The War Of The End Of The World Part 10

But a look from Moreira Cesar made him keep his distance. The colonel was livid now, his forehead beaded with sweat, his lips purplish, as though he had bitten them. He rose from his chair and addressed the baroness, his voice scarcely more than a mumble: "I beg you to excuse me, Baroness. I know that my manners leave a great deal to be desired. I come from a humble background and the only social circle I have ever frequented is the barracks room."

He staggered out of the drawing room, weaving from side to side between the pieces of furniture and the gla.s.s cabinets. At his back, the voice of the journalist rudely asked for another cup of tea. He and Olimpio de Castro remained in the room, but the doctor went to see what had happened to the commanding officer of the Seventh Regiment. He found him in bed, panting for breath, in a state of great fatigue. He helped him undress, gave him a sedative, and heard him say that he would rejoin the regiment at dawn the next morning: he would entertain no discussion of the matter. This said, he allowed the doctor to apply the cupping gla.s.ses again and plunged once more into a tub of cold water, from which he emerged shivering. Ma.s.sages with turpentine and mustard warmed him up. He ate in his bedroom, but then got up in his bathrobe and spent a few minutes in the drawing room, thanking the baron and baroness for their hospitality. He awoke at five the following morning. As he drank a cup of coffee, he a.s.sured Dr. Souza Ferreiro that he had never felt better in his life and warned the nearsighted journalist, who was just waking up, disheveled and yawning, as he sat at his side, that if there was the least little news item about his illness in any paper, he would hold him responsible. As he was about to leave, a manservant came to tell him that the baron would like him to come by his study. He led him to a small room with a large wooden writing desk on top of which a device for rolling cigarettes occupied the place of honor; on the walls, in addition to shelves lined with books, were knives, whips, leather gloves, and sombreros and harnesses. The room had windows with a view, and in the dawning light the men in the colonel's escort could be seen talking with the journalist from Bahia.

The baron was in his bathrobe and slippers. "Despite our differences of opinion, I believe you to be a patriot who has Brazil's best interests at heart, Colonel," he said by way of greeting. "No, I am not trying to win your sympathies by flattering you. Nor do I wish to waste your time. I need to know whether the army, or at least you yourself, are aware of the underhanded maneuver being used against me and against my friends by our adversaries."

"The army doesn't interfere in local political quarrels," Moreira Cesar interrupted him. "I have come to the state of Bahia to put down an insurrection that is endangering the Republic. That is my sole purpose in coming."

They were standing very close to each other, looking each other straight in the eye.

"That's precisely what their maneuvering has been aimed at," the baron said. "Making Rio, the government, the army believe that this is the danger that Canudos represents. Those miserable wretches don't have any sort of modern weapons. The explosive bullets are limonite projectiles, or brown hemat.i.te if you prefer the technical term, a mineral found everywhere in the Serra de Bendengo that the people in the backlands have always used as shotgun pellets."

"Are the defeats undergone by the army in Uaua and on O Cambaio also a maneuver?" the colonel asked. "And the rifles shipped from Liverpool and smuggled into the region by English agents?"

The baron scrutinized the officer's fearless face, his hostile eyes, his scornful smile. Was he a cynic? At this point he couldn't tell yet: the only thing that was entirely clear was that Moreira Cesar detested him.

"The English rifles are indeed a part of their scheme," he answered. "Epaminondas Goncalves, your most fervent supporter in Bahia, had them brought here so as to accuse us of conspiring with a foreign power and with the jaguncos jaguncos. And as for the English spy in Ipupiara, he manufactured him too, by giving men in his hire orders to kill a poor devil who to his misfortune had red hair. Did you know that?"

Moreira Cesar didn't blink, didn't move a muscle. Nor did he open his mouth. He continued to stare straight back at the baron, a look that told the baron more eloquently than words what he thought of him and of the things he had just said.

"So you do know, you're a co-conspirator and perhaps the Gray Eminence of the entire plot." The baron averted his eyes and stood for a moment with his head down, as though he were thinking hard, but in truth his mind was a blank. Finally recovering from his daze, he said: "Do you think all this is worth the trouble? All these lies, these intrigues, all these crimes even, in order to establish the Dictatorial Republic? Do you really believe that something born of all that will be the panacea for Brazil's many ills?"

A few seconds pa.s.sed without Moreira Cesar's opening his mouth. Outside, a reddish glow heralded the rising of the sun; voices and the whinnying of horses were heard; from upstairs came the sound of shuffling feet.

"There are people up in arms here who are refusing to accept the Republic and have routed two military expeditions," the colonel said suddenly, his firm, curt, impersonal tone of voice not changing in the slightest. "Objectively, these people are the instruments of those who, like yourself, have accepted the Republic the better to betray it, to seize the reins of power, and by changing a few names maintain the traditional system. You were well on your way to attaining your goal, I grant you. There is now a civilian president, a party rule that divides and paralyzes the country, a parliament where every effort to change things can be delayed and distorted thanks to the ruses of which you people are past masters. You were already crowing in triumph, isn't that true? There is even talk of reducing the army's troop strength by half, isn't that true? What a victory! Well, you people are mistaken. Brazil will not go on being the fief that you have been exploiting for centuries. That's what the army is for. To bring about national unity, to bring progress, to establish equality among all Brazilians, to create a strong, modern country. We are going to remove the obstacles in the way, I promise you: Canudos, you, the English merchants, whoever blocks our path. I am not going to explain to you what we true republicans mean by a republic. You wouldn't understand, because you belong to the past, you are someone who is looking backward. Don't you realize how ridiculous it is to be a baron when in just four years it will be the beginning of the twentieth century? You and I are mortal enemies, the war between us is without quarter, and we have nothing to say to each other."

He bowed, turned round, and headed for the door.

"I thank you for your frankness," the baron murmured. Without moving from where he stood, he saw the colonel leave the study and appear again outside the manor house a few moments later. He saw him mount the white horse that his orderly was holding by the bridle, and, followed by his escort, ride off in a cloud of dust.

[IV].

