The Double Death of Quincas Water-Bray (7 page)

She arose from the chair and called to Marocas: “Let’s go.” And to Leonardo: “Don’t stay too late. You can’t spend the whole night. Uncle Eduardo has already said he’d stay the whole time.”

Eduardo, taking over the chair, agreed. Leonardo went along to see them to the streetcar. Corporal Martim ventured a “Good night, ladies,” but got no response. Only the candles were lighting up the room. Bangs Blackie was sleeping, giving off a fearsome snore.

At ten o’clock Leonardo got up from the kerosene can and went over to the candles, looking at his watch. He woke up Eduardo, who was sleeping with his mouth open, uncomfortable in the chair.

“I’m leaving. I’ll be back in the morning, at six, to give you some time to go home and change your clothes.”

Eduardo stretched his legs, thinking about his bed. His neck hurt. In the corner of the room Sparrow, Swifty, and Corporal Martim were talking in low voices, having a heated argument: Which one of them was going to take Quincas’s place in Quitéria Goggle-Eye’s bed? Corporal Martim, exhibiting a revolting selfishness, would not accept being scratched from the list just because he was in possession of the heart and the slim body of little black Carmela. When the sound of Leonardo’s steps had disappeared onto the street, Eduardo looked at the group. The argument came to a halt. Corporal Martim smiled at the storekeeper. The latter was looking with envy at Bangs Blackie, lost in the best of sleeps. He settled himself in the chair again and put his feet on the kerosene can. His neck still hurt. Swifty couldn’t resist. He took the frog out of his pocket and put it on the floor. It took a leap. It was funny. It looked like a spook loose in the room. Eduardo couldn’t manage any sleep. He looked at the dead man, motionless in the coffin.
He was the only one who was comfortably lying down. What the devil was he, Eduardo, doing there playing watchman? Wasn’t it enough to go to the burial? Wasn’t he paying part of the expenses? He was going beyond his brotherly duties, especially for a brother like Quincas, who was an annoyance to his life.

He stood up and moved his limbs about, opened his mouth in a yawn. Swifty was hiding the little green frog in his hand. Sparrow was thinking about Quitéria Goggle-Eye. A woman and lots of it.…

Eduardo turned to face them. “Tell me something…”

Corporal Martim, a psychologist by nature and by necessity, came to attention. “At your orders, commandant, sir.” Who knows, maybe the merchant would send out for some drinks to help pass the long night.

“Are you all planning to spend the night here?”

“With him? Yes, sir. We were friends.”

“Then I’m going to go home and get a little rest.” He put his hand in his pocket and took out a bill. The eyes of the corporal, Sparrow, and Swifty were following his movements. “Here’s something for you to buy some sandwiches with. But don’t leave him alone, not for one minute, eh?”

“You can rest easy. We’ll keep him company.”

Before they began their drinking, Sparrow and Swifty lit cigarettes and Corporal Martim one of those fifty-centavo cigars, black and strong, the kind only real smokers could appreciate. The powerful smoke passed across the black man’s nostrils, but not even then did Bangs wake up. As soon as they uncorked the cachaça (the disputed first bottle that, according to the family, the corporal had brought in under his shirt), Bangs Blackie opened his eyes and demanded a drink.

The first round brought out a critical spirit in the four
friends. That stuck-up family of Quincas’s had shown itself to be stingy and greedy. They did everything halfway. Where were the chairs for visitors to sit in? Where were the usual food and drink they have at poor people’s wakes? Martim had served as watch for many wakes. He’d never seen one with such a lack of activity. Even at the poorest of them, they served at least coffee and a swig of cachaça. Quincas didn’t deserve such treatment. What did it get them to belch out their importance and then leave the dead man in that humiliation, with nothing to offer his friends? Sparrow and Swifty went to get something to sit on and some food. Corporal Martim thought it necessary at least to organize the wake with a minimum of decorum. Sitting in the chair, he gave orders: some crates and bottles. Bangs Blackie was on the kerosene can, and he nodded his approval.

It must be confessed, however, that with regard to the corpse itself, the family had behaved quite well. New clothes, new shoes—all of it elegant. And nice candles, the church kind. Even so, they’d forgotten the flowers. Where did you ever see a corpse without flowers?

“He looks like a gentleman,” Bangs Blackie said proudly. “An elegant dead man!”

Quincas smiled at the praise.

The black man returned his smile. “Little Papa…,” he said, lovingly poking him in the ribs, the way he used to when he’d just heard one of Quincas’s good stories.

