Custódio sat up straighter, having been sitting somewhat slumped. He was a man of about forty. Poorly dressed, but well groomed, neat, and very correct. He had long nails, neatly trimmed, and his hands were slender and soft, unlike the skin on his face, which was somewhat lined. Minor details, but necessary to illustrate a certain duality in the man, an air of being both a beggar and a general. Walking down the street with no breakfast and not a penny in his pocket, he behaved as if he were marching at the head of an army. The reason was none other than the contrast between nature and situation, between soul and life. Custódio had been born with a vocation to be wealthy, but with no vocation for work. He had an instinct for elegance, a love of excess, good food, beautiful ladies, luxuriant carpets, exquisite furniture, a voluptuary (and, up to a point, an artist) capable of running the Villa Torlonia or the Hamilton Gallery. But he had no money; neither money nor the aptitude or patience to earn it. And yet, on the other hand, he needed to live. Il faut bien que je vive, a man in search of a favor once said to Talleyrand. Je n’en vois pas la nécessité, the minister replied coldly. Nobody gave this answer to Custódio; they gave him money instead—someone would give him ten mil-réis, another would give five, another twenty, and it was principally from such small donations that he paid his bed and board.

I say “principally,” because Custódio did not hold back from involving himself in various business deals, but always on condition that he could choose them, and he always chose the ones that were doomed to fail. He had an excellent nose for disasters. From among twenty businesses, he could immediately pluck the most foolhardy, and would plunge in resolutely. The bad luck that pursued him would ensure that the other nineteen would prosper, while the one he chose would blow up in his face. No matter; he would pick himself up and get ready for the next.