The sound of the whistles is like the call of certain birds, an unrhythmic lament that pierces the soldiers' eardrums and embeds itself in their nerves, awakening them at night or taking them by surprise during a march. It is a prelude to death, for it is followed by bullets or arrows that rise with a clean hiss and gleam against the sunlit or star-studded sky before striking their target. The sound of the whistles ceases then and the plaintive moans of wounded cattle, horses, mules, goats, or kids is heard. Sometimes a soldier is. .h.i.t, but this is exceptional because just as the whistles are destined to a.s.sail the ears-the minds, the souls-of the soldiers, so the bullets and arrows stubbornly seek out the animals.

The first two head of cattle that were hit have been enough for the soldiers to discover that these victims are not edible, not even for those who have lived through all the campaigns and learned to eat stones. Those who ate the meat from these cattle began to vomit so badly and to suffer from such severe diarrhea that, even before the doctors rendered their opinion, they had realized that the jaguncos jaguncos' arrows killed the animals twice over, first taking their lives and then the possibility of their helping those who were herding them along to survive. From that point on, the moment an animal falls, Major Febronio de Brito pours kerosene over it and sets fire to it. Grown thinner, suffering from eye irritation, in the few short days since the departure of the column from Queimadas the major has become a bitter, sullen man. Of all those in the column, he is probably the one on whom the whistles wreak their intended effect most successfully, keeping him awake and tormenting him. As his ill luck would have it, he is the one responsible for these quadrupeds that fall amid loud bellows of pain, he is the one who must order them to be given the coup de grace coup de grace and burned, knowing that these deaths herald future pangs of hunger. He has done everything within his power to minimize the effect of the arrows, sending out men to patrol in circles around the herds and shielding the animals with leather and rawhide coverings, but in the very high summer temperature, this protection makes them sweat, lag behind, and sometimes topple over in the heat. The soldiers have seen the major at the head of the patrols which go out to scour the countryside the moment the symphony begins. These are exhausting, depressing incursions that merely serve to prove how elusive, impalpable, ghost-like the attackers are. The earsplitting racket their whistles make suggests that there are many of them, but that cannot possibly be so, for how in the world could they make themselves invisible in this flat terrain with only spa.r.s.e vegetation? Colonel Moreira Cesar has given them the explanation: the attackers are divided into very small groups, which hole up in key sites and lie in wait for hours, for days, in caves, crevices, animal lairs, thickets, and the sound of the whistles is deceptively amplified by the astral silence of the countryside they are pa.s.sing through. This trickery should not distract them; it can have no effect on the column. and burned, knowing that these deaths herald future pangs of hunger. He has done everything within his power to minimize the effect of the arrows, sending out men to patrol in circles around the herds and shielding the animals with leather and rawhide coverings, but in the very high summer temperature, this protection makes them sweat, lag behind, and sometimes topple over in the heat. The soldiers have seen the major at the head of the patrols which go out to scour the countryside the moment the symphony begins. These are exhausting, depressing incursions that merely serve to prove how elusive, impalpable, ghost-like the attackers are. The earsplitting racket their whistles make suggests that there are many of them, but that cannot possibly be so, for how in the world could they make themselves invisible in this flat terrain with only spa.r.s.e vegetation? Colonel Moreira Cesar has given them the explanation: the attackers are divided into very small groups, which hole up in key sites and lie in wait for hours, for days, in caves, crevices, animal lairs, thickets, and the sound of the whistles is deceptively amplified by the astral silence of the countryside they are pa.s.sing through. This trickery should not distract them; it can have no effect on the column.

And on giving the order to resume their march, after receiving the report on the animals that have been lost, he has remarked: "That's fine. It lightens our burden, and we'll get there that much sooner."

His serenity impresses the correspondents, before whom, each time he receives reports of more deaths, he permits himself to make some joking remark. The journalists are more and more nervous in the presence of these adversaries who constantly spy on their movements yet are never seen. It is their one subject of conversation. They besiege the nearsighted reporter from the Jornal de Noticias Jornal de Noticias, asking him what the colonel really thinks of this relentless attack on the nerves and reserves of the column, and each time the journalist answers that Moreira Cesar doesn't talk about those arrows or hear those whistles because he is entirely preoccupied, body and soul, by one concern: arriving at Canudos before the Counselor and the rebels can make their escape. He knows, he is certain, that those arrows and whistles have no other object than to distract the Seventh Regiment so as to give the bandits time to prepare their retreat. But the colonel is a clever officer who does not allow himself to be taken in or lose a single day pointlessly scouring the countryside or turn aside a single millimeter from his planned route. He has told the officers who are worried about future provisions that, from this point of view too, what matters most is getting to Canudos as soon as possible, since the Seventh Regiment will find everything it needs there, in the enemy's storehouses, fields, and stables.

How many times since the regiment began marching again have the correspondents seen a young officer clutching a handful of b.l.o.o.d.y arrows gallop up to the head of the column to report yet another attack? But this time, at midday, a few hours before the regiment enters Monte Santo, the officer sent by Major Febronio de Brito brings not only arrows but a whistle and a crossbow as well. The column has halted in a ravine, the men's faces drenched with sweat in the beating sun. Moreira Cesar carefully inspects the crossbow. It is a very primitive type, fashioned of unpolished wood and crudely strung, simple to use. Colonel Tamarindo, Olimpio de Castro, and the correspondents crowd round him. The colonel takes one of the arrows, fits it in the crossbow, shows the journalists how it works. Then he raises the whistle, made of a length of sugarcane with notches cut into it, to his mouth, and all of them hear the lugubrious lament.

Only then does the messenger report the earthshaking news. "We have two prisoners, sir. One of them is wounded, but the other one is able to talk."

