The Collected Novels of José Saramago (95 page)

Ricardo Reis is alone. On the lower branches of the elm trees the cicadas begin to chirr, mute but inventing their own voice. A great black vessel enters the straits, only to disappear into the shimmering reflection of the water. The panorama seems unreal.

Ricardo Reis now has another voice in his apartment. He owns a small radio, the cheapest on the market, the popular Pilot model with an ivory-colored Bakelite case, chosen because it occupies little space and can easily be transported from the bedroom to the study, the two rooms where the somnambulist who lives here spends most of his time. Had he decided to buy one before the pleasure of living in new quarters wore off, he would now possess a superheterodyne receiver with twelve vacuum tubes and enough power to rouse the neighborhood and draw a crowd beneath his window. Eager to enjoy the music and listen to the broadcasts, all the housewives in the district would be there, including the two old men, friendly and polite once more because of this latest novelty. But Ricardo Reis only wants to keep up with the news, discreetly, in privacy, the radio lowered to an intimate whisper. He does not explain to himself or try to analyze the restless feeling that brings him to the set, he does not wonder about the hidden message in that dim eye, the dying Cyclops that is the light of the minuscule dial, its expression showing neither joy nor fear nor pity. And he cannot say whether it is the victories of the revolutionary army in Spain that delight him or the resounding defeats of the forces that support the government. Some will argue that the two are the same, but they aren’t, no sir, the human soul is more complicated than that. To be pleased that my enemy is beset doesn’t mean that I applaud the besetter. Ricardo Reis does not investigate his inner conflict, he leaves his uneasiness alone, like one who, lacking the courage to skin a rabbit, asks another to do the job for him while he stands watching, annoyed at his own squeamishness. Standing close enough to breathe in the warmth released by the skinned flesh, a subtly pleasant smell, he conceives in his heart, or wherever such things are conceived, a loathing for the man capable of the great cruelty of skinning. How can he and I possibly belong to the same human race. Perhaps this is why we hate the hangman and refuse to eat the flesh of the scapegoat.

Lydia was delighted when she saw the radio, How pretty, how nice to be able to hear music at any hour of the day or night. An exaggeration on her part, because that time is a long way off. She is a simple soul able to rejoice at the smallest thing, unless this is a pretext to conceal her distress that Ricardo Reis has become so slovenly in his ways, no longer caring about his appearance, no longer looking after himself. She told him that the dukes of Alba and Medinaceli had left the hotel, to the great disappointment of Salvador, who cherishes a real affection for his clients, especially if they are titled, though in this case they are not, because the idea of calling Don Lorenzo and Don Alonso dukes was nothing but a joke of Ricardo Reis, which it is time to drop. He is not surprised. Now that the day of victory is approaching, they live their final moments of exile in sweet luxury, which explains why the hotels in Estoril are now frequented by what the gossip columns refer to as a select Spanish colony, with plenty of dukes and counts there on vacation. Don Lorenzo and Don Alfonso followed the scent of the aristocracy, and in their old age they will be able to tell their grandchildren, In the days when I was exiled with the Duke of Alba. For the benefit of these Spaniards the Portuguese Radio Club recently introduced a Spanish broadcaster, a woman with a voice like a soubrette in an operetta. She reads the news of the Nationalist advances in the graceful language of Cervantes. May God and the Portuguese Radio Club pardon us this sarcasm, it is provoked by an urge to weep rather than any desire to smile, which is exactly how Lydia feels, who tries valiantly to be merry and lighthearted though weighed by her anxiety for Ricardo Reis in addition to the terrible news from Spain, terrible from her point of view, which as we have seen coincides with that of her brother Daniel. Upon hearing, on the wireless, that Badajoz has been bombarded, she begins to cry like a Mary Magdalene, strange behavior for her, considering that she has never been to Badajoz and has neither family nor possessions there that might have suffered in the bombing. Why are you crying, Lydia, Ricardo Reis asks her, but she has no reply, perhaps it was something Daniel told her, but who told him, what was his source of information. The war in Spain must be much discussed aboard the
Afonso de Albuquerque,
as the sailors scrub the decks and polish the brass, they pass on the latest news among themselves, nor is all the news what the newspapers and radio would have us believe. Aboard the
Afonso de Albuquerque
there is not much confidence in the reassurances of General Mola, who belongs to the quadrille of the matador Franco and has promised that before the month is out we shall hear him address us over Radio Madrid. That other general, Queipo de Llano, says that for Madrid it is the beginning of the end, the revolution is barely three weeks old and almost over. Rubbish, replies the sailor Daniel. But Ricardo Reis, awkwardly trying to console Lydia and dry her tears, and still hoping to win her over to his way of thinking, repeats the news he has read and heard, There you are weeping for Badajoz, don’t you realize that the Communists cut an ear off one hundred and ten landowners and then defiled their womenfolk, in other words, raped the poor creatures. How do you know. I read it in the newspapers and also read, in an article written by Tomé Vieira, a journalist and the author of several books, that the Bolsheviks gouged out the eyes of an elderly priest, then poured gasoline on him and set him on fire. I don’t believe that. It’s in the newspapers, black on white. My brother says one shouldn’t always believe what the newspapers say. I’m not in a position to go to Spain to see for myself, I have to believe that they are telling the truth, newspapers don’t lie, that would be the greatest crime imaginable. Doctor, you are a learned man while I can scarcely read or write, but I’ve learned one thing in life, there are lots of truths and they often say different things, we won’t know who is lying until the fighting starts. And what if it is true that they gouged out a priest’s eyes and poured gasoline on him and burned him alive. Then it’s a horrible truth, but my brother says that if the church were on the side of the poor and helped them on this earth, then the poor would be the first to give their lives for the church. And what if they cut the ears off the landowners and raped their wives. That would be another horrible truth, but my brother says that while the poor are suffering on this earth, the rich are already enjoying paradise without going to heaven. You always answer with your brother’s words. And you, Doctor, always speak with the words of the newspapers. True enough.

