The War Of The End Of The World (63 page)

A knock at the door rouses Abbot João from his thoughts. Catarina removes the plank, held fast by a length of wire, that bars the door, and one of Honório Vilanova’s children appears amid a cloud of dust, white light, and noise.

“My uncle Antônio wants to see the Street Commander,” he says.

“Tell him I’ll be right there,” Abbot João replies.

Such happiness was bound not to last, he thinks, and he can tell from his wife’s face that she is thinking the same thing. He pulls on his coarse cotton pants fastened with leather thongs, his rope sandals, his blouse, and goes out into the street. The bright light of midday blinds him. As always, the women, children, old people sitting at the doors of the dwellings greet him and he waves back. He walks on amid knots of women grinding maize in their mortars together, men conversing in loud voices as they assemble reed flats and fill in the chinks with handfuls of mud to replace walls that have fallen. He even hears a guitar somewhere. He does not need to see them to know that at this moment hundreds of other people are on the banks of the Vaza-Barris and at the Jeremoabo exit, squatting on their haunches clearing the land, tidying up the orchards, ridding the animal pens of rubble. There is almost no debris in the streets, and many huts that were burned down have been rebuilt. “That’s Antônio Vilanova’s doing,” he thinks. The moment the procession celebrating the triumph of Belo Monte over the heretics of the Republic was ended, Antônio Vilanova had taken charge of the squads of volunteers and people from the Catholic Guard, and was out organizing the burial of the dead, the removal of rubble, the rebuilding of the huts and workshops, and the rescue of the sheep, goats, and kids that had scattered in terror. “It’s their doing, too,” Abbot João thinks. “They’ve accepted the situation. They’re heroes.” There they are, untroubled, greeting, smiling at him, and this evening they will hurry to the Temple of the Blessed Jesus to hear the Counselor, as if nothing had happened, as if all these families did not have someone who had been shot to death, run through with a lance, or burned to death in this war, and someone among the countless wounded lying moaning in the Health Houses and in the Church of Santo Antônio now turned into an infirmary.

And then something makes him stop short. He closes his eyes to listen. He is not mistaken; he is not dreaming. The even, harmonious voice goes on reciting. From the depths of his memory, a cascade that swells and becomes a river, something stirring takes shape, materializes in a rush of swords and a dazzle of palaces and luxurious chambers. “The battle of Sir Olivier with Fierabras,” he thinks. It is one of the episodes from the tales of the Twelve Peers of France that he is fondest of, a duel that he hasn’t heard the story of for years and years. The voice of the minstrel is coming from the intersection of Campo Grande and Divino, where many people have gathered. He draws closer, and on recognizing him, people move aside for him. The one who is singing of Olivier’s imprisonment and his duel with Fierabras is a child. No, a dwarf. Tiny, very thin, he is pretending to be strumming a guitar and at the same time is miming the clash of the lances, the knights galloping on their steeds, the courtly bows to Charlemagne the Great. Seated on the ground, with a tin can on her lap, is a woman with long hair, and at her side a bony, bent, mud-spattered creature with the sightless gaze of blind men. He recognizes them: they are the three who appeared with Father Joaquim, the ones whom Antônio Vilanova allows to sleep in the store. He reaches out and touches the little man, who immediately falls silent.

“Do you know the Terrible and Exemplary Story of Robert the Devil?” he asks him.

After a moment’s hesitation, the Dwarf nods.

“I would like to hear you recite it sometime,” the Street Commander says in a reassuring tone of voice. And he breaks into a run to make up for lost time. Here and there, there are shell holes along Campo Grande. The façade of the former steward’s house of Canudos is riddled with bullet holes.

“Praised be the Blessed Jesus,” Abbot João murmurs, sitting down on top of a barrel next to Pajeú. The expression on the
caboclo
’s face is inscrutable, but he notes that Antônio and Honório Vilanova, old Macambira, Big João, and Pedrão are all scowling. Father Joaquim is standing in the middle of them, covered with mud from head to foot, his hair disheveled, and with a growth of beard.

“Did you find out anything in Juazeiro, Father?” he asks him. “Are there more troops coming?”

