“You staying?” asked the girl.
Surprised, almost scared, Virgínia looked at her with more attention.
“You staying?” the other continued with patience and politeness.
“What . . .”
“You staying?” demanded the girl screaming.
“I’m staying, yes, I’m staying,” Virgínia hastened in alarm while looking at her with confusion. The girl was still standing, observing. The mother, sitting with her back turned, realizing that something was happening, turned around, looked quickly with her yellowish eyes, asked: were you chatting? Virgínia assented. “She doesn’t have her words straight yet,” said the woman in a strange tongue, smiling and turning back around. She seemed happy to see the child occupied. The girl was watching them while waiting with docility.
“You staying?” she asked after a pause.
“I’m staying. And are you staying?”
She seemed to fall into a great astonishment at that question; she drew back frightened without taking her eyes off Virgínia. Suddenly she went up to her mother:
“Am I staying?”
“Yes, yes,” said the woman with her back still turned, her expression impossible to guess.
She walked up to Virgínia, stopped a little ways off.
“I’m staying.”
“Ah, yes, great, great.”
“And you staying?”
“Staying where?”
Again the question terrified the child, she gazed in anguish, her face bright and round. Could she be an idiot? Her runny nose was shining damp in the sun, soft and short. Virgínia took advantage of her retreat to disappear. When she’d already arrived at the end of the car with horror she was reached by the girl.
“This is Conceição,” she said showing a rag doll. She was holding up the little face with anxiety and politeness, her dirty nose seeming to wait as if she were blind. Virgínia pursed her lips, her eyes suddenly hard to hide: My God, what did that little animal want?
“Ah she’s pretty, your Conceição is pretty,” she told her almost in a sob.
“You staying?”
Maybe she’d come back for good but nobody knew it and around her the instants weren’t connecting themselves to the future, just temporary and unattached — they were saying all the things to her and she was understanding. Her grandmother had died and her father was going up the stairs upright, the steps were creaking. Virgínia was putting off to the next day keeping the promise to find out if he was suffering and to help him. Her mother had dealt with a slight indisposition, her teeth were starting to look old and unwell. And as soon as she got out of bed everything could be ready for Virgínia to return. That period at Quiet Farm was so placid and unconquerable that she was allowing without surprise the possibility of going back without even walking through the fields a single time, without sitting for a moment peacefully beside the river.
She was looking. In vain she was seeking clues to her childhood, to the vague air of complicity and fear that she’d breathed. Now the mansion seemed to get more sun. The limestone chippings from the gnawed-at walls had lost their sad sweetness and were only showing a tired and happy old age. Her father, though still the same, had now inexplicably become a type, his own type. And her mother had transformed. Her skin had dried up, acquired a peevish tone; she was still well-preserved from her forehead to the beginning of her mouth, but after that old age was rushing in as if it had been hard to hold itself back. She’d wake up with a rested, swollen face, eat well, embroider, her chin double and firm, her head half-erect with satisfaction and dignity, making a perfect story of her life. The features of her face and body had become distinguished and domestic; a pale fatness was spun around her figure that now, so aged and rigid, would acquire for the first time a kind of beauty, a familiarity and a pleasantness, a certain air of fidelity and power like that of a big dog raised inside the home. She seemed to have discovered a new secret from which to live; she was interrupting herself for a second, running her tongue over her teeth:
“When I’d go to Upper Marsh . . . ,” she was saying . . .
