Chronicle of the Murdered House

by Lúcio Cardoso

  30.

  Continuation of Father Justino’s Second Account

  It did not take me long to realize my mistake: Senhor Valdo was unaware that a third person had joined us on the verandah. He may still have had something left to say, but, noticing my eyes fixed on the door, he turned and saw his sister-in-law, still uncertain as to whether to come forward or to retreat into the drawing room. It was already too late to withdraw, though, and she moved, glacially, toward me. (As I stood up, I understood why I had come to that house: the reason that had brought me was something more decisive, more imperious, and I no longer had the slightest doubt that the reason was standing there before me. How she had changed! And even though she kept her eyes prudently lowered, how fiercely they burned compared to that day long ago when she had summoned me to the bedside of the young man in the Pavilion. My first act—and I had known this for a long time—would be to tell her: “Don’t worry, it’s of no importance,” but from the very first glance I sensed that she was quite literally on her guard, and that any soothing words of mine would be a mistake.)

  “Father Justino,” she said to me, “how are you?”

  Nothing in her voice indicated any kind of emotion. On the contrary, it was the most banal of greetings, so banal indeed that it could have been addressed to anyone. I held out my hand and, to my surprise, found that it was trembling. Senhor Valdo must have noticed my discomfort, for I saw him bow his head slightly as if deep in thought.

  “You . . .” he began, staring first at me and then at his sister-in-law.

  Dona Ana realized what he was about to say:

  “No! No!” she exclaimed vehemently and made as if to leave.

  I do not know what inner force impelled me to intervene:

  “Senhor Valdo, I have a couple of things to say to Dona Ana.”

  I saw his arms drop disconsolately by his side and noticed that he was biting his lip. He nodded and said:

  “In that case, I’ll go in and fetch that donation I promised you.”

  We were left alone, and the light on the verandah seemed to grow still brighter. She was standing quite close to me, but in her hostility, she had all but turned her back. I might have thought she was studying something happening out in the garden, but when I looked more closely I could see that her eyes were half-closed, doubtless dazzled by the intensely blue sky.

  “My child . . .” I began.

  (Ah, how ridiculous we priests feel at times! I was sure she knew what I had to say to her, and I was assailed by a keen awareness of the impossibility of my position—but how to express myself? How could I penetrate the depths of her soul? My words seemed old and tired, and if the means I had to move her seemed inadequate, it was because I needed gestures, and gestures of love are both difficult and dangerous. I ought to speak to her as a priest, mouthing the same old truths and much-repeated revelations, whereas what was really needed was something stronger and more spontaneous, a single, definitive gesture of tenderness and compassion issuing forth from my whole self to her broken soul. And yet, poor wretch, there I was—and even before I began, I knew that everything I said would be in vain, like the seed that fell on stony ground. But a priest has his vocation, I said to myself by way of consolation, and I must be a priest, even if I had no faith in my actions.)

  “My child,” I repeated, and she must have noticed the uncertainty in my voice.

  She turned so quickly then that I felt almost afraid.

  “Father Justino,” she exclaimed, “I heard every word you said to my brother-in-law. For quite some time now, my sole occupation has been listening at doors.”

  She stopped, and I was about to speak again—oh! the futile pride of these rebellions, the poor heart that castigates itself with a supposedly humiliating confession—when once again she interrupted me:

  “If hell exists, Father Justino, then it exists right here in this house. You cannot imagine what disorder reigns . . .”

  Suddenly, as if by divine grace, I found the means to reach her heart. Nothing but the truth—and only the truth—because in goodness as in evil, truth is the only thing that can satisfy those souls who thirst for absolutes.

  “I know,” I said in a voice that had regained its self-control, “I know, and more than you think. When I arrived here, I brought with me a great secret. And here it is: the devil took hold of this house long ago.”

  She covered her mouth with her hand, as if to hold in an exclamation. When I remained silent, she lowered it again and I realized that she had simply been hiding a scornful smile.

  “That’s no great secret, Father Justino,” she said.

  I looked up then, although I still felt small and insignificant, as indeed I had since setting foot on that verandah; perhaps it was the effect of the sun.

  “The devil is not as you imagine,” I continued. “He does not signify disorder, but rather certainty and calm.”

  Now that I had begun it was easy to carry on. She was still standing almost with her back to me—no doubt on account of the feelings of disgust and nausea I aroused in her—but that no longer mattered to me. She was listening and that was enough. What I had concealed from Senhor Valdo, or, rather, what I had not dared to tell him, now came rushing to my lips:

  “What do you think a house ruled by the power of evil is like?” (I skated clumsily over those words—the power of evil—ignoring their poverty and vulgarity.) “It is constructed very much like this one, firm in its foundations, secure in its traditions, conscious of the heavy responsibility of its name. It isn’t tradition that takes root in it, it is tradition as the sole defense of truth.”

  I paused—just for a moment—while a lingering ray of sun once again dazzled my eyes.

  “It is what we could call a solidly built home.” (I could not help noticing that my voice had become singularly calm.) “There is not a single crack through which heaven can enter.”

