, You phoned her, Yes, You spoke to her, Yes, When was that, A few days after you came here, I couldn't cope with all the memories, I couldn't sleep, And what happened, We talked, She must have been surprised, She didn't seem to be, But that would be the normal reaction after so many years of separation and silence, You obviously don't know much about women, especially when they're unhappy, So she was unhappy, It didn't take long before we were both crying, as if we were bound to each other by a thread of tears, What happened next, What do you mean, Did she tell you anything about her life, Very little, just that she'd been married, but was now divorced, We know that already, it's on her card, We left it that she would come and visit me as soon as she had time, Did she come, No, not as yet, What do you mean, Just that she hasn't come, And she hasn't phoned either, No, she hasn't, How long ago was this, About two weeks, More or less, Less I think, yes, less, And what did you do, At first, I thought she'd changed her mind, that she didn't want to renew old friendships, that she didn't want us to get close, those tears must have been a moment of weakness and nothing more, it happens often enough, there are times in our lives when we just let go, when we're capable of telling the first stranger we meet about our pain and sorrow, do you remember, when you were here, Of course I remember, and I never thanked you properly for the trust you placed in me, It wasn't a question of trust, it was despair, Whatever it was, I promise you will never regret it, you can trust me, I'm very discreet, Yes, I'm sure I won't regret it, Thank you, But the reason I know I won't regret it is because nothing really matters to me anymore, Ah. It wasn't easy passing from a disconsolate interjection like that to a direct question of the type, So, then what did you do, it required time and tact, so Senhor José fell silent, waiting for what would happen next. As if she were aware of that too, the woman asked, Would you like some more tea, he accepted, Yes, please, and held out his cup. Then the woman said, A few days ago I telephoned her house, And what happened, No one answered, I got the answering machine, You only phoned once, On the first day, yes, but the following days I tried several times and at different hours, I phoned in the morning, I phoned in the afternoon, I phoned after supper, I even phoned at midnight, And nothing, Nothing, I thought perhaps she'd gone away, Did she tell you where she worked, No. The conversation could not continue to roll around the black hole hiding the truth, the moment was approaching when Senhor José would say Your goddaughter is dead, in fact, he should have told her as soon as he arrived, that's what the woman will say to him shortly, Why didn't you tell me straightaway, why did you ask all those questions if you knew she was already dead, and he will be unable to lie alleging that he remained silent because he didn't want to spring the painful news on her, without preparation, without due respect, in truth, the only reason for this long, slow dialogue had been the words she had said at the start, I've got something to tell you too, at that point, Senhor José lost the resigned serenity that would have made him reject the temptation of knowing about that tiny, useless thing, whatever it was, he lacked the serene resignation necessary to say, It doesn't matter, she's dead. It was as if what the lady in the ground-floor apartment had to tell him might still, who knows how, make time run backwards and, at the very last moment, steal the unknown woman back from death. Weary, with no other desire now than to delay the inevitable for a few more seconds, Senhor José asked, You didn't consider going to her house, asking the neighbours if they'd seen her, Of course I did, but I didn't go, Why, Because it would look as if I was interfering, she might not like that, But you phoned, That's different. There was a silence, then the expression on the woman's face began to change, it became interrogative, and Senhor José realised that she was going to ask, at last, what questions relating to the matter of her goddaughter had brought him there today, had he managed to speak to her and when, was the problem with the Central Registry resolved and how, I regret to tell you that your goddaughter is dead, said Senhor José. The woman opened her eyes very wide, raised her hands from her lap and covered her mouth, What, Your goddaughter has died, How do you know, asked the woman without thinking, That's what the Central Registry is there for, said Senhor José, and he shrugged his shoulders slightly, as if to say, It's not my fault, When did she die, I've got the card here, if you want to see it. The woman reached out her hand, held the card close to her eyes then moved it farther off, mumbling, My glasses, but she didn't go and look for them, she knew they wouldn't help, even if she wanted to she wouldn't be able to read what was written there, her tears were blurring the words. Senhor José said, I'm very sorry. The woman left the room and was gone for a few brief moments, when she came back she was drying her eyes with a handkerchief. She sat down, poured herself some more tea, then asked, Did you come here just to tell me that my goddaughter had died, Yes, That was very kind of you, I thought it was my duty really, Why, Because I felt I was in your debt, Why, Because of the nice way you received me and helped me, the way you answered my questions, Now that force of circumstances has brought the job they gave you to an end, you won't have to wear yourself out any more looking for my poor goddaughter, No, I won't, Perhaps the Central Registry has already instructed you to start looking for another person, No, no, cases like this are very rare, That's the good thing about death, it brings everything to a close, Its not always like that, that's when the battles begin between heirs, the ferocious dividing up of the spoils, then there's inheritance tax to be paid, For the person who's died I meant, As for that, yes, you're right, everything ends, It's odd, you never explained to me why the Central Registry was looking for my goddaughter, why they were so interested in her, As you said, death resolves all problems, So there was a problem, Yes, What, It's not worth talking about it, the matter is of no importance now, What matter, Please don't insist, it's confidential, said Senhor José desperately. The woman angrily put down her cup and saucer and, looking straight at him, said, All the time that you and I have been together here, both the other day and today, right from the start, one of us has always told the truth and the other has always lied, But I didn't He then and I'm not lying now, You'll admit that I always talked to you frankly, clearly, openly, that it would never even have occurred to you that there might be a single He in anything I said, Absolutely, Then if there's a liar in this room, as I know there is, it's certainly not me, I'm not a liar, No, I'm sure you're not a fiar by nature, but you lied when you first came here, and you've been lying ever since, You wouldn't understand, I understand enough not to believe that the Central Registry sent you here looking for my goddaughter, You're wrong, they did send me, Then if you've nothing more to say to me, if that is your final word, please leave my house this instant, now, she almost shouted that last word, and then she began to cry. Senhor José got up, took a step towards the door, then sat down again, Forgive me, he said, don't cry, I'll tell you everything.

