Shortly afterward, I learned that Maria Cora was separated from her husband. They had married eight years before, and it had been a real love match. For five years, they lived very happily together. Then, one day, her husband had an affair that destroyed their domestic peace. João da Fonseca fell in love with a circus performer, a Chilean woman, Dolores, who did stunts on horseback. He left house and estate and went after her. Six months later, he returned, entirely cured of love, but only because Dolores had fallen in love with a newspaper editor without a penny to his name, and for whom she left Fonseca and all his wealth. His wife had sworn never to take him back, and this is what she said to him when he returned:

“It’s all over between us. We must separate.”

At first João da Fonseca agreed, but he was a proud forty-year-old, for whom such a suggestion was in itself an affront. That same evening, he began making the necessary arrangements; however, the following morning, his wife’s beauty again stirred his heart and—not imploringly, but rather as if he were forgiving her—he suggested that they wait for six months. If, at the end of that period, the feelings that had provoked the separation remained unchanged, then they would part. Maria Cora did not want to accept this emendation, but her aunt, who lived in Porto Alegre and had gone to spend a few weeks with them, acted as go-between. Three months later, they were reconciled.

“João,” his wife said to him on the day after their reconciliation, “as you can see, my love is greater than any feelings of jealousy, but you have to understand that if you deceive me again, I will never forgive you.”

João da Fonseca’s conjugal passion was reborn; he promised his wife everything and more. “I’m forty years old,” he said, “I’m hardly going to have such an affair again, especially one that had such painful consequences. You’ll see, this is forever.”