The Head of the Saint (6 page)

Thursday, five a.m. precisely. Samuel awoke with a start in his saint's-head house and pressed his ear to the mark for the voice they'd worked out to be Madeinusa's. It was on the right, just above the ear. Francisco tried, too; he had stayed over especially, as this business of the saint preferring Samuel really annoyed him. It was no use, though—he still couldn't hear anything.

Madeinusa was asking the saint to give her the strength and courage to go to see Dr. Adriano. She asked the wedding maker, St. Anthony, to find some way to make sure her mother would not suspect anything, she said amen and that was that. The plan was to say she was going to a friend's house to collect some money she was owed, because she knew that the girl had won something on the lottery in Fortaleza. Helenice was money-mad, so the plan was perfect.

Samuel and Francisco ran out without having to say a word—their plan was all ready, too. Francisco would go to the health center, and Samuel would go and talk to Madeinusa.

And so it was.

Samuel surprised the girl in the middle of the street as she hurried along, and he walked beside her at the same pace. She was afraid.

“Listen, Madeinusa. You know I live in St. Anthony's head? He's sent you a message.”

“Ha, that's all I need.”

“He said he can't bear being tied up under your bed any longer.”

Madeinusa went pale. This was ridiculous. How could he possibly know?

“St. Anthony said he wants to see you married to Dr. Adriano, and he has instructions for you.”

“What kind of joke is this?”

“Look, you just have to go into his office and say you've got a pain in the heart. Just say that. And take the sock.”

“What?”

“The doctor's sock. Take the sock with you to the appointment.”

No one knew about the saint under the bed, about her passion for the doctor, the appointment and the sock—oh God! If this crazy beggar boy was talking about it, his story deserved her attention. She prayed to the saint in secret, she had stolen the sock in secret, and now this boy was revealing it all like this—it had to be for some good reason.

“Pain in the heart? What pain in the heart?”

“Don't ask me. It's a message from the saint.”

Moments before the crazy boy had appeared, Madeinusa had been wondering what she could say when she walked into the office, since she wasn't in any pain apart from the passion that was consuming her life. It made her believe the boy's words were true. All this happened so fast—the two of them spoke so quickly—that there was no time for her to think.

The next day Francisco arrived early at the health center so he could be first in the queue. Madeinusa took a little longer, and there were about eight people ahead of her. She stood at the back of the queue in a state of visible anxiety. She was pretty, Madeinusa, she always had been. Her father said that something as lovely as her must have been imported, like the radio he'd bought. The box bore the words: “Made in USA.” “My daughter's name comes from abroad. All I did was put the letters together.”

She wore her hair long, always tied back, her skirt below the knee, clothes buttoned up to her neck. She instinctively knew that untying her hair, rolling down the waistband of her skirt just a bit and opening one pathetic button on her blouse would make her even more beautiful, with many, many more years to live.

Samuel took his place at the front of the queue alongside Francisco. The doctor arrived right away, said good morning without looking at anyone and went into the building. He didn't even see Madeinusa as she practically fainted. She loved that man, everything she saw of him and everything she imagined he had within him.

The queue was kept in order by a health assistant, whose job it was to note who arrived after whom and to open the office door. Her portly bearing and permanent expression of disgust averted any possibility of confusion in the order of arrivals. There was no need, there were never many people—eight, ten, fifteen of the area's residents. People came here from outside Candeia, because they knew there was almost nobody living here in need of a doctor.

She opened the door, making an abrupt gesture as if to say, “Well, go in then, idiots….”

Francisco and Samuel went in. That was the deal. If Francisco took Samuel to the doctor to cure the wound on his leg and help Madeinusa, he would have the privacy of the hollow head restored to him. Samuel could leave once his leg had healed, and he could set about finding his father once more. The doctor, jotting something down, asked what the problem was. Dr. Adriano looked at the wound from a distance, not disguising his shock. It was serious.

“How did that happen?”

“A dog bite, at the saint's head.”

The doctor looked up and gave Samuel a ferocious look of reproach. The boy guessed why—he had mentioned the saint's head that had condemned Candeia to wretchedness. He knew from Francisco that talking about St. Anthony was forbidden.

“I live in the head and I listen to what the saint is thinking, Doctor.”

“He's trying to help the town,” Francisco joined in.

“How long have you been hearing voices?”