Because for fifteen days her husband had driven her every day in the buggy to town until her new dentures were ready. It had even been necessary to sew in a hurry a blue linen dress with several rows of buttons. All she’d have to do was run her tongue across her teeth and the small, calm town would come back to her in a disturbance that would make her blink, her tongue forgotten on her upper teeth, her lip curled. It had become a habit to seek her teeth for a quick contact. And by now the caress would be unwittingly followed by an irresistible tic that no longer seemed to bring her the clear memory of Upper Marsh but just a certain rushed and anguished taste, a muttering of approval. Looking at her Virgínia would feel clenched and disgusted wondering how that woman could still live; and how the form of love that her mother now felt was made of gluttony, of total surrender, gasping fatigue, and hope, by God, hope. Her own thoughts were frightening her, Virgínia was stifling her body, turning her head to the side as if diverting it from herself. She was regarding them fixedly but kept making them out as at the moment of jumping from the train: faces slightly twisted and unfamiliar as if she were seeing them in a mirror. On the Farm now a simple truth was being breathed, almost wholesome and airy. In each bedroom would a different color light up as soon as the doors were closed? In the clean and bright lives into which no moist angel would ever slide, the miracle had dried into stalks of fragile grasses in the wind — where, where was whatever she had lived? Quiet Farm had lost any cloister-like characteristics. Only for an instant was she picking up in the air that old vibration, that shaky life of the things in the mansion that she’d known so well to hear when she was small. The Farm had risen to the surface in her absence and was shining in the sun; its inhabitants seemed resuscitated but, without awareness of their own death, were going along calmly upon the flat ground. What had happened? she was feeling there each thing free of her presence and her touch — in a revolt life was refusing to repeat itself and to be subjugated. Now the house was useful enough for her big and timid body — she was observing with slight bitterness in a smile that wanted to mean lived experience but that was just sad and pensive. Even in the park of Upper Marsh — she stopped short clasping the shawl she’d started wearing again — the fountain had stopped underneath the little statue of the naked boy and without the shine of the water the child god had vanished. A living child was playing in the dry fountain. The yellow dress. Two new hotels had set up in the center, some lads and girls crossed the streets with whips and riding clothes, observing.
Esmeralda’s clothes had the same pleasant smell of freshness and salt. That’s how she’d dress up, take care of herself and burn perfumes in her room — and her preparation was so active that time would pile up while she thought she was living minutes. She’d wear feminine clothes with voluptuousness; her breasts would hide like jewels among frills and pleats, her thick pale legs sprouting from long skirts. She’d look with surprise at Virgínia’s nude dresses, smooth silks, and short hair.
“You didn’t learn much in the city, Virgínia,” she’d tell her.
With age she seemed to have rushed into her true body and Virgínia could imagine how men might want her. Vicente, yes, Vicente would turn around to look at her with attention, unaware that his face was suddenly becoming masculine and hard . . . — she’d come across that expression in him so many times on the street. So why hadn’t Esmeralda married anyway? she was shrugging with indifference. The round face on top was coming together in a deliciously feminine point, almost repugnant to another woman, so attractive it was and so destined for men alone. And she had still other marks. A tiny mouth, arched and hard, almost in her chin like an unused toy, a pale always lively mouth, slightly protruding eyes, black. Some thing about her inspired the desire to walk all over her and abuse her even without rage. Around her eyes fine wrinkles, skin of a fearful c
olor despite being matured and almost cooked. And that power pulsating with a haughtiness of a unique woman. Daniel did almost nothing, letting their father take care of the store. Sunburned, he went hunting, swimming in the river, had earned strong and shining muscles, living with ferocity and calm off his own body. She would look at him from afar; how to get closer? With sloth and fatigue she’d say little useless things to him, they’d barely run into each other. He didn’t seem to miss Rute, nobody ever mentioned her, actually. Yet in four months she’d return to spend six months with Daniel. Virgínia managed a few moments with her brother; they went to the balcony, leaned against it silent, distant.
“Daniel,” she said.
She wanted to talk about Vicente.
“Hmm?” he asked.
He’d never known how to ask or to listen, that was true. She was thinking: we have nothing in common, nothing. And in a calm apathy she was looking at the transparent air. It was almost the end of the afternoon.
“You’ve been well?” she asked him at last.
He looked at her quickly and answered nothing. She filled up with a difficult and cold feeling, saw his white suit so starched and narrow at the shoulders, his hair nice and straight, kept at him just to be obnoxious:
“You’ve been well?”
“All you managed to do was get fat but you’re still the same Virgínia: so vulgar and clueless that I feel sorry for you. Screw you, kid.”
They stood pensive for a moment. He finally said:
“I’m going.”
