All The Names - Jose Saramago

esponse, and she was perfectly right, because what I'd said was just for effect really, one of those
essentially empty expressions that appear to be deep but have nothing inside. We were silent for about
two minutes, she was looking at me reproachfully, as if I had made her a solemn promise which I had
broken at the last moment. I didn't know where to put myself, I just wanted to say goodnight and leave, but
that would have been both stupid and rude, a lack of consideration which the poor lady certainly didn't
deserve, it's just not in my nature to do something like that, that's the way I was brought up, it's true I can't
remember ever having gone to tea at someone's house when I was small, but it comes to the same thing. I
was thinking that it would be best to take up her idea and begin searching again, only from the opposite
direction this time, that is, from death into life, when she said, Take no notice, I get these ridiculous ideas
now and then, when you're old and realise that time is running out, you start imagining that you have the
cure for all the ills of the world in your hand, and get frustrated because no one pays you any attention,
I've never had ideas like that, You will, in time, you're still very young, Me, young, I'm nearly fifty-one,
You're in the prime of life, Don't make fun of me, You only become wise after seventy, and then it's no use
to you anyway, not to you or anyone else. Since I still have a long way to go before I reach that age, I
didn't know whether to agree or not, so I thought it best to say nothing. It was time I said goodbye, so I
said, I won't trouble you any more, thank you for all your patience and kindness, and forgive me, it was
that mad idea of mine that got me into this, it's all absolutely absurd, there you were, sitting contentedly in
your home, and along I come with my lies, my deceitful stories, I blush to think of some of the questions I
asked you, Contrary to what you've just said, I wasn't sitting here contentedly, I was lonely, being able to
tell you some of the sad things that have happened in my life was like getting rid of a great weight, Well, if
that's how you feel, then I'm glad, It is and I don't want you to leave without asking you something, Ask
anything you like, as long as it's within my power to help, You're the only person who can help, what I
have to ask you is very simple, come and see me now and then, when you remember or feel like visiting,
even if it's not to talk about my goddaughter, Why I'd be delighted to come and visit you, There'll always
be a cup of coffee or tea waiting for you, That would be reason enough to come, but there are plenty of
others, Thank you and, look, don't take any notice of that idea of mine, it's as mad as yours was, I'll think
about it. I kissed her hand as I had on the first occasion, but then something unexpected happened, she kept
hold of my hand and raised it to her lips. No woman had ever done that to me, I felt something like a
shock in my soul, a tremor in my heart, and even now, now that it's morning, and many hours have passed,
while I finish writing up the events of the day in my notebook, I look at my right hand and it seems
different to me, although I can't quite say how, it must be an internal rather than an external matter. Senhor
José stopped writing, put down his pen, put the unknown woman's school record cards carefully away in
the notebook, he had, in fact, left them on top of the table, and went and hid them away again between the
mattress and the base of the bed. Then he heated up the stew left over from lunch and sat down to eat.
There was an almost absolute silence, you could scarcely hear the noise made by the few cars still out
and about in the city. What you could hear most clearly was a muffled sound that rose and fell, like a
distant bellows, but Senhor José was used to that, it was the Central Registry breathing. Senhor José went
to bed, but he wasn't sleepy. He remembered the events of the day, the unpleasant surprise of seeing his
boss go into the Central Registry out of hours, and his troubling conversation with the lady in the groundfloor
apartment, which he had set down in his notebook, faithful as to the meaning, less so as regards
form, which is both understandable and forgivable, since memory, which is very sensitive and hates to be
found lacking, tends to fill in any gaps with its own spurious creations of reality, but more or less in line
with the facts of which it has only a vague recollection, like what remains after the passing of a shadow. It
seemed to Senhor José that he had still not reached a logical conclusion about what had happened, that he
still had to make a decision, otherwise his last words to the lady in the ground-floor apartment, I'll think
about it, would be no more than a vain promise, of the sort that is always cropping up in conversation and
that no one expects will be kept. Senhor José was desperate to get to sleep when, suddenly, from unknown