“If it wasn’t for anonymous letters, a lot of things would remain hidden. You wouldn’t want poor Senhor Morais playing the cuckold, would you?”
They were heading toward the decision that the events cried out for. Anselmo agreed:
“Naturally, if I was in the same situation, I’d certainly want to know…”
Scandalized at such a hypothesis, his wife broke in:
“So that’s what you think of me, is it? Our daughter is here listening, you know!”
Claudinha got up and went to her room. Still bristling, Rosália commented:
“Honestly, the things you come out with! How could you?”
“All right, all right. Isn’t it about time we ate?”
The decision was postponed for the time being. Claudinha returned from her room and, shortly afterward, they were seated at the supper table. During the meal, husband and wife talked of nothing else, while Claudinha remained silent throughout, as if this were too scabrous a conversation for her to take any part in. Rosália and Anselmo examined the matter from all angles, except one, the one that would require them to make a decision. They both knew it was necessary, but tacitly put it off until later. Rosália declared that she had never liked Senhor Silvestre’s lodger and reminded her husband that the very first time she’d clapped eyes on the man, she had commented on his shabby appearance.
“What I don’t understand,” said Anselmo, “is why Dona Lídia would get involved with some vagrant who has to live in rented rooms. Whatever can have possessed her?”
“It’s obvious, isn’t it? As you yourself said just now: what can you expect of someone living the life she lives?”
“Yes, you’re right.”
When supper was over, Claudinha said she had a headache and was going to bed. Feeling able at last to talk more freely, husband and wife looked at each other, shook their heads and simultaneously opened their mouths to speak, then promptly closed them again, each waiting for the other to begin. In the end, it was Anselmo who spoke:
“Well, what can you expect of a whore?”
“Shameless hussy!”
“I don’t blame him, of course. He’s a man, after all, and simply took what was offered. But her, when she’s so well set up at home!”
“Nice dresses, lovely furs, beautiful jewelry…”
“That’s what I mean, but once you’ve stumbled, it’s easy enough to stumble again. It’s in the blood. People like her are only happy when they’re thinking shameless thoughts.”
“If only they were just thoughts!”
“And with Senhor Silvestre’s lodger too, right under Senhor Morais’s nose!”
“The woman has no shame at all!”
All these things had to be said, because the decision could only be made when blame had been duly allotted. Anselmo picked up his knife and, using the blade, began carefully shepherding the crumbs on the table into a neat pile. His wife observed him intently, as if the very foundations of the building depended on the successful outcome of this task.
“Well, in the circumstances,” said Anselmo, once all the crumbs were safely gathered in, “we have to take a stand.”
“Indeed.”
“We have to act.”
“I agree.”
“Claudinha must have nothing more to do with her. She’s a bad influence.”
“I wouldn’t let Claudinha near her. In fact, it’s been on my mind for a while now.”
Anselmo picked up his plate to reveal more crumbs, which he added to the others, declaring:
“And as for us, we will never again speak to that woman, not even to say good morning or good afternoon. We’ll just pretend she doesn’t exist.”
They were in complete agreement. Rosália began clearing the table and Anselmo took his photo album out of a drawer in the sideboard. They did not linger long after supper, though. High emotion is always draining. Husband and wife went to their bedroom, where they continued their harsh assessment of Lídia’s behavior. Their conclusion was this: some women — women whose mere existence is a blot on the lives of honest folk — simply deserve to be wiped from the face of the earth.
Claudinha could not sleep, but it wasn’t the alleged and very real headache that prevented her from sleeping. She kept thinking about her conversation with Senhor Morais, which had not been quite as straightforward as she had given her parents to understand. She’d had no difficulty finding out what had happened between him and Lídia, but what had followed was less easy to describe. Nothing very terrible had occurred, nothing that could not or should not be told, but it was complicated. Not everything is as it seems, and not everything that seems is. Between being and seeming there is always a point of agreement, as if being and seeming were two inclined planes that converge and become one. There is a slope and the possibility of sliding down that slope, and when that happens, one reaches a point at which being and seeming meet.
Claudinha had asked her question and been given an answer, but not immediately, because Paulino had a lot of work to do and could not give her the desired explanation there and then. She had to wait for six o’clock. Her colleagues left, and she stayed. Paulino called her into his office and told her to sit in the armchair reserved for the company’s more important clients. The armchair was a well-padded affair and rather low-slung. Claudinha had not given in to the latest fashion for long skirts, and so when she sat down, her skirt rode up above her knees. The soft upholstery held her there as if she were seated on a warm lap. Paulino paced up and down the office, then perched on one corner of his desk. He was wearing a light gray suit and yellow tie, which made him look more youthful. He lit a cigarillo, and the already stuffy atmosphere grew still heavier. It would soon become suffocating. Long minutes passed before Paulino spoke. Maria Cláudia found the silence, broken only by the tick-tock of the solemn grandfather clock, increasingly awkward. Paulino, on the other hand, seemed perfectly at ease. He had already smoked half his cigarillo when he said:
“So you want to know what’s going on, do you?”
“I realize, Senhor Morais”—that is how Maria Cláudia had responded—“I realize that I probably have no right to ask, but given my friendship with Dona Lídia…”
That is what she said, as if she knew already that a quarrel was the only possible explanation for Paulino’s absence. She may have been under the influence of her mother, who could think of no other motive. Her response would have appeared foolish in the extreme if it turned out that there had been no such quarrel.
“And does your friendship with me not count?” asked Paulino. “If your only reason for coming to talk to me about the matter is your friendship for her, I’m not sure I should…”
“It was wrong of me to ask. Your personal life is none of my business. Please forgive me…”
This show of disinterest could have provided Paulino with an excuse not to explain what had happened, but Paulino had been expecting Maria Cláudia to ask and had even considered how he might respond.
“You haven’t answered my question. Is it just your friendship for her that makes you ask that question? Does the friendship you feel for me not count at all? Are you not my friend as well?”
“You’ve always been very kind to me, Senhor Morais…”
“I’m kind to the other employees too, and yet I’m not about to reveal details of my private life to them, nor do I invite them to sit in that armchair.”
Maria Cláudia said nothing. She found his remark embarrassing and bowed her head, blushing. Paulino pretended not to notice. He drew up a chair and sat down opposite Claudinha. Then he told her what had happened: the letter, the conversation with Lídia, the breakup. He omitted any episodes that might show him in an unfavorable light and presented himself with a dignity that would have been fatally compromised had he included them. When he faltered in his account of events, Maria Cláudia sensed that this was because he might well have emerged from the encounter as the less dignified of the two. However, as to the crux of the matter, there was no room for doubt once she had read the letter that Paulino showed to her: