João Mau-Tempo will stand there like a statue for seventy-two hours. His legs will swell up, he’ll feel dizzy, and every time his legs give way, he’ll be beaten with the ruler and the stick, not that hard, but enough to hurt. He didn’t cry, but he had tears in his eyes, his eyes swam with tears, even a stone would have taken pity on him. After a few hours, the swelling went down, but beneath his skin, his veins became as thick as fingers. His heart shifts position, it’s a thudding, deafening hammer echoing inside his head, and then finally his strength deserts him, he can no longer remain on his feet, his body droops without his realizing it, and he’s crouching now, he’s a poor farm laborer from the latifundio, squeezing out a final turd, the turd of cowardice, Get up, you swine, but João Mau-Tempo couldn’t get up, he wasn’t pretending, this was another of his truths. On the last night, he heard screams and moans coming from the room next door, then Inspector Paveia came in, accompanied by a large number of policemen, and when the screams started again, growing ever shriller, Paveia walked over to him with calculated slowness and said in a voice intended to terrify, So, Mau-Tempo, now that you’ve been to Monte Lavre and back, you can tell us your story. From the depths of his misery, his hunched body almost pressed against the floorboards, his eyes clouded, João Mau-Tempo answered, I have no story to tell, I’ve said all I have to say. It’s a modest sentence, it’s the skeleton of the dog after two years, a sentence barely worth recording compared to what others have said, From the top of those pyramids, forty centuries look down on you, I’d rather be queen for a day than duchess for a lifetime, Love one another, but Inspector Paveia’s blood is boiling, And what about the twenty-five newspapers you distributed in your village, if you deny it, I’ll kill you right now. And João Mau-Tempo thought, Life or death, and said nothing. Maybe Inspector Paveia was once again late for mass, or perhaps leaving his prisoner seventy-two hours on his feet was enough for the first round, but what he said was, Take the bastard back to Aljube and let him rest there, then bring him back here again to tell his story, otherwise he goes straight to the cemetery.
Two dragons approach, grab João Mau-Tempo by the arms and drag him down the stairs, from the third floor to the ground floor, and while they’re hauling him along, they say, Tell him your story, Mau-Tempo, it will be better for you and for your family, besides, if you don’t, the inspector will pack you off to Tarrafal,* he knows everything, a friend of yours from Vendas Novas told him, all you have to do is confirm what he said. And João Mau-Tempo, who can barely stand, who feels his feet flopping from step to step as if they belonged to someone else, answers, If they want to kill me, let them, but I have nothing to tell. They bundled him into the police van, it was a short journey, there had been no earthquake, all the churches were still triumphantly standing, and when they reached Aljube and opened the door, Out you jump, he missed the step and fell, and again was dragged inside, his legs were slightly steadier now, but not much, and then they shoved him into a cell, which, either by chance or on purpose, was the one he had been in before. Almost fainting, he collapsed face-forward onto the rolled mattress, but although he felt as if he were in a dream, he had just enough strength to unroll and fall on top of it, and there he lay for forty-eight hours, as if dead. He is clothed and shod, a broken statue held together only by his internal wiring, a puppet from the latifundio who peers over the top of the curtain and makes faces while he dreams, his beard continues to grow, and from one corner of his mouth a trickle of saliva forges a slow path through the stubble and the sweat. During those two days, the guard will look in now and then to see if the cell’s occupant is alive or dead, the second time he looks in, he feels relieved, because the sleeper has, at least, changed position, but the guard knows the routine, whenever these men come back from playing statues, they always sleep like this, they don’t even need to eat, but now the prisoner has slept enough, he’s sleeping less profoundly, Wake up, your lunch is here on the shelf, and João Mau-Tempo sat up on the mattress, uncertain as to whether
