All things come to an end, reader; it’s an old truism, to which we may add that not everything that lasts, lasts for very long. This second part does not readily find believers; on the contrary, the idea that a castle in the air lasts any longer than the air of which it is built is difficult to get out of anyone’s head, and it’s as well that this is so, so that the habit of constructing these near-eternal structures is not lost.
Our castle was solid, but one Sunday … The previous day we had spent the evening at Flamengo, not only the two inseparable couples, but also the dependent and cousin Justina. It was then that Escobar, speaking to me in the window, invited us for dinner there the next evening; he wanted us to talk about a family project, a project for the four of us.
“For the four of us? A quadrille?”
“No, you’ll never guess what it is, and I won’t tell you. Come tomorrow.”
Sancha didn’t take her eyes off us during the conversation next to the window. When her husband went out, she came across to me. She asked me what we had been talking about; I told her it was a plan, but I didn’t know what for. She asked me to keep a secret, and told me what it was: a trip to Europe in two years’ time. She said this with her back to the room, almost sighing. The sea was crashing on the beach; there was a strong undertow.
“Are we all going?” I asked finally.
“Yes.”
Sancha lifted her head and looked at me with so much pleasure that I, thanks to her close friendship with Capitu, would have been quite happy to kiss her on the forehead. However, Sancha’s eyes were not inviting me to fraternal enthusiasm, they seemed warm and imperious, saying something else, and it was not long before they removed themselves from the window, where I stayed looking at the sea, lost in thought. The night was clear.
From that very place I sought Sancha’s eyes, next to the piano: mine met hers half way. The four of them stopped and faced each other, each pair waiting for the other to pass on, but neither did: like two stubborn people meeting each other in the street. Caution separated us; I went to look outside again. And there I began to search my memory to see if I had ever looked at her with the same expression; I was unsure. I was sure of one thing, that I had thought of her one day, as one thinks of any pretty passer-by; but could it be that she had guessed … Perhaps the mere thought had shone in my face, but before, she had fled from me out of annoyance or timidity; now, because of an invincible urge … Invincible; the word was like the priest’s blessing at mass, which one receives and repeats inside oneself.
“That sea tomorrow will be a real challenge,” said Escobar’s voice, right next to me.
“Are you going in tomorrow?”
“I’ve gone in rougher seas, much rougher; you’ve no idea what a really good angry sea is like. You have to swim well, as I do, and have lungs like these,” he said, slapping his chest, “and these arms; feel them.”
I felt his arms, as if they were Sancha’s. This is a painful confession to make, but I cannot suppress it; that would be to avoid the truth. Not only did I feel them with that idea in mind, but I felt something else as well; I thought they were thicker and stronger than mine, and I envied them; what’s more, they knew how to swim.
When we left, I again spoke with my eyes to the lady of the house. Her hand squeezed mine hard, and stayed there for longer than usual.
Modesty required that then, as now, I should see in Sancha’s gesture nothing more than an approval of her husband’s project and an expression of gratitude. That’s the way it should have been, but a peculiar fluid that flowed through my whole body removed from me the conclusion I have just written. I felt Sancha’s fingers again, as they gripped mine and mine hers. It was a dizzy moment, a moment of sin. It took no time on the clock; when I put my watch to my ear, I heard only, the ticking of virtue and reason.
“… A most delightful lady,” José Dias concluded a speech he had been making.
“Most delightful!” I repeated with some warmth, which I then moderated, correcting myself: “Really, it is a lovely night!”
“As every night in that house must be,” the dependent went on. “Not out here: there’s an angry sea; listen.”
We could hear the roaring sea—as one could hear it from the house too—there was a violent swell, and in the distance one could see the billowing waves. Capitu and cousin Justina, who were walking ahead, stopped at one of the turns in the beach, and we went on, the four of us conversing; but I could hardly talk. There was no way of completely forgetting Sancha’s hand, nor the look we exchanged. First I thought of them in one way, then in another. God’s minutes were interrupted by the devil’s moments, and so the pendulum swung between my perdition and my salvation. José Dias said goodbye to us at our door. Cousin Justina was to sleep at our house; she would go back next day, after lunch and mass. I retired to my study, where I stayed longer than usual.
Escobar’s photograph, which I had there next to my mother’s, spoke to me as if it were he himself. I sincerely struggled against the impulses I had brought from Flamengo; I thrust aside the image of my friend’s wife, and accused myself of disloyalty. Besides, who could tell me that there was any intention of that kind in her goodbye gesture, or the previous ones? Everything could be put down to her lively interest in the trip. Sancha and Capitu were such friends that it would be an added pleasure for them to travel together. Even if there was any sexual intent, who could prove to me that it was no more than a fleeting sensation, destined to die with night and sleep? Remorse often springs from such trivial sins, and lasts no longer than this. I clung to this hypothesis, which could be reconciled with Sancha’s hand, the memory of which I could feel in my own, warm and slow, squeezed and squeezing…
In all sincerity, I felt ill at ease, caught between my friend and the attraction I felt. It may be that timidity was another cause of this crisis: it is not only heaven that gives us our virtues, timidity, too, and that’s not counting chance—but chance is mere accident; it is best if virtue comes from heaven. However, since timidity comes from heaven, which gives us this disposition, virtue, its daughter, is, genealogically speaking, of the same celestial family. That is what I would have thought if I had been able to; but at first my thoughts simply wandered in confusion. It was not passion or a serious inclination. Was it just a caprice? After twenty minutes it was nothing, nothing at all. Escobar’s portrait seemed to speak to me; I saw his frank, open manner, shook my head and went to bed.