Crimes of August: A Novel: 5 (Brazilian Literature in Translation Series) (26 page)

twenty-two

ALZIRA VARGAS DO AMARAL PEIXOTO
discovered her father, as she herself said, the day she lost him for the first time. It was the year 1923, and her father had left for a revolution that never seemed to end, the first among many others in his life. He seemed very tall, and powerful, in his blue colonel’s uniform of the Provisional Auxiliary of the Military Brigade with black boots and baldric, a black revolver in a holster attached to his belt, his head of thick dark-brown wavy hair covered by a wide-brimmed hat. Alzira would never forget the light caress of her father’s mustache brushing against her cheek in a goodbye kiss. Since that time, she had come to see him, always, as the central figure in great deeds. The moments of simple happiness, as when he had taught her how to play billiards in the game room of the governor’s palace in Porto Alegre, were less significant, though still pleasant to remember. The memories that dominated her mind and filled her dreams were of the moments of tension and heroism they had experienced together. Such as in May of 1938 when Integralists invaded the Catete to arrest the president, with the collusion of the commander of the guard, the Marine Lieutenant Júlio Nascimento. The invaders were beardless and inexperienced youths; attackers and defenders were matched in their grotesque and fatal ineptitude, she could see today, coolly. But Alzira remembered, without that memory having been deformed by time, the epic figure of her father remaining calm amid the general commotion. Earlier, in 1930, on that railroad platform, she had listened emotionally to her father, no longer a colonel but just a soldier dressed in khaki leading the revolution that would place in his hands, for many years, the destiny of a people and a country, utter his unforgettable command: “Rio Grande! Arise, for Brazil!” In 1932, on July 9, she was at a dinner dance at the country club in Rio de Janeiro, the first truly elegant party she had ever attended, when they came to take her back to the palace because an insurrection had broken out in São Paulo. Her heart pounded with excitement as her father said that the constitutional allegations of the Paulistas were a simple pretext for an uprising, for over a month earlier he had named a commission to draw up the proposal for the new Brazilian constitution. These reminiscences came, sometimes, mixed with the sweet aroma of the cigars her father smoked. Oh, how she had suffered that twenty-fifth of November in 1935, away from Brazil and unable to be at her father’s side as he commanded the resistance to the rebels at Campo dos Afonsos or in the Third Infantry Regiment when the communists with their revolt engendered a senseless and bloody comedy of errors identical to what the Integralists would repeat three years later. She had sworn she would never again leave her father. In the treason of ’45, she was at his side; defeated, he had maintained his courage; an exile in his own country, he had comported himself with exemplary dignity.

Alzira had thought that history had redeemed her father in 1950 when he became president in a democratic election. Now, in that painful August of 1954, when for the first time she saw her father as a disenchanted old man, a small man, a man without hope, without desire, without the will to fight, victim of the sordid betrayals of his enemies, the ambiguous judgments of his friends—now she became aware of history as a stupid succession of random events, an inept and incomprehensible confusion of falsity, fictitious inferences, illusions populated by ghosts. Now she wondered, has that other man whose memory she had kept in her heart for so many years ceased to exist? Was he another ghost, had he never existed? That idea was so painful and unbearable that she thought she would not resist and would die of pain, there in the Ingá Palace, in Niterói.

AFTER RETURNING FROM HIS TIME OFF
, Mattos was at the precinct that Sunday when Cosme, the son of the Portuguese Adelino, asked to speak to him.

“Did you know my father died?”

“I did. I’m very sorry.”

“Since I was a little boy, I’ve always been afraid of the police. When I was still very young, I would ask my father why an awful thing like that existed, that caught and mistreated people.”

“That’s a hard question to answer,” said Mattos.

“Not that you mistreated me when I was held here.”

Silence.

“And your wife’s birth? Did everything go well?”

“Yes, yes. More or less. The boy has a problem with asthma, but the doctor said it’ll go away with time.”

Silence.

“Is there something you need? The matter of your father is finished.”

“I came to tell you something. I don’t know if it can be bad for me, maybe it will, but I don’t care.”

“Say what you have to say.”

“You convinced my father to confess he killed that guy in the workshop. You convinced the prosecutor to charge him. You convinced everybody. You’re an intelligent man.”

“I did what had to be done. To look for the truth. I’m very sorry about the death of your father.”

“The truth. You want to know the truth?”

Mattos put an antacid into his mouth. Chewed.

“Yes, I want to know the truth.”

“It was me who killed the guy.”

“Your father confessed.”

