The Book of Chameleons

by Jose Eduardo Agualusa

  ‘It ended up being a good business.’

  Heat was rising from the floor. It slipped in, a damp breath, through the cracks in the doors, in slow waves, carrying with it the salty smell of the sea and its murmur too, the wonder of the fish, the dim light of the moon. ngela Lúcia’s skin shone. Her shirt, clinging to her breasts. Félix still had his jacket on – he must have been baking. All I wanted was a cool crack to dive in to. I went to the kitchen – up there, through the highest windowpane, I could see over the wall of the yard to the luminous clamour of the musseques, and beyond them a broad black abyss, and the stars. The black abyss was the sea. I spent some time just looking out. I imagined myself sinking into that silence, blindly, like I used to, my heart leaping, my hands opening the water, at my feet a pleasant coldness, rising up my legs to my waist. I felt refreshed. When I came back to the living room I saw that Félix had taken off his jacket and was now sitting on the big cushions in front of the television, with his arms around ngela. The ceiling-fan pushed around the warm air, the blades sweeping it lazily towards the walls. Centuries of dust, mites, old writers’ souls, came away from the books and danced in the air like a mist, like a faint dream, lit by flashes from the television screen. Soundless images in black and white of the President presiding over a meeting. The President raising his fist. The President in a kit playing football. The President greeting other presidents. And then images in colour, of the President opening a park. ‘The Chaves Ex-Heroes Park’, read the plaque. ngela laughed. Félix laughed. The President cut the ribbon. Félix turned back to ngela, and kissed her on the lips. I saw her – with some surprise – closing her eyes and accepting his kiss. I heard her moan. The albino tried to undo her shirt, but she stopped him.

  ‘No. Not that. Don’t do that.’

  She raised her legs elegantly, and slipped off her shorts. Through the shirt that clung to her body you could make out the roundness of her breasts, her smooth belly. Then she turned her body, till she was kneeling over Félix. Her broad shoulders – lovely swimmers’ shoulders – made her waist look even slimmer. My friend sighed:

  ‘You’re so beautiful…’

  ngela took his head in her hands and kissed him. A long kiss.

  It took my breath away.

  Mother was little older than I, and of course as we both aged – alongside one another – the difference got smaller and smaller. Besides which I actually think she aged more slowly than I did. From a certain moment when we went out together people began to talk to me about her as ‘your wife’. Maybe if she’d lived longer people would have started taking her for my daughter. I think these little mistakes used to make her happy. She insisted on calling me her ‘boy’. Until the day she decided to die – nearly a hundred years old – she held the threads of my life in her hands.

  ‘My boy mustn’t come home too late.’

  And I – aged eighty-something – would be terrified of coming home after midnight. If I went out with a woman friend, I felt I’d have to phone home every half hour, so Mother wouldn’t torment herself. She’d be up waiting for me, vigilant, with her cat on her lap.

  ‘My boy mustn’t drink alcohol.’

  And I’d sit at bar tables and drink a glass of milk, while my friends teased me affectionately and got themselves drunk on whisky or beer. And Mother went to trouble to keep me away from any women she suspected might one day take me away from Her. And she’d push the ones who were decidedly ugly – and especially the more stupid ones – into my arms, sure that I’d spurn them; and then she’d reprimand me:

  ‘My boy plays very hard-to-get. He’s going to end up on his own.’

  I’m not telling you this to justify myself. It wouldn’t be fair to blame Mother’s zeal or my poor father’s severity for my misogyny. I was who I was because I lacked the courage to be any different. I watch Félix Ventura run his fingers across the trembling body of his love, I watch him whisper sweet words in her ear, I watch him carry her to the bedroom (the woman protests, gesticulates, cries out laughing happily) and lay her down on the bed. And I watch him – at last – fall asleep, exhausted – and I begin to understand how I have come to be here.

