Pereira Maintains

ELEVEN

Pereira maintains that on reaching the office the following Tuesday he met the caretaker, who handed him an express letter. Celeste passed it over with mocking air and said: I gave your instructions to the postman, but he can’t come back later because he has to do the round of the whole neighbourhood, so he left this express letter with me. Pereira took it, nodded his thanks and looked to see if the sender’s name was on the back. Luckily it wasn’t so Celeste had got nothing for her pains. However he instantly recognized Monteiro Rossi’s blue ink and florid hand. He entered the office and switched on the fan. Then he opened the letter. It read: ‘Dear Dr Pereira, unfortunately I am going through a tricky period. I urgently need to talk to you but I’d rather not come to the office. May I hope to see you at eight-thirty on Tuesday evening at the Café Orquídea? I would very much like to have supper with you and tell you my problems. Hopefully yours, Monteiro Rossi.’

Pereira maintains that for the ‘Anniversaries’ column he had in mind a short piece on Rilke, who had died in ’Twenty-Six, so it was just twelve years since his death. Also he’d begun translating a story by Balzac. He had chosen Honorine, a story about repentance which he intended to publish in three or four instalments. Pereira does not know why, but he had a feeling this story about repentance might come into someone’s life like a message in a bottle. Because there were so many things to repent of, he maintains, and a story about repentance was certainly called for, and this was the only way he had of sending a message to someone ready and willing to receive it. So he put his Larousse under his arm, switched off the fan and started home.

When his taxi reached the cathedral the heat was appalling. Pereira removed his tie and put it in his pocket. He climbed laboriously up the steep ramp leading to his house, opened the street door and sat down inside on the bottom step. He was panting heavily. He felt in his pocket for the pills the cardiologist had prescribed for his heart and swallowed one dry. He mopped away the sweat, took a moment’s rest in the cool dark hallway, then clambered up to his flat. The caretaker Piedade had left no food for him because she was away with her relatives in Setúbal and would only return in September, like every other year. This depressed him not a little. He didn’t care for being on his own, completely on his own, with no one to look after him. He passed his wife’s photograph and told it: I’ll be back in ten minutes. Then he went through to the bedroom, undressed and turned on the bath. The cardiologist had ordered him not to have his baths too freezing cold, but now he really needed a cold one. So he waited until the bath was full and then got in up to his chin. While he was in the water he spent a long time stroking his paunch. Pereira, he told himself, once upon a time your life was a different kettle of fish. He dried himself, put on his pyjamas, then went through into the hall, stopped before his wife’s photograph and said: This evening I’m seeing Monteiro Rossi, I don’t know why I don’t give him the sack and tell him to go to hell, he’s got problems which he wants to unload on me, I’ve understood that much, what do you think about it, what should I do? His wife’s photograph replied with a faraway smile. Right you are then, said Pereira, I shall now go and have a siesta, and after that I’ll find out what that young fellow wants. And off he went to lie down.

That afternoon, Pereira maintains, he had a dream. It was a beautiful dream about his youth, but he prefers not to relate it, because dreams ought not to be told, he maintains. He will go no farther than to say he was happy, that it was winter and he was on a beach to the north of Coimbra, perhaps at Granja, and that he had with him a person whose identity he does not wish to disclose. Anyway, he awoke in a good mood, put on a short-sleeved shirt, didn’t even pocket a tie, though he did take a light cotton jacket, carrying it over his forearm. The evening was hot, though happily there was a bit of a breeze. At first he considered going all the way to the Café Orquídea on foot, but on second thoughts this seemed folly. However he did walk as far as Terreiro do Paço and the exercise did him good. From there he took a tram to Rua Alexandre Herculano. The Café Orquídea was practically deserted, Monteiro Rossi had not yet arrived because he himself was too early. Pereira sat himself down at a table inside, near the fan, and ordered a lemonade. When the waiter came he asked him: What’s the news Manuel? If you don’t know, Dr Pereira, and you a journalist! replied the waiter. I’ve been away at Buçaco, at the spa, replied Pereira, I haven’t seen the papers, and anyway you never learn anything from the papers, the best thing is to find out by word of mouth and that’s why I’m asking you, Manuel. Barbarous goings on, Dr Pereira, replied the waiter, barbarous goings on. And he went about his business.

