It was eight days since the first flash of lightening on the horizon.
Since the first day my grandfather had stood on the porch every night for many
hours watching the flashes of lightening in the hills. And when he was tired of
watching he got the boys to watch for him.
One day, up toward the springs that were the sources of the Paraíba, right on the
horizon, there was a huge electric storm of sheet lightening that lit up the
hills. There, up in the backwoods, it was already winter for sure. From
experience people knew that within the next two weeks the Paraíba would swell and
the first floods would begin.
In the summer the river was dry and you could walk across the river bed
from one side to the other. Here and there on its bed there were pools that had
somehow survived the summer drought. Here people fished, washed their horses
and bathed themselves. They planted sweet potatoes in the river bed and dug
small water holes for the people who came from the bush, who often had walked
for many miles with their jugs carried upon their heads.
The white sand of the river bed was covered in reeds and parsley, and
the umarizeiro trees provided some welcome shade from the mid-day sun. In the
great droughts the poor people lived from the muddy water and what they could
glean from the river bed and its plain. The cattle came down to graze in the
long grass. With the news of lightening up in the headwaters the sweet potatoes
were dug up.
People liked to see the river swell up, the water pouring down and
pushing against the barriers. People talked excitedly of the great flood that
was on its way. They talked about its arrival like you might talk about the
arrival of a real person. The flood had already passed through Guarita. Now it
was on its way to Itabaiana.
The news was passed from mouth to mouth. It was all people could talk
about on the plantation. The canoes were tarred and painted. We all slept with our
heads filled with thoughts of the great flood which would not be long in
coming.
I waited with a fearful anxiety for the flood. In Recife I had seen the
River Capibaribe in flood, carrying with it the debris from upstream, but the
Capibaribe filled and emptied with the tide. The oncoming flood of the Paraíba was something
totally different.
They came to the plantation with the news;
"The stationmaster at Pilar has received a telegram saying that the
flood is already at Itabaiana."
It was coming our way soon. It was going from barrier to barrier. And
one evening a boy came running and shouting;
"The flood's at Seu Lula's plantation!"
Everyone went running to the river bank, the black kids, the white kids,
the plantation workers, my grandfather. They stood on the river bank shouting
and yelling.
"There it is! There's the flood, up there!"
"It's still a long way off," others said.
"No it isn't! Look at the vultures flying up there."
Before long a thread of water snaked its way down the river bed. This was
the head of the flood. And when it passed close by, carrying branches and
brushwood with it, it already covered the width of the river bed.
"There's a lot of water coming. The river's overflowing into the
fields. It's like a dam has burst!"
People were shouting everywhere. And the noise of the water, which was
coming down in waves now, filled our ears. You couldn't see the slightest patch
of sand. Everywhere was flooded. The water was rising up to the barrier. Whole
trees were dragged up by their roots.
"Look! There's a dead ox! Look, there's a saddle! Some of that wood
has been worked."
"Those are beams from the roof of a house that's been pulled
down!"
In the distance the cry of an ox could be heard, and cow bells too. The
noise from the water became so loud that it was impossible to hear those on the
other side of the river. The river bank was battered by a current and the earth
sank into the water.
At nightfall there was a melancholy chorus of goodness knows how many
toads, croaking in sinister fashion, like voices of the damned being sucked by
a whirlpool into the earth.
I wondered where so much muddy water could possibly come from, and so
much wood. It was hard to believe that the rainfall in the hills could produce
such a flood.
When it was nearly time for dinner we left the river bank. At the table
my grandfather told us stories of the flood of '75.
"The river came right up to the buildings. Old Calisto, whilst
trying to save an animal, was swept away by the current. And a slave was lost
when a canoe overturned. The meadows were all under water, and the river left a
whole metre or more of mud.
It was many years since the Paraíba had flooded like
this.
I went to bed with my head full of the day's excitement. In the middle
of the night we were woken up by the noise outside the house. The waters had
continued growing. If they continued like this they would reach the main house
in the morning.
We all went out to see the river. We did not need to go far. The water
had already reached the stables. The orchards were under water. It was a
roaring sea. My grandfather, wrapped up in woollen cape, gave out orders like
the captain of a ship caught in a storm. The danger was at the sugar mill,
where the year's crop was stored, as well as the syrup and the processed sugar.
Nothing could be done, surely. There was no way of stopping the water. And it
was impossible to move to safety such an enormous quantity of sugar.
"We need to send a canoe to the people at Ponte. It's nearer the
river bank. They'll be needing help.
José Ludovina took a canoe over the fields. The
water was everywhere. We sank poles so we could see if the water rose and fell.
At three in the morning the river stopped rising. But on every side you
could hear the dark groaning river. And now and again a crash, as an embankment
collapsed into the water.
I don't know why, but I wanted the river to keep on rising, to go into
every corner with its dirty waters. I wanted to see the furniture floating
around the house. My Aunt Maria and the maids stayed in the chapel in prayer.
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