Something in my life seemed to come to an end during those days when Nelio lay on the roof of the theatre, slowly languishing from the black wounds that poisoned him and finally took the life from him. I think that's the way it has to be expressed: that his life was taken from him. Death always comes uninvited; it disrupts and causes disorder. But in Nelio's case, death arrived with a crowbar and broke its way into his body and stole his spirit.
Afterwards, when I had taken off my white cap, hung up my apron and left Dona Esmeralda's bakery behind, it was a different life that I began. I could not have taken Maria into that life, even if I had wanted to. How could I have asked her to follow me out into the world as the wife of a man who had chosen to be a beggar? How could I have made her understand that, for me, this was a necessity?
But I did see her in the streets of the city. And she was still extremely beautiful. I will never forget her. One day when I know that my time has come, when the spirits are calling me too, I will close my eyes and in my soul I will see her again, and with the image of her I will leave this world. It will make death easier for me. At least I hope so. Because as an ordinary, simple man, I feel the same fear of the unknown that everyone feels. I don't think my fear comes from the fact that life is short. The trembling and darkness that seize hold of me tell me that I will be dead for such an extremely long time.
I hope my spirit will have wings. I can't sit motionless in the shade of a tree during all the time I will have to spend in the unknown landscape of eternity.
I think you can hear from a man's footsteps that he's in love. His feet barely touch the ground, all fear is conquered, and time is dissolved like the fog in the first light of dawn.
Maria was the best dough mixer I ever had. I asked her where she had worked before and how Dona Esmeralda had found her. But she merely laughed at me, and never did give me an answer.
To watch her work was like listening to someone sing.
When you see someone working the way she did, you start to sing yourself.
I baked the best bread of my life during those nights when Maria mixed the dough and I followed her out to the street after midnight to watch her disappear into the dark. I was already longing for the next night when she would come back. In a childish and perhaps naive way I would worry that she had vanished into the darkness, never to return. But she did come back, her dresses were always thin, and she would smile her beautiful smile when I came down from the roof.
I wish that I could have told her about Nelio. She would have changed his bandage better than I did, and maybe she also would have persuaded him that the time was right to be carried down from the roof and taken to the hospital if he wanted to live.
But I never told her anything. And I never mentioned her name to Nelio either.
Up there, beneath the stars, only he and I existed.
When I went up to him on the roof after shoving the first baking pans into the hot oven, I felt that he was lying there waiting for me. Was it still true that he was trying to get better? His wounds had darkened more, and I held my breath as I unwrapped the bandage because the stench was so awful. But could a healing process be under way that was not apparent to me? I felt his forehead. It was hot again. I diluted some of Senhora Muwulene's herbs with water, and he drank the solution but with greater effort. It occurred to me that he had never asked me what kind of herbs I was giving him. From the moment I carried him up to the roof, he never once questioned my ability to take care of him.
Or was it because he already knew, from the moment the shots were fired, that there was no saving him?
I might have wished that I had not been alone with the responsibility. It was too great for me to bear alone, and yet I had no one to share it with. It was quite simply too late.
I helped him on with a clean shirt after I had changed his bandage. Since it was so warm, I took away the blanket and folded it beneath his head as an extra pillow. He was very tired, but his eyes were strangely clear. Again I had the feeling that he could see right through me.
At those moments when he looked at me, he was a ten-year-old boy lying there, with two bullets in his body. But when the fever returned, he was transformed once more into a very old man. I thought that it was not only his consciousness that seemed able to switch unhindered between what had been and what was to come, between the spirit world and the world that we lived in together. His body could also switch between ages, between the child that he was and the old man he would never be.
'Do the spirits of our ancestors have faces?' I asked him. Where that question came from, I didn't know. It was as if I didn't know what I was saying until after I had said it.
'People have faces,' replied Nelio. 'Spirits don't have faces. And yet we recognise them. We know who is who. Spirits don't have eyes or mouths or ears either. And yet they can see and speak and hear.'
'How do you know that?'
'The spirits are all around us,' he said. 'They're right here, but we can't see them. What's important is that we know they can see us.'
I didn't ask any more questions. I wasn't sure whether I had understood what he meant. But I didn't want to tire him unnecessarily.