At this point in came Monteiro Rossi. He approached with that sheepish air of his, peering furtively this way and that. Pereira noticed he was wearing a brand-new shirt, blue with a white collar. It flashed upon Pereira that it had been bought with his money, but he had no time to dwell on this fact because Monteiro Rossi spotted him and came on over. They shook hands. Take a seat, said Pereira. Monteiro Rossi took a seat and said nothing. Well now, said Pereira, what would you like to eat? here they only serve omelettes aux fines herbes and seafood salad. I could really do with a couple of omelettes aux fines herbes, said Monteiro Rossi, I’m afraid you’ll think it’s awfully cheeky of me but I didn’t get any lunch today. Pereira ordered three omelettes aux fines herbes after which he said: Now tell me your problems, seeing that’s how you put it in your letter. Monteiro Rossi pushed back his lock of hair and that gesture had a weird effect on Pereira, he maintains. Well, said Monteiro Rossi lowering his voice, I’m in a pickle, Dr Pereira, and that’s the truth of it. The waiter arrived with the omelettes and Monteiro Rossi changed the subject. Ah, what sweltering weather we’re having, he said. All the while the waiter was serving them they talked about the weather and Pereira told how he had been at the baths at Buçaco, how the climate there was a treat, up there in the hills and with all that greenery in the gardens. Then the waiter left them and Pereira said: Well? Well, I don’t know where to begin, said Monteiro Rossi, I’m in a pickle, that’s the long and the short if it. Pereira took a forkful of omelette and asked: Is it to do with Marta?

Why did Pereira put such a question? Because he really thought that Marta could make trouble for this young man, because he had found her too uppish and sure of herself, because he would have liked things to be otherwise, for the pair of them to be in France or England where uppish, cocksure girls can say whatever they please? This Pereira cannot presume to say, but the fact is he asked: Is it to do with Marta? Partly yes, replied Monteiro Rossi in a low voice, but I can’t blame her, she has her own ideas and they’re as solid as a rock. Well? queried Pereira. Well, what has happened is that a cousin of mine has arrived, said Monteiro Rossi. That doesn’t sound so awful, replied Pereira, we all have cousins. True enough, said Monteiro Rossi almost in a whisper, but my cousin has come from Spain, he’s in an international brigade, he’s fighting on the republican side, he’s here in Portugal to recruit Portuguese volunteers for this international brigade, I daren’t have him to stay with me, he has an Argentine passport which you can see is a fake from a mile off, so I’m at my wits’ end where to put him, where to hide him. Pereira felt sweat beginning to trickle down his back, but he kept calm. Well? he asked, going on with his omelette. So what it needs is you, said Monteiro Rossi, it needs you, Dr Pereira, to help him out, to find him some unobtrusive place to stay, it needn’t be clandestine just as long as it’s somewhere, I can’t keep him at home because the police may be suspicious on account of Marta, I might even be under surveillance. Well? asked Pereira yet again. Well, no one suspects you, said Monteiro Rossi, he’ll be here for several days, just as long as it takes to make contact with the resistance, then he’ll go back to Spain, please help me Dr Pereira, please find him somewhere to stay.

Pereira finished his omelette, beckoned to the waiter and ordered another lemonade. I am astounded by your impudence, he said, I don’t know if you realize what you are asking of me, and anyway what am I supposed to find? A room to rent, said Monteiro Rossi, a cheap hotel, somewhere they’re not too fussy about documents, you must know places like that, considering all the people you know.

All the people you know! thought Pereira. But what if with all the people he knew he still didn’t really know anyone, he knew Father António whom he could scarcely burden with a problem like this, he knew his friend Silva who was away at Coimbra and couldn’t be trusted anyway, and there was the caretaker at Rua Rodrigo da Fonseca who was most probably a police spy. But then he was suddenly reminded of a little doss-house in La Graça, up beyond the Castle, where illicit couples used to go and they never asked for anyone’s documents. Pereira knew of it because his friend Silva had once asked him to book a room in some such unobtrusive place for him to spend a night with a Lisbon lady who couldn’t risk scandal. So he said: I’ll see about it tomorrow morning, but don’t send or bring your cousin to the office, because of the caretaker, bring him round at eleven o’clock tomorrow morning to my home and then stay around yourself, I may need you, I’ll give you the address right away, but no telephone calls if you please.

Why did Pereira say all this? Because he felt sorry for Monteiro Rossi? Because he had been at the spa and had such a disheartening conversation with his friend Silva? Because on the train he had met Senhora Delgado who had told him that he must do something, be it ever so little? Pereira has no idea, he maintains. He only knows that clearly he had got himself into a fix and needed to talk to someone about it. But this someone was not in the offing so he thought that when he got home he would talk it over with the photograph of his wife. And that, he maintains, is what he did.