She stayed bent over the balcony; she saw him leave, shrugged. He was walking hard and clean. Walking, walking, one footstep following the next in the silence of the road stepping on damp, thick leaves. He went into the side trails; unhurried he went on, went on. The mansion had been lost, he was walking. He took a shortcut, crossed the new road, went into the first streets of Upper Marsh. On the narrow lane covered in grass a few hens were scratching in the twilight. He walked on stepping on the dry stone. The dark sloped street opened onto a luminous, colorless, and cold slice of the river; all the garbage of Upper Marsh was piled up black upon its bank; he put his hands in his pockets, wrinkled his eyes as if affronted by the evidence of things. He was now in a square with high walls, calm and full of clear air like the courtyard of a convent. At that hour the windows were closing, the odd open one revealed on the parapet an uncollected cushion. Upper Marsh seemed constructed of pale stone, wrought iron and damp wood. The houses were stooping old and blackened as after a fire, weeds were growing in tufts on the sloping roofs — he went on, smoothed his black hair, fine and combed went into the business district; from the shops that were still open was coming a suffocating smell of a gloomy place where old cockroaches, ashen and sluggish, are walking, a barn smell. From the telegraph wires dirty rags and papers were hanging. He saw the church. With a quick movement he took his hands out of his pockets; entered the shadowy humidity stepping with careful and peaceful feet on the brick slabs. A lit candle was burning on the altar of St. Louis, thin and delicate. He read: Do Not Put Paper on the Floor and then left, hands in his pockets; the air was still bright; he walked on. Suddenly he saw: there were five people approaching. He stopped short, pressed against the wall. The woman was dry, her neckline excessively wide, a shoulder peeping through a rip; she was wearing blue slippers and her hair was disheveled in an enormous design around her dark, thin face. She was clasping the hand of a little kid who was shuffling along with a piece of bread in her closed fist, whimpering. In front of the mother a girl of about twelve was coming, tall and serious inside a large black dress, the face of a widow. A skinny, lively girl was skipping all around her mother, grabbing a stone, gnawing at a piece of bread wiping with her forearm her broad runny nose. And behind them all a boy of about nine, cap pressed halfway down his forehead, a bag threaded through his arm at shoulder height. Five people, he said in a low voice. The group stopped in front of the row of identical houses. The little girl stopped crying, licked the butter from her fingers. The boy approached, took off his cap with fatigue. He, the girl in black, and the mother were looking at the houses with faces creased by the remains of the foggy brightness. The mother, holding the hand of the little girl who had sat on the ground, was hesitating. The houses painted pink. She pointed her eyes to a terrace, examining. A fat white woman was knitting while swaying. The boy with the cap and the girl in black were looking at the mother waiting. She ran her eyes over the houses one more time, over the swaying woman. Then she pulled the little kid by the arm and said low, her voice coarse:
“Not here.”
But why not? wondered Daniel disturbed, almost enraged. The girl in black started walking again. The mother dragged the little girl who was rubbing her sleepy eyes. The boy adjusted the bag on his shoulders, put the cap back on, straightening it. The skinny, lively girl was skipping along in a run and waiting to gnaw on the roll or lingering beside some gate. The group got smaller and smaller and disappeared. He’d seen, he’d seen. He sighed deeply as if waking up and his eyes really had the blind luminosity of eyes that returned from sleep. A weak lamp started blinking in the colorless and sharp air of dusk. Before he averted his gaze he heard a noise at the top of the street. He turned around and saw nothing at first because another group was approaching against the light. Gradually he started making things out and with a muffled exclamation recognized two soldiers leading a prisoner, pushing him, halting every once in a while to beat him up. The group was getting closer, he stitched himself to the wall. A feeling of nausea filled his mouth with a saliva redolent of blood. The prisoner kept going between the two soldiers with his red eyes blinking, his mouth open, his face marked by the hands of the policemen. Daniel shrank back: they were passing right beside him, the prisoner let out a groan and one of the soldiers pushed him with a punch in his back. Daniel closed his eyes deeply, gritted his teeth with pallor. A delicious amazement was overtaking him giving him loathing and strength, an extraordinary feeling of closeness. It occurred to him to knock down the soldiers and free the man — but with motionless eyes he was feeling more capable of knocking down the man and injuring him with his feet, with his feet. He suddenly smiled caressing his upper lip as if smoothing an imaginary mustache. The prisoner and the soldiers plunged into a corner . . . With a start he observed the street empty once again and holding back a curse he headed almost at a run in the direction where he’d seen the woman and the four children disappear. He went ahead sticking close to the walls . . . he turned a corner, yes, there they were moving off at the end of the street . . . He was hurrying, his footsteps were booming, and the fear of not getting to them made him shout calling them. The woman turned around, hesitated for an instant in the deserted street, the group stopped. Daniel was getting closer, getting to them fast with wheezy breath, shining eyes. Now he was seeing the woman up close, making out her dark and dirty skin, those worried, tired eyes. Frightened he stuck his hand in his pocket, took out a coin . . . He extended it to the woman with harshness. Without unclosing her lips she looked at him in shock, was about to touch the handout but with a sudden suspicion drew back, answered him:
“No, thank you.”
A movement of wrath and surprise overtook him. The two looked at each other silent; he was roughly brutalizing her with his raw gaze. A second later Daniel finally said almost with courtesy because he knew he’d dominated her: