"Hang on a moment."
Surprised, she glanced to one side. This was a respectable bar, it wasn't the Copacabana, where men had the right to say that, although the women could always respond: "No, I'm leaving and you can't stop me."
She was about to ignore the remark, but her curiosity got the better of her, and she turned towards the voice. She saw a very strange scene: kneeling on the floor, with various paintbrushes scattered around him, was a long-haired young man of about thirty (or should she have said: a boy of about thirty? Her world had aged very fast), who was making a drawing of a gentleman sitting in a chair, with a glass of anisette beside him. She hadn't noticed them when she came in.
"Don't go. I've nearly finished this portrait, and I'd like to paint you as well."
Maria replied--and as she did so, she created the link that was lacking in the universe.
"No, I'm not interested."
"You've got a special light about you. Let me at least do a sketch."
What was a "sketch"? What did he mean by "a special light"? Besides, she was vain enough to want to have her portrait painted by someone who appeared to be a serious artist. Her imagination took flight. What if he was really famous? She would be immortalized forever in a painting that would be exhibited in Paris or in Salvador da Bahia! She would become a legend!
On the other hand, what was the man doing, surrounded by all that clutter, in an expensive, perhaps usually crowded cafe?
Guessing her thoughts, the waitress said softly:
"He's a very well-known artist."
Her intuition had been right. Maria tried not to show her feelings and to remain calm.
"He comes here now and again, and he always brings an important client with him. He says he likes the atmosphere, that it inspires him; he's doing a painting of people who represent the city. It was commissioned by the town hall."
Maria looked at the subject of the portrait. Again the waitress read her thoughts.
"He's a chemist who apparently made some really revolutionary discovery. He won the Nobel Prize."
"Don't go," said the painter again. "I'll be finished in five minutes. Order what you like and put it on my bill."
As if hypnotized, she sat down at the bar, ordered an anisette (she wasn't used to drinking, and the only thing that occurred to her was to order the same as the Nobel prizewinner), and watched the man working. "I don't represent the city, so he must be interested in something else. But he's not really my type," she thought automatically, repeating what she always said to herself, ever since she had been working at the Copacabana; it was her salvation, her voluntary denial of the traps set by the heart. Having cleared that up, she didn't mind waiting awhile--perhaps the waitress was right, perhaps this man could open doors to a world of which she knew nothing.
She watched how quickly and adroitly he put the finishing touches to his work; it was apparently a very large canvas, but it was all rolled up, and so she couldn't see what other faces he had painted. What if this was a new opportunity? The man (she had decided that he was a "man" and not a "boy," because otherwise she would start to feel old before her time) didn't seem the sort likely to make that kind of proposal just in order to spend the night with her. Five minutes later, as promised, he had finished his work, while Maria concentrated hard on thinking about Brazil, about her brilliant future there, and her complete lack of interest in meeting new people who might jeopardize all her plans.
"Thanks, you can move now," said the painter to the chemist, who seemed to awaken from a dream.
And turning to Maria, he said simply:
"Sit in that corner and make yourself comfortable. The light is wonderful."
As if everything had been ordained by fate, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, as if she had known this man all her life or had already lived this moment in dreams and now knew what to do in reality, Maria picked up her glass of anisette, her bag, and the books on farm management, and went over to the place indicated by the man--a table near the window. He brought his brushes, the large canvas, a series of small glass bottles full of various colors and a packet of cigarettes, and knelt at her feet.
"Now don't move."
"That's asking a lot; my life is in constant motion."
Maria thought she was being terribly witty, but the man ignored her remark. Trying to appear natural, because she found the way the man looked at her most discomfiting, she pointed across the road at the plaque:
"What is the 'Road to Santiago'?"
"It's a pilgrimage route. In the Middle Ages, people from all over Europe would come along this street, heading for a city in Spain, Santiago de Compostela."
He folded over one part of the canvas and prepared his brushes. Maria still didn't know quite what to do.
"Do you mean that if I followed that street, I'd eventually get to Spain?"
"Yes, in two or three months' time. But can I just ask you a favor? Stop talking; it will only take about ten minutes. And take that package off the table."
"They're books," she said, slightly irritated by his authoritarian tone. She wanted him to know that he was kneeling before a cultivated woman, who spent her time in libraries not shops. But he himself picked up the package and placed it unceremoniously on the floor.
She had failed to impress him. Not, of course, that she was remotely interested in impressing him; she was off-duty now and would save her seductive powers for later, for men who would pay handsomely for her efforts. Why bother striking up a relationship with a painter who might not even have enough money to buy her a coffee? A man of thirty shouldn't wear his hair so long, it looked ridiculous. Why did she assume he had no money? The waitress had said he was well-known, or was it just the chemist who was famous? She studied his clothes, but that didn't help; life had taught her that the men who took least care of their appearance--as with this painter--always seemed to have more money than the men in suits and ties.
"What am I doing thinking about this man? What interests me is the painting."
