Hotel Brasil

by Frei Betto

  The Igreja do Outeiro da Glória was too small for so many guests and not everyone could fit in the church. Yet those left outside were not too distraught: it was a hot Saturday afternoon and it was quite a relief not to be sitting inside the stuffy church.

  Bramante was neither inside nor out: he’d chosen not to attend, though he did send the happy couple a set of bone-china plates as a gift.

  The priest launched into a sermon exalting conjugal faithfulness, prompting Diamante Negro to whisper to Dona Dinó, “Heim! Most of us aren’t even faithful to ourselves, let alone others!”

  The priest then preached against abortion, as if programmed to do so regardless of his audience. He stressed his personal friendship with the groom and praised the bride’s intellectual background, all in a muddle of uninspiring words and Latin quotations devoid of anything remotely transcendental.

  What caught Rosaura’s attention was that not once did he utter the word love.

  Dona Dinó admired the elegant women and dashing men, while Madame Larência was reduced to tears by the Gregorian chant underscoring the ceremony, causing her make-up to smudge.

  THE RECEPTION

  Lassale threw a barbecue for the bride and groom at his house in Barra da Tijuca. The garden was thick with the smell of grilled meat. In one corner, a group of publishers had a whisky-fuelled discussion about the book trade. The general consensus was that things were not going well. Paper had become more expensive, the government had cut back on its purchases of educational material, distributors were demanding a bigger slice of the pie and livrarias were closing down in the face of the recession.

  Several of the publishers admitted they’d have been bankrupt themselves if it hadn’t been for self-help books and crude religious texts, both of which targeted the reader’s emotion rather than their reason.

  “The important thing,” said the host of the party, speaking with the authority of someone who’d scored a modest success with the first instalment of the Terceiro Milênio series, “is to steer clear of theology and avoid all doctrine of any known religious persuasion. Fill the books with metaphors, mix different spiritual sources and never make the reader feel guilty with notions of sin. Cut any words that might need looking up in a dictionary and add a sprinkling of mystical beings – elves, angels, demons, wizards, that sort of thing. The goal is to turn God into a pop star: well-produced and apolitical, with some dazzling onstage acrobatics and music that has enough melody and rhythm to hide the poverty of its lyrics. In short, lots of noise and zero substance. The public doesn’t want to reflect, only to feel.”

  THE GOOD DAUGHTER RETURNS HOME

  A few nights after getting back from their honeymoon, the newlyweds were fast asleep in Mônica’s apartment when the phone rang. It was Madame Larência. Beatriz had turned up at Hotel Brasil and was anxiously asking for Cândido.

  Cândido got dressed and headed straight to the hotel. He found Madame Larência in the TV lounge watching a programme showcasing the miraculous powers of an evangelical pastor. The cafetina said Beatriz had arrived looking exhausted, so she’d fixed the girl some food, had her take a shower and put her to bed.

  Cândido was overcome with emotion when he saw Beatriz fast asleep in Madame Larência’s bed, snuggled up among lace sheets and cuddly toys. The room looked more like a maiden’s chamber than a bawd’s bedroom.

  “And where’s she been all this time?”

  “Ora, do I look like the sort of person who goes poking her nose into other people’s business?” answered Madame Larência.

  Cândido took the girl in his arms and carried her into the lounge. He called Mônica and gave her the good news, saying he’d bring Beatriz back in the morning rather than wake the girl up now. He wanted to wait until he could talk to Beatriz in private, to tell her she now had a home to go to. He lay the girl down on the sofa and settled himself on the carpet beside her, with a cushion for a pillow.

  THE PRESENT

  When he opened his eyes in the morning, Beatriz was gone. In her place was a quartz clock and an envelope, postmarked Assunción. There was a note inside – To the bride and groom, with lots of love, Bia – along with a wad of hundred-dollar bills. Four grand in total.

  Cândido had just finished counting the money when the girl came out of the toilet by the dining room.

  “What’s all this?” he asked, waving the banknotes at her.

