The War of the End of the World

  He reached the edge of her bed without awakening her. There was a dim light in the room—the glow from the gas lamp out in the street, which took on a blue tinge as it filtered through the curtains—and the baron could make out the woman’s sleeping form, lying on her side, the sheets rising and falling with her breathing, her head resting on a little round pillow. Her long loose black hair fanned out across the bed and over the side, touching the floor. The thought came to him that he had never seen Sebastiana standing up with her hair undone, that it must no doubt reach to her heels, and that at one time or another, before a mirror or before Estela, she must surely have played at enveloping herself in this long hair as though in a silken mantle, and the image began to arouse a dormant instinct in him. He raised his hands to his belly and felt his member: it was flaccid, but in its warmth, its complaisance, the swiftness and the feeling close to joy with which he unsheathed the glans from the prepuce, he sensed a profound life, yearning to be called forth, reawakened, poured out. The things he had been afraid of as he approached—what would the servant’s reaction be? what would Estela’s be if Sebastiana woke up screaming?—disappeared instantly and, as startling as a hallucination, the face of Galileo Gall flashed before his mind and he remembered the vow of chastity that the revolutionary had sworn to himself in order to concentrate his energies on things he believed to be of a higher order—action, science. “I have been as stupid as he was,” he thought. Without ever having sworn to do so, he had kept a similar vow for a very long time, renouncing pleasure, happiness, in favor of that base occupation that had brought misfortune to the person he loved most dearly in this world.

  Without thinking, automatically, he bent over and sat down on the edge of the bed, at the same time moving his two hands, one downward to pull back the sheets covering Sebastiana, and the other toward her mouth to stifle her cry. The woman shrank away, lay there rigid, and opened her eyes, and a wave of warmth, the intimate aura of Sebastiana’s body reached his nostrils; he had never been this close to her before, and immediately he felt his member come to life, and it was as though he were also suddenly aware that his testicles existed, that they, too, were there, coming back to life between his legs. Sebastiana had been unable to cry out, to sit up: only to utter a muffled exclamation that brought the warm air of her breath against the palm of the hand that he was holding a fraction of an inch away from her mouth.

  “Don’t scream; it’s best if you don’t scream,” he murmured. He could hear that his voice was not firm, but what was making it tremble was not hesitation but desire. “I beg you not to scream.”

  With the hand that had pulled the sheets back, through her nightdress buttoned all the way up to the neck, he now fondled Sebastiana’s breasts: they were large, well proportioned, extraordinarily firm for a woman who must be close to forty years old; he felt the nipples grow hard, shiver from the cold beneath his fingertips. He ran his fingers along the ridge of her nose, her lips, her eyebrows, with the most delicate touch of which he was capable, and finally sank them in the tangle of hair and gently wound her locks round them. Meanwhile, he tried to exorcise with a smile the tremendous fear he saw in the woman’s stunned, incredulous gaze.

  “I should have done this a long time ago, Sebastiana,” he said, brushing her cheeks with his lips. “I should have done it the very first day I desired you. I would have been happier, Estela would have been happier, and perhaps you would have been, too.”

  He brought his face down, his lips seeking the woman’s, but struggling to break the hold of fear and surprise that had paralyzed her, she moved away, and as he read the plea in her eyes he heard her stammer: “I beg you, in the name of what you love most, I implore you…The senhora, the senhora.”

  “The senhora is there and I love her more than you,” he heard himself say, but had the sensation that it was someone else who was speaking, and still trying to think; he for his part was merely that body in heat, that member, completely roused now, that he felt bounding against his belly, erect and hard and wet. “I’m also doing this for her, although you may not be able to understand that.”

  Fondling her breasts, he had found the buttons of her nightdress and was popping them out of their little buttonholes, one after the other, as with his other hand he took Sebastiana by the nape of the neck and forced her to turn her head and offer him her lips. He could feel that they were ice-cold and tightly pressed together, and noted that the servant’s teeth were chattering, that she was trembling all over, and that in the space of a few seconds she had become drenched with sweat.

  “Open your mouth,” he ordered her, in a tone of voice that he had very seldom used in his life when speaking to servants, or to slaves when he had had them. “If I must force you to be docile, I shall do so.”

