She was a tall woman with very white skin and thick, pale hair; of late, she had grown a little flabby and faded, almost colorless, like a reclusive nun. She was starting to put on weight, not out of inertia, but possibly out of apathy, because taking pills or following a diet was not strictly necessary and this way was easier, less bother; mainly, though, it was because she felt it was no longer worth worrying about such things, now that she was past her prime as a woman and would soon become a sexless human creature with no desires, en route to death or waiting for death to arrive. She had married very young, but never had children. Not that this was a source of regret, not consciously at least, perhaps, she thought, because her maternal instincts had withered away or were nonexistent, perhaps because in her immediate family there were no children whose presence might make her miss the children she’d never had. As everyone said, she lacked for nothing. And she did have a very comfortable house and could buy whatever clothes she wanted and had no need to worry about material things; her husband was what is usually known as a good husband; she was in reasonable physical health; and her life had been so easy that, before she knew it, she was forty years old. Forty years that had raced by, slipped past like a gentle river with no dips or boulders to block its flow or hurry it along, a river that would soon reach its end. For the first time, she thought about the years she had lived and about the years that remained to her. Not that she was afraid of death. With the passing days, she had gradually lost, without even noticing she was losing them, the innocent, mechanical prayers that, as a child, her mother had passed on to her from her mother and that, even when she was married, she had always said before going to bed. No, the end of life seemed to her, quite simply, like the end of everything: a mixture of permanent night and calm sea and nothing at all. What she did think about were the gray hairs that had already appeared and the lines around her eyes and her large empty hands, with no past and no future.
It was then, for the first time in her life, that she fell gravely ill. Death almost touched her with its stone-cold fingers, but she somehow found the necessary strength to draw back in time. Inevitably, she felt utterly exhausted. During the worst moments of the most difficult days, she would find herself pleading with someone or other—perhaps herself or her own ailing body burning up with fever: “Not yet, not yet. I mustn’t die yet. I must live for another year, just one more year…” As if that year were the time required for her to experience something of great importance.
Her husband couldn’t waste much time keeping her company because, although he had never really loved another woman, he had to earn money, always more money. What for? Who for, if he had no children? Lately, she had begun to ask herself many things that had never occurred to her during all those years. She looked for satisfactory answers in the smooth, white ceiling of their bedroom, but the ceiling either said nothing or told her things she had known for ages, even if she couldn’t remember having thought them: for example, he would never ever be capable of doing anything else, he would never be able to sit beside her chatting or simply reading a book. No, he would never be able to do that. All he could do was earn money for no reason at all, to store up human sweat, his own and that of the people who worked for him, sweat that was then transformed into money to be put in the bank. It wasn’t his fault; that’s what he had been born to do. He was a man, a simple man, a poor rich man who lived his life swept along by the circumstances he had created, glued to his wealth, obliged to keep it, to increase it, without knowing why or for what.
She knew all this and would like to feel a little pity for him when he returned home in the evening with the lines on his face made still deeper by weariness. However, all her pity died the moment after she saw him. He wasn’t a man to inspire sorrow or pity or even tenderness. It would have been good to do something for him, even if only by saying a single word, a simple word that he needed to hear. But what word would that be?
Her husband was short and skinny and full of vitality. He had been born poor and had worked his way to the top. He would sometimes recall A, B, or C, his friends in high school, the one school he had attended before joining the factory. A, B, or C, who were now fathers, some of them already grandfathers (poor people marry young), still mere workers or clerks. The only friend who had made more of an effort to become “someone” was the boss of a small office. Whereas he owned three factories. He used to say, “I’m a winner.” And a winner doesn’t want pity or tenderness or sorrow. Only admiration. She, alas, had no more admiration to give him. Lately, while convalescing, she had even grown accustomed to viewing him with new eyes, eyes heavy with a critical spirit she herself didn’t know she had and that quite alarmed her.
One day, when visiting a female friend, she met a tall, rather charming man, mild-mannered and soft-spoken. This was what first impressed her. Otherwise, he seemed rather ordinary. When he left, having first come out with a series of rather trite remarks about America, a country he claimed to know well, her friend looked at her and laughed. Then she said:
“Mateus was very keen to meet you.”
“Why?” she had asked without a hint of false modesty.
It seemed to her strange, even impossible, that a man, him or any man, should still be interested in meeting her in her own right.
Her friend shrugged.
“I’ve no idea.”
Then the woman had said very firmly:
“He probably wants a job in one of my husband’s factories.”
“You’re joking! He’s rich; he doesn’t need a job. Work? He wouldn’t know how. He’s a landowner, and you know what they’re like. They think making other people work is quite exhausting enough. Maybe they’re right, after all, lots of people think the same.”
That evening at home, without knowing why, she said to her husband:
“I met a man named Mateus Porto today. Pleasant enough, but pretty insignificant. Do you know him?”
Her husband looked at her with abnormal curiosity, but said only:
“Yes, the name rings a bell, but then I know so many people.”
He stood up and gave her a kiss. He had a business meeting to go to.
The two happened to meet downtown a few days later, and only then did she notice that he had a limp. Mateus gave her a long, warm handshake, and she saw in his face an almost forgotten light that made her blush.
