Young Luísa, who was, by nature, a cheerful girl, soon livened up the proceedings, chatting animatedly to the other girls, one of whom she invited to play something on the piano. Calisto Valadares suspected that the Scriptures had made a serious omission in excluding the piano from among the plagues of Egypt. The reader can imagine the look on his face when he saw one of the girls get up and walk over to that vile instrument. He uttered a long sigh and went to study the two engravings purchased the day before.

“Magnificent!” he said, standing before The Death of Sardanapalus, a painting he loathed.

“Yes, it was Papa who chose it,” said Rodrigo, and these were the first words he had spoken since entering the room.

“He obviously has good taste,” said Calisto. “Do you know what the painting is about?”

“It’s about Sardanapalus,” replied Rodrigo, undeterred.

“I know that,” retorted Calisto, hoping to continue the conversation, “what I meant was—”

He could not finish his sentence, because the first chords on the piano rang out.

Eduardo, who, in his role as poet, was expected to love music, too, strolled over to the piano and leaned on it in the melancholy pose of a man conversing with the muses. Meanwhile, his brother Calisto, finding it impossible to avoid the cascade of notes, went and sat down near Vilela, with whom he struck up conversation, beginning by asking what time it was by his watch. This touched Vilela’s tenderest nerve.

“It’s getting late,” he said in a faint voice. “Nearly six o’clock.”

“They can’t possibly take much longer.”

“Can’t they! It’s a long ceremony and they might not have been able to find the priest . . . Marriages should be held at home and at night.”

“My feelings exactly.”

The girl finished playing, and Calisto breathed easily again, while Eduardo, still leaning on the piano, applauded enthusiastically.

“Why don’t you play something else?” he asked.

“Yes, Mariquinhas, play something from the La Sonnambula,” said Luísa, making her friend sit down again.

“Yes, La Son—”

Eduardo did not finish the word; he saw before him his brother’s two disapproving eyes, and winced. Stopping in midsentence and wincing could simply have been the sign of a painful corn. And so everyone thought, except for Vilela, who, assuming the others felt as he did, was convinced that some sharp hunger pang must have interrupted Eduardo’s thoughts. And as does sometimes happen, Eduardo’s pain awoke his own, so much so that Vilela’s stomach issued a real ultimatum, to which he succumbed, and, taking advantage of his position as family friend, he wandered off into the house, on the excuse that he needed to stretch his legs.

A marvelous idea.