“You forced him to confess. And me, my mother, my wife, all of us in our selfishness ended up believing it was better for my father to say he was the guilty one, because being old he would be acquitted easier than me. We believed that, because it was better for us. I could be near my son and my wife, I could take care of the workshop and the orange grove better than him. My father was an old man and us young ones thought old people don’t need anything, they’ve already lived all they’re supposed to live. So we decided to let my father sacrifice himself for me.”

Silence.

“You killed my father. I killed my father. My wife, my mother killed my father. He was an old Portuguese who didn’t know how to pretend he was something he wasn’t, a murderer, even to protect his son.”

“It’s too late now. Things are never the way they are, that’s life.”

“I want you to arrest me.”

“The case is closed.”

“Arrest me.”

Mattos grabbed Cosme by the arm and dragged him like a rag doll into his office. The inspector’s stomach burned. He threw the fragile youth’s body against the wall.

“Listen, you fool. I cannot and will not arrest you for that crime. I can’t salve your conscience, or your wife’s, or your mother’s. Don’t be stupid. There’s nothing more can be done. Get out of here and don’t come back. I don’t want to see your face ever again, live with that horrible memory for the rest of your life, just as I’ll have to live with it.”

“Sir—”

“Out! Out!”

Mattos, taking Cosme by the arms, led him to the office door, pushing him violently into the corridor and from there to the door opening onto the street.

AT A MEETING
that lasted twelve hours, all the air force brigadiers present in the capital decided unanimously that only the resignation of President Vargas could restore calm to the country. The meeting was interrupted twice: for Brigadier Eduardo Gomes to communicate to the other military secretaries the assembly’s decision to issue a proclamation demanding Vargas’s resignation; for Eduardo Gomes to try to obtain the support of Marshal Mascarenhas de Morais, whose loyalty to Vargas was well known.

The meeting was held in an atmosphere of frenzy created by the lower-ranking officers. Editing the communiqué had been extremely difficult. On one side, the younger officers demanded in angry terms that the note directly accuse the president of the death of Major Vaz and demand his resignation. If he didn’t resign, he should be deposed by force of arms. On the other side, the brigadiers, more prudent and possessing a sharper sense of discipline and hierarchy, had no desire for the note to be characterized as subversive. If not for the presence of Brigadier Eduardo Gomes, the younger officers would have breached subordination and imposed their point of view. Brigadier Eduardo Gomes reflected that a struggle among comrades at that moment would only benefit the common enemy; he asked the younger officers to trust their chiefs, the chiefs present there, among whom was Air Force Secretary Epaminondas.

To go to the residence of Marshal Mascarenhas de Morais to communicate the decision of the assembled military men, in permanent session at the Aeronautics Club awaiting the outcome of the efforts of their leader, Eduardo Gomes was accompanied by Brigadier Ivã Carpenter and Generals Juarez Távora, Fiuza de Castro, and Canrobert. Eduardo Gomes had attempted, by taking with him important army generals, to obtain the support of the chief of the general staff of the armed forces. Once again the marshal called upon General Castello Branco as adviser. After hearing the visitors, the marshal stated that, although he deemed resignation a worthy solution, under no circumstance would he countenance its being imposed on the president of the Republic.

The marshal’s attitude disappointed the generals and brigadiers. However, given that the marshal’s reaction had not been one of violent repudiation of the subversive probe of his feelings, the would-be enticers left the marshal’s home believing that in case of a military coup the marshal would not fight against his colleagues in uniform.

As an assiduous follower of regulations, Mascarenhas de Morais related to Secretary Zenóbio, when he succeeded in finding him, what had happened. “The situation is serious, very serious,” Zenóbio had said. At seven that evening, the chief of the general staff went to Catete Palace, where he repeated to the president the meeting that had taken place at his residence.

“I will not resign. I was elected by the people and cannot leave expelled by the armed forces. I will only leave here dead,” said the president. Worried, the marshal noticed in his friend’s voice, more than challenge, sadness and regret.

Eduardo Gomes encountered difficulty in meeting with the secretary of war.

Zenóbio had gone to a luncheon and to watch horse races at the Jockey Club, in the Gávea district. The brigadier only managed to see him in his residence, at five p.m.

“The army will not permit subversion of order,” said Zenóbio curtly.

“Mr. Secretary, I’m not talking about subversion of order. I’ve come to advise you that if the president does not resign, there will be civil war,” answered Eduardo Gomes. “Consult your generals and you’ll find out, if you don’t know already, that our comrades in the army, as well as those in the navy, share the same sentiments of rebellion as their air force comrades.”

