The Collected Novels of José Saramago

by José Saramago

  More than four hundred kilometers from here, in his childhood bedroom, Tertuliano Máximo Afonso is preparing to go to sleep. Having left the city on Tuesday morning, he spent the whole journey arguing with himself about whether he should tell his mother at least part of what was going on or if, on the contrary, it would make more sense to keep his mouth firmly shut. After fifty kilometers, he decided that it would be best to make a clean breast of things, after a hundred twenty, he raged against himself for having even been capable of such an idea, after two hundred ten, it seemed to him that a superficial explanation given in an anecdotal tone might be sufficient to satisfy his mother's curiosity, after three hundred fourteen, he called himself a fool and said that surely he knew his mother better than that, at four hundred forty-seven, when he stopped outside the door of the family home, he had absolutely no idea what to do. And now, as he puts on his pajamas, he is thinking that the trip was a grave error, an out-and-out mistake, that he would have been better off not leaving his apartment, staying shut up in his protective shell, waiting. It's true that here he is out of the way, but, no offense to Dona Carolina, who does not deserve such comparisons either on physical or on moral grounds, Tertuliano Máximo Afonso feels as if he had fallen into the wolf's mouth like an unwary sparrow that has flown into the trap without realizing the consequences. His mother did not ask him any questions, she just looked at him expectantly now and then, then immediately looked away again, the look said, I don't mean to be indiscreet, but the message said, If you think you're going to leave here without telling me, you can think again. Lying on his bed, Tertuliano Máximo Afonso goes over and over the problem in his head but reaches no solution. His mother is made of sterner stuff than Maria da Paz, who is satisfied, or so she allows him to believe, with any explanation that he gives her and would wait her whole life, if necessary, for the moment of revelation. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso's mother, with every gesture, every movement, when she puts his plate down in front of him, when she helps him on with his jacket, when she hands him a newly laundered shirt, is saying to him, I'm not asking you to tell me everything, you have a right to your secrets, but with one absolute exception, the secrets on which your life, future, and happiness depend, those I want to know, it's my right, and that you cannot deny me. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso turned out the bedside lamp, he had brought some books with him, but tonight his spirit does not want reading matter, and as for the Mesopotamian civilizations, which doubtless would have gently carried him off to the diaphanous threshold of sleep, these were too heavy and so stayed at home on the bedside table, with the bookmark placed at the beginning of the illustrative chapter on King Tukulti-Ninurta I, who flourished, as they say of historical figures, between the thirteenth and twelfth centuries before Christ. The bedroom door, which was only pushed to, opened softly in the darkness. Tomarctus, the household dog, had come in. He came to find out if this master, who only turns up very infrequently, was still here. He is a medium-sized dog, and ink black, not like other dogs that, when seen from up close, are really gray. The strange name was given to him by Tertuliano Máximo Afonso, that's what happens when you have an erudite master, instead of christening the creature with a name that he could pick up easily through direct genetic routes, as must have been the case with Faithful, Pilot, Sultan, or Admiral, names inherited and then transmitted from generation to generation, he gave him the name of a canine said to have lived about fifteen million years ago and that, according to the paleontologists, is the fossil-Adam of these four-legged creatures who run, sniff, and scratch their fleas and who, as is only natural in a friend, occasionally bite. Tomarctus has not come to stay for very long, he will sleep for a few minutes curled at the foot of the bed, then he will get up and take a turn about the house to see if everything is in order, and then, for the rest of the night, will be the watchful companion of his constant mistress, apart from the odd sortie into the yard to bark and, while he's there, drink some water from his bowl and lift his leg against the bed of geraniums or the rosemary bush. He will return to Tertuliano Máximo Afonso's bedroom at first light to check that nothing has moved on this side of the earth either, for what dogs most want in life is for no one to go away. When Tertuliano Máximo Afonso wakes, the bedroom door will be closed, a sign that his mother is already up and about and that Tomarctus has gone out with her. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso looks at his watch, says to himself, It's still early, as long as this last, vague sleep endures his worries can wait.

