The Collected Novels of José Saramago

by José Saramago

  This might be the moment to express our regret that this true story is not the libretto of an opera, for if it were we would stage an ensemble the like of which has never been heard before, with twenty voices comprising lyric and dramatic sopranos of every timbre, one by one, or in chorus, in succession or simultaneously, trilling their parts, namely the joint sessions of the Spanish and Portuguese governments, the total disruption of the electric transport system, the resolution adopted by the European Community, the stand taken by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the flight of tourists in panic, the attacks on airplanes, the congestion of traffic on the roads, the meeting between Joaquim Sassa and José Anaiço, their encounter with Pedro Orce, the agitation of the bulls in Spain, the nervousness of the horses in Portugal, the disquiet on the coasts of the Mediterranean, the disturbance of tides, the flight of the rich and their fortunes, shortly there will be no singers left onstage. Those who are curious, not to say skeptical, will want to know what is causing all these serious developments, as if the simple breaking up of the Pyrenees were not enough for them, with rivers turning into waterfalls and tides advancing sev eral kilometers inland, after a recession that has lasted millions of years. At this point the hand falters, how can it plausibly write the words that are about to follow, words that will inevitably throw everything into jeopardy, all the more so since it is becoming extremely difficult, should such a thing ever be possible in life, to separate truth from fantasy. But now we must finish off what has remained in suspense, by striving to transform with words what can probably only be transformed with words, the moment has arrived, it has finally come, to reveal that the Iberian peninsula has suddenly broken away, all in one uniform piece, leaving a gap of ten whole meters, who would believe it, the Pyrenees have opened up from top to bottom as if some invisible ax had descended from on high, penetrating the deep cracks, clawing stone and earth down into the sea. Now we can certainly see the Irati dropping a thousand meters, falling headlong into infinity, the Irati opens to the wind and sun, a crystal fan or the tail of a bird of paradise, the first rainbow poised over the abyss, the first vertigo of the hawk hovering with drenched wings, tinged with seven colors. And we should also be able to see the Visaurin, Monte Perdido, the peaks of the Perdiguere and of Estats, two thousand meters, three thousand meters of steep slopes unbearable to behold, you cannot even trace their descent, because of the misty atmosphere in the distance, and then fresh clouds will appear as the gap widens, as certain as the existence of destiny itself.

  Time passes, memories fade, we can scarcely perceive any longer the truth and the truths, once so clear and defined, and then, wishing to confirm what we ambitiously call the accuracy of the official version, we consult the evidence relating to the period, the various documents, newspapers, films, video recordings, chronicles, private diaries, parchments, especially the palimpsests, we question survivors, with much good will on either side, we even succeed in believing what some old man claims to have seen and heard as a child, and from all of this we shall have to draw some conclusion, in the absence of any convincing certainties one has to pretend, but what appears to be beyond question is that until the electric cables burst apart there was no real fear in the peninsula, although it has been stated to the con trary, of course there was some panic, but not fear, which is emotion of another order. Obviously, there are many people who retain a clear picture of the dramatic scenes at Coll de Pertus when the concrete disappeared from the sight of those who were shouting, We are winning, we are winning, but the episode only made an impression on those who were actually there, the others looked on from a distance, sitting at home before their own little stage, their television set, in that small rectangle of glass, that courtyard of miracles where an image sweeps away the previous one without trace, everything is on a reduced scale, even emotions. And those sensitive viewers, for they still exist, those viewers who start shedding tears at the slightest pretext and to disguise the lump in their throat, did what they usually do when they cannot bear it any longer, confronted by famine in Africa and other such calamities, they turned their eyes away. Besides, we must not forget that in vast areas of the peninsula, in the heart of the countryside where newspapers do not arrive and the television reception is poor, there were millions, yes, millions of people who did not see what was happening, or had only a vague idea, formed from words whose meaning they had only half digested, perhaps not even that, an idea that was so unreliable that there really was not much difference between what some people thought they knew and what others did not.

  But when all the lights in the peninsula went out at the same time, a blackout they later referred to as apagón in Spain, negrum in a Portuguese village that still invents words, when five hundred and eighty-one square kilometers of land became invisible on the surface of the earth, then there was no longer any doubt, everything was coming to an end. It was just as well that the entire power cut lasted no more than fifteen minutes, then emergency connections were rigged that put domestic energy resources into action, scant at this time of the year, the height of summer, mid-August, dry, low reservoirs, a shortage of power stations, and these cursed nuclear installations, but the pandemonium was truly peninsular, demons on the loose, cold fear, bedlam, even an earthquake could not have had a worse effect on morale. It was night, the beginning of night, when most people have retired indoors, they are sitting watching television, in their kitchens the women are preparing dinner, one particularly patient father is helping, somewhat tentatively, with the solution of an arithmetic problem, there does not appear to be much happiness, but it soon became clear just how much this terror meant, this pitch-darkness, this ink stain that had fallen on Iberia. Do not take away the light, O Lord, let it return, and I promise you that until my dying day, I shall ask for nothing else, this was what penitent sinners were saying, but then they always exaggerate. Anyone living in a valley would have imagined himself to be inside a covered well, anyone living higher up would have climbed to the top and, for many leagues around, failed to see a single light, it was as if the earth had changed its orbit and was now traveling in a space without any sun. Trembling hands lit candles in the houses, flashlights, paraffin lamps kept for an emergency, but not like this one, brought out candlesticks in wrought silver, those in bronze that were used only as ornaments, brass candlesticks, long-forgotten oil lamps, dim lights that filled the darkness with shadows and allowed one to catch a glimpse of startled faces, as distorted as reflections on the water. There were many women shouting, many men were shaking, as for the children, all one can say is that they were all crying their hearts out. After fifteen minutes, which, as the saying goes, seemed like fifteen centuries, although there was no one who had lived the latter and was thus able to compare them with the former, the electricity came back, little by little, intermittent, the lamps were like sleepy eyes casting surly looks everywhere, ready to fall asleep again, until they could finally stand the light and hold it there.

