Dragon's teeth

AT nine o’clock Sebastião left his house, and braving the sharp northeast wind that made the gas-jets flicker inside the globes, went slowly to the house of Vicente Azurara, a cousin of his, who was a commissary of police. An elderly female servant in shabby attire took him to the bachelor’s den where the Senhor Commissary was sweating away a severe cold. He found him enveloped in a great-coat, his feet and legs wrapped in a blanket, sipping hot grog, and reading “O Homem dos tres calções.” When Sebastião entered he took his eye-glass off his nose and raising his watery eyes, exclaimed,—

“I am tormented with a cold that I have had for the last three days.”

He grumbled a little, passing his thin and dirty hand over his face, which was dark and full of lines, and to which a heavy mustache gave a certain air of fierceness.

Sebastião said he was very sorry, but it was not strange with this weather! He advised him to take sulphur-water with boiled milk.

“No; if it does not go away,” said the commissary, in a hoarse voice, “I will attack it to-morrow with half a bottle of gin; and then, if it does not go of its own accord, it will have to go by force. And what is the news?”

Sebastião coughed, complained of feeling somewhat indisposed himself, and taking a chair and seating himself near his cousin, said, placing his hand upon the knee of the latter,—

“Vicente, if I were to ask you to let a policeman accompany me on a little matter of business—merely to show himself—so that a certain person might make restitution of something that has been stolen, you would give me the order, eh?”

“Order, for what?” asked the commissary slowly, fixing his small eyes on Sebastião.

“The order for him to accompany me,—only to show himself. It is a delicate affair. To give a fright—nothing more. It is to make some one restore something that has been stolen, without causing scandal.”

“Effects, or money?” said the commissary, slowly twisting his mustache with his long tapering fingers that bore the stains of the cigarette.

Sebastião hesitated.

“Well, effects—so as not to cause scandal, you understand. You can already imagine that.”

“A policeman in order to give some one a fright,” murmured Vicente. He blew his nose noisily, and with a sudden change of countenance said, “It is nothing relating to politics?”

“No!” returned Sebastião, with emphasis.

The commissary wrapped the blanket more closely about his feet, and raised his eyes with a suspicious glance.

“It does not concern any person of respectability?”

“Nonsense, man!” returned Sebastião.

“A policeman, in order to give some one a fright,” ruminated Vicente. “You are a man of honor; hand me the portfolio that is on the chest of drawers there.”

He took from it a sheet of ruled paper, and reflected a moment, with his hand to his head.

“Mendez—would Mendez do?” he asked. Sebastião, who did not know who Mendez was, responded,—

“Yes, any one you choose. It is only that he may be seen.”

“Mendez, then; he is a respectable man; he belongs to the Guard.”

He asked Sebastião to hand him the inkstand, wrote an order, read it over twice, put strokes to the dried it at the flame of the lamp, and folding it with solemnity, said,—

“Second division.”

“Thanks, Vicente. It is a great service. I am much obliged to you. Wrap yourself up well and do not forget the sulphur-water; it is to be had at the pharmacy of Azevedo, Rua de S. Roque—with half a litre of boiled milk. Thanks. Have you any commands?”

“No; give something to Mendez. He is a person of respectability; he belongs to the Guard.” And putting on his eye-glasses he again became absorbed in the “Homem dos tres calções.”

Half an hour afterwards Sebastião, followed by Mendez, who walked with military step, his arms slightly bending outward like a bow, was on his way to Jorge’s house. He had formed no plan of action. He reflected naturally that Juliana, on seeing a policeman enter the house at that hour, would be frightened, would think at once of Limoeiro and the coast of Africa, and would deliver up the letters and beg for mercy. And afterwards? He thought vaguely of paying her passage to Brazil, or giving her five hundred thousand reis to establish herself in some distant province. He would consider about it,—the chief thing was to frighten her.

In effect, when Juliana opened the door, and saw a policeman standing behind Sebastião, she grew livid, and exclaimed,—

“Ave Maria! What is the matter?”

