“Fine!”
But the next day, they continued their discussion.
“Listen,” the tavern-keeper said, “fifteen and it’s a deal.”
“Twenty!”
“Twenty’s too much!”
“I won’t do it for less!”
“And I won’t go that high!”
“Well, nobody’s forcing you—so long!”
“See you later!”
The next time they met, João Romão looked at his friend and chuckled. Botelho replied by shrugging his shoulders, as though the whole matter were of no particular concern to him.
“You’re a regular devil!” the tavern-keeper said jokingly, giving the other man a friendly pat on the shoulder. “So there’s no way we can come to an agreement?”
“Twenty or nothing.”
“And if I give you twenty, can I count on you to . . . ?”
“If my worthy friend makes up his mind to pay twenty, he’ll receive an invitation to dine at the baron’s house next Sunday. Accept the invitation, and you’ll find the ground prepared.”
“Well, what the hell? After all, I can’t take it with me!”
Botelho kept his word. A few days after the contract had been sealed, João Romão received a note from his neighbor, asking him to be kind enough to dine with him and his family.
Ah! What apprehensions afflicted the tavern-keeper’s soul! He spent hours and hours fretting over that visit; he rehearsed what he would say, talking to himself in front of the bathroom mirror. Finally, when the day arrived, he bathed, brushed his teeth till they shone, dabbed cologne all over his body, shaved with great care, clipped and polished his fingernails, donned some brand-new clothes, and at four-thirty that afternoon he appeared, smiling timidly, in His Lordship’s mirrored and pretentious drawing room.
With his first steps onto the carpet, where his feet, accustomed to the freedom of clogs and sandals, stood out like a pair of tortoises, he felt his spirit quail. Sweat trickled down his brow and neck, as though he had just finished a long race. His red, hammy hands were dripping, and he didn’t know what to do with them once the baron had solicitously taken his hat and umbrella.
He wished he had never come.
“Make yourself at home!” the master of the house roared. “If you’re hot come over here by the window. No need to stand on ceremony. Leonor! Bring some vermouth! Or maybe you’d prefer a beer?”
João Romão accepted everything, with shy, awkward smiles, afraid to say a word. The beer made him sweat even more and, when Dona Estela and her daughter entered the room, the poor devil got so embarrassed that he was truly painful to behold. He tripped over his own feet twice, and one of those times he had the misfortune to grab a chair on casters and nearly ended up flat on his face.
Zulmira snickered but disguised her amusement by whispering something to her mother. At seventeen, she no longer seemed so anemic. She had breasts, and her hips had filled out. She looked better. Dona Estela, poor thing, was hurtling toward old age despite all her efforts to stave it off. She had two false teeth, she dyed her hair, and two long wrinkles descended from the corners of her mouth. Even so, her neck was white, smooth, and voluptuous, and her arms remained as plump and attractive as ever.
At table, their guest ate and drank so little that his hosts began to tease him, pretending to interpret his lack of appetite as proof that the meal did not please him. João Romão begged them for the love of God not to think such a thing and swore on his word of honor that he had never tasted such delicious food. Botelho was present, seated beside an aged landowner who was staying at Miranda’s house. Henrique, having passed his first year of medical school, had gone to visit his family in Minas Gerais. Isaura and Leonor served them, tittering discreetly at the sight of Seu João all dressed up and on his best behavior.
After supper, a family they knew dropped in with a flock of girls. Some young men showed up as well, and they all began to play forfeits, a game of which João knew nothing. Still, he held his own rather well.
Tea was served at ten-thirty without any untoward incident, and when the neophyte found himself again in the street, he breathed a sigh of relief, unbuttoning his starched collar and stretching his neck. Rejoicing in his victory, he drank in the cool night air with a pleasure that was new to him. Feeling very satisfied with himself, he entered his house, eager to be rid of those boots and uncomfortable clothes and to climb into bed, where he could dream about his future, whose horizons seemed to broaden hopefully before his eyes.