  He felt the servant—conditioned, doubtless by a habit, a fear, or an instinct of self-preservation that had come down to her from the depths of time, along with a centuries-old tradition that his tone of voice had succeeded in reminding her of—obey him, as at the same time her face, in the blue shadow of the alcove, contorted in a grimace in which fear was mingled now with infinite repulsion. But this did not matter to him as he forced his tongue inside her mouth, met hers violently, pushed it back and forth from one side to the other, explored her gums, her palate, tried his best to introduce a little of his saliva into her mouth and then suck it back and swallow it. Meanwhile, he had gone on ripping the buttons from her nightdress and trying to remove it. But though Sebastiana’s spirit and her mouth had yielded to his will, her entire body continued to resist, despite her fear, or perhaps because an even greater fear than the one that had taught her to bow to the will of any person who had power over her made her defend what he was trying to take from her. Her body was still hunched over, rigid, and the baron, who had lain down in the bed and was trying to embrace her, felt himself stopped by Sebastiana’s arms, held like a shield in front of her body. He heard her say something in a pleading, muffled whisper and he was sure that she had begun to cry. But he was concentrating his entire attention now on trying to remove her nightdress, which he was having difficulty pulling down past her shoulders. He had been able to put one arm around her waist and draw her to him, forcing her to press her body against his, as with his other hand he went on tugging the nightdress off. After a struggle—he could not have said how long it lasted—during which, as he pushed and pulled, his energy and his desire grew greater and greater by the moment, he finally managed to climb on top of Sebastiana. As he forced her legs, pressed as tightly together as though they were brazed, apart with one of his, he avidly kissed her neck, her shoulders, her bosom, and, lingeringly, her breasts. He felt himself about to ejaculate against her belly—an ample, warm, soft form against which his rod was rubbing—and closed his eyes and made a great effort to hold back. He managed to, and then slid all over Sebastiana’s body, caressing her, sniffing her, kissing her haunches, her groin, her belly, the hairs of her pubis, afterward discovering them in his mouth, thick and curly. With his hands, his chin, he pressed down with all his strength, hearing her sobs, until he had made her part her thighs enough for his mouth to reach her vulva. As he was kissing it, sucking gently, burying his tongue in it, sucking its juices, overcome by an intoxication that, at long last, freed him of everything that was making him sad and bitter, of those images that were eating his life away, he felt the gentle pressure of fingers on his back. He turned his head and looked, knowing what he would see: Estela standing there looking at him.

  “Estela, my love, my love,” he said tenderly, feeling his saliva and Sebastiana’s juices running down his lips, still kneeling on the floor beside the bed, still holding the servant’s legs apart with his elbows. “I love you, more than anything else in the world. I am doing this because I have wanted to for a long time, and out of love for you. To be closer to you, my darling.”

  He felt Sebastiana’s body shaking convulsively and heard her sobbing desperately, her mouth and eyes hidden in her hands, and he saw t
he baroness, standing motionless at his side, observing him. She did not appear to be frightened, enraged, horrified—merely mildly intrigued. She was wearing a light nightdress, beneath which he could dimly make out in the half light the faint outlines of her body, which time had not contrived to deform—a still harmonious, shapely silhouette—and her fair hair, with none of the gray visible in the dim light, caught up in a hairnet with a few stray locks peeking out. As far as he could see, her forehead was not furrowed by that single deep wrinkle that was an unmistakable sign that she was greatly annoyed, the sole manifestation of her real feelings that Estela had never succeeded in controlling. She was not frowning; her lips, however, were slightly parted, emphasizing the interest, the curiosity, the calm surprise in her eyes. But what was new, however minute a sign it might appear to be, was this turning outward, this interest in something outside herself, for since that night in Calumbi the baron had never seen any other expression in the baroness’s eyes save indifference, withdrawal, a retreat of the spirit. Her paleness was more pronounced now, perhaps because of the blue half shadow, perhaps because of what she was experiencing. The baron felt all choked up with emotion and about to burst into sobs. He could just make out Estela’s bare white feet on the polished wood floor, and on impulse bent down to kiss them. The baroness did not move as he knelt there at her feet, covering her insteps, her toes, her toenails, her heels with kisses, pressing his lips to them with infinite love and reverence and stammering in a voice full of ardor that he loved them, and that they had always seemed extremely beautiful to him, worthy of intense worship for having given him, all during their life together, such unrequitable pleasure. On kissing them yet again and raising his lips to her frail ankles, he felt his wife move and immediately lifted his head, in time to see that the hand that had touched him on the back before was coming toward him once again, without haste or abruptness, with that naturalness, distinction, discretion with which Estela had always moved, spoken, conducted herself. He felt it alight on his hair and remain there, its touch soft and conciliatory, a contact for which he felt the most heartfelt gratitude because there was nothing hostile or reproving about it; on the contrary, it was loving, affectionate, tolerant. His desire, which had vanished completely, again made its appearance and the baron felt his penis become hard again. He took the hand that Estela had placed on his head, raised it to his lips, kissed it, and without letting go of it, turned back toward the bed where Sebastiana was still curled up in a ball with her face hidden, and stretching out his free hand he placed it on the pubis whose pronounced blackness was such a striking contrast to the matte duskiness of her skin.

