Quincas Borba

by Machado De Assis

  “So much the better!” he said aloud

  It was close to two o’clock when he left the window. He closed it and got into bed, falling asleep immediately. He awoke to the sound of the voice of the Spanish servant who was bringing him a note.

  XCVIII

  Rubião sat up in bed, bewildered. He didn’t notice the handwriting on the envelope. He opened the note and read:

  We were quite concerned last night after you left. Cristiano can’t stop by there now because he got up late and has to see the customs inspector. Send us a note saying you’re feeling better. Best wishes from Maria Benedita and

  Your faithful friend

  SOFIA.

  “Tell the messenger to wait.”

  Twenty minutes later the reply reached the hand of the black boy who’d brought the note. It was Rubião himself who gave it to him, asking him how the ladies were. He learned that they were well. He gave him ten tostões, telling him that if he ever was in need of money to come by and get some. The boy, startled, opened his eyes wide and promised that he would.

  “Goodbye!” Rubião said to him benevolently.

  And he stood there while the messenger went down the few steps. When the latter got to the center of the garden, he heard a shout:

  “Wait!”

  He came back in response to the call. Rubião had already gone down the steps. They approached each other and stopped, not saying anything. Two minutes passed before Rubião opened his mouth. Finally he asked something—if the ladies were well. It was the same question as the one a short time back. The servant confirmed the answer. Then Rubião let his eyes wander over the garden. The roses and the daisies were pretty and fresh, a few carnations were in bloom, other flowers and foliage, begonias and vines, that whole little world seemed to be placing its invisible eyes on Rubião and calling to him:

  “You indolent soul, follow your desire for once, pick us, send US ...”

  Fine,” Rubião said finally. “Remember me to the ladies. Don’t forget what I told you. If you need me, come here. Have you got the letter?”

  “Yes, sir. It’s here.”

  “You’d better put it in your pocket, but be careful not to crumple it.”

  “I won’t crumple it, no, sir,” the servant replied, putting the letter away.

  XCIX

  The black boy left. Rubião remained there, strolling in the garden, his hands in the pockets of his dressing gown and his eyes on the flowers. Should he have sent some? It was a natural present and even an obligatory one, repaying one courtesy with another. He’d done poorly. He ran to the gate, but the boy was far off. Rubião remembered that mourning excluded happy offerings, and he calmed down.

  Except that as he start strolling again he spied a letter next to a flower bed. He leaned over, picked it up, and read the envelope . . . It was in her hand, it could only be hers. He compared it with the note he’d received. It was the same. The name on it was the devil’s own: Carlos Maria.

  “Yes, that’s what happened,” he thought after a few minutes. “The fellow who brought my letter was carrying this one and dropped it.”

  And, looking the letter up and down, he wondered about the contents. Oh, the contents! What could be written there on that homicidal piece of paper? Perversion, lust, the whole language of evil and dementia summed up in two or three lines. He held it up to his eyes to see if he could read some word. The paper was thick, nothing was legible. Remembering that the messenger, when he found the letter missing, would be coming back looking for it, he quickly put it in his pocket and ran inside.

  In the house he took it out and looked at it again. His hands hesitated, following the state of his conscience. If he opened the letter, he would know everything. Once read and burned, its contents would never be known to anyone else, while he would be putting an end, once and for all, to that terrible fascination that had been giving him so much pain there on the brink of that pit of infamy… I’m not the one who’s saying it; he’s the one who’s putting together those and other horrible names, he’s the one who stands in the center of the room with his eyes on the rug, where in the design an indolent Turk figures, pipe in mouth, looking out over the Bosporus . . . It has to be the Bosporus.

  “Hellish letter!” he snorted softly, repeating a phrase he’d heard at the theater a few weeks earlier, an odd phrase that was emerging now to express the moral analogy between spectacle and spectator.

  He had an urge to open it. It was only a gesture, an act. No one could see him; the pictures on the wall were silent, indifferent; the Turk on the rug continued smoking and looking out at the Bosporus. Nevertheless, he had scruples. The letter, even though found in the garden, didn’t belong to him but to the other man. It was the same as if it had been a roll of bills. Wouldn’t he return the money to its owner? Annoyed, he put it back in his pocket. Between sending the letter to its addressee and giving it to Sofia, he chose the second solution. It had the advantage of letting him read the truth in the features of the writer herself.

  “I’ll tell her I found a letter, that’s all,” Rubião thought. “And before I hand over the letter, I’ll take a good look at her face and see if she’s frightened or not. Maybe she’ll grow pale, then I’ll threaten her, talk to her about the Rua da Harmonia. I’ll swear to her that I’m prepared to spend three hundred, eight hundred, a thousand cantos, two thousand, thirty thousand cantos if necessary to strangle the swine …”

  C

  None of the habitual visitors to the house appeared for lunch. Rubião waited for about ten minutes more and reached the point of sending a servant out to the gate to see if anyone was coming. Nobody. He had to lunch alone.