That night he told me about the arrival of the xidjana.
She was the one who turned up on that morning after they celebrated Alfredo Bomba's birthday in the marques's house. She was wearing a ragged dress, her face was covered with burns from the scorching sun, and she truly was an albino. She heard Nelio approach and quickly turned.
'What are you doing sitting in my place under the tree?' asked Nelio.
'A shadow is not a house that can be owned,' the xidjana said. 'I'm thinking of staying here.'
During all his days on the streets, Nelio had never been as challenged as he was by the xidjana. Yet he sensed that she was uncertain and maybe even weak. He squatted down a short distance away.
'What's your name?'
'Deolinda.'
'Where are you from?'
'The same place as you. Nowhere.'
'What are you doing here?'
'I want to stay here.'
They were interrupted by Nascimento who had caught sight of the girl under the tree from his place on the bed of the rusty lorry which he happened to be guarding. With a howl he came running over.
'What's this xidjana doing here? Don't you know that a xidjana means bad luck?'
'I'm not bad luck,' said the girl, standing up.
'Get away from here,' screamed Nascimento, rushing at her with clenched fists. Nelio didn't have time to intervene. But it wasn't necessary anyway. Reacting swiftly, the xidjana knocked Nascimento to the ground. He lay there, staring in amazement up at Deolinda who stood leaning over him.
'I'm not bad luck,' the girl said. 'I can beat anyone and I want to stay here.'
'We can't have a xidjana around,' Nascimento said, getting to his feet.
'Her name is Deolinda,' Nelio said. 'Go back to the lorry. She's stronger than you are.'
Nascimento left. Nelio watched him summoning the others to the bed of the lorry. None of them would want an albino in the group. He too thought it best if she disappeared. The band of kids should never be allowed to get too big: he would lose control, and the group, in turn, would lose control of itself.
'You're sitting in my place,' Nelio said. 'That's forbidden. Get out of here! We don't want a girl in our group. You can't do anything we can't do.'
'I can read,' Deolinda said. 'I can do lots of things.'
Nelio was sure that she was lying. He pointed at a word that someone had scratched on the side of the building.
'What does this say?'
Deolinda squinted as if the harsh sunlight was hurting her eyes.
'Terrorista.'
Nelio, who couldn't read, realised that he wouldn't be able to tell whether she was right.
'It's just because the letters are so big that you can read them,' he said evasively.
He picked up a piece of newspaper from the street.
&nb
sp; 'Read this,' he said, handing the paper to Deolinda.
She held it up close to her eyes and started to read.
"'A number of children will be given the chance to live in a big house. Nobody's children will become Everybody's children.'"
'What does that mean? "Nobody's children?" What's that?'
She frowned and thought for a moment. Then her face brightened.
'Maybe that's us.'
She continued to spell her way through the words. '"A European organisation will give money to the project . .."'
'"The project"?'
'We're going to be projected. I've been projected once. They gave me clothes and I was supposed to live in a house with lots of other kids. I was supposed to stop living on the street. But I projected myself out as fast as I could.'
Nelio begrudgingly acknowledged that Deolinda actually did know how to read. He realised that she had a good head, even though it was white and covered with permanent burns. And yet he still was not sure whether she should be allowed to stay with the group. Maybe it was true that an albino brought misfortune. But he also reminded himself that he had heard the opposite from his father. A xidjana could never die; a xidjana possessed many extraordinary powers.
But the big problem was something else entirely. She was a girl. Not many girls lived on the streets. Things were often much worse for them than for the boys.
Nelio needed to be alone to think.
'Go away,' he said. 'Get two grilled chickens. Show us what you can do. Then I will decide.'
Deolinda left. Slung over one shoulder she had a little bag made from woven strips of raffia. Her dress was hanging in tatters, but she carried herself as if at any moment she might start dancing. Nelio sat down in his spot in the shade under the tree. What would Cosmos have done? he wondered. He tried to picture Cosmos on board a ship, far away, quite close to the sun. He tried to hear his voice.
'You're crazy if you let her into the group,' he seemed to hear Cosmos saying.
'But she can read,' Nelio protested. 'I've never heard of a street kid who could read. Least of all a girl.'
