The Collected Novels of José Saramago

by José Saramago

  These are days of bliss. On vacation from her job at the hotel, Lydia spends nearly all her time with Ricardo Reis and goes home only to sleep at her mother's house, out of propriety, to avoid gossip among the neighbors, who notwithstanding the good relations established ever since the doctor offered some medical advice, continue to comment slyly on these disgraceful associations between master and servant, all too common in this Lisbon of ours no matter how carefully disguised. Someone of greater moral fastidiousness might insinuate that people can also do during the day what they normally do at night, but another could reply that during the day there is no time, because of the great spring cleaning done in houses every Easter after the long winter, which explains why the doctor's charwoman comes early each morning and leaves almost at dusk, and work she does, for all to see and hear, with feather duster and cloth, scrub brush and broom. Sometimes the windows are closed and there is a sudden silence, but is it not natural for a person to rest between one chore and another, to untie the kerchief on her head, to loosen her clothes, to groan from a new and sweet exertion. The apartment is celebrating Resurrection Saturday and Easter Sunday by the grace and labor of this humble servant who passes her hands over things and leaves them spotless and gleaming, not even in the days of Dona Luisa and the Appeals Court Judge, with a regiment of maids to do the shopping and the cooking, did these walls and furniture shine with such luster, blessed be Lydia among women. Marcenda, were she living here as the legitimate mistress of the household, could not compete, not even with two good hands. A few days ago the place smelled of mildew, dust, must, blocked drains, and now light penetrates the most remote corners, makes all the glass look like crystal, polishes every surface, the ceiling itself becomes starlit with reflections when the sun enters the windows, a celestial abode, a diamond within a diamond, and it was through menial housework that this sublime transformation was achieved. Perhaps also the abode is celestial because of the frequency with which Lydia and Ricardo Reis make love, such is their pleasure in giving and taking, I cannot think what has come over these two that they are suddenly so demanding and so generous with their favors. Could it be the summer that is heating their blood, could it be the presence of that tiny ferment in her womb, the ferment is nothing in this world as yet, yet already it has some influence in governing it.

  But now Lydia's vacation is over and everything returns to normal, she will come, as before, once a week on her day off. Now, even when the sun finds an open window, the light is different, weaker, and the sieve of time has started once more to sift the impalpable dust that makes outlines fade and blurs features. When Ricardo Reis turns down the bedcover at night, he barely sees the pillow where he will rest his head, and in the morning he cannot rise without first identifying himself with his own hands, line by line, what he can still find of himself, like a fingerprint partially obliterated by a large scar. One night Fernando Pessoa, who does not always appear when he is needed, knocked on his door. I was beginning to think I'd never see you again, Ricardo Reis told him. I haven't been out much of late, I get lost so easily, like a forgetful old woman, the only thing that saves me is the mental picture I still have of the statue of Camoes, working from there, I can usually get my bearings. Let's hope they don't remove him, given this latest mania of removing things, you should see what's happening on the Avenida da Liberdade, they have stripped it bare. I haven't been back there, I know nothing about it. They have removed or are about to remove the statue of Pinheiro Chagas, and that of a certain José Luis Monteiro, whom I've never heard of. Nor I, but as for Pinheiro Chagas, they have done the right thing. Be quiet, you don't know what awaits you. They will never erect a statue to commemorate me, only if they have no shame, I'm not one for statues. I couldn't agree more, there can be nothing more depressing than having a statue as part of one's destiny, let them raise statues to military leaders and politicians, who like that sort of thing, we are men of words only and words cannot be set in bronze