The Collected Novels of José Saramago

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The very genuine motives for complaint that Cipriano Algor has about the Center's pitiless commercial policy, largely presented in this story from the point of view of frank class solidarity without, or so we believe, ever departing from the most rigorous impartiality, cannot disguise the fact, though we run the risk here of stirring up the slumbering bonfire of the historically difficult relationship between capital and work, cannot, as we were saying, disguise the fact that Cipriano Algor bears some of the blame for this himself, the main reason, ingenuous and innocent enough, but also, as so often with the ingenuous and the innocent, the malignant root of all the other reasons, was his assumption that certain tastes and needs common to his founding grandfather's contemporaries vis-à-vis ceramics would remain unchanged per omnia saecula saeculorum or, at least, for the rest of his life, which, when you think about it, comes to the same thing. We have seen the very traditional way in which the clay here is kneaded, we have seen the rustic, almost primitive wheels they use, we have seen that the kiln outside shows traces of an antiquity unforgivable in this modern age, which, for all its scandalous defects and prejudices, has had the goodness to allow a pottery like this to coexist with a Center like that, at least until now. Cipriano Algor complains and complains, but he does not seem to understand that kneaded clay is no longer stored like this, that it will not be long before the basic ceramics industries of today turn into laboratories with employees in white coats taking notes and with immaculate robots doing all the work. This pottery for ex ample, is crying out for hygrometers to measure the atmospheric humidity and the appropriate electronic mechanisms for keeping it constant and correcting it whenever it gets too high or too low, there is no place now for working things out by eye or by touch, by feel or by smell, according to the retrograde technological procedures of Cipriano Algor, who has just said to his daughter as if it were the most natural thing in the world, The clay's fine, just the right degree of wetness and plasticity, nice and easy to work, now, we ask ourselves, how can he be so sure of what he's saying when all he has done is to place his hand on the clay, if all he has done is to pinch the clay between his thumb, forefinger, and middle finger, as if, with eyes closed, depending entirely on the interrogative sense of touch, he were appreciating, not a homogeneous mixture of red clay, kaolin, silica, and water, but the warp and weft of silk. It is likely, as we have recently had occasion to observe and to propose for consideration, that it is not he, but his fingers who know. At any rate, Cipriano Algor's verdict must be in accordance with the physical reality of the clay because Marta, who is much younger and much more modern, much more in tune with the age we live in, and, as we know, no fool when it comes to making pots, passed without comment to another matter, asking her father, Do you think there's enough here to make one thousand two hundred figurines, Yes, I think so, but I'll try to beef it up a bit. They moved into the part of the pottery where they kept the colors and other finishes, recorded what was there and made a note of what was not, We're going to need more colors than this, said Marta, the dolls have to be attractive to the eye, And we'll need plaster for the molds and ceramic soap and oil for the paints, added Cipriano Algor, we'd better get everything we need now, so that we won't have to stop work in order to go and buy things later. Suddenly Marta looked very thoughtful, What's wrong, asked her father, We've got a really serious problem, What's that, We'd decided to use press molding, Right, But we haven't discussed the making of the figurines themselves, we can't possibly make one thousand two hundred figurines using press molding, the molds wouldn't take it and we wouldn't be able to work quickly enough, it would be like trying to empty the sea with a bucket, You're right, Which means that we're going to have to resort to slip casting, We don't have much experience with that, but we're not too old to learn, That isn't the worst of it, Pa, What is then, Well, I remember reading, I'm sure we've got the book in the house somewhere, that to do slip casting, it's best not to use a clay that contains kaolin, and ours does, at least thirty percent, My brain clearly isn't what it was, why didn't I think of that, It's not your fault, we're not used to working with casting slip, Yes, I know, but you learn