Now there have been disturbances in Funchal and in other places on the island, with crowds looting public offices and dairy farms, and people have been killed or wounded. The situation must be serious, because two warships have been sent out, along with a fleet of airplanes and squads of hunters with machine guns, a military force capable of waging a civil war Portuguese-style. Ricardo Reis does not fully grasp the reason for the uprising, which need not surprise either us or him, because he has only the newspapers to rely on for information. He turns on his ivory-colored Pilot radio. Perhaps the words we hear are more believable than the words we read, the only drawback is that we cannot see the announcer’s face, because a look of hesitation, a sudden twitch of the mouth will betray a lie at once, let us hope that someday human inventiveness will make it possible for us, sitting in our own homes, to see the face of the announcer, then at last we will be able to tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and the era of justice will truly begin, and let us say, Amen. The arrow on the dial points to the Portuguese Radio Club, and while the tubes are heating up, Ricardo Reis rests his weary forehead on the radio case. From inside comes a warm odor that makes him feel a little giddy, a distracting sensation, then he notices that the volume knob is switched off. He turns it, at first hears only the deep hum of the carrier wave, then a pause, a sudden burst of music, the song
Cara al sol con la camisa nueva,
the anthem of the Falange for the pleasure and comfort of the select Spanish colony in the hotels of Estoril and at the Brangança. At this very moment in the casino they are having a dress rehearsal for the Night of Silver, to be presented by Erico Braga, and in the hotel lounge the guests glance suspiciously at the green-tinted mirror.
The Radio Club announcer then reads a telegram sent by veteran Portuguese legionnaires who served in the fifth division of the Spanish Foreign Legion, they greet their former comrades who are taking part in the siege of Badajoz, a shiver goes up our spine as we listen to those military sentiments, the Christian fervor, the fraternity of arms, the memory of past triumphs, the hope in a bright future for the two Iberian fatherlands united in one Nationalist cause. After listening to the final news bulletin, that three thousand soldiers from Morocco have landed in Algiers, Ricardo Reis switches off the Pilot and stretches out on the bed, desperate at finding himself so alone. He is not thinking about Marcenda, it is Lydia who occupies his thoughts, probably because she is closer at hand, one might say, although there is no telephone in this apartment, and even if there were one, he could hardly call the hotel and say, Good evening, Senhor Salvador, this is Doctor Ricardo Reis speaking, do you remember me, we haven’t spoken to each other in ages, I say, those were extremely happy weeks I spent in your hotel, no, no, I don’t need a room, I simply wanted to speak to Lydia, could you ask her to come around to my apartment, excellent, how very kind of you to let her off for a couple of hours, I am feeling very lonely, no, it isn’t for that, all I need is a little company. He gets up from the bed, gathers together the pages of the newspaper lying all over the floor and on the bedspread, and runs his eye down the list of entertainments, but nothing stirs his interest. For a moment he wishes he were blind, deaf, and dumb, thrice the cripple Fernando Pessoa says we all are, then among the news items from Spain he notices a photograph that had escaped him previously, army tanks bearing the Sacred Heart of Jesus. If this is the coat of arms they are using, then there can be no doubt that this will be a war waged without mercy. He remembers that Lydia is pregnant, with a baby boy, as she constantly tells him, and this baby boy will grow up and go to the wars that are now in the making. One war leads to another, let us do some calculations, the baby comes into the world in March of next year, if the average age when youths go to war is twenty-three or twenty-four, what war will we have in nineteen sixty-one, and where, and why, and over what wasteland. With the eyes of imagination Ricardo Reis sees the boy riddled with bullets, dark and pale like his father but only his mother’s son, for his father will not acknowledge him.