That same day, at his residence, which had been transformed into his general headquarters, Zenóbio conferred with Brigadier Epaminondas, secretary of the air force, who had been informed by Eduardo Gomes of the stance taken by the meeting at the Aeronautics Club. Present at the meeting of the two secretaries were General Odilio Denys, commander of the Eastern Military Zone, and Police Chief Colonel Paulo Torres.

Around ten o’clock that night, Zenóbio headed to the military compound, where the main army units in the capital were concentrated. He returned after midnight and went directly to the War Department, where almost all the generals on active duty in the Federal District were waiting for him. A communiqué was issued saying that the armed forces were united in defense of the law and the Constitution and that every measure had been taken to prevent subversion of order, from wherever the call for violation of the regime might come.

LATE THAT NIGHT
, the home of Café Filho, vice president of the Republic, was packed with friends and fellow party members. Café Filho demonstrated good humor, giving vent to a characteristic of his personality that his friends called “
blagueur
spirit.” He refused to make any statement to the press.

THE WARSHIPS
anchored in the Bay of Guanabara kept their engines running all night.

twenty-three

MATTOS READ
in Monday’s newspapers the brigadiers’ communiqué about the Sunday meeting at the Aeronautics Club. To the inspector, the note, sketchy and obscure, would through its veiled threats increase the rumors flying in the city. “The general officers of the Brazilian Air Force, identifying with the feelings of the corps stemming from the criminal facts brought to light in the Police/Military Inquiry, once again express their gratitude for the solidarity received from the army and the navy, and the assurance that the armed forces, within the framework of order and discipline, and faithful to the Constitution, will not betray the confidence vested in them, in order that the current crisis may have a definitive and worthy conclusion. They also agreed that Brigadier Eduardo Gomes, the highest officer present at the meeting, should communicate to the secretaries of the military departments and to the chief of the general staff of the armed forces the unanimous decision taken there, as being one capable of restoring peace to the country.”

To Mattos, the note left an open field for speculation. But the secret word that Eduardo Gomes had taken to the secretaries wasn’t hard to imagine; the air force was demanding the removal of Vargas.

“In the War Palace, General Zenóbio, hero of the
FEB
and secretary of war, expressed complete satisfaction with the conduct of the troops at the military compound, who have remained at the ready for the safeguarding of the regime and the Constitution,” said Radio Globo. An identical announcement, also referring to Zenóbio as the hero of
FEB
, had been published that day by
Última Hora
. The government had decided to stop the “spreading of alarmist news.” The radio stations announced events, under police control. But by now censorship is useless, thought the inspector. At that juncture public opinion was no longer worth anything.

While Mattos was absorbed in these thoughts, Alice was writing in her diary, sitting at the table in the living room. Lately she remained silent, staring at the wall, or writing for hours on end in the thick hardcover notebook.

She raised her eyes for an instant from the diary and noted the look of absorption on Mattos’s face.

“What are you thinking about?”

“Getúlio Vargas.” Pause. “And you?”

“I have more important things to think about. I have my life.”

“Getúlio Vargas is part of my life.”

“He arrested you when you were a student.”

“It wasn’t him. It was some flunky of his. I feel sorry for Getúlio. I know that sounds absurd; I’m surprised myself.”

“You told me that when you were arrested they put you in something called the Polish corridor, where you were hit and kicked when you were forced to walk through. You were only seventeen.”

“Everything lasted two minutes at most.”

Mattos stood up and got a briefcase with papers and photos from the bedroom.

“See this photo here? As a high school student I’m parading on the Seventh of September, 1937, at the height of the dictatorship. I liked parading on the Seventh of September. I liked marching to the beat of the drums. See this other photo? I’m singing patriotic anthems with thousands of other children in the Vasco stadium, a chorus directed by Villa-Lobos. In this one here I’m speaking at a pro-Vargas
queremist
rally in 1944, when I was already in law school.”

“Queremists . . . I have a vague recollection . . . Who were they actually?”

“Pressured by the military in ’44, Getúlio had to schedule elections for president of the Republic and launched the candidacy of his secretary of war, Gaspar Dutra. But at the same time he organized a movement to keep him in power, whose motto was ‘Queremos Getúlio’—We Want Getúlio—and defended convoking a constituent assembly with Getúlio in power.”

“And were you a queremist?” Pause. “Or a masochist?”

“I was very confused in those days.”

“And these days, too.”