In the silence that ensues, Moreira Cesar, Tamarindo, and Olimpio de Castro exchange looks. The young officer goes on to explain that three patrols stand ready at all times to scour the countryside the minute the whistles are heard, that two hours before, when the whistling started, the three of them headed off in different directions before the arrows started falling, and that one of them spied the archers just as they slipped away behind some rocks. The patrol had given chase, caught up with them, and tried to take them alive, but one of them attacked and was wounded. Moreira Cesar immediately gallops off in the direction of the rear guard, followed by the correspondents, who are wildly excited at the thought of seeing the enemy's face at last. They are not to see it for some time. When they reach the rear guard an hour later, the prisoners are shut up in a hut guarded by soldiers with fixed bayonets who do not allow them to come anywhere near it. They prowl about the vicinity, watch the officers bustling back and forth, receive evasive answers from those of them who have seen the prisoners. Two or perhaps three hours later Moreira Cesar appears, on his way back to his place at the head of the column. They finally learn a little about what was gone on.

"One of them is in rather bad shape," the colonel tells them. "He may not last till we get to Monte Santo. A pity. They should be executed there, so that their death might serve as an example. It would be pointless here."

When the veteran journalist who always goes about all bundled up as though he were recovering from a cold asks if the prisoners have provided any useful information, the colonel shrugs skeptically. "The usual rigamarole about G.o.d, the Antichrist, the end of the world. They're willing to talk endlessly about all that. But not a word out of them about accomplices or instigators. It may well be that they don't know very much, the poor devils. They belong to a band led by a cangaceiro cangaceiro named Pajeu." named Pajeu."

The column immediately marches off again, at a h.e.l.lish pace, and enters Monte Santo as night is falling. There things take a different turn from what they have in other towns, where the regiment has merely made a rapid search for arms. Here, as the correspondents are still dismounting in the town square beneath the tamarinds, at the foot of the mountainside lined with chapels, surrounded by women, children, and old men with looks in their eyes that they have already learned to recognize-apathetic, mistrustful, distant, stubbornly feigning stupidity and total ignorance of what is going on-they see the troops running, by twos and threes, toward the mud huts and entering them with their rifles at the ready, as though expecting to encounter resistance. Alongside them, in front of them, everywhere, as orders and shouts ring out, the patrols kick in doors and windows and force them open with blows of their rifle b.u.t.ts, and the correspondents soon begin to see lines of townspeople being herded into four enclosures guarded by sentinels. There they are interrogated. From where the journalists are standing they can hear insults, protests, bellows of pain, along with the wails and screams of women outside struggling to get past the sentinels. A few short minutes suffice to turn all of Monte Santo into the scene of a strange battle, without charges or exchanges of fire. Abandoned, without a single officer coming to them to explain what is happening, the correspondents wander aimlessly about the town of calvaries and crosses. They go from one enclosure to another, seeing the same thing in each: lines of men hemmed in by soldiers with bayonets. And from time to time they see a prisoner that they are leading away, pushing and shoving him before them, or are dragging out of a hovel, so battered he can scarcely stand on his feet. The correspondents huddle together, terrified at being caught up in this mechanism relentlessly grinding away round about them, not understanding what is happening but suspecting that it is a consequence of what the two prisoners taken that morning have revealed.

And their suspicions are confirmed by Colonel Moreira Cesar, with whom they are able to speak that same night, after the prisoners have been executed. Before the execution, which takes place under the tamarinds, an officer reads the order of the day that spells out that the Republic is obliged to defend itself against those who, out of cupidity, fanaticism, ignorance, or deliberate deception, rise up against it and serve the appet.i.tes of a retrograde caste whose interest it is to keep Brazil in a backward state the better to exploit it. Do the townspeople understand this message? The correspondents intuit that these words, proclaimed in a thundering voice by the town crier, are taken by the silent creatures being held back by the guards as mere sound and fury. Once the execution is over and the townspeople are allowed to approach those whose throats have been slit, the journalists accompany the commanding officer of the Seventh Regiment to the dwelling where he will spend the night. The nearsighted reporter from the Jornal de Noticias Jornal de Noticias arranges matters, as usual, so that he may be at his side as he receives the press. arranges matters, as usual, so that he may be at his side as he receives the press.

"Was it necessary to turn all of Monte Santo against you with those interrogations?" he asks the colonel.

"They're already enemies, the entire populace is a party to the conspiracy," Moreira Cesar replies. "Pajeu, the cangaceiro cangaceiro, has pa.s.sed through here recently, with about fifty men. They were feted and given provisions. Do you correspondents see what I mean? Subversion has sunk deep roots among these wretched people, thanks to ground already fertilized by religious fanaticism."

He does not appear to be alarmed. Oil lamps, candles, bonfires are burning everywhere, and in the dark shadows patrols of the regiment are prowling about like specters.

"To execute all the accomplices, it would have been necessary to slit the throats of every last person in Monte Santo." Moreira Cesar has reached a small house where Colonel Tamarindo, Major Cunha Matos, and a group of officers are awaiting him. He dismisses the correspondents with a wave of his hand, turns to a lieutenant, and abruptly changes the subject: "How many animals are left?"

"Between fifteen and eighteen, sir."

"We'll offer the troops a feast before the enemy poisons the poor beasts. Tell Febronio to have them all killed once and for all." The officer leaves on the run and Moreira Cesar turns to his other junior officers. "After tomorrow, we'll have to tighten our belts."

He disappears into the rude dwelling and the correspondents head for the mess hut. There they drink coffee, smoke, exchange impressions, and hear the litanies that are drifting down from the chapels on the mountainside where the townspeople are holding a wake for the two dead men. Later on, they watch as the meat is distributed, see the soldiers dig into this splendid repast with gusto, and hear them begin to play guitars and sing, their spirits lifted. Although the journalists also eat the meat and drink cane brandy, they do not share the euphoria that has taken possession of the soldiers as they celebrate what they believe to be imminent victory. A little while later, Captain Olimpio de Castro comes to ask them if they plan to stay in Monte Santo or go on to Canudos. Those who go on will find it difficult to make their way back, for there will not be another intermediate camp set up.

Of the five, two decide to remain in Monte Santo and another to return to Queimadas, since he is not feeling well. The captain suggests to the two who choose to go on with the regiment-the elderly journalist who goes around all bundled up and the nearsighted one-that they go get some sleep, since from now on there will be forced marches.