She had a blank shawl around her shoulders, and the lamp she carried in her hand projected on the wall the shadow of her repulsive profile.

“Senhora Juliana,” said Sebastião, quietly, “do me the favor to light the parlor.”

She fixed an uneasy glance on the policeman.

“But what is the matter, Senhor? The master and mistress are out. If I had known, I should not have opened the door; no, indeed. Has anything happened?”

“It is nothing,” answered Sebastião, opening the door of the parlor. “Everything can be quietly arranged.”

He himself lighted one of the candles, causing the gilded picture-frames to stand out indistinctly from the surrounding darkness, and casting a gleam on the pallid countenance of the portrait of Jorge’s mother.

“Sit down, Senhor Mendez, sit down,” he said to his companion.

Mendez sat down on the edge of a chair, his hand on his hip and his sabre between his knees, maintaining all the while a grave countenance.

“This is the person,” said Sebastião, pointing to Juliana, who stood petrified with terror at the door.

“Senhor Sebastião, what jest is this?” she cried, retreating with a pallid countenance.

“It is nothing, nothing.”

He took the light, and touching her on the arm said, “Let us go inside to the dining-room.”

“But why? My God! is it anything that concerns me?”

Sebastião, when they had entered, closed the door, leaving Mendez in the parlor. He placed the light upon the table, on which were remnants of food on a plate, and a little wine in a glass; he took a few turns up and down the room, nervously snapping his fingers, and then stopping abruptly before Juliana,—

“Give me the letters that you stole from your mistress,” he said.

Juliana made a movement as if to open the window and call for help. Sebastião caught her by the arm, and forcing her into a chair, said,—

“You need not scream out of the window, because there is a policeman in the house. Give me the letters; if not—”

Juliana mentally caught a glimpse of a dark cell in Limoeiro, of the broth served out to prisoners.

“But what have I done?” she stammered.

“You have stolen those letters. Give them to me quickly!”

Juliana, seated on the edge of the chair, clasped her hands together with a gesture of desperation, and muttered between her teeth,—

“The hypocrite! the hypocrite!”

Sebastião laid his hand impatiently on the bolt of the door.

“Wait, in the name of a hundred thousand devils!” she cried, springing to her feet at a bound. She glanced at him vindictively, unfastened her jacket, put her hand into her bosom, and drew out a pocket-book. But suddenly she stamped her foot upon the floor, and cried frantically, “No, no, no!”

“May the Devil take me if you do not sleep to-night in prison,” said Sebastião to her. He half opened the door and called out, “Senhor Mendez!”

“There they are!” cried Juliana, throwing the pocket-book at his feet; and shaking her clenched fist in his face, she added, “may a thunderbolt strike you dead for this, you villain!”

Sebastião took up the pocket-book. It contained three letters, one, very much folded, of Luiza’s. He read the first line: “My adored Bazilio,” and turning very pale, placed all three in the breast-pocket of his great-coat. He opened the parlor door; the robust figure of Mendez stood out against the shadowy background.

“Everything is settled, Senhor Mendez,” he said, in a slightly tremulous voice. “I will not detain you any longer.”

The policeman bowed in silence. When Sebastião slipped a douceur into his hand at the head of the stairs, Mendez bowed again respectfully, and said in mellifluous accents,—

“When you need me again, you know my address, No. 64, Mendez, of the Guard. Do not trouble yourself, your Excellency; at the service of your Excellency. My wife and children will be grateful to you. Do not trouble yourself, your Excellency. No. 64, Mendez, of the Guard!”

Sebastião closed the door behind him and returned to the dining-room. Juliana had sunk into a chair, apparently overwhelmed by the blow that had fallen upon her; but no sooner did she see him than she rose, furious.

“I will tell that hypocrite what I think of this, when I see her. You have set this trap for me because you are her lover also!”

Sebastião, who had turned very pale, restrained himself with difficulty.

“Go get your hat and send to-morrow for your trunk,” he said; “your master has already dismissed you.”

