The Piano Cemetery

by José Luís Peixoto

  After putting the children to bed, after a little longer sitting at the kitchen table, after talking about Francisco and agreeing about everything, after remembering many things and laughing more, my wife and my daughters go to bed, and before they fall asleep they think that they could live like this for ever.

  Marta hadn’t yet been born, my wife was pregnant, we were sitting very close together — sometimes she would sit on my lap — and wondering which of us would die first. It was an anxiety that afflicted us. There were other insoluble conversations which like this one would return every once in a while. A lot of time might go by without us having it, months, years, but when we returned to it we always remembered that it was not the first time we’d talked about it. It was an anxiety that existed underground, and that never completely disappeared. We were too alert to the truth to ignore it. We couldn’t pretend it didn’t exist. All our children had already been born, we might be lying in bed, naked, we might have just finished making love, and one of us would remember to wonder which of us would die first. And then we also thought about our children. It would be very hard for us to leave them, we weren’t sure they could manage themselves on their own, we were afraid they would be incapable, that they’d need us and we wouldn’t be there. Marta, Maria, Francisco and even Simão, even Simão. And we thought about what it would be like to die and leave the other, to be left alone. And how long would we be apart? Months? Years? How many years’ life would be left to the one who survived the other? I was already very sick, without enough peaceful time to say anything. It was one afternoon. My wife brought me food that I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t eat anything. I was at home, in the pyjamas my wife had bought me to wear in hospital. For months I’d spent all my time in pyjamas, thin, my hair frail. And I wanted to sit up in bed, I wanted to hold her hand and press her to my breast. It was one of the last things I said in total consciousness. I was capable of a great deal of hurt. I said to her:

  ‘Now we know who’s going to die first.’

  There were Sundays. Looking back, it’s impossible to avoid the feeling that a lot of them were wasted. Today I feel that just one more Sunday would be enough for me to be able to resolve everything. Then straight after that, I think that it would not. Then straight after that, I think that yes, it would. A single Sunday, from the morning, always bright and unconcerned, a whole day to take advantage of, to waste until the drawing-in of the night — an illusion created by a planet that turns around itself. Today is a Sunday different from every other — Francisco is running the marathon in the Olympic Games. It is this shock of happiness that wakes first Íris, then all the other children, then Maria, Marta, then my wife, who, waking, almost believes she never fell asleep. It is Sunday, Sunday, Sunday, Sunday, Sunday.

  Marta combs Hermes’s hair in front of the bathroom mirror. Maria gets excited walking up and down the hall runner, followed by Íris, who wants to tell her something, or who just wants to pretend for a few moments that she is big and has important chores to do. Ana and Elisa are talking in the living room. Ana’s eyes are shining with the illusion of being a big girl, correct, well-behaved, who does what is expected of her, who understands conversations. My wife is in the kitchen — piano music on the wireless — and she is thinking.

  There are not many hours left now until the marathon starts. In Maria’s house my wife, like my daughters, like my grandchildren, is alive. The brightness — coming in through the windows, being born beyond the buildings, beyond Lisbon in some pure place without imperfections, without the memory of imperfections — wraps up their lives, just as there is always a glow wrapped around objects that are precious, transforming their simplicity into grandeur.

  My wife finds it difficult to persuade Íris and Hermes to leave their playing and come and sit at the table for lunch. When she finally manages it, after picking up Íris under her arms and sitting her down, when she bends down to arrange the chair, Íris pulls her head down with both hands — both arms — and kisses her cheek.

  My wife raises her voice. All the voices at the table mingle together, like a web of tangled threads. My wife is trying to talk to Marta, who is trying to talk to Elisa, who is trying to talk to Ana, who is listening to her mother trying to talk to Íris, who is talking to Hermes, who is talking to Íris. They can hear one another, sometimes.

  My wife gets up and changes the channel on the wireless on top of the fridge. As though speaking through a funnel, the voice of a commentator is there already, describing the atmosphere inside the Olympic stadium in Stockholm. My daughters and grandchildren suddenly fall quiet. From time to time the commentator says Francisco’s name. He says something, and in the middle, says:

  ‘Francisco Lázaro.’

  Íris is bubbling in her chair. She puts her hands on the seat, pushing herself up and fidgeting. But no one can resist the enthusiasm. Maria says things in an artificial tone of voice. Marta just smiles. My wife tries to pretend that nothing unusual is happening because that’s the form her enthusiasm takes. They can all recognise it, even Hermes giving little cries, even Ana turning her head this way and that, even Elisa who rests her hands in her lap and shrugs in on herself, as though about to implode.

