to make her a big star in Europe. The whole neighbourhood knew, and her old schoolfriends asked: ‘How did it happen?’
‘I was just lucky.’
They wanted to know if such things were always happening in Rio de Janeiro, because they had seen similar scenarios in TV soaps. Maria would not be pinned down, wanting to place a high value on her personal experience and thus convince her friends that she was someone special.
She and the man went to her house where he handed round leaflets, with Brasil spelled with a ‘z’, and the contract, while Maria explained that she had an agent now and intended following a career as an actress. Her mother, seeing the diminutive bikinis worn by the girls in the photos that the foreigner was showing her, immediately gave them back and preferred to ask no questions; all that mattered was that her daughter should be happy and rich, or unhappy, but at least rich.
‘What’s his name?’
‘Roger.’
‘Rogério! I had a cousin called Rogério!’
The man smiled and clapped, and they all realised that he hadn’t understood a word. Maria’s father said:
‘He’s about the same age as me.’
Her mother told him not to interfere with their daughter’s happiness. Since all seamstresses talk a great deal to their customers and acquire a great deal of knowledge about marriage and love, her advice to Maria was this:
‘My dear, it’s better to be unhappy with a rich man than happy with a poor man, and over there you’ll have far more chance of becoming an unhappy rich woman. Besides, if it doesn’t work out, you can just get on the bus and come home.’
Maria might be a girl from the backlands, but she was more intelligent than her mother or her future husband imagined, and she said, simply to be provocative:
‘Mama, there isn’t a bus from Europe to Brazil. Besides, I want a career as a performer, I’m not looking for marriage.’
Her mother gave her a look of near despair.
‘If you can go there, you can always come back. Being a performer, an actress, is fine for a young woman, but it only lasts as long as your looks, and they start to fade when you’re about thirty. So make the most of things now. Find someone who’s honest and loving, and marry him. Love isn’t that important. I didn’t love your father at first, but money buys everything, even true love. And look at your father, he’s not even rich!’
It was bad advice from a friend, but good advice from a mother. Forty-eight hours later, Maria was back in Rio, though not without first having made a visit, alone, to her old place of work in order to hand in her resignation and to hear the owner of the shop say:
‘Yes, I’d heard that a big French impresario wanted to take you off to Paris. I can’t stop you going in pursuit of your happiness, but I want you to know something before you leave.’
He took a medal on a chain out of his pocket.
‘It’s the Miraculous Medal of Our Lady of the Graces. She has a church in Paris, so go there and pray for her protection. Look, there are some words engraved around the Virgin.’
Maria read: ‘Hail Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who turn to you. Amen.’
‘Remember to say those words at least once a day. And…’
He hesitated, but it was getting late.
‘…if one day you come back, I’ll be waiting for you. I missed my chance to tell you something very simple: I love you. It may be too late now, but I wanted you to know.’
Missed chances. She had learned very early on what that meant. ‘I love you’, though, were three words she had often heard during her twenty-two years, and it seemed to her that they were now completely devoid of meaning, because they had never turned into anything serious or deep, never translated into a lasting relationship. Maria thanked him for his words, noted them in her memory (one never knows what life may have in store for us, and it’s always good to know where the emergency exit is), gave him a chaste kiss on the cheek and left without so much as a backward glance.
They returned to Rio, and within a day she had her passport (Brazil had really changed, Roger said, using a few words in Portuguese and a lot of gestures, which Maria took to mean ‘before it used to take ages’). With the help of Maílson, the security officer-cum-interpreter-cum-agent, any other important purchases were made (clothes, shoes, make-up, everything that a woman like her could want). On the eve of their departure for Europe, they went to a nightclub, and when Roger saw her dance, he felt pleased with his choice; he was clearly in the presence of a future great star of Cabaret Cologny, this lovely dark girl with her pale eyes and hair as black as the wing of the graúna (the Brazilian bird often evoked by local authors to describe black hair). The work permit from the Swiss consulate was ready, so they packed their bags and, the following day, they were flying to the land of chocolate, clocks and cheese, with Maria secretly planning to make this man fall in love with her – after all, he wasn’t old, ugly or poor. What more could she want?
She arrived feeling exhausted and, while still in the airport, her heart contracted with fear: she realised that she was completely dependent on the man at her side – she had no knowledge of the country, the language or the cold. Roger’s behaviour changed as the hours passed; he no longer made any attempt to be pleasant, and although he had never tried to kiss her or to fondle her breasts, the look in his eyes grew more and more distant. He installed her in a small hotel, introducing her to another young Brazilian woman, a sad creature called Vivian, who would be in charge of preparing her for the work.
Vivian looked her coolly up and down, without the least show of sympathy for someone who had clearly never been abroad before. Instead of asking her how she was feeling, she got straight down to business.
‘Don’t delude yourself. He flies off to Brazil whenever one of his dancers gets married, something which seems to be happening more and more frequently. He knows what you want, and I assume you do too: you’re probably looking for one of three things – adventure, money or a husband.’
How did she know? Was everyone looking for the same thing? Or could Vivian read other people’s thoughts?
‘All the girls here are looking for one of those three things,’ Vivian went on, and Maria was convinced that she really could read her thoughts. ‘As for adventure, it’s too cold to do anything and, besides, you won’t earn enough to go off travelling. And as for money, once the cost of room and board has been deducted, you’ll have to work for nearly a whole year just to pay for your flight back home.’
‘But…’
‘I know, that isn’t what you agreed. But the truth is that, like everyone else, you forgot to ask. If you had been more careful, if you had read the contract you signed, you would know exactly what you were getting yourself into, because the Swiss don’t lie, they just rely on silence to help them.’
Maria felt the ground shifting beneath her.
‘And as for a husband, every time a girl gets married, that represents a great financial loss for Roger, so we’re forbidden to talk to the customers. If your interests lie in that direction, you’ll have to run