'Did you see her eyes?' Cosmos said, and Nelio thought his voice sounded annoyed. 'Did you see that they're red and inflamed? That's the kind of eyes you get from reading. And then you go blind.'
'All xidjanas have red eyes,' Nelio said. 'Even the ones who can't read.'
He heard Cosmos sigh. 'Let her stay then. But chase her away as soon as there's a problem.'
Nelio nodded. He would let her stay. But only if she came back with the grilled chickens.
By evening she still hadn't returned. Nelio thought that she must have realised that she wouldn't be allowed to stay, and so she wasn't going to bother to get the chickens or come back. Nascimento was pleased and said that he would kill her if she ever appeared on their street again. When Mandioca pointed out that Nascimento had been knocked down by a xidjana, a violent fight broke out, and Nelio had great difficulty stopping it. It began with Nascimento throwing himself at Mandioca. But when Alfredo Bomba got mixed up in it, their anger turned on him. Nelio had learned that fights among street kids followed their own rules and could develop in the most unexpected directions.
'She's gone,' he said when the fight was over. 'Maybe she'll come back, maybe she won't. For now we can forget that she was ever here.'
They started getting ready for the night.
'What should I think about now?' asked Tristeza.
'Think about the night at the marques's house,' Nelio said.
'I've stopped thinking about my bank,' Tristeza said proudly.
'You can think about it once a week,' said Nelio. 'But never in the afternoon when we're having our siesta.'
In the morning of the following day Deolinda came back. Nelio found her once again sitting under his tree. When he went over to her, she pulled two chickens out of her bag.
'Where did you get them?'
'An ambassador was having a big dinner in his garden. I climbed over two fences and went into the kitchen when no one was looking.'
Nelio didn't know what an ambassador was. He hesitated for a moment, wondering whether he should tell Deolinda that he didn't know. Then his curiosity got the better of him.
'An ambassador?' he said.
'An ambassador for a country far away.'
'What country?'
'Europe.'
Nelio had heard people talk about Europe. That's where the marqueses came from, and all the others who were cooperantes and had small pouches with money on their bellies.
He tasted one of the chickens.
'Not enough piri-piri,' he said.
Deolinda opened her bag and took out a little glass jar.
'Piri-piri,' she said.
The group had cautiously approached. Nelio divided the two chickens among them. At first Nascimento refused to take his share, but finally he snatched a piece and sat down a short distance away. From that moment on, Deolinda was one of them. Nelio remembered Cosmos asking him who he belonged to, and then from that moment on he was one of them. Now they had taken in Deolinda, and Nelio knew that the group was complete. No other new members would join unless one of them disappeared.
When the chickens had been eaten, Nelio told Nascimento to come closer.
'From now on Deolinda will be one of us. This means that no one can hit her without first asking my permission. Since she's new, she'll get only a half-share of our money. When we think that she deserves it, she'll get the same as everybody else. And no one calls her a xidjana unless she agrees to it. At the same time, Deolinda can't take advantage of the fact that she's a girl. She has to act exactly like the rest of us.'
Nelio thought about whether he had forgotten anything. After a moment's hesitation he added one thing.
'If Deolinda wants to be alone when she pees, she can. And she can also have a blanket if it's cold at night. But she has to get the blanket herself
Nelio looked around to see if anyone wanted to say anything.
'What do we need her for?' Nascimento said. 'She's neither black nor white, and she'll bring bad luck.'
To everyone's surprise, it was Tristeza who spoke up. 'Maybe that's a good thing. When she's with us, she's a xidjana. When she's with the whites, she's white. She can be both them and us.'
A good answer,' Nelio said. 'Soon you will earn your trainers.'
It didn't take long before Nelio saw that he had been right about taking Deolinda into the group. She was clever at begging, and she was quick to see possibilities in various situations that cropped up on the street. And besides, she could fight and defend herself. Soon nobody dared to accost her without risking that she would demonstrate her superior strength. Only Nascimento openly continued to show his dissatisfaction. Nelio began to suspect that one day Nascimento might leave them to join another band of street kids. He took Nascimento behind the petrol station and asked him straight out if he was thinking of leaving.