Crimes of August: A Novel: 5 (Brazilian Literature in Translation Series)

by Rubem Fonseca

  The inspector took from his pocket the ring he had found in Gomes Aguiar’s bathroom and the gold tooth. Inexplicably, to him, they were in the same pocket. He hastily placed the gold tooth on the floor, beside the sofa bed. With the ring in his hand, he again looked at the photo in the newspaper, at what truly interested him, the ring finger of Gregório’s left hand, on which could be seen a ring resembling the one he held at that instant. He recalled the conversation he’d had with the doorman Raimundo about a Negro visiting Gomes Aguiar’s apartment the day of the murder. He put this information together with that of the medical examiner Antonio Carlos, according to which the hairs found on the soap from the dead man’s bathroom were from a Negro. The inspector fought the excitement of the hunt that he was experiencing, which resulted as much from the possible discovery and contingent arrest of the one responsible for the crime as from the identity of the suspect. He had to maintain his clearheadedness and confront such indications coldly: they were merely a clue, a lead to be followed like any other.

  He picked up the gold tooth and went into the bathroom. Standing before the mirror, he peeled back his lips and put the gold tooth in front of where it had been previously, now occupied by a porcelain incisor. No one remembered anymore, or perhaps no one even knew, for the dentist who did the work had died, that he once had a gold tooth in his mouth. But he didn’t forget.

  The music had stopped. Mattos flipped the LP on the turntable. His stomach was hurting. He needed to eat something. As he was opening the refrigerator, the doorbell rang.

  “May I come in?” Alice asked.

  “Come in.”

  The two stood there, in the living room.

  “What opera is that?”

  “La Bohème.”

  Alice paced from side to side in the small living room.

  “Tell me right off what you want to say to me.”

  “My husband is Luciana Gomes Aguiar’s lover.”

  Alice spoke rapidly, never stopping her pacing.

  “That’s what I wanted to tell you that day when we had tea at the Cavé. I had read in the paper that you were investigating her husband’s death.”

  “Does your husband know you’re here?”

  “No. He went to São Paulo to a boxing match.”

  Lomagno had left the night before to attend the fights on Saturday, at the Pacaembu Gymnasium, of two Brazilian pugilists, Ralph Zumbano and Pedro Galasso, against Argentine opponents.

  “Sit down, please. Why are you telling me this story of your husband and Luciana Aguiar?”

  “I had to get it off my chest with someone.”

  Mattos remained silent, avoiding looking his former girlfriend’s face.

  “Do you still like me?” Alice asked.

  “I don’t know.” A pause. “Get what off your chest?” Now Mattos looked directly at the woman’s face, seeking signs of guile or treachery.

  The doorbell rang again.

  “Let it ring,” Alice said.

  The inspector opened the door.

  It was Emilio, the maestro. He removed his Panama hat, passing it to his left hand, which was already holding his cane, and extended his hand to the inspector.

  “Forgive me for bothering you at home, but—”

  He stopped when he noticed Alice’s presence. “Good afternoon, Miss. I’m an old and humble friend of the gentleman.”

  “Come in,” said the inspector.

  “May I have a word with you in private?”

  Mattos led Emilio to the bedroom.

  “Yes, Mr. Emilio . . .”

  The old man, surprised and disappointed at the modesty of the inspector’s apartment, didn’t know what to say. He chewed his dentures nervously.

  “I’m embarrassed to make another request of you . . . After all, it hasn’t even been a week . . . But I’ll pay it all back to you . . . Something unforeseen came up . . .”

  “I’m broke, Mr. Emilio. I just bought the Encyclopedia Britannica and a collection of classic books . . . More than fifty volumes . . .”

  “Why didn’t you buy them on credit?”

  “I bought them at a used bookstore. They don’t sell on credit.” The sounds of Emilio’s dentures touched the inspector.

  “What about your girlfriend? . . . Could she maybe . . .”

  “That young woman is not my girlfriend.”

  “She’s not? Well, sir, these eyes that the earth will yet consume can spot passion in a woman’s face . . .”

  “I can’t ask her for money.”

  Emilio took an enormous dirty handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his eyes.

  “I’m sorry. We old people cry over nothing.”

