Crimes of August: A Novel: 5 (Brazilian Literature in Translation Series) (16 page)

After the inauguration of the mill, at a luncheon at the Palace of Liberty with Juscelino Kubitschek, governor of Minas Gerais, Vargas stated that he would not permit the agents of mendacity to lead the country into chaos. While he was installing factories for the economic emancipation of Brazil, his adversaries were trying to install disorder in the streets to enslave the people to their hidden interests. He wasn’t thinking, had never thought, of resigning. He was the legally elected president and planned to serve out his term to the end and not a minute longer.

A slip of the tongue from someone who had always been accused of not wanting to relinquish power. Vargas should have said, under the circumstances, that he intended to serve out his term to the end and not a minute less.

“I’ll preside over the elections,” said the president in his speech, “assuring the free manifestation of the right to vote, offering broad guarantees to the people to choose their representatives. Contrary to what the agitators and rumormongers disseminate, I do not consider the regime threatened. Men pass on, Brazil goes on.”

TAKING ADVANTAGE
of the Marechal Floriano incidents,
UDN
deputies took the floor in the Chamber to accuse the government.

Maurício Joppert: “The people are in the streets seeking punishment of the criminals, demanding justice. We have now, more than ever, to demand the resignation of the president of the Republic from the office he has failed to honor.”

Herbert Levy: “The conclusion is unmistakable and obligatory: no further sifting of facts is needed. The moral responsibility of the president of the Republic is definitive.”

Bilac Pinto: “The president of the Republic can and must resign as the coauthor of the homicide of Major Vaz.”

Tristão da Cunha: “The president of the Republic is rendered morally impossible of presiding at this inquiry, given the suspicions that fall on his excellency and persons of his family. In conditions far less grave than these, Pedro I abdicated and Deodoro resigned.”

Afonso Arinos: “Resignation is the solution that will fend off the possibility of subversion, anarchy, and a coup.”

IN COMMISSIONER RAMOS’S OFFICE
, this conversation took place between Inspectors Mattos and Pádua:

“All we have to do is lean on the fucker, and he’ll spill his guts,” said Pádua.

“We’re not going to do that,” said Mattos.

“The guy shows up at your home to kill you, and you come up with these idiotic scruples? It’s not only your life that was threatened. It was the life of every one of us. We have to make an example of him. These fuckers have got to learn that anybody who lays a finger on us dies like a mad dog.”

“Stop talking nonsense, Pádua.”

“See how he talks to me!” The muscles in Pádua’s arms were pulsing.

Ramos furrowed his brow as if concerned about the harsh discussion between Mattos and Pádua. Actually, he was quite happy; he detested both inspectors and would have loved to see them, like in a cowboy movie, kill each other simultaneously. But, unfortunately, Mattos would doubtlessly not be carrying his gun. So then, let Pádua kill Mattos, mused Ramos.

“Pádua, I don’t want to fight with you. I really don’t.”

“You’re an idiot,” sighed Pádua. “I don’t know how you’re still alive.”

“We’re going to have to let the man go,” said Ramos.

The commissioner had waited a long time for such a situation, one in which he could make the correct decision that infuriated Pádua and harmed Mattos, at least in theory, for the outlaw that Mattos had caught was obviously dangerous.

“He’s been held since day before yesterday,” continued Ramos, “without being charged. In fact, the guy isn’t guilty of anything. There wasn’t, strictly speaking, a home invasion, according to the report Mr. Mattos himself made. The most we can charge him with is carrying a weapon and send him away.”

“If it goes to trial he’ll get off or be fined two hundred cruzeiros, which is more probable,” said Pádua.

“The law is meant to be obeyed,” said Mattos.

“All right. Whatever you two want,” agreed Pádua. “I don’t want to fight with you either, Mattos.” Pause. “On second thought, you’re right. Us cops have to follow the law.”

Pádua patted Mattos’s arm. “You forgive me?”

“I apologize too,” said Mattos.

“Associating with you is going to end up making me into a bleeding heart,” said Pádua.

“Phone call for you, Mr. Mattos,” said the guard, entering the room.

“Who is it?” asked the inspector.

“Somebody named Lomagno.”

The inspector took the call in the reception area.

“Mattos speaking.”

“My name is Pedro Lomagno.”

“Go on.”

“I’d like to talk to you.”

