If I Close My Eyes Now (23 page)

When they left the cinema they were hit by the cold night air that had emptied the streets. Ubiratan paused for a few minutes in front of the billboard of
La Dolce Vita
, while an excited Paulo went on ahead with Eduardo.

‘… And those breasts! Did you see what huge breasts she had, Eduardo? Did you see what tits that blonde had? Well, Eduardo? Did you see the size of them? That time she went to … ?’

Eduardo said nothing; he was still sniffling in secret. Paulo was talking so much he didn’t notice. Ubiratan caught up with them. The two boys began walking slowly the way the old man did, under a bright, starry sky. Paulo continued with his excited account of the film.

‘… What about that party? Do you remember that dark-haired woman riding on the back of the guy on all fours? She was a bit old, but she was still gorgeous. Not as gorgeous as the blonde one. She was the best of all of them, the most gorgeous of all the women the journalist picked up. Much better than his wife, the one with light-blue eyes, wasn’t she, Eduardo? Don’t you think so?’

Eduardo couldn’t remember ever having seen his friend so talkative. And the things he was saying! The two of them had talked about women, had shared their doubts about what they would do when they were grown up and went with one, had discussed whether a girl’s thing was just under her belly button or hidden further down, but … Never like this. Never so confidently.

‘… And when the guy with the blond beard picked her up, that time when she was whirling through the air, just like in a circus, don’t you think she was the most absolutely gorgeous, the most beautiful woman you have ever seen, Eduardo? Don’t you?’

‘I … I liked … I thought that scene with the fish was nice. When the little girl says farewell to him, waving to him from the far river bank.’

‘It was a beach.’

‘Wasn’t it a river? I don’t think I saw it properly. But she, the young girl, was very nice.’

‘She was only a kid. Not a real woman.’

Without noticing, they had taken up position on either side of the old man, who was still walking along in silence. Paulo’s voice grew louder and louder.

‘… that blonde woman going into the fountain with all her clothes on, and calling to him: I liked that scene too, that big fountain, and him jumping in to meet her in the middle of the water. And her dressed as a priest, walking up those steps, what about that? What did you think of that? Ah, and there was that scene where I thought, you know, I liked it, the one where Christ flies through the air suspended from a helicopter! I think it was really funny, with those women in bikinis waving and blowing kisses to the statue of Jesus, I thought that was really funny! Did you like it?’

‘Yes … I did. But I don’t think they were blowing kisses to the Christ.’

‘Yes, they were. And they were shouting things I couldn’t understand to the journalist in the helicopter. And do you
remember when he was running up the steps inside the church after the blonde woman dressed as a priest? What did you think of that scene when the journalist tried to get hold of her inside the church, when she was dressed as a priest and everything, eh, Eduardo? He wanted to kiss her, didn’t he? Did you like that?’

‘Yes, I did. But there were some boring bits as well.’

‘Yes, there were. The scene with the white kitten on her head and her walking around the streets was pretty boring. Nothing happens, she simply walks around, from one side of the street to the other. And that strange Japanese dance in the nightclub, near the beginning, do you remember that, before the skinny dark-haired woman appears, the one in dark glasses? I thought that was boring too.’

‘The journalist wears dark glasses as well.’

‘And the scene with that guy who plays the organ and talks and talks, while he’s in the church? That was the most boring of all.’

‘I couldn’t work out why that man killed himself.’

He looked over towards Ubiratan, who said nothing.

‘He had a pretty wife …’ said Eduardo, trying to fit the character into models he understood. ‘He had children, and friends … There was nothing wrong with his life. Or was there?’

He looked at Ubiratan once more, but there was no response.

‘He had no reason to kill himself, did he?’

His question was aimed at neither of them in particular. Paulo ignored it, still enthralled by the intoxicating images of
Anita Ekberg and the euphoria of his first erection. Realizing that the idea of a chosen death was a threatening concept for a boy inclined to melancholy, Ubiratan simply said, in all sincerity:

‘It’s important not to believe, ever, that you can’t go on. Always, Eduardo, you must always go on.’