  “I always wanted to share her with you, my darling,” he stammered, his voice unsteady because of the contrary emotions he was experiencing: timidity, shame, devotion, and reborn desire. “But I never dared, because I feared I would offend you, wound your feelings. I was wrong, isn’t that so? Isn’t it true that you would not have been offended or wounded? That you would have accepted it, looked upon it with pleasure? Isn’t it true that it would have been another way of showing you how much I love you, Estela?”

  His wife continued to observe him, not in anger, no longer in surprise, but with that calm gaze that had been characteristic of her for some months now. And he saw her turn after a moment to look at Sebastiana, who was still curled up sobbing, and saw that gaze, which until that moment had been neutral, grow interested, gently complaisant. Obeying this sign that he had received from the baroness, he let go of her hand. He saw Estela take two steps toward the head of the bed, sit down on the edge of it, stretch out her arms with that inimitable grace that he so admired in all her movements, and take Sebastiana’s face between her two hands, with great care and precaution, as though she were afraid of breaking her. He did not want to see any more. His desire had returned with a sort of mad fury and the baron bent down toward Sebastiana’s vulva once again, pressing his face between her legs so as to separate them, forcing her to stretch out, so as to be able to kiss it again, breathe it in, sip it. He remained in that position for a long time, his eyes closed, intoxicated, taking his pleasure, and when he felt that he could no longer contain his excitement he straightened up, got onto the bed, and crawled on top of Sebastiana. Separating her legs with his, fumbling about for her privates with an uncertain hand, he managed to penetrate her in a moment that added pain and rending to his pleasure. He heard her moan, and managed to see, in the tumultuous instant in which life seemed to explode between his legs, that the baroness was still holding Sebastiana’s face between her two hands, gazing at her with pity and tenderness as she blew gently on her forehead to free a few little hairs stuck to her skin.

  Hours later, when all that was over, the baron opened his eyes as though something or someone had awakened him. The dawn light was coming into the room, and he could hear birdsong and the murmur of the sea. He sat up in Sebastiana’s bed, where he had slept by himself; he stood up, covering himself with the sheet that he picked up off the floor, and took a few steps toward the baroness’s room. She and Sebastiana were sleeping, their bodies not touching, in the wide bed, and the baron stood there for a moment looking at them through the transparent mosquito netting, filled with an indefinable emotion. He felt tenderness, melancholy, gratitude, and a vague anxiety. He was walking toward the door to the hallway, where he had stripped off his clothes the evening before, when, on passing by the balcony, he was stopped short by the sight of the bay set aflame by the rising sun. It was something he had seen countless times and yet never grew tired of: Salvador at the hour when the sun is rising or setting. He went out onto the balcony and stood contemplating the majestic spectacle: the avid green of the island of Itaparica, the grace and the whiteness of the sailboats setting out to sea, the bright blue of the sky and the gray-green of the water, and closer by, at his feet, the broken, bright-red horizon of the roof tiles of houses in which he could picture in his mind the people waking up, the beginning of their day’s routine. With bittersweet nostalgia he amused himself trying to identify, by the roofs of the Desterro and Nazareth districts, the family mansions of his former political cronies, those friends he didn’t see any more these days: that of the Baron de Cotegipe, the Baron de Macaúba, the Viscount de São Lourenço, the Baron de São Francisco, the Marquis de Barbacena, the Baron de Maragogipe, the Count de Sergimirim, the Viscount de Oliveira. His sweeping gaze took in different points of the city: the rooftops of the seminary, and As Ladeiras, covered with greenery, the old Jesuit school, the hydraulic elevator, the customhouse, and he stood there for a time admiring the sun’s bright reflections on the golden stones of the Church of Nossa Senhora da Conceição de Praia which had been brought, already dressed and carved, from Portugal by sailors grateful to the Virgin, and though he could not see it, he sensed what a multicolored anthill the fish market at the beach would be at this hour of the morning. But suddenly something attracted his attention and he stood there looking very intently, straining his eyes, leaning out over the balcony railing. After a moment, he hurried inside to the chest of drawers where he knew Estela kept the little pair of tortoiseshell opera glasses that she used at the theater.