and stone, they are words, nothing more, look at Camóes, where are his words. That is why they made him a fop at court. A D'Artagnan. With a sword at his side, any puppet looks good, I'm sure I would cut a ridiculous figure. Don't upset yourself, you might escape this curse, and if you don't, like Rigoletto, you can always hope that they will pull your statue down one day, as in the case of Pinheiro Chagas, and transfer it to a quiet spot or store it in some warehouse, it is happening all the time, some people are even demanding that the statue of Chiado be removed. Chiado too, what do they have against Chiado. They say he was a scurrilous buffoon and is not fit for the elegant site where his statue stands. On the contrary, Chiado could not stand in a better place, one cannot imagine Camoes without Chiado, besides they lived in the same century, if there is anything that needs changing it is the position in which they put the friar, he should be turned to face the epic poet with hand outstretched, not a begging hand but an offering, giving hand. Camoes needs nothing from Chiado. Camoes is no longer alive, therefore we have no idea what he needs or doesn't need. Ricardo Reis went to the kitchen to get some coffee, returned to the study, sat opposite Fernando Pessoa, and said, It always feels strange not being able to offer you a cup of coffee. Pour another cup and put it in front of me, I'll keep you company while you drink. I cannot get used to the idea that you do not exist. Seven months have passed already, enough time to engender a life, but you know more about that than I do, you are a doctor. Is there some veiled hint in that last remark. What veiled hint should I make. I'm not sure. You are touchy today. Perhaps it's this business of removing statues, this proof of how fickle human loyalties can be, the Discus Thrower is another example. What discus thrower, The one on the Avenida, Now I remember, that naked youth pretending to be Greek, Well, he too has been removed. But why. They said he looked effeminate, they spoke of moral health and protecting the eyes of the city's inhabitants from shameful displays of nudity. If the youth was not exaggerated in any of his physical proportions, what harm was he doing. Those so-called proportions, although neither exaggerated nor excessive, were more than sufficient to illustrate certain details of the male anatomy. But I thought they said the youth looked effeminate, is that not what they said. Yes. Then surely he offended because he was found wanting, not because there was too much of him. I am only repeating as best I can the rumors circulating in the city. My dear Reis, are the Portuguese gradually taking leave of their senses. If you who lived here ask this question, how can a man who lived abroad for so many years be expected to answer it.

  Ricardo Reis, finishing his coffee, now debated whether or not to read the poem he had dedicated to Marcenda, the one beginning, Already impatient for the summer. When finally he made up his mind and began to rise from the sofa, Fernando Pessoa pleaded with him with a sadly vacant smile, pleaded, Distract me, you must have other scandals to confide. Whereupon Ricardo Reis, without needing to pause for thought, announced in seven words the biggest scandal of all, I am about to become a father. Fernando Pessoa looked at him in astonishment, then burst out laughing, he could not believe it, You're joking. Ricardo Reis said somewhat stiffly, I am not joking, besides I fail to understand your surprise, if a man regularly sleeps with a woman, in all likelihood she will conceive, that is what happened in my case. Who is the mother, your Lydia or your Marcenda, or is there a third woman, with you one never knows. There is no third woman, and I did not marry Marcenda. Ah, so you would have a child with Marcenda only if you were married to her. Well, obviously, you know the stria morality observed in traditional families. And chambermaids have no such scruples. Sometimes they do. True, remember when Alvaro de Campos told us how he was mocked by a hotel chambermaid. Not in that sense. In what sense, then. A hotel chambermaid is also a woman. The things one learns after one is dead. You don't know Lydia. My dear Reis, I shall always treat the matter of your child with the greatest respect, nay, veneration, but having never been a father myself, I know not how to translate these metaphysical feelings into the tedious reality of everyday life. Stop being ironic. Your
