‘But you’re very young too, Senhor Correia,’ exclaimed Teresa.
The Minister smiled and bowed.
‘Say something,’ said the Countess to her husband, who was tenderly scratching the parrot’s head.
‘What’s the point, poor Correia has been routed! Cousin Teresa called him “young”.’
‘I say,’ said the Minister. ‘It’s not such an exaggeration, I’m not exactly ancient.’
‘You liar!’ cried the Count. ‘You were already plotting with the best of them in 1820!’
‘That was my father, you wretch!’
Everyone laughed
‘Right, Senhor Correia,’ said Teresa, ‘it’s all settled then. Father Amaro will go to Leiria.’
‘All right, all right, I give in,’ sighed the Minister wearily. ‘But this is an abuse of power.’
‘Thank you,’ said Teresa, holding out her hand to him.
‘You seem different today,’ said the Minister, looking at her hard.
‘I’m just happy,’ she replied. She looked at the floor for a moment, distracted, lightly tapping her silk dress, then she got suddenly to her feet, went over to the piano and began singing the same sweet English aria:
The village seems asleep or dead
Now Lubin is away . . .
Meanwhile, the Count had gone over to Amaro, who stood up.
‘That’s settled then,’ the Count said. ‘Correia will sort things out with the Bishop. You’ll receive your appointment as parish priest in a week’s time. So you needn’t worry about it any more.’
Amaro bowed and went humbly over to the Minister, who was standing by the piano.
‘Minister, I would just like to thank you . . .’
‘Oh don’t thank me, thank the Countess,’ said the Minister, smiling.
‘Senhora, thank you,’ he said to the Countess, bowing low.
‘Oh, it’s Teresa you should thank. She’s obviously trying to buy indulgences.’
‘Senhora . . .’ he started saying to Teresa.
‘Remember me in your prayers, Father Amaro,’ she said and continued singing in her mournful voice of how sad the village was when Lubin was away.
A week later, Amaro received confirmation of his nomination to the post. But he never forgot that morning in the house of the Condessa de Ribamar – the Minister with his too-short trousers, comfortably ensconced in the armchair, promising him the job; the bright, calm light of the garden glimpsed through the window; the tall, blond young man who kept saying ‘Yes’ . . . He could not get that sad aria from Rigoletto out of his head and he was pursued by the image of Teresa’s white arms beneath the black gauze. Instinctively he imagined those arms slowly, slowly encircling the blond man’s elegant neck; he hated him then, as well as the barbarous tongue he spoke and the heretical land he came from, and his temples throbbed with the idea that one day he might have to confess that divine woman and, in the dark intimacy of the confessional, feel her black silk dress brush against his old lustrine cassock.
One day, at dawn, after his aunt had repeatedly embraced him, he left for Santa Apolónia station, with a Galician porter to carry his trunk. Dawn was breaking. The city was silent, and the streetlamps were going out. Sometimes a cart would rattle by over the cobbles; the streets seemed to him interminable; villagers from outside Lisbon were beginning to arrive, muddy-booted legs joggling on either side of their donkey mounts; here and there shrill voices selling newspapers rang out; and the young lads employed by theatres were rushing around with their pots of glue, sticking up posters on street corners.
When he reached the station, the bright sun was tinging with orange the sky behind the mountains on the far side of the river; the river lay unmoving, veined with dull, steel-grey currents, and, on it, the occasional sailing barge drifted by, slow and white.
IV
The following day, the whole town was talking about the arrival of the new parish priest, and everyone knew that he had brought with him a tin trunk, that he was tall and thin, and that he addressed Canon Dias as ‘Master’.
São Joaneira’s closest friends, Dona Maria da Assunção and the Gansoso sisters, had all gone to her house first thing in the morning ‘to get all the details . . .’ It was nine o’clock; Amaro had already gone out with Canon Dias. São Joaneira, looking radiant and full of self-importance, received them at the top of the stairs, still in her morning garb, with her sleeves rolled up, and she immediately launched into an animated account of the priest’s arrival, his exquisite manners, what he had said . . .
‘Just come downstairs with me and you can see for yourselves.’
She showed them Amaro’s room, the tin trunk, the shelf she had put up for his books.
‘Oh, very nice,’ said the old ladies, ‘very nice indeed,’ as they walked slowly about the room as respectfully as if they were in church.
