The Collected Novels of José Saramago (349 page)

want to happen to me, but at least my selfishness, in this case, doesn’t mean I don’t care about protecting her as well, Perhaps Maria da Paz wouldn’t mind taking the risk, Another divorce, my second, her first, no, Mama, absolutely not, It might turn out well, we don’t know precisely what awaits us beyond each action we take, True enough, Why do you say it like that, Like what, As if we were sitting in the dark and you had suddenly turned a light on and off, It’s just your imagination, Say it again, Say what again, What you said, Why, Repeat it, please, As you wish, true enough, Say just the two words, True enough, No, it wasn’t the same, What do you mean it wasn’t the same, It just wasn’t the same, Come on, Mama, stop imagining things, please, too much imagination is not the best way to gain peace of mind, the words I said just signified agreement, conformity, Thanks, I could work that out for myself, I too used to consult dictionaries when I was young, you know, Now don’t get angry, When are you coming, Like I said, soon, We need to have a talk, We can have all the talks you want, Yes, but I just want the one talk, Which one, Don’t pretend you don’t know, I want to know what’s going on, and please don’t come with any ready-prepared stories, fair play and cards on the table, that’s what I expect from you, That doesn’t sound like you talking, It’s what your father often used to say, do you remember, All right, I’ll put all my cards on the table, And you promise you’ll play fair, no tricks, Yes, I’ll play fair and there’ll be no tricks, That’s what I like to hear from my son, We’ll see what you have to say when I lay down the irst card in the pack, Oh, I think I’ve seen just about all there is to see in life, Cherish that illusion until we have that conversation, Is it so very serious, Time will tell when we get there, Well, don’t take too long, please, It could be as soon as the middle of next week, Well,
I certainly hope so, Take care, Mama, Take care, son. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso put down the receiver, then he let his thoughts wander, as if he were still talking to his mother, Words can be the very devil, there we are thinking we allow out of our mouths only the words that suit us, and suddenly another word slips out, where it came from we don’t know, we didn’t ask for it to appear, and because of that word, which we often have difficulty remembering afterward, the whole conversation abruptly changes direction, and we find ourselves affirming what we denied before, or vice versa, what happened just now was a perfect example, I hadn’t intended to speak to my mother so soon about this whole mad story, if I ever really intended to do so at all, and then, from one moment to the next, how I don’t know, she has my formal promise that I’ll tell her everything, she’s probably already putting a cross on the calendar, for next Monday, just in case I should turn up unannounced, I know her, the day she chooses is the day I should arrive, and it won’t be her fault if I don’t. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso isn’t annoyed, on the contrary, he feels an indescribable sense of relief, as if a weight had suddenly been lifted from his shoulders, he wonders what he has gained by remaining silent all these days and he cannot find a single decent answer, in a while he might be able to come up with a thousand explanations, each more plausible than the last, now all he can think of is getting it off his chest as soon as possible, he’ll have the meeting with António Claro on Sunday, in two days’ time, so there’s nothing stopping him getting in the car on Monday morning and going to show his mother all the cards that make up this puzzle, all of them, because it would be one thing to have told her some time ago, There’s a man who looks so like me that even you couldn’t tell us apart, and quite a different thing to say, I’ve met him and now I
don’t know who I am. At that moment, the tiny fragment of consolation that had been charitably caressing him vanished, and in its place, like a pain that suddenly reasserts itself, fear reappeared. We don’t know precisely what awaits us beyond each action we take, his mother had said, and this banal truth, within the grasp of a mere provincial housewife, this trivial truth that forms part of the infinite list of those truths not worth saying because they won’t cause anyone any sleepless nights, this truth that belongs to everyone and means the same thing to everyone, can, in certain situations, afflict and frighten more than the worst of threats. Every second that passes is like a door that opens to allow in what has not yet happened, what we call the future, but, to challenge the contradictory nature of what we have just said, perhaps it would be more accurate to say that the future is just an immense void, that the future is just the time on which the eternal present feeds. If the future is empty, thought Tertuliano Máximo Afonso, then nothing that one might call Sunday exists, its possible existence depends on my existence, if I were to die now, part of the future or part of possible futures would be canceled out forever. The conclusion Tertuliano Máximo Afonso was about to reach, For Sunday to exist I must continue to exist, was interrupted by the phone. It was António Claro asking, Did you get the map, Yes, I did, Any problems, None, Look, I know I said I’d ring tomorrow, but I thought the letter must have arrived by now and so I thought I’d just call to confirm the meeting, Fine, I’ll be there at six, Don’t worry about having to drive through the village, I’ll be taking a shortcut that goes straight to the house, that way no one will find it odd seeing two people with the same face driving past, And what about the car, Which car, Mine, Oh, that doesn’t matter, if anyone does mistake you for me, they’ll just think I’ve got a new car, besides, I haven’t been to the house much lately, All right then, See you the day after tomorrow, Yes, see you on Sunday. After hanging up, it occurred to Tertuliano Máximo Afonso that he should have mentioned he would be wearing a beard. Not that it matters, he will take it off as soon as he gets there. Sunday has just taken a great step forward.

