Quincas Borba (Library of Latin America) (35 page)

“My dear sir...,” Carlos Maria repeated, holding out his hand.

He said goodbye to him and closed the door. Rubião came up with a few more words and went down the steps. Maria Benedita, who was spying on them from inside, came over to her husband, took his hand, and stayed looking at Rubião as he crossed the garden. He wasn’t walking straight, or hurriedly, or silently. He would stop, gesticulate, pick up a dry twig, seeing a thousand things in the air, more elegant than the lady of the house, more handsome than the man. They were watching our friend from the window, and after one grotesque action Maria Benedita couldn’t hold back a laugh. Carlos Maria, however, looked on placidly.

“B
ut if the fall of the government is true,” she said, “do you know who’s going to be a minister?”

“Who?” Carlos Maria asked with his eyes.

“Your cousin Teófilo. Nana told me that he’s got his hopes up, and that’s why he stayed in the capital this year. He suspected, or there was already talk of the government’s falling. He must have suspected. I don’t remember exactly what she told me, but it seems he’ll be joining in.”

“It could be.”

“Look, there goes Rubião. He stopped, he’s looking up, maybe he’s waiting for the public coach or his carriage. He had a carriage. There he goes, walking…”

“S
o Teófilo’s a minister!” Carlos Maria exclaimed. And after a moment:

“I think he’ll make a good minister. Would you like to see me a minister, too?”

“If you’d like to be, why not?”

“So I have your vote then, right?” Carlos Maria asked.

“What am I supposed to answer?” she thought scrutinizing her husband’s face.

He, laughing:

“Confess that you’d adore me even if I were only a minister’s errand boy.”

“Exactly!” the young lady exclaimed, throwing her arms around his neck.

Carlos Maria stroked her hair and murmured seriously: “Bernadotte was a king and Bonaparte an emperor. Would you like to be the queen mother of Sweden?”

Maria Benedita didn’t understand the question nor did he explain it to her. In order to explain it to her it would be necessary to say that possibly she was carrying a Bernadotte in her womb. But that supposition meant a desire and the desire a confession of inferiority. Carlos Maria ran his hands over his wife’s head again with a gesture that seemed to be saying: “Maria, you chose the best there was…” And she seemed to understand the meaning of that gesture.

“Yes! Yes!”

Her husband smiled and went back to the English magazine. She, leaning on the armchair, ran her fingers through his hair, ever so lightly and silently so as not to disturb him. He went on reading, reading, reading. Maria Benedita was limiting her caresses, withdrawing her fingers little by little until she left the room, where Carlos Maria continued reading a study by Sir Charles Little, M.P., on the famous statuette of Narcissus in the Naples Museum.

W
hen Rubião got to Dona Fernanda’s in the late afternoon, he heard from the servant that he couldn’t come in. The lady wasn’t feeling well. Her husband was with her. It seems that they were waiting for the doctor. Our friend didn’t insist, and he went away.

It was just the opposite. It was the husband who was ill, and his wife was with him. But the servant couldn’t change the message they’d given him. Another servant was suspicious, it’s true, that he was the ill one and not she, because he’d seen him come in in low spirits. Upstairs in their bedroom there was the sound of voices, sometimes loud, sometimes low, with intervals of silence. A servant girl who’d tiptoed up came down saying that she’d heard the master complaining. The mistress was probably in trouble. Downstairs soft words back and forth, sharp ears,
conjectures. They noted that there was no request from upstairs for water, medicine, a broth at least. The table was set, the butler in uniform, the cook proud and anxious … Surely one of his finest dinners!

What was it? Teófilo had the same downcast expression as when he came in. He was on a settee, his vest off, staring. Next to him, also sitting, grasping one of his hands, Dona Fernanda was asking him to calm down, that it wasn’t worth it. And, leaning over to look into his face, she pulled him over, wanting him to lay his head on her shoulder …

“Let it go, let it go,” her husband murmured.

“It’s not worth it, Teófilo! Is it a ministry now . .. ? Is a short-term position full of annoyances, insults, and hard work worth all that? What for? Isn’t a peaceful life much better? Of course it’s unfair. I do think you’ve got the capacity, but is it that great a loss? Come, my dear, relax. Let’s go down to dinner.”