that in pottery kindergarten, it's absolutely basic to the craft. They looked at each other in bewilderment, they were not father and daughter, not future grandfather and future mother, they were just two potters confronted by the enormous and risky task of having to extract the kaolin from the worked clay and then making it less heavy by introducing some lighter clay. In fact, such an alchemical operation is simply impossible. What shall we do, asked Marta, let's look at the book, perhaps, No, it's not worth it, you can't remove kaolin from clay or neutralize it, it doesn't even make sense, how could you remove or neutralize kaolin I ask myself, the only solution is to prepare more clay with the right components, There isn't time, Pa, No, you're right, there isn't. They left the pottery, two dejected figures whom Found did not even attempt to approach, and now they were sitting in the kitchen, looking at the drawings that were looking back at them, and they could see no way of getting over this sticking point, they knew from experience that heavy clays tend to shrink too much, to crack and become distorted, they are too plastic, soft, pliable, but they did not know how this would affect the casting slip nor what negative consequences this might have for the finished work. Marta looked for and found the book, there it said that to prepare the slip, it was not enough to dissolve the clay in water, you had to use deflocculants, such as sodium silicate, or soda ash, or potassium silicate, or even caustic soda if it wasn't such dangerous stuff to handle, ceramics is the art in which it is truly impossible to separate chemistry from its physical and dynamic effects, but what the book doesn't say is what will happen to my dolls if I make them with the only clay I've got, and about which there is nothing I can do, the other problem is quantity, if there were only a few of them, we would use press molding, but one thousand two hundred, good grief. If I understand it correctly, said Cipriano Algor, the most important things to bear in mind with casting slip are density and viscosity, Yes, it explains that here, said Marta, Read it, then, The ideal density is one point seven, in other words, one liter of slip should weigh one thousand seven hundred grams, if you don't have a suitable densimeter and you want to know the density of the slip, use a test tube and a pair of scales, minus the weight of the test tube of course, And what about viscosity, To measure viscosity, use a viscosimeter, of which there are various types, each of them giving readings drawn from scales based on different criteria, It's not much help that book, Yes, it is, pay attention, All right, One of the most frequently used is the torsion viscosimeter which gives a reading in degrees Gallenkamp, Who was he, It doesn't say, Read on, According to that scale, the ideal viscosity is between two hundred and sixty and three hundred and sixty degrees, Can't you find anything in there I can understand, asked Cipriano Algor, Coming up now, said Marta, and she read, In our case we will use a traditional method, which, though empirical and imprecise, can, with practice, give an approximate measurement, Which method is that, Plunge your hand deep into the casting slip, then take it out and let the slip run off your open hand, if it forms a membrane between the fingers like a duck's webbed foot then the viscosity is right, Like a duck's webbed foot, Yes, like a duck's foot. Marta put the book down and said, We're not much farther forward, Yes, we are, now we know that we won't be able to work without deflocculants and that until we have duck's feet we won't have any usable casting slip, Well, I'm glad you're in a good mood, Moods are like the tides, they come in and they go out, mine has just come in, we'll see how long it lasts, It has to last, this house is in your hands, The house is, yes, but not life, Has the tide gone out already, asked Marta, It's hesitant, vacillating, not quite sure whether it's high tide or low tide, Then stay with me, because I'm in a fluctuating mood, as if I wasn't quite sure that I am what I think I am, Sometimes I think we might be better off not knowing who we are, said Cipriano Algor, Like Found, Yes, I imagine that a dog knows less about himself than he does about his master, he can't even recognize himself in a mirror, Perhaps a dog's mirror is his master, perhaps that's the only mirror in which he can recognize himself, suggested Marta, It's a nice idea, You see, even wrong ideas can be nice, If the pottery goes under, we can always breed dogs, There are no dogs at the Center, Poor Center, not even dogs want to live there, It's the Center that doesn't