“He shall know everything!” she screamed. “May the roof fall and crush me if I don’t tell him everything,—the letters she received from him, and when they met—”

“Silence!” cried Sebastião, bringing his hand down upon the table with a force that made the china rattle, and woke up the canaries. And he added, with white lips and trembling voice: “The police have your name written down, thief. At the first word you utter you go to Limoeiro or beyond seas, for you stole not only letters but gowns, linen—”

Juliana endeavored to protest, but he continued with violence,—

“Very well; she gave them to you, then, but under compulsion, for you threatened her. It is a robbery, which means transportation to Africa! You can tell your master now anything you please; the only thing wanting is that he should believe it. It will only end in your getting a good thrashing, you thief!”

Juliana muttered between her teeth. It was amusing! They had everything on their side, the police, the prison, fetters, Africa. And she—nothing.

All her hatred against Luiza burst forth.

“She is no better than a street-walker,” she exclaimed, “and I am an honest woman; no man can boast of ever having laid a hand on me. And that hypocrite!”

Her shawl had fallen from her shoulders, and she felt an uneasy sensation in the throat.

“This is an outrage!” she shrieked. “And all that I suffered with that witch his aunt! Is this the reward they give me? May the Devil take me if I don’t put this in the papers,—I who have passed my life chained down to work like a dog!”

Sebastião, against his will, listened with painful curiosity to these details. He felt an intense desire to choke her, and with his ears he devoured her words. When she paused, out of breath,—

“Put on your hat, and let us go,” he said.

Juliana, convulsed with rage, her eyes starting from their sockets, went up to him and spat in his face. But all at once she opened her mouth to its fullest extent, bent forward, pressed her hands to her heart with an agonized expression on her countenance, and fell, with a dull noise, a lifeless heap upon the floor. Sebastião bent over her and tried to move her; she was rigid, and a reddish foam discolored her lips. He caught up his hat, hurried downstairs, and ran along the Patriarchal. An empty carriage was passing. He hailed it, entered, and ordered the driver to take him with all speed to the house of Julião, whom he obliged to accompany him at once, without a collar, and in slippers.

“It is very serious—Juliana—” he murmured, with a pallid countenance.

On the way, amidst the noise of the carriage and of bells ringing, he told his companion incoherently that he had gone to Luiza’s, that he had found Juliana enraged at having been dismissed, and that, while talking and gesticulating she had suddenly fallen lifeless upon the floor.

“It was there, and it must happen one day or another,” said Julião, puffing his cigar.

The carriage stopped. Sebastião in his excitement had closed the door behind him on leaving the house. And the dead woman inside! The driver offered his latch-key, with which they succeeded in opening the door.

“Sha’n’t we take a little drive to Dá Fundo?” said the driver, as he put his latch-key back into his pocket.

But on seeing the door close behind them,—

“They are not the sort of people for that,” he muttered contemptuously, touching his horses with the whip.

Meantime they had entered the house. The silent hall had a lugubrious aspect in Sebastião’s eyes. With a feeling of terror he went up the stairs that seemed to be unending, and with his heart beating violently he glanced around, expecting to see her lying there in a faint, or standing before him pale but breathing.

No, there she was as he had left her, stretched on the floor, her arms extended, her fingers drawn up like claws. The edge of her skirt was slightly raised, disclosing to view her rose-colored stockings and her carpet slippers. The lamp that Sebastião had left on the floor, by the side of a chair, gave her rigid features livid tones, her distorted mouth was set in a grimace, and her half-open eyes, fixed immovably in death, were veiled by a cloud like a diaphanous cobweb. Everything around seemed motionless and dead. The silver on the shelves of the sideboard gleamed faintly in the light, and the cuckoo-clock continued its ceaseless ticking.

Julião examined her and then stood up, shaking his hands.

“She is dead, and very dead,” he said. “She must be taken away from here. Where is her room?”

Sebastião, very pale, pointed upstairs.