The following day, when the two correspondents wake up-it is dawn and c.o.c.ks are crowing-they are told that Moreira Cesar has already left because there has been an incident in the vanguard: three soldiers have raped an adolescent girl. They depart immediately, with a company under the command of Colonel Tamarindo. When they reach the head of the column, they find that the rapists have been tied to tree trunks, one alongside the other, and are being flogged. One of them roars with pain at each lash of the whip; the second one appears to be praying; and the third one keeps his face set in an arrogant expression as his back grows redder and redder and the blood begins to spurt.

They are in a clearing, surrounded by a thicket of mandacarus, velame mandacarus, velame, and calumbi calumbi. The companies of the vanguard are standing amid the bushes and brambles watching the flogging. An absolute silence reigns among the men, whose eyes never leave those receiving the lashing. The screech of parrots and a woman's sobs break the silence from time to time. The one who is weeping is a young albino girl, slightly deformed, barefoot, with bruises showing through the tears in her garments. No one pays any attention to her, and when the nearsighted journalist asks an official if she is the one who has been raped, he nods. Moreira Cesar is standing next to Major Cunha Matos. His white horse idles about a few yards away, without a saddle, its coat fresh and clean as though it had just been curried.

When the flogging is over, two of the soldiers being punished have fainted, but the third one, the arrogant one, makes a show of coming to attention to listen to the colonel's words.

"May this serve as a lesson to you men," he shouts. "The army is and must be the most incorruptible inst.i.tution of the Republic. All of us, from the highest-ranking officer to the humblest private in the ranks, are obliged to act at all times in such a way that civilians will respect the uniform we wear. You know the tradition of this regiment: misdeeds are punished with the greatest severity. We are here to protect the civilian population, not to rival bandits. The next man guilty of rape will meet with the death penalty."

There is not a murmur, not a movement in response to his words. The bodies of the two men who have fainted lie in ridiculous, comic postures. The albino girl has stopped weeping. She has a mad look in her eyes and every so often breaks into a smile.

"Give this unfortunate creature something to eat," Moreira Cesar says, pointing to her. And adds, addressing the journalists who have approached him: "She's a little touched in the head. Would you say that raping her was setting a good example in the eyes of a populace that is already prejudiced against us? Isn't a thing like this the best way to prove that those who call us the Antichrist are right?"

An orderly saddles the colonel's horse and the clearing resounds with orders, the sound of troops on the move. The companies take off, in different directions.

"The important accomplices are beginning to turn up," Moreira Cesar says, the rape suddenly forgotten. "Yes indeed, gentlemen. Do you know who the supplier of Canudos is? The cure of c.u.mbe, a certain Father Joaquim. The ca.s.sock: an ideal safe-conduct pa.s.s, an open sesame, an immunity! A Catholic priest, gentlemen!"

The expression on his face is more one of self-satisfaction than of wrath.

The circus people proceeded, amid macambiras macambiras and across stony ground, taking turns pulling the wagon. The landscape round about was parched now and sometimes they made long days' journeys without a thing to eat. After Sitio das Flores they began to meet pilgrims on their way to Canudos, people more wretched than they, carrying all their possessions on their backs and often dragging the disabled along with them as best they could. Wherever circ.u.mstances permitted, the Bearded Lady, the Idiot, and the Dwarf told their fortunes, recited romances, and performed clown acts, but these people on the road had very little to give in return. As rumors were going about that the Bahia Rural Guard in Monte Santo had blocked off the road to Canudos and was conscripting every man of fighting age, they took the longest way round to c.u.mbe. Every once in a while they spied clouds of smoke; according to what people told them, it was the work of the and across stony ground, taking turns pulling the wagon. The landscape round about was parched now and sometimes they made long days' journeys without a thing to eat. After Sitio das Flores they began to meet pilgrims on their way to Canudos, people more wretched than they, carrying all their possessions on their backs and often dragging the disabled along with them as best they could. Wherever circ.u.mstances permitted, the Bearded Lady, the Idiot, and the Dwarf told their fortunes, recited romances, and performed clown acts, but these people on the road had very little to give in return. As rumors were going about that the Bahia Rural Guard in Monte Santo had blocked off the road to Canudos and was conscripting every man of fighting age, they took the longest way round to c.u.mbe. Every once in a while they spied clouds of smoke; according to what people told them, it was the work of the jaguncos jaguncos, who were laying waste to the land so that the armies of the Can would die of hunger. They, too, might be victims of this desolation. The Idiot, grown very feeble, had already lost his laugh and his voice.

They pulled the wagon along two by two; the five of them were a pitiful sight to behold, as though they had endured tremendous sufferings.

Every time it came his turn to be a draft animal, the Dwarf grumbled to the Bearded Lady: "You know it's madness to go to Canudos and yet we're going. There's nothing to eat and people there are dying of hunger." He pointed to Gall, his face contorted with anger. "Why are you listening to him?"

The Dwarf was sweating, and since he was bending over and leaning forward to speak he looked even shorter. How old might he be? He himself didn't know. His face was already beginning to wrinkle; the little humps on his back and chest had become more p.r.o.nounced now that he was so much thinner.

The Bearded Lady looked at Gall. "Because he's a real man!" she exclaimed. "I'm tired of being surrounded by monsters."

The Dwarf was overcome by a fit of the giggles. "And what about you? What are you?" he said, doubling over with laughter. "Oh, I know the answer to that one. You're a slave. You enjoy obeying a man-him now and the Gypsy before him."

The Bearded Lady, who had burst out laughing too, tried to slap him, but the Dwarf dodged her. "You like being a slave," he shouted. "He bought you the day he felt your head and told you that you'd have been a perfect mother. You believed it, and your eyes filled with tears."

He was laughing fit to kill and had to take off at a run so the Bearded Lady wouldn't catch him. She threw stones after him for a while. A few minutes later the Dwarf was back walking at her side again. Their quarrels were always like that, more a game or an unusual way of communicating.