Sparrow and Swifty returned with some crates, a chunk of salami, and some full bottles. They stood in a semicircle around the dead man, and then Sparrow suggested they say an Our Father together. He managed, with a surprising effort of memory, to remember the prayer almost in its entirety. The others followed along, showing little conviction. It didn’t look all that easy for them. Bangs Blackie knew
some drumbeats for Oxum and Oxalá, but his religious training hadn’t gone much further than that. It had been some thirty years since the last time Swifty had prayed. Corporal Martim considered prayers and churches weaknesses, not very much in keeping with military life. Even so, they made an attempt, with Sparrow leading the prayer and the others responding as best they could. Finally, Sparrow, who had knelt and lowered his head in contrition, grew annoyed.

“You bunch of boobs!”

“A lack of training,” the corporal explained. “But it did amount to something. The priest will take care of the rest tomorrow.”

Quincas seemed indifferent to the prayer. It must have been hot for him in those heavy clothes. Bangs Blackie looked his friend over. They had to do something for him now, because the prayer hadn’t worked. Should they sing a chant from
candomblé
maybe? They had to do something. He asked Swifty, “Where’s the toad? Take him out.”

“He’s not a toad; he’s a frog. What good will he be?”

“Maybe Quincas will like him.”

Swifty carefully took out the frog and placed him on Quincas’s crossed hands. The animal leaped and nestled himself in the bottom of the coffin. When the wavy light from the candles hit his body, green flashes of light ran over the corpse.

The argument over Quitéria Goggle-Eye started up again. Sparrow was more combative after a few drinks. He raised his voice in defense of his interests.

Bangs Blackie complained: “Aren’t you two ashamed to be arguing about his woman in front of him? Him still warm and you like a couple of vultures.”

“He’s the one who should decide,” Swifty said. He was hopeful that Quincas would choose him to inherit Quitéria,
his only possession. Hadn’t he just brought him the prettiest green frog he’d ever caught?

“Unh!” said the dead man.

“You see? He doesn’t like this talk,” the black man scolded.

“Let’s give him a drink too,” the corporal proposed, desirous to be in the dead man’s good graces.

They opened his mouth and poured in the cachaça. A little spilled onto his coat collar and shirtfront.

“I never saw anyone drink on his back.”

“It would be best to prop him up. Then he can look right at us.”

They sat Quincas up in the coffin, his head lolling from one side to the other. With the swig of cachaça his smile had grown broader.

“Nice jacket,” Corporal Martim said, examining the material. “It’s foolish to put new clothes on a dead man. He died, he’s finished, he’s going six feet under. New clothes for the worms to eat while there are so many people in need…”

Words full of truth, they thought. They gave Quincas another drink. The dead man nodded. He was a man who could agree with someone who was right. He was obviously in agreement with what Martim had been saying.

“He’s ruining the clothes.”

“It would be better if we took off the jacket so it won’t get all messed up.”

Quincas seemed relieved when they took off the heavy, hot, black coat jacket. But since he was still spitting up cachaça, they took his shirt off too. Sparrow had fallen in love with the shiny shoes. His were a shamble. What does a dead man need with new shoes, eh, Quincas?

“They’re just the right size for my feet,” said Sparrow.

Bangs Blackie picked up his friend’s old clothes, which had been lying in a corner of the room, and together they put them on him. Then they recognized him.

“There now. Yes, that’s the old Quincas.”

They felt happy. Quincas seemed happier too, rid of those uncomfortable clothes. He was especially grateful to Sparrow because the shoes had been pinching his feet. The street peddler took advantage of this and put his mouth close to Quincas’s ear, whispering something about Quitéria. What had he done that for? Bangs Blackie had been right that talk about the whore would irritate Quincas. He became violent, spitting out a gush of cachaça into Sparrow’s ear. The others shuddered, scared.

“He’s mad.”

“What did I tell you?”

Swifty finished putting on the new shoes. Corporal Martim got the jacket. Bangs Blackie would exchange the shirt for a bottle of cachaça in a shop he knew. They were sorry he didn’t have any underwear on. Corporal Martim spoke quite to the point when he said to Quincas, “I don’t mean to say anything bad, but that family of yours is a tad stingy. I think your son-in-low made off with your underwear.”

“Tightwads,” Quincas corrected.

“Since you say so yourself, it must be true. We didn’t mean to offend them. After all, they
are
your relatives. But so stingy, so chinchy…buying our own drinks. Where did you ever see a wake like this?”

“Not even a single flower,” Blackie agreed. “I’m glad I haven’t got relatives like that lot.”

“The men are blockheads and the women vipers,” Quincas defined with precision.

“Look, little Papa, the chubby one might be worth a few puffs. She’s got a nice rear end.”

