Chronicle of the Murdered House Read online

  I could not bear what, for me, was not so much a laugh as an offence of the gravest order; I recoiled, turned, and fled, feeling that, without even having met him, I had already lost him forever.

  9.

  Betty’s Diary (ii)

  5th – We haven’t had a moment’s peace since she arrived. She’s constantly asking for things and is never happy, complaining about the servants, the house, the weather, everything, as if we were to blame for what is happening to her. I haven’t yet seen her at rest, and I don’t honestly think she knows how to rest. She is always pacing back and forth, doing something or thinking of something to do—this gives her a feverish, almost hostile appearance, which creates an uneasy, expectant atmosphere. In the servants’ quarters, the maids complain, and in the house itself the masters and mistress sit around, grim-faced.

  It’s odd, but despite all this activity, and right from the very first moment, she struck me as not being in the best of health. She complained of headaches and looked very pale; dark shadows appeared under her eyes. Once installed in her room, she began unpacking the many suitcases she had brought with her. I asked why she needed so many dresses, and if she planned to wear them all, adding: “Because the family hardly ever goes out.” She responded tartly: “What do I care what the family does or doesn’t do? I will do exactly as I please.” Then she asked what amusements were to be had in town—dances, theaters, meetings of some kind. I couldn’t help but laugh as I continued to unpack quantities of capes and dresses. Seeing the angry glance she shot me, I told her straight out that there were no dances and no theaters, that the Baron very occasionally invited a few families to his house, but that we never went. “Why?” she asked, still helping me unpack. “That’s how Senhor Demétrio lives,” I said. She dropped everything and gave me a hard look: “I don’t want to live the way Senhor Demétrio lives,” she said. I merely shrugged, imagining the battles that lay in store for us if she really intended to live a different kind of life. I said nothing, but was filled with dread for the future. When she had finished unpacking, she dropped into a chair, exhausted. “I can’t do any more.” Her forehead was beaded with sweat, which seemed excessive after carrying out such a minor task.

  “Are you feeling ill?” I asked.

  She slowly shook her head:

  “No, not ill. But I haven’t felt well since I arrived. Perhaps it’s the atmosphere in this house. I’m afraid I won’t be able to bear it. Oh Betty, if you knew how unhappy I am!”

  I don’t know why, but I felt she was telling the truth. The way in which she spoke those words left no room for doubt, and my heart ached for her. If you asked me to explain, I couldn’t, but it was clear to me that she was suffering from some unnamable malaise.

  “I think you should rest a little, Senhora. Then you can think about the future more calmly.”

  She fixed her eyes on me again, and this time they were filled with scorn:

  “I never rest, Betty. What kind of a woman do you think I am, to waste my time lying in bed?”

  My suggestion filled her with a disgust verging on terror. I finished putting away all her clothes, then dusted the furniture and was about to leave, when she called me back:

  “Betty, who sent me that message when I arrived?”

  “Senhor Timóteo.”

  I imagined she would want to know more, but instead she remained silent for a moment, before exclaiming “Ah, yes!” as if she knew all she needed to know. Then she thoughtfully bowed her head.

  I assumed I would be able to leave then with no further delays, but I again heard her voice behind me:

  “And where is his room?”

  “Right next door.”

  She thanked me and I left, leaving her sitting in the chair.

  7th – I was talking to the maids in the kitchen—all of whom were surprised to see the mistress—when I was told that Senhor Timóteo wanted to speak to me. Before going to him, I wondered what excuses I would give to Senhor Demétrio if he should find out, because he had already forbidden me several times from answering his brother’s calls. I had never obeyed those orders and now, drawing myself up, I went straight to Senhor Timóteo’s door—what did I care about family squabbles? Senhor Timóteo himself came to greet me.

  “Good morning, Betty,” he said cheerfully, quite unlike his usual self. I could see that he was happy and wanted to show how happy he was.

  “Good morning. You were asking for me.”

  “Indeed I was, Betty,” and before I could do or say anything, he dragged me inside.

  He was dressed in his usual eccentric fashion and, as always, the curtains were carefully closed. Nevertheless, it was easy to see from the dust on the furniture and the dirt on the floor that the room had not been cleaned for a long time: the air was warm and fetid, as if it were Senhor Timóteo’s own personal climate, as though it were the only element in which he was allowed to exist. While I was looking around me, I suddenly spotted someone moving in the gloom and it did not take me long to identify who that person was.

  “It’s me, Betty,” came my mistress’s calm voice. “If Senhor Valdo asks for me, you can tell him I’m here, visiting my brother-in-law.”

  At these words, a strange, guttural sound emerged from the spot where Senhor Timóteo was standing. It was impossible to describe it as a laugh or any other normal manifestation of joy.

  “Did you hear that, Betty?” and he came over to me, his voice brimming with excitement. “Did you hear what she said? She came especially to see me. I think the Meneses will have many reasons to be glad today . . .”

