“Oh, Betty,” and she blurted these words out with a strange urgency, “oh, Betty, he is certain I will die!”
It was my turn then to stare at her in astonishment.
“He doesn’t want me to die,” she explained, “but he’s sure my death is on its way.”
We did not continue the conversation, but for the rest of the day, Dona Nina was extremely agitated. She asked me to bring her paper and ink, because she wanted to write a letter. However, she then abandoned the idea and threw herself down on the bed, weeping. Then, with her face wet with tears, she embraced me and begged me “in the name of all that is most sacred” to go to Rio on her behalf. When I asked why, she shook me by the shoulders, saying that she needed me to deliver a very important letter. Without my asking, she added: “But don’t go thinking it’s a letter to a man, no, it’s to a woman, a nurse. Her name is Castorina.” To calm her, I promised that I would, and thinking that her agitation was the result of drinking too much coffee, I surreptitiously carried the coffee pot off with me to the kitchen.
13.
The Doctor’s Second Report
I don’t particularly like revisiting things I consider dead and buried, even if not all of them have been properly explained, and not everything should be taken as an accusation of the people involved. I believe, furthermore, that a family like the Meneses, who have added such luster to our local history, are entitled to the silence they have sought over the years but have so signally failed to find, on account of the violent events that have overtaken it—events that nonetheless deserve only to be understood and then forgotten. It weighs on my conscience, however, to conceal facts that could shed light on some of the mysteries that so shook our town at the time. Indeed, that is why I am here, once again peering into the past through these thick lenses of mine, with one tremulous desire: to serve the truth. Not that it is easy for me to exhume those people and events, for they are intimately attached to the person I myself was and to my emotions at the time. And yet what happened is still so vivid that it seems like only yesterday: I can summon up the scenes so easily and the house rises up, bright and perfect, from the sleep in which they have since been shrouded.
I can no longer recall whether it was on the second or third occasion that some unusual circumstance took me to the Chácara. I say “unusual” because I had, of course, already been there on numerous occasions, but it was only the first or second time that I had been summoned there for what could properly be described as an extraordinary occurrence. As before, I was not surprised when they asked for me, since the goings-on at the Chácara had become the subject of ever more persistent rumors throughout the town. No detail was spared in the telling, as if it were a spectacle offered up for the amusement of all. Some of the more outspoken townspeople, wishing to show themselves better informed than the rest—Senhor Aurélio at the pharmacy, for example—raised the possibility that a crime had been committed, and this was insisted on so vehemently that we would long ago have sought the assistance of the police had we not been perfectly aware that everyone was safe and well behind the fortress walls of the Chácara.
I remember that it happened soon after Senhor Valdo’s supposed accident. In Vila Velha and other towns further away such as Mercês and Rio Espera, that so-called accident was already being openly talked about as a case of attempted suicide, on account of his wife wanting to leave him. This country tittle-tattle, stirred up outside the pharmacy door or in the course of a monotonous journey on horseback, was eagerly received, as indeed was any other snippet of information that reflected badly on the inhabitants of the Chácara. The news quickly gathered momentum, fueled by “facts” that were as likely to be false as true—for example, that Dona Nina was demanding an enormous pay-off from the family, that Senhor Demétrio had threatened her with legal proceedings, that a summons had already been filed with the judge in Rio Espera, that someone madly in love with Dona Nina had sworn to kill Senhor Valdo, etc.—all of which, of course, was accompanied by dire predictions and the most disapproving of comments. Others, including those claiming to be better informed than everyone else, maintained that Dona Nina had been caught in flagrante with a lover, that she was already on the verge of leaving, and that she had flung the very worst of insults at the Meneses. Some were even bolder and swore blind that all these things had not only taken place, but had done so in the presence of the Baron himself, on the occasion of his official visit to the family. This had caused an enormous scandal, and the Baron had declared to his circle of confidantes that he had never seen anything more shameful in his entire life. This version, however, was hotly disputed, since it was widely known that, despite frequent and repeated invitations from the Meneses, the Baron had never, and would never, set foot in the Chácara. And so the gossip simmered away, and, whether true or false, all it achieved was to create some idea of the atmosphere surrounding events at the Chácara. It goes without saying that I never said a word about what I myself had witnessed, still less about my meeting with Dona Nina in the garden, for I knew that anyone I spoke to would, in the first place, distort my words, and, secondly, would retain only what was deemed most likely to contribute to the continued slandering of the Meneses. In any event, and thanks to the sixth sense I consider part of my professional calling, I was ready for the summons I received some days after my visit to Senhor Valdo. I could not say exactly how many days later, but it cannot have been many, because the facts of that visit were still the main topic of conversation among the idle classes. I was at home, and my wife, with unusual vivacity, ran in to tell me that someone was at the door asking for me. She had no doubt recognized the messenger, and I saw that it was the same black servant who had come for me on the previous occasion and who was standing waiting on the pavement.
“What is it?” I asked. “Has Senhor Valdo got worse?”