“These days too.” Pause. “Getúlio ended up being deposed, in ’45. Know what he liked doing, when he returned, like an outcast, to his ranch in the South? Plant trees.” Pause. “He enjoyed planting trees.”

“I like flowers. Why are you so unhappy? That’s irritating me. You are unhappy, aren’t you?”

“How do you want me to answer?”

“That you’re happy.”

“I’m happy.”

“Promise me you’re not going to see that girl again, that Salete.”

“I can’t promise that. I can only promise that I’m happy.”

“She’s not a woman from your world.”

Mattos felt like telling Alice that neither was she a woman from his world; that he himself didn’t know what his world was; that he felt like a stranger in his nebulous world and in the world of others, too.

“I have to go out,” he said.

“It’s good for me to be alone. I have lots of things to write in my diary.”

Before going to the precinct, Mattos went to the Senate Annex, in the São Borja Building, to look for Laura, but Almeidinha said she wasn’t in.

“Tell her I’ll be back soon to talk to her.”

When he got to the precinct, he called his doctor.

“Your x-ray isn’t good. You may have to have an operation. Remember that new technique I mentioned? Antrectomy and vagotomy?”

“I remember.” Mattos put an antacid in his mouth. “You remove the antrum from my stomach and cut the nerves that govern secretion of stomach acid. You put an end to my ulcer and my excessive hydrochloric acid. Doctor, I’m a little bit of a physician and a little bit crazy, like everybody. Will I still be the same man or will I be a different person afterwards?”

“It’s not good to play around with your health. This is something we have to resolve right away. You’re running the risk of a serious hemorrhage. Can you come here today?”

“What time?”

“As soon as you can. Don’t fail to come.”

Rosalvo entered the office.

“Any orders, sir?”

Mattos was awaiting the arrival of Detective Celso, head of surveillance and apprehension, with whom he had established a plan for the arrest of Francisco Albergaria. He had not yet spoken with anyone about the information he had obtained from Kid Earthquake at the Boqueirão do Passeio or revealed to his colleagues the name of the suspect.

“When Celso from Surveillance shows up, let me know.”

But the alert that Rosalvo gave him, shortly afterward, was that the doorman from Mattos’s building had just called, saying there was a small fire in his apartment and that Alice was all right.

“Who’s Alice?” asked Rosalvo.

Mattos didn’t answer. He rushed out in search of a taxi.

The building’s doorman went up with Mattos in the elevator.

“Did anything happen to Dona Alice?”

“No . . . I mean, she was a little upset . . . But it wasn’t necessary to call the fire department. I put out the fire myself with the extinguisher. Annoying, isn’t it, sir?”

“How did it happen?”

They got to the floor where the inspector lived. The burnt smell was evident from the corridor. The apartment door was shut.

The doorman took the inspector’s arm.

“Look, sir, it was the girl who set the apartment on fire. I think she had an attack . . . I wanted to have my wife stay with Dona Alice until you arrived, but she threw my wife out.”

“Thank you. I’ll take care of everything.”

The table and chairs were partially burned. The books on the shelves, the records and the player were singed by the flames. Mattos saw all this at a glance as he went toward the bedroom.

Alice was sitting on the bed. Her head was covered with black residue from burnt paper, which was spread about her face.

Mattos sat down beside her. He delicately took her ash-stained hands.

“I burned my diary,” Alice said. She seemed sleepy.

“It doesn’t matter. You can write another.”

“I don’t want to write another. I want to forget.”

Mattos picked up the pill bottle, open on the bed. It was almost full.

Mattos put the bottle in his pocket. “How many pills did you take?”

“Two . . . Three . . . Two . . .”

“All right if I call Dr. Arnoldo?”

“I want to be with you.”

“You’re going to be with me. I just want to call Dr. Arnoldo. Stay there while I call him.”

Dr. Arnoldo asked Mattos to take Alice to the Dr. Eiras Clinic on Rua Assunção, in Botafogo and ask for Dr. Feitosa. He, Dr. Arnoldo, would leave at once for the clinic.

“If she resists leaving, it’s best not to force her. Call me back.”

Mattos got a damp towel and cleaned Alice’s hair and hands. She sleepily allowed Mattos to exchange her dress for a clean one. Before they left, the inspector put Alice’s toothbrush in his pocket.

AT THE SUGGESTION
of General Humberto Castello Branco, the chief of the general staff of the armed forces, Marshal Mascarenhas, held a meeting of the Joint Chiefs. Mascarenhas listened apprehensively as the chiefs of the three armed forces—army, navy, and air force—said only the resignation of President Vargas could end the crisis.

