Orphans of Eldorado - Milton Hatoum [33]
I stopped going to the harbour because lots of young people from Vila Bela were now boatmen and canoeists. They made a terrific racket to attract attention; then, by mimicry, they amused the passengers of the Hilary with their begging faces, and took the tourists off on canoe trips. I was getting too old and was redundant. So I withdrew from the world. I wanted silence. The only voice I wanted to hear was my own. That way, I could think of Dinaura’s silence. Did the silence hide something obscure? Not a word, not a sound, this silence grew and seemed like a knife threatening me, cutting into my peace. Early in the morning, when the sun was still weak, I went out for a walk to the Ribanceira and leant on the tree trunk, the same cuiarana that sheltered us that night of rain and pleasure. Cuiarana: a tree with lovely flowers, thick petals, not in the least pale: yellow, pink, almost red. The scent of the flower is strong, as strong as a rose. And the fruit is large and heavy like a man’s head. When it falls and lies forgotten on the ground, it smells like something rotten, something spoiled. Not even the pigs will eat it. One late afternoon, during a downpour, I lay down on the flowers and remembered that night. And every year, in July, 16 July, the night of the Patron Saint’s Festival, I remembered the dance, Dinaura’s body whirling beside the dancer from the Silêncio do Matá quilombo. Something had changed. The festival ended at midnight, or even later. I heard the voice of the penitents, the sounds made by the musicians, other musicians, the laughter of women piercing the darkness; I heard the noise of hurried, furtive footsteps, I saw a moored boat rock back and forth, then I heard other laughter with whispers of pleasure. The delicious rapture of climax. I shook with so much longing. On the morning of 17 July I thought of talking to Mother Caminal, and on an impulse left here and crossed Sacred Heart of Jesus Square, where I saw the streamers from the festivities on the bandstand, bottles of guaraná and beer on the ground, the stage empty, the ashes of the bonfire; luckily, I didn’t see Iro, the harbinger of bad omens. And that gave me hope. For a second I thought that I wasn’t going to meet the headmistress, but Dinaura. I opened the door and saw a group of girls playing with a shuttlecock in the garden; something had changed, for these orphans were not working in the morning. I saw two nuns, the younger of them a novice. They were surprised by the presence of a man with sad eyes in his pale face, and dressed in old clothes. A middle-aged man who wanted to see the headmistress. Mother Caminal, I said. Our reverend Joana Caminal? She’s in Spain, sir, said the novice. She left us six years ago. Our Reverend Mother wanted to die in Catalonia, but she is still alive. She didn’t even say goodbye to me, I said resentfully. They looked at me uncomprehendingly. Then they moved away, took the orphans’ hands, made a circle, sang and skipped. How lively they were. How much happiness in the house of God. Not a sign of my beloved. I came back here eaten up with a hellish longing. I dozed off after lunch, and woke to hear a voice asking me if it was really me in the rain, laughing or crying, with my hands full of flowers. A musician from the island even composed a tune, forgotten now: ‘The Enchanted Woman’. The song told the story of Dinaura, and of her life as an unhappy queen at the bottom of the river. This was years ago, when I last walked through the town.
The sadness I felt that afternoon