  When I'd finished talking, she asked me, And what do you think you'll do now, Nothing, I said, Are you going to go back to your collections of famous people, I don't know, possibly, I'll have to fill my time somehow, I fell silent, thinking, and then said, No, I don't think I will, Why, Well, when you think about it, their lives are always the same, they never change, they appear, they talk, they show themselves off, they smile for the photographers, they're always arriving or departing, Just like us, Not like me, Like you and me and everyone, we all show ourselves off in various places, we talk, we leave our homes and come back, sometimes we even smile, the difference is that no one takes any notice of us, We can't all be famous, Just as well, imagine if your collection were as big as the Central Registry, It would have to be even bigger, the Central Registry only wants to know when we're born and when we die, and that's about it, Whether we marry, get divorced, widowed or remarried, the Central Registry has absolutely no interest in finding out if we were
happy or unhappy while all that was going on, Happiness and unhappiness are just like famous people, they come and they go, the worst thing about the Central Registry is that they're not interested in what we're like, for them we're just a piece of paper with a few names and dates on it, Like my goddaughter's card, Or yours, or mine, What would you have done if you'd actually met her, I don't know, perhaps I'd have spoken to her, perhaps not, I never really thought about it, And did it occur to you that, at the moment when she was actually there before you, you would know as much about her as you did on the day you first decided to look for her, that is, nothing, and that if you wanted to know who she was, you would have to begin looking again and that, from then on, it would be much more difficult, if, unlike famous people, who like showing themselves off, she preferred not to be found, You're right, But, since she's dead, you can go on looking for her, she won't mind now, I don't understand, Up until now, despite all your efforts, the only thing you've found out is that she went to a school, in fact, the very one I told you about, I've got photographs, Photographs are just bits of paper too, We could share them, And we would imagine that we were sharing her out between us, one bit for you, one bit for me, There's nothing more to be done, that's what I said at the time, assuming that she considered the matter closed, but she asked me, Why don't you go and talk to her parents, to her ex-husband, What for, To try and learn something more about her, how she lived, what she did, Her husband probably wouldn't want to talk about her, it's all water under the bridge, But her parents are bound to, parents never let slip a chance to talk about their children, even if they're dead, at least that's been my experience, I didn't go and see them before and I'm certainly not going to now, before, I could have said that I'd been sent by the Central Registry, What did my goddaughter die of, I don't know, How is that possible, her death must be registered at the Central Registry, On the card we just put the date of death, not the cause, But there must be a certificate, doctors are obliged by law to certify a death, when she died, they wouldn't just write She's dead, The death certificate wasn't with the papers I found in the archive of the dead, Why, I don't know, they must have dropped it when they were taking her file to be put away, or else I dropped it, anyway, it's lost, it would be like looking for a needle in a haystack, you can't imagine what it's like in there, From what you've told me I can, You can't, it's impossible, you'd have to actually be there, In that case you've got a perfect reason to go and talk to her parents, tell them that, unfortunately, her death certificate has got lost in the Central Registry, that you have to complete the file otherwise your boss will punish you, show them how humble and anxious you are, ask the name of the doctor who came, where she died, and what of, if it happened at home or in the hospital, ask everything, you've still got your letter of authority, I suppose, Yes, but don't forget it's a false one, It fooled me, it'll probably fool them too, no life is without its lies, perhaps there's some deceit involved in this death as well, If you worked at the Central Registry, you'd know that there is no deceiving death. She must have thought the remark didn't merit a response, and she was perfectly right, because what I'd said was just for effect really, one of those essentially empty expressions that appear to be deep but have nothing inside. We were silent for about two minutes, she was looking at me reproachfully, as if I had made her a solemn promise which I had broken at the last moment. I didn't know where to put myself, I just wanted to say goodnight and leave, but that would have been both stupid and rude, a lack of consideration which the poor lady certainly didn't deserve, it's just not in my nature to do something like that, that's