The Collected Novels of José Saramago

by José Saramago

  Thus Cipriano Algor returned to the pottery much sooner than he had anticipated. The advice given by Isaura Estudiosa, or Isaura, for short, had been sensible, reasonable, and absolutely appropriate to the situation, and, if it were ever applied to the general functioning of the world, there would be no difficulty whatsoever in fitting it into the plan for an order of things that would prove little less than perfect. The truly admirable thing about it, though, was the fact that she had said it all so naturally, without even thinking, just as someone wanting to say that two and two are four doesn't waste time thinking that two and one are three, and then that three and one are four, Isaura is right, the main thing is to respect the animal's wishes and the will that transformed those wishes into action. Whoever the owner is, or, prudent correction, whoever the owner was, will have no right now to turn up here and declare, That dog is mine, when all the appearances and all the evidence show that if Found had the human gift of speech, he would have only one answer to give, Well, I don't want him as my master. Meanwhile, a thousand blessings on that broken water jug, blessings on the idea of giving the woman in black a new jug, and let us add, in anticipation of what is to come, blessings on the encounter that took place on that damp, drizzly afternoon, all dripping water, all material and spiritual discomfort, which, as we know, apart from those who have suffered a recent loss, is not the kind of weather that encourages the grief-stricken to go to a cemetery to mourn for their dead. There is no doubt about it, Found is a most favored dog, he can stay where he wants for as long as he wants. And there is another reason that only redoubles Cipriano Algor's relief and satisfaction, which is that he will not now have to knock at the door of marçal's parents, who also live in the village and with whom he is not on the best of terms, and relations would certainly not have been helped if he had passed by their door and ignored them. Besides, he is sure that Found does not belong to them, as long as he has known them, their taste in matters canine has always inclined them to bulldogs or to some other kind of guard dog. We've had a good morning, Cipriano Algor said to the dog.

  A few minutes later, they were back at the house. Once the van was parked, Found looked hard at his master, realized that, for the moment, he was relieved of his duties as navigator, and so off he went in the direction of the kennel, but with the unmistakable air of someone who has just decided that now is the moment to reconnoiter the surrounding area. Should I put him on a chain, the potter wondered anxiously, and then, when he saw what the dog was doing, sniffing around and here and there marking his territory with urine, No, I don't think I need to keep him chained up, if he had wanted to run away, he could have done so already He went into the house and heard his daughter's voice, she was talking on the phone, Hang on, hang on, Pa's just got back. Cipriano Algor took the re ceiver and immediately asked, Any news. At the other end of the line, after a moment's silence, marçal Gacho proceeded like someone who considers that this is no way to begin a conversation between two people, father-in-law and son-in-law, who have not spoken to each other for a whole week, which is why he calmly said good morning and asked how Cipriano was, to which Cipriano Algor responded with his own brusque good morning and then without a pause or without any kind of transitional phrase, I've been waiting, I've been waiting a whole week, how would you feel in my place, Sorry, but I only managed to talk to the head of the buying department this morning, marçal explained, refraining from pointing out to his father-in-law, even indirectly, the unnecessary brusqueness of his tone, And what did he say, That they haven't come to a decision yet, but that you are not the only person affected, and that merchandise falling in and out of favor is an almost daily occurrence at the Center, that's what he said, an almost daily occurrence, And what was your impression, What was my impression, Yes, judging by his tone of voice, his way of looking at you, did you get the feeling that he was trying to be helpful, You know from your own experience that they always give the impression that their minds are on other things, Yes, you're right, And to be absolutely frank, I don't think they'll buy any more crockery from you, it's all very simple for them, either the product sells or it doesn't, they don't care about anything else, there's no halfway house for them, And what about me, what about us, is it that simple for us, is it a matter of indifference to us, is there no halfway house for us either, asked Cipriano Algor, Look, I did what I could, I am just a security guard, after all, No, you couldn't really have done much more, said the potter, and his voice faltered on that last word. marçal Gacho felt sorry for his father-in-law when he