“
THE BEST THING
is to let her sleep,” said Dr. Arnoldo. “Alice isn’t well. She’s deeply depressed. I’m going to call her husband.”

“She’s separated from her husband,” Mattos said.

“Legally?”

“Not yet.”

“I always take the precaution of communicating with the family, in case of certain treatments—”

“What treatments?”

“Electroshock. This isn’t the first time it’s been considered in Alice’s case.”

“But can’t electroshock cause harmful effects, like loss of memory?”

“You just told me she said she wanted to forget, and that’s why she burned the diary she was writing. Don’t you find that significant?” Pause. “In any case, any amnesia provoked by the treatment is always transitory.”

“Don’t do it, doctor, I’m begging you, please. When she wakes up, maybe she’ll be better.”

“This state of depression and melancholia only tends to get worse.”

“She wasn’t depressed this morning when I left. Please, promise me you’ll wait a few days.”

“All right. I’ll wait a bit. In fact, as a rule that’s the procedure I adopt. In any event, I’m going to have to advise the husband. They’re still not legally separated. She doesn’t have any relatives, understand?”

“Can’t I be responsible for her?”

“You’re not anything to her—you’re a good friend, I know—but she has a husband.”

“I’ll come back later.”

“Come tomorrow. She’s going to sleep all afternoon and all night. She’ll be well taken care of, don’t worry.”

“No shock treatment, please.”

“That’s a layman’s prejudice, sir. Historically, every medical advance meets hostile objections based on ignorance and superstition. There are people who for religious reasons refuse to accept blood transfusions. Others, out of ignorance, refuse to take allopathic medicines. Et cetera.”

“Doctor, I go on duty tomorrow at noon. But I’ll stop by here first.”

IT WAS ELEVEN AT NIGHT
when General Zenóbio asked Marshal Mascarenhas to come to the War Department.

“The situation has gotten worse,” said Zenóbio. “More than forty army generals signed the brigadiers’ manifesto. I’ve asked Mendes de Morais to go to the Catete to speak with Alzira. I’m waiting for the general to return.”

The two sat, downcast, in the brown leather armchairs in the secretary’s office. They had served together in the
FEB
. Mascarenhas, then a three-star general, had commanded the 25,162 men of the Brazilian Expeditionary Force sent to Italy in 1944. Zenóbio, then a two-star general, had commanded one of the five echelons into which the Force was divided.

“In Italy it was easier to make decisions,” said Zenóbio, rising impatiently. “I think we’d better go to the Catete and speak with the president. I’m going to ask Denys to go with us.”

It was past midnight when they arrived at Catete Palace. The children and other relatives of the president were at the palace. Vargas received Mascarenhas and Zenóbio in the presence of Secretary Oswaldo Aranha. In silence, he heard Zenóbio say that he, the president, had lost the support of the military.

“Tomorrow I’ll call a cabinet meeting,” said Vargas.

Mascarenhas proposed calling the meeting immediately, and the suggestion was accepted by the president.

A little after two a.m., all the cabinet secretaries were in the meeting room of the palace. Only the secretary of foreign affairs was absent.

Vargas sat in the dark, straw-bottom chair at the head of the table in the meeting room. The secretaries were in their places, silent. All the lights were on, but at meetings held at night the room was always dark, gloomy. Vargas contemplated, for moments, the painting by Antonio Parreiras on the opposite wall, an oil in tones of gray that the artist had titled “A Day of Sadness.”

In a tired voice, the president, after recounting the information given him by his military secretaries, asked those present for their opinions. The military secretaries confirmed that the navy and air force were united in wanting the president’s resignation; the army was divided. The military secretaries advised resignation.

While they were speaking, Alzira Vargas came into the room, along with Deputy Danton Coelho, the president’s son-in-law Amaral Peixoto, and others.

The president then asked the civilian secretaries for their opinion. The acting labor secretary, Hugo de Faria, said that the Constitution must be respected and maintained, and that the president should not resign. Oswaldo Aranha and José Américo shared the opinion of the military secretaries, favorable to resignation. The rest were hesitant, none of them offering an objective view.

At that instant, Alzira came from the back of the room and stood beside the president’s chair.

“What about you, General Caiado? I want your opinion,” said Vargas.

“Mr. President. Don’t accept any imposition. I favor armed resistance. The army, even divided, as the secretary claims, will prevent any subversion.”

“If you give me the name of the regiment that’s going to resist, I, with due authorization from the president, will issue the command,” said Zenóbio.