Nowhere People

Catarina arrived before him, sat down at one of the tables in the ice cream parlour on the other side of Barreto Viana, strategically positioned behind the tower of potted Swiss cheese plants that adorn the outside, she asked for the menu, put her video camera down on the table and waited. Here he comes, from Praça Maurício Cardoso. She starts filming. He stops outside the hotel. She keeps filming from a distance for a few minutes longer. Time to get up and meet him. She crosses the street and, still filming, walks over to him. ‘Hi.’ He’s singing (and he doesn’t stop to greet her). ‘Can I film for a bit? This is a great camera, the sound quality is nearly perfect. I want to have some record.’ He keeps singing, she goes on filming. Never crossing the boundaries of the public pavement, he walks close to hotel entrance. The take there lasts a minute. Eyes squeezed in between the fixed slits in the direction of the lens. She cuts to his whole body, which is now maybe some four metres away. Two security guards in black jackets enter the frame, approach the masked man, try to talk to him, but he does not interrupt his singing. The taller of the security guards waves his arms in annoyance, he’s telling him to keep moving, to leave, get out of there. Catarina shouts: ‘Hey, you can’t force him to leave, the pavement’s public space, didn’t you know?’ The guard turns to the camera and orders Catarina to switch it off. She cuts to the back of the man in costume. The security guard is yelling that the police will be here in a few minutes, that you can’t be filming the front of the hotel without permission and that they are embarrassing their clientele. Catarina tells the guard he’s acting out his role as the Wicked Witch of the West beautifully. The guard threatens to take her camera, but a group of people who have got involved in the situation stop him. (What a lovely new opportunity has just presented itself.) Catarina does not stop filming. The masked man sings more forcefully, louder than he has up till then. The police arrive, but (very much as a consequence of Catarina justifying the beauty of the peaceful performance that is taking place there) there’s already a larger group supporting this pair of performance artists. The policemen tell them not to dawdle too long, they might get in the way of the traffic. Catarina keeps filming. The police leave. The security guards keep their hands off, but standing a little under two metres away from the man in the mask, they realise there is not much they can do. The masked man seems to be in a trance. She doesn’t disturb him for nearly half an hour, she doesn’t turn the camera off for a single second. But the time comes for her to say: ‘Man, this isn’t the right place for you, there are better places for you to be doing your ritual. Let’s get out of here.’ He does not move. ‘I’m staying,’ he says. ‘You really are crazy … These guys are going to end up giving you a beating,’ and she takes his arm. ‘Let go,’ he warns her. She obeys. ‘What do you suggest?’ asks Catarina. He doesn’t reply, but she can see that he has been worn out by the whole thing. ‘We can go to my apartment. I live with my great-aunt, but this is the day she goes out with her friends and she only gets back in the evening. There’s the maid, but she’s on my side.’ Not letting go. ‘Come on now, forget all this, for today, at least.’ He hesitates. ‘Come on, do it for me.’ She gets behind him and gives him a push. He starts walking, sluggishly, with dislocated steps. And they have already been walking for more than fifteen minutes. ‘Why have we been zigzagging round all these blocks?’ he asks. ‘Oh, you’ve discovered my plan at last,’ and she laughs. ‘You really don’t know when to stop,’ he says. ‘To be honest, I thought you’d complain a lot sooner.’ He stops. ‘I was waiting till I was sure … I can’t see very well in the mask.’ She gives him an affectionate glance. ‘So tell me what you think now? Have we already gone past the building? Are we far? Near?’ He turns his back and starts walking. ‘Right … Back this way, we’re nearly there. The building’s on this street.’ He stops and turns to face Catarina. She’s smiling and pointing at a building with a grey and blue frontage, many stories high, a hundred and fifty metres from where they are standing. ‘The plan was to get you to break a sweat so you’d have to take that mask off.’ She walks over and takes his arm. A police car passes them slowly and the two policemen look at them closely. There’s no denying it: he has been gaining some notoriety. ‘Seriously, though. Can I ask you something? Would you take off those clothes, and that mask?’ He answers, ‘That’s not going to happen.’ She grimaces. ‘Have you got some kind of deformity?’ she asks, concerned. ‘What kind of deformity were you imagining?’ he asks. ‘On your face?’ She adopts a scared expression. But he knows she isn’t the type to be scared. ‘Perhaps,’ he provokes her. They reach the building. ‘Shall we?’ The gate opens (the man on the front desk has already seen her). They go in, she with her arms folded, cool. ‘Hi, senhor Carlos,’ she greets him with a wave and heads for the lifts. She presses the button, they wait. ‘Do you like heights?’ she asks. The lift arrives. She presses the button for the fifteenth floor, then reaches out her right arm to touch the surface of the mask, scratching it lightly with the nails of her middle and index fingers. He doesn’t wait for her to ask: ‘Balsa wood.’ ‘A custom-made life-vest,’ she teases. They step out of the lift, walk over to 1502, Catarina rings the doorbell. The maid answers it, a girl of eighteen at most. ‘Thank you, Fátima.’ Catarina kisses the girl on the cheek. ‘This is a friend of mine. You don’t need to worry about serving anything because he has made a promise to one of the saints and he isn’t going to drink, eat or take off the mask until Easter next year. You can make a green tea for me, leave it on the coffee table and get on with your own things without worrying about us … ok?’ The maid excuses herself and leaves. ‘Want to listen to some music?’ Catarina asks. ‘No. I just want to understand why we’re here,’ he says, looking through the windowpane at the privileged view of the inside of the DMAE water treatment plant. ‘And I’d like to believe that the fact we’re here started with a good coincidence,’ she says, animated. ‘A coincidence? I see … ’ he replies. ‘I try not to be afraid of good things,’ and she positions herself in front of him (between him and the window). ‘And how do you know I’m a good thing?’ he says. ‘I’m in a hurry to get to know you … And because I’m in this hurry, that’s how I know. And when I know, I know right away.’ She is touching the mask. ‘And what if I’m violent, the kind of guy who might, say, cruelly take advantage of a situation like this?’ She makes an angry face. ‘Like in that Prince song?’ He doesn’t reply. ‘In that case I’d use one of the dozens of protections that right now are scattered strategically about the house. All of them within reach, all of them very well hidden. Besides which, as you can see, I’m a strong woman … ’ She shows off the strength in her biceps. He steps to one side and keeps looking out of the window. ‘You like taking risks, Catarina, don’t you? And completely gratuitously.’ She shakes her head. ‘I don’t think the fact I want to get to know you is gratuitous at all.’ The two of them stand in silence until the maid comes back in with a pot of tea and a cup. ‘Thanks, negra,’ says Catarina, looking him straight in the eye. ‘I’m going to my room to get changed, to put on something lighter so I can dance a bit here in the living room … When I come back, will you do that chant for me?’ He sighs. ‘I will, then I’ll go … ’ She leaves the room, but comes back at once. ‘And do you mind if I get the camera to do some filming?’ she asks. ‘No,’ comes his reply. ‘Great. I was going to say make yourself comfortable, like you could possibly make yourself comfortable wearing that thing.’