“As he offered to, Father Maximiliano came from Queimadas and brought me the complete list,” Father Joaquim replies in a hoarse voice. He takes a paper out of his pocket and reads out, panting for breath: “First Brigade: Seventh, Fourteenth, and Third Infantry Battalions, under the command of Colonel Joaquim Manuel de Medeiros. Second Brigade: Sixteenth, Twenty-fifth, and Twenty-seventh Infantry Battalions, under the command of Colonel Inácio Maria Gouveia. Third Brigade: Fifth Artillery Regiment and Fifth and Ninth Infantry Battalions, under the command of Colonel Olímpio da Silveira. Chief of Division: General João da Silva Barboza. Field Commander: General Artur Oscar.”

He stops reading, exhausted and in a daze, and looks at Abbot João. “How many soldiers does that add up to, Father?” the former
cangaceiro
asks.

“Some five thousand men, it would appear,” the little priest stammers. “But those are only the ones that are in Queimadas and Monte Santo. Others are coming from the North, via Sergipe.” He begins reading again, in a quavering voice. “Column under the command of General Cláudio da Amaral Savaget. Three brigades: Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth. Made up of the Twelfth, Thirty-first, and Thirty-third Infantry Battalions, one artillery division, and the Thirty-fourth, Thirty-fifth, Fortieth, Twenty-sixth, Thirty-second Battalions, and another artillery division. Four thousand more men, approximately. They disembarked in Aracaju and are advancing on Jeremoabo. Father Maximiliano was unable to obtain the names of the officers in command. I told him it didn’t matter. It really doesn’t matter, does it, João?”

“Of course not, Father Joaquim,” Abbot João answers. “You’ve managed to obtain excellent information. God will repay you.”

“Father Maximiliano is a good believer,” the little priest murmurs. “He confessed to me that it scared him to do that. I told him that I was more scared than he was.” He gives a forced laugh and immediately adds: “They have a great many problems there in Queimadas, he told me. Too many mouths to feed. They haven’t organized their train yet. They don’t have the wagons, the mule teams to transport the enormous amount of matériel they have. He says it may be weeks before they’re ready to move.”

Abbot João nods. No one speaks. They all appear to be concentrating on the buzzing of the flies and the acrobatics of a wasp that finally lands on Big João’s knee. The black removes it with a flick of his finger. Abbot Jo$$$o is surprised all of a sudden at the chatter of the Vilanovas’ parrot.

“I also met with Dr. Águiar do Nascimento,” Father Joaquim adds. “He said to tell you that the only thing you could do was to disperse people and send them back to their villages before all that armory gets here.” He pauses and takes a fearful sidelong glance at the seven men looking at him respectfully and attentively. “But that if, despite everything, you are going to fight it out with the soldiers, then, yes, he has something to offer you.” He lowers his head, as though fatigue or fear will permit him to say no more.

“A hundred Comblain rifles and twenty-five cases of ammunition,” Antônio Vilanova says. “From the army, brand-new and in their factory cases. They can be brought via Uauá and Bendengó, the road is clear.” He is sweating heavily and wipes his forehead as he speaks. “But there aren’t enough hides or oxen or goats in Canudos to pay the price he’s asking.”

“There are silver and gold jewels,” Abbot João says, reading in the merchant’s eyes what he must have said or thought already, before he arrived.

“They belong to the Virgin and her Son,” Father Joaquim says in an almost inaudible voice. “Isn’t that sacrilege?”

“The Counselor will know whether it is or not,” Abbot João says. “We must ask him.”

“It is always possible to feel even more afraid,” the nearsighted journalist thought. That was the great lesson of these days without hours, of figures without faces, of lights veiled with clouds that his eyes struggled to penetrate until they burned so badly that it was necessary for him to close them and remain in the dark for a while, overcome with despair: discovering what a coward he was. What would his colleagues on the staff of the
Jornal de Notícias
, the
Diário da Bahia, O Republicano
say if they knew that? He had won the reputation among them of being a fearless reporter, ever in search of new experiences: he had been one of the first to attend
candomblé
rites—voodoo ceremonies—in whatever out-of-the-way back street or hamlet they might be held, in an era in which the religious practices of blacks aroused only fear or disgust among the whites of Bahia, a dogged frequenter of sorcerers and witches, and one of the first to take up smoking opium. Had it not been his spirit of adventure that had led him to volunteer to go to Juazeiro to interview the survivors of Lieutenant Pires Ferreira’s military expedition, was it not he himself who had proposed to Epaminondas Gonçalves that he accompany Moreira César? “I’m the greatest coward in the whole world,” he thought. The Dwarf went on recounting the adventures, the misadventures, the gallant deeds of Olivier and Fierabras. The vague shapes—he was unable to make out whether they were men or women—stood there, not moving, and it was evident that the recital of the tale held them spellbound, outside of time and outside of Canudos. How was it possible that here, at the very end of the world, he was hearing, recited by a dwarf who no doubt did not know how to read, a romance from the Round Table cycle brought here centuries before by some sailor or some young graduate of Coimbra? What other surprises did the
sertão
hold in store for him?

