Thrown in the back of the cab, Janaína broke into a fit of crying. Vinte e Cinco grabbed her savagely by her hair and tore off her clothing.
“Why are you doing this?”
“I want you. That other time was horseplay. This is different.”
“I hate you.”
“Liar. If you did, you’d have killed the girl.”
“She’s not your daughter.”
“I’m sure she is. Today we’re going to make a son,” said Vinte e Cinco smiling as Janaína tried to rake him with her nails. “I came a long way to enjoy you. Never had another woman turn my head that way before.”
“Bastard!”
“You’re mine!”
“You louse!”
The hoodlum’s firm hand squeezed Janaína’s neck, and she began to faint.
“Don’t make me do this. I want you to be willing, just as you see I am.”
“You don’t interest me!”
“I met you as part of a prank; later I regretted it. Nobody cares about the regrets of someone like me. Vinte e Cinco’s sorry—is he happy or sad? So? Who cares? I lived a long time with your marks on me. I didn’t take a bath for two days after you left the bunkhouse, just so I wouldn’t lose your scent. I never came to your cottage to kill your little husband, because I didn’t want you to hate me the rest of my life. But I thought long and hard about it.”
“Luís isn’t the violent type,” Janaína said, face turned into the pillow with Vinte e Cinco on top of her.
“Know what’s going to happen? One of these days I’m going to come get you and the girl. I’ve had it up to here with that Colonel Barros.”
“Let me go home! Let me go!”
“No. We still have time.”
Vinte e Cinco wrapped her in one of his arms and pulled her toward him. Tears ran down Janaína’s face. The gangster kissed her lightly, hardly touching her lips.
“How can I believe you about Colonel Barros?”
“By taking advantage of the few moments I have. When I’m not raiding places out here, I’m hard to locate.” Vinte e Cinco laughed ruefully. “It’s good enough to live that way when you’re a kid. After forty, one starts getting tired.”
“What about all the people you’ve killed? How can I be the woman of an assassin?”
“When you’re in love there are no flaws! I doubt your little husband grips you as strongly as I do.”
He put the side of a hand in the woman’s mouth and smiled.
“Go ahead and bite. Make me bleed!”
Janaína clenched her teeth, then loosened them. Vinte e Cinco kissed her on the neck and nibbled at her back and buttocks. Janaína trembled; as the truck rocked the radio played nostalgic music but they paid no attention to it.
Trial was recessed the next morning. The room emptied instantly. The judge left with Dr. Jansen. He went into his chambers and rinsed his face, then stretched out in a comfortable chair.
“It’s insane to go on this way,” the doctor complained.
“It’d be more crazy to stop now, with things happening the way they are now.”
“Is Antonhoé willing to go through with it all the way?”
“I think so. He’s already compromised himself too much to turn back.”
“What about the other military police you mentioned?”
“They’ll be called if humanly possible.”
“When do you think you’ll wrap this trial up?”
“Going at this horse-and-buggy pace, my dear Jansen, this trial will be the longest in the judicial history of this country. I think we’ll get there by the third or fourth day. Do you think the judge will hold up?”
“The whole thing is insane.”
“I’m thinking in political terms, dear friend. Something’s going in our favor right now. I don’t know how or why. But the detachment they sent from João Pessoa is the proof of it. A delay could cool it down and set it all back.”
As I finished up my notes, Alice sat in the empty courtroom waiting for me.
“Want to go get a snack?”
We left the courthouse, crossed some intersections, and got to João Pessoa Square, with which she was unfamiliar. We went up into the bandshell; I took her hands and kissed her. The square was deserted, and neither she nor I had much to say. I kissed her some more.
“Where are you staying?”
“In that house over there, next to the one with the staircase.”
I opened the front door. Alice did not seem concerned. I turned on the light. The room was neat and clean, with its bookshelf against the wall, its armchairs, its paintings, and its worn carpets. Alice looked it over admiringly. The table, however, was a mess: my typewriter, typing paper, various newspapers, an ashtray filled with cigarette butts, a radio the judge had lent me, extra typewriter ribbons, and a box filled with pens and pencils.
“When do you write?”
“When I get out of court.”
“Then I’m interfering.”
“It’s nothing.”
Alice looked at the papers and the paintings as I moved about.
“Do you think any of the witnesses is going to talk about the cabrocós?”
“Right now,” I said as I opened the refrigerator, “that’s about the only question still open. Did you see how that former cop turned in a bunch of people?”
“Could it be what he says is true?”
“Needs to be confirmed. That’s what Judge Fernandes will do.”
I laid out slices of cheese, bread, and butter and a vacuum jug of coffee that Jandira had made.
“And your newspaper there in Rio, what’s it like?”
“Lively. A large editorial staff.”
“Do you like being a reporter?”
I shook my head yes. “It’s a crazy job. Just the other day I was writing stories about drug traffickers; now I’m trying to understand the peasants’ drama in the Jungle Zone, where death is the topic of conversation.”
“Aren’t you glad you came?”
“Since I met you the path’s been easier.”
Alice laughed. I took a piece of cheese and poured coffee in the cups.
