And then, like someone who has been hit in the face, I was furious. Mad enough that my eyeballs pulsated. I reached for the door handle, the blood thumped in my forearm, as a tremendous hammering started on the front door. I gripped the door handle and felt it gripped from the other side. The hammering at the front door didn't stop. I thought of the fire brigade, my mind going for an odd link.
I ran down the stairs. The cat had vacated the kitchen chair. I ripped open the front door. There was a man I knew, but not in this context, standing with six men behind him and a van behind them.
'Inácio?' I said, my mind in pieces now, holding out my hand.
'I'm sorry, Inspector,' he said, ignoring the hand. 'But this is business.'
'Narcotics business? Here?' I said, hearing movements up the stairs behind me.
'That's right,' he said. 'I'm still with Narcotics.'
'But you said this was business. I don't...'
'We've come to search the house,' he said, holding out a warrant, which I didn't read. 'You know a local fisherman called Faustinho Trindade?'
'I know Faustinho,' I said, looking through the warrant now. 'He was...'
'He's a well-known drug-smuggler. He was seen going into this house. You were seen leaving with him and going down to the boat club.'
'Search the house, Inácio. Search the house. Take your time,' I said.
Inácio stepped into the hall and gave the men their instructions. Two went back to the van and returned with large tool boxes. Olivia and Carlos met them on their way down the stairs. Inácio directed us into the kitchen. The three of us sat around the table with an agente standing over us while the rest thundered around the house. Olivia engaged me in some direct eye contact.
'Who are these guys?' she asked in English.
'Narcotics agents. They're searching the house. If you've got any in your room you'd better tell me now.'
'No, I haven't,' she said, unblinking.
'Are you sure?'
'I'm sure.'
Only then did I become aware of each blood cell, every platelet in my veins. My stomach went into free fall. The bag of grass in the attic room.
Carlos looked like a dog who'd regretted eating some green meat from the bin. There was a loud cracking noise from above. I asked the agente what was going on.
'Floorboards, I imagine,' he said. 'Empty your pockets on the table.'
We emptied our pockets. Carlos', I noted, contained 4000 escudos, some change, four condoms, which I was glad about, a pen, his ID card and his Polícia Judiciária card.
'I didn't know you were a cop,' said the agente looking at Carlos' card. 'Are you boyfriend and girlfriend?'
Nobody said anything. The agente shrugged. He picked up Olivia's card and measured the birthdate against Carlos'.
'Maybe not,' he said.
They were in the house for forty minutes. They found nothing. Inácio apologized and this time shook my hand which was running with sweat. The men left. I stood in the darkened hallway and looked into the lit kitchen. Olivia and Carlos were standing together like some movie couple who'd survived a hurricane. I pointed a finger at Carlos.
'You can leave now,' I said. 'Go on! Get out! Fuck off out of here!'
He came towards me and slipped out of the door. I had nothing to say to my little girl. Nothing to say to my daughter. I went up the stairs one at a time all the way to the attic room. I turned on the table lamp. I sat at the desk. I opened the drawer. No bag of grass. No papers. I took out my late wife's photograph which was face-up and not how I'd left her. I closed the drawer. I put her photograph on the desk facing me. I felt betrayed, defiled, rifled, my world shaken up so that I was reduced to the one constant—the unflagging image of my dead wife.
Half an hour passed and three ships in the night.
Olivia appeared, reflected in the dark panes of the window.
'Your bag of grass is outside in the bougainvillea ... and the papers.'
'You've been in here before?' I said, tired, not angry any more.
'After school ... just to look at Mummy,' she said. 'But I don't talk to her like you do.'
'You think a year is a long time, but it isn't,' I said.
'I sat here the other day and wondered what it would be like to have her back ... whether I would want to have her back.'
'Wouldn't you?'
