Yann Martel - The High Mountains of Portugal

The villagers smile and clap their hands.

Odo joins him at the window. In a state of high excitement, he says the same thing Peter has just said, only in his own language, which, to his ears and those of the people down below, comes as a terrific shriek. The villagers cower.

“Macaco…macaco”—he searches for the word—“macaco…é feliz!”

The villagers break into applause once more. Which increases Odo’s happiness. He shrieks again with primate glee — and throws himself out the window. Peter bends forward in alarm, his hands outstretched. He looks down. He cannot see the ape. The villagers are going ooh and ahh in surprise and slight alarm. They are looking up.

He runs down the outside steps and joins them. Odo has grabbed the edge of the schist-tile roof and, pushing himself off the stones of the wall, has climbed on top of the house. He is now perched on its peak, looking about with unbounded delight at the humans below, at the village, at the trees nearby, at the wide world around him.

The moment is good to conclude matters with the villagers. Peter introduces himself to their leader. Her name is Amélia Duarte; he should call her Dona Amélia, she tells him. He makes her understand that he would be happy to live in the house. ( Whose house? he wonders. What happened to those who lived in it? ) In butchered Portuguese he inquires about the windows and the plumbing and about the place being cleaned. To all these, Dona Amélia nods vigorously. All will be taken care of, she makes clear. She turns her hand over and over. Amanhã, amanhã . And how much? The same: Tomorrow, tomorrow .

To one and all he says, “Obrigado, obrigado, obrigado.” Odo’s shrieks echo the same gratitude. Eventually, after he has shaken hands with each and every one, the villagers move off, their eyes fixed on the roof of the house.

Odo is sitting in what Peter already recognizes is a posture of relaxation: feet apart, forearms resting on the knees, hands dangling between the legs, alert head peering about. After the villagers have gone, and with the ape showing continuing pleasure at being where he is, Peter walks down to retrieve the car. “I’ll be back,” he shouts to Odo.

Back at the house, he unpacks their few belongings. Then he makes an early supper using the camping gear, which requires him to find a bucket and walk down to the village fountain to get water.

A little later he calls out to the ape again. When Odo fails to appear, he moves to the window. Just then, the ape’s head pops into view, upside down. Odo is clinging to the outside wall of the house.

“Supper’s ready,” Peter says, showing Odo the pot in which he has boiled eggs and potatoes.

They eat in thoughtful silence. Then Odo leaps out the window again.

Leery of the old mattress, Peter sets his camping mat and sleeping bag on the table in the living room.

And then he has nothing to do. After three weeks — or is it a lifetime? — of ceaseless activity, he has nothing to do. A very long sentence, anchored in solid nouns, with countless subordinate clauses, scores of adjectives and adverbs, and bold conjunctions that launched the sentence in a new direction — besides unexpected interludes — has finally, with a surprisingly quiet full stop, come to an end. For an hour or so, sitting outside on the landing at the top of the stairs, nursing a coffee, tired, a little relieved, a little worried, he contemplates that full stop. What will the next sentence bring?

He settles in his sleeping bag on the table. Odo stays on the roof till it’s dark, then returns through the window, his shape cut out by the moonlight. He grunts with pleasure at discovering that he has the mattress in the bedroom all to himself. Soon the house is quiet. Peter falls asleep imagining that Clara is lying next to him. “I wish you were here,” he whispers to her. “I think you’d like this house. We’d set it up really nicely, with lots of plants and flowers. I love you. Good night.”

In the morning, a delegation stands before the house, the tomorrow crew, led by Dona Amélia. Armed with buckets, mops, and rags, with hammers and wrenches, with determination, they have come to fix the place up. As they set to work, Peter tries to help, but they shake their heads and shoo him away. Besides, he has his ape to take care of. They are nervous about having him around.

He and Odo go for a walk. Every eye, human and animal, turns to them and stares. The gaze is not hostile, not at all; in every case it comes with a greeting. Peter again marvels at the vegetable gardens. Turnips, potatoes, zucchini, gourds, tomatoes, onions, cabbages, cauliflowers, kale, beets, lettuce, leeks, sweet peppers, green beans, carrots, small fields of rye and corn — this is cottage-industry gardening on a serious scale. In one garden, the ape pulls out a head of lettuce and eats it. Peter claps his hands and calls Odo to him. The ape is hungry. So is he.

They stand before the village café. Its patio is deserted. He does not want to risk entering the café—but surely it would be all right to be served outside? He consults the dictionary, then lingers beside a table. The man behind the counter comes out, eyes wide and alert, but with an amiable mien.

“Como posso servi-lo?” he asks.

“Dois sanduíches de queijo, por favor, e um café com leite,” Peter pronounces.

“Claro que sim, imediatamente,” the man replies. Though he moves warily, he wipes down the table nearest them, which Peter takes as an invitation to sit down.

“Muito obrigado,” he says.

“Ao seu serviço,” replies the man as he returns inside the café.

Peter sits down. He expects Odo to stay seated on the ground beside him, but the ape’s eyes are fixed on his metal chair. Odo climbs onto the one next to him. From there, he peers at the ground, rocks the chair, slaps its arms, generally explores the uses and capabilities of the peculiar device. Peter glances into the café. The patrons within are looking at them. And outside, people are starting to gather in a wide circle. “Steady, steady,” he mutters to Odo.

He moves closer to Odo and makes a few grooming gestures. But the ape seems in no way distressed or under strain. On the contrary, as attested by his bright expression and lively curiosity, he’s in good spirits. It’s the people around who seem in need of social grooming, so to speak.

“Olá, bom dia,” Peter calls out.

Greetings come back.

“De onde o senhor é?” asks a man.

“I’m from Canada,” he replies.

Murmurs of approval. Lots of Portuguese immigrants in Canada. It’s a good country.

“E o que está a fazer com um macaco?” asks a woman.

What is he doing with an ape? It’s a question for which he doesn’t have an answer, neither in English nor in Portuguese.

“Eu vive com ele,” he replies simply. I live with him . That’s as much as he can say.

Their order arrives. With the alertness of a bullfighter, the man places the coffee and the two plates on the side of the table farthest from Odo.

The ape loudly grunts and reaches across to take hold of both cheese sandwiches, which he devours in an instant, to the amusement of the villagers. Peter smiles along. He looks at the server.

“Outro dois sanduíches, por favor,” he asks. He remembers that the café is also a grocery store. “E, para o macaco, dez…” He makes a long shape with his hands, which he then peels.

“Dez bananas?” the man asks.

Ah, it’s the same word. “Sim, dez bananas, por favor.”

“Como desejar.”

If the villagers were amused by Odo eating both sandwiches, they are even more mirthful at his reaction to the bananas. Peter thought he was buying a supply that would last a few days. Not so. The chimpanzee, upon seeing the bananas, grunts ecstatically and proceeds to eat every single one, peels flying off, and would have eaten the two new sandwiches if Peter had not quickly grabbed one of them. As a chaser, he downs Peter’s cup of coffee, first dipping his finger into it to test the temperature. When he’s licked the cup clean, he dangles it from his mouth, playing with it with his tongue and lips, as if it were a large mint.