The War Of The End Of The World Part 4

"Protestants"-on them. Only then did the soldiers become aware of their presence. They all turned tail and fled, except for three wounded, who were overtaken and finished off by young jaguncos jaguncos dodging bullets, and the horse, which reared and threw its rider, rolled down the mountainside amid the rough stones and broke its legs. The lieutenant managed to take refuge behind some boulders and began returning the fire as the animal lay there, neighing mournfully, for several hours as the shooting went on. dodging bullets, and the horse, which reared and threw its rider, rolled down the mountainside amid the rough stones and broke its legs. The lieutenant managed to take refuge behind some boulders and began returning the fire as the animal lay there, neighing mournfully, for several hours as the shooting went on.

Many jaguncos jaguncos had been blown to bits by sh.e.l.ls from the Krupps, which began to bombard the mountain shortly after the first skirmish, causing landslides and showers of rock shards. Big Joao, who was posted alongside Jose Venancio, realized that it was suicide to stay bunched together, and leaping from one rock slab to another, waving his arms like the sails of a windmill, shouted at them to disperse so as not to offer such a compact target. They obeyed him, jumping from rock to rock or crawling along on their bellies as below them, divided into combat groups led by lieutenants, sergeants, and corporals, the infantrymen climbed up O Cambaio amid a cloud of dust and a flurry of bugle calls. By the time Abbot Joao and Pajeu arrived with reinforcements, they had gotten halfway up the mountain. Despite their heavy losses, the had been blown to bits by sh.e.l.ls from the Krupps, which began to bombard the mountain shortly after the first skirmish, causing landslides and showers of rock shards. Big Joao, who was posted alongside Jose Venancio, realized that it was suicide to stay bunched together, and leaping from one rock slab to another, waving his arms like the sails of a windmill, shouted at them to disperse so as not to offer such a compact target. They obeyed him, jumping from rock to rock or crawling along on their bellies as below them, divided into combat groups led by lieutenants, sergeants, and corporals, the infantrymen climbed up O Cambaio amid a cloud of dust and a flurry of bugle calls. By the time Abbot Joao and Pajeu arrived with reinforcements, they had gotten halfway up the mountain. Despite their heavy losses, the jaguncos jaguncos who were trying to drive them off had not given a foot of ground. The reinforcements who were equipped with firearms began to shoot immediately, accompanying the volleys with loud shouts. The ones who had only machetes and knives, or the sort of crossbows that men of the backlands used to hunt duck and deer, which Antonio Vilanova had had the carpenters of Canudos make dozens of, confined themselves to grouping themselves around those with firearms and handing them gunpowder or charging the muzzle-loading carbines, hoping that the Blessed Jesus would see fit to allow them to inherit a gun or get close enough to the enemy to be able to attack with their bare hands. who were trying to drive them off had not given a foot of ground. The reinforcements who were equipped with firearms began to shoot immediately, accompanying the volleys with loud shouts. The ones who had only machetes and knives, or the sort of crossbows that men of the backlands used to hunt duck and deer, which Antonio Vilanova had had the carpenters of Canudos make dozens of, confined themselves to grouping themselves around those with firearms and handing them gunpowder or charging the muzzle-loading carbines, hoping that the Blessed Jesus would see fit to allow them to inherit a gun or get close enough to the enemy to be able to attack with their bare hands.

The Krupps kept bombarding the heights of the mountain, and the rockslides caused as many casualties as the bullets. As dusk was just beginning to fall and the figures in red-and-blue and green-and-blue uniforms were beginning to break through the lines of the elect, Abbot Joao convinced the others that they should fall back or they would find themselves surrounded. Several dozen jaguncos jaguncos had died and many more were wounded. Those able to hear the order and obey it began to retreat, slipping off via the plain known as O Taboleirinho toward Belo Monte; they numbered just over half as many men as had taken this route in the other direction the night before and that morning. Jose Venancio, who was one of the last to fall back, leaning on a stick with his b.l.o.o.d.y leg bent, was. .h.i.t in the back by a bullet that killed him before he could cross himself. had died and many more were wounded. Those able to hear the order and obey it began to retreat, slipping off via the plain known as O Taboleirinho toward Belo Monte; they numbered just over half as many men as had taken this route in the other direction the night before and that morning. Jose Venancio, who was one of the last to fall back, leaning on a stick with his b.l.o.o.d.y leg bent, was. .h.i.t in the back by a bullet that killed him before he could cross himself.

From dawn on, that morning, the Counselor never left the Temple, remaining there praying, surrounded by the women of the Sacred Choir, Maria Quadrado, the Little Blessed One, the Lion of Natuba, and a great crowd of the faithful, who also prayed, while at the same time keeping their ears trained on the din, very distinct at times, borne to Canudos on the north wind. Pedrao, the Vilanova brothers, Joaquim Macambira, and the others who had stayed behind readying the city for the attack, were deployed along the Vaza-Barris. They had brought down to its banks all the firearms, powder, and projectiles they were able to find. When old Macambira caught sight of the jaguncos jaguncos returning from Monte Cambaio, he murmured that the Blessed Jesus apparently wanted the dogs to enter Jerusalem. None of his sons noticed that he had mixed up the names of the two cities. returning from Monte Cambaio, he murmured that the Blessed Jesus apparently wanted the dogs to enter Jerusalem. None of his sons noticed that he had mixed up the names of the two cities.

But they did not enter. The outcome of the battle was decided that very day, before nightfall, on the plain of O Taboleirinho, where at that moment the troops of Major Febronio de Brito's three columns were stretching out on the ground, dizzy with fatigue and joy, after seeing the jaguncos jaguncos flee from the last spurs of the mountain and being almost able to make out from there the heterogeneous geography of straw rooftops and the two lofty stone towers of what they already regarded as the prize that their victory had won them, less than half a league's distance away. As the flee from the last spurs of the mountain and being almost able to make out from there the heterogeneous geography of straw rooftops and the two lofty stone towers of what they already regarded as the prize that their victory had won them, less than half a league's distance away. As the jaguncos jaguncos still left alive were entering Canudos-their arrival gave rise to anxiety, to agitated conversations, weeping and wailing, shouts, prayers recited at the top of people's lungs-the soldiers were collapsing to the ground, opening their red-and-blue, green-and-blue tunics, removing their leggings, so exhausted that they were not even able to tell each other how overjoyed they were at having defeated the enemy. Meeting in a war council, Major Febronio and his fourteen officers decided to camp on that bare mountain plateau, alongside a nonexistent lagoon which their maps showed under the name Cipo-Liana-and which, from that day forward, they would show as Lagoa do Sangue-Lagoon of Blood. The following morning, at first light, they would attack the fanatics' lair. still left alive were entering Canudos-their arrival gave rise to anxiety, to agitated conversations, weeping and wailing, shouts, prayers recited at the top of people's lungs-the soldiers were collapsing to the ground, opening their red-and-blue, green-and-blue tunics, removing their leggings, so exhausted that they were not even able to tell each other how overjoyed they were at having defeated the enemy. Meeting in a war council, Major Febronio and his fourteen officers decided to camp on that bare mountain plateau, alongside a nonexistent lagoon which their maps showed under the name Cipo-Liana-and which, from that day forward, they would show as Lagoa do Sangue-Lagoon of Blood. The following morning, at first light, they would attack the fanatics' lair.