'I've never stopped thinking "Mum would be interested in that, I'll tell her when I get home",' she said. 'And then I get home, and there's nobody here and there's never going to be anybody here. Absolutely never. And that's when I miss her. I want to have her back, but it would have to be as it was before. This gap. This one year without her has changed everything.'
I nodded, slightly exaggerated, like a drunkard. I lit a cigarette, Olivia took it. I lit another and played with the tin seashell ashtray.
'Loss is like a shrapnel wound,' I said, 'where the piece of metal's got stuck in a place where the surgeons daren't go, so they decide to leave it. It's painful at first, horribly painful, so that you wonder whether you can live with it. But then the body grows around it, until it doesn't hurt any more. Not like it used to. But every now and again there are these twinges when you're not ready for them, and you realize it's still there and it's always going to be there. It's a part of you. A still, hard point inside.'
She kissed the top of my head. I put an arm around her hips. I put the photograph back in the drawer.
'I've met somebody,' I said.
'I know.'
'Do you?'
'That business with the telephone on Sunday. The way you smelt when you came back and ... you might not know it, but you're happier.'
'I'm not sure how to do it ... this getting to know someone again.'
'What's she like?'
'I couldn't tell you yet,' I said. 'It's been a rocket ride so far. She's different to your mother, but she's like her too in the important ways. She's a good person, a real person. Someone you can trust.'
She stroked my head.
'Like Carlos,' she said.
I resisted a reply, but I didn't deny it.
'I'm angry with him. I'm not going to tell you otherwise. If Inácio hadn't turned up...'
'Why?'
'He knows what he's doing. He knows your vulnerability. He knows he's ten years older than you. He even knows it's against the law. He met you on a Sunday morning and by Tuesday evening he's in bed with you ... he abused...'
'He didn't know what he was doing. I've already talked to him about Mum. What's ten years? The law's stupid. And so what? Mum told me that you two were in bed with each other inside a week and I knew I wanted him more than anything else in my life. And that's what I did. He did not seduce me. He didn't abuse anything. He's... he's got something. He's got something that all those fancy kids I go to school with haven't.'
'What? What's he got...?' I said and stopped the second half of that sentence just in time ... that I haven't.
'That's the point, Dad,' she said, running a hand through my hair.
'What is? You're being as cryptic as your mother used to be.'
'I don't know ... but I want to. The thrill of that mental connection, remember.'
Chapter XXXV
23rd October 1980, Banco de Oceano e Rocha, são Paulo, Brazil
Manuel Abrantes' secretary came in to his office with a padded package which had been delivered by courier.
'He needs you to sign for it,' she said.
Manuel beckoned the guy in and signed. His eyes fell automatically on the two inches of his secretary's legs between the desk and her skirt hem. He wondered if her underwear was as sensible as the girl. The courier backed out. He told his secretary to straighten the magazines on the table and peered around his desk. She dropped down on to her haunches to do the work. After six years working for him, she knew Manuel Abrantes' sly tricks.
He waved her out of the room, annoyed. Maybe he should take her out to dinner before he left, get her back to his apartment, show her a thing or
two. He opened the package. Inside was a passport, an ID card, an envelope of cheques, a cheque wallet from a Portuguese bank, a Visa card, and an Amex card. There was also a photograph of a thirty-two-year-old woman called Lurdes Salvador Santos. She looked good-natured, despite a severe hairstyle and a faint moustache. A four-page letter from Pedro explained the documents and photograph.
He checked the ID card and passport. The latter was well-used, broken in with plenty of stamps. He opened the packet of cheques. He removed three and put the rest in the cheque wallet. He made up three fictitious amounts and wrote them in the account movements booklet within the wallet. He read the letter four times and memorized every detail. He burnt it with the three blank cheques.
He took one thousand U.S. dollars from his top drawer and left the office. He walked six blocks in the staggering afternoon humidity to a rubber-stamp maker, who'd already prepared a Brazilian entry stamp for him. He went to a travel agent and booked a flight from'são Paulo to Buenos Aires and on to Madrid. He went to the Argentine embassy with his tickets and they gave him a visa while he waited. He went back to his office.