  She had slowly turned toward me, and I saw that the look of revulsion had vanished from her face, like an unravelling cloud. She was breathing faster, but this revealed both her excitement and her total surrender to the words I was saying.

  “Often, in times gone by,”—it was my turn now to confess—“I wondered what made this house so cold, so soulless. And it was then that I discovered the formidable immutability of its walls, the frozen tranquility of its inhabitants. Ah, my friend, trust me when I tell you that there is nothing more diabolical than certainty. In certainty there is no place for love. Everything that is solid and firm is a denial of love.”

  She reached for something to hold on to and let herself fall into the chair that Senhor Valdo had occupied moments earlier. It was as if nothing separated us now and that we were both in the same abyss, discussing identical passions.

  “I don’t understand, Father,” she stammered.

  I sat down too, and tried to explain myself more clearly.

  “It is perhaps difficult for you to accept your own reality. Deep down, we are horrified by what we really are. Imagine, for the sake of argument, that heaven was not at all a place of peace and tranquility, but a land of torment and anguish. Let us imagine, if we can, a heaven far beyond our own limited possibilities. Because if it were like that, what would they go there to do those who, all their lives, have enjoyed only rest and repose?”

  She had turned very pale and merely shook her head:

  “I still don’t understand, Father.”

  Then I leaned closer and placed one hand on her arm:

  “I am talking about sin, my child.” (I knew how difficult it was to say that—but how else was I to touch that heart of stone, how else lead her where I wanted to go? As I said, the only key to some people’s souls is the brutal truth, the uncompromising revelation.) “I want to make you conscious once again of sin, because you long ago banished it from your thoughts and replaced it with certainty, which, in your eyes, is the only manifestation of good. There is no chaos or struggle or fear in the depths of your soul. I repeat, I want to reinstall in
you an awareness of sin—not for fear of sin itself, but for fear of heaven. Let us imagine a heaven so heavenly that the thought alone of the Son of God’s death robs us forevermore of our peace of mind. My child, the abyss inhabited by the saints is not a harmonious place, but a cavern of warring passions.”

  I stopped speaking, almost breathless. I don’t know if I had been entirely clear in my explanation, but the spirit that moved me was genuine. I had not perhaps wished to do so initially, but I had, in the end, succumbed to the violence of my own ideas. I bowed my head and waited for my feelings to subside. She must have understood what was happening, for she asked me almost humbly:

  “Do you mean . . .”

  The ray of sun had broadened into a great shaft of light filled with dancing motes of dust. Staring into it, I continued:

  “I mean that our essence is of this world, and for us to imagine salvation as seen through our unworthy eyes is to diminish the greatness of God. Let us first assess the extent of our defeat, for such is man’s lot, and only then the triumph, which is God’s alone. For there can be no triumph over something that does not exist—what is virtue without struggle, or conquest without turmoil?—and without the existence of sin there can be no triumph. Now do you understand?”

  She did not reply at once. She bowed her head as I had done moments before and then, looking up again, said simply:

  “Father . . .”

  The moment had arrived. As if a wall inside her had come crashing down, the words began to pour forth from I know not where, loud with the somber eloquence of long-suppressed thoughts. I no longer remember exactly what she said and I could not repeat what I heard, but I know that it concerned everything that was most intense and enduring in her being, possibly in her soul itself, torn between her inhibitions and her desires. It would have been pointless to talk again about God as I had once before—what she was giving expression to was the world, indeed the most violent thing that exists in this world: passion. Perhaps the passion of the flesh, which is the most ferocious of all, for it labors within like a cancer. I don’t remember the name nor what it was all about, even though there is nothing to stop me revealing everything here since what I heard was not subject to the secrecy of the confessional. But such facts are unimportant; what counts are the consequences. Furthermore, she was probably not even interested in who was listening, for she talked almost mechanically, as if her only wish was to free herself from that silence. Listening to her, I thought to myself that this was exactly as it should be, for who could listen to her better than that other side of her own self, that constant warrior who had perhaps been her greatest adversary? The details were banal enough, even if they seemed exceptional to the person telling them, but I was more than used to witnessing such unchained emotions and was not shocked by what I heard. Now, as I write these lines, I remember a young man like any other (a gardener, if I’m not mistaken), lying dead in some cramped cellar, while she, in a fit of despair, implored me to bring him back to life. Is that right? Does it matter? There is nothing more touching than that youthful lust for life, for it is often in its bright, lithe allure that death sets its most perfect trap. I remember that her voice became quieter and quieter, until it faded and then ceased completely—the way water from a spring gushes forth then slows. I stared at her. She had raised her hand to her breast, feeling for some hidden object, which I somehow realized was a gun. As she stood up, her eyes wet with tears, she said: “And her, Father. What punishment does she deserve now?”

  31.