I
T WAS FIVE MINUTES PAST SIX WHEN
T
ERTULIANO
M
ÁXIMO
Afonso parked the car opposite the house on the other side of the road. António Claro’s car was already there, by the entrance, by the wall. Their cars are a whole mechanical generation apart, Daniel Santa-Clara would never have exchanged his car for anything that looked like Tertuliano Máximo Afonso’s car. The garden gate stands open, so does the front door, but the windows are closed. Inside stands a barely distinguishable figure, however the voice that emerges from within is clear and precise, as the voice of a film actor should be, Come in, make yourself at home. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso went up the four steps and paused on the threshold. Come in, come in, said the voice, don’t stand on ceremony, although, judging from what I see, you are not the person I was expecting, I thought I was the actor, but I was wrong. Without a word, very carefully, Tertuliano Máximo Afonso removed his beard and went in. That’s what I call a sense of theater, it puts me in mind of those people who like to burst into a room, shouting, I’m here, as if their presence actually mattered, said António Claro, while he emerged from the shadows and stood in the bright light coming in through the open
door. They stood stock-still, looking at each other. Slowly, as if painfully dragging itself up from the depths of the impossible, stupefaction wrote itself across Antonio Claro’s face, not across Tertuliano Máximo Afonso’s face, for he knew what he was going to find. I’m the person who phoned you, he said, I’m here so that you can see with your own eyes that I was not just having fun at your expense when I said we were identical, So I see, stammered António Claro in a voice that no longer resembled that of Daniel Santa-Clara, I had imagined, because you were so insistent, that there was a strong resemblance, but I confess I wasn’t prepared for what I have before me now, my own image, Well, now that you have the proof, I’ll leave, said Tertuliano Máximo Afonso, No, no, I asked you to come in, now I’m asking you to sit down so that we can talk, the house is a bit of a mess but these sofas are serviceable enough and I’ve probably got something to drink too, but no ice, Oh, I wouldn’t want to put you to any bother, It’s no bother, although you’d get much better service if my wife was here, but it’s not hard to imagine what she would be feeling right now, more confused and troubled than I am, that’s for sure, Speaking for myself, I have no doubt about it, what I’ve had to live through these past few weeks I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy, Sit down, please, what would you like to drink, whiskey or brandy, Oh, I’m not a great drinker, but I think I’ll have a brandy, just a drop, nothing more. António Claro brought bottles and glasses and poured the visitor a drink, then poured himself three fingers of whiskey without water and sat down on the other side of the small table separating them. I just can’t get over it, he said, Oh, I’ve got past that stage, replied Tertuliano Máximo Afonso, now my only concern is what will happen next, How did you find out, As I told you when I phoned, I saw you in a
film, Ah, yes, I remember now, the one where I played a hotel receptionist, Exactly, Then you saw me in other films, Exactly, And how did you track me down, since the name Daniel Santa-Clara isn’t in the phone book, Before I could do that, I had to find a way of identifying you among all the other supporting actors who appear in the final credits with no mention of which character they played, Yes, of course, It took time, but I got there in the end, And why did you go to so much trouble, It seems to me that anyone in my position would have done the same, Yes, I suppose so, it’s such an extraordinary situation, you couldn’t really ignore it, Then I rang all the people listed in the phone book under the surname Santa-Clara, And they, of course, said they didn’t know me, Yes, although one of them mentioned that this was the second time someone had rung him up asking for Daniel Santa-Clara, Someone else, before you, had asked for me, Yes, A female fan perhaps, No, it was a man, How strange, Stranger still, he said the man seemed to be trying to disguise his voice, How odd, why would he want to disguise his voice, No idea, The person you spoke to might have imagined it, Possibly, So how did you find me in the end, I wrote to the production company, Well, I’m surprised they gave you my address, They told me your real name too, Oh, I thought you only found that out when you spoke to my wife on that first occasion, No, the production company told me, As far as I know, at least as regards myself, that’s the first time they’ve done anything like that, Well, I did stick in a paragraph about the importance of supporting actors, maybe that convinced them, That would be more likely to have the opposite effect, Anyway, I got your name, And here we are, Yes, here we are. António Claro drank some of his whiskey, Tertuliano Máximo Afonso took a sip of his brandy, then they looked at each other and immediately