  “First give me a hug and a kiss,” she said smiling. “Congratulations on getting married. I’ve missed you.”

  She threw herself on him and then whispered in his ear:

  “It’s a present.”

  “Sim, but where did you get so much money from?”

  “Working for Bola.”

  Cândido got annoyed.

  “Working as what? Doing what?”

  “If I were rich, tio, I’d be called a trader. But as I’m just a poor flip-flop girl, I suppose I’m a contrabandista.”

  Cândido surprised himself by getting cross and giving the girl a firm telling-off. She burst out crying, tears of real feeling.

  “You know what I’m going to do with this money?” he said. “Give it to the Casa do Menor. Now, pull yourself together. I’ve got good news.”

  REUNION

  As they made their way to the flat, Cândido told Beatriz about the decision he and Mônica had made.

  When she opened the door and saw Beatriz, Mônica choked up.

  “Querida,” she babbled, as she crouched down and squeezed Beatriz to her chest, tears running down her face and into the girl’s hair.

  “Mamãe!” exclaimed Beatriz, shedding tears of her own.

  THE NEXT VICTIM

  A few weeks later, Jorge Maldonado was found dead in his broom cupboard at the back of the hotel.

  The tragedy proved just how unfounded Delegado Del Bosco’s initial allegations had been. After calling for him repeatedly and getting no response, Dona Dinó went to investigate and found Jorge laid out on his bed among his tools and cleaning equipment. He was dressed in his Botafogo shirt and shorts, and his severed head sat between the football boots on his feet. A blue ribbon from his ponytail dangled down at the cut of the neck.

  Two dark holes lay where his eyes should have been.

  NEW PROJECT

  “And how’s it going with Beatriz?” Del Bosco asked Cândido, after calling him in for questioning over Jorge Maldonado’s murder.

  “Tudo bem. We managed to reach an understanding with the Juiz de Menores and Mônica and I are now officially Beatriz’s parents. She’s back in school and getting treatment from a good psychologist. Graças a Deus she reappeared.”

  “Pleased to hear it,” said the detective. “She deserves a decent life. And is senhor still working at the publisher’s?”

  “Sim, I’m involved in a new project. I’m writing a history of the suburbs.”

  “I know senhor no longer lives at Hotel Brasil,” said Del Bosco, “but tell me about Jorge Maldonado.”

  12The Ritual

  Marcelo finished his soup and loosened his tie. He lit a cigarette then stubbed it out, complaining of a headache.

  “I know the perfect cure,” said Dona Dinó, as she took away his dirty dishes. “Go and lie down and I’ll bring you something to take care of it.”

  The journalist undressed and waited for the water in the shower to warm up. While he soaped himself down, he thought about the interrogation he’d been subjected to that afternoon. He’d lost count of the number of times he’d been summoned to the Delegacia da Lapa. Del Bosco was still insisting that one of the hotel residents was the “Lapa Decapa”, or at the very least an accomplice. Which meant Marcelo remained on his list of suspects.

  Right from the start, the journalist had chosen attack as the best form of defence. That afternoon he’d reiterated his claim that the killer had to be a police officer. There was no other way of explaining the ease with which the maniac entered the hotel, went into rooms and caused carnage without leaving any clues.
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br />   The allegation had so annoyed the detective that the questioning session had descended into a slanging match. Now, under the shower, Marcelo weighed up the pros and cons of writing an exposé on how the “Lapa Decapa” investigation had failed to get off the ground due to police incompetence.

  The matter required careful consideration. He knew running a story like that would not only mean Del Bosco being taken off the case but also the end of the detective’s career. Marcelo didn’t really want to be the cause of that. But as a journalist, and as someone at the heart of the investigation, he felt public patience had reached its limit. A clue had to appear from somewhere.

  He dried himself with his Flamengo towel, put his pyjamas on and climbed into bed. He rolled the towel up and laid it across his face, covering his eyes, for he believed that light aggravated his headache. A few minutes later, Dona Dinó knocked gently on the door with the tip of her broom.