noticed that change of tone and he tried to amend that somber prognostication, He didn't close the door entirely, he just said that they were reviewing the situation, and so we shouldn't lose hope, I'm too old for hopes, marçal, I need certainties, immediate certainties, ones that don't pin their hopes on a tomorrow that might not even be mine, Yes, I understand, Pa, life's full of ups and downs, everything changes, but don't despair, you've got us, Marta and me, with the pottery or without it. It was easy to see where marçal was going with this speech on family solidarity, in his view, all their problems, present or future, would be resolved on the day that the three of them moved to the Center. In different circumstances and in a different mood, Cipriano Algor would have responded sharply, but now, either because resignation had touched him with its melancholy wing, or because he had definitely not lost the dog Found, or even, who knows, because of a brief conversation between two people objectively separated by a water jug, the potter replied gently, I'll pick you up on Thursday at the usual time, and if you hear anything meanwhile, give us a call, and without leaving space for marçal to respond, he brought the dialogue to a close, I'll pass you back to your wife. Marta exchanged a few more words with marçal, said We'll just have to see what happens, then said good-bye until Thursday and hung up. Cipriano Algor had gone outside, he was in the pottery, sitting at one of the wheels, his head bowed. It was there that a massive heart attack had cut short the life of Justa Isasca. Marta went and sat at the other wheel and waited. After a long minute, her father looked at her, then looked away. Marta said, You didn't spend much time in the village, No, I didn't, Did you ask at all the houses to see if anyone knew the dog, if he had an owner, I asked at a few, then decided it wasn't worthwhile continuing, Why, Is this an interrogation, No, Pa, it's just me trying to take your mind off things, I hate to see you sad, I'm not sad, Well, a bit low then, I'm not low either, All right, whatever, but now tell me why you thought it wasn't worthwhile asking, I decided that if the dog did have an owner in the village and had run away, and having had the opportunity to go back, had decided not to, it was because he wanted to be free to find another owner, Seen from that point of view, you might be right, That's exactly what I said, To whom. Cipriano Algor did not answer. Then, since his daughter merely sat there calmly looking at him, he added, To that woman in the village, What woman, The one with the water jug, Oh, of course, you went to give her the water jug, That's why I put it in the van, Of course, Right, So, if I understand you correctly, she was the one who explained that it wasn't worth going looking for Found's owner, Yes, she was, She's obviously an intelligent woman, She seems to be, And she kept the water jug, Is there something wrong with that, Don't get angry, Pa, we're only talking, what on earth could be wrong about something as simple as giving someone a water jug, Exactly, anyway, we've got more important matters to deal with, and there you are trying to pretend that everything's going swimmingly, That's precisely what I want to talk to you about, Then why all this beating around the bush, Because I like talking to you as if you weren't my father, I like to pretend, if you want, that we are just two people who love each other very much, father and daughter who love each other because they are father and daughter, but who would love each other as friends even if they weren't, You'll have me crying soon, you know how treacherous tears can be at my age, You know I'd do anything to see you happy, Yet you're trying to convince me to go and live at the Center, knowing that it would be the worst thing that could possibly happen to m
e, Oh, I thought the worst thing that could possibly happen to you was to be separated from your daughter, That's not fair, perhaps you should apologize, You're right, it wasn't fair, forgive me. Marta got up and embraced her father, Forgive me, she said again, It doesn't matter, said the potter, if we weren't in this unfortunate situation, we wouldn't be talking like this. Marta drew her bench nearer to her father, sat down and, taking his hand, said, I had an idea while you were out with the dog, What's that, Let's just put to one side the question of the Center, that is, whether you decide to come with us or not, Agreed, It's not going to happen tomorrow or even next month, and when the time comes you can decide whether to go or whether to stay, it's your life, Thanks for the breathing space, I'm not giving you breathing space, What else have we got to deal with then, After you'd gone out, I came in here to work, I'd gone into the storeroom to have a look around and I noticed that we were very low on small flower vases, so I came in here to make a few, when suddenly, with the clay already on the wheel, I realized how absurd it was just to continue carrying blindly on, What do you mean