He took all his old documents out of his pockets and desk and passed them through the shredder. He emptied the shredder and burnt the contents in the waste bin.
He went out past his secretary, paused and came back to her. They looked at each other. Too complicated, he thought. He nodded to her and left. She gave him the finger to his departing back.
At 2.00 p.m. the following day his passport received an exit stamp as he went through to the departure lounge in'são Paulo airport. The Immigration officer had no thoughts or opinions as to why a Portuguese national, Miguel da Costa Rodrigues, should be leaving Brazil for Argentina and he didn't ask him any questions.
By the 25th October, after two flights and a car journey, Miguel da Costa Rodrigues was sitting in the office of Pedro Abrantes, Director of the newly privatized Banco de Oceano e Rocha, still in their old offices on Rua do Ouro in the Baixa.
'I can't believe what's happened to Portugal,' said Miguel, looking up from the latest photograph of his brother's wife, Isabel, and their three children.
The government's determined that we are going to join the EEC at the same time as Spain. We have to make progress,' said Pedro.
'No, no. I mean I can't believe the sex. There's sex everywhere on the advertisements, the film posters. Have you seen that kiosk in the Rossio? The nudity. I mean it's incredible. It would never have been possible...'
'Yes, well, salazarismo was very Catholic and respectful of women,' said Pedro, frowning. 'There were censors. You, of all people, should know that.'
'Me, of all people?' asked Miguel, alarmed by his brother's casual slip.
'Sorry, Senhor Rodrigues, I forgot,' said Pedro. 'You'll see ... we've put all that behind us.'
The Portuguese never put anything behind them except a chair to eat lunch. We live with our history as if it's still all happening around us. There are people in this country who think the Hidden King Sebastião is going to come back after four hundred years, to lead them on to greater things. For all I know there could be people waiting for me.'
Pedro didn't say anything. He loved his brother, but he thought he was exaggerating his importance in the ancien régime. His brother had never told him about General Machedo. His brother thought that Pedro was an innocent—an intelligent man, a charming and gifted banker, a much-respected and well-liked person, but an innocent.
'I sold the gold,' said Pedro to get off the old subject, back on to something he felt confident with and the future.
'Seeing as we're talking about history, you mean?' said Miguel.
'I used it to capitalize the bank.'
'Who bought it?'
'A Swiss-based Colombian.'
'What did you get for it?'
'It seemed the right time to sell. This U.S. budget deficit scare is nothing. It's just a...'
'How much?'
'Six hundred dollars an ounce.'
'Didn't it go as high as eight hundred?'
It did, but he was the right buyer in the right climate. Not inquisitive, if you understand my meaning.'
'Doesn't this U.S. budget deficit bring into question the real value of the dollar?' asked Miguel, trying to sound knowledgeable, spouting stuff he didn't fully understand, from reading Time on the aeroplane.
'That's why I've moved into property.'
'If the U.S. goes bust it won't matter what you've moved it into.'
Pedro stood up and spun the dial on a wall safe behind him. Miguel saw the small kid in him, the excited one at Christmas.
'The U.S. won't go bust, but if it does...' he said, and opened the safe door.
Inside were two gold bars. Miguel joined him on his side of the desk and rubbed his thumb over the eagle and swastika stamp of the old German Reichsbank.
'I'm hoping their value will be purely sentimental,' said Pedro.
'Tell me about the job,' said Miguel, sitting back down, sweating a little, not sure, in his slightly paranoid state, whether it was such a good idea to have kept those souvenirs.
'We've bought some property just off the Largo Dona Estefânia. Old apartments, falling to pieces. We're expanding. We don't fit in this old building any more. So we're going to demolish those old apartments and build ourselves a new office building. We'll take the top three floors and rent out the rest. I want you to manage the project. The architect's on my back and I haven't got the time for him.'
