The Abyss (3 page)

It's all the same to me!
 How he hated that sentence, accompanied by a listless manner, a floppy wrist, a sluggish eye.

He knew that Clara would not like some of the things he loved, and vice-versa. She had already given short shrift to Portugal's greatest poet, Camões, but she had been so highly amusing while doing it that he had not minded. He had told his brother that she had a good mind, and she did: she was quick, had an excellent memory and a well formed taste in both literature and art.

He dreamt of the time when they would be married and he would put his head on her lap as she read to him in English or French, for she had a very good accent in both languages.

There was more that he thought about, more impatiently. She was a very lovely woman, and no man with a drop of red in his blood would be immune from images of her in his bed.

She had looked ravishing that night, since the fashion of the day suited a woman like Clara best: a slender but shapely woman with height, good shoulders and full though not large breasts. Very thin women who seemed consumptive looked like dry twigs in the high-waisted dresses, and women who were too round looked like silly dolls, if one were to add to their heads the tight curls that were in vogue at the moment.

Clara had looked ravishing in her white dress, with her black hair done in soft, long curls and gathered at the back. He could imagine taking the pins away from her chignon and letting the mass of locks fall, probably past her waist. It must be lovely hair, once it was let down.

On her wrist Clara always wore a gold bracelet, a present from her father, and it slipped up and down her arm when she moved it. A short bit of chain with a ball at the end hung from the fastening, and Gabriel loved to watch it move as she served coffee or hot chocolate at her parents' house, or as she made a point in conversation, or put her hand up to her mouth to laugh. 

He had often had to stop himself from leaning forward and simply kissing her lips, which were an almost violent red, as if they were stained with berries. And then there were her eyes: no other woman with black eyes had a glance so radiant.

That night he had felt, along with desire, a certain pity, or perhaps compassion, when he had seen her jewelry. She had worn a diamond pin shaped like a half moon in the parting of her hair, following the craze for the goddess Diana, a pearl necklace and diamond earrings. A man accustomed to seeing very expensive stones as he was could immediately tell that her diamonds were cheap, and that the settings were coarse.

And yet her father had probably ruined himself buying her those things, so that she could attract the best possible husband. Unless he were taking bribes, and it was widely agreed that he wasn't, Pedro Tavares could not even afford pieces of jewelry such as those without feeling the pinch.

He and his wife were doing their utmost to ensnare a husband with fortune and a title for Clara, to help her transcend her station in life. The corner of Gabriel’s mouth went up in a mirthless smile as he thought that insufferable Juliana did not consider him good enough for her daughter.

It was Clara he pitied as her mother prowled around the ballrooms and receptions of courtly Lisbon, looking for the highest prospect at which she could launch her daughter. It seemed that Voges had been chosen ─and Voges would marry Clara in a heartbeat.

Gabriel's smile became complete when he thought that Voges must excuse him again, but
 he
 was going to marry Clara, and soon. He planned to give her better jewels, better dresses and better company than those parents. They would travel, to Italy and England since the upstart Napoleon had made France impossible to visit; they would sit in the shade of cathedrals, walk in gardens wet with rain and stand looking at calm aquamarine seas.

It would be his pleasure to rescue the loveliest, cleverest and most passionate girl he had ever known from the ridiculous fate her parents had envisaged for her. They were the coarse setting, and she was the sparkling diamond that needed to be taken elsewhere.

He thought of these things as he arrived at home, went to the drawing room and asked the footman for a glass of Madeira. He would have a nightcap and go to bed.

When he heard the carriage outside, he knew that his father and brother were returning. He also knew, by the fact that Manuel was hurrying Eduarda up the stairs, that the Marquis was coming to have words with him. He stood up when the door opened rather violently, and found that he was already scowling.

The Marquis met him with a scowl of his own, "Would you care to explain that preposterous performance?" he asked his son, his nostrils moving in anger above his mustache.

"If you tell me what you mean by 
performance,
" Gabriel countered, keeping calm.

"You know very well what I mean!"

"I don't remember anything preposterous taking place."

"Don't infuriate me! Showing favor to that...
girl,
 in front of the whole court!" the Marquis cried in a loud voice. "Did you want me to die of shame?"

"I have no desire to kill you," Gabriel replied coldly. "But I don't see how my liking a girl should provoke your death."