  Half an hour later, radio and television stations went back on the air, gave reports about the blackout, and so we learned that all the high-voltage cables between France and Spain had blown up, some pylons had collapsed, through some inexcusable oversight none of the engineers had remembered to disconnect the lines since it was impossible to cut them. Fortunately, the fireworks caused by the short circuits did not claim any victims, a most selfish way of putting it, for while it is true that no human lives were lost, one wolf, at least, did not escape the electrical discharge and was reduced to smoking cinders. But the blowing up of the cables was only one half of the explanation for the blackout, the other half of the explanation, despite the garbled form in which it was, deliberately, expressed, soon became clear, each man spelling things out to his neighbor, What they don't want to admit is that it's not just the cracks in the ground, otherwise the cables wouldn't have broken. Then you tell me, friend, what do you think happened, It's white and the hen lays it but this time it wasn't an egg, the cables broke because they were str
etched, because the earth was pulled apart, that's what happened as sure as God is my Maker, You don't tell me, I'm telling you, I'm telling you, just you wait and see, they'll end up spilling the beans. And they did, but only the following day, when there were so many rumors flying about that one more, even if true, could not have added to the confusion, but they did not explain everything, or put it very clearly, they simply announced, and these were the exact words, An alteration in the geological structure of the Pyrenean cordillera has resulted in a continuous rupture, in a disjunction of physical continuity, and for the moment all communications by road between France and the peninsula are interrupted, the authorities are carefully monitoring the situation, air connections are being maintained, all airports are open and fully operational, and as from tomorrow the number of daily flights is likely to be doubled.

  And how badly they were needed. When it became clear and beyond question that the Iberian peninsula had separated completely from Europe, as people began saying, The peninsula has broken away, hundreds of thousands of tourists, for as we know this was the peak season, hastily left their hotels, pousadas, paradores, inns, hostels, pensions, rented houses and rooms, camping sites, tents and caravans, without paying their bills, suddenly causing the most colossal traffic jams on the roads, which grew even worse when cars were left abandoned everywhere, it took some time but then it was like a lit fuse, people are generally slow in recognizing and accepting the seriousness of situations, the futility of having a car, for example, once the roads to France were cut off. Littered around the airports, like a flood, stood masses of cars of all sizes, models, makes, and colors, obstructing the roads and access ramps, all bunched up, completely disrupting the life of the local communities. The Spaniards and the Portuguese, having recovered from the frightening experience of finding themselves in a blackout, apagón or negrum, looked on in panic, thought it absurd, after all there had been no loss of life, Ah, these foreigners, take them out of their routine and they lose control, that's the price they pay for being so advanced in science and technology, and after passing this damning judgment they went off to choose, from among the abandoned vehicles, the ones that appealed to them most and best reflected their aspirations.

  In the airports, the airline counters were assailed by the excited multitude, a furious babel of gestures and shouting, unheard-of bribes were offered and accepted in exchange for a ticket, people were selling and buying everything, jewels, cameras, clothes, drugs, these now being peddled quite openly, My car's outside, here are the keys and the papers, if you can't get me a seat to Brussels I don't mind going to Istanbul, even to hell, this tourist was one of the distracted ones, he couldn't see the forest for the trees. Overloaded, their bloated memories nearly saturated, the computers wavered, mistakes were multiplied, until the entire system was paralyzed. Tickets were no longer sold, the planes were stormed, such ferocity, the men first because they were stronger, then the fragile women and innocent children, a great many women and children were left crushed between the terminal gate and the boarding steps, these were the first casualties, and then there were a second and a third cluster of casualties when someone had the tragic idea of forcing his way through, brandishing a pistol, only to be tackled and knocked to the ground by the police. There were other weapons in the crowd and they were fired, there is little point in stating in which airport this disaster occurred, an abominable affair repeated in several other places, although with less serious consequences, for eighteen people died there.