Teófilo bit his lip, pulling on one of his sideburns. He hadn’t heard anything his wife had said, neither exhortations nor consolations. He’d heard the conversations of the night before and that morning, the political combinations, the remembered names, the refusals and the acceptances. No combination included him, even though he’d spoken to a lot of people concerning the real aspect of the situation. He was listened to with attention by some, impatience by others. Once the eyeglasses of the organizer seemed to be interrogating him—but it was a quick and illusory gesture. Teófilo was reconstructing the agitation of so many hours and places now—he remembered the ones who looked askance, the ones who smiled, the ones who had the same expression as he. Finally, he was no longer speaking. His last hopes had been blown out in his face like a night-light at dawn. He’d heard the names of the ministers, was obliged to find them good. But what strength it took for him to articulate a single word! He was afraid they would discover his disappointment or resentment, and all his efforts ended up accentuating them even more. He grew pale, his hands trembled.

“C
ome, let’s go down to dinner,” Dona Fernanda repeated. Teófilo slapped his knee and stood up, speaking disjointed, angry words, walking back and forth, stamping his foot, threatening. Dona Fernanda was unable to overcome the violence of that new attack, she hoped it was brief, and it was brief. Teófilo went to an armchair, shook his head, dropped into it again, prostrate. Dona Fernanda took a chair and sat down beside him.

“You’re right, Teófilo, but you’ve got to be a man. You’re young and strong, you’ve still got a future, and maybe a great future. Who knows, getting into the cabinet now might mean a loss later. You’ll get into another one. Sometimes what looks like misfortune is good luck.”

Teófilo squeezed her hand with thanks.

“It’s treachery, it’s intrigue,” he murmured, looking at her. “I know all of those swine. If I were to tell you everything, everything … But what’s the use? I’d rather forget... It isn’t because of a miserable cabinet position that I’m upset,” he went on after a few moments. “Ministries aren’t worth anything. A person who knows how to work and has talent can laugh at a cabinet position and show that it’s beneath him. Most of those people can’t hold a candle to me, Nanã. I’m sure of that and so are they. Dirty bunch of schemers! Where can they find more sincerity, more loyalty, more readiness for a fight? Who worked more with the press during our time out of power? They excuse themselves, say that cabinets come all set up from Sao Cristóvão … Oh, if I could only speak to the Emperor!”

“Teófilo!”

“I’d tell the Emperor: ‘Sire, Your Majesty is unaware of these lobby politicians, these arrangements of cliques. Your Majesty wants the best people to work in your councils, but the mediocre ones arrange them … Merit is put aside.’ That’s what I’ll tell him someday. It might even be tomorrow…”

He fell silent. After a long pause he arose and went to his study, which was next door to the bedroom. His wife went with him. It was already dark. He lighted the gas jet and ran his eyes veiled with
melancholy about the room. There were four wide bookcases full of books, reports, budgets, Treasury ledgers. The desk was orderly. Three tall cabinets without doors held manuscripts, notes, memoranda, calculations, appointments, all stacked methodically and labeled—
Extraordinary Credits
—
Supplementary Credits
—
Army Credits
—
Navy Credits
—
1868 Loan
—
Railroads
—
Internal Debt
—
Budget for 61–62, for 62–63, for 63–64
etc. That was where he worked in the morning and at night, adding, calculating, gathering together the material for his speeches and reports, because he was a member of three parliamentary committees and generally worked for himself and six colleagues. The latter listened and approved. One of them, when the reports were extensive, would approve them without hearing them.

“You’re the expert, old man, and that’s enough for me,” he would tell Teófilo. “Hand me the pen.”

Everything there breathed attention, care: assiduous, meticulous, and useful work. From hooks on the wall hung the week’s newspapers, which were later taken down, put away, and finally bound in six-month batches for future consultation. The deputy’s speeches, printed and bound in quartos, were lined up on a shelf. No picture or bust, decoration, nothing for recreation, nothing to admire—everything dry, exact, administrative.