Badajoz has surrendered. Spurred by the rousing telegram from the veteran Portuguese legionnaires, the Spanish Foreign Legion achieved miraculous victories, whether at a distance or in hand-to-hand combat, and singled out for special honor were the brave Portuguese legionnaires of the new generation who were anxious to prove themselves worthy of their predecessors, one should add that it always helps to feel that one’s native land is not far away. Badajoz has surrendered. Reduced to ruins by continuous bombardment, swords broken, scythes blunted, clubs and hatchets smashed, the city has surrendered. General Mola declared, The hour has come to settle accounts, and the bull ring opened its gates to receive the militiamen taken captive, then closed them, the fiesta is under way, machine guns shout
ole, ole, ole,
the noise is deafening in the bull ring of Badajoz, and the minotaurs dressed in cheap cotton fall on top of one another, mingling their blood in mutual transfusion. When not a single monster is left standing, the matadors will liquidate with their pistols those who were simply wounded, and if any escape this mercy, it is only to be buried alive. All that Ricardo Reis knew about this event was what he read in the Portuguese newspapers, but one newspaper accompanied its report with a photograph of the bull ring in which bodies could be seen scattered here and there, a wagon looked completely out of place, was it meant for deliveries or removals, for bulls or minotaurs. Ricardo Reis learned the rest from Lydia, who had been told by her brother, who had been told by who knows whom, perhaps it was a message from the future when all will finally be resolved. No longer crying, Lydia tells him, Two thousand lost their lives, her lips are trembling, her cheeks flushed. Ricardo Reis tries to console her, takes her by the arm, but she pulls away, not out of any rancor but simply because today she cannot bear it. Later, in the kitchen, as she is washing the dirty dishes that have accumulated, she begins to cry again, and for the first time she asks herself why she comes to this apartment. Is she the doctor’s maid, his cleaner, she is certainly not his lover, because that word implies equality, no matter whether male or female, and they are not equal. Then she does not know if she is crying for the dead of Badajoz or for her own death, which is the death of feeling that she is nobody. Sitting in his study, Ricardo Reis has no idea what is going on. To take his mind off the two thousand dead, a truly incredible number, if Lydia was telling the truth, he reopened
The God of the Labyrinth
, to continue where he had left off, but could get no meaning from the words. He realized that he had forgotten the narrative, so he went back once more to the beginning, The body, discovered by the first chess player, occupied with its outstretched arms the squares of the King and Queen’s pawns as well as the next two squares in the direction of the enemy camp. Reaching this point, Ricardo Reis again lost the thread, seeing the chessboard as a desert and the sprawled corpse as a young man who was no longer a young man, then he saw a circle inscribed in that huge square, an arena strewn with bodies crucified on their native soil, and Sacred Hearts of Jesus went from one to the other making sure that there were no survivors. When Lydia walked into the study, done with her chores, Ricardo Reis was sitting with the book closed in his lap, he appeared to be sleeping and looked, caught unawares like this, almost old. She stared at him as if he were a stranger, then left without making a sound. She begins to think, I won’t come back here, but she cannot be certain.