But, before an hour was out, as lieutenants, sergeants, and corporals were still inspecting the benumbed companies and drawing up lists of the dead, wounded, and missing, and soldiers of the rear guard were still arriving, picking their way between the rocks, they were attacked. Sick and healthy, men and women, youngsters and oldsters, all the elect able to fight fell on them like an avalanche. Abbot Joao had convinced them that they should attack then and there, all of them together, since there wasn't going to be any "later on" if they didn't do so. The tumultuous mob had followed after him, crossing the plateau like a cattle stampede. They came armed with all the images of the Blessed Jesus, of the Virgin, of the Divine to be found in the city, they were clutching all the cudgels, clubs, sickles, pitchforks, knives, and machetes in Canudos, along with blunderbusses, shotguns, carbines, muskets, and the Mannlichers captured in Uaua, and as they shot off bullets, pieces of metal, spikes, arrows, stones, they let out war cries, possessed by that reckless courage that was the very air that people of the sertao sertao breathed from the day they were born, multiplied in them now by the love of G.o.d and the hatred of the Prince of Darkness that the saint had contrived to instill in them. They did not give the soldiers time to recover from their stupefaction at suddenly seeing that yelling, shouting horde of men and women running across the plain toward them as though they had not already been defeated. When fear brought them to, jolted them awake, propelled them to their feet, and they finally grabbed their guns, it was too late. The breathed from the day they were born, multiplied in them now by the love of G.o.d and the hatred of the Prince of Darkness that the saint had contrived to instill in them. They did not give the soldiers time to recover from their stupefaction at suddenly seeing that yelling, shouting horde of men and women running across the plain toward them as though they had not already been defeated. When fear brought them to, jolted them awake, propelled them to their feet, and they finally grabbed their guns, it was too late. The jaguncos jaguncos were already upon them, among them, behind them, in front of them, shooting them, knifing them, stoning them, piercing them with spikes, biting them, tearing away their guns, their cartridge belts, tearing out their hair, their eyes, and above all reviling them with the strangest curses they had ever heard. First a few of them, then others managed to make their escape, bewildered, driven mad, petrified by this sudden insane attack that seemed beyond the human. In the shadows that were falling in the wake of the ball of fire that had just sunk behind the mountaintops, they scattered, one by one or in groups, amid those foothills of O Cambaio that they had climbed with such effort all through the long day-running in all directions, stumbling, falling, getting to their feet again, ripping off their uniforms in the hope that they would not be noticed, and praying that night would finally come and be a dark one. were already upon them, among them, behind them, in front of them, shooting them, knifing them, stoning them, piercing them with spikes, biting them, tearing away their guns, their cartridge belts, tearing out their hair, their eyes, and above all reviling them with the strangest curses they had ever heard. First a few of them, then others managed to make their escape, bewildered, driven mad, petrified by this sudden insane attack that seemed beyond the human. In the shadows that were falling in the wake of the ball of fire that had just sunk behind the mountaintops, they scattered, one by one or in groups, amid those foothills of O Cambaio that they had climbed with such effort all through the long day-running in all directions, stumbling, falling, getting to their feet again, ripping off their uniforms in the hope that they would not be noticed, and praying that night would finally come and be a dark one.

They might all have died, there might not have been a single officer or infantryman left to tell the world the story of this battle already won and then suddenly lost; every last one of these half a thousand vanquished men running about aimlessly, driven hither and yon by fear and confusion, might have been pursued, tracked down, hemmed in if the victors had known that the logic of war demands the total destruction of the enemy. But the logic of the elect of the Blessed Jesus was not the logic of this earth. The war that they were waging was only apparently that of the outside world, that of men in uniform against men in rags, that of the seacoast against the interior, that of the new Brazil against traditional Brazil. All the jaguncos jaguncos were aware that they were merely puppets of a profound, timeless, eternal war, that of good and evil, which had been going on since the beginning of time. Hence they allowed their adversaries to escape, as in the light of oil lamps they recovered their dead and wounded brothers who lay on the plateau or on the slopes of O Cambaio with grimaces of pain or of love of G.o.d etched into their faces (provided the enemy's machine guns had spared their faces). They spent the entire night transporting the wounded to the Health Houses of Belo Monte, and taking dead bodies, once they had been dressed in their best clothes and placed in coffins hastily nailed together, to the wake that was held for them in the Temple of the Blessed Jesus and the Church of Santo Antonio. The Counselor decided that they would not be buried until the parish priest from c.u.mbe could come say a Ma.s.s for their souls, and one of the women of the Sacred Choir, Alexandrinha Correa, went to fetch him. were aware that they were merely puppets of a profound, timeless, eternal war, that of good and evil, which had been going on since the beginning of time. Hence they allowed their adversaries to escape, as in the light of oil lamps they recovered their dead and wounded brothers who lay on the plateau or on the slopes of O Cambaio with grimaces of pain or of love of G.o.d etched into their faces (provided the enemy's machine guns had spared their faces). They spent the entire night transporting the wounded to the Health Houses of Belo Monte, and taking dead bodies, once they had been dressed in their best clothes and placed in coffins hastily nailed together, to the wake that was held for them in the Temple of the Blessed Jesus and the Church of Santo Antonio. The Counselor decided that they would not be buried until the parish priest from c.u.mbe could come say a Ma.s.s for their souls, and one of the women of the Sacred Choir, Alexandrinha Correa, went to fetch him.

