Felicia had spoken as if she were reading from a script. Ana knew she was right. The number of customers had indeed gone down — at first only slightly, but lately much more noticeably. Herr Eber was worried and had shown her a graph illustrating how income was falling — not exactly over a precipice, but down a hill that was growing steeper and steeper.
Nevertheless, Ana was both annoyed and disappointed by what Felicia had said. She had hoped for approval and support for her efforts to get Isabel released. She found herself feeling contempt for these black women who sold their bodies without a second thought. All that mattered to them was their income.
She realized immediately that the thought was unfair. She was the one who earned more than anybody else from the activities of the brothel. She was the one who could afford to spend time and money on attempts to help Isabel. She was the one who had the means to bring Pandre to Lourenço Marques from abroad, and she was the one who might eventually be able to bribe somebody to allow Isabel to escape.
But what Felicia had said continued to annoy her. Even during the time when Senhor Vaz was alive, the women in his establishment had earned much more than those in any of the town’s other brothels.
‘The difference in earnings can’t be all that great,’ said Ana. ‘Is there really anybody among you who has cause for complaint?’
Ana noticed that her voice was tense. She wanted them to be aware of her anger.
None of the women spoke. They all stared into space. Nobody reacted even when two orange-sellers in the street outside started quarrelling. The women were normally more interested in fights or noisy quarrels outside the brothel than almost anything else.
‘I want to know,’ said Ana. ‘Is there anybody who has noticed a significant fall in earnings?’
Still nobody spoke — but then, as if in response to an invisible sign, all of them raised their hands.
Ana stood up. She felt she couldn’t bear this any longer.
‘I shall personally pay each of you however much you think you have lost as a result of my helping Isabel,’ she shouted. ‘Come to me every month with bills for what you would have earned from customers who haven’t shown up. I shall pay them. I shall become your new customer!’
Ana stormed out of the brothel without looking back, and was driven straight back to her house. She sat for ages in front of her open diary without actually writing anything. She didn’t yet know how to deal with her big disappointment.
After a while, she went over to a window and looked out over the sea. Small fishing boats with triangular sails were scudding along over the waves, making the most of a fresh following wind. Carlos had climbed up on to the roof and was sitting on the edge of the chimney with an orange in his hands.
Ana was just about to leave the window when she noticed a black man standing in the street down below, looking up at her. She had never seen him before. He was strongly built, and wearing what looked like overalls. When he noticed that she had seen him, he turned round and walked away. She shouted for Julietta.
‘Have you seen a black man standing in the street, looking up at my house?’
‘No,’ said Julietta.
‘I’ve just seen one down below, looking up.’
‘I don’t know who it could have been. But I can ask.’
By the time Ana got into the car that afternoon to be driven down to the fort, Julietta had still not managed to find out the identity of the man in the street. Nobody seemed to have seen him. Ana began to wonder if she’d imagined it.
Sullivan was standing on the steps waiting for her when she arrived.
‘The prisoner was injured last night,’ he said, off-handedly as if it didn’t concern him.
At first Ana didn’t understand what he meant.
‘The woman for whom you bring food was injured during the night.’
‘What happened?’
‘Somebody tried to kill her. But failed. It’s also possible that it was only somebody trying to disfigure her, to make a mess of her face.’
‘How could that happen?’
‘We are investigating the circumstances.’
Ana didn’t wait to hear what else Sullivan had to say. She ran across the open courtyard with the grassy patch where goats were grazing. A soldier had already raised the grating when he saw her come in through the front gate. Ana raced along the dark corridor. The door to Isabel’s cell was standing open. For once she wasn’t sitting on the bunk, but lying down. Ana sat down on the stone floor next to the bunk. Blood was running from one of Isabel’s cheeks and her mouth. It was obvious that she had been slashed with a knife.
Sullivan had followed her down to the cell.
‘Maybe you should fetch that Indian doctor,’ he said.
Ana had the distinct impression that Sullivan knew Pandre was not at all what he had pretended to be, but just now was not the time to start wondering about what Sullivan knew or didn’t know. He could think whatever he liked.
‘He’s already left,’ she said. ‘Why can’t the fort summon a doctor?’
‘He’s on his way,’ said Sullivan. ‘But he had to deliver a baby first. Life always takes precedence over death.’
‘Not always,’ said Ana. ‘I think that life and death are equally important. Isabel might die if she doesn’t get medical treatment.’
The doctor who eventually arrived turned out to be an extremely deaf old Portuguese man who had lived in Africa for over fifty years. He surprised Ana by stitching up the gaping wound with admirable skill, and covering it with cotton wool.
‘Will she survive?’ Ana asked.
‘Of course she’ll survive,’ said the doctor. ‘She’ll have a scar. But that’s all.’
‘Did whoever attacked her want to kill her, or just to injure her?’
She had to shout loudly into the doctor’s ear in order for him to understand.
‘Both intentions are possible,’ he said, ‘but the probability is that he wasn’t trying to kill her. To do that all he’d have needed to do was to slash her a bit lower down, over her throat, and a bit deeper. A sharp knife across a victim’s throat can kill in less than a minute.’
Ana stayed with Isabel. She couldn’t be sure how much pain the patient was in. They shared the silence and listened to each other’s breathing. Ana watched an insect creeping incredibly slowly over one of the cell walls.
‘Who could have got access to her?’ Ana asked.
‘To be absolutely honest,’ said Sullivan, ‘I just don’t know. But I can promise you that we shall get to the bottom of this. I don’t want a prisoner for whom I’m responsible to be killed.’
‘Is that true?’
‘Yes,’ said Sullivan. ‘It certainly is true. I don’t care about her — I think she ought to be hanged or shot. But nobody is going to sneak into one of my cells and kill her, and get away with it.’
That evening, when Ana returned to her house and was about to draw the curtains in her bedroom, she once again saw the black man in overalls standing in the street below.
Not long afterwards, she peered out through a gap in the curtains.
The man was still there.
He’s waiting for me, she thought. There’s something he wants from me.
She went down the stairs, carefully opened the front door and passed by the guards. She was possessed by an overwhelming desire to push them into the fire for falling asleep instead of standing guard over the entrance to her house, but instead she opened the gate leading into the street. The man was still there, on the other side. She was carrying a candle, and walked over to him.