blindly, Well, no one has ordered any flower vases, small or large, no one is waiting impatiently for me to finish them so that they can rush out and buy them, and when I say vases I could as easily say any of the other things we make, large or small, useful or useless, Yes, I understand, but, even so, we ought to be prepared, Prepared for what, For when the new orders come in, And what shall we do until that happens, what shall we do if the Center stops buying altogether, how are we going to live and on what, are we just going to wait until the mulberries ripen and Found manages to catch the odd decrepit rabbit, That won't be a problem for you and marçal, Look, Pa, we agreed that we wouldn't talk about the Center, All right, go on, Now, just supposing that, by some miracle, the Center changes its mind, which I don't believe it will, and neither do you if you're honest, how long are we going to sit here with our arms folded or else making things for no reason and for no one, In our situation, I don't really see what else we can do, Well, I'm of a different opinion, And what different opinion is that, what marvelous idea have you come up with, That we should make other things, If the Center is going to stop buying some things, it's highly unlikely that they're going to buy anything else, They might and they might not, What are you talking about, woman, I think we should start making dolls, Dolls, exclaimed Cipriano Algor in a tone of scandalized surprise, I've never heard such a ridiculous idea, Yes, Father dear, dolls, statuettes, effigies, figurines, mannequins, knickknacks, or whatever you want to call them, but don't go telling me it's a ridiculous idea until you've seen the result, You talk as if you were sure the Center was going buy these dolls of yours, The only thing I'm sure about is that we can't just sit around here waiting for the world to fall in on us, It's already fallen in on me, Everything that falls on you, falls on me, so you help me and I'll help you, After all this time making crockery, I've probably lost my touch when it comes to modeling, The same goes for me, but if our dog got lost in order to be found, as Isaura Estudiosa so intelligently explained, who knows, we might find our lost touch, yours and mine, in the clay, It's a risky venture and it could end badly, But, as we've seen, even things that aren't risky ventures can end badly. Cipriano looked at his daughter in silence, then he picked up a piece of clay and shaped it roughly into a human figure. Where do we begin, he asked, Where you always have to begin, at the beginning, replied Marta.

  Authoritarian, paralyzing, circular, occasionally elliptical stock phrases, also jocularly referred to as nuggets of wisdom, are a malignant plague, one of the very worst ever to ravage the earth. We say to the confused, Know thyself, as if knowing yourself was not the fifth and most difficult of human arithmetical operations, we say to the apathetic, Where there's a will, there's a way, as if the brute realities of the world did not amuse themselves each day by turning that phrase on its head, we say to the indecisive, Begin at the beginning, as if beginning were the clearly visible point of a loosely wound thread and all we had to do was to keep pulling until we reached the other end, and as if, between the former and the latter, we had held in our hands a smooth, continuous thread with no knots to untie, no snarls to untangle, a complete impossibility in the life of a skein, or indeed, if we may be permitted one more stock phrase, in the skein of life. Marta said to her father, Let's begin at the beginning, and it was as if all they needed to do was to sit down at the table and start making dolls with fingers grown suddenly agile and exact, having regained their former skill after a long period of inactivity. These are the delusions of the pure and the unprepared, the beginning is never the clear, precise end of a thread, the beginning is a long, painfully slow process that requires time and patience in order to find out in which direction it is heading, a process that feels its way along the path ahead like a blind man, the beginning is just the beginning, what came before is nigh on worthless. Which is why what Marta said next was less categorical, We have only three days to prepare our presentation, I think that's what businessmen and executives call it, Sorry, I don't quite follow, said her father, Today is Monday, you'll be picking marçal up on Thursday afternoon, so that's the day when you'll have to show the head of the buying department our proposals for making the dolls, complete with drawings, models, prices, in short, everything we can think of that might persuade them to buy the dolls and help them come to a decision now rather than next year. Without noticing that he was repeating what he had already said, Cipriano Algor asked, Where do we begin, but Marta's answer this time was different, We'll have to choose half a dozen types, possibly fewer, we don't want to make things too complicated for ourselves, then work out how many dolls we can