“I’d like to be a reporter. As I mentioned when we met, my father was a layout man. He wanted me to major in communications. Poor guy!”
“I could teach you if you want. When you enroll you’ll already be halfway done.”
Alice glanced at me and stopped smiling. Her eyes unmasked me. I felt vulnerable, subtly dominated, directed.
“Could it be that you are my destiny?”
“If I were?”
“I’d like it.”
I hugged her as she tried to stop the coffee from spilling.
Mara buttoned her blouse, straightened her hair with her painted fingernails, and grabbed Luís by the hand.
“Let’s go. There’s dancing music downstairs.”
She took the radio on the wall. Luís smiled.
“Trying to turn my head, are you girl?”
“Anything’s possible at night.”
“I don’t have much money. Vinte e Cinco’s going to fix me up with some.”
“Don’t worry about it. Now that I know who you are, you’ll get credit here.”
Luís let himself be led out onto the shadowy verandah. Mara hugged and kissed him. A bolero was playing in the small bar amidst raucous laughter.
“Wanna see my bedroom?”
She pushed open the door. Before Luís could think, he ran into a mosquito net of blue netting and fell onto the empty bed, a strong light burning as if inside him, blinding rays that hurt his face and eyes. He felt the heat of the light, the impact of the bullets, an intense heat burning his chest. Mara held him up. He didn’t know if he’d fallen or was still next to the girl. In his state of distress, all he could see were the growing mists of silence and an uncontrollable need to shout. He shouted, but the sound died in his throat. The Indian woman took his hand and examined the lines that foretell the future. She smiled. On one side, the
narrow road, with but one cross; on the other, a cemetery vanishing into the land of black clay.
Vinte e Cinco drove the truck with Janaína next to him, tears in her eyes, thinking of Luís, her swollen and bitten lips numb. The hoodlum focused on negotiating the pothole-strewn road.
“From now on whoever touches you dies!”
Janaína clung to the passenger door. The truck’s springs jolted, Vinte e Cinco driving skillfully. The woman gripped the revolver with trembling hands, tried to concentrate, and pulled the trigger. A first time, then a second. Drops of blood stained his face and his ragged clothing. The truck broke free, went into the jungle, and ran into a tree. Vinte e Cinco tried to reach her, his head drooping over the steering wheel. Janaína pushed the door and started running. She fell but got up and continued. When she reached the yard of the family’s cottage, she felt relieved. Filling the washbasin with water, she soaped down her arms and face, then put on clean clothing and sat down in a chair to wait for dawn. She could hear the roughneck’s snarl in her ears.
From now on whoever touches you dies!
She took a mirror and held it in the direction of the growing light so she could see the marks on her lips and neck. There was a fleck of blood on her torso. She tried to rub it off but couldn’t, then made sure to cover it with her blouse as though it could hide it. Jeruza began to cry. She hugged her daughter and went outside with her to see the sun rising through the canefield, dispersing doubts and fears that had collected in the shadows of the dawn.
Outside the hostelry a crowd of onlookers was gathering. Mari’s only police officer arrived, one foot in a wooden clog and another in a boot. Next to him was the perpetually drunk Puba, a police informant.
“Where’s the body?”
Alberto pointed with his cane toward the porch. More people wandered over. They spoke quietly and seemed uneasy.
“What the hell happened, Alberto?” asked an old man wearing a hat.
“Some guy got killed last night. The idiot got drunk and then tried to beat up a hooker.”
The uniformed policeman and the informant reemerged, pulling Luís by his jacket, red-faced, eyes askew, as if terrified by the day that was dawning luminous and beautiful like all the sunny days in the Jungle Zone.
Chapter 18
I waited all morning for Luís. Alice had agreed to take down the names of the witnesses who were appearing before the jury and a still packed courtroom. I needed to go to Campina Grande to get the story in the mail and buy back issues of The Nation. Alice equipped herself with a small notepad and sat in a seat near Dr. Jansen. The court was working as never before, with citizens actively playing the part of accused or accuser. On the sidewalks and street corners, in stores and barber shop doors, the only talk was of Judge Odilon Fernandes and his skill.
The Rural Workers’ Unions of Sapé and Alagoa Grande mobilized in support of the judge. Father Juliano convened the faithful to stay in church and pray during the long trial. The lights remained on, devout women sang, masses were said over and over, and the Gregorian chants began to dominate mornings of palm trees waving leaves of sun.
Next to the courthouse an overweight, jolly street vendor had set up a stand. He sold everything: cane soup, sweet bread, cornbread, hominy, and boiled corn. And for anyone who might want it, mango popsicles and passion fruit ice cream.
People who were not from Sapé began to be noticed in the crowds. Some came from the capital—journalists and communications or law students—and others from Recife.
Beneath a tree Asbal was speaking to a group of youngsters, waving his hands and making long pauses as if searching for his words in the air. Armed police remained at their posts. So far there had been no sign of disturbances.
Alves was applauded by the farmworkers when she arrived at the courthouse quite early, shortly before my departure for Campina Grande. She appeared happy and confident. I arranged a later interview with her and asked her what she was thinking of the trial.