As they waited for him, Antonio the Pyrotechnist prepared a fireworks display, and there was a procession. On the following day, many jaguncos jaguncos returned to the site of the battle. They stripped the soldiers and left their naked corpses to rot. Once back in Canudos, they burned the troops' tunics and trousers and everything in the pockets: paper money issued by the Republic, cigars, ill.u.s.trated cards, locks of hair of wives, sweethearts, daughters, keepsakes they frowned upon. But they put the rifles, the bayonets, the bullets aside, because Abbot Joao, Pajeu, the Vilanovas had asked them to and because they realized that they would be indispensable if they were attacked again. As some of the returned to the site of the battle. They stripped the soldiers and left their naked corpses to rot. Once back in Canudos, they burned the troops' tunics and trousers and everything in the pockets: paper money issued by the Republic, cigars, ill.u.s.trated cards, locks of hair of wives, sweethearts, daughters, keepsakes they frowned upon. But they put the rifles, the bayonets, the bullets aside, because Abbot Joao, Pajeu, the Vilanovas had asked them to and because they realized that they would be indispensable if they were attacked again. As some of the jaguncos jaguncos still insisted they should be destroyed, the Counselor himself had to ask them to place all the Mannlichers, Winchesters, revolvers, boxes of gunpowder, cartridge belts, cans of grease in the care of Antonio Vilanova. The two Krupp cannons were still at the foot of O Cambaio, in the emplacement from which they had bombarded the mountain. All the parts of them that could be burned-the wheels and the caissons-were set afire, and the steel barrels were hauled to Canudos by mule team so that the smiths could melt them down. still insisted they should be destroyed, the Counselor himself had to ask them to place all the Mannlichers, Winchesters, revolvers, boxes of gunpowder, cartridge belts, cans of grease in the care of Antonio Vilanova. The two Krupp cannons were still at the foot of O Cambaio, in the emplacement from which they had bombarded the mountain. All the parts of them that could be burned-the wheels and the caissons-were set afire, and the steel barrels were hauled to Canudos by mule team so that the smiths could melt them down.

In Rancho das Pedras, which had been Major Febronio de Brito's last camp, Pedrao's men found six hungry, disheveled women who had followed the soldiers, cooking for them, was.h.i.+ng their clothes, and sleeping with them. They took them to Canudos and the Little Blessed One made them leave, telling them that anyone who had freely chosen to serve the Antichrist could not remain in Belo Monte. But two half-breeds who had belonged to Jose Venancio's band and were disconsolate at his death caught one of them, who was pregnant, on the outskirts of Canudos, slit her belly open with a machete, ripped out the fetus, and put a live rooster in its place, convinced that they were thus doing their leader in the other world a favor.

He hears the name Caifas, repeated two or three times, in between words that he doesn't understand, and struggles to open his eyes, and there Rufino's wife is, standing next to the hammock, all excited, moving her mouth, making noises, and it is broad daylight now and the sun is pouring into the cabin through the door and the c.h.i.n.ks between the palings. The light hurts his eyes so much that he blinks and rubs his eyelids hard as he gets to his feet. Blurred images come to him through a milky water, and as his head clears and the world comes into focus, Galileo Gall's mind and eyes discover that a metamorphosis has taken place in the room: it has been carefully put back in order; floor, walls, objects look bright and s.h.i.+ning, as though everything had been scrubbed and polished. He understands now what Jurema is saying: Caifas is coming, Caifas is coming. He notices that the tracker's wife has changed out of her tunic that he ripped open and is now wearing a dark blouse and skirt, that she is barefoot and frightened, and as he tries to remember where his revolver fell that morning, he tells himself that there is no need to be alarmed, that the man coming is the guide dressed in leather who took him to Epaminondas Goncalves's and brought him back here with the arms, precisely the person he needs most at this moment. There the revolver is, next to his small valise, at the foot of the print of the Virgin of Lapa hanging on a nail. He picks it up and as the thought occurs to him that there are no more bullets left in it he sees Caifas in the doorway of the cabin.

"They tried to kill me," he blurts out in English, and then, realizing his mistake, switches to Portuguese. "They tried to kill me. They've stolen the arms. I must go see Epaminondas Goncalves, right away."

"Good morning," Caifas says, raising two fingers to his sombrero with ornamental thongs round the brim without taking it off, addressing Jurema in what strikes Gall as an absurdly solemn manner. Then Caifas turns to him, makes the same gesture, and repeats: "Good morning."

"Good morning," Gall answers, feeling suddenly ridiculous with the revolver in his hand. He tucks it away at his waist, between his trousers and his belly, and takes two steps toward Caifas, noticing the confusion, the abashment, the embarra.s.sment that have come over Jurema on the guide's arrival: she is standing there not moving, staring at the floor, not knowing what to do with her hands.

Galileo points outside. "Did you see those two dead men out there? There was another one with them, the one who made away with the arms. I must talk to Epaminondas, I must warn him. Take me to him."

"I saw them," Caifas says, not wasting words. And he turns to Jurema, who is still standing there with her head down, petrified, flexing her fingers as though she had a cramp in them. "Soldiers have come to Queimadas. Over five hundred of them. They're looking for guides to take them to Canudos. Anyone who doesn't want to hire on with them they take by force. I came to warn Rufino."

"He's not here," Jurema stammers, without raising her head. "He's gone to Jacobina."

"Soldiers?" Gall takes another step, bringing him so close to the newcomer that he is practically brus.h.i.+ng against him. "Major Brito's expedition is already here?"

"There's going to be a parade," Caifas says, nodding. "They're lined up in formation in the main square. They arrived on the morning train."

Gall wonders why the man doesn't seem surprised by the dead bodies he saw outside the cabin when he arrived, why he's not asking him any questions as to what's happened, how it happened, why he's still here, so calm, so impa.s.sive, so unexpressive, waiting-for what?-and he tells himself once more that the people in these parts are strange, impenetrable, inscrutable, reminding him of Chinese, of Hindustanis. Caifas is a very skinny, bony, bronze-skinned man with prominent cheekbones and wine-dark eyes that are disconcerting because they never blink, whose voice is quite unfamiliar to him, since he scarcely opened his mouth all during the trip back and forth that he made with him, sitting directly alongside him, and whose leather vest and pants, reinforced in the seat and the legs with strips of leather as well, and even his rope sandals appear to be part of his body, a tough additional skin, a crust. Why has his arrival so disconcerted Jurema? Is it because of what has happened between the two of them a few hours before? The little woolly dog appears from somewhere and leaps and gambols and plays about at Jurema's feet, and at that moment Galileo Gall notices that the chickens in the room have all disappeared.

"I saw only three of them. The one who escaped took the arms off with him," he says, smoothing his disheveled red hair. "Epaminondas must be told of this as soon as possible; it might be dangerous for him. Can you take me to his hacienda?"

"He's not there any more," Caifas says. "You heard him yesterday when he said he was about to leave for Bahia."

"That's true," Gall says. There is no getting round it; he, too, will be obliged to go back to Bahia. He thinks: "The soldiers are already here." He thinks: "They're going to come looking for Rufino, they're going to find the dead men, they're going to find me." He simply must leave, shake off this la.s.situde, this drowsiness that has overcome him. But he doesn't move.

"Perhaps they were enemies of Epaminondas's, Governor Luiz Viana's people, the baron's," he murmurs, as though speaking to Caifas, though he is really talking to himself. "Why didn't the National Guard come, then? Those three men weren't gendarmes. They could have been brigands, who might have wanted the arms for their depredations, or in order to sell them."