“Are you going to your friend’s house on Thursday?” he asked.
Probably not, she said, but immediately regretted not having said Yes. She would have liked to see him again and talk to him. Why? That afternoon, when she got home, she looked at herself in the mirror with the old attentiveness of youth, and her scrutiny did away with any illusions she might have. A few wrinkles, some gray hairs, a dull, almost lifeless complexion. No, she wouldn’t go. And she didn’t, although she spent all of Thursday feeling on edge and unable to concentrate on the embroidery she was intending to do.
Then he began phoning her. The first few times, she told the maid to say she wasn’t in. There followed a long week with no calls, a week that seemed to her endless and empty. Then she decided she would answer the phone, telling herself she was doing this so that the maid wouldn’t have to waste her time, and every time the phone rang, she felt her heart beat faster. But it was never him.
One afternoon, though, she heard his slow, calm voice. She said “Hello.” What else did she say? She would never be able to remember clearly what he had said or what she had said in response, or even what they had said in the following days, or how and why she had finally agreed to meet him. A kind of mist covered everything. It was a voyage on the North Sea, just them and the surrounding mist. However, the voyage was brief, and the mist suddenly lifted and the sun laid bare everything, and all the veiled words and images and gestures went back to being what they really were: words and images and gestures. Nothing more. Now everything was hard, brutal, and all too real. The dream had gone, and before her stood a man, a stranger, who shared with the other man only the soft, familiar voice. Now, though, he was no longer speaking to her of his love or asking her to run away with him.
He was sitting opposite her, and she was standing looking at him as if hypnotized. He had a faint smile on his lips, but this, she realized, was his usual expression, even when he was saying those words to her that she had thought genuine. Except that now she was standing stark naked in a public square, exposed to all eyes.
“There was probably no need for me to tell you this, but I decided I would, just to show you at least a minimum of loyalty,” he was saying casually. “I wouldn’t want you to be too surprised by what you’ll hear when your husband comes home. As I said, a long time ago now, he and I knew the same woman. He treated her like the utter bastard he is, and I swore I would have my revenge. Now we’re even or, rather, we will be in a few minutes.”
As if all this were some peculiarly complicated story that had occurred on another continent and that she had not yet fully understood, she asked very calmly:
“Why did you wait so long?”
“As I said, I lived for some years in America. Then I had my estate here to deal with, and I only rarely come to Lisbon. Besides, it wasn’t easy getting to meet you. It took time. You live a very solitary life.”
“Yes, very solitary.”
It didn’t even occur to her to beg for pity. She would be incapable of doing that, and he would be incapable of hearing her. It was enough to see that half-smile, which only now did she fully understand, that hard gaze, those hands with their stubby fingers. Nor did she even consider denying the evidence. She didn’t know how to lie and never had. She simply asked him:
“Do you have to tell him absolutely everything?”
“Of course. If I didn’t, it would all have been a waste of time…”
She interrupted him, saying:
“Yes, you’re right, what was I thinking? And are you counting on me to tell him?”
“No, not at all. I’ll do that. In fact, right about now,” he said, looking at his watch, “he’ll be getting a phone call. A mysterious phone call of course. Just to arouse his curiosity. I’ll do the rest. Your husband isn’t a man to wait around; he’ll be on his way right now. His office is really close, and he always drives very fast.”
“Has it occurred to you that he might kill you?”
“Who? Him? You don’t really believe that, do you? I know him well. Like I said, at one time, we were almost friends. He’s incapable of killing anyone. He’s the kind who keeps any kind of canker locked away inside and slowly rots away with it, not telling anyone… He can’t bear to look foolish.”
She nodded. It was strange. She didn’t hate this man at all, nor was she surprised at this denouement. It was as if she were on his side, happy to collaborate. As if she had always expected this.
She got up and opened the drawer in her writing desk. The man went on talking—he knew there were no weapons in the house. She, however, wasn’t listening. She was thinking about her husband. She could see him getting up from his chair after putting the phone down. There was a look of perplexity on his face. He didn’t quite understand what he had just heard. Why were they telling him to go home? He would go home, though; of that she was sure. He was a man who liked to clear up any problems quickly so as not to waste time worrying about them. He was a businessman. He might already be on his way. He might even be coming up in the elevator now. As never before, she desperately wanted to clasp him to her, to stroke his hair. But it was late, too late.
When the blood began to gush from her wrists, the man screamed. She said in a tremulous voice:
“Leave now, quickly. Take all your things with you. Your gloves are over there on that chair… There’s no one here; I gave the maids the afternoon off so that we could meet in private.”
She fell onto the sofa, and the red flowers of her blood began to bloom among the white flowers of the blue upholstery.
She tried to say something that would wound him, that would make him suffer a little, even if only his vanity, but she could find nothing worth saying. Personal pride, remorse, her shame, all of that was beginning to be left behind, lost, of no importance. Of not the slightest importance.
In a soft voice she said again:
“Leave now.”
The man left without a word, and she heard the muffled sound, the oddly muffled sound of the door slamming. Far away, in another world.
Then she closed her eyes and lay there waiting.