by Ed Siegle
‘And what if I don’t want to help?’
‘Then Adolfo will kill him.’
‘That’s a lot to lay on the doorstep of a woman you hardly know,’ said Eva. ‘If Nelson’s in such trouble, why don’t you bail him out?’
‘I bailed him out a few times,’ said Zemané. ‘I can’t do that forever.’
‘But you’re here?’
‘I’m here to help him help himself.’
‘To Joel’s money,’ said Eva.
‘If he takes Joel to his father, everybody wins.’
‘Or shows him my certificate?’
‘Right,’ said Zemané.
‘And for that you’re going to pay me?’
‘The important thing is to see that you emerge with happiness.’
‘Happiness can mean a lot of things, but I appreciate the thought.’
Zemané gazed at Eva for a while. She thought he was on the verge of a pronouncement or a threat but he said, ‘Shall we attack the famous buffet?’
There were salads of feijão fradinho with fresh tuna, fresh palm hearts with basil pesto and chicken with green coconut. There were mineira beans and Marimbondo rice and at the heart of it all was a roasted suckling pig. It was a thrill to lunch in a restaurant with a spread like this, where the glasses bore coats of arms and the plates were ringed with gold. But although Eva took a tiny portion of fried okra salad and a smudge of pureed yam with gorgonzola – even a woman with the will of a goddess could surely not resist – she was determined not to be bribed with fine cuisine. She would eat properly another time, at her own bidding, in circumstances altogether more celebratory. She vowed she would come here with Liam and Joel. If the certificate was wrong – how tempting to hope it was – they might even come here with Gilberto.
Eva watched Zemané tuck a napkin into his collar. If an elephant had hands they’d be like his, she thought. She watched his sizeable fingers peel a quail’s egg and regretted not selecting more to eat. Eva wondered how many years of her life she’d spent watching men do things: eating, sleeping, playing stupid games, scratching assorted parts, working a little, making a lot of noise about work, and snoring, snoring, snoring. She must have spent twice as long watching them as they’d spent watching her, in spite of all her efforts. In her experience, they could only keep their mind on a woman for so long before they found another focus – usually something another man was doing, or television.
But Zemané seemed a man with a good heart – it might be a little soon to judge, but she liked to judge – and she needed to think his heart was good, because she had to admit that losing her job was starting to freeze her up inside, and she wasn’t a woman who wanted to be even partly frozen. She certainly wasn’t averse to an offer of happiness, now that misery was looking likely. So while she didn’t like to give in to a man who was used to holding all the cards, now was not the time to be making life more difficult in the name of pride. Supply and demand were the yin and yang of the modern world – and too much of the time she was stuck in the little black hole of demand. If she helped them and they helped her and Joel found the answer, then, in the end, what was the harm? Perhaps it was even one of those win-win situations Liam was always mentioning, to which – as far as she could tell – she’d never been party. So, as she waited for him to finish, she decided to give Nelson the benefit of the doubt, which made her happy, though she was careful to retain a tightness in the lips – which she hoped made her look like a woman not to be trifled with, but which she suspected made her look a bit like a fish.
When Zemané had cleared his plate, she said, ‘There is something I need.’
‘Name it,’ said Zemané.
‘A president and a million dollars and a condo in Spring Palms – wherever that is.’
‘I’m sad to say my spells are on a smaller scale.’
‘I need a job,’ Eva said.
Zemané smiled, touched her hand and said, ‘Then I might be able to help.’
They dropped in on the buffet once again, where the ribbon of Eva’s resolve snapped and she piled her plate high with éclairs and chocolate millefeuilles. Back at the table, she devoured her haul while Zemané smiled on. When she had finished, the plates were cleared and they ordered coffee.
‘Why do you care about Nelson so much?’ asked Eva.
‘I’m sentimental. I like his singing.’
‘But really? I mean, the two of you are hardly similar.’
Zemané asked if he could smoke a cigar, and lit one when she said it was fine.