Jurema is still standing motionless with her head down, and not three feet away from him is Caifas, still calm, quiet, impa.s.sive. The little dog leaps about, panting.

"What's more, there's something strange about this whole thing," Gall says, thinking aloud. And to himself: "I must hide out till the soldiers leave and then go back to Salvador"-reflecting at the same time that Major Brito's expedition is already there, less than two kilometers away, that it will proceed to Canudos and no doubt put an end to this outbreak of rebellion in which he thought he saw, or fondly believed he saw, the seeds of a revolution. "They weren't only after arms. They also were out to kill me, there's no doubt of that. And that I don't understand at all. Who could possibly want to kill me here in Queimadas?"

"I could, sir," he hears Caifas say, in the same toneless voice, as he suddenly feels the knife edge at his throat, but his reflexes are, have always been, very fast, and he has managed to throw his head back, to step a few millimeters away just as the man dressed in leather has leapt upon him, and his knife, instead of burying itself in his throat, misses its mark and wounds him farther down, to the right, where his neck and his shoulder meet, producing in his body a sensation that is more one of cold and surprise than of pain. He has fallen to the floor and is touching the wound, noting that blood is pouring out between his fingers, his eyes opened wide, staring spellbound at the man with the biblical name dressed in leather, whose expression, even now, has not changed, except perhaps for the pupils of his eyes, opaque before and now gleaming brightly. He is holding the b.l.o.o.d.y knife in his right hand and a small pearl-handled revolver in his left. Leaning over him, he aims it at Galileo's head, offering him more or less of an explanation as he does so: "I'm acting on orders from Colonel Epaminondas Goncalves, sir. I was the one who rode off with the arms this morning; I'm the leader of the men you killed."

"Epaminondas Goncalves?" Galileo Gall roars, and now the pain in his throat is agonizing.

"He needs an English corpse," Caifas says in what sounds like a more or less apologetic tone of voice as he squeezes the trigger, and Gall, who has automatically tilted his head to one side, feels a burning sensation in his jaw and in his hair and another that feels as though his ear is being ripped off.

"I'm a Scotsman and I hate the English," he manages to murmur, thinking that the second shot will hit him in the forehead, the mouth, or the heart and he will lose consciousness and die, for the man dressed in leather is raising his hand with the revolver again, but instead what he sees is a meteor, a commotion, as Jurema lunges at Caifas, grabs him, and trips him, and then he stops thinking, and discovering strength within himself he no longer knows he possesses, he rises to his feet and also flings himself upon Caifas, vaguely aware that he is bleeding and burning with pain, and before he can think again or try to understand what has happened, what has saved him, he is. .h.i.tting with the b.u.t.t of his revolver, with every last ounce of his strength, the man in leather, whom Jurema is still hanging on to. Before seeing him fall senseless, he realizes that Caifas is not looking at him as he defends himself from the blows of his revolver, but at Jurema, and that there is no hatred or anger but only an immeasurable stupefaction in his dark wine-colored pupils, as though he is unable to comprehend what she has done, as though the fact that she has been the one who has flung herself upon him and deflected his arm, thereby permitting his victim to rise to his feet, was something he could not have imagined, could never have dreamed of. But when Caifas, his body going limp, his face swollen from the blows, covered with his own blood or Gall's, lets go of the knife and his miniature revolver and Gall grabs it and is about to shoot him, it is again Jurema who stops him, grabbing his hand, just as she had seized Caifas's before, screaming hysterically.

"Don't be afraid," Gall says in English, with no strength left to fight. "I must clear out of here; the soldiers will be coming. Help me onto the mule, woman."

He opens and closes his mouth several times, certain that he is about to collapse alongside Caifas, who appears to be stirring. His face contorted from the effort, noting that the burning sensation in his neck has grown worse and that now his bones, his fingernails, his hair hurt him too, he walks across the cabin, b.u.mping into the trunks and the furniture, toward the blaze of white light that is the door, thinking: "Epaminondas Goncalves," thinking: "I'm an English corpse."

The new parish priest in c.u.mbe, Dom Joaquim, arrived in the town-no skyrockets were set off, no bells pealed-one cloudy afternoon with a storm threatening. He appeared in an oxcart, with a battered valise and a little umbrella to keep off the rain and the sun. He had had a long journey, from Bengalas, in Pernambuco, where he had been the parish priest for two years. In the months to come, the story was to go round that his bishop had sent him away because he had taken liberties with a girl who was a minor.

The townspeople he met at the entrance to c.u.mbe took him to the church square and showed him the tumbledown parish house where the priest had lived at the time when c.u.mbe still had a priest. The dwelling was now a hollow sh.e.l.l with walls but no roof that served as a garbage dump and a refuge for stray animals. Dom Joaquim went into the little Church of Nossa Senhora da Conceicao, and by putting the usable benches together made himself a bed and stretched out on it to sleep, just as he was.

He was a young man, short and slightly stoop-shouldered, with a little potbelly and a jovial air about him that made people take a liking to him from the very beginning. If it hadn't been for his habit and his tonsure, no one would have taken him to be a man in active commerce with the world of the spirit, for it sufficed to be in his company just once on some social occasion to realize that he cared about the things of this world (women in particular) just as much, or perhaps more. On the very day that he arrived he showed c.u.mbe that he was capable of rubbing elbows with people in the town as though he were one of them and that his presence would not interfere in any substantial way with the habits and customs of the population. Nearly every family in c.u.mbe had gathered in the church square to welcome him when he opened his eyes after sleeping for a fair number of hours. Night had fallen, it had rained and stopped raining, and in the warm damp crickets were chirping and there were myriad stars in the sky. The introductions began, a long line of women filing past who kissed his hand and men who removed their sombreros as they came by, murmuring their names. After only a short time Father Joaquim interrupted the hand-kissing, explaining that he was dying of hunger and thirst. A ceremony then took place that was somewhat reminiscent of the stations of the cross during Holy Week, as the priest dropped in at one house after the other and was offered the choicest viands the householder could provide. Dawn found him still awake, in one of the two taverns of c.u.mbe, drinking brandy with sour cherries and having a ballad contest with the caboclo caboclo Matias de Tavares. Matias de Tavares.