“Very well; carry her you, and I will take the light,” said Julião. Seeing that Sebastião did not move, “Are you afraid?” he asked, laughing. And he began to ridicule him. What was he afraid of? It was inert matter; it was just as if he were carrying a trunk. Sebastião, perspiring to the roots of his hair, put his hands under the arms of the corpse, raised it, and dragged it slowly along. Julião held the light before him, and through bravado sang the first bars of the March of Faust. But Sebastião, shocked, said in a trembling voice,—

“I will leave it all, and go away.”

“Let us respect the nerves of the young lady,” said Julião, with a bow.

They went on in silence. This frail body weighed on Sebastião like the stone of a sepulchre; one of the dead woman’s slippers fell off and rolled downstairs. Sebastião felt something strike against his knees; it was the chignon, fastened with a ribbon, which had fallen down. They laid her on the bed, and Julião said they must respect the traditions. He folded her hands across her breast, and closed her eyes. He stood watching her for a moment, and then said,—

“An ugly reptile!”

He covered her face with a towel, and glancing around as he left the room, remarked, “That good-for-nothing was better lodged than I am!”

He closed the door, turned the key in the look, and said, “Requiescat in pace?”

They went downstairs in silence, and when they were in the parlor Sebastião, laying his hand on Julião’s shoulder, said,—

“Do you think it was the aneurism?”

“Yes; she allowed herself to become excited, and it burst. It is stated by the authorities on the subject—”

“So that if she had not been excited to-night—”

“It would have been to-morrow. She has been dying for some time past. Leave her in peace; she is already beginning to decompose. Let us not disturb her.”

He then observed, rubbing his hands together, that he would like to eat something. He found in the cupboard some cold meat and half a bottle of Collares. He sat down, and, looking through his glass at the light, asked Sebastião, with his mouth full,—

“Have you heard the news?”

“No.”

“My opponent has got the place.”

“Is it possible!”

“It was settled beforehand,” said Julião, with a grimace. “I was going to make a scandal, but—” and he smiled—“but they pacified me by giving me another position. They threw me a bone.”

“Indeed!” responded Sebastião. “I am very glad; I congratulate you. And now?”

“Now, I will gnaw it.”

They had promised it to him at the first vacancy. The place was not a bad one. In short, he had bettered his condition. He was sick of medicine, he continued; it was a lane that led nowhere. He ought to have been a lawyer, a politician, a diplomat; he was born for it. He rose, and taking long strides up and down the room, he began, with shrill voice, his cigar between his teeth, to disclose his ambitious projects.

“The country is ruled by an intriguer who has strength of will; the people are degenerate, diseased, full of chronic catarrhs, of hereditary ailments, rotten within and without. The old constitutional society will fall to pieces. New men are needed!”

He planted himself in front of Sebastião.

“This country, my friend,” he said, “thus far has been governed by expedients. When the reaction against these comes, the country will look for some one who will give it fundamental truths. But who has fundamental truths? No one. They have debts, secret vices, artificial teeth; but fundamental truths, no one! If there were a few brave spirits who would take the trouble to expound half a dozen serious, rational, modern truths, the country would go on its knees to them and would say to them, ‘Gentlemen, do me the favor to put the bit in my mouth;’ I ought to be one of those men. I was born for it, and it makes me angry to think that while others, astuter or less scrupulous, are basking in the sun,—‘the beautiful Portuguese sun,’ as the farces say,—I should be prescribing poultices for devout old women, or curing the ailments of decayed clerks.”

Sebastião’s thoughts, meanwhile, dwelt silently on the dead woman upstairs.

“Stupid country, stupid life!” growled Julião.

A carriage stopped at the door.

“The prince and princess have returned!” said Julião.

Jorge was helping Luiza out of the carriage, when Sebastião, opening the door, said abruptly,—

“Something very serious has happened.”

“Fire?” asked Jorge, turning around in alarm.

“No; Juliana’s aneurism has burst,” said Julião in the shadow of the doorway.