The Marquis began shouting, "How dare you pretend not to know what I am talking about! That daughter of a servant! Of a market vendor!"

Now Gabriel turned to face his father, and there was some menace in his stance. "Do not, I beg you, refer to her in this way."

Vargas put his head on the side in mockery, "Oh, forgive me, how should I refer to her? The great Dona Clara?"

"You will be soon referring to her as my wife," his son spat out.

There was horror across the Marquis' face for a second, then there was a roar from him, "Your 
what
?"

Gabriel's eyes were full of blue sparks, "I have asked her to marry me," he roared back. "She will be my wife!"

"You have ─ " Now the Marquis was reeling, shock and fury mingled in his expression. "You
 boy
! How dare you? How dare you suppose that a little nothing like you can bring shame to a family that goes back hundreds of years? How dare you?"

The young man scoffed, "You have already married a son to another name long enough for you, I intend to marry the woman I love!"

"Love!" Vargas was almost laughing now, though his eyes held something that looked almost like madness. "Love! The pretty boy has found love!"

The Marquis stood breathing heavily, clearly trying to regain some sort of composure. Finally, he began to speak in a low voice, "You ungrateful fool, this is what you are going to do: you are going to stay away from that low born girl. You will pack your bags and go somewhere else until your ardor for that body, which I admit is beautiful, cools down. That absurd mother of hers will marry her off soon, and then you can return ─and when you do, you will see that it was no great thing, this
 love
 of yours. You will stop being ridiculous, and you will start being my son!"

The last sentence was screamed by the Marquis at the top of his voice.

Gabriel did not flinch; he only looked at his father with contempt. Finally, he said, "I shall tell you what I will do. Tomorrow morning I shall go to Clara's house, and I shall ask her father for her hand. If, for some reason, he has heard that he will face your wrath in giving her to me, I shall ask Clara herself. I am fairly confident she will say yes. In fact, I know she will. After that, we will be married as soon as the law and the church allow. 
That
 is what is going to happen."

Vargas was shaking his head slowly, "You would defy me?"

"I will do what is best for me!"

"You miserable wretch, if you are planning this, you will not sleep under this roof, or any roof of mine. You will not be my son!"

The two men faced each other, standing on the exquisite oriental carpet in their impeccable suits, in their animal stubbornness and their pride.

"Then I will not," Gabriel said.

He moved past his father decisively, and walked out the front door.

"Gabriel!" his father cried behind him. "How dare you, 
boy
?"

There was a light at the window above and Gabriel saw his brother's face appear. Manuel made a gesture as if asking, 
where are you going
? Gabriel ignored him, and kept on walking.

He did not even ask for a carriage, or his horse, he simply walked past the servants through the garden until he reached the gate, which was flung open for him by a surprised guard; then he stepped outside, leaving behind his name, his father and the fate that would have been forced on him.

Five. A Grimace

For years, many times a day, Clara would go over the morning after the ball, when Gabriel came to ask for her hand in marriage.

She had gone to bed thinking of him, of the way he had run his fingers through the feathers in her fan. She had sighed for most of the night and then fallen asleep at dawn.

It was ten o'clock by the time she got up, put on her robe and sat drinking her coffee at the window as she looked at the Tagus in the distance, and saw the ships that carried things back and forth. They were coming from Macao carrying china and silk, from Africa with rubber and ivory, from India with spices and from Brazil with sugar, gold and diamonds.

However, it was of Gabriel that she was still thinking when the door to her room opened so suddenly and violently that she almost spilled her coffee.

"Do you know what happened to that jack-a-napes of yours?" Juliana asked, advancing with her hands on her waist.

Clara went pale as she stood up.

"Don't drop the cup, it's porcelain!" Juliana screamed.

"What...what happened?" Clara managed to ask. 
Had he had an accident in the carriage? Had he fallen ill?

"Put the cup down," Juliana instructed, and when Clara obeyed, she went on, "He has managed to get himself disinherited!"

Thank God he isn't dead
, Clara thought, and some color returned to her cheeks, though she stood trying to understand what it all meant, and if it was true or just gossip. She could hear her father's steps approaching, though at that hour he ought to be at the palace.

Pedro walked in huffing. He had probably run after his wife, to try and stop her giving the news with so little consideration to Clara's feelings.

"
Papá
!" Clara cried. "Is it true?"