He began his priestly functions immediately, saying Ma.s.ses, baptizing newborn babes, confessing the adults, administering the last rites to the dying, and marrying newly betrothed couples or those who were already living together and wanted to appear upright in the sight of G.o.d. As he had a vast territory to look after, he traveled about a great deal. He was active and even self-abnegating when it came to fulfilling his duties as priest of the parish. The fees he asked for many of his services were modest, he didn't mind if people put off paying him or didn't pay at all, for, of the capital vices, the one that he was definitely free of was avarice. Of the others, no, but at least he indulged in all of them without discrimination. He accepted the succulent roast kid offered him by the owner of a hacienda with the same warm thanks and rejoicing as the mouthful of raw sugar that a poor peasant invited him to share, and his throat made no distinction between aged brandy and the throat-scalding raw rum toned down with water that was the usual drink in times of scarcity. As far as women were concerned, nothing seemed to put him off: gummy-eyed crones, silly girls who hadn't yet reached p.u.b.erty, women punished by nature with warts, harelips, or feeblemindedness. He never tired of flattering them and flirting with them and insisting that they come round to decorate the altar of the church. He would have boisterous romps with them, his face would grow flushed, and he would paw them as though it were the most natural thing in the world. The fact that he was a man of the cloth made fathers, husbands, brothers look upon him as s.e.xless, and they resignedly put up with these audacities on the part of the priest of the parish; had any other male made so bold, they would have had their knives out instantly. Nonetheless, they heaved a sigh of relief when Father Joaquim established a permanent relations.h.i.+p with Alexandrinha Correa, the girl who had remained a spinster because she was a water divineress.

Legend had it that Alexandrinha's miraculous ability came to light when she was still a little girl, the year of the great drought, as the townspeople of c.u.mbe, desperate because of the lack of water, were going about digging wells everywhere. They had divided up into crews and from dawn on, each day, excavated everywhere where there had once been thick vegetation, thinking that this was an indication of water below ground. The women and children were doing their share of this exhausting work. But the earth that was brought up showed no sign of moisture, and the only thing found at the bottom of the holes was more layers of blackish sand or unbreakable rock. Until one day Alexandrinha, speaking in a vehement rush of words, as though they were being dictated to her with barely enough time for her to get them out, interrupted her father's crew to tell them that instead of digging where they were they should do so farther up, at the beginning of the trail leading to Ma.s.sacara. No one paid any attention to her. But the little girl kept insisting, drumming her feet on the ground and waving her hands as though inspired. "All right then, we'll dig just one more hole," her father said. They went off to put her inspiration to the test, on the flat stretch of yellowish pebbles where the trails to Carnaiba and Ma.s.sacara fork off. On the second day of digging, after they had brought up nothing but dry clods of earth and stones, the subsoil began to turn a darker color, to show signs of moisture, and finally, amid everyone's excitement, drops of water appeared. Three more wells were found close by, thanks to which c.u.mbe was less hard hit than other towns by those two years of misery and wholesale death.

From that day on, Alexandrinha Correa became an object of reverence and curiosity. And in the eyes of her parents something else besides: a creature whose intuition they tried to profit from, charging the settlements and the inhabitants round about a fee for divining the place where they should dig to find water. Alexandrinha's talents, however, did not lend themselves to being bought and sold. The little girl was wrong more often than she was right, and many times, after sniffling all about her with her little turned-up nose, she would say: "I don't know; nothing comes to me." But neither these blanks of hers nor her mistakes, which were always effaced by the memory of her successes, dimmed the reputation that surrounded her as she grew up. Her talents as a water divineress made her famous but not happy. Once it became known that she possessed this power, a wall went up round about her that isolated her from people. The other youngsters did not feel at ease with her and adults did not treat her as though she were just an ordinary little girl. They stared at her, they asked her strange questions about the future or life after death and brought her to kneel at the bedside of sick people to try to cure them with the powers of her mind. Her efforts to be simply a woman like all the others were of no avail. Men always respectfully kept their distance. They didn't ask her to dance at fiestas or serenade her, and none of them would ever have dreamed of taking her for a wife. It was as though falling in love with her would have been a profanation.

Until the new parish priest arrived in town. Father Joaquim was not a man to allow himself to be intimidated by an aura of sanct.i.ty or sorcery when it came to women. Alexandrinha was now past twenty. She was tall and slender, with the same curious nose and restless eyes, and still lived with her parents, unlike her four older sisters, who already had husbands and homes of their own. Because of the religious respect that she inspired and was unable to banish despite her simple, straightforward behavior, her life was a lonely one. Since this spinster daughter of the Correas seldom went out except to attend Sunday Ma.s.s, and since she was invited to very few private celebrations (people were afraid that her presence, contaminated as it was by an aura of the supernatural, would put a damper on the festivities), it was a long time before the new parish priest made her acquaintance.

A romance must have begun very gradually, beneath the bushy-topped Malay apple trees of the church square, or in the narrow streets of c.u.mbe, where the little priest and the water divineress must necessarily have met and then continued on their way, as his impertinent, vivacious, provocative little eyes looked her up and down while at the same time the good-natured smile on his face made this inspection seem less rude. And he must have been the one who spoke first, perhaps asking her about the town festival, on the eighth of December, or why he hadn't seen her at Rosaries or what that story about her and the water was all about. And she must have answered him in that quick, direct, straightforward way of hers, gazing at him unblus.h.i.+ngly. And so one casual meeting must have followed upon another, then others less casual, conversations in which, besides chitchat about local happenings, bandits and flying brigades and quarrels and love affairs and exchanges of confidences, little by little guileful and daring remarks must also have entered the picture.

The fact is that one fine day all of c.u.mbe began slyly commenting on the change in Alexandrinha, an indifferent paris.h.i.+oner who had suddenly become the most diligent one of all. She could be seen, early every morning, dusting the benches in the church, putting the altar to rights, sweeping the doorway. And she also began to be seen in the parish house, which, with the help of the townspeople, now had a roof, doors, and windows once again. That what there was between them was more than kissing and giggling became evident the day that Alexandrinha strode resolutely into the tavern where Father Joaquim had hidden out with a group of friends after a christening feast and was playing the guitar and drinking, happy as a lark. The moment she entered he fell silent. She marched over to him and said to him in a firm tone of voice: "You're coming with me, right now, because you've had enough to drink." Without a word, the little priest followed her out.

The first time the saint came to c.u.mbe, Alexandrinha Correa had already been living for several years in the parish house. In the beginning she had installed herself there to take care of Father Joaquim after he had been wounded in the town of Rosario, where he'd been caught in the middle of a shootout between Satan Joao's cangaco cangaco and the police brigade of Captain Geraldo Macedo, known as Bandit-Chaser, and afterward she had stayed on there. They had had three children, whom people referred to only as "Alexandrinha's kids," and she was spoken of as Dom Joaquim's "caretaker." By her very presence she had a calming effect on the priest's life, although he did not change his habits in the slightest. The townspeople would summon her when, having drunk more than he should have, the little priest became a problem, and once she appeared he was always docile, even when he was drunk to the gills. Perhaps this was one of the reasons why the townspeople tolerated their relations.h.i.+p without making too much of a fuss. When the saint came to c.u.mbe for the first time, Alexandrinha was so well accepted by the town that even her parents and her brothers and sisters visited her in the parish house and called her children "grandson," and the police brigade of Captain Geraldo Macedo, known as Bandit-Chaser, and afterward she had stayed on there. They had had three children, whom people referred to only as "Alexandrinha's kids," and she was spoken of as Dom Joaquim's "caretaker." By her very presence she had a calming effect on the priest's life, although he did not change his habits in the slightest. The townspeople would summon her when, having drunk more than he should have, the little priest became a problem, and once she appeared he was always docile, even when he was drunk to the gills. Perhaps this was one of the reasons why the townspeople tolerated their relations.h.i.+p without making too much of a fuss. When the saint came to c.u.mbe for the first time, Alexandrinha was so well accepted by the town that even her parents and her brothers and sisters visited her in the parish house and called her children "grandson,"

"granddaughter,"

"niece,"

"nephew," without feeling at all uncomfortable.

