José Saramago - Baltasar and Blimunda

Baltasar went down into the town by a slippery path, a man going down ahead of him fell in the mud and everyone laughed whilst another fell down laughing, these are welcome distractions, for in Mafra there are no outdoor theatres, no singers or actors, opera is performed only in Lisbon, nor will there be any cinemas for another two hundred years, and by then flying machines will have engines, time is slow in passing until one finds happiness at last, Hello there. His brother-in-law and nephew must have arrived home already, lucky for them, for there is nothing like a good fire when a man is chilled to the marrow, to be able to warm your hands before those tall flames and toast the hard skin on the soles of your feet right up against the hot embers, the chill slowly thawing out your bones like dew melting in the sun. Better still if you find a woman in your bed, and if she is the woman you love, you need only catch sight of her, as we now see Blimunda, she has come to share the same cold and rain, and she is bringing one of her skirts to cover Baltasar's head, and the very scent of this woman brings tears to his eyes, Are you tired, she asks him, and these words are all he needs to make existence tolerable, the hem of her skirt is drawn over their two heads, and heaven could never match such bliss, if only God were to enjoy such harmony with our angels.

News reached Mafra sporadically that Lisbon was suffering the tremors of an earthquake, there is no real damage apart from the odd roof and chimney collapsing and cracks appearing in the walls of old buildings, but since somebody always benefits from misfortune, the chandlers did a roaring trade, the churches were crammed with lighted candles, especially before the altar of St Christopher, a saint noted for warding off plague and epidemics, lightning and fire, tempest and flood, as well as shipwreck and earthquake, in competition with St Barbara and St Eustace, who are also extremely reliable in providing such forms of protection. But the saints are like these workers building the convent, and when we refer to these workers, we mean all those others, too, who are employed elsewhere on buildings and demolitions, saints tire easily and value their rest, for they alone know how difficult it is to control the forces of nature, if they were the forces of God, things would be much easier, it would suffice to ask God, Look here, call off that tempest, earthquake, fire, flood, don't unleash that plague or allow that villain on to the highway, and only if He were an evil God would He ignore their pleas, but because these are the forces of nature and the saints get distracted, no sooner do we sigh with relief that we have escaped the worst than suddenly a storm breaks out, the likes of which has never been experienced in living memory, without rain or hail, but these might have been preferable and helped to break the strong wind, which tosses the anchored ships as if they were empty nutshells and goes tugging, stretching, and breaking the chains and yanking up the anchors from the depths of the sea, and once the ships are dragged from their moorings, they collide with one another and their sides are cracked open, causing them to sink as the sailors cry out, they alone know whom to ask for help, or they run aground where the relentless waves finally smash them to pieces. All the quays upriver collapse, the wind and waves dislodge the stones from their foundations and hurl them to the ground, doors and windows are shattered as if struck by cannon, what enemy can this be that wreaks havoc without sword or fire. Convinced that this upheaval must be the work of the devil, every woman and nursemaid, servant, and female slave, is on her knees praying, Most Holy Mary, Virgin and Mother of God, the men, meanwhile, looking deathly pale, and with neither Moor nor Indian on whom to inflict revenge, recite the rosary aloud, Pater Noster, Ave Maria, that we should invoke them with such insistence suggests that what we really need is a father and a mother. The waves break with such force on the shore of Boavista that the spray inundates the walls of the Convent of the Cistercian Nuns and the Monastery of St Benedict, which lies even farther inland. If the world were a boat and sailing a mighty ocean, it would sink this time, gathering waters upon waters in a flood that would be universal and save neither Noah nor the dove. From Fundição to Belém, which is almost a league and a half away, there was nothing but debris littered along the shores, splintered timber and cargo that had not been sufficiently heavy to sink and was swept ashore, which meant serious losses for the vessels' owners as well as for the King. The masts on some of the ships were sawn off to prevent them from capsizing, yet even with this precaution three men-of-war were driven ashore and would certainly have perished if they had not been rescued immediately. Countless skiffs, fishing boats, and barges finished up in fragments along the beaches, some one hundred and twenty large vessels used for cargo were grounded or lost at sea, and it would be futile to try to calculate the numbers of those drowned or killed, for many of the corpses were swept out beyond the straits or dragged to the bottom of the sea, but on the beaches alone, one hundred and sixty corpses were accounted for, the scattered beads of a rosary over which the widows and orphans weep, Ah, my beloved father, few women were drowned, some man will sigh, Ah, my beloved wife, for we are all beloved once we are dead. There were so many corpses that they had to be buried in haste, some could not be identified, nor their relatives located, and many who came to mourn the dead failed to arrive in time, but serious misfortunes call for serious measures, had the previous earthquake been more severe and the number of dead greater, the same measures would have been taken to bury the dead, and take care of the living, a sound piece of advice should any such calamity ever happen again, but spare us, oh Lord.

