Chapter 34
What kind of a man cannot even fire his own servants? Mother says.
I stir awake. I fell asleep at my desk. A noise comes from above like the thump of footsteps.
For a moment I’m dazed, unsure how long I’ve been asleep.
I haven’t left my office in a long time.
The window shows dark skies; night has fallen.
At this hour, everyone should be gone except Joaquina. The footsteps upstairs must be her.
I rise, resigned to my fate, but also excited by it.
The house is dim, shadows hang in every corner.
A faint glow emanates from the drawing room as I head to the staircase.
Putting out the candles and lamps is Joaquina’s job, but she stopped attending to her duties when we started our affair.
I veer toward the drawing room to put out the lights, then pause when I hear a different sound. A faint moaning.
I am confused—I thought I heard footsteps upstairs, but the moaning comes from the drawing room.
I step through the corridor into the drawing room. She lies on the sofa dressed only in shadows. She turns her head to look at me, eyes blurry black diamonds, wisps of hair falling over her face, hand lost between her legs.
“I’ve been thinking about you.”
A feverish thrill engulfs me as I climb on top of her. She giggles and helps me shed my clothes. I used to rush my time with her, fearful of my own thoughts intruding. But I’ve learned to let the moments linger.
Then I hear it again. A creaking of the floorboards above. Wood groaning under the weight of a heavy thump. The movement of a person, not a small critter.
We both still. The confusion in her eyes mirrors my own.
“I thought it was you upstairs,” I say.
“I thought it was you,” she counters. “Maria das Dores has already left for the day.”
And she would not be hanging about upstairs anyway.
Then…
“Oh my God.” I pull myself up.
“What?”
I can only think of one person it could be.
“Get dressed,” I tell Joaquina. “You need to go home.”
“Home? What are you talking about?”
“Go to your own house.”
Her face turns crimson. “At this hour? I shall do no such thing. Have you lost your senses? Who is up there?”
Her volume is loud enough that Mother could hear her.
“Go.”
“No.” She crosses her arms defiantly.
We glare at each other. She spins on her heel and heads to the door. My relief is short-lived, because she turns sharply at the bottom of the staircase and starts going up.
“Wait.” I catch her by the elbow. She spins around to face me.
“At least go down to the servants’ quarters,” I say.
“Who is up there?”
“My mother.”
Her eyes widen. “I thought you said she was dead?”
I sigh. I never said she was dead. I said that Mother was ill and sent away for treatment. Joaquina simply does not even remember, that is how little regard she has for Mother or me. I open my mouth to correct her, then suddenly a new idea strikes me.
“Yes, she is dead.”
Joaquina gasps. “Truly?”
I nod.
“And haunting the house?”
Just then there is another thump and Joaquina jumps.
“Go!”
Joaquina moves quickly now. We rush through the kitchen to the servants’ quarters. She shuts the door behind her once we’re in the room, then crosses herself. “Is this why you always look so haunted and tense?”
“You’re safe here. Try and get some sleep.”
“What if she haunts me here? Where are you going?”
“I’m going to investigate. Stay here, no matter what you hear.”
I am profoundly relieved to leave Joaquina behind. My head is abuzz with the thought of Mother being awake after all.
In my rush to drop Joaquina off, I forgot to take a candle, so I stumble in the darkness, grasping the walls with outstretched arms. I hear footsteps from above and am seized by fright.
What if Mother knows? What if she remembers what I have told her and knows the terrible things I have done in this house, with Joaquina?
I can’t shake the feeling that she will know somehow, will read it on my face.
I have never been able to keep secrets from her.
It is this fear which makes me slow my steps as I approach the bottom of the stairs.
I look up and come to a halt.
A figure stands on the upper landing. My eyes adjust and take in the broad shoulders and looming silhouette of a tall man. He wears a dark-gray coat, bears an oil lamp and a walking cane.
“Leandro?” he says.