His stomach growled and he wondered whether the audience would give them enough money for a meal. That was another discovery he had made in these days that had taught him so many lessons: the fact that food could be a primary concern, capable of occupying all his thoughts for hours on end, and at times a greater source of anxiety than the semi-blindness in which the breaking of his glasses had plunged him, that state in which he stumbled over everything and everyone, which left his body full of bruises from crashing into indiscernible objects and shapes that got in his way and obliged him to continually apologize, saying I’m sorry, I can’t see, I beg your pardon, to appease any possible anger that might be forthcoming.

The Dwarf interrupted his recital and indicated that in order to go on with the story—the journalist pictured in his mind his imploring gestures, the pleading expressions on his face—he required nourishment. The journalist’s entire body went into action. His right hand moved toward Jurema and touched her. He did this many times a day, every time something new happened, since it was on the threshold of the novel and unpredictable that his fear—always lurking—would again take possession of him. It was merely a quick brush of his fingertips, to reassure him, for this woman was his only hope now that Father Joaquim seemed to be definitely out of reach; she was the one who looked after him and made him feel less helpless. He and the Dwarf were a bother to Jurema. Why didn’t she go off and leave them? Out of generosity? No, out of apathy doubtless, out of that terrible indolence into which she seemed to have sunk. But with his clowning the Dwarf at least managed to obtain for them those handfuls of maize flour or sun-dried goat meat that kept them alive. He himself was the only totally useless one, whom sooner or later the woman would get rid of.

After making a few jokes that no one laughed at, the Dwarf went back to reciting the story of Olivier. The nearsighted journalist felt the touch of Jurema’s hand and instantly opened his. He immediately put the vague shape that appeared to be a hard crust of bread in his mouth. He chewed stubbornly, greedily, his entire mind concentrated on that pap that gradually formed in his mouth, that he swallowed with difficulty and with a happy heart. He thought: “If I survive, I shall hate her, I shall curse even the flowers that have the same name she does.” Because Jurema knew the extent of his cowardice, the extremes to which it could drive him. As he chewed, slowly, avidly, happily, fearfully, he remembered the first night in Canudos, the half-blind, exhausted person with legs of sawdust that he had been, stumbling, falling, dazed and deafened by the tumult of voices shouting “Long live the Counselor.” He had suddenly been caught up in a swirling confusion of smells, sputtering, oily points of light, and the swelling chorus of litanies. Then, just as suddenly, complete silence fell. “It’s him, it’s the Counselor.” He gripped that hand he had not let go of all day so tightly that the woman said: “Let go of me, let me go.” Later, when the hoarse voice stopped speaking and the crowd began to disperse, he, Jurema, and the Dwarf collapsed right in the middle of the open square between the churches. They had lost the curé of Cumbe, who had been joyously swept along by the crowd as they entered Canudos. During his sermon, the Counselor thanked heaven for bringing him back to Canudos, for restoring him to life, and the nearsighted journalist presumed that Father Joaquim was there at the saint’s side on the dais, platform, or tower from which he was preaching. Moreira César was right, after all: the little priest was a
jagunço
, he was one of them. It had been at that moment that he had begun to cry. He had sobbed his heart out, as he could not even imagine himself having done as a child, begging the woman to help him get out of Canudos. He offered her clothes, a house, anything if she would promise not to abandon him, half blind and half dead from hunger. Yes, she knew that fear turned him into a despicable creature capable of anything in order to arouse her compassion.