The History of the Siege of Lisbon

DURING THOSE FIRST DAYS after he had thrown away the dyes which for years had concealed the ravages of time, Raimundo Silva, like an ingenuous sower waiting to see the first shoot break through, examined the roots of his hair, day and night, with obsessive interest, morbidly relishing his anticipation of the shock he would almost certainly get once the natural hairs began to appear amongst the dyed ones. But because one's hair, from a certain age onwards, is slow in growing, or because the last dyeing had tinged, or tinted, even the subcutaneous layers, let it be said in passing that all of this is no more than an assumption imposed by the need to explain what is, after all, not very important, Raimundo Silva gradually lost interest in the matter, and now combs his hair without another thought as if he were in the first flush of yiuth, although it is worth noting a certain amount of bad faith in this attitude, a certain falsification of self with oneself, more or less translatable in a phrase that was neither spoken nor thought, Because I can pretend that I cannot see, I do not see, which came to be converted into an apparent conviction, even less clearly expressed, if possible, and irrational, that the last dyeing had been definitive, like some prize conceded by fate in recompense for his courageous renunciation of the world's vanities. Today, however, when he has to deliver to the publisher the novel which he has finally read and prepared for the printers, Raimundo Silva, on entering the bathroom, slowly put his face to the mirror, with cautious fingers he pushed back the tuft of hair on his forehead, and refused to believe what his eyes were seeing, there were the white roots, so white that the contrast in colour seemed to make them whiter still, and they had an unexpected appearance, as if they had sprouted from one day to the next, while the sower had fallen asleep from sheer exhaustion. There and then, Raimundo Silva repented the decision he had taken, that is to say, he did not quite get round to repenting, but thought that he might have postponed it a little longer, he had foolishly chosen the least opportune moment, and he felt so vexed that he wondered whether there might be a bottle which he had forgotten and was still lying around somewhere, with some dye left, at least just for today, tomorrow I'll go back to sticking to my resolution. But he did not start searching, partly because he knew he had thrown out the lot, partly, because he feared, assuming that he found something, that he would have to make another decision, as it was quite possible that he might decide against it and end up playing this game of coming and going for lack of the willpower to refuse to succumb once and for all to the weakness he acknowledges in himself.