It was Sunday. The first Sunday after the Chief had sailed away on the SS Funchal.
I got up early to take full advantage of my day off. The city was blanketed in a dense grey mist, and the weak wind blowing in from the Atlantic was cold and damp. A good day for chipping off rust below decks.
Some people say that chipping off rust is hard and dreary work. And they’re right. It’s both dirty and boring—don’t let anyone tell you otherwise! After an hour I needed to stretch my legs and go up for a breath of fresh air. I climbed the engine-room ladder and went to the galley to heat up some coffee left over from that morning. The galley is at the front of the ship, next to my small cabin, and you reach it through a hatchway in the foredeck. I’d reached the bottom step of the ladder when I got such a fright I almost fell backwards.
Harvey Jenkins was standing in the galley. His cockerel, head to the side, had one of its blind eyes rigidly fixed on me.
“So there you are,” Harvey Jenkins said with a smile. “I didn’t mean to scare you. We were out for a little Sunday stroll and happened to be passing. Since the hatch was open, we came aboard… I brought some vanilla cakes, if you’d like one?”
In his hand he was holding a brown paper bag, its sides covered in fat stains. I quickly pulled myself together and pointed at the coffee pot.
“Yes please,” Jenkins said. “A cup of coffee with the cake would be just the job.”
Our snack didn’t last long. Jenkins talked a bit about this and that and rose to his feet as soon as he’d drunk his coffee.
“I won’t keep you from chipping the rust,” he said. “See you this evening then, when you take over from me at the merry-go-round.”
I nodded.
Jenkins went ashore and walked off along the quayside with his hands in his pockets and his collar turned up against the drizzle. The cockerel huddled down on his shoulder.
I watched them for a long time. There was something strange about their visit, I felt. It wasn’t exactly the perfect weather for a walk. And what had Jenkins been up to in the galley? Why hadn’t he come down to the engine room instead? He must have heard me down there, chipping rust…
I stopped work for the day a couple of hours later. I washed, changed into clean overalls and then Ana, Signor Fidardo and I took the tram out to the Prazeres cemetery. We do that almost every Sunday and Signor Fidardo plays the harmonium while Ana sings in the cemetery chapel. While they are doing that, I visit my good friend João, the cemetery caretaker.
I helped João weed the flowerbeds and rake the gravel until it was time for me to go to Rua Moeda and take my shift at the merry-go-round.
“Hi there, matey,” Jenkins said, casual as ever when he caught sight of me.
He was standing by one of the braziers to keep warm and the cockerel had crept in under his coat. Jenkins was gently stroking its bald little head.
“He’s afraid of the fire,” Jenkins explained. “All animals are, I suppose… well, except you, of course. By the way, have you had any dinner? I’ve been roasting chestnuts if you’re hungry.”
There was a pile of freshly roasted chestnuts on a dish beside the brazier and the smell was wonderful. I signalled my gratitude by touching the brim of my cap with two fingers.
Jenkins put the cockerel back on his shoulder and buttoned up his coat.
“We’re away to Bairro Alto to see what the lovely Eulalia has cooked for us today,” he said, full of anticipation. “Have a good shift and see you again tomorrow.”
The hours passed slowly. I kept a good fire going to serve the boiler of the steam engine, but there was little to do apart from that, other than to eat chestnuts and drink tea with Sylvie Dubois. To help pass the time she read to me from a newspaper one of the fairground customers had left behind.
The big news of the day was the report of an Italian sail-assisted steamship from Salerno putting into Lisbon as an emergency when several passengers fell ill with diphtheria, a very dangerous and infectious disease. The port authorities had quarantined the vessel. No one on board was allowed to go ashore and no one ashore was allowed to go aboard. In spite of that, some people in the city were so frightened the infection might spread they were demanding the vessel be towed out to sea and left to its fate.
“Poor souls,” Sylvie Dubois sighed and I nodded my head in agreement.
When the clock eventually reached twelve, I walked to the tram stop at Cais do Sodré and caught the night tram towards Alfama. The tram was full of sleepy-eyed waitresses and cleaners on their way home from the evening shift at the big casino in Estoril. I found an empty place by the window and slumped down on the worn and shiny wooden seat.
I must have fallen asleep and by the time I opened my eyes again we’d already reached Comércio Square. A tram going in the opposite direction was waiting at the stop. The two cars were right alongside one another and I turned my head and looked into the other tram. The very first thing I saw through the rain-streaked windows was Harvey Jenkins. He was sitting just a couple of yards away, staring straight ahead, and he hadn’t noticed me.
I was taken by surprise. Hadn’t Jenkins told me he was going to visit the widow Eulalia in Bairro Alto? So what was he doing on a tram coming from the Alfama harbour area? Perhaps the widow had got tired of baking leek pie for him? He was obviously now on his way back to the fairground and he didn’t look as if he’d had a particularly enjoyable evening.
One of the cockerel’s white eyes was staring straight at me and I had a strange feeling that the blind bird knew I was close by. It began stamping excitedly up and down on its master’s shoulder. Without really knowing why, I slipped down in my seat so that Jenkins wouldn’t see me. Just then, his tram jerked into motion and set off with a ping and at the same moment my tram set off in the opposite direction.