Ten minutes of her time was not such a high price to pay for the chance of being immortalized in a painting. She saw that he was painting her alongside the prizewinning chemist and she began to wonder if, after all, he would want some kind of payment.
"Turn towards the window."
Again she obeyed unquestioningly, which was not at all like her. She sat looking at the people passing by, at the plaque with the name of that road on it, thinking about how that road had been there for centuries, how it had survived progress and all the changes that had taken place in the world and in mankind. Perhaps it was a good omen, perhaps that painting would share the same fate and still be on display in a museum in the city in five hundred years' time...
The man started drawing, and, as the work progressed, she lost that initial sense of excitement and, instead, began to feel utterly insignificant. When she had gone into the cafe, she had been a very confident woman, capable of making an extremely difficult decision--leaving a job that earned her lots of money--and taking up a still more difficult challenge--running a farm back in her own country. Now, all her feelings of insecurity about the world seemed to have resurfaced, a luxury no prostitute can allow herself.
She finally worked out why she was feeling so uncomfortable: for the first time in many months, someone was looking at her not as an object, not even as a woman, but as something she could not even comprehend; the closest she could come to putting it into words was: "he's seeing my soul, my fears, my fragility, my inability to deal with a world which I pretend to master, but about which I know nothing."
Ridiculous, pure fantasy.
"I'd like..."
"Please, don't talk," said the man. "I can see your light now."
No one had ever said anything like that to her before. "I can see your firm breasts," "I can see your nicely rounded thighs," "I can see in you the exotic beauty of the tropics," or, at most, "I can see that you want to leave this life--let me set you up in an apartment." She
was used to comments like that, but her light? Did he mean the evening light?
"Your personal light," he said, realizing that she didn't know what he was talking about.
Her personal light. Well, how wrong could he be, that innocent painter, who obviously hadn't learned much about life in his thirty-odd years. But then, as everyone knows, women mature more quickly than men, and although Maria might not spend sleepless nights pondering her particular philosophical problems, she knew one thing: she did not have what that painter called "light" and which she took to mean "a special glow." She was just like everyone else, she endured her loneliness in silence, tried to justify everything she did, pretended to be strong when she was feeling weak or weak when she was feeling strong, she had renounced love and taken up a dangerous profession, but now, as that work was coming to an end, she had plans for the future and regrets about the past, and someone like that doesn't have a "special glow." That must just be his way of keeping her quiet and still and happy to be there, playing the fool.
Personal light, indeed. He could have said something else, like "you've got a lovely profile."
How does light enter a house? Through the open windows. How does light enter a person? Through the open door of love. And her door was definitely shut. He must be a terrible painter; he didn't understand anything.
"I've finished," he said and started collecting up his things.
Maria didn't move. She felt like asking if she could see the painting, but that might seem rude, as if she didn't trust what he had done. Curiosity, however, got the better of her; she asked and he concurred. He had painted only her face; it looked like her, but if, one day, she had seen that painting, not knowing who the model was, she would have said that it was someone much stronger, someone full of a "light" she didn't see reflected in the mirror.
"My name's Ralf Hart. If you like, I can buy you another drink."
"No, thank you."
It would seem that the encounter was now taking a sadly foreseeable turn: man tries to seduce woman.
"Two more anisettes, please," he said, ignoring Maria's answer.
What else did she have to do? Read a boring book about farm management. Walk around the lake, as she had hundreds of times before. Or talk to someone who had seen in her a light of which she knew nothing, and on the very date marked on the calendar as the beginning of the end of her "experience."
"What do you do?"
That was the question she did not want to hear, the question that had made her avoid other encounters when, for one reason or another, someone had approached her (though given the natural discretion of the Swiss, this happened only rarely). What possible answer could she give?
"I work in a nightclub."
Right. An enormous load fell from her shoulders, and she was pleased with all that she had learned since she had arrived in Switzerland; ask questions (Who are the Kurds? What is the road to Santiago?) and answer (I work in a nightclub) without worrying about what other people might think.
"I have a feeling I've seen you before."
Maria sensed that he wanted to take things further, and she savored her small victory; the painter who, minutes before, had been giving orders and had seemed so utterly sure of what he wanted, had now gone back to being a man like any other man, full of insecurity when confronted by a woman he didn't know.
"And what are those books?"
She showed them to him. Farm administration. The man seemed to grow even more insecure.
"Are you a sex worker?"
He had shown his cards. Was she dressed like a prostitute? Anyway, she needed to gain time. She was watching herself; this was beginning to prove an interesting game, and she had absolutely nothing to lose.
"Is that all men think about?"
He put the books back in the bag.
"Sex and farm management. How very dull."
What! It was suddenly her turn to feel put on the spot. How dare he speak ill of her profession? He still didn't know exactly what she did, though, he was just trying out a hunch, but she had to give him an answer.
"Well, I can't think of anything duller than painting; a static thing, a movement frozen in time, a photograph that is never faithful to the original. A dead thing that is no longer of any interest to anyone, apart from painters, who are people who think they're important and cultivated, but who haven't evolved with the rest of the world. Have you ever heard of Joan Miro? Well, I hadn't until an Arab in a restaurant mentioned the name, but knowing the name didn't change anything in my life."