“Since I arrived in Candeia.”

“Is there any history of mental illness in your family?”

“You think I'm crazy, Doctor? I'm completely normal!”

Dr. Adriano laughed quietly to himself, because he'd learned from his psychiatry professor that crazy people always say they're sane. The prescription he wrote out was more illegible than his usual scrawl; he wanted to get rid of the strange boy as quickly as he could. No sane person would live in the saint's head. He handed over the prescription, said the course of treatment would last ten days and gave Samuel a few boxes of free medicine samples. He looked over at the door, wishing the two of them were already on the other side of it, but they didn't move a muscle.

“St Anthony has sent you a message, Dr. Adriano.”

Dr. Adriano sighed but waited for more.

“He said a girl's going to come in here today saying she's got a pain in the heart. St. Anthony asked me to tell you that she's the love of your life.”

“That's a good one!”

“Listen to me, Doctor. She will be bringing you your sock.”

Sock. The word struck the doctor between the eyes like a lightning bolt.

“When did he arrive?” the doctor asked Francisco.

“A few days ago.”

“Before last Friday?”

“After Friday.”

“How do you know about the sock?” he asked Samuel.

“The saint told me.”

No one knew about the sock. It had disappeared from the doctor's car. The previous Friday he had left one of the doors unlocked and a single sock had vanished. Just one of the pair—it was the oddest thing. If it had been a real thief, he'd have stolen the envelope of money that was in the glove compartment, his jacket, the car stereo, his watch, his bag. Candeia had never been the sort of place to have thieves. Getting a single sock stolen from a pair—that was something you didn't forget.

The doctor was shaken. He threw the two of them out of the room and hurried back to his desk. There was still time for Samuel to give Madeinusa an encouraging wink.

With every minute that passed during his work, the message from the saint troubled the young doctor more and more. This wasn't the kind of thing that happened in his predictable life. Every day he would wake up and drive his car to the towns where he worked, knowing precisely the menu of ailments that he would find. A message from a saint—that was not on the list. It was unsettling.

The most practical thing would be for him to stick his head out of the door and take a look at the queue, but he was afraid. With each woman who came in, his panic increased, particularly if it was a woman without many teeth or a hefty woman with digestive troubles. The rest of the patients were all men and children.

The young doctor rushed through the consultations as quickly as he could, sweating. He asked his assistant at the door how many people were still in the queue.

“Only three, thank God. I'll be out by eleven.”

Two patients dripping with sweat and then finally Madeinusa. The long wait had left both of them overcome by anxiety—knowing that there was some superior force at work in this meeting. Hers were eyes of curiosity and courage. His, of dread and eagerness. Adriano was shy, very shy, especially when it came to women. Madeinusa had never been this close to a man in her life. Especially not in a room with no one else there.

She didn't even sit down. She took the sock out of her top, from the neckline of her blouse, and squeezed it tight in her hand. Meanwhile, he pointed toward the examination table, an iron thing painted in beige, old and peeling like everything else in that town.

Madeinusa climbed the iron steps and sat on the bed, because something told her to do this. The doctor took hold of his stethoscope nervously, already knowing that the ailment was in her heart.

Adriano, the timid doctor, brought the end of the stethoscope into contact with the girl's young skin and listened as she held out the sock and said:

“It's just…I've…I've got a pain in my heart.”

Nothing else needed to be said for a romance to begin right then, a romance blessed by St. Anthony. Those who are shyest are the wildest when they attack, and Dr. Adriano kissed Madeinusa without even asking her permission. He had no need.

The health assistant must have heard the racket of the iron bed banging against the wall, and she soon flung open the door and saw the doctor examining Madeinusa with his hands and his mouth, without glasses, in order to see better. They barely noticed their audience.

It didn't take long for the talk to reach the ears of Helenice, a former devoted churchgoer, now a devout evangelical, chronically bad tempered, intolerant and prejudiced, miserly and hysterical mother to a deflowered young woman. And thanks to the message from St. Anthony, Madeinusa and Adriano soon set the date for their marriage, as Helenice didn't want a daughter with a reputation. Either, stated Helenice, the doctor married her and took on her dishonor, or Madeinusa was better off dead, in the name of Jesus Christ, hallelujah.