‘I wasn’t always so up,’ he said, ‘and he wasn’t always down. But his aunt was killed, his sister was killed. It can be hard to stick to a nine-to-five after that. So he moves around trying to sing it out, bet it away, sell it with other people’s furniture, smile it away to a thousand casual friends who’ll never ask too many searching questions.’
‘But why him? I mean, there must be millions of Nelsons.’
‘I used to dine alone a lot at an Italian place, after our daughter died. My wife and I were lost in a terrible silence. We couldn’t find a sentence to make it better. But Nelson used to wait my table and I found I could talk to him a little, and he would talk a lot – about what Zila would say or what Yemanjá was going to do to right our wrongs. He always had a theory. Then, one day, I heard him play. If you’ve heard his voice you’ll know what I mean.’
‘Yes,’ said Eva.
‘Of course he lost that job, but I found out where he went to drink – I wanted to buy him a beer and thank him. I liked the bar where he drank, and as I didn’t have a bar myself it became my bar as well, as an occasional drinker, at first, and then as a regular. When the owner, Paulo, ran into trouble with Adolfo – Nelson is far from alone in that – I bought the bar for a very nice price. And the rest, as they say…’
‘It’s a lovely story, no doubt about that, but I hope there aren’t too many Nelsons in your life. Others might take you for more than a ride.’
‘Everyone needs at least one Nelson, don’t you think?’
‘Don’t get me wrong – I’m as sympathetic as the next woman. But this week everyone seems to be going sympathy-crazy. Murderers are victims and hijackers are saints. If I don’t break the law soon, they’ll come and lock me up.’
Zemané laughed. ‘You know who I feel sorry for in that bus business?’ he asked.
‘Surprise me.’
‘The policeman, the one who shot Geisa.’
‘For a successful man you’re quite the softy,’ said Eva.
‘He took a chance, that boy, the way I see it. He took action, tried to solve everything in a stroke. OK, so he missed the hijacker and shot her by mistake –’
‘Some mistake!’
‘Quite a mistake, yes,’ said Zemané, ‘but with better aim he’d be a hero.’
‘You must be kidding me, friend! There are a zillion others more deserving of sympathy.’
‘He was a thoughtful man, I read, who liked to play the piano and paint. He made a mess in front of the world and now he can’t eat or sleep.’
‘Some mistakes have to be paid for. You can’t just shrug off the shooting of a woman. He’s not testified yet, because the doctors say he’s ill; the five that squashed the hijacker are claiming a right to silence; the commanding officer at the scene is going to be cleared. They shoot and kill – bangue-bangue – and when do they ever pay?’
‘They’re poor kids too, a lot of them. Would you like to be a cop?’
‘Not all of them are poor. These guys were supposed to be Special Forces. Do poor kids play the piano like your little favourite?’
‘They don’t train them properly, that’s the trouble,’ said Zemané. ‘They send them into the hills to fight a war.’
‘They need to train them better, I agree,’ said Eva.
‘There’s a murder every two hours – they need to do something.’
‘They need to do something, I’ll drink to that.’
Eva realised she’d enjoyed
the cut and thrust. She was able to be herself without him spitting out his pips. She was damned if she was going to play the weeping woebetide to find a helping hand, but he didn’t seem to want that. He showed no signs of wanting to get on top of her – in any meaning of the phrase. He might not be a bad boss, she thought.
She put her handbag on the table, undid the clasp, took out the folded certificate and handed it to Zemané.
When Joel got back from the bus station, he called Liam’s office.
‘How was Paraty?’ Liam asked.
‘A beautiful dead-end,’ said Joel.
‘So what now?’
‘I don’t suppose Eva’s had any news?’
‘Sorry.’
‘Nelson still reckons he knows where my dad is. I’m going to go with him to some restaurant tomorrow. If that doesn’t work out, it’s back to the drawing board, I guess.’
Joel wondered what else he could try, if it wasn’t his father at the restaurant. Perhaps he could talk to some of the news people, a reporter or cameraman at the hijack scene. It might be worth a try. He watched television for a while then went for a swim in the pool on the roof. He walked round the rooftop, looking at the view: Corcovado, the lake, the twin mountains at the far end of the beach. Behind their embrace, its face hidden, Joel could see one side of the summit of Pedra da Gávea. It was hard to believe he’d ever been up there. Joel leaned on the rail and looked at the faded blue edge of the distant mountain and thought about that final day with his dad.