sudden paternity must have dulled your senses, otherwise you would perceive that there is nothing ironic in what I am saying. Irony there most certainly is, though it may go under the guise of something else. Irony, rather, is the disguise. A disguise for what. Perhaps for grief. Don't tell me that it grieves you never to have had a child. Who knows. Have you regrets. I am the most regretting of persons and today do not even have the heart to deny it. You regret that you regret. That habit I had to give up when I died, there are certain things on this side that are not permitted. Fernando Pessoa stroked his mustache and asked, Are you still thinking of going back to Brazil. There are days when I seem to be back there already, and there are days when I have the impression that I was never there at all. You are floating, in other words, in midocean, neither here nor there. Like the rest of the Portuguese. But this gives you an excellent opportunity to make a new life for yourself, with a wife and child. I have no intention of marrying Lydia, and I still haven't decided whether I will acknowledge the child as mine. If you will allow me to express an opinion, my dear Reis, you are a cad. Perhaps, but Alvaro de Campos took loans he never repaid, He was a cad too, You never really got along with him, I never really got along with you, We never really understood each other, That was inevitable, since each of us was a multitude of different people. What I do not understand is this high moral tone of yours, this conservatism. A dead man by definition is a conservative, he cannot bear any tampering with order. You once fulminated against order. Now I fulminate on its behalf. If you were alive and found yourself in my shoes, with an unwanted child, its mother from a lower class, you would have the doubts I have. The very same. The doubts of a cad. That's right, dear Reis, of a cad. I may be a cad, but I have no intention of abandoning Lydia. Perhaps because she is making things easy for you. True enough, she told me there was no need for me to acknowledge the child as mine. Why are women like this, Not all of them, Agreed, but only women can be like this. Anyone listening to you would think you had a great deal of experience with women. The only experience I have is that of a spectator, an observer. No, one has to sleep with them, make them pregnant, even if it ends in abortion, one has to see them when they are sad and happy, laughing and weeping, silent and talkative, one has to watch them when they do not know that they are being watched. And what does an experienced man see at such moments? An enigma, a labyrinth, a charade. I was always good at charades, But a disaster when it came to women, My dear Reis, that is not kind, Forgive me, my nerves are humming like a tele phone wire in a strong wind. You are forgiven. I have no job and no interest in looking for one, I spend my days sitting here in my apartment, sitting in some restaurant, or on a bench in the park, as if I had nothing to do but sit and wait for death. Let the child be born. It isn't up to me, and a child wouldn't solve anything, I feel that it does not belong to me. You think someone else might be the father. No, I'm certain I'm the father, that's not the problem, the problem is that only the mother truly exists, the father is an accident. A necessary accident. Undoubtedly, but dispensable once the necessity has been provided, so dispensable that he could die at once, like a praying mantis. You are as frightened of women as I was, Perhaps even more. Did you ever hear from Marcenda again, Not a word, but I wrote a poem to her several days ago, Are you serious, Well, to be frank, it's only a poem in which her name appears, would you like me to read it to you. No. Why not. I know your poetry by heart, both the poems you have written and the poems you will write, the only novelty would be the name Marcenda. Now it is your turn to be unkind. Nor can I ask to be forgiven on the grounds that my nerves are bad, go ahead, then, and read me the poem. Already impatient for the summer. And the second line could be, I also weep for its flowers. That's right. As you can see, we know everything about each other, or at least I about you, Is there anything that belongs only to me, Probably not. After Fernando Pessoa left, Ricardo Reis drank what remained of the coffee in his cup, it was cold but tasted good.