Madeinusa's friend—who did owe her money but had never won on the lottery—was the girlfriend of Aécio Diniz, whose slogan was “He tells it like it is.” Aécio was a presenter on Canindé Radio 89.1 FM and got in touch with Madeinusa less than a week later, interested in learning more about this story of the message from St. Anthony. They set up an interview for the Bride of the Week slot, which had been a great success in the area, though it had been canceled several times recently due to a lack of brides. Those were difficult days for the romantically inclined.

Canindé was in full pilgrimage season, full of devotees of St. Francis like the ones Samuel had met on the road. There were many of them, thousands of them. Madeinusa put on perfume to speak into a microphone for the first time.

She told the whole story: that more than a year ago she had tied up St. Anthony under her bed, wrapped in cardboard, hidden from her mother, and prayed for help in getting married to Adriano, the doctor who didn't even know her.

“But isn't it forbidden to keep an image of St. Anthony in Candeia?” asked the reporter.

“It is, but I managed to get one in secret from the mother of a friend. She's going to be the matron of honor. And the best man will be Samuel, who brought me the message from the saint.”

The program was broadcast in Canindé and a number of other nearby towns. Everybody stopped to listen when Madeinusa said that the outsider had heard the thoughts of St. Anthony because he lived inside his head. The episode with the stethoscope also got the attention of the listeners. Naively, Madeinusa recounted it all, repeated it, gave details. Never had Canindé Radio 89.1 FM
had so many listeners.

Madeinusa's wedding dress was loaned by the beauty parlor owner, who'd worn it for her fifteenth birthday party. It looked as good as new; they just had to leave it out in the sun for a few days to get rid of the musty smell. It was white and puffy, with fake mini-pearls sewn all over it. It was so beautiful that it didn't fit into Madeinusa's little dreams. She had to learn to dream bigger.

Dr. Adriano was no less happy. He scraped together his savings and paid for the wedding party willingly. The biggest expense was doing up the little church of St. Anthony in Candeia; the two of them insisted that the wedding should be held there, in the remains of a town that meant so much to them.

The door to the little church had been locked with a rusty chain ever since Father Zacarias had been driven out, ever since that sea of misfortune had swept over Candeia. The old parish priest could barely believe it when Adriano's car pulled up outside his house in Tauá and he asked him to officiate at the wedding. He had baptized Adriano, Madeinusa and almost everyone who was still holding out in Candeia. The doctor told Father Zacarias what had happened, and about Samuel, the outsider. The priest looked up to heaven, utterly convinced.

“A miracle from St. Anthony! He may take his time, but he never fails!”

They painted the church inside and out. It was small; not even thirty people could fit inside it. They brought in laborers from nearby towns. The floor was washed more than four times, scrubbed till the brooms were ruined, and the benches coated with varnish and a lot of poison against the termites, which didn't think to spare a house of God.

Despite the evidence of the apparent miracle, the people of Candeia still believed that St. Anthony brought only misfortune, and no one wanted anything to do with this change. They still nurtured a hatred for the saint who had betrayed them, who hadn't even been strong enough to prevent his own head being left on the ground, far from his body, like any old decapitee. If St. Anthony was so powerful, why did he not make the impossible possible? Why would he allow such misfortune to happen? Those who remained in the town had turned away from Catholicism and learned to love images that had nothing to do with God.

“This is the work of The Enemy!” cried Helenice, who would not refer to Mr. Satan by name.

Adriano got hold of a suit for Samuel, the best man. A suit, tie, shoes, eau de cologne, socks and underpants. He made sure Samuel had a bath, inviting him to his own house to scrub off every last dot of grime. And he even paid for him to get a haircut with the same barber in Canindé who had done the bride's hair. They arrived at the ceremony together, in the same car, under the alert gaze of the curious onlookers, who had been waiting at the door to the church for hours.

Madeinusa was beautiful. Adriano was moved. Samuel, unrecognizable. Now it really was possible to see how handsome this outsider was. In the little church the crowds of women jostled for a glimpse of the saint's messenger. Apart from the priest, the groom, the best man and Francisco, there were hardly any men at the ceremony. Those who reported back later said that there were sixty-four women.

Adriano came out of the church carrying the bride in his arms. She threw the bouquet of plastic flowers, which was pulled apart by a number of women and transformed into several treasured relics of the first new miracle of St. Anthony of Candeia, through his intermediary, Samuel, the carrier of the messages of heaven.