‘Lovely overcoat!’ remarked Dona Joaquina Gansoso, stroking the edging of the coat where it hung on the stand. ‘I bet that cost a pretty penny.’
‘And he’s got very good quality underwear!’ said São Joaneira, lifting the lid of the trunk.
The group of old ladies peered in admiringly.
‘I’m so pleased that he’s a young man,’ said Dona Maria da Assunção piously.
‘Oh, yes, so am I,’ said Dona Joaquina Gansoso authoritatively. ‘Being in the middle of your confession and seeing the dewdrop on the priest’s nose after he’s taken a pinch of snuff, the way you did with Raposo, was just awful! It’s enough to make an unbeliever of you! And as for that brute José Miguéis . . . No, give me a young man every time!’
São Joaneira went on to show them Amaro’s other marvels – a crucifix still wrapped up in a sheet of old newspaper and an album of photographs, the first of which showed the Pope blessing the Christian world. They all went into ecstasies over this.
‘Oh, isn’t he a love,’ they said.
As they left, they all kissed São Joaneira fervently and congratulated her because, by having the new parish priest as lodger, she had taken on an almost ecclesiastical authority.
‘Come back tonight,’ she called down from the top of the stairs.
‘Oh, we will!’ called back Dona Maria da Assunção, who was already at the street door, doing up her cape. ‘Then we can have a good look at him!’
Libaninho, the most active male devotee of the church in Leiria, arrived at midday. He ran up the stairs, calling out in his high voice:
‘São Joaneira!’
‘Come up, Libaninho, come up,’ she said from her seat by the window, where she was sitting sewing.
‘So the new parish priest has come, has he?’ asked Libaninho as his fat, lemon-yellow face and gleaming bald pate appeared round the dining-room door; then he minced over to her, swaying his hips.
‘So what’s he like, then? Does he seem nice?’
São Joaneira launched again into her glorification of Amaro: his youth, his pious air, the whiteness of his teeth . . .
‘Bless him!’ Libaninho said, almost drooling with devout tenderness. But he couldn’t stay, he had to get back to the office. ‘Goodbye, my dear, goodbye!’ And he patted São Joaneira’s shoulder with one plump hand. ‘You’re looking lovelier each day, you know. And I said that Hail Mary for you yesterday, just as you asked me to, so don’t say I never think of you.’
The maid had come into the room.
‘Hello, Ruça! Oh, dear, you are thin. Try praying to Our Lady Mother of Mankind!’ And glimpsing Amélia through the half-open door of her room: ‘Don’t you look a picture, Amélia! You’re the girl to show me the path to salvation all right!’
Then off he bustled, loudly clearing his throat, and scuttled down the stairs, trilling:
‘Bye now, girls! Bye!’
‘Libaninho, are you coming tonight?’
‘Oh, I can’t, my dear, I can’t!’ And his voice almost broke with sadness. ‘Tomorrow is St Barbara’s day. I have six Our Fathers to say.’
Amaro had g
one to visit the precentor with Canon Dias and had given him a letter of recommendation from the Conde de Ribamar.
‘Oh, I knew the Count well,’ said the precentor. ‘We met in ’46, in Oporto. We’re old friends. I was the priest at Santo Ildefonso, oh, years ago now.’
And leaning back in his old damask armchair, he spoke with satisfaction of his life: he told anecdotes about the Junta, discussed the men of the time, imitated their voices (this was one of his specialities), their tics, their eccentricities, especially Manuel Passos, whom he described strolling in the Praça Nova, in a long, grey overcoat and a broad-brimmed hat, declaring: ‘Courage, fellow patriots! Xavier won’t give in!’
The ecclesiastical gentlemen of the cathedral chapter roared with laughter. There was an atmosphere of great cordiality. Amaro left feeling very pleased.
Afterwards, he dined at Canon Dias’ house, and they went for a stroll together along the road to Marrazes. A soft, tenuous light spread over the countryside; on the hills, in the blue air, there was a sense of repose, of sweet tranquillity; whitish smoke rose up from the hamlets, and one could hear the melancholy sound of bells as the animals wended their way back to the farms. Amaro paused by the bridge and, looking around at the pleasant landscape, he said:
‘I think I’ll get on very well here!’
