At home, they had already lied to my mother, saying that I had come back and was changing my clothes.
“Eight o’clock mass must be over … Bentinho should be back by now … Has something happened, brother Cosme? … Send someone to see …” She voiced her alarm over and over, but then I came back and with me came tranquility.
It was a day of pleasant surprises. Escobar came to see me and to inquire after my mother’s health. He had never visited me before, nor were our relations as close as they afterwards became; but knowing why I had left three days before, he took advantage of the Sunday to come and see me, and ask if the danger had passed. When I said it had, he sighed with relief.
“I was worried,” he said.
“Did the others find out?”
“I think so: some did.”
Uncle Cosme and José Dias liked the lad; the dependent said that he had once seen his father in town. Escobar was very polite; and though he spoke more than was his habit later, even so it was not as much as most young men of our age; that day I found him a little more expansive than usual. Uncle Cosme invited him to dine with us. Escobar thought for a moment and then said that his father’s agent was expecting him. I, thinking of Gurgel’s words, repeated them:
“We’ll send a black to say you’re having lunch with us, and will be along later.”
“Don’t trouble yourselves!”
“It’s no trouble,” said Uncle Cosme.
Escobar accepted, and dined with us. I noted that the quick movements that were natural to him, and which he controlled in class, were also under control now, in the living room and at table, We spent an hour together, on openly friendly terms. I showed him the few books I possessed. He much admired my father’s portrait; after looking at it for a short while, he turned and said to me:
“One can tell that he had a good heart!”
Escobar’s eyes, which were pale as I have already said, were of the softest; that was how José Dias defined them, after he had gone, and I will not change the word, in spite of the forty years that have passed. The dependent was not exaggerating. His clean-shaven face had white, smooth skin. His forehead, though, was a little low, so that his parting almost came down to the left eyebrow; but it was still high enough not to clash with his other features, or diminish their charm. Truly, it was an interesting face, with an delicate mouth always ready for a laugh, and a thin, curved nose. He had the habit of twitching his right shoulder from time to time, but rid himself of it when one of us pointed it out to him one day in the seminary; the first example I’ve seen that a person can perfectly well cure himself of small defects.
I have always felt a certain pride when my friends have pleased everybody. At home, everyone came to like Escobar; even cousin Justina thought that he was an estimable lad, in spite of … “In spite of what?” asked José Dias, seeing that she did not finish the phrase. He got no reply, nor was he likely to; cousin Justina could probably find no obvious or important defect in our guest; the in spite of was a kind of safety clause in case she discovered one some day; either that or it was the product of an old habit, which made her criticize when she had found no object of criticism.
Escobar said goodbye straight after dinner; I took him to the door, where we waited for a tram to pass. He told me that the agent’s warehouse was in the Rua dos Pescadores, and was open until nine o’clock; but he did not want to stay out late. We parted very affectionately: he waved goodbye from the bus. I stood at the door to see if he would look back again when he was far off, but he didn’t.
“Who’s the great friend then?” asked someone from a nearby window.
There’s no need to say that it was Capitu. There are things that can be divined, in life as in books, whether they are novels or true stories. It was Capitu, who had been watching us for some time from behind the shutters, and now had opened the window and appeared. She saw our effusive, affectionate farewells, and wanted to know who was so important to me.
“That’s Escobar,” I said going to beneath the window, and looking up at her.