They reached the end of the slope, opposite the Maria Beatriz Marques Torres School.

‘I liked the look of being a journalist,’ said Paulo, still enchanted by the film. ‘A convertible, lots of girlfriends and parties, work only when he felt like it, trips all over the place … I think I’m going to be a journalist.’

‘What about medicine?’ Eduardo interrupted him. ‘Are you going to give up medicine just like that? Have you forgotten all those incurable diseases?’

‘Medicine!’ said Paulo, his eyes opening wide. ‘Oh, my God!’

‘What’s the matter?’

‘The science test, Eduardo! It’s tomorrow!’

‘Yes, I know.’

‘I haven’t studied at all!’

Eduardo went up to Paulo and, imitating Ubiratan, shrugged his shoulders and said:

‘You’ll have to find a way.’

All three of them laughed. Eduardo was pleasantly surprised at the pleasure he got from a sense of humour he did not know he possessed. When they had finished laughing, he said goodbye and went off towards his home. Ubiratan and Paulo walked on a few more streets, until they reached the city jail.

‘OK, here’s where I leave you.’

‘Hmm, hmm,’ Ubiratan concurred.

‘Will we see you tomorrow?’

‘Hmm. Hmm.’

‘What about our investigation? Are we going on with it?’

‘Hmm. Hmm.’

‘He didn’t kill himself, did he?’

‘We’ll talk tomorrow about everything that’s happened today. Go home now, Paulo. It’s late.’

‘Before now you never thought this time of night was late.’

‘Today wasn’t a day like the others.’

‘Why do you never talk like other people?’

‘Hmm?’

‘Why don’t you ever answer questions the way others do?’

‘And how do they answer them?’

‘Why do you never say yes or no, like everybody else?’

‘Not every question can be answered with a yes or no, Paulo.’

‘Every time I talk about something with you, you make me think of something else, beyond it.’

‘That’s good.’

‘Why good? All it does is fill my head with questions.’

‘That’s better than having it filled with answers. Good night, Paulo.’

‘Good night,’ he replied, watching the white-haired man amble into the distance. He gave a last glance at the run-down police station building, and started on his way home, at first muttering about the impenetrable adult world, and then, as the
voluptuous images from the film flooded back into his mind, he felt overwhelmed by an inexplicable sense of joy.

‘What a pair of tits!’ he sighed into the darkness.

PAULO STOOD UP
, the science test in one hand, his dog-eared books and textbooks in the other, as two other pupils got up to leave the chemistry classroom. He walked up with them, left his test on the teacher’s desk, turned and went out of the room.

Exactly as we agreed, thought Eduardo.

Now came his part.

One by one, he checked the answers he had given on each page of the two sets of foolscap paper on his desk. Almost all of them correct. Then he scribbled on one set, rubbing things out and dirtying parts of it, before carefully signing it. He placed the paper under the other impeccably composed and written set of answers, and signed these nonchalantly, without thinking. He waited, pretending to be rereading it.

When two girls stood up, Eduardo did the same. He reached the teacher’s desk in time to place the two tests on it, one signed with his name and the other with Paulo’s, just before the girls covered them with their own. No one, least of
all the teacher, Ronaldo Abreu, had noticed that Paulo had merely pretended to hand his in earlier.

This was Eduardo’s greatest feat so far: to write a whole exam in someone else’s handwriting. He considered, jokingly but with a slight twinge of genuine pride, whether perhaps he should abandon his plans of studying to be an engineer and become the world’s greatest forger instead.

The priest in the threadbare cassock finished the prayer, closed the black-backed book, blessed the coffin. He cast a swift glance at the police sergeant beside him, and made the sign of the cross before withdrawing, passing close to the gravediggers who were already shovelling earth on the casket. The policeman waited a few minutes longer, then he also left, stepping over the edge of the grave to reach the avenue.