make each day, though that depends on our approach, whether we model the clay like sculptors or make identical male and female figures and then dress them according to their professions, they'll all be standing figures, of course, in my experience, they're so much easier, What do you mean by dress them, Well, dress them, by attaching to the naked figurine the clothes and accessories that characterize them and give them their individuality, I reckon that two people working like that would make faster progress, then it's just a matter of taking care with the painting, there can't be any smudges, You've obviously given this a lot of thought, said Cipriano Algor, Not really, I just thought quickly, And well, Now don't make me blush, And a lot, even though you deny it, Look, I'm blushing already, Fortunately for me, you're capable of thinking quickly, thinking a lot and thinking well all at the same time, You know what they say, naught so blind as a father's love, And what figures do you think we should make, Nothing very antiquated, a lot of professions have completely disappeared, and no one nowadays has a clue what those people did, what purpose they served, on the other hand, I don't think they should be too modern either, that's what plastic dolls are for, with their heroes, their Rambos, their astronauts, their mutants, their monsters, their superpolice and their superbandits, and, of course, their weapons, we mustn't forget their weapons, Hm, I was just thinking, because every now and then I too manage to squeeze a few ideas out of my brain, although not as good as yours, Now, now, no false modesty, it doesn't suit you, How about taking a look at the illustrated books we've got, for example, that old encyclopedia your grandfather bought, if we can find some models for the dolls in there, then we'll also have solved the problem of which drawings I should take with me to show the head of the buying department, he won't know that we've copied them and even if he did he wouldn't care, That idea would have gotten an A+ on the old scale of school marks, No, a B would do me fine, it attracts less attention, Let's get down to work then.

  As you might imagine, the Algor family library is neither extensive nor of exceptional quality. You wouldn't expect great erudition in ordinary people and in a place like this, far from civilization, but even so, there are some two or three hundred books on the shelves, some old, some, the majority, middle-aged, the rest more or less recent, although only a few are brand new. The village does not have a shop that would do justice to the old and noble name of boo
kshop, there is only a small stationer's that will order any textbooks needed from publishers in the city, and, very rarely, some literary work that has been touted a lot on the radio or the television and whose content, style, and intentions correspond satisfactorily to the average interests of the inhabitants. Although marçal Gacho is not himself a keen and conscientious reader, when he turns up at the pottery with a book as a gift for Marta, it must be said that he knows the difference between what is good and what is merely mediocre, although good and mediocre are such slippery terms that they always give rise to discussion and disagreement. The encyclopedia that father and daughter have just opened on the kitchen table was considered the best of its kind at the time of publication, whereas today its only use would be to find out about areas of knowledge no longer considered useful or which, at the time, were still only artic ulating their first, hesitant syllables. Placed in a line, one after another, the encyclopedias of today, yesterday, and the-day-before-the-day-before-yesterday represent successive images of frozen worlds, interrupted gestures, words in search of their ultimate or penultimate meaning. Encyclopedias are like immutable cycloramas, prodigious projectors whose reels have gotten stuck and which show, with a kind of maniacal fixity, a landscape which, because it is condemned to be only and for all eternity what it was, will at the same time grow older, more decrepit and more unnecessary. The encyclopedia purchased by Cipriano Algor's father is as magnificent and as useless as a line of poetry we cannot quite remember. However, let us not be too proud and ungrateful, let us remember the sensible advice of our elders who counseled us to keep what was no longer necessary because, sooner or later, although we might not think so, it could turn out to be just the thing we needed. Today, bent over the old, yellowing pages, breathing in the smell of damp, untouched by the air, unstirred by the light, and that has been contained for years in the smooth thickness of the paper, father and daughter are learning the value of that lesson, looking for what they need in something they had thought to be useless. They found along the way a member of the academy wearing a plumed bicorn hat, rapier, and lace ruffles on his shirt, they found a clown and a tightrope walker, they found a skeleton with a scythe and immediately moved