want the dogs, Well, that problem is of interest solely to those who live there, said Cipriano Algor in an angry tone of voice. Marta did not respond, realizing that anything she said might give rise to another argument. As she reordered the somewhat dog-eared drawings yet again, she thought, If marçal comes home tomorrow and says that he's been made a resident guard, that we have to move, then what we're doing now makes no sense, whether Pa comes with us or not, one way or another the pottery will be condemned, even if he insists on staying, he can't work on his own and he knows that. What thoughts Cipriano Algor had meanwhile remain a mystery, and it's hardly worth inventing some which might not coincide with any real and actual thoughts he had, however, always supposing that words were not given to man in order to conceal his thoughts, it would be permissible for us to conclude from what the potter said after a long silence, There's nothing wrong with having illusions, what's wrong is deluding yourself, that he had probably been thinking the same as his daughter and that, logically speaking, they would both have reached the same conclusions. Anyway, said Cipri ano Algor, without realizing, or perhaps only realizing at the very moment in which he spoke it, what sibylline subtleties it contained, anyway, a moored boat goes nowhere, whatever happens tomorrow, we've got to work today, there's no way of knowing if the tree you plant will also turn out to be the tree you hang yourself from, In an oil slick like that our boat will never get anywhere, said Marta, but you're quite right, time isn't out there waiting for us, we have to start work, my first task is to draw the side views and back views of the figures and color them in, I should finish them by tonight if no one disturbs me, We're not expecting any visitors, said Cipriano Algor, and I'll make the lunch, It's just a matter of heating it up, so all you have to do is make a salad, said Marta. She went off to get the drawing paper, watercolors, paint pots, and brushes and an old rag to dry them on, placed everything neatly and methodically on the table, sat down, and picked up the drawing of the bearded Assyrian, I'll start with this one, she said, Simplify as much as possible so that we won't have any problems with bits sticking or catching when the mold is removed, two molds will be enough, a third one would be beyond us, All right, I won't forget. Cipriano Algor remained for a few minutes watching his daughter draw, then he went outside to the pottery. He was going to grapple with the clay, to lift the weights and barbells involved in learning something anew, to rediscover a lost dexterity and to make a few experimental figures that are clearly not jesters or clowns, Eskimos or nurses, nor Assyrians or mandarins, figures that anyone, man or woman, young or old, could look at and say, They look just like me. And perhaps one of those people, woman or man, old or young, out of the pleasure or possible vanity of taking home with them that extraordinarily faithful representation of the image they have of themselves, will come to the pottery and ask Cipriano Algor how much that figurine over there costs, and Cipriano Algor will tell them that it's not for sale, and the person will ask why, and he will reply, Because it's me. It was late afternoon, almost dusk, when Marta came into the pottery and said, I've finished, I've left them to dry on the kitchen table. Then, noticing the work her father had been doing, two unfinished standing figures about two spans high, one male, the other female, both naked, and one of whom has a bit of wire sticking out of one shoulder, she said, Not bad, Pa, not bad, but don't forget that our figurines won't need to be so big, we were thinking of a height of about one span, They should be a bit bigger than that, I think, then they'll stand out more on the shelves in the Center, and we have to take into account shrinkage inside the kiln when they lose the last bit of moisture, besides, I was just experimenting, No, I think they're good, I really do, and they're not like anything else I've ever seen, although the woman does remind me of someone, Make up your mind, said Cipriano Algor, first you say they're nothing like anything you've ever seen and then you say the woman reminds you of someone, It's a kind of dual impression, of strangeness and familiarity, Perhaps I won't have to breed dogs after all, perhaps I can take up sculpture, which is, so I hear, one of the more lucrative arts, An exemplary family of artists, commented Marta with a half-ironic smile, Fortunately, we've got marçal, so all is not lost, replied Cipriano Algor, but he did not smile.