“A fart-sack.”

“Don’t say that, little Papa. She may be a little on the fat side, but that’s no reason to put her down. I’ve seen worse.”

“You dumb nigger, you couldn’t tell a pretty woman if you were looking right at her.”

Swifty, with no sense of the proper moment, spoke up. “Quitéria’s pretty, isn’t she, old man? What’s she going to do now? I was thinking…”

“Shut your mouth, you bastard! Can’t you see he’s getting mad?”

But Quincas wasn’t listening. He had turned his head toward Corporal Martim, who at that very moment was trying to steal his turn in the distribution of drinks. Quincas almost knocked the bottle over with his head.

“Give little Papa his cachaça,” Bangs Blackie demanded.

“He was spilling it,” the corporal explained.

“He can drink it any way he wants to. That’s his right.”

Corporal Martim put the bottle to Quincas’s open mouth. “Take it easy, old chum. I wasn’t trying to cheat you. There you are. Drink all you want. It’s your party, after all.”

They’d dropped the argument over Quitéria. From the looks of it, Quincas wouldn’t even let them mention the matter.

“Good stuff!” Sparrow praised.

“Crummy!” corrected Quincas, a connoisseur.

“A good price too.”

The frog had leaped onto Quincas’s chest. Quincas was admiring it. It didn’t take long for him to tuck it away in the pocket of his old, greasy coat.

The moon had come up over the city and its waters. The Bahia moon, with its flow of silver, was coming in through the window. The sea breeze came in along with it and put out the candles. You couldn’t see the coffin anymore. The melody from some guitars was coming down the hillside;
the voice of a woman was singing the sorrows of love. Corporal Martim began singing too.

“He loved to hear a good song…”

All four of them were singing. Bangs Blackie’s bass voice carried on down beyond the hillside to where the skiffs were. They were drinking and singing. Quincas didn’t miss a single swig or a single note. He liked music.

When they’d had their fill of all the singing, Sparrow asked, “Wasn’t tonight the night for Master Manuel’s
moqueca
fish stew?”

“Right. Today. A
moqueca
with ray fish,” Swifty emphasized.

“Nobody can make
moqueca
like Maria Clara,” the corporal affirmed.

Quincas stuck out his tongue. Bangs Blackie laughed. “He’s crazy about
moqueca
.”

“So why don’t we go? Master Manuel might be offended.”

They looked at one another. They would already be a little late because they still had to pick up the women.

Sparrow expressed some doubt. “We promised not to leave him all alone.”

“All alone? What do you mean? He’s coming with us.”

“I’m hungry,” said Bangs Blackie.

They consulted Quincas.

“Do you want to come?”

“You think I’m a cripple, staying behind here?”

After a drink to empty the bottle, they stood Quincas up. Bangs Blackie commented, “He’s so drunk he can’t handle it. At his age he’s losing his capacity for cachaça. Let’s go, little Papa.”

Sparrow and Swifty went ahead. Quincas, satisfied with life, was doing a dance step between Bangs Blackie and Corporal Martim, holding their arms.

From the way things were going, it was looking to be a memorable, even unforgettable, night. Quincas Water-Bray was having one of his best days. An unusual enthusiasm came over the group—they felt themselves to be the lords of that fantastic night, with the moon wrapping the city of Bahia in mystery. On the Ladeira do Pelourinho, couples hid in ancient doorways, cats yowled on roofs, guitars wailed their serenades. It was a night of enchantment, as distant drumbeats sounded and the Pelourinho, where the pillory once stood, looked like a phantasmagoric stage set.

Quincas Water-Bray, enjoying himself mightily, was trying to trip up the corporal and the black man. He was sticking out his tongue at passersby and tipping his head into doorways for a leer at lovers. With every step he took, he felt like lying down on the street. The five friends had lost their sense of haste. It was as though time belonged to them completely, like they were beyond the bounds of any calendar and that magical Bahian night would last for at least a week. Because, as Bangs Blackie affirmed, the birthday of Quincas Water-Bray couldn’t be celebrated in the short span of a few hours. Quincas hadn’t denied it was his birthday in spite of the fact they weren’t too sure when they had celebrated it in previous years. But they had celebrated, that was for sure, Sparrow’s multiple engagements, the birthdays
of Maria Clara and Quitéria, and, once, a scientific discovery by one of Swifty’s customers. In the joy of his accomplishment, the scientist had placed a bill of fifty in the hand of his “humble collaborator.” As for Quincas’s birthday, it might be the first time they would be celebrating it, and they had to do it right. They were going along the Ladeira do Pelourinho on their way to Quitéria’s house.