looked away. The light from the declining afternoon sun came in through the still-open door. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso pushed his glass to one side and spread his two hands out on the tabletop, his fingers splayed, Let’s compare, he said. António Claro took another sip of his whiskey and placed his hands symmetrically opposite, pressing them down hard on the table to conceal the fact that they were shaking. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso seemed to be doing the same. Their hands were identical in every respect, every vein, every wrinkle, every hair, each and every finger, as if they had come out of a mold. The only difference was the gold wedding ring that Antonio Claro was wearing on his ring finger. Let’s have a look at the moles on our right forearms, said Tertuliano Máximo Afonso. He got up, took off his jacket, which he deposited on the sofa, and rolled up his shirtsleeve to his elbow. Antonio Claro had got up too, but, first, he went and closed the front door and turned on the lights in the living room. When he draped his jacket over the back of a chair, there was a dull clunk. Is that your pistol, asked Tertuliano Máximo Afonso, Yes, Oh, I thought perhaps you’d decided not to bring it, It’s not loaded, It’s not loaded are just three words that say it’s not loaded, Do you want me to show you, since you obviously don’t believe me, Do what you like. António Claro put his hand into the inside pocket of the jacket and showed him the gun, Here it is. With deft, rapid movements, he removed the empty clip and pulled back the breech to reveal the equally empty chamber. Convinced, he asked, Convinced, And you don’t suspect me of having another pistol in another pocket, That would be too many pistols, It would be the right number of pistols if I was planning to get rid of you, And why would the actor Daniel Santa-Clara want to get rid of the history teacher Tertuliano Máximo Afonso, You yourself
put your finger on the problem when you wondered out loud what will happen next, Yes, but I was all set to leave right away, you were the one who asked me to stay, That’s true, but your withdrawal wouldn’t have solved anything, here or at home or teaching your classes or sleeping with your wife, Actually, I’m not married, You would still be my copy, my duplicate, a permanent image of me in a mirror in which I would not be looking at myself, and that would probably be unbearable, Two bullets would solve the problem before it even presented itself, They would, But the pistol isn’t loaded, Exactly, And you haven’t got another one in the other pocket, Precisely, Which brings us back to the beginning, to not knowing what will happen next. António Claro had now also rolled up his shirtsleeve, at the distance they were standing one from the other it was not easy to see the marks on their skin, but when they went over to a light, there they were, clear, precise, identical. This is like a science-fiction film written, directed, and acted by clones under orders from a mad philosopher, said António Claro, We still haven’t looked at the scars on our knees, said Tertuliano Máximo Afonso, It hardly seems worth it, we don’t need any further proof, hands, arms, faces, voices, everything about us is the same, we’ll be taking all our clothes off next. He poured himself more whiskey, he looked at the liquid as if expecting some idea to emerge from it, then said, Why not, yes, why not, Because it would be grotesque, you yourself said that no further proof was needed, Why would it be grotesque, either from the waist up or from the waist up and down, we cinema actors, theater actors too, do little else but take our clothes off, But I’m not an actor, Don’t take your clothes off if you don’t want to, but I’m going to, it’s no big deal, I’m used to it, and if our bodies are the same all over, you’ll be seeing yourself even when you’re looking at me,