She wondered if she had gone too far, but then the drinks arrived and the conversation was interrupted. They sat saying nothing for a while. Maria thought it was probably time to leave, and perhaps Ralf Hart thought the same. But before them stood those two glasses full of that disgusting drink, and that was a reason for them to continue sitting there together.
"Why the book on farm management?"
"What do you mean?"
"I've been to Rue de Berne. When you said you worked in a nightclub, I remembered that I'd seen you before in that very expensive place. I didn't think of it while I was painting, though: your 'light' was so strong."
Maria felt the floor beneath her feet give way. For the first time, she felt ashamed of what she did, even though she had no reason to; she was working to keep herself and her family. He was the one who should feel ashamed of going to Rue de Berne; all the possible charm of that meeting had suddenly vanished.
"Listen, Mr. Hart, I may be a Brazilian, but I've lived in Switzerland for nine months now. I've learned that the reason the Swiss are so discreet is because they live in a very small country where almost everyone knows everyone else, as we have just discovered, which is why no one ever asks what other people do. Your remark was both inappropriate and very rude, but if your aim was to humiliate me in order to make yourself feel better, you're wasting your time. Thanks for the anisette, which is disgusting, by the way, but which I will drink to the last drop. I will then smoke a cigarette, and, finally, I'll get up and leave. But you can leave right now, if you want; we can't have famous painters sitting at the same table as a prostitute. Because that's what I am, you see. A prostitute. I'm a prostitute through and through, from head to toe, and I don't care who knows. That's my one great virtue: I refuse to deceive myself or you. Because it's not worth it, because you don't merit a lie. Imagine if that famous chemist over there were to find out what I am."
She began to speak more loudly.
"Yes, I'm a prostitute! And do you know what? It's set me free--knowing that I'll be leaving this godawful place in exactly ninety days' time, with loads of money, far better educated, capable of choosing a good bottle of wine, with my handbag stuffed with photographs of the snow, and knowing all there is to know about men!"
The waitress was listening, horrified. The chemist seemed not to notice. Perhaps it was just the alcohol talking, or the feeling that soon she would once more be a woman from the interior of Brazil, or perhaps it was the sheer joy of being able to say what she did and to laugh at the shocked reactions, the critical looks, the scandalized gestures.
"Do you understand, Mr. Hart? I'm a prostitute through and through, from head to toe--and that's my one great quality, my virtue!"
He said nothing. He didn't even move. Maria felt her confidence returning.
"And you, sir, are a painter with no understanding of your models. Perhaps the chemist sitting over there, dozing, lost to the world, is really a railway worker. Perhaps none of the other people in your painting are what they seem. I can't understand otherwise how you could possibly say that you could see a 'special light' in a woman who, as you discovered while you were painting, IS NOTHING BUT A PRO-STI-TUTE!"
These last words were spoken very slowly and loudly. The chemist woke up and the waitress brought the bill.
"This has nothing to do with you as prostitute, but with you as woman." Ralf ignored the proffered bill and replied equally slowly, but quietly. "You have a glow about you. The light
that comes from sheer willpower, the light of someone who has made important sacrifices in the name of things she thinks are important. It's in your eyes--the light is in your eyes."
Maria felt disarmed; he had not taken up her challenge. She had wanted to believe that he was simply trying to pick her up. She was not allowed to think--at least not for the next ninety days--that there were interesting men on the face of the Earth.
"You see that glass of anisette before you?" he went on. "Now, you just see the anisette. I, on the other hand, because I need to be inside everything I do, see the plant it came from, the storms the plant endured, the hand that picked the grain, the voyage by ship from another land, the smells and colors with which the plant allowed itself to be imbued before it was placed in the alcohol. If I were to paint this scene, I would paint all those things, even though, when you saw the painting, you would think you were looking at a simple glass of anisette.
"In just the same way, while you were gazing out at the street and thinking--because I know you were--about the road to Santiago, I painted your childhood, your adolescence, your lost, broken dreams, your dreams for the future, and your will--which is what most intrigues me. When you saw your portrait..."
Maria put up her guard, knowing that it would be very difficult to lower it again later on.
"...I saw that light...even though all that was before me was a woman who looked like you."
Again that constrained silence. Maria looked at her watch.
"I have to go in a moment. Why did you say that sex is boring?"
"You should know that better than me."
"I know because it's my job. I do the same thing every day. But you're a young man of thirty..."
"Twenty-nine."
"...young, attractive, famous, who should be interested in things like that, and who shouldn't have to go to Rue de Berne looking for company."
"Well, I did. I went to bed with a few of your colleagues, but not because I had any problem finding female company. The problem lies with me."
Maria felt a pang of jealousy, and was terrified. She really must leave.
"It was my last try. I've given up now," said Ralf, starting to pick up the painting materials scattered on the floor.