  A few days later the newspapers reported that twenty-five Hitler Youth students from Hamburg, visiting our country in order to study and promote National-Socialist ideals, were guests of honor at the Teacher Training College. After an extensive tour of the Exhibition to Mark the Tenth Anniversary of the National Revolution, they wrote the following in the Roll of Honor, We are nobody. This meant, as the clerk on duty hastened to explain, that the people are indeed nobody if not guided by the elite, the cream, the flower, the chosen few of our society. Note that the word chosen derives from choice which implies election, for we would have our people guided by the chosen few if they can choose them, whereas to be guided by a flower or by a cream is ridiculous, at least in the Portuguese language, so let us use the French word elite until such time as we find something better in German. Perhaps with this in mind the creation of the Portuguese Youth Movement has been decreed, in October its activities will start in earnest, the Movement will have a membership of two hundred thousand youths, the flower or cream of our youth, from which, hopefully, the elite will emerge, destined to govern us when the present regime comes to an end. If Lydia's child is born and survives, in a few years' time he will be able to take part in parades, enroll in the junior ranks of the Portuguese Youth Movement, don the green and khaki uniform, display on his belt the letter'S, which stands for Serve and Salazar, or Serve Salazar, therefore a double'S, SS, extending his right arm in Roman-style salute. And Marcenda, with her aristocratic background, will enroll in the Women's Organization for National Education, she too will raise her right arm, since it is only the left that is paralyzed. To show how our patriotic youth is shaping up, representatives of the Portuguese Youth Movement will travel to Berlin in uniform, let us hope they will have an opportunity to repeat that celebrated phrase, We are nobody. They will also attend the Olympic Games, where, needless to say, they will make a splendid impression, these proud and comely youths, the glory of the Lusitanian race, the mirror of our future, a blossoming tree that extends its branches in Roman salute. My son, Lydia tells Ricardo Reis, will have nothing to do with such a farce, and with these words we could start an argument that would last ten years, if we live that long.

  Victor is nervous. This mission is one of enormous responsibility, not to be compared with the routine job of tailing suspects, bribing hotel managers, interrogating porters who spill the beans immediately. He puts his right hand to his hip to feel the reassuring presence of his pistol, then takes from the inside pocket of his jacket, very slowly, with the tip of his fingers, a peppermint lozenge. He unwraps it with infinite care, because in the silence of the night the sound of rustling paper can be heard ten paces away, this is unwise of him, an infringement of security regulations, but the smell of onion, perhaps because of his nervousness, has become intense and there is the danger that at the critical moment his prey might flee, being downwind of him. Hidden behind tree trunks, concealed in doorways, Victor's henchmen are waiting for the signal, they gaze steadily at the window from which filters an almost invisible thread of light, the fact that the inside shutters are closed in this heat is itself an indication of conspiracy. One of Victor's henchmen hefts the crowbar with which he will prize open the door, another slips the fingers of his left hand into an iron knuckle-duster, both men, much experienced, will leave a trail of shattered hinges and broken jaws. On the sidewalk opposite stands another policeman, behaving like an innocent passerby or rather a law-abiding citizen returning home to this building, but he does not rap with the knocker for his wife to come and open up, What kept you so late. In less than fifteen seconds the door is opened just as effectively by crowbar, the first obstacle overcome. The policeman waits on the staircase, his job is to listen carefully, to give warning if he hears anything, to let Victor know, for Victor is the brains behind this operation. In the doorway the shadowy form of the policeman appears, he lights a cigarette, which means that all is well, no suspicions have been aroused on the floor they have surrounded. Victor spits out the peppermint, he is afraid of choking at the height of the action, shou
ld there be hand-to-hand combat, he breathes through his mouth, relishes the freshness of the peppermint, he no longer seems the same Victor. But he has barely taken three steps before that telltale effluvium again rises from his stomach, its one advantage, considerable, is that the henchmen, following their leader, will not lose him. Only two remain behind, watching the window for any attempt to escape, in which case they have been given orders to shoot without first calling out. The squad of six men ascends Indian file, like a procession of ants, in the total silence, and the air grows close and electric with tension. The men have all become so nervous, they do not even notice their chief's stench, you could almost say that everything now smells the same. Having reached the landing, they begin to wonder if there is really anyone in the building, the silence is so deep that the entire world