'When do you want me to start?' asked Miguel, unnerved at the immediate possibility of heavy responsibilities.
'As soon as you're comfortable. There's an office ready for you upstairs. We've had to convert the apartments to fit ourselves in here.'
Miguel stood and shook himself out.
'I need some time to get used to being back in Portugal. I want to go back to the Beira and smell the air again. I want to eat some fish on Guincho beach, you know, that sort of thing.'
Pedro, suddenly moved to have his brother back in the country, went round his desk to him and embraced him.
'Before you do any of these things we have to go to the notary tomorrow,' he said. 'Now that you're Miguel da Costa Rodrigues there are a few small problems. The first, and most important, is that I have to make you guardian to my children in case anything should happen to me and Isabel. Dr Aquilino Oliveira has arranged everything.'
'Of course,' said Miguel, nearly emotional.
They clapped each other's shoulders and Miguel made for the door.
'There's one other thing,' said Pedro. 'Klaus Felsen was released from prison last month.'
'Isn't that a year early?'
'Don't ask me why. You just have to know and you also have to remember that it was one of our father's dying wishes that we have nothing to do with him.'
Miguel was surprised to see his brother cross himself.
'Has Senhor Felsen called?'
'He's tried.'
'Well, he won't have much interest in Miguel da Costa Rodrigues.'
'I'm just telling you because ... he has every reason to be angry. Not with us, maybe, but...'
'You should make him an offer.'
'Father made me promise ... on his deathbed. I can't.'
Miguel shrugged. It felt good to have a heavy suit on his shoulders again, to not be sitting in the chill of air conditioning.
Pedro straightened the photograph on his desk and watched his brother's wide back fit through the doorway. He hadn't told him about his father's other dying wish, which was that his younger brother should inherit nothing from the Banco de Oceano e Rocha or any of its associated companies. It was the only thing he hadn't understood and his father hadn't explained but now, strangely, he'd been relieved of the problem—Manuel Abrantes no longer existed and Miguel da Costa Rodrigues would have to be on the board.
Miguel da Costa Rodrigues was a different man to Manuel Abrantes. The old Manuel wasn't just a shredded passport or an old skin left in a'são Paulo
apartment. He was a dead man. Miguel da Costa Rodrigues proved to be more than just an identity change. He wasn't someone who'd tortured, raped, murdered and summarily executed anybody. He was a graduate from an American university, with an MBA and seven years' work-experience in Brazilian banking. He was charming and affable with a long line in bad after-dinner jokes. He liked children and children liked him. He was popular at work, respected for his unique relationship with the owner of the bank and his instinctive ability to manage people, to know their weaknesses and strengths.
For the second time in his life he became a success.
On January 19th 1981 he married the woman his brother had found for him—Lurdes Salvador Santos. Not even the name bothered him. That huge build-up of sainthood would have had him sweating in the dark ten years ago. Now he basked, if not in her beauty, then in her sweet nature and, of course, in her total dedication to him. Their only unhappiness was over two miscarriages in quick succession, and the doctor's advice not to try again.
That last miscarriage had come at a time when he believed that nothing could go wrong. In June he had delivered the planning permission for a twenty-storey high-rise on the Largo Dona Estefânia site. A week later construction had begun and he became known to the Lisbon business community as the Director Geral de Oceano e Rocha Propriedades Lda with a seat on the full board of the bank and a major shareholding.
His wife's news disappointed him and he unconsciously turned more of his attention to his work. He bought property around Saldanha for future development. He bought old factory sites on the outskirts of Lisbon for development into light industrial units and small businesses. He bought sites on the edge of Cascais, near Boca do Inferno, to build tourist apartments. He bought an apartment block in the Graça area of Lisbon, with a panoramic view of the city. He converted the top two floors into his Lisbon residence. He refurbished his wife's house in the old part of Cascais. He became fatter, and even more genial.
A Small Death in Lisbon Page 39