“Come by the precinct tomorrow. I go on duty at noon.”

“It’s urgent.”

“Then come now.”

Mattos sensed a slight hesitation at the other end. “I . . . uh . . . have problems here at the firm, I don’t know what time I’ll be free. Could you maybe come to my office? It’s a matter that concerns you. That concerns us.”

Mattos embraced Pádua as he said goodbye. “I have to go out.”

“Keep your eyes open, man,” said Pádua affectionately.

Thirty minutes later, the inspector arrived at the offices of Lomagno & Company, on Avenida Graça Aranha.

The city was calm, the only abnormality was the presence, on almost every downtown corner, of open vehicles of the special forces, full of men in khaki uniforms and red berets.

A secretary showed the inspector to Pedro Lomagno’s office.

The two men were seeing each other for the first time. Mattos, who as a cop had acquired the habit of looking people directly in the eye, examined the face, the clothes, the abundant slicked-down hair, the athletic built that his elegant suit didn’t conceal, the powerful hand with long pale fingers of the man who had married his old girlfriend. He only didn’t see the eyes, for Lomagno pretended to arrange some papers on his desk.

“Please sit down,” said Lomagno, still arranging the papers.

He’s taller than me. Has all his teeth. Good health, thought Mattos.

“I don’t know where to begin,” said Lomagno, sitting on the other side of the desk.

Lomagno had rehearsed with Luciana the conversation he would have with the inspector, but he had become dominated by a sudden nervousness that he couldn’t control and that the other man must surely be noting. He felt hatred and fear of the policeman sitting in front of him. His opening sentence struck him as good justification for his uncertainty.

“I don’t know where to begin,” Lomagno repeated.

Mattos remained silent, observing the other man. Elusive green eyes, no wedding band, he’s uncomfortable in my presence. He doesn’t know where to begin, because he’s going to lie? Or because he’s going to tell the truth?

“It’s about my wife.”

Silence from Mattos.

“About Alice.”

Silence.

“She told me to get in touch with you.”

Silence.

“What did she say to you?”

“I’m here to listen.”

“It’s very hard for me to say what I have to say.”

Silence. Alice when she was with him used to say similar things, thought Mattos.

“Alice isn’t well, she’s sick, undergoing psychiatric treatment.”

Silence.

“She told me she contacted you, told you that I . . . uh . . .”

Silence.

“. . . that I was Luciana Gomes Aguiar’s lover.”

Silence.

“That’s nothing but a morbid hallucination on the part of my wife. Paulo was my best friend, and I hope that you, who are investigating his murder, find the guilty person soon.”

Silence.

“She was already interned in Dr. Eiras’s hospital.”

Silence.

“I didn’t want to commit her, but the doctor said it was necessary.”

“Can you give me the doctor’s name and address?”

“I have his card here.” Lomagno picked up a card from the desk and handed it to Mattos, who put it in his pocket unread.

“Do you know Lieutenant Gregório?”

“What?”

“Lieutenant Gregório, head of the president’s personal guard.”

“No.”

Well, well, thought Lomagno, relieved, the cop thinks the Negro referred to by Alice and the doorman is this Gregório. He had to check himself in order not to show his satisfaction.

Mattos’s misconception gave Lomagno the courage to observe, openly, the policeman who was interrogating him. What could a refined and elegant woman from a good family, like Alice, have seen in the guy? Actually, Alice had never been a person with a lot of good sense.

“I don’t know that gentleman personally, only by name. The one who knew him well was Paulo. It seems that Lieutenant Gregório helped him obtain—overcome certain, uh, bureaucratic difficulties. You know how it is . . .”

“Be more specific.”

“You know what Brazil is like.”

“I don’t know. Tell me.”

“If you had an import-export business you’d know.”

“But I don’t.”

“To import or export anything you need a license from Cexim. It’s not easy to get. Often the cooperation of an influential friend is necessary. Lieutenant Gregório helped Paulo get an . . . important . . . license for his firm, Cemtex, in which I also am a partner. For Brazil to grow, businessmen need to humble themselves by asking favors.”

“Did Gregório frequent the home of Paulo Gomes Aguiar?”

“I can’t say. I do know that they met a few times . . . They had a good relationship . . . I wouldn’t call it a friendship . . . Yes, I believe that gentleman did go to Paulo’s house, sporadically . . .”