They walked along in silence, with no set system for taking turns pulling the wagon or stopping to rest. They halted when one or another of them was too tired to walk another step, or when they came upon a little stream, a spring, or a shady place where they could spend the hottest hour of the day. As they walked along, they kept a sharp eye out at all times, scanning the environs in search of food, and hence from time to time they had been able to catch game. But this was a rare occurrence, and they had to content themselves with chewing on anything that was green. They looked for imbuzeiros imbuzeiros in particular, a tree that Galileo Gall had taught them to appreciate: the sweetish, refreshing taste of its juicy roots made it seem like real food. in particular, a tree that Galileo Gall had taught them to appreciate: the sweetish, refreshing taste of its juicy roots made it seem like real food.

That afternoon, after AlG.o.des, they met a group of pilgrims who had stopped to rest. They left their wagon and joined them. Most of them were people from the village who had decided to go off to Canudos. They were being led by an apostle, an elderly man dressed in a tunic over trousers and shod in rope sandals. He was wearing an enormous scapular, and the people following him looked at him with timid veneration in their eyes, as though he were someone from another world. Squatting at the man's side, Galileo Gall asked him questions. But the apostle looked at him with a distant gaze, not understanding him, and went on talking with his people. Later on, however, the old man spoke of Canudos, of the Holy Books, and of the prophecies of the Counselor, whom he called a messenger of Jesus. His followers would be restored to life in three months and a day, exactly. The Can's followers, however, would die forever. That was the difference: the difference between life and death, heaven and h.e.l.l, d.a.m.nation and salvation. The Antichrist could send soldiers to Canudos: but to what avail? They would rot away, they would disappear forever. Believers too might die, but three months and a day later, they would be back, their bodies whole and their souls purified by the brush of angels' wings and the breath of the Blessed Jesus. Gall gazed at him intently, his eyes gleaming, trying his best not to miss a syllable. As the old man paused for a moment, he said that not only faith, but arms as well, were needed to win wars. Was Canudos able to defend itself against the rich people's army? The pilgrims' heads turned round to see who was speaking and then turned back toward the apostle. Though he had not looked at Gall, the latter had listened. When the war was ended, there would no longer be any rich people, or rather, no one would take any notice of them, because everybody would be rich. These stones would become rivers, these hillsides fertile fields, and the sandy ground of AlG.o.des a garden of orchids like the ones that grow on Monte Santo. Snakes, tarantulas, cougars would be friends of man, as it would be now if Adam had not been driven out of Paradise. The Counselor was in this world to remind people of these truths.

Someone began to weep in the semidarkness, with quiet, heartfelt sobs that continued for a long time. The old man began to speak again, with a sort of tenderness. The spirit was stronger than matter. The spirit was the Blessed Jesus and matter was the Dog. The miracles so long awaited would take place: poverty, sickness, ugliness would disappear. His hands touched the Dwarf, lying curled up next to Galileo. He, too, would be tall and beautiful, like all the others. Now other people could be heard weeping, caught up by the contagious sobs of the first person. The apostle leaned his head against the body of the disciple closest to him and dropped off to sleep. Little by little, the pilgrims quieted down, and one after the other, they, too, fell asleep. The circus people returned to their wagon. Very soon afterward they heard the Dwarf, who often talked in his sleep, snoring away.

Galileo and Jurema slept apart from the others, on top of the canvas tent that they had not set up since Ipupiara. The moon, full and bright, presided over a cortege of countless stars. The night was cool, clear, without a sound, peopled with the shadows of mandacarus mandacarus and and cajueiros cajueiros. Jurema closed her eyes and her breathing grew slow and regular, as Gall, lying alongside her, face up with his hands behind his head, contemplated the sky. It would be stupid to end up in this wasteland without having seen Canudos. It might well be something primitive, naive, contaminated by superst.i.tion, but there was no doubt of it: it was also something unusual. A libertarian citadel, without money, without masters, without politics, without priests, without bankers, without landowners, a world built with the faith and the blood of the poorest of the poor. If it endured, the rest would come by itself: religious prejudices, the mirage of the beyond, being obsolete and useless, would fade away. The example would spread, there would be other Canudoses, and who could tell...He had begun to smile. He scratched his head. His hair was growing out, long enough now for him to grasp with his fingertips. Going around with a shaved head had left him a prey to anxiety, to sudden rushes of fear. Why? It went back to that time in Barcelona when they were taking care of him so as to garrote him. The sick ward, the madmen of the prison. They had had their heads shaved and been put in straitjackets. The guards were common prisoners; they ate the patients' rations, beat them mercilessly, and delighted in hosing them down with ice-cold water. That was the vision that came to life again each time he caught a glimpse of his head reflected in a mirror, a stream, a well: the vision of those madmen tortured by prison guards and doctors alike. Back then he had written an article that he was proud of: "Against the Oppression of Illness." The revolution would not only free man of the yoke of capital and religion, but also of the prejudices that surrounded illnesses in a cla.s.s society: the patient-above all, the mental patient-was a social victim no less long-suffering and scorned than the worker, the peasant, the prost.i.tute, the servant girl. Hadn't that revered old man said, just tonight, thinking that he was speaking of G.o.d when in reality he was speaking of freedom, that in Canudos poverty, sickness, ugliness would disappear? Wasn't that the revolutionary ideal? Jurema's eyes were open and she was watching him. Had he been thinking aloud?

"I would have given anything to be with them when they routed Febronio de Brito," he said in a whisper, as though uttering words of love. "I've spent my life fighting and all I've seen in our camp is betrayals, dissensions, and defeats. I would have liked to see a victory, if only just once. To know what it feels like, what it's really like, what a victory for our side tastes like."

He saw that Jurema was looking at him as she had at other times, at once aloof and intrigued. They lay there, just a fraction of an inch apart, their bodies not touching. The Dwarf had begun to babble deliriously, in a soft voice.

"You don't understand me and I don't understand you," Gall said. "Why didn't you kill me when I was unconscious? Why didn't you convince the capangas capangas to take my head away with them instead of just my hair? Why are you with me? You don't believe in the things that I believe in." to take my head away with them instead of just my hair? Why are you with me? You don't believe in the things that I believe in."