Hence it was as though a bomb had gone off when, in his first sermon from the pulpit of the church in c.u.mbe, to which Father Joaquim, with an affable smile, had allowed him to ascend, the tall, gaunt man with flas.h.i.+ng eyes and cascading Nazarene locks, dressed in a long flowing dark purple tunic, railed against bad shepherds. A sepulchral silence fell in the crowded nave. No one looked at Dom Joaquim, who had taken a place on the front bench. He had opened his eyes with a more or less violent start, and was sitting there not moving a muscle, staring straight ahead, at the crucifix or at his humiliation. Nor did the townspeople look at Alexandrinha Correa, who was sitting in the third row. Unlike Dom Joaquim, she was gravely contemplating the preacher, her face deathly pale. Apparently the saint had come to c.u.mbe after enemies of the couple had had a word with him. Solemn, unbending, with a voice that reverberated from the fragile walls and the concave ceiling, he said terrible things about those chosen by the Lord who, despite having been ordained and taken the habit, turned into Satan's lackeys. He mercilessly vituperated all Father Joaquim's sins: the shamefulness of pastors of the Lord's flock who instead of setting an example of sobriety drank cane brandy to the point of delirium; the unseemliness of those who instead of fasting and being frugal stuffed themselves without stopping to think that they lived surrounded by people who had barely enough to eat; the scandal of those who forgot their vow of chast.i.ty and took their pleasure with women, whom they did not guide spiritually but instead doomed to perdition by delivering their poor souls over to the Dog of the domains of h.e.l.l. When the townspeople finally dared to look at their priest out of the corner of their eyes, they saw him still sitting there, still staring straight ahead, his face beet-red.

What had happened-an event that remained the talk of the town for many days-did not prevent the Counselor from continuing to preach in the Church of Nossa Senhora da Conceicao during his stay in c.u.mbe, or again when, months later, he returned accompanied by a retinue of the elect, or on other occasions in the years that followed. The difference was that Father Joaquim usually was absent when these subsequent sermons were delivered. Alexandrinha, however, was not. She was always there, in the third row, with her turned-up nose, listening to the saint's admonishments against worldly wealth and excesses, his defense of austere habits, and his exhortations to prepare the soul for death through sacrifice and prayer. The former water divineress began to show signs of growing religious fervor. She lighted candles in the vaulted niches along the streets, she spent a great deal of time on her knees before the altar in an att.i.tude of profound concentration, she organized acts of thanksgiving, public prayers, Rosaries, novenas. One day she appeared with her head covered with a black kerchief and an amulet with the image of the Blessed Jesus on her breast. Rumor had it that, though they continued to live under the same roof, nothing that would offend G.o.d happened now between Father Joaquim and her. When the townspeople dared to ask Dom Joaquim about Alexandrinha, he would change the subject. He seemed bewildered. Although he continued to lead a happy life, his relations with the woman who shared his house and was the mother of his children changed. In public at least, they were as perfectly polite to each other as two people who scarcely knew each other. The Counselor aroused indefinable feelings in the parish priest. Did he fear, respect, envy, pity him? The fact was that every time the saint came to town Father Joaquim opened the church to him, confessed him, gave him Communion, and during his stay in c.u.mbe was a model of temperance and devotion.

When, on the saint's last visit, Alexandrinha Correa took off with him among his followers, abandoning everything she had, Father Joaquim was the only person in town who did not appear to be surprised.

He thought that he had never feared death and that he didn't fear it now. But his hands trembled, s.h.i.+vers ran up and down his spine, and he kept moving closer and closer to the fire to warm his ice-cold insides. Yet he was sweating. He thought: "You're dying of fear, Gall." Those great beads of sweat, those s.h.i.+vers, that icy feeling, that trembling were the panic of one who has a premonition of death. "You don't know yourself at all well, old pal." Or had he changed? For he was certain that he had never felt anything like this as a young man, in the jail in Paris when he was waiting to be shot to death by a firing squad, or in Barcelona in the infirmary, while the stupid bourgeois were curing him so that he would be in good health when they executed him by tying him to a post and strangling him with an iron collar. He was about to die: your hour has come, Galileo.

Would his p.e.n.i.s get hard at the supreme moment, as was said to happen to men who drowned or were beheaded? That belief straight out of a horror show concealed some tortuous truth, some mysterious affinity between s.e.x and the awareness of death. If such a thing did not exist, what had happened early this morning and what had happened a little while ago would not have occurred. A little while ago? Hours, rather. Night had fallen and there were countless stars in the sky. He remembered that as he was waiting in the boarding house in Queimadas, he had planned to write a letter to L'Etincelle de la revolte L'Etincelle de la revolte explaining that the skyscape in this region was infinitely more varied than the landscape, and that this no doubt had a determining influence on the inhabitants' religious bent. He could hear Jurema's breathing, mingled with the crackling of the dying fire. Yes, it had been sniffing death close at hand that had made him fall upon this woman and take her with his stiff p.e.n.i.s, twice in the same day. "A strange relations.h.i.+p based on fear and s.e.m.e.n and nothing else," he thought. Why had she saved his life, by interceding just as Caifas was about to give him the explaining that the skyscape in this region was infinitely more varied than the landscape, and that this no doubt had a determining influence on the inhabitants' religious bent. He could hear Jurema's breathing, mingled with the crackling of the dying fire. Yes, it had been sniffing death close at hand that had made him fall upon this woman and take her with his stiff p.e.n.i.s, twice in the same day. "A strange relations.h.i.+p based on fear and s.e.m.e.n and nothing else," he thought. Why had she saved his life, by interceding just as Caifas was about to give him the coup de grace? coup de grace? Why had she helped him onto the mule, gone with him, cured him, brought him here? Why was she behaving like this toward someone she must hate? Why had she helped him onto the mule, gone with him, cured him, brought him here? Why was she behaving like this toward someone she must hate?

