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By Root 2062 0

I heard it and still don’t believe it. A cangaceiro like Pajeú, a murderer, a rapist, a thief, a man who cuts off people’s ears, who sacks towns, suddenly become a religious crusader! I saw him with my own eyes. It’s hard to believe I was born in these parts, and spent a good many years of my life here. It’s a strange land to me now. These people aren’t the same ones I’ve known as long as I can remember. Maybe that Scottish anarchist understands them better than I do. Or the Counselor. It’s quite possible that only madmen understand other madmen…” He gestured in despair and left his sentence unfinished.

“Speaking of the Scottish anarchist,” Gumúcio said. The baron felt intensely uneasy: he knew the question would be asked, and had been expecting it for two hours now. “You surely know that I have never doubted your good judgment when it comes to politics. But I fail to understand why you would let the Scotsman go like that. He was a valuable prisoner, the best weapon we had against our number-one enemy.” He looked at the baron, his eyes blinking. “Isn’t that so?”

“Our number-one enemy is no longer Epaminondas, or any other Jacobin,” the baron murmured dispiritedly. “It’s the jagunços. The economic breakdown of Bahia. That’s what’s going to happen if there’s not a stop put to this madness. The lands will remain uncultivatable, and everything’s going to go to hell. The livestock is being eaten, the cattle are disappearing. And what’s worse still, a region where the lack of manpower has always been a problem is going to be depopulated. People are leaving in droves and we aren’t going to be able to bring them back. We must halt at any price the ruin that Canudos is bringing down upon our heads.”

He saw Gumúcio’s and José Bernardo’s surprised and reproving looks and felt uncomfortable. “I know I haven’t answered your question about Galileo Gall,” he murmured. “By the way, that isn’t even his real name. Why did I let him go? Perhaps it’s another sign of the madness of the times, my contribution to the general folly.” Without noticing, he traced a circle like Murau’s with his hand. “I doubt that he would have been of any use to us, even if our war with Epaminondas goes on…”

“Goes on?” Gumúcio growled. “It hasn’t let up for a second, as far as I know. With the arrival of Moreira César, the Jacobins in Salvador have become more arrogant than ever. The Jornal de Notícias is demanding that parliament try Viana and appoint a special tribunal to judge our conspiracies and shady deals.”

“I haven’t forgotten the harm done us by the Progressivist Republicans,” the baron interrupted him. “But at the moment things have taken a different turn.”

“You’re mistaken,” Gumúcio said. “They’re just waiting for Moreira César and the Seventh Regiment to enter Bahia with the Counselor’s head to turn Viana out of office, close down parliament, and begin the witch-hunt against us.”

“Has Epaminondas Gonçalves lost anything at the hands of the monarchist restorationists?” The baron smiled. “In addition to Canudos, I for my part have lost Calumbi, the oldest and most prosperous hacienda in the interior. I have more reasons than he does to welcome Moreira César as our savior.”

“Nonetheless, none of this explains why you allowed the English corpse to escape your grasp in such cavalier fashion,” José Bernardo said. The baron realized what a great effort it was costing the old man to utter these phrases. “Wasn’t he living proof of Epaminondas’s lack of scruples? Wasn’t he a prize witness to bring forward to testify to that ambitious man’s scorn for Brazil?”

“In theory, yes,” the baron agreed. “In the realm of hypotheses.”

“We would have paraded him in the same places that they paraded his famous mop of red hair,” Gumúcio murmured in an equally severe, hurt tone of voice.

“But not in practice,” the baron went on. “Gall is not a normal madman. No, don’t laugh. He’s a special type of madman: a fanatic. He would not have testified in our favor but against us. He would have confirmed Epaminondas’s accusations, and made us appear utterly ridiculous.”

“I