  The inspector put his arms around Emilio’s shoulders. He felt pity at the old man’s fragility and repugnance at the smell of cheap lavender that emanated from his body.

  “Wait here.”

  The inspector returned to the living room.

  “Do you have any money you can lend me?”

  “How much do you want?”

  “Five hundred cruzeiros.”

  “Two hundred, it can be two hundred,” Emilio shouted from the bedroom.

  Alice took a checkbook from her purse and signed a check. The inspector took the check and went back to the bedroom. He found Emilio hiding near the door, his mouth open, attentive, trying to hear better. He was starting to go deaf.

  The old man took the check. He looked at the amount.

  “I’ll be eternally grateful, I won’t forget—”

  “Yes, yes. It’s time to leave,” Mattos interrupted, taking Emilio by the arm and leading him to the living room.

  In the living room, the old man stopped. He made a sweeping gesture with his hat in Alice’s direction, like a nobleman hailing a queen. Then, at the door, he looked at the man and woman standing gravely in the middle of the living room and said grandiloquently, “The potion that Brangane gave you to drink is not fatal.” This said, he withdrew, dramatically.

  “What did he mean?”

  “He was doing justice to the five hundred cruzeiros that you gave him.” Mattos flipped the record again. La Bohème in the background gave him a certain feeling of security.

  “Who is Brangane? Do you have any matches?”

  “A character in an opera. Isolde asks her chambermaid Brangane to prepare a lethal poison for her and Tristan. But the maid prepares a different potion. When they drink it, they rediscover that they love each other.”

  “Light my cigarette.”

  Mattos lit Alice’s cigarette.

  Alice moved closer to the inspector.

  “You said rediscover. Did they love each other before?”

  “Yes.”

  “And after the rediscovery of love, what did they, the lovers, do?”

  “Nothing.”

  Alice looked closely at the inspector’s face. He had always been hard to understand. At first Alice had thought that her boyfriend’s awareness of his own poverty and an exaggerated pride were the cause of his problems. Later, agreeing with her mother’s opinion, she came to believe that the young man suffered from some kind of psychological morbidity. But who didn’t?

  “Why?”

  “As a Wagnerian would say, the pathos in the story is that Tristan’s honor prevents their love from being consummated.”

  They fell silent.

  “Is your husband a Negro?”

  “A Negro? My husband?”

  “Whoever killed Paulo Machado Gomes Aguiar was a Negro. If your husband isn’t a Negro, he’s not the murderer.”

  “I didn’t say my husband killed Paulo.”

  “But you suspect he might have killed Gomes Aguiar.”

  “I don’t know, I don’t know. You’re making me nervous!”

  “Is there some Negro who comes to your house often?”

  “Of course not!”

  “There are millions of Negroes in this city. One of them might frequent your house.” Pause. “You came here and told me your husband is Lucia
na Gomes Aguiar’s lover. And then what?”

  “Why are you talking to me like that?” The hardness in the inspector’s voice and the stain from water infiltration that she had just noticed on the ceiling made her feel a sudden anxiety. Her hands were trembling.

  “You make me nervous talking to me like that.” Alice picked up her purse, took a mirror from it, and went into the bathroom.

  Mattos opened the refrigerator, took out a bottle of milk, and drank from the bottle. The music had ended, but now he preferred silence. He needed to take a look at his feces; he was always forgetting to do that. He picked up the book on civil law and threw it violently against the wall.

  “What was that noise?” asked Alice, startled, coming out of the bathroom.

  “Nothing. I threw a book against the wall.”

  “Oh . . .” Alice said. “I’m late, I have to go.”

  “Is that what you wanted? For me to suspect your husband?”

  “I’m quite nervous.”

  “You do want me to suspect your husband.”

  Hurriedly, Alice opened the door and ran out.

  When the inspector went after her, Alice had already descended the stairs and disappeared.

  At the door to the building on Rua Marquês de Abrantes, holding a package with spaghetti, tomatoes, garlic, and onions, Salete paced back and forth, waiting for Alice to leave. Salete had gone there to visit the cop and arrived at the moment Alice got out of the taxi. She had thought about going in also but lacked the courage. Besides which, Alice’s presence had spoiled her plans. Salete put on dark glasses and cried several times, standing in the street, as she imagined what Alice and the inspector were doing in bed. The displeasure engendered by wounded pride had the effect of dissipating the scruples she had felt at making plans for that visit to the inspector. Now she would go ahead to the end.

