Sound of Butterflies, The

by King, Rachael

  His demeanour made Thomas cold and did not invite further inquiry. The smell of the blackened house came back to him, the scent of burned wood and flesh. He turned his face away from Antonio and took out his last cigarette. The sulphur of the match was a welcome barrier to his imagination.

  On his first day back at Santos’s house, Thomas stayed in his room, rousing himself only to drink some water. An electric fan turned overhead, sucking the warm air upwards and leaving Thomas cooled. He kept the curtains closed, and for a time he was able to retreat into the world of a dreamless sleep, his limbs spread across the bed like butter.

  By the second day, he began to feel a little better; the heaviness in his neck and shoulders had lifted, and the prospect of getting out of bed did not exhaust him as it had done upriver.

  Antonio offered to accompany him on a walk around town, but Thomas declined, saying he would take Joaquim as his guide. Antonio shrugged, as if to say suit yourself, and Thomas was relieved the man didn’t push him further.

  Joaquim no longer avoided Thomas, but a chill hung about him, and his eyes held extra years. He walked beside Thomas, silent. Thomas didn’t want to ask him about what had happened with George — to save not just the boy’s embarrassment but his own also, for he could not think about the incident without blushing and wanting to disappear into the earth. He knew the world could be a cruel place, but he had always thought he could live his life without encountering it head on. He should have known that the Amazon would change all that.

  The streets, washed by rain, shone with their neat cobblestones and swept gutters. If it weren’t for the heat Thomas could have imagined himself back in Lisbon, not in the middle of the jungle. The sight of the tram wheezing past and the smell of its brakes on the lines were incongruous after his weeks in the forest. Women who passed him on the street met his eye and looked at him with curiosity — hunger, even. He tipped his hat and moved along, remembering Clara’s words about every third house containing a brothel. No wonder the women stared after him like that; they hoped to get some of his money. From what he had heard, he doubted he could afford them even if he wanted to.

  From out of a shop came the smell of freshly baked bread. Thomas closed his eyes for a moment to savour it before removing his hat and ducking into the bakery, while Joaquim waited for him outside.

  It was unbearable inside, and Thomas fought the urge to remove his jacket in the heat. The poor baker, trussed up in a white suit and apron, was sweating so hard Thomas had second thoughts about buying from him. But one look at Joaquim’s face pressed to the window decided it for him. He bought two round custard tarts, as yellow as fresh paint, which cost him more than a meal at the Star and Garter would cost him at home. Outside, he gave one to a disbelieving Joaquim and sank his teeth into the other. The pastry gave way perfectly between his lips, with just the right amount of flakiness; the custard was sweet, but not too sweet. Heavenly. They stood on the street, munching the tarts as narrow-waisted women with enormous bosoms and backsides stepped around them, raising their parasols to avoid knocking off Thomas’s hat. Men in starched collars and white suits, with huge moustaches like Santos’s, shot him uncomprehending looks, as if they had never seen a man and a child enjoying themselves.

  On a whim Thomas decided to buy a broadsheet to practise his Portuguese.

  ‘I can only give you an old one, from Belém,’ said the shopkeeper, a tiny man with rolled-up sleeves and a dirty apron. ‘The local paper has not been available for some time.’

  ‘Oh?’ Thomas took the paper and handed him some coins. ‘Why is that?’

  ‘The printing press burned down two weeks ago.’

  ‘That’s awful. How did it happen?’

  ‘I don’t know. I suppose they printed something they shouldn’t have. It wasn’t an accident.’

  ‘What did they print?’

  ‘Are you joking?’ The man folded his arms across his chest. ‘Do you want my shop burnt down as well?’

  ‘Who would do such a thing?’

  The man narrowed his eyes. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘How would I know?’ The man shrugged theatrically, his hands out as if to show they were empty, so how could he be hiding something? Thomas shifted his weight and glanced outside at Joaquim. He’s scared of me, thought Thomas. He thinks I’m something I’m not. But what?

  ‘The article —’

  ‘Good day, Senhor,’ said the man, turning to dust the shelves behind him.