“It’s an event for Sapé. Leave it to Judge Fernandes to tell the colonels that the law was meant to be obeyed. The way things are going I think the peasant-killers are going to wind up in jail, or at least their names will be revealed by us, the people.”
I shook Alves’s hand and made for the road to the bus terminal. I couldn’t get Alice out of my mind. But another thought made me uneasy: the insistence of that giant that I visit Janete. Why? What was so special about that? What if I invited Luís to go with me? On the bus people talked about the trial. A prematurely aged black man with a felt hat, umbrella and overcoat kept repeating behind me, in a low voice:
“Judge Fernandes is one stubborn guy. They’ve tried to kill him twice but he wasn’t scared. Now with those police reinforcements he’ll follow it to the end. Colonel Barros had better watch it.”
“I’ll have to see it to believe it,” replied his companion. There’s one thing you can be sure about: I’ve never seen such a slow trial. There’s a heap of witnesses showing up and each one’s saying whatever comes into his head. Did ya see how Asbal blasted Batista? What an embittered old coot! I remember the day he threw Elizabeth out of the house like it was today. Now there was a rotten guy. Hard as a whetstone.”
“One of the guys in the ambush ate lunch at his daughter Berenice’s house. It was Batista gave the go-ahead. After they gave it good to Pedro Teixeira, they all celebrated. They helped themselves to the best stuff in the house Pedro’d bought for his family. Gives me the creeps just thinking about it.”
“Asbal the prophet said it real good: Batista never liked Teixeira. First it was the union fight, then his participation in the League. That’s when the bad blood started.”
“Black and poor—worse than poor, a communist! That was the last straw for Batista!” said the old black man with the umbrella.
The two began to laugh. I looked out at the passing trees, seeing Alice’s face in each of them, her smile, her special way of straightening her hair.
As I walked down the bustling street toward a news kiosk draped with soccer-team pennants, I felt like an important journalist. Without anybody being able to question it, there I was, the reporter charged with revealing to the whole country the events that were sweeping Sapé and would soon be stories in the João Pessoa and Recife newspapers. Two copies of The Nation were on prominent display. One of the handbills accompanying them announced my story. It bylined Jorge Elias as the correspondent. I bought five copies as before, and also bought the Folha de São Paulo and O Globo from Rio.
I opened to the page mentioned on the handbill and got a shock. What was going on? The story, despite bearing my byline, had shrunk to two columns with a photo at the bottom. It couldn’t possibly be true. What about the space Veiga de Castro had promised? It made no sense at all. I went to a pay phone and spoke with Barbosa.
“What happened?” I asked, annoyed. “What’s going on, Barbosa?”
“Listen, Jorginho. I just follow orders. Veiga de Castro has other ideas about the trial. In your case, the paper’s editorial board thinks we’ve been exaggerating things, especially because only The Nation ran with the piece. The other papers aren’t following along. It makes things awkward.”
“Yeah—so?”
“I’m under orders to put out what you send slowly. No more sensational scoops!”
“Do I stay here, or just get my pack and scram?”
“Calm down. You sound like a sailor on his first voyage. Just hang in there until you get new instructions.”
The call was cut off. I left the booth, frustrated and furious. How could I explain it to Judge Fernandes, who was killing himself so that the guilty would be punished or at least exposed to public scorn? And how could that happen if the press made itself scarce? Including The Nation. What had really happened?
I went into a bar with cloth-covered tables, ordered a beer, and unfolded the paper. The heat was intense. I took a first sip and tried to concentrate on the reading. Nothing particularly interesting. Then, sudde
nly, an advertisement taking up an entire page. At the bottom a bold-face line: the Northeastern Sugarcane Planters’ Association. That explained it. The Nation had decided to put its money on the growers. And I had gotten mixed up in it like an idiot. I had thought the paper would really stand behind my polemical reporting. I could imagine what Judge Fernandes would think. I took another sip of beer, then another, then a new bottle. I feigned reading. I considered whether to quit reporting on the trial and return to Rio. I would contact another newspaper, probably in São Paulo, or maybe a television station.
When the evening lights came on, I was still in the bar, a collection of bottles on the table. People were staring at me, and I realized that I looked ridiculous. I paid the bill, grabbed a copy of The Nation, and asked the waiter to throw the rest of them in the trash. A form of vengeance. The waiter pretended to acknowledge my request with a nod of the head as he rechecked the bill.
I remained embittered on my way back to Sapé. Fortunately I’d gotten a row of seats to myself: nobody to make me open my mouth and force me into small talk. I reclined the seat back, closed my eyes, and thought about Alice. Would I mention the business of the newspaper to her? I decided I’d get it off my chest, telling her about the paper’s hidden agenda and how I’d fallen for it. It would have been a decision of the editor-in-chief, Veiga de Castro. The first and second stories had appeared as expected: almost two pages, lots of photographs, a prominent byline for me, clearly responsible for all the denunciations and affirmations that were printed there, with a reference on the front page. Barbosa had played his part. Suddenly, everything had changed and coincidentally there had appeared on page seven the planters’ association advertisement. Did I need it spelled out for me any further? Again I thought about Judge Fernandes’s reaction.
Land of Black Clay Page 21