said Antonio Claro. He removed his shirt in one movement, he took off his shoes and then his trousers, followed by his underwear and, finally, his socks. He was naked from head to toe, and from head to toe he was Tertuliano Máximo Afonso, history teacher. Not wanting to be left behind, and feeling he had to accept the challenge, Tertuliano Máximo Afonso got up from the sofa and started getting undressed as well, more inhibited in his gestures out of modesty and lack of habit, but when he had done, his body slightly hunched in shyness, he had turned into Daniel Santa-Clara, cinema actor, with the one visible exception of his feet, for he had kept his socks on. They looked at each other in silence, conscious of the utter futility of any word they might utter, gripped by a confused sense of humiliation and loss that drove out any quite natural sense of amazement, as if the shocking sameness of their bodies had stolen something from the identity of each. The first to get dressed was Tertuliano Máximo Afonso. He stood there like someone who thinks it is time to leave, but Antonio Claro said, Would you mind sitting down, there’s one last point I’d like to clarify with you, I won’t take up much more of your time, What is it, asked Tertuliano Máximo Afonso as he reluctantly sat down again, I’m talking about the dates when we were born and the time, said An-tónio Claro, taking his wallet out of his jacket pocket and removing his identity card, then handing the card to Tertuliano Máximo Afonso across the table. The latter glanced at it quickly, then gave it back, saying, I was born on the same date, year, month and day, Would you be offended if I asked you to show me your identification, Not at all. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso’s card passed into António Claro’s hands, where it remained for ten seconds before being returned to its owner, who asked, Satisfied, Not yet, we still don’t know what time each
of us was born, my idea is that we should write down the time on a piece of paper, Why, So that the second person to speak, if we were to do it that way, wouldn’t give in to the temptation to subtract fifteen minutes from the time the first one gave, And why wouldn’t he add those fifteen minutes, Because any increase would be against the interests of the second of us to speak, But the piece of paper doesn’t guarantee the seriousness of the procedure either, there’s nothing to stop me from writing, and this is just an example, that I was born the very first minute of the day, even if that wasn’t true, You would be lying, Yes, I would, but either of us, if he chooses, can lie even if we just say out loud the time we were born, You’re right, it’s a matter of integrity and good faith. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso was trembling inside, he had been sure from the very beginning that this moment would arrive, he had simply not imagined that he would be the one to invite the moment to reveal itself, to break the final seal, to reveal the one difference. He already knew what António Claro’s answer would be, but he still asked, And what difference would it make telling each other what time we came into the world, Then we would know which of us, you or me, was the duplicate of the other, And what would happen to either of us if we knew that, I haven’t the faintest idea, although my imagination, because we actors do have some imagination, tells me that, at the very least, it would be uncomfortable to live knowing that one was the duplicate of another person, And are you prepared, on your part, to run that risk, More than prepared, And no lying, That, I hope, won’t be necessary, replied António Claro with a studied smile, an expressive composition of lips and teeth in which frankness and malice, innocence and impudence were united in identical but indiscernible doses. Then he added, Naturally, if you would prefer,
we can draw lots to see who should speak first, That’s not necessary, you yourself said it was a question of integrity and good faith, said Tertuliano Máximo Afonso, So what time were you born, At two o’clock in the afternoon. António Claro pulled a regretful face and said, I was born half an hour before or, to put it with absolute chronometrical exactitude, I stuck my head out at thirteen hundred hours twenty-nine minutes, sorry, old pal, but I was already here when you were born, so you are the duplicate. Tertuliano Máximo Afonso drank down the rest of his brandy, got up, and said, It was curiosity that brought me to this meeting, now that my curiosity is satisfied, I’ll go, So soon, let’s talk a little more, it’s still early, in fact, if you haven’t anything else to do, we could have supper together, there’s a good restaurant near here, you could wear your beard, so there wouldn’t be any