The gravediggers went on working unhurriedly, taking little care and showing no interest in what they were doing. It didn’t take long for them to fill the grave dug the previous day. One of them banged a wooden cross into the mound of red earth; the other picked up their spades, and they walked away together.

The woman dressed in black stayed on for a while. In her old-fashioned dress, with short kid gloves, her face shaded by the veil draped from her hat, she looked like a character from an old silent film. She didn’t seem to be praying, and was certainly not crying, yet she didn’t appear to want to leave
either. Finally, risking her suede shoes in the soil scattered round the hole, she began to walk away.

When she reached the stone cross, she stopped. She opened the bag on her arm, took out a silver cigarette case and a mother-of-pearl holder, and placed a cigarette in it. She lifted the veil up to her eyes, then put the holder between her crimson lips. Sliding the case back in the bag, she took out a gold-plated lighter. She lit the cigarette, and inhaled so deeply that the tip soon glowed brightly. She kept the smoke in her lungs for a while, then blew it out. Clasping the holder in her gloved hands, she headed for the arch where the Virgin Mary stood, surrounded by disembodied cherubs and with the evil serpent beneath her feet. It was there she came face to face with Ubiratan.

Hanna Wizorek slowed down, and for a brief instant it seemed she was going to come to a stop. But she merely glanced at him blankly before taking another puff on her cigarette and continuing on her way. She was soon outside the cemetery, walking past the black iron railings.

Ubiratan caught up with her.

They walked side by side down the empty street, without exchanging a word. Anyone seeing them would have thought they were out for a stroll together.

‘Sad, isn’t it?’ said Ubiratan finally.

She gave another pull on her cigarette, openly ignoring him, her head turned in the opposite direction.

‘Very sad that such a generous person should take his own life. A dentist, a man from the best circles, buried in an unmarked grave like a pauper. Don’t you think that’s a shame?’

She blew the smoke high into the air, without replying. The hot morning sun revealed a mass of fine lines at the corners of her painted lips. The lipstick started to ooze down them.

‘No friends came, no relatives. As far as I could tell, not even the poor people he treated for nothing came to pay their last respects. Nobody came to the dentist’s funeral. Doesn’t that seem sad to you?’

There was no reply this time either. Ubiratan’s nostrils detected a strong aroma of rice powder, sickly-sweet perfume and camphor exuding from her and her clothes.

‘That is, no one except the priest, the policeman and you.’

Hanna continued on her silent walk. Her high-heeled, old-fashioned shoes clacked rhythmically along the pavement.

‘Strange. Very strange.’

She raised the holder to her mouth, inhaled deeply again, and still refused to look at him.

‘Of course, deep down I can understand perfectly well why nobody came to the funeral. After all, the dentist wasn’t the understanding, charitable man he appeared to be. In all truth, he was a crook. A murderer. He killed his own wife. A man like that doesn’t deserve to have his old friends turn up at his burial. The lack of colleagues from the past is perfectly natural, isn’t it?’

She blew out the smoke, still without a word.

‘Strange that a priest did come though …’

She inhaled again, more quickly this time.

‘I noticed that you didn’t pray, which means you can’t be a Catholic. Nor am I. I don’t know if you have another religion. I don’t; I’m an atheist. But I worked in a Catholic school so I
know some of the taboos – or more exactly, some of the precepts of the Church. I know, for example, that it forbids any religious ceremony for suicides.’

Hanna came to a halt, the cigarette smoke seeping out of her nostrils. With a dramatic gesture, she tore the cigarette out of the holder and threw it to the ground. She crushed it with the tip of her shoe.

‘But the priest prayed at the graveside and blessed the coffin. He can’t have done that on his own initiative. All I can imagine is that the monsignor gave special permission. That’s the only explanation that occurs to me. What do you think, Madame Wizorek?’