  Continuation of Ana’s Third Confession

  . . . And so I walked back to the house, following more or less the same route she had taken. I had no doubts now about what was happening, and I was being guided by a certainty, a cold, calculated certainty. Had I not heard it from her own lips, had I not been given a description of their love in all its detail? Her words were still ringing in my ears, or, rather, not the words exactly, which mattered little to me, but the sound of her voice, the ecstatic way in which she had spoken about Alberto. What I had sensed in the heat of her words, behind the mere sordid details, was the passion and the crime. Maybe that wasn’t true love, but what did it matter if the flame burned anyway? There was only one punishment for that woman’s crime: death. Death pure and simple. Inside me, my old anger was ebbing away; I had finally reached the end of a long, long wait. It was so easy to comprehend, but I had needed that extended period of time in order finally to realize the truth. Nina had to disappear, and I must be the one to make that happen—with my own hands too. And just as she had derived pleasure from my torment, so I would achieve peace with her death. I was not in the least bit feverish when I thought these things, no, I was filled, rather, with an immense calm, and the only noticeable difference was that the world seemed clearer, and I looked around me with more than usual clarity. My sensibility had grown more refined, I felt a kind of inner music flowing through my veins, and I was astonished to find that everything still existed, even though I had never realized it before. For example, walking down the avenue, I noticed how very long it was, that the flower beds had become neglected, that the Chácara, framed by the trees, looked grubby and sad. Precisely when had the house become frozen in time like that, what had silenced it, a house that had always prided itself on being so full of life, so full of flowers? I could still remember Dona Malvina early in the morning, secateurs in hand, as a black servant pushed her wheelchair down the sandy paths glittering in the morning sun. Then, life and health still filled those now rotten foundations. Dona Malvina’s presence had vitalized a whole generation of Meneses condemned to die. At that moment, I felt I had the right to do anything: any attack would merely drag down into the dust the architecture of a family that had already half-disappeared.

  While these ideas were gathering strength in my mind, I was remembering, too, that I still had the revolver that had been used on that tragic night. It was an old thing, with a bluish barrel and a mother-of-pearl grip. I had checked that it still worked, and its first owner, who had been fond perhaps of that small instrument of death, had clearly taken special care of it. Another question occurred to me, directly linked with that weapon: why had it been left lying around for someone to pick it up and use it? (Everything became suddenly very clear at that moment, when I recalled the abandoned revolver, perhaps waiting for some convenient fit of rage. Someone had put it there, with his eye on a particular pair of hands, but whose hands? What other object in that house deserved to be destroyed? The sentence passed at the time was still valid. Nina had to disappear, and had stood condemned ever since that first episode. Trembling, not daring to probe too deeply into my suspicions, I asked myself: Who hated her enough to desire her death? Who in that house would prefer to see her dead to seeing her going about her daily life? The name came to my lips, but I refused to speak it. Poor Alberto had been the victim of a mistake.)

  Still immersed in these thoughts. I was greatly relieved to find that everyone had retired to bed, which meant that I could walk, untroubled, through the house. However, the moment I entered the hallway, Betty opened the door of her room:

  “Do you need anything, Senhora?” she asked.

  “No, thank you, Betty,” I replied. Then, stopping, I asked as casually as I could:

  “Is everyone home?”

  “Yes, Senhora, apart from Senhor Valdo. He’s gone into town.”

  This was precisely the information I needed. I thanked her and continued on my way. When I reached my room, I noticed a light under the door opposite mine—Nina and Valdo’s room. “Nina must be awake.” And a tremor of joy ran through me: she would lose nothing by waiting. I opened the door to my own room, turned on the light and saw that my husband was asleep. It was odd, lately he had been taken by an irresistible need to sleep, whereas in the past, he had always been such an active man, something that had led to him being considered the head of the household. Normally he was always going on about ledgers and accounts, and complaining about the servants. Now, however,
he was clearly not at all well—it was as if he were being eaten away by something inside. I leaned over the bed, curious to take a good look at that pale face, its lines deeply etched by age. He gave off such an air of weariness, as if he were being rapidly worn down by the rigors of time. So rapid was the change, he looked like someone who would not live for very much longer. I leaned closer, but could not explain why I felt so very curious. His forehead was bathed in sweat and I could hear his shallow, labored breathing. I don’t know if this was true or if it was just my imagination, but I felt I was in the presence of a dying man.

  I tiptoed over to the chest of drawers and, from one of the drawers, removed the small revolver hidden under the sheets. I checked that it was loaded—of the five bullets it had contained, three had been used, two on the occasion of Valdo’s accident and the other . . . The remaining two would complete the sequence of deaths. I slowly closed the drawer and crept out into the hallway again. There was still a light under Nina’s door, and I wondered what a woman like her would be doing all alone. Would she be praying, thinking about God or merely telling the beads on the rosary of her crimes? I really didn’t care. I pushed the door, which was not quite closed, and saw Nina sitting on the bed, her back to me, and still wearing the clothes she’d had on in the garden. At first, that was all I could see because of the extremely bright light next to her. However, when I advanced further into the room, I saw that her back was shaking and realized with some astonishment that she was weeping. My surprise lasted no more than a minute. She must, I thought, be feeling remorse for all her horrible sins. As I stood there, I could have given in to a feeling of pity—touched by the sight of such grief in a frivolous creature like Nina—had it not been for the memory of Alberto and the room in which he had died, that and the revolver I was clutching in my pocket; both those things anaesthetized any capacity I had for emotion. I walked coolly over to her; and she, sensing another presence in the room, looked up.