Raised from the Ground

and thus managed to reach the middle, where the water lapped against the bottom of his cart. At that point, fearing the current seething about them and fearing that he would be swept away with no hope of salvation, he tried to drive the mules upstream. They resisted as best they could, but being subject to the whip and the bit, they finally submitted. At one point, the right-hand mule lost its footing, one wheel slipped off the edge and into the chasm, and amid screams and rumbles of thunder, Augusto Pintéu and his mules, along with the cart, the groceries and the other merchandise, were all drowned, plunged forever into the thick blackness of the waters, into mortal silence. They touched bottom and there they remained, with Augusto Pintéu still held fast to the reins, and the mules to the cart, because down below the waters were absolutely calm, as if they had been like that since the world began. The following day, accompanied by the widow’s screams and the orphaned children’s tears, they were pulled out, thanks to some lengths of rope and the efforts of some very brave men, while a crowd, come from far and wide, gathered on the banks of the river. It had stopped raining by then. That was a summer of great afflictions. So great were the storms that men working in the cork forests fell from the trees and, as they fell, cut themselves on their axes. This is a life more filled with tribulations than one can say.

At the time, the Mau-Tempo family lived in Monte de Berra Portas with their uncle and brother, Joaquim Carranca. The next year, when Portugal had been following the Braga road^* for some six months, João Mau-Tempo, along with his siblings Anselmo and Maria da Conceição, went to work in the winter pastures for a different boss, in a place called, for some reason, Pendão das Mulheres, Ladies’ Pennant. It was four long leagues away, on foot and on bad roads, from Monte de Berra Portas that is, whereas from Monte Lavre it was only a league and a half. There were quite a few girls in the party, which explained why the boys were so pleased, up there all week with those young women and only going home every other Saturday. The workers were mostly youngsters. The place was a hotbed of flirtations and dalliances, and quite a few got burned. At the time, João Mau-Tempo had a girlfriend elsewhere, but he didn’t care, and pretended that he was a free agent, and his skill as a dancer made him a most attractive prospect.

What with work and romance, the weeks flew past, and then a girl from Monte Lavre joined them, a girl he knew well from having danced and sung with her countless times. But they had never been in love. Half serious, half joking, they addressed each other as Friend João and Friend Faustina, for that was her name. There would seem to be nothing more to say about them. However, this turned out not to be the case. Whether it was because of the freedom they enjoyed or because the time had come to tie that particular knot, João fell in love with Faustina, and Faustina with João. In matters of love, it can as easily bloom in diamond rings in shop windows as grow wild among the castor-oil plants, only the language differs. This love began to put down roots, and João Mau-Tempo forgot all about his other girlfriend, but since this new love was serious, they agreed to say nothing for the moment to Faustina’s family, because although João Mau-Tempo himself had done nothing to be ashamed of, he had inherited his father’s bad name, and these things stick, for as the saying goes, He who is born of a cat will run after mice. The secret nonetheless reached the ears of Faustina’s family, and they made her life a misery. He can’t be any good, he looks shifty with those strange blue eyes, and then there was that father of his, a loose-living, drunken fellow who only ever did one good thing, which was to hang himself. That is how some village evenings are spent, beneath the starry sky, while the male genet pursues the female genet and copulates with her amid the bracken. The lives of human beings are far more complicated, for we are, after all, human.

It was January and very cold, the sky was one solid sheet of cloud, the laborers were walking along the road toward Monte Lavre for their fortnightly rest, and as befitted a courting couple, João was talking to Faustina, and she, fearing the domestic storm awaiting her, was telling him her problems. Then suddenly they were assailed by the angry shouts and violent gestures of one of Faustina’s sisters, who, given their mother’s advanced age, had taken over as family spokesperson, and it was her treacherous ambush that so startled the couple. Natividade, for that was her name, said, Have you no shame, Faustina, you stubborn creature, it seems that no amount of good advice and beatings has any effect, Lord knows what will become of you. She said other things too, but Faustina did not leave João’s side. Natividade stood in front of them, intending to block their path and their destiny, if it is in a sister’s power to do such a thing, and it was then, so to speak, that João Mau-Tempo took hold of the world and felt its weight, because from then on, it would be a matter of world and man, house, children, the shared life. He placed one hand on Faustina’s shoulder, for she would be his world, and said, trembling at his own daring, We can’t go on like this, we either finish right here and now so that you don’t suffer anymore, or you come and live with me in my mother’s house, until I can get us a house