‘Superbly I should say,’ said the Canon, taking a pinch of snuff.
It was eight o’clock by the time they reached São Joaneira’s house.
All her old friends were gathered in the dining room. Amélia was sitting sewing beside the oil lamp.
Dona Maria da Assunção had dressed in her Sunday black silk; she was wearing a reddish-blonde wig covered in ornamental black lace; her bony, mittened hands, which lay solemnly on her lap, glittered with rings; a thick gold chain made of filigree hung from the brooch at her neck down to her waist. She was sitting very stiff and erect, her head slightly tilted, her gold-rimmed spectacles perched on her rather equine nose; she had a large, hairy mole on her chin, and whenever she spoke of religious feelings or of miracles she would make an odd movement with her neck and then open her mouth in a silent smile that revealed enormous, greenish teeth, like wedges hammered into her gums. She was a wealthy widow and suffered from chronic catarrh.
‘This is our new parish priest, Dona Maria,’ São Joaneira said.
Dona Maria rose to her feet and, much moved, performed a shallow curtsey with just a slight movement of her hips.
‘And these are the Misses Gansoso of whom I’m sure you’ve heard,’ said São Joaneira to Amaro.
Amaro bowed shyly. There were two Gansoso sisters. They were thought to be wealthy, but often took in lodgers. The older sister, Dona Joaquina Gansoso, was a scrawny woman with a very large, elongated head, lively eyes, turned-up nose and thin lips. Wrapped in her shawl, sitting very upright, her arms folded, she talked incessantly in a shrill, domineering voice and was always full of opinions. She spoke disparagingly of men and devoted herself entirely to the Church.
Her sister, Dona Ana, was extremely deaf. She never spoke and would sit with eyes downcast, her hands in her lap, calmly twiddling her thumbs. She was a stout woman and always wore the same black dress with yellow stripes, edged at the neck with ermine; she dozed all evening and only occasionally made her presence felt with a sudden heavy sigh. It was said that she nursed a fatal passion for the post master. Everyone pitied her, but admired her skill in cutting up paper to make boxes for sweets.
Dona Josefa, Canon Dias’ sister, was also there. Her nickname was ‘the dried chestnut’. She was a shrivelled, hunched creature, with a sibilant voice and wrinkled skin the colour of cider; twitching with nervous rage, her little eyes ever ablaze with anger, she lived in a perpetual state of irritation, full to the brim with bile. She was much feared. Dr Godinho referred to her mischievously as Leiria’s Central Station of gossip.
‘Did you go for a long walk, Father?’ she immediately asked, drawing herself up very straight.
‘We went almost to the end of the Marrazes road,’ said Canon Dias, sitting down heavily behind São Joaneira.
‘It’s so pretty there, don’t you think, Father?’ said Dona Joaquina Gansoso.
‘Oh, very.’
They spoke of the lovely countryside around Leiria, of the excellent views; Dona Josefa particularly enjoyed the riverside walk; she had even heard tell that there was nothing to compare with it in Lisbon itself. Dona Joaquina Gansoso preferred the Church of the Incarnation up the hill.
‘You get a wonderful view from there.’
Amélia said, smiling:
‘I really love that part near the bridge, under the willows.’ And biting through the thread with which she was sewing, she added: ‘It’s so sad.’
Amaro looked at her then for the first time. She was wearing a blue dress that fitted closely over her lovely bosom; her plump, white throat emerged from a turn-down collar; her white teeth gleamed between fresh, red lips; and it seemed to Amaro that a fine down created a soft, subtle shadow at the corners of her mouth.
There was a brief silence. Canon Dias’ eyelids were already growing heavy, his mouth beginning to gape.
‘What can have happened to Father Brito?’ asked Dona Joaquina Gansoso.
‘The poor man’s probably got a migraine,’ remarked Dona Maria da Assunção pityingly.
A young man standing by the sideboard said:
‘I saw him out riding today, heading for Barrosa.’
‘Well, frankly,’ said the Canon’s sister, Dona Josefa Dias, sourly, ‘it’s a miracle you noticed.’
‘Why do you say that, Senhora?’ he said, getting up and going over to the old ladies.
He was tall and dressed all in black; standing out against the white skin of his regular, rather weary features was a short, very dark moustache, whose drooping ends he was in the habit of chewing.