  “Come in,” he called out.

  She turned the door handle with her right hand and entered, holding the broom in her left. Osíris stole in artfully through her legs. Marcelo uncovered his face when he felt the cat jump up on the bed.

  Dona Dinó settled herself in the armchair by Marcelo’s computer.

  “As senhor knows, I don’t believe in medicine,” she said. “But if senhor will allow me to perform a little hypnosis, I swear he’ll never have a headache again.”

  “What do I have to do?” asked Marcelo, open to any suggestion that might ease the throbbing at his brain and temples.

  “Sit up against the headboard and look into Osíris’s eyes,” she said, picking up the cat and holding it in her hands.

  The journalist stared hard into Osíris’s eyes while Dona Dinó whispered phrases in a maternal voice, phrases that made Marcelo feel sleepy. She slowly repeated the refrain:

  “Illujanka… Illujanka…”

  They’re not eyes, thought Marcelo, they’re little suns that slowly expand and turn, rotating, radiating a golden ring of light… The Arles sun in a Van Gogh painting… Golden coins…

  Everything went magically yellow. Marcelo was no longer thinking. He didn’t even know if his eyes were open or closed. His mind rocked to the sound of Dona Dinó’s mysterious commentary, until he sunk into a new state of consciousness, a soft smile on his lips.

  Dona Dinó put Osíris down and picked up the broom. Holding it with both hands and laying it flat across her lap, she opened up the handle and pulled out a sword with a fine triangular blade. She then unscrewed the brush and took out a dagger. She stood up and went over to the man lying in a hypnotic trance. With a firm hand, she thrust the dagger into his heart. He spluttered, his feet flailing about on the mattress and his arms reaching out for the old woman. She covered his face with a pillow and then stabbed him a second time until he stopped moving. He was dead.

  Using the tip of the dagger, Dona Dinó lanced out Marcelo’s eyes. She placed one of the eyeballs on the palm of her hand and held it out for the cat, smiling all the while. Osíris came running over, sniffed at the eyeball and gobbled it up. He licked his paw, his golden eyes sparkling. Dona Dinó popped the other eyeball into her own mouth and ate it as if it were an oyster, closing her eyes to savour the alkaline taste, then swallowing it whole without chewing.

  The first part of the triocularity ritual was now complete and Dona Dinó recalled what Hórus had said when he’d first introduced her to the routine:

  “Remember that the eye is both mirror and mirrored. A mirror image is, by its very nature, a reflection. But the mirror image of the eye reflects an inner light. It is through this inner light that the eye sees what’s on the outside. Two pairs of eyes never see the same thing in the same way. When we look at something, it is not our eyes alone that see: the Universe sees through our eyes. But only the third eye is truly creative. Zeus and Shiva are blessed with triocularity, a power that, once attained, allows us to see what others can’t see. It delivers us from illusions, shams, false impressions and deceptions. It enables us to see the essence of what truly exists.”

  Dona Dinó began the laborious task of cutting off the dead man’s head. While she worked with the sword, she said a prayer:

  “Make me worthy, São Dionísio!”

  Decapitation complete, she was ready to make the offering. She arranged the body on the bed with its arms between its thighs and placed the head in its hands. She stuck a cigarette butt into its mouth and fixed its lips into a strange smile, beneath the two empty eye sockets.

  HORROR

  Diamante Negro got back to the hotel at four o’clock in the morning. He went down the corridor on his tiptoes, anxious not to wake the other guests. He felt something wet and sticky on the sole of his shoe. He turned the light on to take a better look. It was blood, and it was pouring out from under Marcelo’s door.

  Diamante Negro rubbed his eyes and took a deep breath. When he opened his mouth, he choked in panic and nothing came out. He stretched his arms above his head and his body started to tremble all over. Performing a strange dance macabre, he screamed:

  “Miiiiiiinha Santa Luzia! Help! Help!”

  Stretched out on the sofa in the TV lounge, Osíris meowed, annoyed to be disturbed by the noise.