It had started with the phone ringing him from sleep and his mother shouting at whoever was on the line. Joel had sat up in bed and listened.
‘It’s the end,’ he heard his father say.
‘Can’t you run?’ said Jackie.
Joel thought there was sobbing, though it didn’t sound like his mum.
‘To where?’
‘I don’t know… Belo, Argentina, the forest –’
‘I’m not a fucking monkey –’
‘This is no time to be funny.’
‘I’m not!’ hissed Gilberto.
‘I’ll go and see the major,’ said Jackie.
‘I’ll talk to Angelica.’
‘Don’t you think that bitch has done enough?’
‘She’s nothing to do with –’
‘You liar!’ bellowed Jackie.
‘Shhhhhhhh! This isn’t going to help, not now. Go on, then, go and see the major –’
‘OK, OK! You take Joel, find somewhere to hide for the day –’
‘Take Joel?’
‘I’m not taking him to the major,’ said Jackie, ‘and we can hardly leave him here. What if they come?’
‘We’ll climb the mountain!’
‘Today! Are you mad?’
‘They’ll never find us there,’ said Gilberto. ‘Besides, I promised him, for his birthday.’
‘His birthday’s not for seven months!’
‘I might not be around in seven months.’
Joel heard Jackie in the bathroom, opening wardrobe doors, emptying her handbag releasing coins which spun on the kitchen worktop. The closing of the front door sealed the flat in a moment of silence.
Gilberto came in and sat on Joel’s bed.
‘Who’s coming?’ Joel asked.
His dad smoothed creases in the sheet.
‘No one.’
‘Is it the polícia?’
‘Perhaps,’ said Gilberto.
‘Let’s climb the mountain,’ said Joel.
Gilberto smiled and ruffled his hair. From behind his back he pulled a present wrapped in paper covered with hummingbirds. Joel slid a fingertip under the sticky tape and folded open the paper. A black box. He felt its weight, its edges. He opened the lid, gasped, took the compass in his hands and stroked the smooth of its silver. Keeping it flat, he flipped it open and turned it until the needle settled on north.
‘Bacana!’ he said with a bounce into his dad’s arms.
They took the yellow Beetle, Joel in the front seat for a treat, his eyes on the swinging needle and the N, telling his dad what bearing they were on. Gilberto kept up cheerful responses, his eyes on the road in front, on the streets to the side, on the cars roving through the rear-view mirror. He’d forgotten about the checkpoints on the Barra road. Would they be on the lookout? Surely there were bigger fish.
Joel remembered the heat in the rattling car, air rushing through wide open windows. They drove round bends which swept past the ocean – so blue, so huge – until, dipping down, they spotted a cluster of vehicles ahead and came upon a soldier, flagging them down. Joel remembered Gilberto trying to joke with a military policeman whose eyes were hidden behind aviator shades.
‘Where are you going?’ asked the man.
‘Barra beach,’ said Gilberto.
‘In walking boots?’
‘We might go for a walk later, when it cools.’
‘Day off work?’
‘That’s right.’
‘It’s all right for some,’ said the policeman.
He looked at Gilberto’s papers then took the documents over to where a fatter officer sat in a jeep. The Beetle’s engine chuntered. There seemed to be some debate. Joel started to hum one of Gilberto’s tunes but his dad told him to hush. Gilberto watched the men from the corners of his eyes, setting his face relaxed.
The policeman returned.
‘They’re looking for a man,’ he said. ‘For all we know, it might be you. They didn’t say anything about a boy. Park up on the right. We’re seeking clarification.’
Joel remembered jumping at the sudden roar of the engine as Gilberto hit the revs. By the time the guards reacted, the Beetle was round a bend and soon had turned off the main road. He remembered parking down a track and looking up through trees at the vast mountain, black above them.
‘Don’t be scared,’ said Gilberto. ‘We’re safe now.’
