Chapter 46
When I next open my eyes, the early-morning azure of the sky peeks through the curtains. I hear birdsong in the distance, and voices speaking in the kitchen. I fell asleep on the couch. My heart lurches—where’s Mother?
As I sit up, I’m hit with a hammering in my head and indigestion. I steady myself, drink a full glass of water, have my coffee-and-cigarette breakfast as I step outside, where the morning sun makes my head spin.
Squinting against the sun, I go to the stable. Mother is not there. I’ve been played for a fool. Lobo, that scoundrel! I ride to Lobo’s house in the carriage at full speed.
The sun is newly risen and the streets are empty at this hour.
I remember hearing at the tavern that his house stands out for its extravagant design and architecture, and its lavish gardens.
I do not know his exact address, only that he lives on the wealthy Rua Imperial, so I make my way down and appraise my surroundings.
I have a terrible instinct about it. He took Mother away against my wishes. No good can come from that.
Rua Imperial is lined with opulent two-story homes.
I soon spot a woman on the ground. I tell the driver to halt, already knowing it’s her, even though I can’t make out her face.
It is a frightening sight that stuns me to my core.
She is in her underpinnings, covered in blood.
There are wounds on her arms and legs, and her hair is unkempt.
Terror rips through me. Something terrible has happened.
The carriage pulls over and I leap out. She startles when she sees me, as though taking a moment to recognize me…Is she in the permanent stupor?
I help her to her feet. Her face has a haunted, weary look. The palms of her hands are blackened with dirt, and she’s shaking. Her eyes are wide and fear stricken. She sweeps into the carriage and demands for us to take off right away. Hearing her speak is a relief—at least she’s not in a stupor.
“What happened?” I tear off a piece of my shirt to bandage her wounds.
Her features twist, but she doesn’t respond.
She mumbles incoherently about the baby.
I press again: What happened? Did he harm her?
But she avoids my gaze, staring at the air in front of her.
Her arms are bruised and there is dried blood all over her.
The fact that she’s only wearing her chemise disturbs me as well.
“We need to get you to a doctor.”
“No more doctors!”
“Why not?”
“Doctor Lobo is a dangerous man,” she says. “How did you know I would be here?”
I blink. “What?”
“Last night he was meant to take me home. How did you know he never took me home? You knew to come look for me here.”
It takes me a moment to orient my mind to what she’s saying: By home, she means her mother’s house, not our home. I want to shout that she has no other home, but in her current state, I don’t think she can take it.
“Last night while you waited in the carriage, he told me he planned to take you to his house. I told him not to. In my inebriated state, I believed him when he acquiesced. But this morning when I woke up sober, I remembered what he said and had a bad feeling about it. Did he hurt you?”
She tells me she agreed to stay the night in his guest room. But in the middle of the night, she heard a noise and went about the house. Then she came across something she wasn’t supposed to see.
“What did you see?”
“It was some sort of black magic ritual, I believe.”
My stomach falls. “What happened?”
She shakes her head. “Don’t ask me, Leandro, I dare not speak of it.”
She shares no more details, other than that she escaped through a window. I am stunned. What could have been so bad that it required her to break through a window? I recall Lobo’s esoteric interests, his penchant for the occult. But black magic…?
Her eyes are dazed, glassy. What is so terrible she can’t even talk about?
I feel her silent despair, and I am furious with Doctor Lobo. What did he do? And why?
I am at a loss. I even consider taking her to her mother’s house, as she asks.
If Doctor Lobo is not to be trusted, then who?
Doctor Lobo was my last resort. My last hope.
Perhaps my grandmother would take pity on her and help somehow, but they were estranged.
If she wanted nothing to do with Mother when she was a young and healthy girl, she surely will want nothing to do with her now that she’s a thirty-nine-year-old woman who believes the year is 1877…
She will send her to the asylum. And being treated this way by her mother, the shock of it will destroy her.
“Why are we back at your house?” Mother asks as the carriage rounds into the entrance of the Fazenda Santa Tereza.
I am pouring myself another drink as Maria das Dores bandages Mother’s wound.
After that, Mother will demand to be taken home.
I cannot keep up the flimsy house of cards.
I do not know where to take her when she demands to be taken to her mother’s house.
And what of Doctor Lobo? If what Mother said is true, then…
The liquor helps my nerves, makes me think clearly, at least the first one.
Mother spent the night at Doctor Lobo’s house.
She came out in tatters, bloody, unkempt, and in her underpinnings.
She said the blood was from breaking through a window.
Beyond that, she refuses to tell me what exactly took place. If he did hurt her, why not tell me? Why the secrecy?
Is her mind falling apart? But something happened to her physically, I can see the bruises on her body.
Upstairs, I hear her call my name. She says something about preparing the carriage to take her home.
I drain the glass, then start pouring another when I hear a violent crash erupt above.
Objects crashing and shattering. I run up the staircase as fast as I can, passing Maria das Dores on the way. And I know, before I even go in, that Mother is present. And she’s in one of her rages.
Mother is neither in the guest room nor in her own bedroom.
She’s in my room. It’s my belongings that lie broken on the floor.
I don’t know what she’s doing there. There are broken pieces of ceramic, clay, and glass on the floor.
All the objects that were sitting atop the dresser, by the looks of it.
She stands between the mess and the bed, glowering at me.
What triggered her rage? It seems particularly bad this time.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
She seizes a candlestick from the mantel and comes at me with it, shouting curses. Mother has found the photographs of Joaquina.
I kept them in my nightstand drawer, but the night I felt lonely, they were my only solace, and then I took them out of the drawer. I didn’t think Mother would come in here.
She knows now the terrible things I’ve done.
I knew it, I knew this moment would come.
I cower by the wall, shielding myself from her relentless attacks. I know at times like this it is best to not say anything because whatever I say only makes it worse. I am baffled as to how she suddenly became so strong.
Yet a part of me relishes it. Alongside the familiar dread of being chastised I feel also relief, even pleasure. If she were to remember me, she would chastise me also, and it is right that I should be punished.
Maria das Dores tells her to stop, and it only causes Mother’s ire to turn against her. She even accuses Maria das Dores of having an affair with me, and I vouch for the woman’s innocence.
“It was all lies,” Mother—or Strange Madalena—says, anguished. “Everything you said in the letters, all lies. You lied and lied and lied…”
It’s not fair, not when I’ve tried so hard not to lie.
“I didn’t!”
“I have the proof right here!” She seizes a photograph from the bed. “Look at this and tell me—”
Her voice dies as she stares at the photograph. Her face goes slack. Then she sinks onto the bed, her face the color of ash.
“What is it?” I ask.
Her bottom lip quivers. I don’t understand.
When she looks up at me, her emotions have shifted. A moment ago she was livid, now she looks…frightened.
She asks me about Joaquina. Where is she now? When did I last see her?
Mother’s sudden interest in Joaquina baffles me. Her expression and demeanor remind me of the way she was in the carriage, the dull countenance of fright and tension, the way she looked when I asked her what happened in Doctor Lobo’s house.
Could Joaquina have something to do with whatever unfolded in Lobo’s house?
Chills run up my arms. He made me promise never to seek her out again.
“Why are you asking about her?” I manage.
She averts her gaze. She’s so guarded now that I can’t even tell if it is Mother still or Strange Madalena.
We are interrupted by the sound of horses outside. Maria das Dores runs to the window and announces Doctor Lobo’s arrival.