“What’s this all worth?” Teófilo asked his wife after a few moments of silent contemplation. “Weary hours, long hours, from night into dawn sometimes . . . It can’t be said that this is the study of an idle man. Work gets done here. You’re witness to the fact that I work. All for what?”

“You get consolation out of your work,” she murmured.

He, bitingly:

“Fine consolation! No, no, I’m through with this. I’m going to forget about everything. Look, in the chamber they all ask for my advice, even the ministers—because I really apply myself to administrative things. What’s the reward? To come here in May and applaud the new masters?”

“So don’t applaud anything,” his wife said softly. “Do you really want to give me a present? Let’s go to Europe, in March or April, and we’ll come back a year from now. Ask for a leave from the chamber, from wherever we might be—from Warsaw, for example, I’ve always wanted to see Warsaw,” she continued,
smiling and holding his face lovingly between her hands. “Say yes. Answer me so I can write to Rio Grande today, the steamer sails tomorrow. It’s all said and done. Shall we go to Warsaw?”

“Stop joking, Nan”, this is no joking matter.”

“I’m serious. I’ve been thinking a long time about proposing a trip to you to see if you can have a rest from this infernal paperwork. It’s too much, Teófilo! You can barely find time for a visit. A ride is rare. We almost never chat. Our children hardly see their father because no one can come in here when you’re working… You’ve got to take a rest. I beg of you, take a year off. Look, I’m serious. We’re going to Europe in March.”

“It can’t be,” he stammered.

“Why not?”

It couldn’t be. It was inviting him to get out of his own skin. Politics was everything. There was politics out there, but what did he have to do with it? Teófilo didn’t know anything about what went on outside Brazil except for our debt to London and a half dozen economists. Nevertheless, he thanked his wife for the intention behind her proposal.

“You’re very good.”

And a vague feeling of hope restored the deputy’s voice to the softness it had lost during that moral crisis. The papers blew encouragement at him. That whole mass of studies appeared to him like fertilized and seeded land to the eyes of the farmer. It wouldn’t be long in sprouting. Work had its recompense. Someday, sooner or later, the sprout would bloom, and the tree would bear fruit. It was precisely what his wife had said with other direct and apt words. But only now was he seeing the possibility of a harvest. He remembered his explosions of rage, indignation, despair, the complaints of a while ago; he was annoyed. He tried to smile and he made a poor job of it. At dinner and over coffee he amused himself with the children, who went to bed later that evening. Nuno, who was in secondary school now, where he’d heard mention of the change in government, told his father that he wanted to be a minister. Teófilo became serious.

“My son,” he said, “choose anything else but a minister.”

“They say it’s nice, Papa. They say you go around in a carriage with soldiers behind.”

“Well, I’ll get you a carriage.”

“Were you a minister already, Papa?”

Teófilo tried to smile and he looked at his wife, who took advantage of the occasion to send the children off to bed.

“Yes, I was a minister already,” his father answered, kissing Nuno on the forehead. “But I don’t want to be anymore. It’s a rotten job, lots of work. You’ll be a chaplain.”

“What’s a chaplain?”

“A chaplain is bed,” Dona Fernanda answered. “Go to bed, Nuno.”

A
t lunch the next day Teófilo received a letter by an orderly. “Orderly?”

“Yes, sir. He says it’s from the president of the council.”

Teófilo opened the letter with a trembling hand. What could it be? He’d read the list of the new ministers in the newspaper. The cabinet was complete. There was no change of names. What could it be? Dona Fernanda, across from her husband, was trying to read the contents of the letter on his face. She saw a clearing. She perceived that his mouth was experiencing a smile of satisfaction—of hope, at least.

“Tell him to wait,” Teófilo ordered the servant.

He went to the study and returned minutes later with his reply. He sat down at the table, silent, giving the servant time to hand the letter over to the orderly. This time, expecting it, he heard the horse’s hooves and then its gallop out on the street, and he felt good.

“Read it,” he said.

Dona Fernanda read the letter from the president of the council. It was a request to speak with him at two in the afternoon.

“But the cabinet then … ?”

“It’s complete,” the deputy hastened to say. “The ministers have been appointed.”

She didn’t completely believe what he was saying. She imagined some last–minute vacancy and the urgent necessity to fill it.