All The Names - Jose Saramago

unsticking them, fortunately he's a real professional, the bag he carries with him is a veritable first-aid kit,
he has a cure for almost everything. When he saw the wounds, the look on his face was that of someone
unconvinced by Senhor José's explanation, that business about a fall, his experience of grazes and bruises
even led him to remark with unconscious perspicacity, Anyone would think you'd been rubbing your knees
against a wall, I told you. I fell, Did you tell your boss about this, It's nothing to do with work, a person
can have a fall without telling his superiors, Unless the nurse they've called in to give you an injection has
to do some extra work, Which I didn't ask for, No, that's true you didn't, but if tomorrow you come down
with a serious infection because of these wounds, then who's going to get blamed for neglect and lack of
professionalism, me, besides, the boss likes to know everything, that's his way of pretending that he
doesn't care about anything, All right, I'll tell him tomorrow, I would advise you most strongly to do so,
that way the report will be confirmed, What report, Mine, I can't see that a few simple grazes can be
significant enough to be mentioned in a report, Even the simplest graze is significant, Once mine have
healed they'll leave nothing but a few small scars that will disappear in time, Ah, yes, wounds heal over
on the body, but in the report they always stay open, they neither close up nor disappear, I don't
understand, How long have you been working at the Central Registry, Going on twenty-six years, How
many Registrars have you had up until now, Including this one, three, And you've never noticed anything,
Noticed what, You've never twigged, I don't know what you mean, Is it or is it not true that the Registrars
have very little to do, It's true, everyone says so, Then it's time you knew that, in the many empty hours
they enjoy while their staff are working, their main occupation is collecting information about their
subordinates, all kinds of information, they've been doing it for as long as the Central Registry has
existed, one after the other, from the very beginning. Senhor José shuddered, which did not pass unnoticed
by the nurse, You shuddered, he said, Yes, I did, Just so that you have a clearer idea of what I'm telling
you, even that shudder must appear in my report, But it won't, No, it won't, I know why, Tell me, Because
then you would have to say that the shudder occurred when you were telling me that the bosses collect
information about the staff at the Central Registry and the boss would be bound to want to know why you
had that conversation with me and also how a nurse came to know about such a confidential matter, so
confidential that in twenty-five years of working in the Central Registry I have never heard anything about
it, There's a lot of the confidant in nurses, although rather less so than with doctors, Are you insinuating
that the Registrar confides in you, I'm not saying that he does, I'm not even insinuating that he should, I
simply take orders, So then you just have to follow them, No, you're wrong, I have to do a great deal more
than just follow them, I have to interpret them, Why, Because there's usually a difference between what he
tells me to do and what he actually wants, He sent you here so that you could give me an injection, That's
how it would appear, And what did you see in this case, apart from what it appears to be, You can't
imagine the number of things you can discover by looking at someone's wounds, You only saw them by
chance, You can never discount chance, it's a great help, What did you discover in my wounds then, That
you grazed them on a wall, I fell, So you said, Information like that, always supposing that it's true,
wouldn't be of much help to the Registrar, It doesn't matter to me whether it is or not, I just write the
reports, He already knows about the flu, But not about the wounds on your knees, He knows about the
damp stain on the floor too, But not about the shudder, If you've nothing further to do here, I'd be grateful if
you'd leave, I'm tired, I need to sleep, You must eat first, don't forget, I hope your supper hasn't gone
completely cold after all this talking You don't need much food when you're just lying in bed, But you.
need some, Was it the Registrar who told you to bring me some food, Do you know anyone else who might
have done it, Yes, if she knew where I lived, Who, An elderly lady who lives in a ground-floor apartment
Wounds on the knees a sudden unexplained shudder an old lady in a ground-floor apartment, Yes ground
floor right, This would be the most important report I've ever written in my life if I wrote it You're not
going to write it though, Yes I am, but only to say that I gave you an injection, Thank you for cleaning my
wounds, Of all the things I was taught, that's what I'm best at. After the nurse had left, Senhor José