  Félix sleeps, his right arm across ngela’s chest, his hand resting on her breast. Her eyes are open. She’s smiling. Carefully she disentangles herself and gets up. She puts on her flowered t-shirt, nothing else. She has long, smooth legs, incredibly thin at her ankles. She crosses the room without a sound. Keeping the darkness away with her fingertips, she opens the bathroom door, switches on the light and goes in. She takes off the t-shirt. She washes her face, her shoulders, her armpits. I notice a group of dark, round scars on her back, which stick out like insults on her golden velvet skin. I think I can see – in the mirror – just the same marks on her breasts and stomach. I go back to the bedroom, Félix is murmuring something. I think I catch the word ‘savannah’. I’d like to talk to him. Perhaps if I were to sleep now I’d find him in his white suit, in coarse linen, and his beautiful panama hat, sitting under a tall baobab tree, somewhere in that savannah he’s crossing in his dreams.

  Ding ding!

  The doorbell. Ding ding! An urgent ringing. Knocking. Ding ding! Félix leaps out of bed, white and naked as a ghost, reaches for the lamp on the bedside table and turns it on. ngela Lúcia appears beside him, alarmed, a towel around her body:

  ‘Who was it?’

  ‘What?! I don’t know, my love. There’s someone knocking at the door. What time is it?’

  ‘It’s still dark. It’s four-twenty.’ ngela says this without looking at her watch. Then she glances at her wrist for confirmation – ‘Yes, four-twenty. I’m never wrong. Who could it be?’

  ‘I’ve no idea!’

  Ding ding! Ding ding! Knocking. A voice calling. Félix opens the cupboard and takes out a white dressing gown. He puts it on. ngela gets up.

  ‘Wait.’ Her voice is hoarse, a murmur: ‘Don’t go.’

  ‘I’m going. You wait here.’

  I rush across the ceiling. Félix peers out of the living room window. The veranda is in darkness. Ding ding!!! He makes his mind up, and opens the door. Edmundo Barata dos Reis hurtles into his arms, pushes him back, closes the door.

  ‘Fucking hell, comrade. They’re after me, they’re right here. They’re going to kill me.’

  ‘Who’s going to kill you, damn it?! Explain yourself!’

  ‘Them!’

  He’s in his underpants. He’s barefoot. His U.S.S.R. Communist Party t-shirt seems to have regained some of its original colour – perhaps from the shock. Or maybe it’s really blood. Edmundo shakes his grey hair, his eyes bulge from their sockets. He runs from one side of the room to the other. He closes the blinds. Félix watches him, impatient.

  ‘Calm down. Sit down, and calm down. I’ll make you some tea.’

  He makes for the kitchen. Edmundo follows. He closes the blinds. He closes the window shutters. He sits on a bench, his hands on the table, as Félix puts some water on to boil.

  ‘Soup? Don’t you have any soup? I’d rather have some soup…’

  ngela Lúcia appears at the door. She’s wearing a man’s shirt, blue, very large, which comes down almost to her knees. She must have got it from the cupboard. She has Félix’s slippers on her feet, also too big for her. Dressed like that she looks so fragile, almost childlike. Edmundo stumbles:

  ‘I’m sorry, miss – I didn’t mean to disturb…’

  ‘What’s going on?’

  Félix shrugs:

  ‘Edmundo here is going to be killed. Let me introduce you. This is Mr Edmundo Barata dos Reis, ex-agent of the State Security. Or as he’d have it, ex-gent. I’ve told you about him.’

  ‘Who’s going to kill him?!’

  ‘They’re going to kill him, and the man wants soup! So… that’ll be one soup…’

  Ding ding! Ding ding! Ding ding!

  Edmundo Barata dos Reis hides his face between his knees. Félix shudders.

  ‘OK, relax. I’ll go see who it i
s. You two just stay here, I’ll sort it out. ngela, don’t let him leave.’

  He goes back to the living room. He takes a deep breath, and opens the door. In my other life I used to know people like that – they’re frightened by the sound of wind through the leaves, they can’t bear cockroaches, not to mention policemen, lawyers, even dentists. And yet when the dragon bursts into the clearing, opens its mouth and spits fire, they stand up to them. Calm, cool as an angel.

  ‘What do you want?’

  José Buchmann bursts into the room. There’s a pistol in his right hand. He’s trembling. His voice trembles even more:

  ‘Where is the son of a bitch?’

  ‘First of all, give me that gun. I won’t have armed men in my house…’

  He says this firmly, without raising his voice, absolutely sure that he will be obeyed. The other man ignores him, though, stepping quickly across the corridor and heading directly for the kitchen. Félix follows him, protesting. I run. I don’t want to miss any of the excitement. ngela Lúcia is standing in the doorway, her arms out, blocking the way:

  ‘You’re not coming in!’ She explodes: ‘Poças! Where the hell did you come from?’