Turning his straw hat around and around in his hands, he said that no, Senhor Valdo was getting better, but that someone else at the Chácara was ill. He was staring at me wide-eyed and was so reticent that I realized at once that something of exceptional importance had occurred. It seemed inappropriate to try and obtain further details from a servant, especially from one who, to judge by his appearance, was among the lowliest at the Chácara, and so I went back indoors, gathered the things I needed and said goodbye to my wife, who insisted on accompanying me to the door, no doubt hoping that the neighbors would be watching. However, the street was completely deserted, and she was obliged to go back inside, although not before trying to detain me with goodness knows how many useless pieces of advice.
It did not take us long to reach the Chácara. Again I was surprised by the family’s peculiar manners, for no one came to greet me, as one might expect upon the arrival of a doctor. As always, the house appeared deserted, and there was not the slightest sound to be heard. The silence was thrown into even sharper contrast by the racket made by a flock of parakeets which, arriving suddenly from somewhere near the mountains, had perched on a coconut palm close to the verandah. As we paused, however, I caught a glimpse at one of the windows of what I thought was a pale, anxious face. I didn’t have time to see who it was, but something about the clenched, fugitive features made me think it belonged to Senhor Demétrio’s wife. Of this I became almost certain when I noticed on the verandah a swaying hammock, which still bore the impression of a body. Our arrival must have frightened her and, on reaching the drawing room, she’d had just enough time to glance quickly at us through the window. I asked my guide where the patient was, and he replied: “In the Pavilion.” “The Pavilion!” I exclaimed, even more surprised than before, for I could not think what any member of the family, still less an invalid, would be doing in the Pavilion, which I knew to be far from the house and in a state of some abandon. He asked me to wait a moment in the drawing room while he informed Senhor Demétrio of my arrival. Left alone, I seized the opportunity to have a good look around me. At the far end was a sideboard full of glass, opal and silver, gleaming softly in the
darkness. Above it, clearly visible on the wall, was the mark where a painting had once hung. I was about to take a closer look when the black servant returned: Senhor Demétrio had asked that I go on ahead, saying that he would come and meet me later. With a shrug, I prepared to follow my guide, wondering why anyone would choose to leave those sequestered rooms. We walked back through the garden, and I was again impressed by its dignified air of repose and the sheer poetry of its tall trees, hung with lianas. But as I walked, I became more and more convinced that the Pavilion was hardly the ideal retreat for an invalid: the paths grew narrower and narrower, and instead of flowers, the teeming undergrowth began to close in. “It must be someone from the lower orders,” I said to myself, “to be left in such a place.” For there was no doubt that it had seen better days and been better cared for—thick clumps of gourds and bitter melons overflowed what had once been flower beds, their borders still picked out by a few lines of white stones and upturned bottles. Finally, we reached the Pavilion, and one glance was enough to take in the gaping cracks in the foundations, splitting apart the thick wooden piles and cracking the stone base, displaying a neglect that had begun many years before and which would no doubt bring the whole thing crashing down—perhaps not immediately, but the first accusatory signs were plain to see. My guide stopped in front of the closed door:
“In here.”
He was clearly expecting me to enter first and he gave me another of those hesitant, distrustful looks. Since I had, after all, been called to see a patient, I waited no longer and pushed open the door, which was half-concealed beneath the foliage, and found myself in a space I could scarcely call a room—it was more a kind of annex, square and low, the ceiling crisscrossed with thick wooden beams, which showed the same signs of decay I had seen outside. (It was evident that the Pavilion was not as solidly built as the Chácara itself, but had been hurriedly thrown together with ill-fitting, roughly-finished timber—like so many other houses in the countryside—making use of local materials and the most rudimentary of construction methods.) There was so little light that, although it was still daytime, an oil lamp had been lit. The melancholy flame cast a long black stain across the whitewashed wall.
I carried on until I came to a low door, which the servant opened, ushering me into a narrow space full of gardening implements and illuminated by a single round, barred window, through which could be glimpsed some of the greenery outside. On a narrow pallet bed covered only with a thin mat, beside a bench strewn with medicine bottles and rolls of gauze and cotton wool, lay a man. There was nothing to indicate that he was still alive; indeed, it was hard to believe that anyone could possibly live in such a place, devoid of all comfort. However, the tools of his trade (a few rakes and spades, two or three watering cans, and a container of plants that had not yet been put to use) confirmed to me that I was in the gardener’s sleeping quarters, or at least the place he used as a storeroom. I moved closer and saw that the man had one hand under his head, resting on it like a pillow, while the other trailed on the floor. I should add that what first caught my eye was his extreme youth. I imagined he must be asleep or something similar, and when my guide pointed to him—as distastefully as if he were pointing at some disgusting or shameful object—I took the oil lamp from beside the bed and leaned over him. An initial inspection confirmed that the case was even worse than it had at first seemed: the patient’s breathing was labored, his lips were purplish and his face ashen. As I leaned closer in order to take his pulse, the bedclothes covering him slipped off and I was shocked to see that the whole of one side of his body was covered in blood, his chest visible through his torn shirt. In fact it did not take me long to ascertain that he was literally soaked in blood—the dark, sticky substance surrounded him on all sides, spreading out across the mat on which he lay and dripping slowly onto the dusty floor.