  Suddenly, someone remembered that you could also escape from seaports, this sparked another rush for salvation. The refugees turned back, once more in search of their abandoned cars, sometimes they found them, sometimes they did not, but what did that matter, if there were no keys or they could not be used, people soon put two and two together, anyone who did not know quickly learned, Portugal and Spain were transformed into an earthly paradise for car thieves. When the desperate tourists arrived at the ports they went in search of a small boat or canoe to carry them, or, better still, a trawler, a tugboat, a fast rowboat, a sailboat, and in this way they abandoned their last possessions in this cursed land, they departed with the clothes they were wearing and little else, a grubby handkerchief to blow their nose, a lighter without value or fluid, a tie no one had ever liked, it's not right that we should have profited so outrageously from the misfortune of others, we were like brigands from the coast robbing castaways of everything they possessed. The poor wretches disembarked wherever they could, wherever they were swept, and some were left on Ibiza, Majorca, or Minorca, on Formentera or the islands of Cabrera and Conejera, in the hands of fate, the hapless creatures were stuck, in a manner of speaking, between the devil and the deep blue sea, so far there is no evidence that the islands have moved, but who can tell what tomorrow may bring, the Pyrenees appeared to be solid for all eternity, and look what happened. Thousands upon thousands of refugees ended up in Morocco, having fled from the Algarve or from the Spanish coast, in the latter case from below the Cape of Palos, anyone who might have been north of the cape preferred to be taken straight to Europe, if at all possible, and they would ask, How much do you want to take me to Europe, and the first mate would cock an eye, purse his lips, look the refugee up and down assessing his means, You know, Europe is a hell of a long way from here, it's really halfway around the world, and there was no point in arguing. Such exaggeration, it's only ten meters by water, once when a Dutchman dared to advance this bit of sophistry, and a Swede backed him up, they were cruelly told, Oh, so it's only ten meters, then why don't you swim across, and they were forced to apologize and pay twice as much. The bartering flourished until the various countries jointly agreed to provide shuttles to transport their citizens en masse, but, even after this humanitarian measure got under way, certain sailors and fishermen continued to make a fortune, one must not forget that not all travelers are at peace with the law, some who were not were prepared to pay through the nose, not that they had any choice, for the naval forces of Portugal and Spain were patrolling the coasts assiduously, on full alert and under the discreet surveillance of naval squadrons of the other powers.

  Some tourists, however, decided not to leave, they accepted the geological fracture as an irreversible act of fate, saw it as an imperious sign of destiny, and wrote to their families, at least they showed some consideration, to say that they no longer thought about them, that their world had changed, and their way of life, they were not to blame, on the whole they were people with little willpower, the sort of people who cannot make up their mind, leave everything for tomorrow, tomorrow, but this does not mean that they do not cherish dreams and desires, the sad thing is that they die before achieving or knowing how to achieve even a small part of them. Others opted for silence, they simply disappeared, they forgot and allowed themselves to be forgotten, well, any one of these cases by itself could make a novel, the story of how it turned out in the end, and, even if there is little or nothing to relate, no two human stories are ever the same.

  But there are those who carry heavier burdens on their shoulders, burdens from which they cannot escape, so much so that when the nation's affairs are going badly we immediately start asking, Hey, what are you going to do about it, what are you waiting for, these outbursts of impatience are in some measure quite unjust, after all, poor things, they can't escape their destiny either, at best they can go to the President and tender their resignation, but not during a crisis, for that would bring them into dishonor, history would judge severely any man in public life who took such a decision at a time like this when, strictly speaking, everything is going under. On both sides of the frontier, in Portugal and in Spain, the governments began making reassuring statements, they formally assured us that the situation does not give cause for any grave concern, a curious way of putting it, and that all the necessary steps are being taken to safeguard people and their property, finally the heads of government appeared on television, and then, to pacify troubled minds, their King also app
eared over there and our President over here, Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears, they said, and the Portuguese and the Spaniards, gathered in their forums, replied with one voice, Of course, of course, words, words, nothing but words. Faced with the hostility of public opinion, the prime ministers of the two nations met at a secret location, first on their own, then accompanied by members of their respective governments. Jointly and separately, they held two days of exhaustive talks, before finally deciding to set up a joint committee to cope with the crisis, whose main objective would be to coordinate civil defense operations in the two countries, which would muster their respective resources, both technical and human, for mutual benefit, and use every expedient in order to deal with this geological challenge that had distanced the peninsula ten meters from Europe. If it doesn't get any worse, people whispered in corridors, the whole thing won't be too serious, you could even say that it will be one in the eye for the Greeks, a channel bigger than that of Corinth, so widely renowned. Even so, we cannot ignore the fact that our problems of communication with Europe, already so complicated in years gone by, will become explosive. Okay, so let's build some bridges, What worries me is that the channel will become so wide that ships will be able to navigate it, especially the tankers, that would be a severe blow for Iberian ports, and with consequences just as important, mutatis mutandis, of course, as those that resulted from the opening of the Suez Canal, in other words, northern and southern Europe would have a direct link, and be able to avoid the Cape route. And we end up watching the ships, a Portuguese commented, the others took him to mean the ships that would be passing through the new channel, but we Portuguese know perfectly well that the ships to which he was referring are altogether different, they carry a cargo of shadows, longings, frustrations, delusions and deceptions, their holds filled to the brim, Man overboard, they shouted, but no one went to his assistance.