This was the first day of creation. On the second day, the potter went into town to buy plaster for the molds, as well as the soda ash he had decided to use as a deflocculant, colors, a few plastic buckets, new wooden and wire spatulas, paddles and drill bits. The question of colors had been the subject of lively debate during and after supper on that first day, the point of controversy being whether the figurines should be placed in the kiln after being painted or if, on the contrary, they should be painted after firing and then not refired. If they chose one way, the paints had to be of one kind, and if they chose the other way, the paints had to be of another, so the decision had to be made at once, it could not be left until the last minute, when they were sitting poised with brush in hand, It's a question of aesthetics, said Marta, It's a question of time, said Cipriano Algor, and confidence, Painting them before firing will give them a glossier, higher-quality finish, she insisted, But if we paint them afterward, we avoid any unpleasant surprises, the color we use is the one that will remain, we won't be dependent on the effect on the pigments of firing, because you know how temperamental the kiln can be. Cipriano Algor's view prevailed, the colors to be bought would, therefore, be those known in the specialist market as china paints, quick-drying and easy to apply, with a great variety of colors, and, as for a dilutant, which is essential because the paint itself is normally far too thick, if you don't want to use a synthetic dilutant, ordinary lamp oil will do. Marta opened the art book again, looked for the chapter on cold painting and read, To be applied to pieces that have already been fired, the piece should be sanded down with fine sandpaper so as to eliminate any rough edges or other defects in the finish, rendering the surface more uniform and allowing the paint to adhere more easily in areas where the piece may have been overfired, Sanding down one thousand two hundred figurines is going to take forever, Once this has been done, Marta read on, you must remove any trace of dust produced by sanding, using a compressor, We haven't got a compressor, said Cipriano Algor, Another preferable albeit slower method is to use a stiff brush, The old ways have their advantages, Not always, Marta corrected him, and went on, As happens with nearly all such colors, china paints do not remain homogeneous in the can for very long, which is why it is essential to stir well before applying, That's elementary, everyone knows that, skip to the next bit, The colors can be applied directly to the piece, but they adhere better if you begin by applying an undercoat, usually matte white, We hadn't thought of that, It's difficult to think of things you don't know about, I disagree, I think we think about things precisely because we don't know about them, Leave that enthralling idea for another time and just listen, I am listening, The undercoat can be applied with a brush, but in order to achieve a smooth coat, there is some advantage in using a spray gun, We haven't got one, Or else dipping, That's the classic way of doing it, so let's use dipping, The whole process will be carried out cold, Good, Once painted and dried, the piece should not and cannot be subject to any further firing, That's what I was telling you, it saves time, It gives some other recommendations too, but the most important is that you must let the first color dry completely before applying the next, unless you want to achieve a layered or fused effect, We don't want effects or transparencies, we want speed, this isn't oil painting, Anyway, the mandarin's costume will need more careful treatment, said Marta, remember the design itself calls for great diversity and richness of color, We'll simplify it. Those words closed the debate, but the debate continued in Cipriano Algor's mind as he was making his purchases, for, at the last moment, he bought a spray gun. Given the size of the figurines, there's no point in applying a thick undercoat, he explained to his daughter, I think the gun will work best, just give the figurine a quick spray and there you are, We'll need masks, said Marta, Masks are expensive, we haven't got money to spend on luxuries, It's not a luxury, it's a precaution, we're going to be breathing in a cloud of paint, That's easily solved, How, I'll do the work outside in the open air, the weather looks set fair, Why did you say I'll do it rather than we'll do it, asked Marta, Because you're pregnant and I'm not, as far as I know, Your good humor's returned, Pa, Oh, I do my best, and I realize that there are some things that are slipping away from me and others that are threatening to do so, I just have to work out which of them it's worth struggling to hold on to and which I should just let slip away painlessly, Or painfully, The worst pain, my dear, isn't the pain you feel at the time, it's the pain you feel later on when there's nothing you can do about it, They say that time heals all wounds, But we never live long enough to test that theory, said Cipriano Algor, and at that precise moment he realized that he was working at the very wheel over which his wife had collapsed when she suffered her fatal heart attack. Then, obliged to do so by his own moral honesty, he asked himself if the pain of which he had spoken also included that death, or if it was true that, in