"The person who must kill you is Rufino," Jurema whispered, with no hatred in her voice, as though she were explaining something very simple. "By killing you, I would have done a worse thing to him than you did."

"That's what I don't understand," Gall thought. They had talked about the same thing before and each time he had ended up as much in the dark as ever. Honor, vengeance, that rigorous religion, those punctilious codes of conduct-how to explain their existence here at the end of the world, among people who possessed nothing but the rags and lice they had on them? Honor, a vow, a man's word, those luxuries and games of the rich, of idlers and parasites-how to understand their existence here? He remembered how, from the window in his room at the boarding house of Our Lady of Grace in Queimadas, he had listened one market day to a wandering minstrel recite a story that, though distorted, was a medieval legend he had read as a child and as a young man seen transformed into a light romantic comedy for the stage: Robert the Devil. How had it gotten here? The world was more unpredictable than it appeared to be.

"I don't understand those capangas capangas' reasons for carrying off my hair either," he murmured. "That Caifas, I mean. Was he sparing my life so as not to deprive his friend of the pleasure of taking his revenge? That's not the behavior of a peasant. It's the behavior of an aristocrat."

At other times, Jurema had tried to explain, but tonight she remained silent. Perhaps she was now convinced that this stranger would never understand these things.

The following morning, they took to the road again before the AlG.o.des pilgrims. It took them an entire day to cross the Serra da Franca, and that night they were so tired and hungry they collapsed. The Idiot fainted twice during the day's journey, and the second time he lay there so pale and still they thought he was dead. At dusk they were rewarded for their hard day by the discovery of a pool of greenish water. Parting the water plants, they drank from it, and the Bearded Lady brought the Idiot a drink in her cupped hands and cooled the cobra by sprinkling it with drops of water. The animal did not suffer from hunger, for they could always find little leaves or a worm or two to feed it. Once they had quenched their thirst, they gathered roots, stems, leaves to eat, and the Dwarf laid traps. The breeze that was blowing was balm after the terrible heat they had endured all day long. The Bearded Lady sat down next to the Idiot and took his head in her lap. The fate of the Idiot, the cobra, and the wagon was as great a concern to her as her own; she seemed to believe that her survival depended on her ability to protect that person, animal, and thing that const.i.tuted her world.

Gall, Jurema, and the Dwarf chewed slowly, without gusto, spitting out the little twigs and roots once they had extracted the juice from them. At the feet of the revolutionary was something hard, lying half buried. Yes, it was a skull, yellowed and broken. Ever since he had been in the backlands, he had seen human bones along the roads. Someone had told him that some men in these parts dug up their enemies' dead bodies and left them lying in the open as food for scavengers, because they believed that by so doing they were sending their souls to h.e.l.l. He examined the skull, turning it this way and that in his hands.

"To my father, heads were books, mirrors," he said nostalgically. "What would he think if he knew that I was here in this place, in the state that I'm in? The last time I saw him, I was seventeen years old. I disappointed him by telling him that action was more important than science. He was a rebel, too, though in his own way. Doctors made fun of him, and called him a sorcerer."

The Dwarf looked at him, trying to understand, as did Jurema. Gall went on chewing and spitting, his face pensive.

"Why did you come here?" the Dwarf murmured. "Aren't you afraid of dying so far from your homeland? You have no family here, no friends. n.o.body will remember you."

"You're my family," Gall answered. "And the jaguncos jaguncos, too."

"You're not a saint, you don't pray, you don't talk about G.o.d," the Dwarf said. "Why are you so set on getting to Canudos?"

"I couldn't live among foreigners," Jurema said. "If you don't have a fatherland, you're an orphan."

"Someday the word 'fatherland' is going to disappear," Galileo immediately replied. "People will look back on us, shut up within frontiers, killing each other over lines on a map, and they'll say: How stupid they were."

The Dwarf and Jurema looked at each other and Gall had the feeling that they were thinking he was the one who was stupid. They chewed and spat, grimacing in disgust every so often.

"Do you believe what the apostle from AlG.o.des said?" the Dwarf asked. "That one day there'll be a world without evil, without sicknesses..."

"And without ugliness," Gall added. He nodded his head several times. "I believe in that the way other people believe in G.o.d. For a long time now, a lot of people have given their lives so that that might be possible. That's why I'm so doggedly determined to get to Canudos. Up there, in the very worst of cases, I'll die for something that's worth dying for."

"You're going to get killed by Rufino," Jurema muttered, staring at the ground. Her voice rose: "Do you think he's forgotten the affront to his honor? He's searching for us and sooner or later he'll take his revenge."

Gall seized her by the arm. "You're staying with me so as to see that revenge, isn't that true?" he asked her. He shrugged. "Rufino couldn't understand either. It wasn't my intention to offend him. Desire sweeps everything before it: force of will, friendship. We've no control over it, it's in our bones, in what other people call our souls." He brought his face close to Jurema's again. "I have no regrets, it was...instructive. What I believed was false. Carnal pleasure is not at odds with the ideal. We mustn't be ashamed of the body, do you understand? No, you don't understand."

"In other words, it might be true?" the Dwarf interrupted, his voice breaking and an imploring look in his eyes. "People say that he's made the blind see and the deaf hear, closed the wounds of lepers. If I say to him: 'I've come because I know you'll work the miracle,' will he touch me and make me grow?"

Gall looked at him, disconcerted, and found no truth or lie to offer him in reply. At that moment the Bearded Lady burst into tears, out of pity for the Idiot. "He hasn't an ounce of strength left," she said. "He's not smiling any more, or complaining, he's just dying little by little, second by second." They heard her weeping like that for a long time before falling asleep. At dawn, they were awakened by a family from Carnaiba, who pa.s.sed some bad news on to them. Rural Police patrols and capangas capangas in the hire of hacienda owners in the region were blocking the entrances and exits of c.u.mbe, waiting for the arrival of the army. The only way to reach Canudos now was to turn north and make a long detour by way of Ma.s.sacara, Angico, and Rosario. in the hire of hacienda owners in the region were blocking the entrances and exits of c.u.mbe, waiting for the arrival of the army. The only way to reach Canudos now was to turn north and make a long detour by way of Ma.s.sacara, Angico, and Rosario.