Slowly, his appearance crystalizes before me. I note the carved ivory head on the handle of the cane. “Lobo…?”
“Forgive me, it was not my intention to startle you. I received your letter. Given the medical urgency you described, I saw fit to come at once.”
I met him several weeks ago, in the gambling parlor.
I was drowning my sorrows because Mother had recently fallen into the slumber, and Doctor Amado said there was nothing to be done but make her comfortable.
He said she might never recover. He said I should “learn to live with this new reality.” He said I should “mentally prepare for the worst.”
That night, in the smoky air of the gambling parlor, I played truco with a regular by the name of Lobo, who was known for winning against everyone.
His catchphrase was: There is nothing in life that a game of truco can’t fix.
He had the look of a well-bred gentleman with his knee-length frock coat of imported wool, a brocade waistcoat, and shiny, impeccably polished Balmoral boots.
His pocket watch had an engraved golden chain.
His walking stick was made of snakewood and the handle had a miniature engraving of his own head carved in ivory.
This struck me as the sort of frivolous detail only wealthy people spend money on.
He smoked expensive cigars out of the corners of his mouth, smoke trailing from the tip.
They said he spent some time abroad and now lives in a lavish house on the wealthy Rua Imperial, though nobody knew exactly what he did for a living.
Some said he was an alienist, others said he was a retired landowner, yet others said he was an ex-soldier and a government worker.
Lobo ensorcelled me with talk of poetry, philosophy, and politics.
Later, as more drinks were consumed, he talked about the hidden laws of the cosmos, which he said are known only to a select few, and of this he can share nothing.
He called God “the Divine Architect,” spoke of twelve planets revolving around the sun, twelve signs in astrology, twelve brothers in a brotherhood.
At no point did I really understand what he was saying, but there was an undeniable resonance to his words.
I learned he worked as a physician, alienist, and occultist. A three-dimensional healer, he said; a physician heals the body, an alienist heals the mind, and an occultist heals the spirit.
At the end, as we said our goodbyes, he told me: “It will come, what you seek.”
When I wrote him the letter, I went on and on about Joaquina and how tortured I felt.
I do not know what kind of help I sought, only that he seemed like the sort of man who had solutions to problems, the sort you can confide in.
He seemed knowledgeable and worldly. I hardly remember talking about Mother in the letter, but I must have.
I was not expecting him to come so quickly, or to take an interest in Mother.
But now, it brings me profound relief that he did. Perhaps fate interfered on my behalf, my prayers were finally answered.
“Thank you very much for coming.” I start up the stairs. “We heard noises, we thought…So it was you up there all along?”
“Yes.”
“Oh.” Disappointment crushes me: Mother is not awake after all. It was only wishful thinking on my part, yet again.
“I have your mother.”
“What?”
He lifts up the lamp as I ascend the stairs, casting a shimmering glow on the side of his face.
“When I arrived and did not find you, I set about looking for her. You stated in the letter that you had neglected her care for four days, so I deemed the situation medically urgent and resolved to take matters into my own hands. I knew from the letter that she was in the senzala, but it was too dark for me to examine her there, so I moved her up to a room here.”
“Oh…So, you examined Mother?”
“Indeed. And it is a good thing I came when I did, Leandro. Come.”
He leads me across the corridor toward the guest rooms. I suppose he did not know where her actual room was, and simply put her in the first room he saw. Mother is there now? A bad feeling settles in my veins.
He enters the room first and falls silent as I reach the door. I do not fear seeing her because nothing I see can make me feel any worse than I do now.
Mother slumbers as always, eyes shut, but her skin is a dull gray and her lips are paper-thin, white, and slightly parted.
Her cheeks appear to have sunk into her skull.
The bulging veins on her hands and arms look green against her gray skin.
She’s shrunken and shriveled and misshapen.
She looks to have aged ten years in the past four days.
Doctor Lobo stands beside her wearing a grave look. “There is still a heartbeat, but it’s very weak,” he says. “I fear she does not have long.”