  Usually he couldn’t bear solitary meals. He was so accustomed to his friends’ talk, their observations, their witticisms, no less than their respect and consideration, that eating alone was the same as not eating at all. Now, however, he was like a Saul in need of some David to expel the malignant spirit that had gotten into him. He was already having evil thoughts about the messenger because he’d dropped the letter. Not knowing would have been a boon. And then his conscience vacillated—it went from delivering the letter to refusing and keeping it indefinitely. Rubião was afraid of finding something out. Now he wanted, now he didn’t want to read something on Sofia’s face. The desire to know everything was, in short, the hope of discovering that there wasn’t anything.

  David finally appeared with the coffee and cheese in the person of Dr. Camacho, who’d returned from Vassouras the night before. Like the biblical David he brought an ass laden with loaves of bread, a jug of wine, and a kid. He had left a deputy from Minas gravely ill in Vassouras, and he was preparing Rubião’s candidacy, writing to influential people in Minas. That was what he told him after the first sips of coffee.

  “Candidate? Me?”

  “Who, then?”

  Camacho pointed out that there couldn’t be a better one. He had connections in Minas, didn’t he?

  “Some.”

  “You’ve got some very important ones here. By backing that organ of principles with me, you’ve shared the blows I’ve received as well as the sacrifices we’ve all made on the monetary side. I tell you, I’m going to do everything I can. Besides, you’re the best solution for the split.”

  “Split?”

  “Yes, Dr. Hermenegildo from Catas-Altas and Colonel Romualdo. It’s said that they both want to be candidates if there’s a vacancy. It’s splitting the vote …”

  “Certainly, but will they insist?”

  “I don’t think they’ll insist when I send them the confirmation of the party leaders here, because that was one of the things they threw in my face, the fact that I had no power. I confessed that in that unforeseen case I didn’t, but that I had the confidence of the leaders, who would back me up. You can believe me, it’s all set. So what do you think? Do you think that I’ve been working here sacrificing time and money and a bit of talent if not to be of some use to a friend who’s given so many proofs of being
faithful to principles? Oh, no! Not that! They’ll have to listen to me and accept what I propose.”

  Rubião, moved, asked a few more questions about the campaign and the victory, whether expenditures would be needed now, or letters of recommendation, petitions, and whether they would get frequent news concerning the sick man, etc. Camacho answered them all. But he advised caution. In politics, he said, the least little thing can derail the campaign and give victory to one’s opponent. Nevertheless, as no winner had emerged yet, Rubião had the advantage of having his name put up. And being first is worth something.

  “Patience and fortitude,” he concluded.

  And immediately after:

  “Am I not an example of patience and fortitude myself? My province is in the hands of a gang of bandits. There’s no other name for the Pinheiros people. And in addition to that (I tell you this with particular pain), I’ve got friends who are conspiring against me, grasping people who want to see if the party will reject me so they can take my place … The scoundrels! Oh, my dear Rubião, this business of politics can only be compared to the passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. It’s all there, the disciple who denies, the disciple who betrays. The crown of thorns, blows, the cross, and, finally, dying on that cross of ideas, held there by the nails of envy, calumny, and ingratitude ...”

  That last phrase, popping out in the heat of the conversation, seemed worthy of an article to him. He stored it away in his memory. Before going to sleep, he wrote it down on a scrap of paper. But on the occasion of the conversation, while Camacho was repeating it to himself to get it down, Rubião said that he should cheer up, that he was a man for great campaigns. And that he shouldn’t retreat because of scowling faces.

  “Scowling faces? Certainly not. Or from real goblins, if they exist. I’m waiting for them! Let them rue the day we rise up! They’ll pay for everything. Take this advice: in politics, never forgive or forget anything. Someone who does something pays for it. You must believe that revenge is sweet,” he went on, smiling. “There’s a lot of pleasure in it. . . So, adding up the good and the bad in politics, there’s more good than bad. There are ingrates, but ingrates are discharged, arrested, prosecuted ...”

  Rubião listened, subdued. Camacho was in charge. His eyes were flashing. Curses poured out of him as from the mouth of Isaiah. The palms of victory were green in his hands. Every gesture was a principle. When he opened his arms, cutting the air, it was as if he were laying out a whole program. He was getting drunk with hope and the wine was heady. All of a sudden he stood still in front of Rubião:

  “Let’s go, deputy. Rehearse a speech making a motion for the discussion to stop: Mister President… Come on, say it with me: Mister President, I ask Your Excellency …”

  Rubião interrupted him, standing up. He was in a kind of swoon. He saw himself in the chamber, going in to take the oath, all the deputies standing. And he shivered. It was difficult walking. Nevertheless, he crossed the chamber, went up to the president’s rostrum, took the oath in the customary way… Maybe his voice would crack on the occasion …

  CI

  That was the state he was in when the news of Freitas’s death arrived. He wept a hidden tear. He took on the expense of the burial and accompanied the deceased to the cemetery the following afternoon. The dead man’s old mother, when she saw him enter the parlor, tried to kneel at his feet. Rubião embraced her in time to stop her from making that gesture. That act of our friend made a great impression on the invited guests. One of them came over to shake his hand. Later on, in a corner, the man told him about the injustice of the dismissal he’d received days before. A spiteful dismissal, the result of intrigue …

  “Your Excellency can well imagine that the place (and please excuse the expression) is a den of scoundrels …”

  The time arrived for the cortege to leave. The mother’s farewells were painful: kisses, sobs, cries, all mingled and heartrending. The women were unable to tear her away from there. Two men had to use force. She was shouting and insisting on going back to the corpse: My son! My poor son!

