José Saramago - The History of the Siege of Lisbon

The proof-reader is in no doubt that he is about to make a foolish mistake, that these visits will be remembered, when the time comes, as particularly odious expressions of a perverse malevolence, You knew the damage you had done, yet notwithstanding, you didn't have the guts, they would actually use the word guts, the frankness, the honesty, to own up of your own free will, they would use the words free will, you waited for events to take their course, perversely amusing yourself, yes perversely amusing yourself at our expense, and the banality of these final words will clash with the high moral tone of his severe reproof. It would be useless trying to tell them that they are mistaken, that Raimundo Silva was only looking for some peace of mind and reassurance. They still have not found him out, he sighs with relief each time he goes there, but any reassurance and peace of mind were of short duration, no sooner did he enter his apartment than he felt more beleaguered than Lisbon had ever been.

Not being superstitious, he was not expecting anything disagreeable to happen to him on the thirteenth. Only those obsessed with oracles are plagued by mishap and misfortune on the thirteenth day of the month, I have never allowed myself to be influenced by these absurd superstitions, and this would probably have been his answer if anyone had raised this hypothesis. This radical scepticism explains why his initial reaction was one of vexed surprise when he heard the voice of the director's secretary on the line, Senhor Silva, you are requested to attend a meeting at four o'clock this afternoon, she spoke the words in this curt manner as if she were reading from a written memo, carefully drafted to make sure that all the essential words were in place and any word eliminated that might diminish the effect of mental torment and confusion, now that surprise and annoyance no longer have any meaning when confronted with the evidence that the thirteenth of the month does not spare the strong-minded, while dominating the feeble. He slowly replaced the receiver and looked around him, with the distinct impression that he could see the apartment sway, Steady on, he said. At such moments, the stoic would smile, had this classical species not died out completely to give way to the evolution of the modern cynic, who, in his turn, bears scarcely any resemblance to his philosophical and pedestrian ancestor. Be that as it may, there is a wan smile on Raimundo Silva's face, his look of resigned martyrdom is tempered by a manly sorrow, this is what you mainly find in novels dominated by characters, by taking another look you learn so much.

The proof-reader asks himself whether he is troubled or not, and cannot come up with an answer. What he does find intolerable is to be obliged to wait until four o'clock in order to know what the editors have in mind for this irresponsible proof-reader, how they will punish his insolent disregard for sound historical facts which ought to be permanently reinforced and defended from any meddling, otherwise we shall lose any sense of our actuality and seriously undermine the concepts and beliefs derived therefrom, on which we rely for guidance. Now that the error has been discovered, it is pointless to speculate on the future consequences of the presence of that Not in The History of the Siege of Lisbon, whether fate had permitted a slower incubation, page against page, unobserved by the readers but invisibly burrowing a path like woodworms who leave a hollow shell where we expected to find a solid piece of furniture. He pushed the proofs he was revising to one side, not those of the novel Costa had left him on that famous day, this is a slim little volume of poems, and, resting his weary head in his hands, he remembered a story whose tide and author escaped him, although he had an idea it was something like Tarzan and the Lost Kingdom, and where there was a city with ancient Romans and the first Christians, all hidden away in the African jungle, truly, the imagination of novelists has no limits, and this one, if all the rest tallies, can only be Edgar Rice Burroughs. There was an amphitheatre and the Christians were thrown to wild beasts, that is to say, to the lions, all the more feasible since Africa is where lions belong, and the novelist wrote, although without providing any proof or citing his sources, that the more nervous of those unfortunate creatures did not wait for the lions to attack, but actually ran, in a manner of speaking, into the arms of death, not in order to be the first to enter paradise, but simply because they did not have the strength of mind to bear this waiting for the inevitable. These reminiscences of books he had read in his youth made Raimundo Silva think, along the familiar paths pursued by one's thoughts, that it was within his power to precipitate the course of history, to accelerate time, to go immediately to the publisher, on some pretext or other, such as, At four o'clock I have a medical appointment, so don't beat about the bush and tell me what you want, this is the tone he would adopt in speaking to Costa, but needless to say, he did not go to any meeting with Production as the director's secretary called it, his case would be dealt with at the highest level and, ironically, this certainty pandered to his vanity, I must be mad, he muttered, repeating the same words he had spoken three days ago. If only I could find, amidst this confusion, some feeling that might prevail over all others, so that if he were subsequently asked, How did you feel in that terrible situation, he would reply, I felt worried, or indifferent, or amused, or troubled, or fearful, or ashamed, frankly, he does not know what he feels, he only wishes it were already four o'clock and time for that fatal encounter with the lion awaiting him with gaping jaws while the Romans applaud, the minutes are like this, although they usually step back in order to let us pass after brushing against our skin, but there will always be one ready to devour us. All metaphors about time and fate are tragic and at the same time futile, mused Raimundo Silva, perhaps not in these precise words, but since what really counts is the meaning, this is how he jotted it down, pleased to have thought of it. Yet he scarcely felt like eating any lunch, he had a lump in his throat, a familiar sensation, and a knot in his stomach, which is most uncommon, but conveys the seriousness of the situation. The charlady, this being her day, thought he looked odd and asked him straight out, Are you unwell, words which unexpectedly had a stimulating effect, for if his behaviour were giving strangers the impression that he was sick, then it was time to get a grip on himself, to overcome this malaise that was destroying him, so he replied, I feel fine, and at that moment it was true.

It was five to four when he walked into the publishers. This time he found all the things he had been looking for last time, whispering, furtive glances, sniggering, and also, on several faces, simply the puzzled expression of someone who is not entirely satisfied with the evidence, although forced to accept it. They showed him into the waiting-room outside the director's office and left him sitting there for more than a quarter of an hour, which goes to show the futility of fears which are in no sense punctual. He looked at his watch, the lion had obviously been delayed, nowadays it is extremely difficult to drive in the jungle even with Roman roads, but in this case, it is much more likely that someone may have thought it a good idea to have recourse to proven psychological tactics, to make him wait until his nerves became frayed, to push him to the edge of crisis, and leave him defenceless against the very first attack. Raimundo Silva considers that even so, taking into account the circumstances, he is reasonably calm, as if he had spent his entire life doing nothing except replacing true facts with lies, without really noticing the difference and learning to choose between the arguments for and against, accumulated throughout the ages by the endless discourse and sophistry that have flourished in the mind of homo sapiens. All of a sudden, the door was flung open and there stood, not the director's secretary as one might have expected, but the secretary of the Editorial Director. Please to accompany me, she said, and Raimundo Silva, despite having noticed the faulty syntax, perceived that his imagined calm was merely superficial, and tenuous, his knees were shaking as he rose from the sofa, the adrenalin stirring in his blood, the sweat oozing from the palms of his hands and from his armpits, and he could even feel a diffused colic, a sign that his entire digestive system was trying to expand, I am like a calf being led to the slaughterhouse, he thought to himself, and fortunately he was capable of self-disparagement.