  ‘Joaquim,’ he said when he came out of the shop, ‘do you know where the printing factory is for the newspaper?’

  Joaquim nodded.

  ‘Will you take me there?’

  They waded through the rising heat of the narrow cobbled streets. The crowds were thinning as residents sought the cool interiors of their homes.

  Joaquim let out a long, low whistle when he saw the charred skeleton of the warehouse.

  ‘Did you know about this?’ asked Thomas.

  ‘No, Senhor,’ said Joaquim.

  Thomas stepped into the ruins. Clouds of soot puffed upwards with every footfall, coating his trousers. He walked aimlessly about, crunching on charcoal and stepping over twisted metal. What was he looking for?

  ‘O que você quer?’ The voice, though loud, was muffled by the wreckage, as if dampened by smoke.

  Thomas ducked his head, suddenly ashamed, as if he had been caught stealing. Well, he was trespassing. He approached the owner of the voice, a bald man in his forties, who stood mopping his brow. His skin sagged, as if he might have lost a lot of weight; it hung in loose folds under his chin, and his trousers hung from their braces like a windless sail. Thomas was reminded of a sloth that George had tried to stuff, but had made a poor show by not using enough stuffing.

  ‘Você fala Inglês?’ asked Thomas. He couldn’t face having to communicate in his bumbling Portuguese.

  The man turned his eyes to the non-existent ceiling. He sighed. ‘Yes. What do you want? This is private property, you know.’

  ‘What happened here?’

  ‘As you can see, the building burned down.’

  ‘Are you the owner?’

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Forgive me. My name is Thomas Edgar. I heard what happened.’

  ‘Then I do not need to explain it to you,’ said the man.

  ‘Do you know who did this?’

  ‘Of course I do. A man who didn’t like what I printed in my paper.’ He gave a bitter laugh. ‘Look at the good it did me. Now I have no paper at all.’

  ‘I wonder, sir. Might I ask … was that man José Santos?’

  ‘Not him personally. But one of the many men in his employment. You cannot move in this town without bumping into someone who is paid by Santos.’ He stopped. His hand went to his hip. Thomas realised he probably had a gun on his belt back there. ‘Why are you asking me all this? You work for him, too, do you?’

  ‘No sir, I assure you. I have the acquaintance of Mr Santos, but I do not work for him. He has funded a group of naturalists to collect specimens to take back to England, but we’re completely ignorant about the man’s business. We are told nothing. I am beginning to have my suspicions, though, and I would like — no, I need — to find out more, sir.’

  ‘Hm. You’re English? He will respect you for that. How do I know you have not been sent by him?’ He glanced at Joaquim, who had lost interest in a conversation he couldn’t understand and was playing in the mess; already his hands were black and his clean shirt filthy.

  Thomas thought hard about what he could say — some proof he could offer to show he was not an enemy. But he had nothing to use to gain his trust. ‘I give you my word as a Christian,’ he said eventually.

  ‘A Christian!’ said the man and laughed. ‘Well, I suppose that still means something to some people!’

  ‘And also … I lost a friend of mine recently, on the Tapajós. A Captain Arturo. I’m not sure, but I think that Santos may have been responsible for his death and the death of his fami
ly. His house was burned down.’

  Something in his face must have touched the man. His arms relaxed and he nodded sadly.

  ‘All right, Senhor Edgar. God knows why, but I will try and help you. I like your face. No doubt it will be my downfall.’ He grimaced and put out his hand for shaking. ‘My name is Rodrigues. Benedito Rodrigues. You’d better come over the road, to my office.’

  As Rodrigues talked, Thomas stood and stared out the window at the river. The clouds rumbled together and the first rain of the afternoon began. The vultures that had been circling a spot on the dock broke their merry-go-round and wheeled away. A steamship loomed in the port and he watched men unloading cargo, running with awkward loads to escape the downpour.

  The room darkened. Rodrigues leaned back in his chair, his boots on the table. He clasped his hands behind his head. Two sweat patches the size of bowls darkened his underarms.

