He couldn’t put up with the son’s howls, much less his wife’s lies. He went out in the middle of the night; he knew where to find nocturnal friends in the bars in the Educandos. In the daytime, he slipped out more often, and didn’t even wait for the siesta to get out into the street. Zana wouldn’t leave me in peace, knocking on my door, berating me: I had all my life to study, and I was to go out after Halim this minute.

Alone, he got out of the house, and went all over the place, hobbling with his stick under the hot sun. He hadn’t lost his sense of direction; he could still point at a shack and tell you which of his cronies lived there, and walk aimlessly through distant places: the Boulevard Amazonas, the Praça Chile, the cemetery, the English reservoir. When I didn’t find him sitting on the wicker chair in the room above the shop, I followed his trail from bar to bar, all the way along the edge of the river. My search took hours; in fact, he wasn’t hiding, just walking, on the loose, wandering, disenchanted, like a balloon losing air before it reaches the clouds. Sometimes, when he got home, Halim sat on the gray sofa and muttered: “Issa Azmar’s died … that man who lived by the shop, that Portuguese from the Rua Barão de São Domingos, he’s died … what was his name? Balma, that’s it … They never even waited for mass to be said … they’re knocking the big house down … We played billiards in Balma’s house … remember?”

He talked to himself, tapping his stick on the floor, nodding his head. Zana tried to correct him: “Issa died a long time ago and Balma sold the shop and went to live in Rio.” He went on: “Tannus was crazy for that girl of Balma’s … He’d leave us playing billiards and snuggle up with her in the sacks of sugar in the basement … She was lovely, that girl … large eyes, a little round face … really lovely! Balma’s house … now there’s just a hole in the street … a big hole with no shadows.”

Zana kept an eye on him, but he sloped off, lying: “Just going around to the shop, Rânia needs me.” Off he went, nowhere in particular, sometimes for a drink on one of the pontoons in the middle of the river. When it rained, he came back soaked, coughing, spitting, making a mess all over the house. He avoided seeing his son in the garden. He wanted the other one: “Where’s Yaqub? Why doesn’t he come with his wife?” The old man liked Lívia. He provoked his wife, eating the goodies Lívia sent from São Paulo, ignoring our own food. It was an insult to Zana, but he no longer cared. He stuffed himself with his daughter-in-law’s almonds and dates. He no longer gorged himself hungrily, with real pleasure, he ate out of spite, with a sad expression, chewing mechanically, staring into the distance.