The situation was clear to her now. It was a choice between pleasure and power. If she kept silent, she would be accepting defeat in exchange for other such moments, always assuming her husband was prepared to grant them to her. If she spoke, she ran the risk of having him throw her impassioned response back in her face. It was easy enough to set out those two alternatives, but rather harder to choose between them. Shortly before, she had felt nausea and disgust, but now those moments of sexual ecstasy roared inside her like the sea inside a shell. Speaking out would mean that last night’s experience would never be repeated. Saying nothing would mean subjecting herself to whatever conditions her husband chose to impose on her. Justina moved between those two poles — newly awoken desire and the desire to be in control. One excluded the other. Which to choose? And what scope did she have to make such a choice? If she chose control, how could she resist desire now that she had experienced it? If she chose submission, how could she bear submitting to a man she despised?
The Sunday-morning sun flooded in through the window like a river of light. From where she was sitting, Justina could see the small, raggedy white clouds chasing across the blue sky. Good weather. Bright skies. Spring.
From the bedroom came a mumbling sound. The bed creaked. Justina shuddered and felt her face flush scarlet. The line of thought she had been carefully drawing snapped. She sat paralyzed, waiting. The creaking continued. She went to the bedroom and peered around the door: her husband was sitting there, eyes open. He saw her. There was no going back. She entered in silence. Caetano looked at her in silence. Justina didn’t know what to say. All her powers of reasoning had abandoned her. Her husband smiled. She did not have time to find out what that smile meant. Almost without realizing she was speaking, she said:
“Just pretend that nothing happened last night, and I’ll do the same.”
The smile vanished from Caetano’s lips. A deep frown line appeared between his eyebrows.
“Perhaps that won’t be possible,” he answered.
“You know plenty of other women. You can amuse yourself with them.”
“And what if I demand my conjugal rights?”
“I couldn’t refuse you, but you’d soon grow weary of that.”
“I see — at least I think I do. How do you explain your behavior last night, then?”
“If you had an ounce of dignity, you wouldn’t ask such a question! Have you forgotten that I spat in your face?”
The expression on Caetano’s face hardened. His hands, resting on the mattress, clenched. He seemed about to stand up, but stayed where he was. In a slow, sarcastic voice, he said:
“Ah, yes, I’d forgotten about that. I remember now, though, but I also remember that you only spat in my face once…”
Justina saw what he was driving at and said nothing.
“Come on, answer!”
“No, I feel ashamed for you and for me.”
“What about me? I’ve had to suffer years of being despised by you.”
“You deserve it.”
“Who are you to despise me?”
“No one, but I do.”
“Why?”
“I began to despise you as soon as I knew you, and I only really knew you once we were married. You’re depraved, you are.”
Caetano shrugged impatiently:
“You’re just jealous.”
“Jealous? Me? Don’t make me laugh! You can only feel jealous of someone you love, and I don’t love you. I may have once, but it didn’t last. When my daughter was ill, did you care? You spent all your time with your fancy women!”
“Now you’re talking nonsense!”
“If that’s what you think, fine. I just want you to know that what happened last night won’t happen again.”
“We’ll see about that.”
“What do you mean?”
“You called me depraved. Maybe I am, but what if, for some reason, I should start taking an interest in you again?”
“Don’t bother. Besides, it’s been years since you thought of me as a woman.”
“You sound almost sorry.”
Justina did not respond. Her husband was eyeing her malevolently:
“Are you sorry?”
“No! If I was, I’d be sinking as low as all those other women you know!”
“Going with them, of course, is less convenient. With you, I just have to reach out and grab you. I am your husband after all.”
“Unfortunately for me.”
“Now you’re being nasty. Just because I didn’t react when you spat at me doesn’t mean I’m prepared to put up with all your back talk.”
“You don’t frighten me. You threatened to beat me to a pulp once, and I didn’t so much as turn a hair.”
“Don’t provoke me.”
“Like I said, you don’t frighten me!”
“Justina!”
She had moved closer as she spoke. She was standing by the bed, looking down at her husband. He reached out his right arm and caught her by the wrist. He didn’t pull her toward him, but held her firm. Justina felt a tremor run through her whole body. Her knees were shaking as if they were about to buckle beneath her. Caetano said in a hoarse voice:
“You’re right… I am depraved. I know you don’t love me, but ever since I saw you naked the other night, I’ve been mad for you, do you hear, mad. If I hadn’t come home last night, I would have died!”
It wasn’t so much his words as the tone in which he said them that troubled Justina. Feeling her husband drawing her toward him, she desperately tried to free herself from his grip:
“Let me go!”
What little strength she had was ebbing away. She could feel herself being drawn downward, feel her own pulse pounding in her ears. Then her eyes fell on the photograph of her daughter and her stubbornly sweet smile. She pushed hard against the edge of the bed, resisting his efforts to pull her down, and when she saw that he was about to grab her with his other hand, she squirmed around and bit the fingers gripping her. Caetano let out a scream and released his grip.
She ran into the kitchen. She understood now, understood why he had acted as he did. If she hadn’t given in to that impulse to reveal herself naked to her husband, none of this would have happened. The Justina she was today would be the same Justina she had been yesterday. She had spoken out, but what had she gained? Only the certain knowledge that everything had changed. It was pure chance that she hadn’t given in this time. The photo of her daughter would have been of little help if the conversation with her husband earlier hadn’t given her the strength to resist; that, of course, and what had happened only a few hours before… “Which means that if, instead of trying to have sex with me so soon afterward, he’d allowed a day or two to pass and then tried again, I probably wouldn’t have resisted…”
Justina was busy making lunch, her thoughts elsewhere. And what she was thinking was this: “He’s depraved, a lecher, which is why I’ve always despised him. He’s still depraved, which is why I still despise him. And yet, even though I despise him, I gave in to him, and I know that, given the opportunity, I’d do the same again. Is that a marriage? Must I conclude, then, that after all these years I am just as depraved as he? If I loved him, I wouldn’t use a word like ‘depraved.’ I would find it all perfectly natural and would always give myself to him as I did last night. But is it possible not to love a man and still feel what I felt? I don’t love him and yet he drove me mad with pleasure. Is it the same for other people? Do they feel nothing but loathing and pleasure? And what about love? Can pure animal lust give you the kind of pleasure you should only get from love? Or is love just lust in disguise?”
“Justina! I’m getting up. Where are my pajamas?”