But this bubble burst when he saw Bertoleza lying on her back, snoring, with her nightshirt pulled up above her belly, revealing her thick, dark, shiny legs.
He had to sleep beside that nigger who stank of cheap cooking oil and fish! He, who felt so happy and smelled so sweet, had to lay his head on a dirty pillow beside that hideous tangle of nappy hair.
“God Almighty!” the tavern-keeper sighed resignedly.
And he undressed.
Once he was lying down, keeping to the edge of the bed lest he touch his mistress, he began to realize what a serious obstacle she posed.
He hadn’t thought of that! Damn it!
Instead of sleeping, he began to worry.
Thank God; at least they didn’t have any children. Bless those medicines Bruxa had given Bertoleza the two times she had been pregnant! But how the devil would he get that millstone off his neck? How could he have forgotten all about her? It was unbelievable!
In fact, João Romão was so used to the woman’s sight and companionship that in his ambitious musings, he had thought of everything but her.
And now?
He went on worrying until two in the morning without finding a way out. Only the next day, when he spied her outside the store cleaning fish, did the thought “What if she died?” flit across his mind.
XIV
The days drifted by for three months after the stabbing. Firmo went on meeting Rita in that old woman’s apartment, but she didn’t act the same: She was cold, indifferent, and often snappy, looking for excuses to quarrel.
“Hm! It seems like there’s trouble brewing,” the thug muttered jealously. “I hope to hell I’m wrong!”
She always showed up a little late for their trysts, and the first thing she said was that she was in a hurry and couldn’t stay long.
When he asked why, she would reply: “I’ve got so much work to do! I have to finish the laundry for a family that’s sailing tomorrow for the north. I was up late last night doing their washing.”
“You’ve always got a lot of work to do nowadays,” Firmo snarled.
“But I need the money, honey! If I loaf around I won’t be able to pay the rent! I can’t live on what you give me!”
“Wait a minute! How can you say I don’t give you anything? Who gave you that dress you’re wearing?”
“I didn’t say you never gave me anything, but what you give isn’t enough for me to eat and pay the rent. But don’t get me wrong; I’m not asking for more!”
Thus the few moments they had set aside for love were poisoned. One Sunday, Rita didn’t show up at all. Firmo waited for hours in the dark, narrow, windowless room with its stench of mildew. He had bought fried fish, bread, and wine for their lunch. Twelve o’clock struck and he was still waiting, pacing up and down in that squalid cubbyhole like a caged jaguar, cursing under his breath with furrowed brow and clenched teeth. “If that slut comes now, I’ll wring her neck!”
The sight of his package of food made him even angrier. He kicked a china basin sitting near the bed and pounded his own head.
“Damn it!”
Then he sat down on the bed, waited a while longer, grumbling while his crossed legs twitched with rage, and finally he stormed out, hurling a last curse into the empty room.
As he walked along, he swore to make her pay for what she’d done. A fierce desire to get back at her drew him to São Romão, but he didn’t dare to go in and merely hung around the gate. Unable to catch a glimpse of Rita, h
e decided to wait till that evening and send a message. Bored and frustrated, he wandered through the neighborhood, brooding over his joyless Sunday. At two o’clock, he entered Bantam’s Bar, a dingy hole near the beach where he, Porfiro, and their henchmen often drank. His friend wasn’t there. Firmo collapsed in a chair, ordered a shot of rum, lit a cigar and began to think. A young black who lived at Cat Head came in, sat down at his table, and without further ado told him that Jerônimo had gotten out of the hospital.
Firmo jerked to attention.
“Jerônimo?”
“He showed up this morning at São Romão.”
“How do you know that?”
“Pataca told me.”
“So that’s it!” Firmo exclaimed, pounding the table.
“That’s what?” the other asked.
“Never mind. That’s my business. You want something to drink?”