that particular case, time had carried out its work as master healer, or if the pain invoked was not, after all, about death, but about life, about lives, yours, mine, ours, whoever's. Cipriano Algor was working on the figure of the nurse, Marta was busy with the clown, but neither of them felt satisfied with their successive attempts, perhaps because copying is, in the end, more difficult than creating freely, at least that might be the view of Cipriano Algor, who had conceived those two figures, male and female, with such passion and spontaneity, and which are over there, wrapped in damp cloths so that they do not dry out and allow the spirit that keeps them erect, static, and yet alive to crack. Marta and Cipriano Algor have their work cut out for them, part of the clay they are using now comes from other figures they had to discard and reknead, so it is with all things in this world, words, for example, which are not things, which merely designate things as best they can, and in doing so shape them, even if employed with exemplary correctness, always assuming that this could happen, words are used millions of times and rejected as many times again, and then we, tails between our legs, like the dog Found when he shrinks with shame, must humbly go in search of them again, like the pounded clay that they are, kneaded and chewed, swallowed down and regurgitated, the eternal return really does exist, but not in that form, in this. The clown Marta has made might be usable, the jester too bears some resemblance to a real jester, but the nurse, who had seemed so simple, so straightforward, so clear-cut, refuses to allow her breasts to emerge from beneath the clay, as if she too were wrapped in a damp cloth and was keeping a tight grip on the corners. Only when the first week of creation was nearly over, when Cipriano Algor was about to move into the first week of destruction, picking up the crockery from the Center warehouse and getting rid of it somewhere like so much useless rubbish, did the fingers of the two potters, simultaneously free and disciplined, finally begin to invent and forge the straight path that will lead them to the right shape, the precise line, the harmonious whole. Moments never arrive either late or early, they merely arrive at the right time for them, not for us, there is no need to feel grateful when what they propose happens to coincide with what we need. On the half day during which her father will be carrying out the absurd task of unloading as useless trash the very objects he had loaded onto the van as being surplus to requirements, Marta will be alone in the pottery with her half dozen figurines almost finished, busy now with sharpening up any blurred angles and in rounding out any curves unwittingly lost in the modeling process, evening out the height, strengthening the bases, working out for each of the statues the optimum seams for the two molds. The mold frames have not yet been delivered by the carpenter, the plaster is waiting inside great sacks made of thick impermeable paper, but the time to multiply is approaching.

When Cipriano Algor returned home on the first day of the week of destruction, more incensed at the indignity of it all than exhausted by the effort involved, he recounted to his daughter the absurd adventure of a man traipsing around the countryside in search of some deserted place where he could unload the useless crocks he was carrying, as if it were his own excrement, Caught with my trousers down, he was saying, that's what I felt like on the two occasions when people came to ask me what I was doing there, on private property, with a van overflowing with pots and plates, I had to make up some feeble excuse about trying to get to a road farther along and thinking that this was the best route to take, I'm terribly sorry, and by the way, if there's anything in the van you'd like, I'll be happy to give it to you, one of them was very rude and said that, in his house, even the animals wouldn't eat their food off rubbish like that, but the other one took a fancy to a casserole dish and carried it off, So where did you leave the stuff in the end, Near the river, Where, Well, I'd thought a natural cave would be the best bet, but even then there was always the chance that the things would be on full view to anyone passing by and that they would immediately recognize the product and the maker, and we've suffered enough embarrassments and humiliations as it is, I don't feel particularly embarrassed or humiliated, Perhaps you would if you had been in my place from the beginning, Yes, you're probably right, so did you manage to find somewhere, The ideal hollow, Is there such a thing as the ideal hollow, asked Marta, That depends on what you want to put inside it, but imagine in this case a large, more or less circular hollow with trees and bushes growing in it, about nine feet deep and with an easy slope down into it, which, seen from the outside, looks like a green island in the middle of the countryside, in the winter it fills up with water, in fact, there's still some water in the bottom now, It's about a hundred yards from the river edge, said Marta, Oh, so you know it, said her father, Yes, I discovered it when I was ten years old, and it really was the ideal hollow, whenever I went down into it, I felt as if I were going through a door into another world, Yes, I used to go down there too when I was about