A day and a half later they arrived in Santo Antonio, a tiny spa on the banks of the greenish Ma.s.sacara. The circus people had been in the town, years before, and remembered how many people came to cure their skin diseases in the bubbling, fetid mineral springs. Santo Antonio had also been the constant victim of attacks by bandits, who came to rob the sick people. Today it appeared to be deserted. They did not come across a single washerwoman down by the river, and in the narrow cobblestone streets lined with coconut palms, ficus, and cactus there was not a living creature-human, dog, or bird-to be seen. Despite this, the Dwarf's mood had suddenly brightened. He grabbed a cornet, put it to his lips and produced a comic blare, and began his spiel about the performance they would give. The Bearded Lady burst out laughing, and even the Idiot, weak as he was, tried to push the wagon along faster, with his shoulders, his hands, his head; his mouth was gaping open and long trickles of saliva were dribbling out of it. They finally spied an ugly, misshapen little old man who was fastening an eyebolt to a door. He looked at them as though he didn't see them, but when the Bearded Lady threw him a kiss he smiled.

The circus people parked the wagon in a little square with climbing vines; doors and windows started flying open and faces of the townspeople, attracted by the blaring of the cornet, began peeking out of them. The Dwarf, the Bearded Lady, and the Idiot rummaged through their bits of cloth and odds and ends, and a moment later they were busily daubing paint on their faces, blackening them, decking themselves out in bright costumes, and in their hands there appeared the last few remains of a set of props: the cobra cage, hoops, magic wands, a paper concertina. The Dwarf blew furiously into his cornet and shouted: "The show is about to begin!" Gradually, an audience straight out of a nightmare began to crowd round them. Human skeletons, of indefinable age and s.e.x, most of them with faces, arms, and legs pitted with gangrene sores, abscesses, rashes, pockmarks, came out of the dwellings, and overcoming their initial apprehension, leaning on each other, crawling on all fours, or dragging themselves along, came to swell the circle. "They don't look like people who are dying," Gall thought. "They look like people who've been dead for some time." All of them, the children in particular, seemed very old. Some of them smiled at the Bearded Lady, who was coiling the cobra round her, kissing it on the mouth, and making it writhe in and out of her arms. The Dwarf grabbed the Idiot and mimicked the number that the Bearded Lady was performing with the snake: he made him dance, contort himself, tie himself in knots. The townspeople and the sick of Santo Antonio watched, grave-faced or smiling, nodding their heads in approval and bursting into applause now and again. Some of them turned around to look at Gall and Jurema, as though wondering when they would put on their act. The revolutionary watched them, fascinated, as Jurema's face contorted in a grimace of repulsion. She did her best to contain her feelings, but soon she whispered that she couldn't bear the sight of them and wanted to leave. Galileo did not calm her down. His eyes had begun to redden and he was deeply shaken. Health, like love, like wealth and power, was selfish: it shut one up within oneself, it abolished all thought of others. Yes, it was better not to have anything, not to love, but how to give up one's health in order to be as one with those brothers who were ill? There were so many problems, the hydra had so many heads, iniquity raised its head everywhere one looked.

He noticed then how repelled and frightened Jurema was, and took her by the arm. "Look at them, look at them," he said feverishly, indignantly. "Look at the women. They were young, strong, pretty once. Who turned them into what they are today? G.o.d? No: scoundrels, evildoers, the rich, the healthy, the selfish, the powerful."

With a look of feverish excitement on his face, he let go of Jurema's arm and strode to the center of the circle, not even noticing that the Dwarf had begun to tell the strange story of Princess Maguelone, the daughter of the King of Naples. The spectators saw the man with reddish fuzz on his scalp and a red beard, a scar on his neck, and ragged pants begin to wave his arms wildly.

"Don't lose your courage, my brothers, don't give in to despair! You are not rotting away here in this life because a ghost hidden behind the clouds has so decided, but because society is evil. You are in the state you are because you have nothing to eat, because you don't have doctors or medicine, because no one takes care of you, because you are poor. Your sickness is called injustice, abuse, exploitation. Do not resign yourselves, my brothers. From the depths of your misery, rebel, as your brothers in Canudos have done. Occupy the lands, the houses, take possession of the goods of those who have stolen your youth, who have stolen your health, your humanity..."

The Bearded Lady did not allow him to go on. Her face congested with rage, she shook him and screamed at him: "You stupid fool! You stupid fool! n.o.body's listening to you! You're making them sad, you're boring them, they won't give us money to eat on! Feel their heads, predict their future-do something that'll make them happy!"

His eyes still closed, the Little Blessed One heard the c.o.c.k crow and thought: "Praised be the Blessed Jesus." Without moving, he prayed and asked the Father for strength for the day. The intense activity was almost too much for his frail body: in recent days, what with the ever-increasing numbers of pilgrims pouring in, he sometimes had attacks of vertigo. At night when he collapsed on his straw mattress behind the altar of the Chapel of Santo Antonio, his bones and muscles ached so badly that the pain made rest impossible; he would sometimes lie there for hours, with his teeth clenched, before sleep freed him from this secret torture.

Because, despite being frail, the Little Blessed One had so strong a spirit that n.o.body noticed the weakness of his body, in this city in which, after the Counselor, he exercised the highest spiritual functions.

He opened his eyes. The c.o.c.k had crowed again, and the light of dawn appeared through the skylight. He slept in the tunic that Maria Quadrado and the women of the Sacred Choir had mended countless times. He put on his rope sandals, kissed the scapular and the emblem of the Sacred Heart that he wore on his breast, and girded tightly about his waist the length of wire, long since rusted, that the Counselor had given him when he was still a child, back in Pombal. He rolled up the straw mattress and went to awaken the sacristan and s.e.xton who slept at the entrance to the church. He was an old man from Chorrocho on opening his eyes, he murmured: "Praised be Our Lord Jesus Christ."