“Dona Luciana told me her husband was in the habit of using the services of a macumba priest. That individual would have been in their home the day Gomes Aguiar was killed.”

“It’s true. Paulo often consulted him. I thought it strange that an intelligent person like Paulo would believe in such a fraud, a confidence man who exploits people’s superstition. I don’t think he’d be capable of committing violence.”

“Do you know him?”

“I went to his macumba site in Caxias once, with Paulo. Strictly out of curiosity.”

“Could you give me the address of that site?”

“Unfortunately, I don’t know it. I don’t even know how to give you correct information about the locale. But I can take you there. I think that by going to Caxias, I can end up finding the place. I remember a bar, things like that can orient me.”

“Would it be possible tomorrow?”

“I believe so.”

WHEN HE LEFT LOMAGNO’S OFFICE
, Mattos’s stomach ached terribly. He had a doctor’s appointment for that afternoon. From the Mineira milk bar, on Rua São José facing the Cruzeiro Gallery, he phoned the doctor and canceled the appointment. He drank half a liter of milk and left to catch the streetcar at the Tabuleiro da Baiana; it had been years since streetcars went to the Gallery.

In the streetcar, on his way to the Dr. Eiras clinic, the inspector thought about the interview he had conducted moments earlier.

Lomagno was very uneasy at first; by the end, very calm. Was he getting used to the lie he was telling, or to the truth? The story about the macumba priest might be true. And also what Lomagno had told him about Alice. That thought made his stomach and his heart ache, hindered his reasoning, prevented the cop from thinking clearly about the role of—not Gregório yet, it was still too soon!—of the mysterious black man. Alice mentally ill. He hadn’t perceived that when they had been together. How could such a beautiful woman be ill? No, he would not allow his lucidity to be compromised by irrelevant doubts: the Negro was Gregório, he was more and more certain of it. The F for Fortuna engraved in the gold ring. Then why was he, who liked repeating Diderot’s maxim that skepticism was the first step toward truth, now full of certainty? Alice’s illness again. Alice. He remembered his mother’s sister, who wasn’t right in the head, telling him—just when was it?—that she’d seen sputum on the sidewalk and had stood there mentally repeating to herself, “Do I lick it or not?” Knowing there were several crazy people in his own family, he considered it possible he himself might suffer a psychotic episode. Possible, but not probable. In any case, he hoped never to come to having an irresistible urge to lick someone’s spit off the sidewalk.

Arnoldo Coelho, Alice’s psychiatrist, had worked for a time at the Asylum for the Criminally Insane and received the inspector graciously. Nevertheless, he only agreed to speak about his client when Mattos, after explaining he was investigating a homicide, guaranteed that the information he provided would remain confidential.

“She suffers from manic-depressive psychosis.”

“Can you give me more details about the illness?”

“Falret called it circular insanity; Baillarger, biform psychosis; Delay, alternating-type madness; Magnan, intermittent psychosis; Kahlbaum, typical circular vesania; Kraepelin was the first to use the terminology manic-depressive psychosis. Kretschmer—”

“Doctor, I can’t take anymore hearing about those Germans whose names all begin with K. In the police academy I studied judiciary psychology, legal psychiatry, forensic medicine, criminal anthropology. It nearly killed me.”

They laughed.

“Was your professor Alves Garcia?”

“I wish. I wasn’t that lucky.” Pause. “Doctor, tell me about Alice.”

“When she’s in her manic phase, she has an irresistible need for movement. She’s ironic, really biting. She has frenzied ideas, with vertical rapid associations. She compulsively writes page after page in her diary. She behaves prodigally. On one occasion she gave me a gold watch. A Vaucheron Constantin. Of course, I returned the watch.”

“She keeps a diary?”

“Yes. But I didn’t read it. In her depressive phase she becomes very apathetic. She once went into a stupor. That was when we had to hospitalize her.”

“Are there any medicines?”

“Yes, medicines exist. Manic-depressive psychosis is curable, but not all patients have the same positive response. Alice’s is, shall we say, a more difficult case. She’s very intelligent, as occurs in fact with many of these psychotics, and she’s cooperating rather well. Whenever she comes to the hospital—Alice knows when she’s having an episode—I tell her, ‘Stick out your tongue.’ If she does, I know she’s in her manic phase; if she doesn’t, she’s in the depressive phase.”