on, they found a horsewoman astride a horse and an admiral without a ship, they found a bullfighter and a man in a smock, they found a boxer and his opponent, they found a carabineer and a cardinal, they found a hunter and his hound, they found a sailor on leave and a magistrate, a jester and a Roman in a toga, they found a dervish and a halberdier, they found a customs officer and a seated scribe, they found a postman and a fakir, they also found a gladiator and a hoplite, a nurse and a juggler, a lord and a minstrel, they found a fencer and an apiarist, a miner and a fisherman, a fireman and a flautist, they found two puppets, they found a boatman, they found a navvy, they found saints of both sexes, they found a demon, they found the holy trinity, they found soldiers and military men of every rank, they found a deep-sea diver and a skater, they saw a sentinel and a woodcutter, they saw a cobbler wearing glasses, they found a man playing a drum and another playing a cornet, they found an old lady in a shawl and head scarf, they found an old man smoking a pipe, they found a venus and an apollo, they found a gentleman in a top hat, they found a bishop in a miter, they found a caryatid and an Atlas, they found one lancer mounted and another on foot, they found an Arab wearing a turban, they found a Chinese mandarin, they found an aviator, they found a condottiere and a baker, they found a musketeer, they found a maid in an apron and an Eskimo, they found a bearded Assyrian, they found a pointsman, they found a gardener, they found a naked man with all his muscles exposed and a map of the nervous and circulatory systems, they also found a naked woman, although she was covering her pubis with her right hand and her breasts with her left. They found many more, but they were not suited to the ends they had in sight, either because making the figures would be too complicated in clay, or because overuse of celebrities past and present with whose portraits, accurate, plausible or imagined, the encyclopedia was filled, might be misinterpreted as a lack of respect and even give rise, in the case of famous people still alive, or of famous people now deceased but with greedy and vigilant heirs, to ruinous court cases for offence caused, moral damage and defamation of character. Who are we going to choose from this lot, then, asked Cipriano Algor, we can't possibly cope with more than three or four, you have to remember that, between now and then, while the Center is making up its mind whether to buy them, we're going to have to practice a lot if we want to deliver good-quality, presentable work, Yes, I know, Pa, but I think it would be best if we proposed six different figures, said Marta, then they'll either accept and we can divide production into two phases, in which case it will be a question of agreeing to deadlines, or, and, initially, this is much more likely, they themselves will choose two or three dolls to start with just to see if their customers would be interested and to test out their possible response, And it might go no farther than that, That's true, but I think we'll have more chance of persuading them if we show them six designs, numbers count, numbers influence people, it's a question of psychology, Psychology never was my strong point, Nor mine, but even in our ignorance we sometimes have prophetic flashes of intuition, Well, don't aim those prophetic flashes at your father's future, he has always preferred to find out each day what that day decides to bring him, good or ill, What the day brings is one thing, what we ourselves contribute to the day is quite another, The day before, Sorry, I don't know what you mean, The day before is what we bring to the day we're actually living through, life is a matter of carrying along all those days-before just as someone might carry stones, and when we can no longer cope with the load, the work is done, the last day is the only one that is not the day before another day, Now you're just trying to depress me, No, I'm not, but if I am, perhaps you're to blame for that, To blame for what, With you I always end up talking about serious things, All right, let's talk about something even more serious, let's select our dolls. Cipriano Algor is not a man much given to laughter, and even frank smiles are rare on his lips, at most one might notice a brief change in his eyes as if the gleam there had suddenly shifted slightly, sometimes one might glimpse a slight compression of the lips as if they had been forced to smile in order to stop themselves from smiling. No, Cipriano Algor is not a man much given to laughter, but, as we have just seen, today there was a smile awaiting its chance to appear. Right then, he said, I'll choose one and then you choose one, until we've got six, but remember we have to bear in mind the ease of the work and the known or presumed taste of our customers, OK, you begin, The jester, said the father, The clown, said the daughter, The nurse, said the father, The Eskimo, said the daughter, The mandarin, said the father, The naked man, said the daughter, No, you