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Alleging personal reasons of irresistible force majeure, which he begged leave not to have to explain, bearing in mind, anyway, that in twenty-five years of dutiful and always punctual service, this was the first time he had ever done so, Senhor José asked permission to leave an hour early. In accordance with the regulations governing the complex hierarchical relationships in the Central Registry, he began by making his request to the senior clerk in his wing of the Registry, on whose good or bad mood would depend the terms in which the request was transmitted to the corresponding deputy, who, in turn, by the omission or addition of words, by emphasising one syllable or muting another, could, up to a point, influence the final decision. On this matter, however, there are far more doubts than there are certainties, because the reasons that lead the Registrar to allow or refuse this or other authorisations are known only to him, and because there is no memory or record, in all the years of the Central Registry's existence, of a single report, either written or verbal, giving the necessary background information. It will never be known, therefore, why Senhor José was authorised to leave half an hour earlier instead of a whole hour earlier as he had requested. It is perfectly legitimate to imagine, although it is gratuitous, unverifiable speculation, that first the senior clerk or later the deputy, or both of them together, had pointed out that such a prolonged absence would have a deleterious effect on the service, it is much more likely that the boss had merely decided to take advantage of the occasion to humiliate his subordinates yet again with one of his displays of discretionary authority. Informed of the decision by the senior clerk, to whom it had been transmitted by the deputy, Senhor José calculated the time allowed and concluded that, if he was not to arrive late at his destination, if he did not want to come face-to-face with the man of the house, already back from work, he would have to take a taxi, a luxury almost unknown to him. No one was expecting him, there might not even be anyone home at that hour, but what he wanted to avoid was having to deal with the husbands impatience, it would be far more awkward trying to satisfy the suspicions of a person like that than replying to the questions of a woman with a child in her arms.
No man appeared at the door nor did he hear his voice inside the house, so he must still have been at work or on his way home, and the woman was not carrying the child in her arms. Senhor José realised at once that the unknown woman, whether married or divorced, could not possibly be the one who stood before him. However well preserved she might be, however kind time might have been to her, it would be unnatural for someone with thirty-six years behind her to look less than twenty-five. Senhor José could simply have turned his back, come up with some instant excuse, say, for example, I'm sorry, I made a mistake, I was looking for someone else, but, in one way or another, the end of his Ariadne's thread was there, to use the mythological language of the Central Registry, not forgetting, too, the reasonable probability that other people lived in the house, among whom might be the object of his search, although, as we know, Senhor José's spirit vehemently rejects such a hypothesis. He took the record card out of his pocket, as he said, Good afternoon, madam, Good afternoon, what can I do for you, asked the woman, I work for the Central Registry and I've been charged with investigating certain doubts that have arisen about the file of a person who we know was born in this house, Neither I nor my husband was born here, only our daughter, and she's only three months old now, I don't suppose it's her, No, of course not, the person I'm looking for is a woman of thirty-six, Well, I'm twenty-seven, You're obviously not the same person then, said Senhor José, and went on, What's your name. The woman told him, he paused to smile, then asked, Have you lived here long, Two years, Did you know the people who lived here before, these people, he read her the name of the unknown woman and the names of her parents, We don't know anything about them, I'm afraid, the apartment was empty, and my husband sorted out the lease with the agent, Is there an older resident in the building, There's a very old lady in the ground-floor apartment on the right, and I've heard people say that she's the oldest resident, It's unlikely she was here thirty-six years ago though, people today move around so much, I couldn't really say, you'd better talk to her, but I have to go now, my husband's about to arrive and he doesn't like to see me talking to strangers, besides, I have to make supper, As I said, I work for the Central Registry, so I'm not really a stranger, and I did come here on official business, I'm very sorry to have troubled you though. Senhor José's wounded tones softened the woman, No, no, it was no trouble, I just meant that if my husband had been here, he would have immediately asked you for your