Fascinated, he recalled that sudden, pressing, uncontrollable urgency, when the animal fell as it was trotting along at full clip, throwing both of them to the ground. "Its heart must have burst open like a ripe fruit," he thought. How far were they from Queimadas? Was the little stream where he'd washed and bandaged himself the Rio do Peixe? Had they detoured round Riacho da Onca, leaving it behind, or had they not yet reached it? A host of questions were running riot in his head, but his fear had vanished. Had he been badly frightened when the mule collapsed and he realized that he was falling off, that he was rolling on the ground? Yes. That was the explanation: fear. The instant suspicion that the animal had died not of exhaustion but of a shot through the heart fired by the hired a.s.sa.s.sins who were following him to turn him into an English cadaver. And it must have been because he was instinctively seeking protection that he had leapt on top of the woman, who had fallen off and was rolling on the ground with him. Had Jurema thought him a madman, or the Devil perhaps? Taking her in such circ.u.mstances, at that moment, in that state. Ah, the dismay in the woman's eyes, her trepidation when she realized, from the way that Gall's hands were pawing at her clothes, what he wanted from her. She had not put up any resistance this time, but neither had she hidden her disgust, or, rather, her indifference. Ah, that quiet resignation of her body, which had remained impressed on Gall's mind as he lay on the ground, confused, stunned, overwhelmed with something that might be desire, fear, anxiety, uncertainty, or a blind denial of the trap in which he found himself. Through a mist of sweat, with the wounds in his shoulder and neck hurting as though they had reopened and his life were draining away through them, he saw Jurema in the gathering darkness, examining the mule, opening its eyes and mouth. Still lying on the ground, he then saw her collect branches and leaves and light a fire. And without her saying a word to him, he saw her take out the knife tucked in her belt, slice off strips of flesh from the animal's flanks, thread them on a stick, and put them over the fire to roast. She gave the impression that she was merely performing a routine domestic task, as though nothing out of the way had happened, as though the events of that day had not completely changed her life. He thought: "They're the most enigmatic people on this planet." He thought: "Fatalists, brought up to accept whatever life brings them, whether good, bad, or horrendous." He thought: "For her you're the horrendous."

After a while he had been able to sit up, to drink a few swallows of water, and, with a great effort because of the burning pain in his throat, to chew. The pieces of meat seemed like an exquisite delicacy. As they ate, presuming that Jurema was no doubt bewildered by everything that had happened, he had tried to explain everything to her: who Epaminondas Goncalves was, his proposal regarding the arms, how Goncalves had been the one who had planned the attack at Rufino's house so as to steal the rifles he himself had bought and have him, Galileo, killed because he needed a corpse with light skin and red hair. But he realized that she wasn't at all interested in what he was telling her. As she listened, she nibbled the meat with her tiny, even teeth and chased the flies away, without nodding to show she understood or asking a single question, meeting his gaze every so often with eyes that were gradually being swallowed up by the darkness and that were making him feel stupid. He thought: "I am am stupid." That was true; he had amply proved that fact. He had the moral and political obligation to be mistrustful, to suspect that an ambitious bourgeois, capable of mounting a conspiracy against his enemies such as the one involving the arms, was equally capable of mounting another one against him. An English corpse! In other words, what Goncalves had said about the rifles had not been a mistake, a slip of the tongue: he had told him that they were French, knowing full well that they were English. Galileo had discovered this on arriving at Rufino's cabin, as he was loading the cases in the wagon. The factory mark on the b.u.t.t leapt to his eye: "Liverpool, 1891." The discovery had made him joke to himself: "France hasn't yet invaded England, as far as I know. These are English rifles, not French ones." English rifles, an English corpse. What was Goncalves up to? He could well imagine: his idea was a cold, cruel, daring one, and mayhap even a brilliant one. His chest tightened with anxiety once again and he thought: "He'll kill me." This was unknown territory to him, he was wounded, he was an outsider whose trail could easily be pointed out by anyone and everyone in the region. Where was he going to be able to hide out? "In Canudos." Yes, of course. He would be safe there, or at least he would not die there with the rueful feeling that he had been stupid. The thought came to him: "Canudos will justify you, comrade." stupid." That was true; he had amply proved that fact. He had the moral and political obligation to be mistrustful, to suspect that an ambitious bourgeois, capable of mounting a conspiracy against his enemies such as the one involving the arms, was equally capable of mounting another one against him. An English corpse! In other words, what Goncalves had said about the rifles had not been a mistake, a slip of the tongue: he had told him that they were French, knowing full well that they were English. Galileo had discovered this on arriving at Rufino's cabin, as he was loading the cases in the wagon. The factory mark on the b.u.t.t leapt to his eye: "Liverpool, 1891." The discovery had made him joke to himself: "France hasn't yet invaded England, as far as I know. These are English rifles, not French ones." English rifles, an English corpse. What was Goncalves up to? He could well imagine: his idea was a cold, cruel, daring one, and mayhap even a brilliant one. His chest tightened with anxiety once again and he thought: "He'll kill me." This was unknown territory to him, he was wounded, he was an outsider whose trail could easily be pointed out by anyone and everyone in the region. Where was he going to be able to hide out? "In Canudos." Yes, of course. He would be safe there, or at least he would not die there with the rueful feeling that he had been stupid. The thought came to him: "Canudos will justify you, comrade."

He was s.h.i.+vering from the cold, and his shoulder, his neck, his head hurt. To take his mind off his wounds, he tried to turn his thoughts to the troops under the command of Major Febronio de Brito. Had they already left Queimadas and headed for Monte Santo? Would they wipe out that hypothetical refuge before he reached it? He thought: "The bullet isn't lodged in my body, it didn't break the skin, its red-hot fire barely grazed it. The bullet, moreover, must have been very small caliber, like the revolver, meant for killing sparrows." The serious wound was not the one from the bullet but from the knife thrust: it had penetrated deeply, severing veins, nerves, and that was the source of the burning, stabbing pains mounting to his ear, his eyes, the nape of his neck. Hot and cold s.h.i.+vers were making him shake from head to foot. Are you about to die, Gall? All of a sudden he remembered the snowfalls in Europe, its landscape so thoroughly domesticated by comparison with this untamed nature. He thought: "Is there geography anywhere in Europe as hostile as this?" In the south of Spain, in Turkey surely, in Russia. He remembered Bakunin's escape, after being chained to the wall of a prison for eleven months. His father had sat him on his lap and told him the story of it: the epic journey across Siberia, the Amur River, California, then back to Europe, and on his arrival in London, the burning question: "Are there oysters in this country?" He remembered the inns scattered along the roadsides of Europe, where there was always a fire smoking on the hearth, hot soup, and other travelers to smoke a pipe with and share the events of the day's journey. He thought: "Nostalgia is an act of cowardice, Gall."