“What happened?” I asked my guide as I felt for the wounded man’s pulse.
“I think he shot himself,” he answered, his voice as uncertain as his gaze.
“Accidentally?” I asked.
This time he merely shrugged. I observed that the wounded man’s pulse was extremely slow; the incident must have occurred some time ago and he had lost a lot of blood. On closer inspection, I noted that the bed itself was damp, and that the stains, recent and red, were spread over the wall, as if he had struggled, or as if someone, for whatever reason, had tried to lift or drag him over there by force. I was about to stand up and fetch a syringe from my bag when he shifted in the bed, opened his eyes and moved his lips, as if wanting to say something. More out of curiosity than anything else, I leaned closer, trying to make out what his bloodless lips were saying. One single, effortful word came out: “Forgive.” Forgive what? Why? At that age, still barely molded into the flesh of manhood, what sin could he possibly have committed, what irremediable fault could have driven him to such an extreme? I stared in bewilderment at the lad, who was already slipping toward his final, dying breath. His hand kept obsessively, mechanically stroking his blood-soaked chest. Then he would raise that same blood-red hand, only for it to fall limply back down again. From beneath his feet, the dark stain spread, sinuous and unstoppable, like the hidden roots of a tree; it would not be long before his blood-drained body found its final rest. “Forgive? Forgive what?” I repeated to myself, feeling powerless to solve this drama in which I sensed the hand of God; and the word grew and grew, echoing in my ears, like a long, inexplicable groan. Forgive what? Then, in answer, I saw his hand, palm open, rise up one last time in an effort to express what his lips could not, only to fall back lifelessly, pulling his shirt open and exposing the wound, almost exactly over his heart. An overwhelming stillness overtook his body; he was breathing, but already his limbs had softened, like bundles of dead grass lying splayed on the bed. Some urgent first aid was clearly needed, for he had received none up until now. I turned to the servant, who was standing a few feet away, leaning against the door, and told him to bring me a basin of boiling water. He hesitated, and I was about to shout the order again when, looking back at the young man, I realized that these were indeed his final moments and that in just a few minutes more he would be dead.
“There’s no need, not now,” I said, while the servant continued to stare at me impassively. I leaned over the boy, examining his lips—I saw them quiver with the faintest of breaths, then everything went still—and he lay there, inert, benighted, as if sleep had suddenly snatched him from the midst of all that blood. Almost as if by some sort of miracle, a sweet smell hung about him, some secret perfume from his lost childhood. I paused for a moment, entranced by the peace that had descended over his features—the power, the silence, and the magic of those landscapes that the dead suddenly lay before us—and I could not fail to notice that I was trembling, in sympathy for the death of one so young, so eloquent in his simplicity, now so far beyond us and all our miserable earthly concerns.
“There’s no point,” I said to the servant, who had not moved. “The boy’s dead.”
He received this news with the same indifference he had displayed all along. Was he merely insensitive or was he under orders to show no emotion? I don’t know, but it was as if I had just announced the most banal of facts about the most ordinary of mortals.
“It’s the gardener,” he said, as if apologizing for the dead man’s lowly social status.
“The gardener!” I exclaimed, taking a step back. And at the same time, I took one last look at the boy lying on the bed. “Who should I tell?”
“Senhor Demétrio,” said the servant. “He’s waiting for you up at the house.”
Lacking the courage to look again at the corpse, I left that suffocating cellar. At the door, I took a long deep breath of the cool breeze blowing through the garden and, for the second time, I thought I could make out a pair of restless eyes watching me. As I turned into the avenue, I saw who it was: standing motionless behind a tree was Dona Ana, waiting for me to pass.
“There’s someone hiding ba
ck there,” I whispered to the servant, as soon as we had gone a few steps farther. He glanced back in that direction and, if he did see who it was, he gave no indication. When I reached the top of the steps, I again scanned the garden and this time clearly saw Dona Ana scurrying toward the Pavilion. (I may have been mistaken, but I thought I saw a dark shape accompanying her—a woman in black, or a priest perhaps?) If it was a priest, he would, I presumed, be on his way to perform the last rites—so I merely shrugged, inclined to forget what I had just seen. Senhor Demétrio was waiting for me in the drawing room, hands resting on the back of a chair. His studied, solemn pose made it clear that he did not want to know any more than was strictly necessary. He seemed to me to have aged somehow—he was one of those men who can age from one minute to the next, like rotting fruit—and despite his energetic appearance, I noticed a look of weary submission. He had dark circles under his eyes; his lips drooped in two lifeless folds.
“So how is the lad?” he asked abruptly, dispensing with any greeting.
I looked him straight in the eye, trying to discern the secret that he would no doubt never tell:
Chronicle of the Murdered House Page 18