credentials, I can show you my identity card from work, look, Oh right, your name's Senhor José, but when I said credentials I meant some official document giving details of the case you've been charged with investigating, It didn't occur to the Registrar that anyone would be suspicious, Everyone's different, the woman who lives on the ground floor, for example, she doesn't open her door to anyone, I'm different, I like talking to people, Well, I'm very grateful to you for your help, I'm only sorry I can't be of more use to you, On the contrary, you've been a great help, you mentioned the lady downstairs and the matter of the credentials, Well, I'm glad you feel like that about it. The conversation looked set to continue for a few more minutes, but the peace in the house was suddenly interrupted by the crying of a child, who must have woken up, Its your little boy, said Senhor José, It's not a little boy, it's a little girl, I told you before, smiled the woman, and Senhor José smiled too. At that moment, the street door banged and the light on the stairs came on, It's my husband, I recognise the way he comes in the door, whispered the woman, go away and pretend you didn't speak to me. Senhor José did not go down the stairs. Noiselessly, on tiptoe, he went rapidly up to the landing above and stayed there, pressed against the wall, his heart pounding as if he were living through some dangerous adventure, while the young man's firm steps grew louder as they approached. The bell rang, between the opening and shutting of the door he could still hear the baby crying, then a great silence filled the stairwell. After a moment, the light went out. It was only then that Senhor José realised that almost the whole of his dialogue with the woman had taken place in the conspiratorial shadows of the stairway, as if both of them had something to hide, "conspiratorial" was the unexpected word that came into his head, What were we conspiring about, why "conspiratorial," he wondered, the fact is that she hadn't turned the light on again when it went out shortly after they had exchanged their first words. At last, he began to go back down the stairs, cautiously to begin with, then quickly, he paused only for a moment to listen outside the door of the ground-floor apartment, he could hear a sound inside that must be the radio, he decided not to ring the bell, he would leave that new investigation for the weekend, for Saturday or Sunday, but this time he would not be caught out, he would present himself with his credentials in his hand, invested with a formal authority that no one would dare to question. They would be false credentials, of course, but, they would bear the irresistible force of an official stamp and impress, and they would save him the task of having to dispel suspicions before getting down to business. As for the chief's signature, he felt absolutely no qualms, it was hardly likely that the old lady in the ground-floor apartment would ever have seen the Registrar's signature, whose curlicues, when he thought about it, precisely because of their fantastic, ornamental nature, would not prove particularly difficult to imitate. If all went well this time, as it was bound to, he would continue to make use of the document whenever he encountered or foresaw difficulties in future investigations, because he was sure that his search would not end in that ground-floor apartment. Even if the woman had been there when the unknown woman's family had lived in the building, they might not have known each other, in the old lady's weary memory, it might all come down to a few vague recollections, it would depend on how many years had passed since the family on the second floor had moved somewhere else in the city. Or somewhere else in the country or even the world, he thought anxiously, once he was out in the street again. Wherever the famous people in his collection went, they always had a newspaper or a magazine following in their tracks and sniffing around them for just one more photograph, one more question, but nobody wants to know about ordinary people, no one is really interested in them, no one cares what they're up to, what they think, what they feel, even when they try to make you believe otherwise, it's all pretence. If the unknown woman had gone to live abroad, she would be beyond his reach, she might as well be dead Full stop end of the story murmured Senhor José then he thought, that might not be the case, for when she departed! she would at least have left a life behind her, perhaps only a brief life four years five almost nothing or fifteen or twenty a meeting, an infatuation, a disappointment, a few smiles, a few tears, which seem, at first sight, the same for everyone but which are, in fact, different for us all. And different each time too. I'll go as far as I can, concluded Senhor José, with unaccustomed serenity. As if this were the logical conclusion to what he had thought, he went into a stationer's and bought a thick notebook with lined pages, like the ones students use to make notes on their school subjects, believing that they are actually learning them as they do so.