  He went back out onto the balcony and looked, with a growing feeling of puzzlement and uneasiness. Yes, the boats were there, midway between the island of Itaparica and the round Fort of São Marcelo, and, indeed, the people in the boats were not fishing but tossing flowers into the sea, scattering petals, blossoms, bouquets on the water, crossing themselves, and though he could not hear them—his heart was pounding—he was certain that those people were also praying and perhaps singing.

  The Lion of Natuba hears that it is the first of October, the Little Blessed One’s birthday, that the soldiers are attacking Canudos from three sides trying to breach the barricades on Madre Igreja, the one on São Pedro, and the one at the Temple of the Blessed Jesus, but it is the other thing that keeps ringing in his great shaggy head: that Pajeú’s head, without eyes or a tongue or ears, has been for some h
ours balanced on the end of a stake planted in the dogs’ trenches, out by Fazenda Velha. They’ve killed Pajeú. They’ve doubtless also killed all those who stole into the atheists’ camp with him to help the Vilanovas and the strangers get out of Canudos, and they’ve doubtless also tortured and decapitated these latter. How much longer will it be before the same thing happens to him, to the Mother of Men, and to all the women of the Sacred Choir who have knelt to pray for the martyred Pajeú?

  The shooting and the shouting outside deafen the Lion of Natuba as Abbot João pushes open the little door of the Sanctuary.

  “Come out! Come out! Get out of there!” the Street Commander roars, gesturing with both hands for them to hurry. “To the Temple of the Blessed Jesus! Run!”

  He turns around and disappears in the cloud of dust that has entered the Sanctuary with him. The Lion of Natuba hasn’t time to become frightened, to think, to imagine. Abbot João’s words bring the women disciples to their feet, and some of them screaming, others crossing themselves, they rush to the door, pushing him, shoving him aside, pinning him against the wall. Where are his glove-sandals, those little rawhide soles without which he can hardly hunch along for any distance at all without injuring his palms? He feels all about in the darkened room without finding them, and aware that all the women have left, that even Mother Maria Quadrado has left, he trots hurriedly to the door. He doggedly focuses all his energy, his lively intelligence on the task of reaching the Temple of the Blessed Jesus as Abbot João has ordered, and as he lurches along through the maze of defenses surrounding the Sanctuary, bumping into things, getting all scratched and bruised, he notes that the men of the Catholic Guard are no longer there, not the ones who are still alive at any rate, because here and there, lying on top of, between, under the bags and boxes of sand are human beings whose feet, arms, heads his hands and feet keep tripping over. When he emerges from the labyrinth of barricades onto the esplanade and is about to venture across it, the instinct of self-preservation, which is more acute in him than in almost anyone else, which has taught him since he was a child to sense danger before anyone else, better than anyone else, and also to know instantly which danger to confront when faced with several at once, makes him stop short and crouch down amid a pile of barrels riddled with bullet holes through which the sand is pouring. He is never going to reach the Temple under construction: he will be swept off his feet, trampled on, crushed by the crowd frantically bolting in that direction, and—the huge, bright, piercing eyes of the scribe see at one glance—even if he manages to reach the door of the Temple he will never be able to make his way through that swarm of bodies shoving and pushing to get past the bottleneck that the door has become: the entrance to the only solid refuge, with stone walls, still standing in Belo Monte. Better to remain here, to await death here, than to go seek it in that crush that would be the end of his frail bones, that crush that is the thing he has feared most ever since he has been involved, willy-nilly, in the gregarious, collective, processional, ceremonial life of Canudos. He is thinking: “I don’t blame you for having abandoned me, Mother of Men. You have the right to fight for your life, to try to hold out for one day more, one hour more.” But there is a great ache in his heart: this moment would not be so hard, so bitter, if she, or any of the women of the Sacred Choir, were here.