Another shot of rum appeared. After a moment’s silence, Firmo snarled, “That’s got to be it! That’s why the bitch has been acting so funny.”
A bitter jealousy, a fierce despair welled up within him, growing as the minutes passed like a wounded man’s thirst. He had to get back at her! At her and at him! The son of a bitch survived the first time, but he wouldn’t the second!
“Another shot of rum!” he yelled to the Portuguese who ran the joint. And he added, pounding the floor with his walking stick: “I’ll get him before this day is over!”
With his hat pushed back, his wooly hair seemed to stand straight up in disarray. He was foaming at the mouth, overcome by hate and his desire for vengeance.
“Listen,” he told his companion, “Don’t say a word to the silver jennies. If you do I’ll kill you. You know I mean what I say.”
“I’ve got nothing to tell anyone. For what?”
“Good.”
And they went on drinking.
Jerônimo had indeed been released and returned to São Romão that Sunday. Pale and emaciated, he hobbled along with the aid of a bamboo cane. His hair and beard had grown, for he had sworn not to trim them until he fulfilled a certain vow. His wife had gone to meet him at the hospital and walked beside him, saddened both by his illness and the circumstances that had occasioned it. His friends welcomed him sadly and respectfully. A circle of silence formed around the convalescent. Everyone spoke in whispers; Rita’s eyes were filled with tears.
Piedade led her husband into the house.
“Would you like some soup?” she asked. “You’re not all better yet, are you?”
“Yes I am,” he replied, “but the doctor said I have to walk to get my strength back. I was stuck in bed so long! It’s only the last week that I’ve been able to get around at all!”
He took a few steps around his little sitting room and said, returning to his wife, “What I’d really like is some coffee, a good cup like Rita makes—listen; why don’t you ask her to fix me some?”
Piedade sighed and slowly went to look for the mulatta. Jerônimo’s preference for the other woman’s coffee had cut her to the quick.
“My husband likes your coffee and turns his nose up at mine. He wants me to ask you to fix him a cup. Can you believe it?” the Portuguese told the Bahian.
“No trouble at all!” Rita replied. “I’ll be there in a jiffy!”
But she didn’t have to take it anywhere because a minute later Jerônimo, with the calm, passive air of one still suffering from a protracted illness, appeared at her doorway.
“You don’t have to bother going over there. If you don’t mind, I’ll drink the coffee right here.”
“Come in, Seu Jerônimo.”
“It tastes better here.”
“Stop that! You know your wife’s suspicious of me! I don’t want to hear that kind of talk!”
Jerônimo shrugged his shoulders.
“Poor woman!” he muttered. “She’s a good soul, but . . .”
“Shut the hell up! Drink your coffee and stop talking dirt. You Portuguese are all alike: you talk as bad as you eat!”
Jerônimo happily sipped his coffee.
“I don’t want to say bad stuff about her, but it’s true there’s a lot of things she doesn’t have that I’d like . . .”
And he licked his mustache.
“You’re all the same. Only a fool would let herself be sweet-talked by a man! I don’t want to hear any more about it! I already got rid of the other one!”
Jerônimo started.
“Who? Firmo?”
Rita regretted what she had said and stammered; “He’s a bastard! I never want to see him again! A good-for-nothing!”
“Does he still come and see you?” the foreman asked.
“Here? You must be kidding! Not on your life! And if he came I wouldn’t let him in. Hey; when I can’t stand someone, I really can’t stand him.”
“Is this true, Rita?”
“What? That I broke up with him? I’ll never go back with that loafer again! I swear to God!”
“Did he do something to you?”
“I don’t know . . . I don’t want to . . . it’s over!”
“Do you have somebody else?”
“Hell no! I don’t have a man, and I never want to have one!”
“Why not, Rita?”
“Huh? It’s not worth the trouble!”
“But . . . if you found someone . . . who really loved you . . . for-ever . . . ?
“Not even then!”
“Well, I know someone who loves you like God loves his children . . .”
“Tell him to look somewhere else!”