‘“Why?” he asks!’ exclaimed Dona Josefa Dias. ‘You never even take off your hat to him!’
‘Me?’
‘He told me so himself,’ she said in a cutting voice, then added: ‘Father, Senhor João Eduardo here needs setting on the right path.’ And she gave a malicious laugh.
‘I don’t happen to think I’m on the wrong path,’ João Eduardo said, laughing, his hands in his pockets. And he kept glancing over at Amélia.
‘Oh, very funny!’ said Dona Joaquina Gansoso. ‘Well, you’re certainly not going to get into Heaven after what you said this evening about the Holy Woman of Arregaça!’
‘Really!’ roared the Canon’s sister, turning on João Eduardo. ‘And what did you have to say about her, pray? You don’t perhaps think she’s an impostor, do you?’
‘Oh, good heavens!’ said Dona Maria da Assunção, clutching her hands and staring at João Eduardo in pious horror. ‘Did he say that? Good heavens!’
‘No,’ said the Canon gravely; he had woken up and was unfurling his red handkerchief. ‘João Eduardo would never say such a thing.’
Amaro asked:
‘Who is the Holy Woman of Arregaçã?’
‘You mean you haven’t heard of her, Father?’ exclaimed an astonished Dona Maria da Assunção.
‘You must have,’ declared Dona Josefa Dias firmly. ‘They say the newspapers in Lisbon are full of it.’
‘It certainly is a pretty extraordinary case,’ said the Canon in a low voice.
São Joaneira interrupted her knitting, took off her spectacles and said:
‘Oh, Father, you just can’t imagine! It’s the miracle of miracles!’
‘Oh, it is, it is!’ they all agreed.
There was a moment of devout silence.
‘But what is it?’ asked Amaro, filled with curiosity.
‘You see, Father,’ began Dona Joaquina Gansoso, straightening her shawl and speaking in solemn tones, ‘the Holy Woman lives in a neighbouring parish and has spent the last twenty years in bed . . .’
‘Twenty-five,’ Dona Maria da Assunção corrected her quietly, tapping her on the arm
with her fan.
‘Twenty-five? I heard the precentor say it was twenty.’
‘No, it’s twenty-five,’ affirmed São Joaneira, ‘twenty-five.’
And the Canon agreed, nodding gravely.
‘She’s completely paralysed, Father,’ the Canon’s sister said, eager to join in. ‘And she looks like a ghost! Her arms are this thin,’ and she held up her little finger, ‘and to hear her speak you have to put your ear right up against her mouth.’
‘It’s only by the grace of God that she’s still here,’ said Dona Maria da Assunção mournfully. ‘Poor woman! It makes you think . . .’
Amongst the old women an emotion-filled silence fell. João Eduardo, who was standing behind them, hands in pockets, was smiling and chewing his moustache. He said:
‘According to the doctors, Father, she suffers from some sort of nervous disease.’
The irreverence of this remark caused a scandal amongst the devotees, and Dona Maria da Assunção took the precautionary measure of making the sign of the cross.
‘Merciful God!’ boomed Dona Josefa Dias, ‘You may say that in front of anyone else, but not in front of me. I consider it an insult.’
‘He might be struck down by a thunderbolt,’ muttered a terrified Dona Maria da Assunção.
‘Absolutely’ exclaimed Dona Josefa Dias, ‘you are a man without religion and with no respect for holy things.’ Then turning to Amélia, she said sourly: ‘I certainly wouldn’t want him to marry a daughter of mine!’
Amélia reddened, and João Eduardo, who also turned red, bowed sarcastically and said:
‘I am merely repeating what the doctors say. As for the rest, believe me, I have absolutely no ambitions to marry anyone in your family. Not even you, Dona Josefa!’
The Canon gave an embarrassed laugh.
‘How dare you!’ she spluttered.
‘But what does the Holy Woman do?’ asked Father Amaro, trying to restore peace.
‘Everything, Father,’ said Dona Joaquina Gansoso. ‘She never leaves her bed and she has prayers for every occasion; anyone she prays for receives the grace of Our Lord; people only have to touch her and they are cured. And when she takes communion, she starts to rise up until she’s floating in the air, with her eyes lifted up to heaven; it’s quite alarming really.’
The Crime of Father Amaro Page 6