the way I was brought up, it's true I can't remember ever having gone to tea at someone's house when I was small, but it comes to the same thing. I was thinking that it would be best to take up her idea and begin searching again, only from the opposite direction this time, that is, from death into life, when she said, Take no notice, I get these ridiculous ideas now and then, when you're old and realise that time is running out, you start imagining that you have the cure for all the ills of the world in your hand, and get frustrated because no one pays you any attention, I've never had ideas like that, You will, in time, you're still very young, Me, young, I'm nearly fifty-one, You're in the prime of life, Don't make fun of me, You only become wise after seventy, and then it's no use to you anyway, not to you or anyone else. Since I still have a long way to go before I reach that age, I didn't know whether to agree or not, so I thought it best to say nothing. It was time I said goodbye, so I said, I won't trouble you any more, thank you for all your patience and kindness, and forgive me, it was that mad idea of mine that got me into this, it's all absolutely absurd, there you were, sitting contentedly in your home, and along I come with my lies, my deceitful stories, I blush to think of some of the questions I asked you, Contrary to what you've just said, I wasn't sitting here contentedly, I was lonely, being able to tell you some of the sad things that have happened in my life was like getting rid of a great weight, Well, if that's how you feel, then I'm glad, It is and I don't want you to leave without asking you something, Ask anything you like, as long as it's within my power to help, You're the only person who can help, what I have to ask you is very simple, come and see me now and then, when you remember or feel like visiting, even if it's not to talk about my goddaughter, Why I'd be delighted to come and visit you, There'll always be a cup of coffee or tea waiting for you, That would be reason enough to come, but there are plenty of others, Thank you and, look, don't take any notice of that idea of mine, it's as mad as yours was, I'll think about it. I kissed her hand as I had on the first occasion, but then something unexpected happened, she kept hold of my hand and raised it to her lips. No woman had ever done that to me, I felt something like a shock in my soul, a tremor in my heart, and even now, now that it's morning, and many hours have passed, while I finish writing up the events of the day in my notebook, I look at my right hand and it seems different to me, although I can't quite say how, it must be an internal rather than an external matter. Senhor José stopped writing, put down his pen, put the unknown woman's school record cards carefully away in the notebook, he had, in fact, left them on top of the table, and went and hid them away again between the mattress and the base of the bed. Then he heated up the stew left over from lunch and sat down to eat. There was an almost absolute silence, you could scarcely hear the noise made by the few cars still out and about in the city. What you could hear most clearly was a muffled sound that rose and fell, like a distant bellows, but Senhor José was used to that, it was the Central Registry breathing. Senhor José went to bed, but he wasn't sleepy. He remembered the events of the day, the unpleasant surprise of seeing his boss go into the Central Registry out of hours, and his troubling conversation with the lady in the ground-floor apartment, which he had set down in his notebook, faithful as to the meaning, less so as regards form, which is both understandable and forgivable, since memory, which is very sensitive and hates to be found lacking, tends to fill in any gaps with its own spurious creations of reality, but more or less in line with the facts of which it has only a vague recollection, like what remains after the passing of a shadow. It seemed to Senhor José that he had still not reached a logical conclusion about what had happened, that he still had to make a decision, otherwise his last words to the lady in the ground-floor apartment, I'll think about it, would be no more than a vain promise, of the sort that is always cropping up in conversation and that no one expects will be kept. Senhor José was desperate to get to sleep when, suddenly, from unknown depths, the longed-for solution welled up within him, like the end of a new Ariadne's thread, On Saturday, I'll go to the cemetery, he said out loud. The excitement made him sit up in bed, but the calm voice of good sense stepped in with some advice, Now that you've decided what you're going to do, lie down and go to sleep, don't be such a child, you don't really want to go there at this time of night, do you, and jump over the cemetery wall, although that's just a manner of speaking, of course. Obediently, Senhor José slipped down between t
he sheets, pulled them up to his nose and lay for a minute, his eyes open, thinking, I'm not going to be able to get to sleep. A minute later he was sleeping.