  He told Thomas about a man who had come to see him, an American, begging him to run an advertisement asking for testimonials about the treatment of the Indians in Santos’s employ upriver, near Iquitos. It seemed that everybody was on Santos’s payroll up there, and nobody would speak to him. The man, by the name of Roberts, had been sent to oversee the building of a railway through the Amazon; at Iquitos he and a companion had befriended one of Santos’s men — the railway was to cut through some of Santos’s land. The man had taken them into the forest to show them the operations up the Putumayo River. There they witnessed the most terrible atrocities against the Indian workers. When it became clear the men were horrified, they were robbed and beaten, then imprisoned. Even the police were under the influence of Santos.

  Thomas listened with a growing sickness in his stomach. When Rodrigues mentioned the men’s imprisonment, he snapped his eyes away from the river.

  ‘Yes, Mr Edgar, you must tread very carefully. If Santos gets wind of the questions you’ve been asking, you will be in great danger.’

  ‘Surely not,’ said Thomas. ‘The man would not dare let any harm come to me. The British government would never allow it.’

  ‘And yet they allow thousands of Indians to be mutilated and murdered. You don’t know what he is like. The men he employs … he lets them run amok. They are not paid wages, but commission on the rubber, so they drive the Indians and threaten them. They’re bloodthirsty. I’ve spared you from describing what they have done to them, but perhaps it’s better that you know.’

  Thomas took a deep breath. ‘Yes. Go on.’

  ‘Mr Edgar. They tie them to trees and cut off their limbs, leaving them to bleed to death. The women are raped while their children watch. Babies are taken from their mothers and their brains dashed out on trees. The company pretends to employ the Indians, but they are slaves. They bully them into working for them, then keep them in debt by providing food and shelter for them and charging them more than they earn. If they try to leave, they are hunted down for sport, and tortured.’

  ‘But that’s disgusting!’

  ‘Yes, it is. And your Senhor Santos is the cause of it all.’

  Thomas pulled at his collar. How hot the room had become. He threw open the window and thrust his head out into the rain. He’d known that Santos was powerful, but he’d thought people revered him for his wealth, not out of fear.

  Finally he pulled his head back in. Water ran down his face and into his eyes. He rubbed at them. Sweat and rainwater made them sting.

  ‘How can they get away with this?’

  ‘Half the rubber barons are just as bad, and the others are too scared of Santos to do anything about it.’

  ‘Then why run the advertisement?’

  ‘Roberts promised me the protection of the American government.’ He spat on the ground. ‘He convinced me I was doing the right thing. You see how gullible I am? I shouldn’t even be talking to you like this.’

  ‘Senhor Rodrigues. I’ll write to the British directors of Santos’s company: they must know what is happening here!’

  Rodrigues laughed. Thomas had come to realise that he did so when he was anything but amused. ‘And you’re so sure they don’t know about it? Think about it, Senhor. Indians! Cheap labour! They are lining their pockets with gold. Do you think they want to hear from you?’

  ‘Then I’ll tell the government.’

  ‘You don’t understand, do you? You will be dead before you can tell them anything. Santos controls everything in this town. Any letter addressed to the authorities in England or America will be intercepted and you will be killed. The only thing you can do is keep your mouth shut until you are safely out of this place.’

  ‘And what about you? Aren’t you scared?’

  ‘Of course I am. They have ruined me. It is only a warning. If I do anything else — so much as criticise Santos — I will be food for the piranhas. I shouldn’t even be talking to you. But you see that ship out there? In three days I will be on it, bound for Portugal.’

  ‘And this Roberts? You say he and his friend were imprisoned?’

  ‘Yes. They didn’t kill them. They can’t risk that yet; the railroad is too important to them. At the moment there is nothing to link the robbery and the imprisonment with Santos. Roberts managed to bribe his way out — don’t ask me how — and he thought by coming to Manaus he could gather further evidence against Santos. But anybody who talked to him refused to sign anything in front of a lawyer. All the lawyers here are probably on Santos’s payroll.’

  ‘So he did find people to talk to? Do you know who?’

  ‘He promised them confidentiality, so no, I could not tell you. I only know of one, a carpenter by the name of Assis who once worked for Santos in Iquitos. I don’t know where you would find him now.’

  ‘And Roberts? Where is he now?’