  I can hear the voice of Edmundo Barata dos Reis, shrill, desperate, but only then do I see him. He’s standing with his back to the wall, arms hanging down by his sides – his t-shirt glows red on his skinny chest. The blade of the sickle, the gold of the hammer, glimmer for a moment. Then fade.

  ‘Girl, this creature has appeared from hell! From the past! From the place the damned come from…’

  José Buchmann is trapped, with ngela in front of him, and Félix behind him holding his arms. His face is right up against the woman, and he is shouting as though possessed. Suddenly he is like a giant. The veins in his neck fill and pulse, bulge in his forehead:

  ‘Yes, that’s right – I’ve come from the past! And who am I? Well? Tell them who I am!…’

  All of a sudden he throws himself forwards, knocking ngela over while lunging for Edmundo – he grabs his neck with his left hand and forces him to his knees. He pushes the end of the pistol-barrel into his neck:

  ‘Tell them who I am!’

  ‘A ghost. A demon…’

  ‘Who am I!’

  ‘A counter-revolutionary. A spy. An agent of imperialism…’

  ‘What’s my name?’

  ‘ … Gouveia. Pedro Gouveia. I should have killed you back in seventy-seven.’

  José Buchmann kicks at him. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. He has heavy black boots on, which make a dark sound as they strike the body. Edmundo doesn’t cry out. He doesn’t even try to avoid the blows. The kicks find his stomach, his chest, his mouth. The boots turn red.

  ‘Shit! Shit!’

  José Buchmann – or Pedro Gouveia, as you prefer – puts the pistol down on the table. He takes a cloth and wipes down his boots. He’s still shouting – Shit! Shit! – as though the other man’s blood were burning his feet. Then he sits on a bench, hides his face in his hands, and breaks into a deep, heaving sob, which shakes his whole body. Edmundo Barata dos Reis drags himself to a corner of the kitchen. He sits up, back against the wall, his legs out in front of him. He smiles:

  ‘I never forgot you. I never forgot her either – Marta – young Marta Martinho – passing for some sort of intellectual – poetess, painter and God knows what else. She was pregnant, almost at term, a huge belly. Round. So round. It’s as though I can see her now…’

  At the door to the corridor, Félix has taken ngela in his arms, and is watching the scene in silent shock. Pedro Gouveia is crying. I don’t know if he’s listening to what Edmundo Barata dos Reis is saying. The ex-agent of State Security seems to be enjoying himself. His voice echoes, firm, cold, in the silence of the night:

  ‘It happened a long time ago, didn’t it? During the struggles…’ He gestures to ngela – ‘The girl hadn’t even been born. The Revolution was under threat. There was a band of nobodies, a gang of irresponsible petits-bourgeois who tried to seize power. We had to be tough. We’re not going to waste time on trials, the Old Man said in his address to the nation, and so we didn’t. We did what we had to do. When an orange starts rotting we take it out of the fruit basket and throw it in with the rubbish. If we don’t remove it, all the others will rot. One orange is pulled out, or two or three, and the others are saved. That’s what we did. Our job was to separate the good oranges from the rotten ones. But this guy – Gouveia – he thought that because he’d been born in Lisbon he’d be able to escape. He phoned the Portuguese consul – Mr Consul, I’m Portuguese, I’m hiding in such-and-such a place, please come and rescue me, and my wife too, she’s a black woman but she’s pregnant with my child… Ha! And do you know what Mr Portuguese Consul did? He went to meet the two of them, then handed them over to me! HA! I thanked him heartily, the consul, I told him he was a true revolutionary – I embraced him – angry though I was, yes, you mustn’t think I have no scruples, I’d have preferred to spit in his face, but I embraced him, said goodbye and went off to interrogate the girl. She held out for two days. Then she gave birth – right there – to a little girl, like this, so small; blood, blood – when I think about it all I see is blood… And Mabeco, a mulatto from the South – he died a while ago, a stupid way to go, stabbed twice in cold blood in a bar in Lisbon, they never found out who did it – Mabeco cut the umbilical cord with a penknife, then he lit a cigarette and began to torture the baby, burning it on the back and chest. And the blood! Masses of blood, and the girl, that Marta – her eyes wide like moons – it pains me to dream about it – and the baby screaming, the smell of burning flesh. Even today when I lie down to sleep, the smell is still there, the sound of the child crying…’

  ‘Shut up!’