Trying to steady his breathing, her father said, "
Clarinha, minha jóia,
 I am afraid it's true. It's all over the palace. People know it was because of you..."

"Because everyone saw you standing together in that obscene way yesterday!" her mother concluded triumphantly. Juliana lived for the times when she could present the undeniable proof that her thousands of warnings and remonstrations had been right.

"
Minha filha!"
 Pedro exclaimed with compassion, seeing that Clara had gone very pale again, and seemed to lose her footing.

He rushed past his wife to hold his daughter by the arm, and help her into a chair. Then he turned to his wife with unaccustomed spirit, "Don't stand her over her like that, let her take a breath!"

However, Juliana was in full fighting mode.

"How do you feel about shaming your father in this way? Can you imagine what has been whispered since yesterday, what is still being whispered now about us?"

Clara sat, thinking of Gabriel, while her mother went on and on at the top of her voice. "Your father has ruined himself so you could have everything that is good, we have both put you before us in every instance, and this is how you repay us!"

Her father shook his head and patted her hand, because he loved her and wanted her to be happy. She knew he didn't begrudge her anything, though he had sometimes contributed to the "marriage talk", egged on by his wife.

Juliana, however, wanted to bring the roof down.

"You are now considered a fast hussy, and because of a man who now doesn't have a miserable coin to his name! I knew he was bad for you, I knew he was bad for anyone! What would do with a second son, when you can marry a prince? Did I not tell you, both of you last night, that the Marquis was getting angry? Did I not say that something terrible was going to happen?"

She stopped pacing to scream in Clara's face, "There you are now, with a suitor who cannot buy you a tin of sugar! Is that what you wanted?"

Pedro was still patting Clara's hand and making consoling noises, "My poor girl..."

"Poor indeed!" Juliana cried. "Poor and ungrateful! After all we have done for her, nearly ruined ourselves so she could marry well and have a good life, her name is now attached to a man who has been dishonored!"

Clara stood up suddenly at this, the color restored to her cheeks, and Pedro instinctively put his hands over his ears.

"How dare you say he has no honor? He has been disinherited because he would not give me up, what more honor could there be in a man?"

Pedro also stood up and got between his wife and daughter, for he was afraid that they might grab each other by the hair, such was the passion in both their faces.

"Then marry him! Marry him and go live in a hovel, you stupid girl!" Juliana shrieked. "I want to see you with no servants, and without money to buy food, hated and persecuted in a city where the Marquis very much matters! Go ahead!"

Clara couldn't say anything to this. The thought of poverty was always uppermost in her mind: it had been put there, day after day, by her mother. She would lose her looks, she had been told, and she would be a servant somewhere, catering to the whims of the rich, if she did not marry well. The worst things would happen to her if she didn't marry well.

Juliana could see what Clara was thinking, and she pressed her advantage, talking about what her life would be like if she had anything to do with Gabriel. She was crushing a man she deeply disliked for daring to be stronger than her. She was crushing a love that must be utterly annihilated at that very moment, or she would lose her daughter and Clara would lose everything. She was crushing a girl's hope, while being certain that it was for the best.

Clara, on the other hand, felt a dreadful chill inside. She felt like exploding in tears when she thought of what Gabriel had done, wondering what it meant for him, but she had sworn long ago that her mother would never see her crying. Juliana hardly ever wept, except in anger, and she had a way of punishing people who displayed weakness. Clara knew her mother loved her, but she also knew that the desire in Juliana to triumph over others was greater than anything.

So she threw a furious look at Juliana, who, ready to use any advantage in an argument, pointed at her and cried, "See the way she is looking at me! Her own mother!" To Pedro she added, "Are you going to sit there and not say anything? She is about to ruin herself over a pretty man! We both know this love won't last!"

Pedro was still holding his daughter's hand. He said to his wife, "Let me speak to her a moment."

Juliana opened her mouth to refuse, then clearly changed her mind, perhaps realizing that Pedro's voice would be more persuasive than hers now. She turned her back on both husband and daughter and walked out the door, slamming it behind her.

"
Meu amor
," Pedro started, with one of the many loving expressions he had for Clara, "your mother may get too angry, but what she says is not an untruth. I am still a relatively poor man. The weight of two households would be too heavy for me; I wouldn't be able to help you! And as to living here..." He sighed. She knew what he meant ─what newly married couple would choose to live with Juliana?