"Praised be He," the Little Blessed One replied, and handed him the whip with which each morning he offered the sacrifice of his pain to the Father. The old man took the whip-the Little Blessed One had knelt-and gave him ten lashes, on the back and the b.u.t.tocks, with all his strength. The Little Blessed One received them without a single moan. The two of them crossed themselves again. Thus the day's tasks began.

As the sacristan went to tidy the altar, the Little Blessed One headed for the door. On drawing near it, he sensed the presence of the pilgrims who had arrived in Belo Monte during the night. The men of the Catholic Guard had undoubtedly been keeping close watch on them until he could decide whether they might stay or were unworthy of so doing. The fear that he might make a mistake, refusing a good Christian or admitting someone whose presence might cause harm to the Counselor, sorely troubled his heart; it was one of those things for which he implored the Father's help with the most anguish. He opened the door and heard a murmur of voices and saw the dozens of creatures camped in front of the portal. Circulating among them were members of the Catholic Guard, with rifles and blue armbands or kerchiefs, who on catching sight of him said in chorus: "Praised be the Blessed Jesus."

"Praised be He," the Little Blessed One answered softly. The pilgrims crossed themselves, and those who were not crippled or ill rose to their feet. There was hunger and happiness in their eyes. The Little Blessed One estimated that there were at least fifty of them.

"Welcome to Belo Monte, the land of the Father and of the Blessed Jesus," he intoned. "The Counselor asks two things of those who come in answer to the call: faith and truth. There is no place for unbelievers or liars in this land of the Lord."

He told the Catholic Guard to begin letting them in. In bygone days, he conversed with each pilgrim, one by one; nowadays he was obliged to speak with them in groups. The Counselor did not want anyone to lend him a hand. "It is you who are the door, Little Blessed One," he would answer each time that the latter asked that someone be appointed to share this responsibility.

A blind man, his daughter and her husband, and two of their children entered. They had come from Querera, a journey that had taken them a month. On the way the husband's mother and the couple's twin sons had died. Had they given them a Christian burial? Yes, in coffins and with the prayer for the dead. As the old man with eyelids glued shut told him about their journey, the Little Blessed One observed them. He remarked to himself that they were a united family in which there was respect for one's elders, for the other four listened to the blind man without interrupting him, nodding their heads to confirm what he was saying. The five faces showed signs of that mixture of fatigue from hunger and physical suffering and that soul's rejoicing that came over pilgrims as they set foot on Belo Monte. Feeling the brush of the angel's wing, the Little Blessed One decided that they were welcome. He nonetheless asked if any one of them ever served the Antichrist. After having them repeat after him the oath whereby they swore that they were not republicans, did not accept the expulsion of the Emperor, nor the separation of Church and State, nor civil marriage, nor the new system of weights and measures, nor the census questions, he embraced them and sent them with a member of the Catholic Guard to Antonio Vilanova's. At the door, the woman whispered something in the blind man's ear, and in fear and trembling he asked when they would see Blessed Jesus the Counselor. The family awaited his answer with such anxiety that the Little Blessed One thought to himself: "They are elect." They would see him that evening, in the Temple; they would hear him give counsel and tell them that the Father was happy to receive them into the flock. He saw them leave, giddy with joy. The presence of grace in this world doomed to perdition was purifying. These new residents-the Little Blessed One knew for certain-had already forgotten their three dead and their tribulations and were feeling that life was worth living. Antonio Vilanova would now register their names in his ledgers, and would then send the blind man to a Health House, the woman to help the Sardelinha sisters, and the husband and children out to work as water carriers.

As he listened to another couple-the woman had a bundle in her arms-the Little Blessed One's thoughts dwelt on Antonio Vilanova. He was a man of faith, an elect, one of the Father's sheep. He and his brother were people with schooling, they had had various businesses, cattle, money; they might have devoted their lives to acc.u.mulating wealth and acquiring houses, lands, servants. But they had chosen instead to serve G.o.d alongside their humble brothers. Was it not a gift from the Father to have someone like Antonio Vilanova here, a man thanks to whose wisdom so many problems were solved? He had just organized the distribution of water, for instance. It was collected from the Vaza-Barris and the reservoirs of the Fazenda Velha and then brought round to the dwellings free of charge. The water carriers were recently arrived pilgrims; in this way, people got to know them, felt they were of service to the Counselor and the Blessed Jesus, and gave them food.

The Little Blessed One finally pieced together, from the man's torrent of words, that the bundle was a newborn baby girl, who had died the evening before as they were coming down the Serra da Canabrava. He raised the bit of cloth and looked: the little body was rigid, the color of parchment. He explained to the woman that it was a blessing from heaven that her daughter had died on the only piece of earth in this world that remained free of the Devil. They had not baptized her, and the Little Blessed One now did so, naming her Maria Eufrasia and praying to the Father to take this little soul to His Glory. He had the couple repeat the oath and sent them to the Vilanovas to arrange for their daughter's burial. Because of the scarcity of wood, burials had become a problem in Belo Monte. A shiver ran up his spine. That was the most terrifying thing he could think of: his body buried in a grave with no coffin to protect it.

As he spoke with more pilgrims, one of the women of the Sacred Choir entered to tidy the chapel and Alexandrinha Correa brought him a little earthenware bowl accompanied by a message from Maria Quadrado: "For you alone to eat," because the Mother of Men knew that he was in the habit of giving his rations to those who were starving. As he listened to the pilgrims, the Little Blessed One thanked G.o.d for having given him strength of soul such that he never felt the pangs of hunger or thirst: a few sips of water, a mouthful of food sufficed; not even during the pilgrimage through the desert had he suffered the torments of near-starvation that other brothers and sisters had. It was for that reason that only the Counselor had offered up more fasts than he to the Blessed Jesus. Alexandrinha Correa also told him that Abbot Joao, Big Joao, and Antonio Vilanova were waiting for him in the Sanctuary.