  When Alice appeared at the building’s door, Salete hid in the bakery on the ground floor, from which she saw the other woman get into a cab.

  Salete went up in the elevator with her heart aching. She rang the inspector’s doorbell several times in a row. Mattos opened the door.

  “Are you in a hurry?”

  The lump on Mattos’s forehead, as she feared would happen, had almost disappeared completely and left no scab. He was holding an egg in his hand.

  Salete went in and attempted to take the egg from the inspector’s hand but only managed to break it.

  “What’s wrong with you?” asked Mattos, trying with his other hand to prevent the egg from sliding to the floor.

  “You’re not going to eat an egg. I’m going to make spaghetti for you. Spaghetti is good for your ulcer.”

  In the bathroom, Mattos threw the remains of the egg in the toilet. He washed his hands and returned to Salete in the kitchen.

  “Do you have a pot?”

  The inspector had a single pot, of aluminum.

  “That’ll do,” said Salete, her heart beating anxiously.

  Salete filled the pot with water, placed it on the stove, and turned the gas to maximum.

  “I saw that woman leaving here. The blonde from the other day.”

  Mattos remained silent.

  “Did you screw her?”

  “No.”

  The water was slow to boil, increasing Salete’s nervousness. She arranged the tomatoes, the garlic, and the two onions on the counter beside the stove.

  “What do you mean, no? She was here with you a long time.”

  “Don’t hassle me, Salete,” said Mattos, leaving the kitchen.

  Finally, small bubbles began rising to the surface of the water in the pot.

  “Alberto, come here, please!” shouted Salete.

  The inspector entered the kitchen and saw the pot boiling on the stove.

  “Do me a favor, love. Peel those tomatoes. Look at my hand, I can’t do it.”

  Several fingers on Salete’s left hand were covered with adhesive bandages.

  “How do you peel tomatoes?”

  Salete didn’t know how to peel tomatoes either, or any other plant. Nor did she know how to make spaghetti.

  “Oh . . . with the knife . . . take off the skin . . .”

  The inspector had great difficulty doing what Salete had asked. He stained his shirt; the counter was littered with pieces of tomato.

  “There, I’m done.”

  “Now grab all that . . . with your hands and throw it here,” said Salete, gripping the handle of the steaming pot.

  The inspector filled his hands with shredded tomatoes. As he was about to toss them into the pot, everything happened fast. The pot slipped and boiling water poured over his hand.

  “Oh my God,” screamed Salete. “Does it hurt bad?”

  “Don’t worry about it,” said the inspector.

  “My God, my God!”

  “It’s nothing.”

  “Does it hurt a lot? Tell the truth.”

  “It hurt at first. Now it’s just burning.”

  “Is it going to leave a wound? And a scab?”

  “It’s enough to wrap it in gauze.”

  “I have some gauze in my purse,” Salete said.

  Salete took from her purse a roll of gauze, adhesive bandages, and a pair of scissors. She wrapped the inspector’s hand and secured the gauze with a piece of the bandage. While she did this, she held back to keep from crying.

  “You burned me on purpose, didn’t you?”

  “Me—?” She began to cry.

  “I’m not going to fight with you. I just want to know why. A stupid act like that must have its reasons.”

  “I adore you.” Sobs.

  “Answer me.”

  “I’d give my life for you.”

  “Yet you burned me with boiling water. Why?”

  “Kill me, I deserve to die,” said Salete.

  “Stop talking nonsense. Tell me right now why you threw boiling water on my hand.”

  Salete kneeled and hugged the inspector’s legs.

  “Hit me, at least that.”

  The inspector made Salete stand up.

  “Tell me, goddammit.”

  “Do you forgive me?”

  “You’re forgiven. Now then. Why did you burn me?”

  “I need a scab from an injury of yours.”

  “A scab from an injury?”

  Salete told the story of Mother Ingrácia.

  “I like you, you don’t need any macumba for that. And how is it you can believe in such idiocy?”

