The Collected Novels of José Saramago (375 page)

underfoot / then, as you well know, I would trample you underfoot, abruptly threw off the bedclothes and said, I’m going to my study to keep an eye on developments, you go back to sleep, rest. The thought flashed through his wife’s mind that, in a critical situation like this, when moral support would be worth its weight in gold, always supposing moral support had a weight, the widely accepted code of basic marital obligations, in the chapter on mutual help, determined that she should, without summoning the maid, immediately get up and prepare with her own hands a comforting cup of tea with the appropriate alimentary accompaniment of a few plain biscuits, instead, annoyed, frustrated, with her nascent lust quite evaporated, she turned over in bed and firmly closed her eyes, in the faint hope that sleep might still be able to make use of the remnants of that lust to put on a brief, private, erotic fantasy for her. Oblivious to the disappointments he had left behind him, and wearing over his striped pajamas one of those silk dressing-gowns adorned with exotic motifs, with Chinese pavilions and golden elephants, the prime minister went into his study, turned on all the lights, and switched on first the radio and then the television. The television screen still showed only the test card, it was too early for broadcasting to begin, but all the radio stations were already talking animatedly about the monstrous traffic jams on the roads, and opinions were bandied about on what was clearly an attempt at a mass escape from the unhappy prison into which the capital, through its own stupid fault, had been transformed, although there were also comments to the effect that such an unusually large circulatory blockage would mean that the vast trucks that brought food into the city every day would be unable to get through. These commentators did not yet know that these same trucks were being held, on strict orders from the army, three kilometers from the frontier. Radio reporters, traveling on motorbikes, questioned people all along the lines of cars and vans and were able to confirm that
this was, indeed, a properly organized collective action, bringing together whole families, in order to escape the tyranny and the suffocating atmosphere which the forces of subversion had imposed on the city Some household heads complained about the delay, We’ve been here for nearly three hours and the queue hasn’t moved a millimeter, while others protested that they had been betrayed, They promised us we’d be able to get through with no problem, and here you have the brilliant result, the government bolted, went on holiday and threw us to the lions, and now, when we had our chance to get out too, they have the nerve to slam the door in our face. There were hysterical outbursts, children crying, old people white-faced with fatigue, angry men who had run out of cigarettes, exhausted women trying to impose some order on the desperate family chaos. The occupants of one car tried to turn round and drive back into the city, but were forced to give up under the hail of insults and abuse that fell on them, Cowards, black sheep, blankers, bastards, spies, traitors, sons-of-bitches, now we know why you came, to demoralize us decent folk, but if you think we’re going to let you go, you’ve got another think coming, if necessary, we’ll let your tyres down and see if that teaches you some respect for other people’s sufferings. The phone rang in the prime minister’s study, it could be the minister of defense, or the interior minister, or the president. It was the president, What’s going on, why wasn’t I informed immediately about the general pandemonium along all the routes out of the capital, he asked, Sir, the government has the situation under control, the problem will soon be resolved, Yes, but I should have been informed, you owe me that courtesy at least, Well, I felt, and I take personal responsibility for the decision, that there was no reason to interrupt your sleep, but I was going to phone you in about twenty minutes or half an hour, but, as I say, I take full responsibility, president, Good, good, that was kind of you, but if my wife were not in the healthy habit of getting up early, I,
the president, would still be sleeping while the country burns, It’s not burning, president, all the appropriate measures have been taken, Don’t tell me you’re going to bomb the lines of vehicles, As you should know by now, president, that is not my style, It was, of course, just a manner of speaking, obviously I never thought you would commit such a barbaric act, The radio should soon announce that the interior minister will address the nation at six o’clock, there it is, they’re giving the first announcement now, and there will, of course, be others, it’s all organized, president, Well, at least, that’s something, It’s the beginning of success, president, I have complete confidence that we will be able to persuade these people to return to their homes in peace and good order, And if they don’t, If they don’t, the government will resign, Oh, don’t play that old trick on me, you know as well as I do that, in the situation in which the country finds itself, I couldn’t accept your resignation even if I wanted to, Yes, I know, but I had to say it, Fine, anyway, now that I’m awake, be sure to keep me up to date on what’s happening. The radios kept insisting, We interrupt the programme once again to inform our listeners that the interior minister will, at six o’clock, be making a statement to the nation, we repeat, at six o’clock the interior minister will make a statement to the nation, we repeat, a statement will be made to the nation by the interior minister at six o’clock, we repeat, at six o’clock the nation will be made a statement by the interior minister, the ambiguity of this last reformulation did not go unnoticed by the prime minister, who remained for a few seconds smiling at his own thoughts, amusing himself by wondering how the devil an interior minister could make the nation into a statement. He might have reached some conclusion that could have proved of future use had the test card on the television screen not vanished to give way to the usual image of the flag flapping lazily on the flagpole, as if it, too, had just woken up, while the national anthem blasted out with its trombones and drums, with the