danger, Thanks for the invitation, but I’ll have to say no, we probably wouldn’t have much to say to each other, since you are not, I would think, very interested in history, and I’ve been cured of cinema for the foreseeable future, You’re upset because you weren’t the first to be born, because I’m the original and you’re the duplicate, Upset isn’t quite the right word, don’t ask me why, but I would simply have preferred that it hadn’t happened like this, anyway, I didn’t lose out entirely, I still have one small compensation, What compensation is that, The fact that you will gain nothing by going around boasting to all and sundry that, of the two of us, you’re the original, if I, the duplicate, am not around for the necessary corroboration, Look, I have no intention of shouting this whole incredible story from the rooftops, after all, I’m a movie actor, not a circus freak, And I’m a history teacher, not a teratological phenomenon, There we agree, So there’s no reason whatsoever for us to meet again, Not as far as I’m concerned, All that remains, then,
is for me to wish you every happiness in carrying out a role from which you will gain absolutely no advantage, since there will be no audience to applaud you, and I promise you that this particular duplicate will keep well out of the way of scientific curiosity, however legitimate, and out of the way, too, of the media ghouls, whose interest is equally legitimate, since they live off such stuff, for I suppose you will have heard the phrase custom is nine-tenths of the law, if that were not the case, I can assure you that the Hammurabi Code would never have been written, We’ll stay away from each other, That shouldn’t be hard in a city as large as the one we live in, and our professional lives are so different that I would never even have known of your existence if it hadn’t been for that wretched film, and as for the likelihood of a movie actor taking an interest in a history teacher, that’s probably off the scale of mathematical probability, You never know, the probability of us existing as we do was zero, and yet here we are, Well, I will try to imagine that I never saw that film or any of the others, or else remember only that I endured a long, painful nightmare before realizing at last that it wasn’t worth it, after all, two identical men, what does it matter, to be perfectly frank the only thing that really worries me at the moment is whether, since we were both born on the same day, we will both die on the same day, What’s the point of worrying about that now, Death is always to the point, You seem to be suffering from some morbid obsession, when you phoned me, you said the same thing, and I couldn’t see the point even then, At the time, I just said it without thinking, it was one of those expressions out of place and context that slip into a conversation without being called, That wasn’t the case just now, Does it bother you, No, not at all, It might bother you if you heard the idea that had just popped into my head, What idea is that, That if we are as identical as we have seen we are today, the logic of the identity that seems to unite us would mean that you will die before me, precisely thirty-one minutes before me, and during those thirty-one minutes, the duplicate will take the place of the original and himself be the original, Well, I hope you enjoy those thirty-one minutes of personal, absolute, and exclusive identity, because that is all you will enjoy from now on, How kind, said Tertuliano Máximo Afonso. He carefully put on his false beard, patting it delicately into place with his fingertips, his hands no longer trembling, then he said good-bye and headed for the door. There he stopped, turned, and said, Ah, I forgot the most important thing, we’ve done all the tests except one, What’s that, asked António Claro, A DNA test, an analysis of our genetic information, or, put in the simplest of terms, so that anyone can understand it, the decisive argument, the ultimate proof, No way, No, you’re right, because that would mean us going to the genetic laboratory together, hand in hand, for them to pare off a bit of nail or extract a drop of blood, and then we would know if our identity was just a chance coincidence of colors and external forms, or if we really are the double proof, the original and the duplicate proof I should say, that the impossibility of this happening was our one remaining illusion, They would classify us as monsters, Or circus freaks, Which would be unbearable for us both, Absolutely, Well, I’m glad we agree on that, We’d have to agree on something, Good-bye, Good-bye.