  It’s a Sunday that is different from all the ones that have already been, and all the ones that will be. My wife begins to take the things off the table, and in order to pretend that she’s quite calm, rather distant, she mutters bits of words that not even she is listening to. Her movements and her whole body exist only in that voice coming out of the wireless and the distorted, grey sound of the crowds behind it. And the commentator says that it’s very hot in Sweden. Maria comments on every sentence she hears, Marta tells her to be quiet, but very soon she can’t contain herself and starts speaking, too. The tablecloth is still on the table, covered in crumbs. Hermes and Íris get down from their chairs and find a spot on the floor, on the tiles. Together they entertain themselves. There’s not long before it begins. My wife sits down.

  The doorbell rings. Who could it be? They look at one another across the table. No one seems to want to get up. It is Maria’s house. Maria gets up. In the kitchen, almost stopping listening to the wireless for a moment, they wait — the expectation. They hear the door open, but they don’t hear any voices they can identify.

  Maria comes into the kitchen with Simão. Upright, his head lowered, he lifts his face to show himself. For a moment nobody has a heart — an eclipse. Marta places a fist on the table, and with some effort lifts herself up and hugs him. My wife is standing behind her, waiting. It takes all her strength not to cry when he kisses her twice, not to hug him, too, not to say:

  ‘Son.’

  Immediately after her, Elisa and Ana give him two kisses, well-mannered, and smile at him. Simão approaches Hermes and Íris and runs his fingers through their hair. And he sits down in a chair. When he doesn’t notice, my wife or Marta or Maria look at him.

  The marathon is about to begin.

  The commentator says my son’s name in every phrase, he says Portugal. In the kitchen, my wife, my children and my grandchildren. Together. If they aren’t looking at one another they are looking at the wireless or at the air, mixing their thoughts with the commentator’s voice.

  The marathon has begun.

  He’s one of the first ones out. He’s the only one running with his head uncovered. The commentator’s voice is the images of the things he says. They are images that are different in each person’s eyes. They come out of the stadium. Francisco is one of the first. Hermes and Íris jump up and down on the tiles, shouting in unison:

  ‘Uncle, Uncle!’

  Marta tells them to be quiet. They are quiet. Francisco overtakes a runner. Francisco overtakes another runner. Hermes and my granddaughters are the face of the enthusiasm that also exists, hidden, in the faces of my daughters and my wife. The commentator says again that it is very hot in Sweden.

  ‘I thought it was cold in Sweden,’ says Maria.

  ‘Just listen,’ says Marta.
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  After a few kilometres the commentator says that Francisco seems to have something fatty on his skin, perhaps grease, oil. My daughters look at one another, not understanding. The commentator says he’s going at a good pace. They smile. He says that if he can keep up this pace for the whole marathon the gold medal will be his. Even my wife smiles. The commentator says Portugal.

  Francisco crosses a bridge. In the kitchen, everyone imagines him crossing a bridge. A runner approaches him, is going to overtake him, but he doesn’t let him. He takes off running at full speed. For a few minutes Marta and Maria take one another’s hand. They squeeze one another’s hand. In Sweden it’s very hot. In Lisbon, time passes.

  Francisco is out on his own in first place. Seven kilometres. The commentator’s lit-up voice. My daughters’ disbelieving eyes. Ten kilometres. Twelve. Francisco slows. It becomes possible to make out concern on my wife’s face. Twenty-one years ago my wife had Francisco in her belly. She didn’t know his face and invented everything. Today he’s so far away, she can only invent where he is, running in the heat. Will he come back? My wife doesn’t want to have this thought and turns her attention back to the voice of the commentator. He says that Francisco is beginning to drop back a few places. He says you can see the tiredness in his face. Hermes and Íris don’t understand.

  The afternoon slows. Francisco begins to fall behind. Seventeen kilometres. Groups of runners overtake him. The Swedish sun burns. You can see the weakness in Francisco’s body. His running is uncoordinated. The sun is tiring him, draining all his energy. Twenty kilometres. The commentator praises the effort of the Portuguese runner. Francisco — the Portuguese runner. The commentator keeps repeating the word ‘effort’. He uses various verbs — bear, struggle, cope — and always the word ‘effort’. Twenty-one kilometres. Francisco falls.

  My daughters’ mouths open. My wife and Simão lift their faces as though they have been struck, like martyrs. Ana and Elisa look around to try and understand what they should be feeling. Hermes and Íris, sitting on the floor, play with their fingers and don’t understand. They laugh quietly to one another.

  Francisco gets up. He runs slowly, disoriented. My wife brings her hands together on her lap, as if she were praying. She is not. Maria makes as if to say something in an anxious voice. Marta tells her to be quiet. The distance passes very slowly now. The runner who is in first place is already very far away. Unreachable. My wife’s eyes are closed. Simão is examining the palms of his hands. My daughters’ gazes are lost on a non-existent horizon. Twenty-five kilometres — Francisco falls again.

  He gets up again. Within the absolute silence of the kitchen the commentator’s voice is serious and tormented. Hermes and Íris begin to notice that something is happening that they don’t completely understand. On the streets of Lisbon there must be many things happening that no one could have imagined. On the streets that Francisco ran so many times, many things must be happening. The commentator wonders how much longer Francisco can hold out. He’s dragging his feet on the ground. Portugal. Thirty kilometres. Francisco falls, exhausted. His body, lying there, is surrounded by people. My daughters, Simão and my wife get up from their chairs and run to the wireless, as if they could get inside it.