More than two months have gone by since Baltasar and Blimunda came to live in Mafra. A public holiday to mark a feast day meant that the work was suspended on the site, so Baltasar decided to make the trip to Monte Junto to see the flying machine. He found it in the same place, in exactly the same position, tilted to one side and resting on one wing beneath its camouflage of withered foliage. The mainsail, which had been left tarred and fully extended, cast shadows over the amber balls, and because of the angle of the hull, rainwater had not collected inside the sail, thus averting any danger of rot. Tall weeds sprouted everywhere from the stony ground, even brambles in certain places, and this was a curious phenomenon because neither the time nor the place was propitious, the Passarola seemed to be defending itself with its own mysterious powers, but, then, one can expect anything from such a machine. Somewhat hesitant, Baltasar added to the camouflage by cutting branches from the nearby bushes, as he had done before, but with less effort this time, because he had brought a pruning hook, and once the work was finished, he walked all around this other basilica and was pleased with the result. Then he clambered into the machine and, with the tip of his spike, which he had not had occasion to use recently, he scratched out a sun and a moon on one of the planks of the deck, so that if Padre Bartolomeu Lourenço should ever return here, he would see this sign and know at once that it was a message from his friends. Baltasar set out on the road, he had left Mafra at dawn, and it was already night when he returned after a ten leagues walk there and back, and although people say that those who walk for pleasure do not feel tired, Baltasar was exhausted by the time he reached home, yet no one had obliged him to go, so he must have captured the nymph mentioned by Camoens, and had a good time.

One day in mid-September, Baltasar was walking home from work when he saw Blimunda waiting for him on the road as she so often did, but somehow this time she looked anxious and distressed, which was most unlike her, for anyone who knew Blimunda could see that she went through the world as if she had gathered knowledge and experience from previous lives, and on reaching her, he asked, Is Father worse, No, she replied, and then in whispered tones confided, Signor Scarlet is with the Viscount, what can he be doing here, Are you sure, have you seen him, With these very eyes, It could be someone who looks like him, It's him, all right, I only have to see a person once to remember him, and I've seen Signor Scarlet lots of times. They went into the house and joined the others for supper, then everyone settled down for the night, each couple on their own pallet, and old João Francisco with his grandson, the boy is a restless sleeper and tosses and turns all night, but his grandfather does not mind, it is always company for the old man, who finds it difficult to sleep. This explains why he was the only person to hear, very late that same night, that is to say, late for someone who goes to bed early, gentle strains of music penetrating the cracks in the door and the roof of the house, there must have been a deep silence in Mafra that night, if music played on the harpsichord in the Viscounts' palace when the doors and windows were shuttered on account of the cold, and even when it was not cold, for the sake of decorum, was heard by an old man growing deaf with age, had Blimunda and Baltasar heard it, one might well have expected them to comment, It's Signor Scarlet who is playing, for it is quite true to say that the giant is recognised by his finger, this we would not argue with, since the proverb exists and is altogether apt. Next morning, as dawn broke, the old man sat down by the hearth and told them, I heard music last night, neither Inês Antónia nor Álvaro Diogo nor his grandson paid any heed, for old people are always hearing something or other, but Baltasar and Blimunda felt envious to the point of sadness, if anyone there had the right to hear that music, it was them, no one else. When Baltasar went off to work, Blimunda spent the morning prowling around the palace.