  He would have woken with a start if a mischievous goblin had come to whisper in his ear that something of extreme importance is happening at this same hour in the home of António Claro or, to be more precise, more accurate, in the tortuous innards of his brain. The tranquilizers have proved a boon to Helena, the proof of this is to see how she sleeps, her breathing regular, her face as placid and absent as a child's, but we cannot say the same of her husband, who has not spent the nights well, his thoughts returning again and again to the false beard, wondering what Tertuliano Máximo Afonso's intentions had been in sending it, dreaming about the meeting at the house in the country, waking up in a state of anxiety, sometimes bathed in sweat. Not today though. The night proved as inimical as the previous nights, but dawn came like a savior as all dawns should. He opened his eyes and waited, surprised to find himself watching for something that should have been about to explode, and which did explode, a flash, a bolt of lightning that filled the whole room with light, remembering what Tertuliano Máximo Afonso had said at the beginning of their conversation, I wrote to the production company, that was his reply to the question he had asked, So how did you find me in the end. He smiled with pure pleasure as must all discoverers when they first catch sight of the unknown island, but the exultant thrill of discovery did not last long, these morning ideas generally come with a manufacturer's flaw, we think we have just invented the perpetual-motion machine, and as soon as we turn our backs, it stops. The one thing film companies never have a shortage of is letters asking for actors' photographs and autographs, the big stars, as long as they enjoy the public's favor, receive thousands of them a week, well, when we say "receive," they don't actually receive them in the normal sense of the word, they wouldn't even waste their time looking at them, that's what the staff at the production company are for, they go to the appropriate shelf to find the desired photograph, stick it in an envelope with the dedication already printed on it, the same for everyone, and then it's, hurry up now, it's getting late, next, please. Obviously, Daniel Santa-Clara is no star, indeed, if the company were ever to receive three letters in one day asking for his photograph, it would be an occasion to hang out the flags and declare a national holiday, and such letters are never kept, of course, they all pass through the paper shredder, all those longings and emotions reduced to the misery of a pile of indecipherable little strips. Assuming, however, that the filing clerks at the production company had instructions to record, order, and judiciously classify everything, so as not to lose a single scrap of that evidence of the public's admiration for their artistes, we must inevitably ask what possible use Tertuliano Máximo Afonso's letter could be to António Claro, or, more precisely, how that letter could contribute to his finding a way out, if such a thing exists, of that complicated, freakish, never-before-seen case of two identical men. It must be said that it was this unrealistic hope, immediately shattered by the logic of the facts, that brought such joy and cheer to Antonio Claro's awakening, and if something of that mood remains, it is only because there is a remote possibility that the part of the letter in which Tertuliano Máximo Afonso mentioned the importance of supporting actors might have been deemed of sufficient interest to merit the honor of a place in the files and even, who knows, the attention of a marketing specialist to whom the human factor would not be entirely a matter of indifference. All this boils down to is a need for the minuscule satisfaction it would afford to Daniel Santa-Clara's ego, via the pen of the history teacher, to have some recognition of the importance of the cabin boys in
the running of an aircraft carrier, even if all they've done on the voyage is keep the brasses nice and shiny. That this would be enough to make Antonio Claro decide to visit the production company that morning in order to inquire about a letter written by one Tertuliano Máximo Afonso is, to be perfectly frank, questionable, given the unlikelihood of his finding what he so ingenuously imagined, but there are times in life when an urgent need to drag oneself out of the slough of indecision, to do something, anything, however useless, however superfluous, is the final sign that we are still capable of doing something of our own volition, like looking through the keyhole of a door we have been forbidden to enter. António Claro is already out of bed, he slipped out tak ing every precaution not to wake his wife, now he is sprawled on the big sofa in the sitting room, with the script of his next film open on his lap, that will be his excuse for going to visit the production company, he who has never needed excuses before nor been asked for them at home, but that's what happens when one's conscience is not entirely easy, There's a point I need to clear up, he will say when Helena finally appears, there seems to be a bit of dialogue missing, the way it reads now, it just doesn't make sense. He will, in fact, be asleep when his wife comes into the living room, but the effect will not be entirely lost, for she thought he had got up to study his role, some people are like that, people whose overly acute sense of responsibility keeps them in a state of permanent unrest, as if, at every moment, they were not doing their duty and were being accused of just that. He had woken up suddenly, he explained in somewhat garbled fashion, had slept badly, and she asked him why he didn't go back to bed, and then he told her how he had found a mistake in the script that could be rectified only by the production company, and she said that there was no need to go rushing over there, he could go after lunch, but that now he should sleep. He insisted and she desisted, saying only that, personally, she would love to be able to slip back in between the sheets again, The holidays begin in two weeks' time, you'll see then how much I sleep, especially with these tablets, it will be paradise, You're not going to spend your whole holiday in bed, are you, he said, My bed is my castle, she replied, I'm safe behind its walls, You should go to a doctor, you never used to be like this, That's understandable, up until now, I've never had two men on my mind at the same time, You're not serious, are you, Not the way you mean it, no, besides, you must admit it would be pretty ridiculous to feel jealous of a person I don't even know and who, if I have anything to do with it, I never will know. This would be the right moment for Antonio Claro to confess that he isn't going to visit the production company because of any supposed deficiencies in the script, but to read, if he can, a letter written by the second of the men occupying his wife's thoughts, although it is reasonable to presume, given the way in which the human brain works, always ready to slide into some form of delirium, that, at least in these last few agitated days, the second man will have overtaken the first. We recognize, however, that such an explanation, as well as demanding too much effort from António Claro's confused mind, would only complicate the situation still further and would not, in all probability, be received by Helena with great sympathy. António Claro merely said that he wasn't jealous, that it would be stupid to be jealous, he was just worried about her health, We should make the most of your holidays and go somewhere far away from here, he said, To be honest, I'd rather stay at home, and, besides, you've got that film, Yes, but shooting isn't due to start just yet, Even so, We could go and stay at the house in the country, I'll ask someone in the village to tidy up the garden for us, The solitude there is suffocating, Well, let's go somewhere else then, Like I said, I'd rather stay at home, Isn't that just a different kind of solitude, Yes, but I like it here, If that's what you really want, Yes, that's what I really want. There was no more to be said. They ate breakfast in silence, and half an hour later, Helena had left for work. António Claro was not in quite such a hurry, but he nevertheless left soon afterward. He got into his car thinking that he was about to go on the attack. He just didn't know why.