  This was clearly an exceptional event for him, first, because he was getting to know his sister-in-law (who could become an ally, although who knows by what means or by what secret affinities?), second, because he was doubtless secretly plotting against his brothers. Oh, I knew the Meneses tribe well. Meanwhile, as I stood there, I was trying in vain to understand why that visit should give him such extraordinary pleasure. What game was he playing? What future possibilities was he conjuring up out of a gesture that was probably nothing more than an act of courtesy? I went a little closer, trying to see my mistress’s face—and her eyes, which glinted for a moment in the warm shadows, revealed a confidence, and yes, why not, almost a sense that she was quite at ease in that exotic atmosphere. How mysterious those two hidden natures were: that room, where none of us breathed easily, was the one place where she seemed comfortable. Slow and majestic (I don’t know if I mentioned that Senhor Timóteo—who was beginning to drink too much, perhaps in order to escape from the oppressive monotony of life between those four walls, perhaps for some sadder, more hidden reason, a kind of slow suicide—was growing visibly fatter, and his mother’s lavish, extravagant clothes, which had once added such luster to the social world of the Chácara, were now literally bursting at the seams, torn and ripped asunder by the first, irremediable signs of his excesses) Senhor Timóteo came toward me as if defying my gaze. Then, standing before me, he said:

  “Betty, I want you to go at once and fetch a bottle of ice-cold champagne. I want to celebrate this memorable day.”

  From her armchair, the mistress appeared to give her silent consent, and so, having no alternative but to obey, I left the room, closing the door behind me. As soon as I reached the end of the hallway, however, Senhor Valdo suddenly leapt out at me. I tried to avoid him, but he grabbed me by the arm:

  “Where are you going? Where have you been?” he demanded.

  “I was in Senhor Timóteo’s room,” I answered, trying to pull away. However, he simply tightened his grip on my arm and pushed me against the wall.

  “From Senhor Timóteo’s room?” he repeated, aghast. “And who else is in there?”

  “The mistress,” I answered.

  “The mistress!” he repeated, as if I had said something utterly outrageous.

  I merely nodded and he stared at me in silence, perhaps waiting for me to provide him with more details. When I remained defiantly dumb, he let go of
me, and his voice regained its usual polite, almost gentle tone.

  “And where are you going now?” he asked, before immediately adding, as if he no longer cared about that question and wanted to get straight to the point: “What were they doing? What were they plotting against me?”

  “Senhor Valdo,” I exclaimed, “how can you imagine such a thing? No one was plotting against you. They didn’t even mention you!”

  “Ah,” and he gave a rather strained laugh. “So what were they doing then, shut up in his room?”

  “Senhor Timóteo asked me to bring him a bottle of champagne.”

  “A bottle of champagne!” he cried in horror. “But my wife never drinks. Why today?”

  I shrugged:

  “I know nothing about that, Senhor Valdo. I merely carry out orders.”

  He looked at me again, repeating the word “champagne,” and his thoughts were obviously far away. Then a mischievous glint appeared in his eyes.

  “You can get back to your normal duties, Betty, there will be no champagne.”

  “Why not?” I asked hesitantly.

  He laughed:

  “Because I have the key to the cellar.”

  I felt I should take a sterner stance:

  “But what will they think, Senhor Valdo? I really don’t believe it’s right for a Meneses . . .”

  He was already moving away, but at the name “Meneses,” he turned:

  “What will they think, what will they say?”

  I corrected myself:

  “She might think we’re mean. And she would be right, Senhor Valdo. After all . . .”

  “After all what, Betty? Why do they need champagne? They want to get drunk, do they?”

  “No, not drunk. How can you think such a thing of her . . . of your wife? Senhor Timóteo is simply pleased to have met Dona Nina.”

  He shook his head, as if unsure what to do. For a moment, seeing him standing obstinately before me, I thought it was merely a matter of jealousy, one of those spats that seem to be commonplace between newlyweds. But then, when he spoke again, I realized there was something more serious troubling him.

  “It isn’t as innocent as it seems, Betty. Timóteo will not rest until he has destroyed us all.”

  There was such certainty in his voice that, for a moment, I thought perhaps he was right, that the normally reserved Timóteo really might be plotting some treachery. What was he planning? Why had he told me to fetch champagne? What kind of alliance was he trying to forge with the newcomer? And I thought about that room, its suffocating atmosphere and the way in which Senhor Timóteo had spoken to me.

  “Here it is,” said Senhor Valdo, handing me the key to the wine cellar. “Fetch the champagne.”

  And then, as if he could no longer contain his innermost feelings, he blurted out:

  “Take it to them and tell him he can besmirch the family name for all I care, but if he so much as touches Nina . . .”

  He left the sentence hanging and made a threatening gesture. I had never seen him so angry; he, who never lost his composure and never got carried away, was suddenly overwhelmed by rage. And yet, strangely, his fury was merely a display of his own powerlessness. True, the mistress was in his brother’s bedroom, the brother whom everyone considered a reprobate, but if Senhor Valdo had been brave enough, it would not have been so very hard for him to open the door and tell his wife to leave that place of dissolution. Why did he not do that, instead of prowling furiously around outside the room and talking to me, when I had nothing to do with the matter and was in no way responsible for what was happening? He stared at me dumbly, and I could see that there was no peace in his heart: his troubled eyes betrayed the contradictory emotions battling away inside him. When he saw I was about to leave, he went on:

  “Yes, tell him . . . You can even say . . .”

  He stopped in mid-sentence, as if he had run out of breath, then leaned against the wall, bowing his head.

  “Enough is enough,” he said. “It doesn’t matter. She hates us all far too much to accept him as a friend.”

  He said this as if it were the last of his confessions, and left as abruptly as he had appeared. I stood watching him, and it seemed to me that he stumbled slightly as he walked. Somewhat apprehensively, I went and fetched the champagne. And despite everything, my hands were trembling, my whole being was trembling, and I didn’t know who I should believe: that strange creature who kissed me and called me “her friend,” or that man who had suddenly revealed to me his intense suffering.