odd clarinet trill in the middle and a few persuasive belches from the bass tuba. The presenter who then appeared had the knot in his tie all awry and a sour look on his face, as if he had just been the victim of some insult that he would not readily forgive or forget, Considering the gravity of the political and social situation, he said, and in accordance with the population’s sacred right to have access to a free and diverse news media, we are starting our broadcast early today. Like many of those listening, we have just learned that the interior minister will be speaking on the radio at six o’clock, presumably to express the government’s attitude to the attempted exodus from the city by many of its inhabitants. This television company does not believe that it has been the object of any deliberate and intentional discrimination, but, rather, that through some inexplicable misunderstanding, unexpected in highly experienced politicians such as those who form the present national government, this particular company was somehow forgotten. At least, apparently. There will be those who will point out the relatively early hour at which the statement is to be made, but the employees of this network, throughout its long history, have given more than sufficient proof of their self-sacrifice, their dedication to the public cause and their unalloyed patriotism, not to be relegated now to the humiliating condition of bearers of second-hand news. We are confident that, before the hour fixed for the promised statement, it may still be possible to reach a basis for agreement which, without wishing to take away what has been given to our colleagues in public radio, will restore to us that which, by merit, belongs to us, that is, our position and our responsibility as the country’s prime news medium. While we await this agreement, and we hope to receive news of it at any moment, we wish to report that a television helicopter is lifting off even as I speak, in order to offer our viewers the first images of the vast queues of vehicles, whose planned withdrawal was, we have learned, given the evocative and historic name of
xenophon, and which now stand immobilized all along the city’s exit routes. Fortunately, the rain that has been beating down on the selfless convoys all night stopped over an hour ago. The sun will soon rise above the horizon and break through the dark clouds. Let us hope that its appearance will also remove the barriers which, for reasons we fail to understand, still prevent these our courageous compatriots from reaching freedom. May they, for the good of the nation, prove successful. The following images showed the helicopter in the air, then, looking down, the tiny heliport from which it had taken off, and, afterward, the first view of the nearby roofs and streets. The prime minister put his right hand on the phone. He did not have to wait long, Prime minister, began the interior minister, Yes, I know, no need to say anything, we made a mistake, We made a mistake, you say, Yes, we did, because if one of us was wrong and the other failed to correct him, then the mistake belongs to both, But I don’t have your authority or your responsibility, prime minister, Ah, but you had my trust, So what do you want me to do then, You will speak live on television and there will be a simultaneous radio broadcast, problem solved, And we don’t bother to reply to the impertinent terms and tone in which the gentlemen of the television station chose to refer to the government, In time, we will, but not now, I’ll deal with them later, Good, You’ve got the statement with you, Yes, of course, do you want me to read it to you, No, don’t bother, I’ll wait to hear it live, It’s nearly time, I must go, Are they expecting you, then, asked the prime minister, puzzled, Yes, I told my secretary of state to negotiate with them, Without my knowledge, You know as well as I do that we had no alternative, Without my approval, insisted the prime minister, Let me remind you that I had your trust, those are your words, besides, if one makes a mistake and the other corrects it, then both are right, If this whole business isn’t sorted out by eight o’clock, I’ll expect your immediate resignation, Yes, prime minister. The helicopter was flying
