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“Let’s discuss the explosive bullets,” Moreira César says. “They penetrate the body and then burst like a grenade, making wounds like craters. The army doctors had never seen wounds like that in Brazil. Where do those bullets come from? Are they some sort of miracle, too?”

“I don’t know anything about arms,” Father Joaquim stammers. “You don’t believe it, but it’s true, sir. I swear it, by the habit I wear. Something extraordinary is happening up there. Those people are living in the grace of God.”

The colonel gives him a sarcastic look. But there in his corner, the nearsighted journalist has forgotten how thirsty he is and is hanging on the parish priest’s every word, as though what he is saying is a matter of life and death to him.

“Saints, the just, people straight out of the Bible, the elect of God? Is that what you’re expecting me to swallow?” the colonel says. “Those people who burn down haciendas, murder people, and call the Republic the Antichrist?”

“I haven’t made myself clear, sir,” the prisoner says in a shrill voice. “They’ve committed terrible deeds, certainly. But…”

“But you’re their accomplice,” the colonel mutters. “What other priests are helping them?”

“It’s difficult to explain.” The curé of Cumbe hangs his head. “In the beginning, I went up there to say Mass for them, and I had never seen such fervor, such participation. The faith of those people is incredible, sir. Wouldn’t it have been a sin for me to turn my back on them? That’s why I continued to go up there, even though the archbishop had forbidden it. Wouldn’t it have been a sin to deprive the most wholehearted believers I’ve ever seen of the sacraments? Religion is everything in life to them. I’m baring my conscience to you. I know that I am not worthy of being a priest, sir.”

The nearsighted journalist suddenly wishes he had his portable writing desk, his pen, his inkwell, his paper with him.

“I had a woman who cohabited with me,” the parish priest of Cumbe stammers. “I lived like a married man for many years. I have children, sir.”

He stands there with his head hanging down, trembling, and undoubtedly, the nearsighted journalist thinks to himself, he does not notice Major Cunha Matos’s little snicker. And undoubtedly, he also thinks to himself, his face is beet-red with shame beneath the crust of dirt on it.

“The fact that a priest has children isn’t going to keep me awake nights,” Moreira César says. “On the other hand, the fact that the Catholic Church is with the insurgents may cause me a good many sleepless nights. What other priests are helping Canudos?”

“And he taught me a lesson,” Father Joaquim says. “When I saw how he was able to give up everything, to devote his entire life to the spirit, to what is most important. Shouldn’t God, the soul, be what comes first?”

“The Counselor?” Moreira César asks sarcastically. “A saint, no doubt?”

“I don’t know, sir,” the prisoner says. “I’ve been asking myself that every day of my life, since the very first moment I saw him come into Cumbe, many years ago now. A madman, I thought at the beginning—just as the Church hierarchy did. The archbishop sent some Capuchin friars to look into the matter. They didn’t understand at all, they were frightened, they, too, said he was crazy. But then how do you explain what’s happened, sir? All those conversions, that peace of mind, the happiness of so many wretched people?”

“And how do you explain the crimes, the destruction of property, the attacks on the army?” the colonel interrupts him.

“I agree, I agree, there’s no excuse for them,” Father Joaquim concedes. “But they don’t realize what they’re doing. That is to say, they’re crimes that they commit in good faith. For the love of God, sir. It’s admittedly all very confused in their minds.”

He looks all around in terror, as though he has just said something that may lead to tragedy.

“Who put the idea into those wretches’ heads that the Republic is the Antichrist? Who turned all that wild religious nonsense into a military movement against the regime? that’s what I’d like to