that age, And my grandfather when he was that age, And my grandfather too, Everything is lost in the end, Pa, for years the hollow was just a hollow, as well as a magic door for a few imaginative children, and now, it'll get filled up with debris and it will be neither one thing nor the other, There aren't that many pots and plates and the brambles will soon grow over them, no one will even notice, So you left it all there, did you, Yes, I did, At least it's near the village, one day, one of the children here, if, that is, they still visit the ideal hollow, will turn up at home with a cracked plate, they'll ask him where he found it and, before you know it, everyone will be rushing over there to take their pick of the very things that, right now, nobody wants, It wouldn't surprise me in the least, that's the way people are. Cipriano Algor finished the cup of coffee that his daughter had placed before him when he got home and asked, Any sign of the carpenter, No, Right, I'd better go over there and chivy him along, Yes, I think you'd better. The potter got up, I'm going to have a wash, he said, then took a few short steps and stopped, What's this, he asked, What, This, he was pointing at a plate covered with an embroidered napkin, It's a cake, You made a cake, No, I didn't make it, someone brought it over, it's a present, Who from, Guess, I'm not in the mood for guessing games, But this one's really easy. Cipriano Algor shrugged as if to say that he wasn't interested and said again that he was going to have a wash, but he did not move, he did not take the step that would carry him out of the kitchen, a debate was going on inside his head between two potters, one was arguing that it was our duty to behave naturally under all circumstances, that if someone is kind enough to bring us a cake covered with an embroidered napkin, it is only right and proper to ask whom one should thank for this unexpected generosity, and if, in reply, we are told to guess, it would look most suspicious if we pretended not to hear, these little games played in families and in society are not of great importance, no one is going to draw hasty conclusions if we guess correctly, mainly because the number of people who might give us a cake is never going to be that large, indeed often there might be only one, that, at least, is what one of the potters was saying, but the other replied that he was not prepared to play the part of fall guy in some silly circus game of riddles, that it was precisely because he did know the name of the person who had brought the cake that he would not say it, and also because the worst thing about conclusions, at least in some cases, is not that they might occasionally be hasty, but that they are precisely that, conclusions. So, you don't want to guess, then, insisted Marta, smiling, and Cipriano Algor, slightly annoyed with his daughter and very annoyed with himself, but aware that the only way out of the hole he had dug for himself was to admit defeat and turn back, abruptly said a name, though wrapping it up in words, It was the widow, our neighbor, Isaura Estudiosa, as a thank-you for the water jug. Marta shook her head slowly, Her name isn't Isaura Estudiosa, she said, it's Isaura Madruga, Ah, I see, said Cipriano Algor, thinking that now there would be no need to ask Isaura, So what's your maiden name, but then he immediately reminded himself that, while sitting on the stone bench beside the kiln, with the dog Found as witness, he had decided to declare null and void all the words that had been exchanged and all the incidents that had occurred between him and the widow Estudiosa, let us not forget that the words pronounced were So that's that, then, one does not bring an episode in one's sentimental life to such a peremptory close only to unsay what you have said two days later. The immediate effect of these reflections was for Cipriano Algor to adopt such a convincingly nonchalant, superior air that he was able to remove the napkin without a tremor and say, It looks good. It was at that moment that Marta thought fit to add, In a way it's a good-bye present. The hand was slowly lowered, delicately replacing the napkin on top of the cake like a circular crown, Goodbye, Marta heard him ask, Yes, if she doesn't manage to find any work here, Work, You keep repeating what I've just said, Pa, No, I don't, I'm not some kind of echo and I don't keep repeating everything you've said. Marta ignored this answer, We had a cup of coffee, and I wanted to cut a slice of the cake, but she wouldn't let me, she was here for over an hour, we chatted, she told me a bit about her life, the story of her marriage, how they never got a chance to find out whether theirs was a happy marriage or whether the happiness was just beginning to fade, those were her words, not mine, anyway, if she can't find any work, she's going back to where she came from and where she still has family, There's no work for anyone around here, said Cipriano Algor gloomily, That's what she thinks too, that's why the cake is like the first half of a good-bye, Well, I hope I'm not here when the second half arrives, Why, asked Marta. Cipriano Algor did not answer. He left the kitchen and entered his bedroom, undressed rapidly, glanced at what the wardrobe mirror revealed to him of his body and went into the bathroom. A little salt water mingled with the fresh water falling from the shower.