“I leave to the ire of my enemies the legacy of my death,” began the note, which ended by saying: “The answer from the people will come later. .”
Mattos left the palace. He made his way through the crowd gathered in front of the palace. He needed to get back to the precinct.
AT THE FINAL STOP of the streetcar line at Carioca Square, the inspector caught a streetcar and went to the precinct.
Automatically, he began signing the certificates of poverty on his desk. Rosalvo came into the office.
“Those military guys are really stupid. That’s the crux of it. If they’d left Getúlio alone, the senile old man would’ve died in disgrace, having his hair combed in public by the Black Angel, drowned in the sea of mud. But the military backed him up against the wall, without giving him a chance to save face. They played Lacerda’s game; he’s a maniac who doesn’t know when to stop. The people had already taken the old man’s picture down from the wall, now everything’s going to start all over. The old man’s become a saint, like every politician who dies in office in this shithole of a country.”
“Weren’t you a Lacerdist? Against Getúlio?”
“I’ve changed sides.”
Rosalvo began singing a song from the 1951 Carnivaclass="underline" “Put the old man’s picture back up, put it in the same spot, the old man’s smile makes us work.”
“Shut up,” said the inspector.
“The UDN is through,” said Rosalvo. “It’ll never be the government in this country. That boat has sailed.”
“Call the jailer and the guard on duty.”
Rosalvo and the policemen on duty, the investigator who was serving as jailer and the guard, came into the inspector’s office. Mattos ordered them go with him to the Robbery and Theft section.
“Put your weapons on top of this table,” the inspector said.
“I don’t understand, sir,” said Rosalvo.
Mattos took his revolver from his belt and pointed it at Rosalvo’s head.
“You don’t need to understand. Do it.”
“We’re going to do what the man’s ordering,” said Rosalvo.
The policemen placed their guns on the table. Rosalvo shook his head as if to say: “This time the guy has really gone crazy.”
“The keys to the lockup.”
The jailer put the ring of keys on the table.
Mattos left, locking the door. The Robbery and Theft section had only a narrow transom that opened onto a ventilation area.
The prisoners pressed against the wall when Mattos entered the cell. The repugnant smell of poverty, dirt, and disease strengthened even further the inspector’s resolve.
“Everyone out.”
The prisoners didn’t understand the inspector’s order and remained motionless inside the lockup.
“Out!” shouted the inspector. His stomach burned.
The prisoners went out and formed into a group at the far end of the corridor.
Mattos called over Odorico, the cell boss. “Look, they’re going out one at a time, spaced a minute apart. You’re responsible.”
One by one, in silence, the prisoners began leaving. They seemed like fleeing rats.
Mattos located Pádua after several phone calls.
“Pádua, listen carefully. I let all the prisoners out of lockup. All of them, even the convicted ones.”
“You’ve gone crazy, Mattos! They’re going to hold an administrative and a departmental inquiry. This time they’re going to kick you off the force. Know what the outcome of this is going to be?”
“Fuck the outcome.”
“I’m going to have to arrest you.”
“Don’t try it, Pádua. I’m calling you just so you can come here and take control of this shit. I locked up the people on my shift.”
“You’re finished!”
“I’m waiting for you.”
“I can call headquarters and tell them to go there and collar you.”
“You’re not going to do that.”
“The fuck I’m not!” shouted Pádua. “You son of a bitch!”
Mattos hung up.
He thought then that he hadn’t had a chance to talk with Detective Celso about Francisco Albergaria. When Pádua gets here, I’m going to give him all the information about my investigations. Pádua will like arresting the killer of Paulo Gomes Aguiar and solving the mystery of the Deauville.
However, Mattos would forget to give his colleague that information. Pádua arrived by himself. Mattos was sitting behind his desk, on it the ring of keys and the revolvers.
The two looked at each other silently.
“Tell them I threatened you.”
Pádua sighed. “Everybody knows I’m not afraid of threats. And you’re not capable of using those shitty guns.”
“Say whatever you like. Say you felt sorry for me.”
“That’s just what I’m feeling. One of the few honest cops in this precinct, and you go and do something like that. Look, I can order Rosalvo and the other two to say the prisoners sawed through the bars and ran off. We’ll make up something like that. The country’s in the middle of a convulsion, headquarters isn’t even going to start an inquiry, everybody’s going to be replaced, they’re going to give the superintendent of police the boot. Runaway prisoners won’t matter to anyone.”
“It matters to me. I want it to be that way.”
Mattos placed his police ID next to the revolvers.
“Hand this over to the proper person.”
“What proper person? There is no proper person. Hang on to that shit until they open an inquiry and kick your ass out into the street.”
Mattos put his wallet in his pocket and walked toward the door.
“What are going to do now? Something else crazy?”
“Outcome. I liked that word. Forgive me for giving you a double shift.”
As he was leaving he heard Pádua say, “Did you know today is St. Bartholomew’s Day?”
twenty-five
LATE THAT NIGHT, Mattos walked amid the crowd of people forming immense lines near the Catete Palace to see the dead president; he was looking for a bar open at that hour to drink a glass of milk. But they were all closed.
Many people were crying and shouting; one group was singing the national anthem off-key and with faulty lyrics.
Using his police ID, Mattos entered the palace. He wanted to see the dead Getúlio again.
The bier with Vargas’s body was placed in the room of the head of the military cabinet. Mattos stood beside the casket; from there he could see the tranquil face of the dead man. Across from the inspector, on the other side of the coffin, were the president’s children and brother. Alzira, her face puffy, held back tears.
Mattos’s stomach ached fiercely, but he didn’t want to leave there to see if some bar had opened its doors.
Since 5:30 of the previous afternoon — when the body had come down from the third floor to lie in state, and the people filling the salon had received him by singing the national anthem — the mourners filed endlessly past the casket; they placed small slips of paper bearing requests in the dead man’s hand, plucked the flowers to take away as remembrance, prayed. Many fainted and were carried outside. One man, his hand on the coffin, managed to make a short speech before he was escorted away: “The people will avenge Getúlio!” Apolonio Salles, the secretary of agriculture, placed a rosary between Vargas’s waxy fingers.
At 8:30 a.m., Lutero Vargas, João Goulart, and General Caiado de Castro closed the coffin.
Soon afterward, the bier was removed and placed on a cart, at the side entrance to the palace, on Rua Silveira Martins.
Mattos joined the multitude that, shouting Getúlio’s name and waving white handkerchiefs, pushed the cart along Flamengo beach. By the time it arrived at the Glória gardens, the cortege had increased to thousands of people.