  I must go and meet my son.

  ~ ~ ~

  After they had put Francisco on to a stretcher and taken him to the hospital, the commentator said something about death. He said definitely. Marta, trying to keep her voice calm, told Elisa to take her brother and her cousins to the living room. Simão hugged his mother, kept her safe in his arms. Shrunken, she cried and she was a being beneath a tempest, a tempest was passing through her. Her body was small in Simão’s arms, it had no will and no shape.

  ‘It’s probably nothing,’ said Maria, approaching, and deceiving herself.

  But the commentator said something about death again. Exhaustion. Maria started a low whimpering, like a wounded animal. Marta, in her huge body, had the prominent eyes, the pursed lips of a little girl. And the commentator spoke in a sorrowful voice. There was no more Sunday. The marathon had finished.

  My wife came out from Simão’s arms, lost. She wandered, disoriented, one way and another. Our children watched her and there was nothing they could do. The commentator said goodbye to his listeners. His listeners. It was Simão who turned the wireless off.

  And nothing. The noise of the refrigerator existing — a vibrating silence. The sad details — the fruit bowl, the kitchen sink, the tiles and the fear, the panic of the window — the height of the window, three storeys, and everyone who had perished beyond it. Simão was crying as though coughing or choking. Marta and Maria cried freely, rivers after a fall of rain. My wife lost all her strength.

  She sat down, not reacting. Within her, she had being certain and she had not wanting to believe it. She had definite and impossible. My wife, deciding nothing, remembered our son when he was still small, ten years old, and a dizziness of images tumbled inside her — blood. She remembered our son just born, and at that moment she was dead.

  Then the afternoon. No one could understand its calm. Waiting. Each of them abandoned. Time passed, clouded up by the light and distorted by the faces, it went through them, and, clouded up, distorted, installed itself slowly within each of them. Time was a stagnant lake of grey water that slowly grew inside each of them. Simão was the only one who had the courage to approach the window and look at the world, as though it still existed. And it did exist — invisible, meaningless.

  There was nothing they could do but wait. Nothing — a void, a vacuum, a single absence, no reply. They had stopped knowing how to wait, but bit by bit they were forced to relearn the unbearable task of waiting. They were forced. There is no need to ask questions of shadows. Hours passed.

  At times, Maria or Marta, aware, got up from the chairs where they were getting old and went down the corridor to check that the children were all right. Only Elisa looked at them differently. Ana, Hermes and Íris all smiled, in a normal day. It was still Sunday, for them.

  In the kitchen there was only the silence populated by memories, and all my children’s and my wife’s fears covering up a certainty, an abyss, that existed, voracious, between them, like a bonfire lighting up their faces. The night was beginning.

  Death.

  At nine o’clock at night the telephone rang. Nobody knew what to do. The ringing of the telephone tore through them, it was barbed wire dragged across their skin. My wife had her head in her hands, because she couldn’t bear it. Marta and Maria went back to being two little girls, sisters. Simão knew it had to be him to answer the telephone. As he walked, he realised that he had legs and arms and hands. He breathed. He held the telephone. Next to him, the chrome-plated frame — the photograph that we all took together in Rossio. He held the telephone. He answered. Time. The faces of my wife and my daughters forgotten in a fault of time. Simão’s voice:

  ‘Yes, yes. All right. I’ll tell them.’ He walked over to my wife, to my daughters, and told them. He stood there, as though looking at his own words and trying to understand them. An infinite, incandescent light. My wife and my daughters watched him, not knowing how to understand him. Francisco’s son had just been born.

  Francisco’s son had just been born.

  The words were:

  ‘He’s been born, Francisco’s little boy.’

  Francisco’s son had just been born.

  A Note on the Author

  José Luís Peixoto was born in 1974 in Galveias, Portalegre, in Portugal’s Alentejo region. A journalist, novelist, poet, dramatist, literary critic and teacher of languages and contemporary literature, he is also a heavy-metal fan and produced a book and record called The Antidote with Gothic band Moonspell. His work is published and acclaimed in many languages and has won major prizes in Portugal and Brazil, including the José Saramago Prize in 2001 for Blank Gaze.

  A Note on the Translator

  Daniel Hahn is a translator of fiction and non-fiction, mainly from Po
rtuguese. His translation of The Book of Chameleons by Angolan novelist José Eduardo Agualusa won the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 2007.

  Author’s Note

  Francisco Lázaro was a Portuguese athlete who died after completing thirty kilometres of the marathon at the Olympic Games in Stockholm, in 1912. The character in this novel who shares his name is based only circumstantially on his story, and all the episodes and characters depicted come from the realm of fiction.