  Félix, a rough shout, a voice I didn’t recognise in him. Again:

  ‘Shut up! Shut up!’

  From where I’m watching, from here on top of the cupboard, I can see the top of his head lit up in rage – he breaks away from ngela and advances at Edmundo, fists clenched, shouting:

  ‘Get out of here! Go!’

  The ex-agent struggled to his feet, and straightened himself up. He threw a look of disgust at José Buchmann, letting out a harsh laugh:

  ‘Now I’m absolutely certain. It really is you – Gouveia – the factionalist. The other day your laugh almost gave you away. You used to laugh a lot in the faction meetings, before the business with the consul, when your own countryman handed you over to me. Not in prison, though – you just cried in prison. You cried all the time – boohoo, like a girl… I watch you crying now and I see that nobody Gouveia. Revenge – is that what you wanted? No, you need passion for that. You need courage! Killing a man, that’s a man’s job.’

  And then –

  as

  in

  a

  slow

  dance…

  ngela crosses the kitchen,

  Comes to the table,

  her right hand picks up the gun,

  her left hand pushes Félix away,

  she points at Edmundo’s chest –

  and fires.

  The Cry of the Bougainvillea

  Out in the yard, where Félix Ventura buried the narrow body of Edmundo Barata dos Reis, now flowers the ruddy glory of a bougainvillea. It grew fast. It’s already covering a good part of the wall. It hangs down over the passageway, out there, in a cry of praise – or perhaps of accusation – to which no one pays any heed. A few days ago I summoned up the courage to go out into the yard for the first time. I scaled the wall, my heart pounding. The sun was shining on the shards of glass. I slipped carefully between them, and looked out over the world. I saw a big, wide road, muddy red, with tired old houses cluttering up the other side. People passed by, impervious to the bougainvillea’s cries. I was overwhelmed by the vast, cloudless sky, the heavy silence of the light, a flock of birds circling. I hurried back to the safety of the house. Maybe I’ll go back out sometime if the weather clouds a bit. The sun daz
es me, hurts my skin, but I would like to take a more leisurely look at those people passing…

  Félix has been sad. He’s hardly been talking to me. But today he broke his silence. He came into the house, took off his dark glasses, put them away in the inside pocket of his jacket, then took the jacket off and hung it on the back of a chair. Then he opened a folder and took out a small square yellow envelope.

  ‘Another photo has arrived – you see, my friend? She still hasn’t forgotten us.’

  He opened the envelope with great care, trying not to tear it. A Polaroid. A river lit up by a rainbow. In the top right-hand corner, you could make out the silhouette of a naked youth diving into the water. In the margin, ngela Lúcia had written in blue ink: Plácidas Águs, Pará, and the date. Félix went to get a little box of pins, those little ones with coloured round heads. He chose one, a bright, ludicrous green, and fixed the photograph to the wall. Then he took three steps back to consider the effect. The living room wall facing the window is now almost completely covered in photographs. All together they make up a kind of stained-glass window; it reminds me of David Hockney’s experiments with Polaroids. Shades of blue predominate.

  Félix Ventura turned the big wicker chair towards the wall and sat down. He spent some time there, motionless, silent, watching the fine evening light dying as it met the immortal light of the Polaroids. His eyes filled with tears. With a handkerchief he wiped them away. Then he said:

  ‘I know. You want me to forgive her. I’m so sorry my friend, but I can’t. I don’t think I can do it.’

  The Man in the Mask

  The man who has just walked in reminds me of someone. But I still haven’t been able to work out who. Tall, elegant, well dressed. His grey hair, cropped short, gives him an air of nobility, an air which his broad, rather coarse face quickly dispels. I watch him make his way across the sleeping evening light, as a tiger. He ignores the hand Félix proffers him, and then – apparently a little bored – sits down with legs crossed on the leather sofa. He sighs deeply. His fingers drum on the sofa’s arm.