“The devil!” exclaimed Jorge in amazement, as he hastily looked for the money to pay the driver.

“I shall not go in,” exclaimed Donna Felicidade, showing her face, muffled in a veil, at the carriage door. “I shall not enter!”

“Nor I!” said Luiza, terrified.

“But where shall we go, child?” asked Jorge.

To his house, Sebastião answered. There was his mother’s room; there was nothing to do but to arrange the bed.

“Let us go there, Jorge; let us go,” entreated Luiza. “It is the best thing we can do.”

Jorge hesitated; the patrol was passing farther up the street, and on seeing this group standing in the light of the carriage lamp, they stopped. Finally Jorge yielded to persuasion, and consented, but very much against his will.

“The devil of a woman to go take it into her head to die at such an hour!” he exclaimed. “The carriage will take you home, Donna Felicidade,” he added.

“And me,” said Julião. “I am in my slippers.”

Donna Felicidade with Christian piety suggested that some one ought to watch beside the dead woman.

“For Heaven’s sake give up such nonsense!” exclaimed Julião, getting into the carriage and closing the door.

But Donna Felicidade insisted. It was a want of religion; they should light a pair of candles at least, and send for a priest.

“Drive on, coachman,” growled Julião, impatiently.

The carriage turned the corner. Donna Felicidade, putting her head through the window, notwithstanding Julião’s efforts to pull her back by the dress, cried out, “It is a mortal sin, a sacrilege! At least a pair of candles!”

Luiza had some scruples in the matter. It was true, she said, they ought to send for some one.

Jorge grew angry. Whom should they send for at such an hour? What hypocrisy! Was she not dead? Well, then, there was an end of it; they would bury her. To watch beside that good-for-nothing! And why not put her a chapelle ardente as well? Perhaps Luiza herself would like to watch beside her.

“Come Jorge, come,” murmured Sebastião.

“Yes, it is just as I have said; nothing but a love of excitement.”

Luiza bent her head in silence, and while Jorge was closing the door of the house, she went down the street leaning on Sebastião’s arm.

“She expired in a fit of rage,” he said to her in a low voice.

During the whole of the way Jorge continued to grumble. What an idea to go sleep out of the house! That was making too much of the matter.

“It seems as if you wanted to add to my suffering,” said Luiza, “and I feel very ill already.”

Jorge bit his cigar with anger, and was silent. Sebastião, in order to satisfy Luiza, proposed that Aunt Vicenta, the negress, should go watch beside Juliana.

“That would be best,” she murmured.

They had by this time reached Sebastião’s door.

The rustle of Luiza’s silk skirt in his house moved Sebastião profoundly; his hand trembled as he lighted the candles in the parlor. He wakened Aunt Vicenta to make them some tea; he himself saw to the arrangement of their room, happy in being able to extend to them his hospitality. When he returned to the parlor Luiza was alone, seated on the edge of the sofa.

“And Jorge?” he asked.

“In the study, writing to the parish priest about the burial. Have you got them?” she added, with glittering eyes and trembling voice.

Sebastião took Juliana’s pocket-book out of his pocket. Luiza caught it from him eagerly, and, taking his hand in hers with an abrupt movement, pressed her lips upon it.

Jorge entered, smiling.

“Are you more tranquil now, child?” he asked.

“Entirely so,” she answered, with a sigh of relief.

They went into the dining-room to take some tea. Sebastião related to Jorge, coloring faintly as he did so, how he had gone to his house, and how, as Juliana was telling him that she had been discharged, and talking and working herself into a passion, she suddenly fell upon the floor, dead! “Poor creature!” he ended.

Luiza, as he uttered this falsehood, gave him an adoring glance.

“And Joanna?” asked Jorge, suddenly.

“Ah, I forgot to tell you,” said Luiza, tranquilly; “she asked me for permission to go to Bellas to see her aunt, who is very ill. She said she would be back to-morrow. A little more tea, Sebastião.”

They forgot in the end to send Aunt Vicenta, and no one watched beside the dead woman.