low over one of the lines of cars, people were waving at it from the road, they must have been saying to each other, It’s the television people, it’s the television people, and the fact that the great gyratory bird had, indeed, been sent by the television people seemed to everyone a clear guarantee that the impasse was about to be resolved. If the television cameras are here, they said, that’s a good sign. It wasn’t. At six o’clock prompt, when the horizon was already becoming tinged with pink, the interior minister’s voice boomed out from all the car radios, Dear fellow countrymen and women, in the last few weeks, our nation has been through what is, without doubt, the most serious crisis recorded in the history of our people since the very dawn of nationhood, never before has there been a more urgent need to defend national cohesion to the hilt, the behavior of certain people, a tiny, ill-advised minority of the country’s population as a whole, under the influence of ideas entirely at odds with the correct functioning of our current democratic institutions and with the respect that is due to them, has made them the mortal enemies of that cohesion, which is why, today, a terrible threat hovers over our normally peaceable society, the threat of a civil conflict with unforeseeable consequences for the future of the nation, the government was, needless to say, the first to understand the thirst for freedom that lay behind the attempted exodus from the capital carried out by those whom we have always known to be patriots of the first water, people who, in the most adverse of circumstances, have shown themselves, either by voting or by the simple example of their day-to-day lives, to be genuinely incorruptible defenders of legality, restoring and renewing the very best of the old legionnaire spirit and honoring its traditions by placing themselves at the service of the public good, the government was also the first to see that, by firmly turning their backs on the capital, the sodom and gomorrah of our day, these patriots were demonstrating a most praiseworthy combative spirit which
the government does, of course, recognize, however, taking into consideration the national interest as a whole, it is the government’s belief, and, to this end, we appeal to the minds of those men and women who have spent so many anxious hours waiting for a clear message from those responsible for the country’s fate, it is, I repeat, the government’s belief, that the most appropriate militant action to be taken in the present circumstances is for those thousands of people to reintegrate themselves back into the life of the capital city, to return to their homes, those bastions of legality, those centers of resistance, those bulwarks where the unsullied memory of their ancestors watches over the works of their descendants, it is, I say again, the government’s belief that these sincere and objective reasons, brought to you heart in hands, should be weighed by those people in their cars listening to this official statement, and although the material aspects of the situation should, of course, count for little in a calculation in which spiritual values are paramount, the government would like to take this opportunity to reveal that it has received information concerning the existence of a plan to burgle and plunder your abandoned homes, a plan which, according to our latest information, has already been set in motion, as I must conclude from the note I have just been handed, for, according to our sources, a total of seventeen apartments have so far been burgled and plundered, as you see, dear countrymen and women, your enemies are wasting no time, only a few hours have passed since your departure, and yet already the vandals are breaking down the doors of your homes, already the barbarians and savages are stealing your possessions, it lies, therefore, in your hands to avoid a still greater disaster, consult your consciences, know that the nation’s government is on your side, it is up to you now to decide whether you are for us or against us. Before disappearing from the screen, the interior minister just had time to shoot a look at the camera, and in his face there was self-confidence, but also something that looked
very like a challenge, although you would have to be privy to the secrets of the gods to interpret that rapid glance with total accuracy, the prime minister, however, was not fooled, for him it was just as if the interior minister had thrown in his face the words, You who pride yourself on your tactics and your strategies, could not have done better. And he had to agree that he could not, although they would have to wait and see just what the results would be. The helicopter reappeared, and there, once again, was the city, there again were the endless lines of cars. For a good ten minutes, nothing moved. The reporter was struggling to fill in time, he imagined the family councils that would be taking place inside the cars, he praised the minister’s statement, he railed against the burglars, demanded that they be treated with all the rigor of the law, but it was obvious that unease was gradually seeping into him, it was plain as plain that the government’s words had fallen on stony ground, not that he, still waiting for some last-minute miracle, dared to say so, but any viewer with a reasonable degree of experience in deciphering audiovisuals would have noticed the poor journalist’s distress. Then the much-desired, much-longed-for marvel occurred, just when the helicopter was flying over the tail-end of one of the queues, the last car in the line turned round, followed by the car ahead, and then by another and another and another. The reporter gave an excited yelp, We are, dear viewers, witnessing a truly historic moment, for, responding with exemplary discipline to the government’s appeal, in a display of civic duty that will be inscribed in letters of gold in the annals of the capital, the people are beginning their return home, thus bringing to a peaceful close what could have been a catastrophe with, as the interior minister so rightly said, unforeseeable consequences for the future of our nation. From this point on, for some minutes more, the report took on a decidedly epic tone, transforming the retreat of these ten thousand defeated people into a victorious ride of the valkyries, replacing xenophon