  “Scandalous!” the discharged man was insisting. “They say that the minister himself was displeased with the action. But, as Your Excellency knows, in order not to undermine the director …”

  “Boom … boom … boom …” the hammers rang softly as the coffin was nailed shut.

  Rubião acceded to the request that he hold one of the handles and he left the man who’d been dismissed. Outside there were a few people standing, neighbors at their windows leaning over each other with eyes full of the curiosity that death inspires in the living. For the rest, there was Rubião’s coupé, which stood out among the old calèches. There’d already been a lot of talk about that friend of the deceased and his presence confirmed it. The dead man was now looked upon with a certain respect.

  At the cemetery Rubião was not content with shoveling a spadeful of earth, in which he was first at everyone’s request. He waited until the gravediggers filled the pit with their large professional shovels. His eyes were moist. He finished, left, surrounded by the others and at the gate, with just a wave of his hat left and right, he saluted all the uncovered and lowered heads. As he got into his coupé, he could just make out these words spoken in a low voice:

  “I think he’s a senator or a judge or something.”

  CII

  Night had fallen. Rubião was going along thinking about the poor devil he’d buried when, on the Rua de Sao Cristovao, he passed another coupé with two orderlies following. It was a cabinet minister on his way to imperial business. Rubião stuck his head out, brought it back in, and sat listening to the orderlies’ horses, so regular, so clear in spite of the clatter of the other animals. Our friend’s spirit was so tense that he could still hear them when they were far out of earshot. Clip-clop … Clip-clop … Clip–clop …

  CIII

  seven days after the death of Dona Maria Augusta, the customary mass was sung at São Francisco de Paula. Rubião attended, and there he saw Carlos Maria. That was enough to hasten the return of the letter. Three days later he put it in his pocket and hurried to Flamengo. It was two in the afternoon. Maria Benedita had gone out to visit the friends in the neighborhood who had stayed with her during the first days of her sorrow. Sofia was alone, dressed to go out.

  “But it doesn’t matter,” she said, inviting him to have a seat. “I can stay and go out later.”

  Rubião replied that it wouldn’t take long. He’d come to give her a piece of paper.

  “In any case, do sit down. You can hand over a piece of paper from a sitting position, too.”

  She looked so pretty that he hesitated to speak the harsh words he’d brought along all memorized. Mourning was very becoming to her, and her dress fitted her like a glove. When she was seated half of her foot was visible, low shoe, silk stocking, all things that called for pity and pardon. As for the sword in that scabbard—that’s what an old–time author calls the soul—it didn’t seem to have a sharp edge or deft balance. It was an innocent ivory paper knife. Rubião was on the verge of weakening. Her first word dragged out the others.

  “What paper?” Sofia asked.

  “A paper that I imagine is important,” he replied, holding himself back. “Can’t you remember or not whether you lost a letter?”

  “No.”

  “Are you in the custom of writing letters?”

  after listening for a few minutes, came “I’ve written some, but I can’t remember if they were important. Let me see it.”

  Rubião was wild-eyed. He didn’t say or do anything. He got up to leave but didn’t. Then, after a few moments of silence and hesitation, he continued, without anger.

  “It’s no secret for you that I love you. You know that and you neither dismiss nor accept me, you encourage me with your fine manners. I still haven’t forgotten Santa Teresa or our train trip, when we were both traveling along with your husband in the middle. Do you remember? That trip was my undoing. Ever since that day you’ve held
me captive. You’re wicked, you’ve got the ways of a snake. What harm did I ever do to you? It’s all right if you don’t love me, but you might have put an end to my illusions right at the beginning…”

  “Be quiet, someone’s coming,” Sofia interrupted, standing up and looking toward the door.

  No one was coming. They might hear, however, because Rubião’s voice was getting more heated and louder. It grew even louder. He was no longer suing for hope, he was opening up and emptying out his soul.

  “I don’t care if they hear,” he roared. “Let them hear me. I’m going to say everything now, and you can throw me out and it will all be over. No, you can’t make a man suffer like this.”

  “Be quiet, for the love of God!”

  “Leave God out of this! Listen to what I have to say, because I’m not prepared to hold anything back …”

  All confused, really worried that some servant might hear, Sofia raised her hand and covered his mouth. At the contact of that beloved flesh Rubião lost his voice. Sofia took her hand away and made ready to leave the room, but when she reached the door she stopped. Rubião walked over to the window to recover from the outburst.