With the death of cousin Lili, Aunt Maria was even more careful in her
attentions to me. She put an end to my days of roaming. Instead, I spent the
days learning my letters with her. My cousins she regarded as a lost cause.
I spent hours on end sitting in the sewing room with my reading book in
my hand. All the while, I could hear the sound of life outside, a life that was
forbidden to me. It was like being in prison, a Calvary hard to bear. I was
only interested in what I could hear outside in the yard. I didn't learn
anything at all.
“I've never seen such an ignorant little boy," old Sinházinha said harshly.
Aunt Maria did not give up though and was determined to overcome my lack of
interest.
But I was more interested in the conversation of the women as they made
the clothes. While they worked they talked non-stop. They always talked about
other plantations where they had worked and told stories about their families.
"At Santarem all they eat is
dried cod, breakfast, dinner and tea."
Another one said that the master of Poço-Fondo had more than twenty wives. How could I
concentrate on reading and writing when I was surrounded by such interesting
tittle-tattle. For all my Aunt Maria's heroic efforts she could not possibly
win. What I really wanted was the same freedom as my cousins, especially now
the birds were flying down our way again, looking for water to quench their
thirst. With a drought on the coast they were heading for the wetter country.
They flew overhead like a dark cloud, looking for a pond which might provide
them with something to drink. They would cover the white sands at the side of
the river. We would lie in wait, sticks in our hands, ready for the massacre.
The poor creatures were so intent on quenching their thirst that they paid us
no heed. We would beat them to death. It was as if they no longer had wings.
Such was their thirst they had lost their instinct for self-preservation.
Years later, in college, when reading a history of the early church, I
read about the birds of Britain who would fly south from those islands in
winter, it brought to mind the poor little birds we so happily massacred.
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