He was allowing himself to be overcome by self-pity and melancholy. Shame on you, Gall! Haven't you even learned yet to die with dignity? What did it matter if it was in Europe, Brazil, or any other bit of ground on this earth! Wouldn't the result be precisely the same? He thought: "Disintegration, decomposition, the rotting place, the worm brood, and if hungry scavengers don't play their role, a frail frame of yellowish bones covered with a dried-out skin." He thought: "You're burning up and dying of cold and that is what is known as fever." It was not fear, nor the pellet for killing birds, nor the knife wound: it was a sickness. Because he had begun to feel that something was wrong with him even before the attack by the man dressed in leather, when he was on that hacienda with Epaminondas Goncalves; whatever it was had been secretly eating away at some organ and spreading through the rest of his body. He was ill, not badly wounded. Something else new in your life, old pal. He thought: "Fate wants to complete your education before you die by subjecting you to experiences you've never had before." First a rapist and then sick! Because he could not recall ever having been ill, even in earliest childhood. Wounded, yes, a number of times, seriously so that time in Barcelona. But sick: never. He had the feeling that he was about to fall into a faint at any moment. Why this senseless effort to go on thinking? Why this intuition that as long as he kept thinking he would remain alive? He was suddenly aware that Jurema had gone. He listened, terrified: he could still hear the sound of her breathing, to his right. He could no longer see her because the fire had gone out altogether.

He tried to raise his spirits, knowing that it was useless, murmuring that adverse circ.u.mstances spurred the true revolutionary on, telling himself that he would write a letter to L'Etincelle de la revolte L'Etincelle de la revolte pointing out the a.n.a.logy between what was happening in Canudos and Bakunin's address to the watchmakers and craftsmen of La Chaux-de-Fonds and the valley of Saint-Imier, in which he maintained that it was not in the most highly industrialized societies that great uprisings would take place, as Marx had prophesied, but in backward, agrarian countries, whose miserable peasant ma.s.ses had nothing to lose-Spain, for instance, Russia, and, why not? Brazil, and he roused himself to reprove Epaminondas Goncalves in his mind: "Your hopes are going to be thwarted, you bourgeois. You should have killed me when I was at your mercy, on the terrace of the hacienda. I'll get well. I'll escape." He would get well, he would escape, the young woman would guide him, he would steal a mount and would fight in Canudos against what you represented, you bourgeois: selfishness, cynicism, greed, and... pointing out the a.n.a.logy between what was happening in Canudos and Bakunin's address to the watchmakers and craftsmen of La Chaux-de-Fonds and the valley of Saint-Imier, in which he maintained that it was not in the most highly industrialized societies that great uprisings would take place, as Marx had prophesied, but in backward, agrarian countries, whose miserable peasant ma.s.ses had nothing to lose-Spain, for instance, Russia, and, why not? Brazil, and he roused himself to reprove Epaminondas Goncalves in his mind: "Your hopes are going to be thwarted, you bourgeois. You should have killed me when I was at your mercy, on the terrace of the hacienda. I'll get well. I'll escape." He would get well, he would escape, the young woman would guide him, he would steal a mount and would fight in Canudos against what you represented, you bourgeois: selfishness, cynicism, greed, and...

II.

[I].

The heat has not let up as the evening shadows have fallen, and unlike other summer nights, there is not so much as the breath of a breeze. Salvador is burning up with the heat in the darkness. It is now pitch black, since at midnight, by munic.i.p.al ordinance, the gaslights on the street corners go out, and the lamps in the houses of night owls have also gone out some time ago. Only the windows of the Jornal de Noticias Jornal de Noticias, up there on the heights of the old city, are still lit, and their brightness makes the fancy Gothic lettering of the name of the newspaper on the windowpanes of the front office even more indecipherable.

Outside the door is a calash, and horse and coachman are both dozing. But Epaminondas Goncalves's henchmen are awake, smoking, as they lean their elbows on the wall above the escarpment next to the newspaper office. They are talking together in a half whisper, pointing to something down below, there where the ma.s.sive bulk of the Church of Nossa Senhora de Conceicao da Praia and the fringe of foam along the reef are just barely visible in the darkness. The mounted police patrol has pa.s.sed by on its rounds a while before and will not be back that way till dawn.

Inside, all by himself in the combination copy room and office, is that young, thin, ungainly journalist whose thickened eyegla.s.ses to correct his nearsightedness, his frequent fits of sneezing, and his insistence on writing with a goose-quill pen instead of a metal one make him the laughingstock of the office staff. Leaning over his desk, his ugly head bathed in the halo of light from the little lamp, in a posture that makes him hunch over the desk at an awkward angle, he is writing rapidly, stopping only to dip his pen in the inkwell or to consult a small notebook, which he raises up so close to his eyegla.s.ses that it almost touches them. The scratching of his pen is the only sound in the night. The sea is inaudible tonight and the office of the owner and editor-in-chief, which is also lighted up, is silent, as though Epaminondas Goncalves had fallen asleep at his desk. But when the nearsighted journalist has set down the last word of his article and swiftly crosses the large outer office and enters the office of the head of the Progressivist Republican Party, he finds him waiting for him with his eyes wide open. His elbows are resting on the desk and his hands are crossed. As he sees the journalist enter, his dark, angular face, whose features and bones are underscored by that inner energy that enables him to spend entire nights without a wink of sleep at political meetings and then work all the following day without the least sign of fatigue, relaxes, as if to say: "Well, at last."

"Is it finished?" he murmurs.

"Finished." The nearsighted journalist holds the sheaf of pages out to him. But Epaminondas Goncalves does not take them.

"I'd rather you read them aloud to me," he says. "If I hear them, I'll have a better idea of how they turned out. Have a seat there, next to the light."

As the journalist is about to begin to read, he is overcome by a sneeze, and then another, and finally a fit of them that forces him to remove his eyegla.s.ses and cover his mouth and nose with an enormous handkerchief that he pulls out of his sleeve, like a sleight-of-hand artist.

"It's this summer dampness," he says apologetically, wiping his congested face.

"I know," Epaminondas Goncalves cuts him short. "Please read."

[II].

A United Brazil, A Strong Nation JORNAL DE NOTiCIAS.

(Owner: Epaminondas Goncalves) Bahia, January 3, 1897 The Defeat of Major Febronio de Brito's Expedition in the Hinterland of Canudos New Developments THE PROGRESSIVIST REPUBLICAN PARTY ACCUSES THE GOVERNOR AND THE BAHIA AUTONOMIST PARTY OF CONSPIRING AGAINST THE REPUBLIC TO.

RESTORE THE OUTMODED IMPERIAL ORDER.

The corpse of the "English agent"

Commission of Republicans journeys to Rio to seek intervention of Federal Army to put down rebellion of subversive fanatics TELEGRAM OF PATRIOTS