can't choose the naked man, you'll have to choose another one, the Center won't want a naked man, Why not, Well, because he's naked, The naked woman then, That's even worse, But she's covering herself up, Covering yourself up like that is worse than showing everything, How come you know so much about the subject, Because I've lived, I've looked, I've read, and I've felt, What does reading do, You can learn almost everything from reading, But I read too, So you must know something, Now I'm not so sure, You'll have to read differently then, How, The same method doesn't work for everyone, each person has to invent his or her own, whichever suits them best, some people spend their entire lives reading but never get beyond reading the words on the page, they don't understand that the words are merely stepping stones placed across a fast-flowing river, and the reason they're there is so that we can reach the farther shore, it's the other side that matters, Unless, Unless what, Unless those rivers don't have just two shores but many, unless each reader is his or her own shore, and that shore is the only shore worth reaching, Well observed, said Cipriano Algor, you have shown yet again that old people should never argue with the younger generations, we always end up losing, although we do learn a thing or two on the way, Glad to have been of help, Now let's get back to the sixth doll, It c
an't be the naked man, No, Or the naked woman, No, Then let's have the fakir, In general, fakirs, like scribes and potters, are sitting down, when he's standing up, a fakir is just like any other man, and sitting down, he'll be smaller than the others, In that case, what about the musketeer, The musketeer would do, but we'd have to find a solution to the problem of the sword and the feathers on his hat, we could probably manage the feathers, but the sword would have to be fixed to his leg and then it would look more like a splint, All right then, the bearded Assyrian, Suggestion accepted, let's have the bearded Assyrian, he's easy and compact, And I did consider the hunter and his hound, but the dog would cause even more difficulties than the musketeer's sword, Not to mention the shotgun, said Cipriano Algor, and speaking of dogs, I wonder what Found is up to, we've forgotten all about him, He's probably sleeping. The potter got up and drew back the curtain, I can't see him in his kennel, he said, He'll be going about his business, fulfilling his duties as guardian of the house, keeping an eye on the neighborhood, Unless he's escaped, Stranger things have happened, but I doubt it. Anxious and fearful, Cipriano pulled open the door and almost tripped over the dog. Found was stretched out on the mat, lying diagonally across the sill, his nose pointing toward the door. When he saw his master appear, he got up and waited. Here he is, announced the potter, So I see, replied Marta from inside. Cipriano Algor was about to close the door, He's looking at me, he said, Well, he's looked at you before, But what shall I do, Either close the door and leave him outside or invite him in and then close the door, Don't be funny, I'm not being funny, you'll have to decide today whether you want Found in the house, but, you know, if he comes in now, that will be it, Old Constante used to come in whenever he wanted to, Yes, I know, but normally he preferred the independence of the kennel, whereas, unless I'm very much mistaken, this dog needs company as much as it needs food, That seems a good enough reason, said the potter. He opened the door wide and made a gesture, Come in. Without taking his eyes off his master, Found took one timid step, then, as if to indicate that he wasn't quite sure he had understood the order, he stopped. Come in, said the potter again. The dog advanced slowly and came to a halt in the middle of the kitchen. Welcome to our house, said Marta, but you had better know the house rules right away, a dog's necessities, both solid and liquid, should be taken care of outside, the same goes for food, now, during the day, you can come and go as much as you like, but at night, you go to your kennel, so as to guard the house, and I don't want you thinking I'm less well-disposed toward you than your master is, and to prove it I was the one who told him that you are a dog who needs company. During the time this lecture lasted, Found didn't take his eyes off her for a moment. He couldn't understand what Marta wanted of him, but his small dog's brain knew that in order to learn, one must look and listen. He waited for a few moments after Marta had finished speaking, then he curled up in a corner of the kitchen, although he did not even have time to warm the spot up, for as soon as Cipriano Algor had sat down, Found got to his feet again and went and lay by his chair. And just so that there should be no doubts in the minds of his owners that he had a clear understanding of his duties and responsibilities, barely a quarter of an hour had passed before he got up from there and went and lay down beside Marta. A dog knows when someone needs his company.