  ‘I warned him against it, but he has gone back to Iquitos to try to free his colleague.’

  ‘Is that wise?’

  ‘He’ll be dead before he gets there.’

  The sun was out and hot light bounced off the wet road. Thomas squinted and shielded his eyes from the blinding flashes as he moved with slow steps back to the house. What could he do? He wanted more than anything in the world to find his butterfly before he left. At times it seemed so close he could smell it; at others it became nothing but a rumour, not even a legend. But today his petty obsession shrank under his touch, shaming him. Santos was the key to finding the butterfly, but how could he be indebted to a man who was responsible for such crimes? Did it mean that Thomas, too, had blood on his hands? But again, what could he do? To confront Santos about it, even Antonio, could be dangerous. But could he just slip away? Jump on the first boat back to Europe? That would take time; after all, he had no money on him, and without Santos’s help a ticket would have to be organised for him at the other end. Besides, what would running away achieve? He could go to the government and inform them about the treatment of the Indians, but what proof did he have? And would they even care? It wasn’t so long ago that the British enslaved natives of all kinds in their colonies. They would dismiss him as a bumbling do-gooder scientist who had failed in his quest.

  His only chance was to return to the camp and persuade the others it was time to come home, without letting on his reasons — if one of them were to mention Thomas’s fears to Santos, they might all be done for.

  Joaquim walked beside him, matching his sluggish gait. His shorts were blackened by smears of soot from where he had wiped his hands. Thomas reached out a hand and rested it on the boy’s shoulder. He flinched, but didn’t move away, and Thomas gave him a pat before dropping his hand again.

  Passing a hotel he saw a familiar figure moving down the steps onto the street: Miss Lillie. She was accompanied by not one but three men, all poised with hands ready to guide her off the steps. One held a parasol over her head, shading her from the sun. Thomas attempted to step around her without being noticed, but Lillie spotted him.

  ‘Monsieur Edgar!’ she said. ‘What a pleasant surprise! Back so soon from your travels?’<
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  Thomas feigned astonishment. ‘Miss Lillie. How nice to see you.’

  She put out her hand, palm down, and he took it, unsure whether he was expected to shake it or kiss it. He squeezed her fingers and bowed slightly before letting her hand drop.

  ‘And your companions? Dr Harris? Is he with you?’

  ‘No, I came back alone.’

  ‘Senhor Santos?’

  ‘Still upriver as well. I have disappointed you.’

  ‘Oh no,’ she said, but the smile she gave was forced. Her three companions stood silently by, looking at Thomas with contempt. She must have noticed Thomas’s nervous glances at them because she turned to them and said, ‘Would you excuse us for a moment, gentlemen?’

  They murmured their assent and moved a few paces away.

  ‘You seem to have become very popular,’ said Thomas, as warmly as he could.

  ‘I have Senhor Santos to thank for that. He graced me with his patronage, and everybody in this town wants what Senhor Santos has. I am now the most sought-after girl in Manaus.’

  And the most expensive, I’ll warrant, thought Thomas. The light fell fetchingly on her red hair, making it glow, and her pale face had developed more freckles than she’d had earlier — an effect of the tropical sun. The tip of her nose was slightly pink.

  She asked Thomas for a cigarette, and he obliged. Lillie removed her glove to take it and, as he lit it, he noticed two brown sores, the size of pennies, on her hand.

  ‘Did you burn yourself?’ he asked.

  Lillie looked away, and Thomas admonished himself. ‘Forgive me,’ he said.

  ‘No, that is quite all right. These marks, they just appeared one day. I have them elsewhere.’ With her other hand, she pulled down the neck of her dress to reveal another sore at her throat. ‘This heat, and the lace on my collar. I am foolish, I know, but I just couldn’t let people see me like this.’

  ‘Have you seen a doctor?’

  ‘No. The truth is I am too scared. If there is something wrong with me, I think I would rather not know. There are so many deaths here, Monsieur Edgar. Nobody speaks of them. They live such a fine life; everybody pretends to be happy. But this place stinks of death. My mistress, Senhora da Silva, she died two weeks ago. Cholera.’