The History of the Siege of Lisbon

Raimundo Silva is once more alone, for several seconds he was left wondering what to make of the amiable tone with which Senhora Maria took her leave, a disconcerting woman who turns up in a bad mood one minute and is all solicitous the next, but The History of the Siege of Lisbon brought him back to another reality, to the building of the tower destined to break, once and for all, the resistance of the Moors, and knowing that the existence of a nation depends on this, we cannot interrupt our work, although Raimundo Silva would have preferred to have Maria Sara here than to have to cope with operations about which he knows nothing, the dressing of joists, the trimming of wooden planks, the moulding of pegs, the twining of ropes, all these materials contributing to the construction of a tower which is not that of Babel, this present one will rise no higher than the battlements on the wall, and as for tongues, Dom Afonso Henriques has no intention of repeating their multiplicity, but of uprooting this one, both in the figurative and allegorical sense as in the literal and physical sense. When Maria Sara returns tomorrow afternoon as she promised on departing, to stay the night and the night after that, as well as the day in between which is a Sunday, he hopes to have made some progress with his writing, because there are other matters demanding his attention, and time has changed its name and is now called urgency, Calm down, Maria Sara will tell him, you can't fit more things into a year than a minute just because the one is a minute and the other a year, it's not the size of the glass that counts, but rather what each of us manages to put into it, even if it should overflow and be lost. Just as this tower will also be lost.

The construction took more than a week. From morning until night, knight Heinrich only lived for his project, and, even when resting in his tent, he would wake up imagining that one of the supporting beams was not strong enough, and it got to the point where he would get up in the middle of the night to check the solidity of certain joints and the tension of the ropes. He was such an admirable and compassionate man that when the work was at its peak, he was not above lending a hand if one of the soldiers happened to be showing signs of fatigue. On one of these occasions he found Mogueime at his back, for Mogueime, too, was helping to build the tower, and it so happened that Ouroana had come by to see how the work was progressing and naturally to keep her eyes on her lord and master, the only man for whom she should have any eyes, but this did not prevent her from noticing how the tall soldier behind kept staring at her, she had noticed him from the very first day, staring at her wherever they met, there in the encampment of Monte de'São Fransisco, then in the Royal encampment, and now in this narrow stretch of land, so narrow that it was something of a miracle that all the troops could gather there without tripping over each other's feet, for example, this man and woman, who have done nothing more than look at each other. Mogueime could see a handspan away the nape of the German's broad neck, covered by a mane of sandy-coloured hair matted with dust and sweat, to kill him amidst all the confusion would not be difficult thus giving Ouroana her freedom, but bringing her no closer than she is at present. The temptations of violent death, intensifying one's remorse for having indulged them, should be taken to one's confessor, but to discover into the bargain that the friar also coveted the victim's woman, even if only a concubine, was more than he could face. In fury and rage he made a brusque gesture and struck the German on the back causing him to turn round, but calm and showing no surprise, such incidents were common in gatherings involving so much effort, and his steadfast look was enough to quell Mogueime's wrath, he was incapable of hating a man who had never done him any harm, just because he coveted his woman.