Gilberto and Joel drank water, then grabbed their knapsacks and dived up a path through the forest. Joel gripped his dad’s hand as up and up they climbed, Gilberto panting and Joel pulling along behind, holding roots and trees as they scrambled, catching sight of the sea through the forest whenever they turned. They climbed and climbed, sweat sheening their skin, though at least it was cool under the canopy.
‘There’s an easier way,’ said Gilberto. ‘But this is the proper way.’
After what seemed like hours, they reached a flat clearing where they sat on the ground.
‘I’d like to see the polícia climb that,’ said Gilberto, breathing hard.
‘No chance,’ said Joel.
They ate bread and ham and a chocolate bar. They drank water from a canteen. Their breathing became calmer and they could hear birdsong. It was past noon now and all of the cloud had cleared from the sky.
‘Shall we get going?’ asked Gilberto, standing up.
‘I like it here,’ said Joel. ‘If they do come, we can hide in the forest.’
‘Don’t you want to stand on the mountain’s head?’
‘I do. But let’s stay here a bit longer.’
‘Do you remember the story about the Sphinx?’
‘No,’ said Joel, though he did.
They sat against a rock in the shade and Gilberto told Joel the story, making up a few new twists as he always liked to do. Joel listened to his dad’s voice, feeling the grain of its varied tones and enjoying every strand. He listened too for the sound of soldiers, though all he heard were the rustle and creak of trees in the wind and the songs of birds.
After a story or two they stood up, stretched and turned on to the path towards the mountain, which, itself like a sphinx, appeared to be reclining, its head turned back on itself with one eye on the city, as if looking out for their pursuers. They stared up at the black face of the rock and Gilberto put Joel on his shoulders for a few seconds, and Joel remembered feeling like the highest being in the world, there above the forest, looking down the plummeting shoulder of the hill to the vast blue sea and the Marvellous City.
On they strode, turning round the head of the mountain, where the path led to the bottom of an outcrop of rocks, by no means vertical, but seeming steeper than they were because of the great drop of a slope beneath them. Joel paused at the foot of the rocks and looked up at the cracks that would aid their ascent, then back down at the fall of the mountain below and then at his dad who wasn’t smiling any more, but was shading his eyes and squinting into the sky. Joel watched his dad’s face, half-lit by a high sun, shadows deep in its lines, and looked across at the profile of the mountain, which seemed harsher from this angle, blank-eyed and indifferent.
‘We’ve got to get up these rocks,’ said Gilberto. ‘There must be somewhere we can hide.’
‘It’s really steep,’ said Joel, sure he couldn’t reach the cracks, thinking they’d need a rope or something. Then he heard the rotor-blades, still distant, but growing louder.
‘We have to climb, Joel, it’s not far, we’re just high, that’s all. It’s only a small slope. Just keep your eyes up, not down.’
Joel looked down. The slope looked steeper still and he felt the altitude in his stomach for the first time and thought he might fall from the very spot on which he stood. He looked up to where his dad was, a few feet up the rock and holding out his hand. Joel felt frozen. He could hear the blades closer and had the feeling a pterodactyl was going to swoop on him at any moment, like the ones in books his dad used to read to him when he was little.
‘Please, Joel,’ said Gilberto, his voice serious. ‘I’m with you, it’s safe. Trust me, Joelinho – just to the top of this bit, then we’re safe.’
Keeping his eyes on his dad, Joel climbed, grabbing the rock and cracks, using his dad’s hand every now and again. It really wasn’t a difficult slope, he told himself, no worse than those at the foot of Sugarloaf, up which he’d clambered a thousand times. They reached the top and scrambled towards the final cliff below the summit, hunting for somewhere to hide. The helicopter was close. Had it seen them? They found an overhang and crouched beneath it. A whirr of blades was thickening the air. Then they heard the metallic voice of the machine.
‘Come out, Gilberto,’ it shrieked. ‘Come out or we’ll shoot you dead.’
The machine called and called for Gilberto alone, which was strange to him and Joel, since they felt themselves fugitives together.