She approached him to take the cup; he slipped his arm around her waist.
“Wait! Listen!”
Rita pulled away and scolded him; “Stop that! Your wife might see us!
“Come here.”
“Later.”
“When?”
“Later.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“I need to talk to you.”
“I know, but it’s not right to do it here.”
“Then where should we meet?”
“How should I know?”
And seeing Piedade come in, she quickly changed the subject, saying: “Cold baths are good for that! They toughen up your body!”
The other woman angrily and silently crossed the tiny sitting room and told her husband that Zé Carlos and Pataca wanted to speak with him.
“Ah!” replied Jerônimo. “I know what they want. See you later, Nha Rita. Thanks. And if you need anything, just ask.”
As he stepped into the courtyard, he saw his friends coming toward him. The foreman escorted them into his house, where his wife had laid out his lunch on the table, and be signaled them to keep quiet for the moment about what had brought them there. Jerônimo wolfed down his food and then invited his guests to join him for a stroll.
In the street, he asked them in a mysterious tone of voice; “Where can we talk?”
Pataca suggested Manuel Pepé’s Tavern, across the street from the cemetery.
“Good idea!” said Zé Carlos. “No one’ll see us there!”
The three of them set off, not exchanging another word till they reached the corner.
“So, are we still going to do what we decided?” Zé Carlos finally asked.
“Damned right!” Jerônimo replied.
“And what’s the plan?”
“I still don’t know—first I have to find out where that nigger hangs out at night.”
“At Bantam’s Bar,” Pataca declared.
“Bantam’s Bar?”
“That joint at the end of Rua da Passagem, with a rooster on the sign.”
“Ah! Near the new drugstore—”
“Right! He goes there every night and he was there yesterday, having a few.”
“Drunk, huh?”
“Pickled! Seems like Rita did something he didn’t like.”
They had reached the tavern. They went in the back door and sat down on the some soap boxes around
a raw pine table. They ordered rum with sugar.
“Where are they meeting?” Jerônimo asked, pretending the question was of no particular interest to him. “Right there in São Romão?”
“Who? Rita and him? Come on! He’s a cat-head now!”
“Does she go over there?”
“I doubt it! She’s a silver jenny right down to the tips of her toes!”
“I don’t know how they managed to stay together this long!” Zé Carlos interjected. He went on talking about Rita, while Jerônimo listened absentmindedly, staring off into space.
Pataca, as though following the foreman’s thoughts, downed the rest of his drink and said: “Maybe the best thing would be to get it over with tonight.”
“I’m still so weak . . .” the convalescent sadly replied.
“But your club is strong! And besides, we’ll be with you all the way! You can even stay at home—”
“Hell no!” Jerônimo replied. “I wouldn’t miss this for anything!”
“I think we should finish him off today,” the other man said. “Strike while the iron is hot—that’s what I say. Besides, I hate that nigger’s guts.
“Then let’s do it,” Jerônimo decided. “I’ve got the money at home—forty apiece. You’ll get paid as soon as we’re done. And I’ll stand you to the best wine we can find: all you can drink.”
“What time do you want to meet?” Zé Carlos asked.
“As soon as it’s dark, back here! Does that sound all right?”
“Sounds fine; we’ll be here.”
Pataca lit his pipe, and the three of them started talking about what they planned to do and how they couldn’t wait to see the look on Firmo’s face when he saw their clubs. Then they’d find out how handy he was with a knife. That son of a bitch, who would cut someone for nothing!
Two workers entered the tavern, and the group fell silent. Jerônimo lit a cigarette from Pataca’s pipe and left his companions, reminding them of the time they had agreed to meet and tossing a two hundred réis coin onto the table.
He headed straight for São Romão.
“You shouldn’t be out in the hot sun on a day like this!” Piedade said when she saw him come in.
“But the doctor said I’m supposed to walk as much as I can.”
The Slum (Library of Latin America) Page 17