Mia Couto - The Tuner of Silences

And we headed for the open ground next to our house. A solitary casuarina defied the sky. Silvestre fell to his knees before the old trunk. He called me over and pointed to the tree’s canopy:

— This tree, my son. This tree is Dordalma’s soul.

We are daytime creatures, but it’s the nights that give us the measure of our place. And nights only really fit comfortably in our childhood home. I had been born in the residence we now occupied, but this wasn’t my home, it wasn’t here that sleep descended upon me with tenderness. Everything in this dwelling made me feel a stranger. And yet, my slumber seems to have recognized something familiar in its tranquillity. Maybe that was why, one night, I had a dream that I’d never had before. For I fell into a deep abyss and was carried away by waters and floods. I dreamed that Jezoosalem was submerged. First, it rained on the sand. Then on the trees. Later, it rained on the rain itself. The camp was transformed into a riverbed, and not even continents were enough to absorb so much water.

My papers were released from their hiding place and ascended to the surface to ride along on the churning waters of the river. I went down to the shore to collect them. When I held them in my hands, something suddenly happened: the papers were turned into clothes. They were the sodden vestments of kings, queens and knaves. Each one of the monarchs passed by and handed over their heavy mantles. Then, devoid of their clothes, they floated on until they vanished in the calmer waters downstream.

Their clothes weighed so heavily in my arms that I decided to wring them out. But instead of water, letters dripped out of them and each one of these, upon hitting the surface, gave a pirouette and launched itself into the current. When the last letter had fallen, the clothes evaporated and vanished.

— Marcelo!

It was Marta who had just come ashore. She emerged as if from the mist and set off again in pursuit of the letters. She was shouting for Marcelo as her feet guided her with difficulty through the waters. And the Portuguese woman disappeared round the bend in the river.

When I got back to the house, old Silvestre asked about the Portuguese woman in a strangely anxious tone. I pointed back at the mist over the river. He got up in a rush, projecting himself beyond his own body, as if he were undergoing a second birth.

— I’m on my way —he exclaimed.

— Where, Father?

He didn’t answer. I saw him stumble off in the direction of the valley and vanish among the thick bushes.

Some time passed and I almost fell asleep, lulled by the sweet song of the nightjars. Suddenly, I was startled by a rustling in the undergrowth. It was my father and the Portuguese woman approaching, supporting each other. The two of them were soaked. I ran out to help. Silvestre needed more help than the foreigner. He was breathing with difficulty, as if he were swallowing the sky in small doses. It was the Portuguese woman who spoke:

— Your father saved me.

I couldn’t imagine how brave Silvestre Vitalício had been, nor how he had plunged into the swirling river, struggled against the current, and in the face of Death’s designs had pulled her out of the waters where she was drowning.

— I wanted to die in a river, in a river that rose in my homeland and flowed out into the end of the world.

That’s what the Portuguese woman said as she stared at the window.

— Now leave me — she added. — Now I want to be alone with your father.

I went out, smitten by a strange sadness. When I looked through the window, I seemed to see my mother leaning over her former husband, my mother returned from the skies and rivers where she had lingered her whole life. I knocked on the window and called, almost voiceless:

— Mother!

A woman’s hand touched me, and before I could turn round, a bird perched on my shoulders. I slackened lethargically, and didn’t offer any resistance when I felt myself being drawn upwards, my feet leaving the ground, the earth losing size, shrinking away like a deflating balloon.

I washed my face under the washtub tap as if only water could free me from my watery dream. Without drying myself, I looked out at the street through which the city flowed. Why was it that I had been dreaming about Marta ever since she had broken into the big house at Jezoosalem? The truth was this: the woman had invaded me just as the sun fills our homes. There was no way of avoiding or obstructing this flood, there was no curtain capable of blocking out such luminance.

Maybe there was another explanation. Maybe the Woman was already within me even before she arrived in Jezoosalem. Or perhaps Ntunzi was right when he warned me: water has nothing to learn from anyone. It’s like women: they just know things. Inexplicable things. That’s why we need to fear both creatures: woman and water. That, in the end, was the lesson of the dream.

After our outing to the cemetery, Silvestre Vitalício showed no further signs of life. He was an automaton, devoid of speech or spirit. We still believed it might be part of his recovery from the snakebite. But the nurse dismissed this explanation. Vitalício had sought exile within himself. Jezoosalem had isolated him from the world. The city had stolen him back from himself.

Aproximado said that the streets in our area were small and perfectly walkable. I should take my father to explore them, to see if he could be distracted. Now I know one thing: no street is small. They all hide never-ending stories, they all conceal countless secrets.

On one occasion, while we were walking along, I got the impression that my father was pushing me gently, guiding me. We passed by a Presbyterian church at the very time when they were holding a service. We could hear a choir and a tinkling piano. Silvestre stopped short, his eyes ablaze. He sat down on the steps leading to the entrance, his hands open across his chest.

— Leave me here, Mwanito.

He hadn’t spoken for so long that his voice had become almost inaudible. And there, in that cold little corner, he remained for hours, stiff and silent. Even when the service had finished and the worshippers had left, Silvestre didn’t move from the step. Some of the older ones greeted him as they passed by. The church and the street were dark and deserted when I pressed him:

— Father, please, let’s go.

— I’m staying here.

— It’s nighttime now, let’s go home.

— I’m going to stay and live here.

I was familiar with my father’s obstinacy. I returned home alone and alerted Ntunzi and Aproximado to old Silvestre’s decision. It was Uncle who replied:

— Let’s leave the fellow to sleep there tonight. .

— Out in the open?

— He hasn’t had so many houses for ages.

Early the next morning, I went into the street to find out what had happened to my father. When I found him, it was as if he hadn’t changed his position, sheltering there on the steps where I had left him. I woke him with a gentle tap on the shoulder.