appears to be asleep. If Victor's information were not so reliable, he would give everyone orders to return to the usual snooping, shadowing of suspects, asking questions, paying for answers. Inside the apartment someone coughs. The tip-off has been confirmed. Victor aims his flashlight at the door, like a wise cobra the cleft crowbar advances, introduces its fangs between the jamb and the door, and waits. Now it is Victor's turn, with his knuckle-duster he strikes the door with the four blows of destiny, yells, Police, the crowbar gives the first wrench, the jamb splinters, the lock grates, inside there is uproar, chairs overturned, the sound of rapid footsteps, voices. No one move, Victor shouts in a commanding voice, his nervousness gone, and suddenly the lights go on on all the landings. The neighbors, wanting to join the fun, dare not enter the stage but have illuminated it. Someone must have opened a window, because three shots can be heard from the street. Changing position, the crowbar tries the crack at the lower hinge, the door splits from top to bottom, gapes open, and with two mighty kicks the henchmen bring it to the ground. The door first crashes against the facing wall of the corridor, then collapses sideways, making a large gash in the plaster. A great silence has descended on the apartment, there is no escaping now. Victor advances with pistol in hand, Nobody move. Flanked by two henchmen, he enters the room, which looks onto the street, the window is open and outside, below, the men are keeping watch, while here in the room are four men on their feet, their hands in the air, their heads lowered, defeated. Victor smiles with satisfaction, You are all under arrest, you are all under arrest. He gathers up some papers, which lie scattered on the table, orders the search to begin, calls the policeman over, the one with the knuckle-duster who is looking very sorry for himself because there was no resistance and thus no chance to land a single blow, and tells him to go to the back and see if anyone escaped. They hear him call out from the kitchen hatch, then from the fire escape, to his colleagues who were covering the other exits, Did you see anyone escape. They replied that one escaped, in the report tomorrow it will be written that a man was seen climbing over the walls of the courtyard or jumping from rooftop to rooftop, the versions will vary. The policeman with the knuckle-duster returns, looking very sour, Victor does not need to be told, he starts bellowing, livid with rage, the last trace of peppermint gone, What a bunch of idiots. And when he sees that the arrested men cannot suppress a smile of triumph, however wan, he realizes that it was none other than the ringleader who gave them the slip, now he is foaming at the mouth, uttering dire threats, demanding to know the fugitive's name, his destination, Speak or you all die. His henchmen aim their pistols, the one with the knuckle-duster raises his arm, fist clenched, then the director says, Cut. Still beside himself with rage, Victor cannot calm down, for him this is no laughing matter, ten men needed to capture five, and they allowed the ringleader, the brains behind the conspiracy, to give them the slip, but the producer intervenes good-naturedly, the filming has gone so well that there is no need for a retake, Forget it, don't let it upset you, if we had caught him, that would have been the end of the film. But dear Senhor Lopes Ribeiro, the police are made to look such fools, the corps is brought into disrepute, seven men sent to kill a spider and the spider escapes in the end, that is to say the fly, because we are the spider. Let it escape, there is no lack of spiders' webs in the world, from some you escape, in others you die. The fugitive will find shelter in a boardinghouse under an assumed name, thinking he is safe, he has no idea that his spider will be the daughter of the landlady, according to the script a very serious young woman, a dedicated nationalist who will regenerate his heart and mind. Women are a powerful force, real saints, and the producer is clearly an intelligent man. They are engaged in this conversation when the cameraman, a German newly arrived from Germany, approaches, and the producer understands him, for the man practically speaks Portuguese, A gross plan of the Polizei. Victor too understands, gets into position, the cameraman's assistant claps the boards, bang, May Revolution second take, or some other phrase in a similar jargon, and Victor, brandishing his pistol, reappears at the door with a menacing and derisive smirk, You're all under arrest, you're all under arrest. If he now shouts it with less force, it's to avoid choking on the peppermint lozenge he has just popped into his mouth in order to purify the air. The cameraman declares himself satisfied, Auf Wiedersehen, ich habe keine Zeit zu verlieren, es ist schon Zemlich spät, Good-bye, I've no time to waste, it's getting late. Turning to the producer, Es ist Punkt Mitternacht, It is midnight on the dot, to which Lopes Ribeiro replies, Machen Sie bitte das Licht aus, Turn off the light. The translation is supplied because our German is still rudimentary. Victor has already descended with his squad, who lead their captives away handcuffed, so conscious of their duty as policemen that they take even this masquerade seriously, an arrest is an arrest even if it is only make-believe.