  “Everybody believes it. Teachers, lawyers, doctors, politicians, big industrialists, everybody goes to Mother Ingrácia’s macumba site. If you go there, I’ll arrange a way for you to be cured of your ulcer.” Pause. “Does your hand hurt a lot?”

  Salete’s face was like that of a prisoner after a nightlong interrogation.

  “If this injury creates a scab, I’ll give it to you. But you have to promise me you’ll never see that Mother Ingrácia or any other macumba practitioner.”

  “I promise. I swear by everything sacred.”

  Mattos’s stomach ached. He went to the refrigerator and got an egg.

  “You need to eat something, going around on an empty stomach isn’t good for you. I’m going to make the spaghetti.”

  “I’ve lost my appetite for spaghetti.”

  She loved that man. She needed to show him that: “Then eat that egg.”

  Salete watch the inspector suck the egg, after making a small hole in each end. She always found that repulsive. She watched bravely without averting her eyes as the inspector sucked a second egg. When Mattos finished, Salete hugged him and kissed him, sticking her tongue in his mouth, discerning the taste of the egg.

  They went to the sofa bed and fucked until the inspector’s gauze was entirely torn away.

  “This is going to make a good scab,” said Mattos, looking at the condition of the burn on his hand.

  PRESIDENT VARGAS received the visit of his son, Deputy Lutero Vargas, on the second floor, in his office.


  When Lutero entered, Vargas told his aide, Major Dornelles, that he didn’t want to be interrupted.

  Lutero was surprised by his father’s exhausted and worried appearance.

  “That shot that killed Major Vaz also hit me in the back,” said Vargas.

  Lutero, who unlike his sister Alzira had never felt at ease in the presence of his father, remained silent. His recent talks had been less than pleasant. His father had been hard on him at the time of the episode, widely exploited by the press, of the robbery of eleven thousand dollars he had suffered in Venice, on a recent trip to Europe, criticizing him for making himself vulnerable to attacks by the family’s enemies.

  Now, his father’s prostration mortified him. Accustomed to seeing his father as a man of great power and strength, he was surprised to see him so discouraged. He wasn’t the same man who, furious at Lacerda for having called his son debauched, shameless, degenerate, a scoundrel and a thief, had forced Lutero to file a lawsuit against the defamer. Where was the outrage, the indignation, the will to fight, now?

  “You’re being accused of ordering the crime,” said Vargas. “I want to hear it from you that you’re innocent.”

  “I swear I’m innocent,” said Lutero.

  Vargas looked for a long time at the face of his son. Lutero had never lived up to the expectations Getúlio placed on him. Darcy, his mother, had inculcated in her son a horror of politics, helping him to dedicate himself to the profession of medicine, thus distancing himself even further from his father, who having no son to carry on the family tradition, had transferred to his son-in-law Hernani do Amaral Peixoto, a naval officer, his political sponsorship. Only upon Vargas’s return of to the presidency in 1950, not as dictator but elected in a democratic election, had Lutero decided to “go into politics.” But it would have been preferable, both for him and for the entire family, if he had continued practicing medicine. As a politician, Lutero had given no cause for pride to his father, who in reality was more interested in the political future of his son-in-law, then governor of the state of Rio de Janeiro.

  Without knowing whether or not his father believed his oath, Lutero said goodbye to him ceremoniously and left the palace.

  eight

  ILÍDIO, THE NUMBERS GAME BANKROLLER assaulted by Inspector Mattos, was a proud man. He had started his life as lawbreaker by working for Mr. Aniceto Moscoso, the great numbers game financier in Madureira. With extreme efficiency he provided security for Mr. Aniceto’s betting sites. He avoided the use of violence but, when necessary, hadn’t hesitated to kill the usurper of a site or anyone else who was creating serious problems for Mr. Aniceto’s business. His industriousness had led to several promotions within the rigid hierarchy of the numbers game command. Finally, with the help and protection of his patron, and the acquiescence of the other large-scale bankrollers, Ilídio came to control several gambling sites in the city. He became a small-scale bankroller. His businesses, like those of all the others, large or small, prospered endlessly. Ilídio’s ambition was to one day become a major bankroller, like Mr. Aniceto.