"Is it always money, 
papá
?" Clara asked disconsolately. "Is that the whole of life?"

Her father took a moment to say with regret in his face, "It matters, my darling. It especially matters when there is none. Then life becomes all about finding it. It is a thing hard to find, and easy to spend. You see that people who are poor are always tired, and often bitter. Imagine not being able to buy one of the books you so love, because you need the money for food; or having to go without meat, or fish, or fresh things. Imagine having children in such circumstances..."

He stopped again, thinking how he would go on, then said, "The Marquis has made a public break with Gabriel, and he is not a man who goes back on what he says. I think that even if Gabriel went begging now, he wouldn't change his mind."

"Gabriel would never beg for anything!" Clara said.

Pedro nodded, "I know, but that only makes things worse. What work can a young man who has brought up in luxury find? What fortune can he make, when his life has been all about doing nothing? What does he even know of toil and effort?"

Clara still felt like weeping, but she was used to keeping her tears inside. The horror of poverty rose in her once more; Gabriel perhaps did not have such a feeling, because he had never known anything like it. Clara had inherited this fear from her mother, who had told her what it was like to freeze in winter, or go hungry, or have broken shoes. Juliana's own father had only become more prosperous when she was almost grown up, and she had told some terrible tales of her girlhood.

"Life is very hard, Clarinha," her father said in a sad voice. "And living in constant need kills love. People become like animals, thinking only of surviving. I have nothing against Gabriel, but I wouldn't want that for you, my dear, or for your children!"

Pedro kissed her forehead and then patted her head, and she knew that he only thought about her, not about the money he had spent, or about what he wanted her to be. He was thinking about her happiness, and that made his words all the more compelling.

When Gabriel came, at the end of the morning, she heard her mother's voice rise in anger. She blushed with shame and wanted to go out to stop what must be happening outside, but she knew that her presence would only make Juliana more hysterical. After a while her father walked into the drawing room, where she sat wringing her handkerchief, and said, "Gabriel is here. He insists on speaking to you. Please, my dear, please think with your head, not with your heart."

She stood up and nodded, then waited like a schoolgirl, her hands locked in front of her, her eyes on the ground.

He walked in, wearing the same clothes he had worn at the ball. 
So he has truly left with nothing
, she thought. There was determination in his face, and anger. As he spoke, she looked for a sign of his love for her, a sign that this was not just the talk of a man determined to win some sort of battle ─against Juliana, against his father ─ and taking her as the prize, or the casualty.

There would be a whole life beyond this proposal, she knew. An angry gesture cost nothing, she thought, a life cost money.

"I have asked your father for your hand, as I told you yesterday I would," Gabriel said, looking at her with intensity. "He has refused me."

They had not sat down, as what they were saying was too urgent.

"You may know my father has disinherited me, and I don't care,” he continued, “I don't want anything from him. I have some money from my mother, enough to get to Brazil and begin a new life. There are opportunities there, and men have made fortunes. I am certain I can make ours. Will you come with me?"

He extended his hand, and Clara looked at it, knowing that to take it meant either heaven or hell, but she had no idea which.

"Will you marry me?"

It was then that she made a terrible mistake, because so much had been said during her life, so much had been screamed at her that morning, and then so much had been told her reasonably by her father.

She made a mistake because she had been holding tears inside at the thought that Gabriel had ruined himself, at the thought that she could no longer be his, at the fear of losing him and at the greater fear of sinking into penury.

Clara let out a breath that was like a laugh and said, "But you must understand, I can't marry you now!"

For years afterwards she would think of how she had said those words; she would think of how they must have sounded to him, who had given everything up for her sake. It must have seemed as if she had laughed, and dismissed him because he now had nothing.

She would realize later what it must have seemed like to him, but at that moment she could scarcely think, or compose her features, or do anything but stand there, stunned, with a grimace on her face that might have been a laugh of disdain.

Clara saw the light go out in his eyes, she saw them become almost black. She saw his hand retreat, then lie motionless by his side. She saw that she had lost him, and she thought she ought to say something.

But he was too quick for her. "I am sorry," he said, almost with disgust. "I mistook you for someone else!"

He turned his back on her, and walked out. And still she could do nothing but stand in the middle of the room, as if she had turned into a statue that had a grimace carved on its beautiful face.