José Saramago - The Stone Raft

The sun has disappeared. Then the blue thread fluttered in the air, almost invisible in its transparency, searching for some support, grazing hands and faces, Joaquim Sassa held it, was this a coincidence or destiny, let us leave these hypotheses aside, even though there are a number of reasons for not giving credence either to the one or to the other, and now what will Joaquim Sassa do, he cannot travel in the car, with one hand outside holding and accompanying the thread, for a thread at the mercy of the wind does not necessarily follow the line of the road. What should I do with this, he asked, but while the others could not give him an answer the dog could, it left the road and began to descend the gentle slope, Joaquim Sassa followed it, his raised hand followed the blue thread as if it were stroking the wings or the breast of a bird above his head. José Anaiço went back to the car with Joana Carda and Pedro Orce, put it into gear, and, keeping a watchful eye on Joaquim Sassa, began slowly going down the road, he did not want to arrive before him, or for that matter much after him, the potential harmony of things depends on their equilibrium and the time when they occur, not too soon, not too late, which explains why it is so difficult for us to attain perfection.

When they stopped in the square in front of the house, Joaquim Sassa was ten paces from the door, which was ajar. The dog gave a sigh that seemed almost human and lay down, stretching its neck over its paws. It dislodged the thread from its mouth with its paws and let it fall to the ground. A woman emerged from the dark interior of the house, she had a thread in her hand, the same as the one Joaquim Sassa was still holding. She stepped down from the last step at the front door and said, Come in, you must be tired. Joaquim Sassa was the first to move, his end of the blue thread tied round his wrist.

One day, Maria Guavaira told them, about this hour and with much the same light, the dog appeared, looking as if it had come from afar, its coat was filthy, its paws bleeding, it came and knocked on the door with its head, and when I went to open it, thinking it might be one of those beggars who travel from place to place, who arrive tapping their stick and plead, Whatever you can give, ma'am or miss, what do I find but the dog, panting as if it had come running from the end of the world and the blood staining the ground under its paws, the most surprising thing of all was that I didn't feel frightened, though there was every reason to take fright, anyone who didn't know just how harmless the dog is would think he was looking at the wildest of beasts, poor creature, the moment it saw me, the dog lay down on the ground as if it had been waiting until it reached me before attempting to rest, and it seemed to be crying, as if trying to speak but unable to, and all the time the dog was here I never once heard it bark. It's been with us now for six days and it hasn't barked once, Joana Carda said. I took it in, cleaned it up, nursed it, it's not a stray, you can tell from its coat, and the dog's owners obviously fed it properly, showed it love and affection, if you want to see the difference you need only compare it with Galician dogs, who are born hungry and die from starvation after a lifetime of being deprived, beaten, and stoned, that's why the Galician dog can't lift its tail, but hides it between its legs in the hope of going unnoticed, it takes its revenge, when it gets the chance, by biting. This one doesn't bite, Pedro Orce assured them, As for knowing where it came from, we'll probably never know, José Anaiço remarked, perhaps it's not all that important, what surprises me is that it should have come to look for us in order to bring us here, you have to wonder why. I don't know, all I know is that one day it went off with a piece of thread in its mouth, looking at me as if to say, Don't move from here until I return, and off it went up the hill there from which it has just descended, What is this thread, Joaquim Sassa asked, as he wound on his wrist, then unwound, the end of the strand that still tied him to Maria Guavaira. I wish I knew, she replied, winding her end between her fingers and stretching the thread like the taut string of a guitar, while neither he nor she appeared to notice that they were tied together, the others did as they stood there looking on, what they were thinking they kept to themselves although it wouldn't be all that difficult to guess. For I did nothing but unravel an old sock, one of those socks people used to keep their money in, but the sock I unraveled would have given only a handful of wool, while the amount of wool here is what you would get from shearing a hundred sheep, not to say a thousand, and how is one to explain such a thing. For days, two thousand starlings kept following me, said José Anaiço, I threw a stone into the sea that weighed almost as much as I did, and it landed far off in the distance, Joaquim Sassa added, aware that he was exaggerating, and Pedro Orce simply said, The earth is trembling, and trembled.

Maria Guavaira got up and opened a door and said, Look, Joaquim Sassa was standing beside her, but it wasn't the thread that had drawn him, and what they saw was a blue cloud, of a blue that darkened and became almost black in the middle, If I leave this door open there are always ends sticking out, just like the one that went up the road and brought you here, Maria Guavaira said, addressing Joaquim Sassa, and the kitchen where they all had gathered was now deserted, except for these two, joined together by a blue thread, and the blue cloud that appeared to be breathing, firewood could be heard crackling in the hearth where some cabbage soup is on the boil flavored with scraps of meat, not as heavy as the Galician recipe.

Joaquim Sassa and Maria Guavaira must not remain tied together like this for too long, otherwise this union will begin to look suspicious, so she winds up all the thread and on reaching his wrist she pulls the thread around it as if she were invisibly attaching him to her once more, and then holds the tiny ball of wool against her breast, only a fool would be in any doubt about the gesture, but he would be an even bigger fool not to be in doubt. José Anaiço moved away from the fire burning in the hearth, Although it may seem absurd, we've come to the conclusion that there is some connection or other between what has happened to us and the separation of Spain and Portugal from Europe, you must have heard about it, Yes, I have, but in these parts no one gave it another thought, if we go over the mountains and down to the coast the sea is always the same. It was shown on television, I don't have television, It was broadcast in the news bulletin, News is nothing but words, and you can never really tell if words are news.

On this skeptical note the conversation was interrupted for several minutes. Maria Guavaira went to fetch some bowls from the shelf, ladled out the soup, the last bowl but one for Joaquim Sassa, the last one of all for herself, for a moment everyone thought there would be one spoon too few, but no, there were enough to go around, so Maria Guavaira did not have to wait for Joaquim Sassa to finish his soup. Then he asked her if she was living alone, for so far they had seen no one else in the house, and she told him that she had been a widow for three years, and that hired hands came to work the land, I'm between the sea and the mountains, without children or family, my brothers emigrated to Argentina, my father died, my demented mother is in an asylum in La Coruña, there can't be many women in this world as lonely as I am, You could have remarried, Joana Carda pointed out, but immediately regretted having spoken, she had no right to say such a thing, she who only a few days ago had broken up her marriage and was already keeping company with another man, I was worn out, and if a woman remarries at my age, it's on account of any land she may own, men are more interested in marrying land than a woman, You're still young, I was young once but I can scarcely remember that time, and with these words she leaned over the hearth so that the flames lit up her face, she looked up at Joaquim Sassa as if to say, This is what I'm like, take a good look at me, you turned up on my doorstep tied to a thread I was holding in my hand, I could, if I so wished, draw you to my bed, and I'm certain you would come, but beautiful I shall never be, unless you can transform me into the most desirable woman who ever lived, that's something only a man can do, and does, but what a pity it can't last forever.