Suddenly, I heard a voice shout from inside the house next door:
“Capitu!”
And from the yard:
“Yes, Mamma!”
Again from the house:
“Come here!”
I couldn’t stop myself. My legs took me down the three steps into the garden, and led me towards the neighboring yard. It was a habit they had in the afternoons, and in the mornings, too. For legs have personalities too, only inferior to the arms, and they can do things of their own accord when they are not directed by ideas from the head. Mine got almost as far as the wall. There was a connecting door there which my mother had had put in when Capitu and I were small. This door had no lock or latch; it was opened by pushing on one side or pulling on the other, and shut itself by the weight of a stone hanging on a rope. It was almost exclusively for our use. When we were children, we went visiting, knocking on one side, and being received on the other with many bows and curtsies. When Capitu’s dolls fell ill, I was the doctor. I went into her garden with a stick under my arm, in imitation of Dr. João da Costa’s walking stick: I took the patient’s pulse, and asked her to show her tongue. “She’s deaf, poor thing!” Capitu would exclaim. Then I stroked my chin, like the doctor, and finally prescribed leeches, or an emetic: this was the doctor’s usual therapy.
“Capitu!”
“Yes, Mamma!”
“Stop making holes in the wall; come here.”
Her mother’s voice was nearer now, as if it came from the back door. I wanted to go through to their yard, but my legs, which had been so keen to move, now seemed stuck to the ground. Finally I made an effort, pushed the door and went in. Capitu was facing the opposite wall, and scratching on it with a nail. The noise of the door made her look round; when she saw me, she put her back to the wall, as if she wanted to hide something. I went towards her; I suppose I must have looked different, for she came over to me, and asked in a worried voice:
“What’s the matter with you?”
“Me? Nothing’s the matter.”
“Yes there is; something’s bothering you.”
I wanted to insist that there was nothing wrong, but I couldn’t say it. I was all eyes and heart, a heart which this time felt as if it really was coming out of my mouth. I couldn’t keep my eyes off this fourteen-year-old girl, tall, strong and well built, in a tight fitting, somewhat faded cotton frock. Her thick hair hung down her back in two plaits tied together at the ends, as was the fashion at the time. She was of a dark complexion, with large, pale eyes, and a long, straight nose, a delicate mouth and a broad chin. Her hands, although used to hard household work, were well cared for; they were not scented with fine soaps or toilet water, but she kept them spotless with water from the well and ordinary soap. She wore strong cloth shoes, flat and old, which she herself kept mended.
“What’s the matter with you?” she repeated.
“It’s nothing,” I finally stammered out.
Then I corrected myself.
“It’s some news.”
“News of what?”
I thought of telling her that I was going to enter the seminary, and see what impression it had on her. If it dismayed her, then she really cared for me; if not, then she didn’t. But this was a brief, vague notion; I felt unable to speak clearly, somehow I couldn’t see properly …
“Well?”
“You know …”
With that, I looked at the wall, at the place where she had been scratching, writing, or making holes as her mother had put it. I saw some marks there, and remembered the movement she had made to cover them up. I wanted to see them close to, and made a step in that direction. Capitu grabbed me, but, either because she feared I might get away from her, or to stop me by other means, she ran over and rubbed out what she had written. All this did was arouse my desire to read what was there.