Antonio Tabucchi - The Missing Head of Damasceno Monteiro

“Meaning God,” responded the lawyer. “Those diligent, highly refined torturers were working in the name of God, from him they had received the orders from above, the concept is practically the same: I am not responsible, I am a simple sergeant, I’ve had orders from my captain, I am not responsible, and I am only a humble captain, I’ve had orders from my general, or from the Government. Or else from God. The most unbeatable thing.”

“But all the same you wrote nothing?” asked Firmino.

“I gave up on it.”

“Forgive me for asking,” said Firmino, “but why?”

“Who knows?” answered Don Fernando, “perhaps it seemed to me fruitless to write against the Grundnorm , and in any case I’d read an essay on torture by a very bumptious German writer, and it made up my mind for me.”

“Forgive my asking,” said Firmino, “but do you read only German writers?”

“Mostly,” replied Don Fernando, “because even though I grew up in Portugal it may be that culturally speaking I am really German, that was the first language I learnt to express myself in. The author of that essay was called Alexander Mitscherlich, he was a psychoanalyst, because unfortunately even psychoanalysts have started to busy themselves with these problems, and he came up with the image of Christ Crucified, and stated that it is an image closely connected with our culture, and in some way he uses this to maintain that if in the Unconscious death itself is not a sufficient punishment, then it comes down to this: don’t let’s kid ourselves, torture is here to stay, because we cannot suppress the destructive impulses of mankind. To put it more briefly, we’d better resign ourselves because I’homme est méchant . For all his Freudian theories that’s all this fellow had to say: that mankind is wicked. I therefore made a different choice.”

“And what was that?” asked Firmino.

“To dump theory and put things into practice,” said Don Fernando, “it is humbler to go into court and defend those who undergo such treatment. I couldn’t say whether it’s more useful to write a treatise on agriculture or to break up a clod of earth with a mattock, but I decided to work with the mattock, like a peasant. I spoke of humility just now, but don’t put too much faith in that, because when it comes down to it my attitude is more one of pride.”

“Why are you telling me all this?” asked Firmino.

“Damasceno Monteiro was tortured,” said the lawyer quietly, “he has the marks of cigarette burns all over his torso.”

“How do you know that?”

“I asked for a second autopsy,” replied Don Fernando, “at the first autopsy they failed to report this small detail.”

He took a deep breath and emitted an asthmatic wheeze.

“Let’s go outside,” he said, “I need some fresh air. But in the meanwhile you must report this in your newspaper, naturally from an unknown source, but you must inform public opinion at once, and in two or three days’ time we may speak of the so-called secrecy covering the investigations now under way, but let’s go one step at a time.”

They went out into the yard. Don Fernando raised his head to look at the vault of the heavens.

“Millions of stars,” he said, “millions of nebulae, fuck, millions of nebulae, and here we are fretting about electrodes applied to people’s genitals.”

SEATED IN AN ARMCHAIR IN THE lounge, Dona Rosa was sipping a cup of coffee. It was ten in the morning. Firmino knew that he was still looking a bit glassy-eyed, in spite of the quarter-of-an-hour spent under a warm shower to try and wake himself up.

“My dear young man,” said Dona Rosa affably, “come and have a cup of coffee with me, I never manage to catch a glimpse of you.”

“Yesterday I was at the botanical gardens,” apologized Firmino, “I spent the whole day there.”

“And the day before?”

“At the museum, and later at the cinema, they had a film on that I’d missed in Lisbon,” responded Firmino.

“And the day before that?” persisted Dona Rosa with a smile.

“With Don Fernando,” said Firmino, “in the evening he took me out to dine in the country, at a farm of his.”

“It is no longer his property,” corrected Dona Rosa.

“So he told me,” replied Firmino.

“And what did you find to interest you so much in the botanical gardens?” asked Dona Rosa. “I have never been there, I’m so housebound.”

“A hundred-year-old dragon tree, it’s an enormous tropical palm, there are very few specimens in Portugal, it seems it was planted by Salabert in the nineteenth century.”

“You know so much, dear boy,” exclaimed Dona Rosa, “but of course in your profession you need a lot of knowledge, tell me then, who was this gentleman with the foreign name who planted this tree?”

“It’s not that I know all that much,” replied Firmino, “I read it in my guidebook, he was a Frenchman who came to Oporto when Napoleon invaded us, I think he was an officer in the French army, and he it was who founded the botanical gardens here in Oporto.”

“The French are a cultured people,” said Dona Rosa, “their republican revolution came much earlier than ours did.” “We only became a republic in 1910,” rejoined Firmino, “every country has its own history.”

“Yesterday on TV I saw a program on the monarchies of Northern Europe,” said Dona Rosa, “they’re on the ball, those people, they have an altogether different style.”

“They also stood up against the Nazis,” said Firmino.

Dona Rosa uttered a little cry of surprise.

“I didn’t know that,” she murmured, “so you can tell they’re on the ball then.”

Firmino finished his coffee and got up, saying that if she would excuse him he had to go and buy the papers. Dona Rosa, beaming all over her face, pointed to a stack of newspapers on the divan.

“They’re all here,” she said, “fresh off the press, Francisca went to buy them at eight o’clock, it’s a terrific scandal, the whole press is talking about it, this Titânio is up against it in a big way, if it hadn’t been for you journalists the police would never have gone near the place, so thank God for the Press, say I.”

“In all modesty, we do what we can,” responded Firmino.

“Don Fernando telephoned at nine o’clock,” Dona Rosa informed him, “he needs to speak to you, actually he has put everything in my hands, but I think it’s best for you to talk to him first.”

“I’ll go and see him at once,” said Firmino.

“I would advise against that,” said Dona Rosa, “Don Fernando can’t receive you today, he’s having one of his crises.”

“What sort of crises?”

“Everyone can have their little crises,” replied Dona Rosa gently, “so it’s better not to go disturbing him, but don’t worry, he said he’d call you back and give you instructions, all you need is a little patience.”

“I’ve got patience enough,” said Firmino, “but I’d have liked a short stroll, perhaps as far as the Café Centrale.”

“I can see that what you need is a cup of good strong coffee,” said Dona Rosa affectionately, “this stuff Francisca makes in the morning is full of barley, what you need is a good strong espresso so I’ll go and get her to bring you one, meanwhile you stay here and read all the big news about that nightclub, then before long we’ll take a peek at the television, there’s a program on nature, I don’t know if you’ve ever seen it but it fascinates me, it’s presented by a really nice scientist at Lisbon University, and today’s program is all about the chameleon of the Algarve, it seems that the Algarve is one of the few places in Europe where the chameleon has managed to survive, so it says on the TV page.”