After the collision, Paulo and his friends had not only failed to go to Claudinho’s aid but also fled the scene of the accident. They took the car back to Carlinhos’s house and, with the city still in darkness, went to the home of another of the boys who had been in the car, Maurício. On their way there, they realized that news of the accident was spreading. Terrified by rumours that the boy had died, they made a pact of silence: no one would ever utter a word about the incident. They all went their separate ways. In order not to arouse suspicion, when Paulo arrived at his uncle’s home, he ‘cynically’ (his own word) acted as though nothing had happened. However, half an hour later came the moment of truth: Maurício and Aurélio, the fourth member of the group, had been named by a witness and arrested, and while in police custody they revealed the identity of the driver.
Paulo’s uncle took him to a room and told him of the gravity of the situation: ‘The boy’s life is hanging by a thread. We must just hope that he survives, because if he dies, things will get very ugly for you. Your parents have been told everything and they’re on their way from Rio to talk to the police and the magistrate. Meanwhile, you’re not leaving the house. You’re safe here.’
His uncle knew what the tailor was like and was concerned that he might do something crazy. His fears were confirmed that night. After visiting his dying son in hospital, Lauro appeared at the gates of the house where Paulo was hiding, along with two unpleasant-looking men. A revolver stuck in his belt, Lauro wagged a finger at José and said: ‘Dr Araripe, we don’t know yet whether Claudinho will live or die. As long as that’s the case, your nephew is not to leave Araruama. And if my son dies, Paulo will die too, because I’ll come here personally and kill him.’
Late that night, Lygia and Pedro arrived in Araruama and, even before going to see their son, they went to the magistrate’s house, who told them that the ‘perpetrator’ could only leave the city with his permission. His parents’ arrival did nothing to alleviate Paulo’s despair and he spent a sleepless night. Lying in bed, he wrote in a tremulous hand:
This is the longest day of my life. I feel terrible, not knowing how the child is. But the worst thing was when we arrived at Maurício’s house, after the accident, and everyone was saying that the boy was dead. I wanted to run away, to disappear. I can’t think of anything but you, Márcia. I’m going to be charged with driving without a licence. And if the child’s condition worsens, I’ll be tried and might be sent to prison.
This was hell on earth. On Shrove Tuesday news of the two incidents – the accident and the tailor’s threat – had spread rapidly, drawing inquisitive crowds to Rua Oscar Clark, eager to witness the climax to the drama. Early on, Lygia and Pedro decided to visit Claudinho’s parents to offer their apologies and to get news of the boy’s condition, for Claudinho was still unconscious. Lygia put together a large basket of fruit for the boy’s mother to take to him. As she and her husband were approaching the house, which was on the same side of the road as José’s, Lauro ordered them to turn back, because he was not prepared to talk. He repeated his threat – ‘Your son will only leave this town if my son survives’ – and he said that Lygia could take the fruit back: ‘No one here is dying of hunger. I don’t want charity, I want my son back.’
Paulo left his room only to ask for news of the boy. He recorded each piece of information in his notebook:
They went to the hospital this morning. The boy’s temperature is going down, let’s hope that his father withdraws his complaint to the police.
[…] The whole town knows everything and I can’t leave the house because they’re out looking for me. I heard that yesterday, at the dance, there was a detective waiting for me at the door.
[…] The boy’s temperature has gone up again.
[…] It looks as though I might be arrested at any moment, because someone told the police I’m over eighteen. Everything depends on the boy.
Claudinho’s temperature rose and fell several times. He regained consciousness on the Wednesday morning, two days after the accident, but it wasn’t until late that night that the agony ended, when the doctors reported that he was out of danger and would be discharged in a few days.
Early on the Thursday, Pedro Coelho took his son to make a statement to the magistrate, who had him sign an agreement to pay all the medical and hospital expenses. The boy survived and suffered no long-term consequences, apart from an enormous scar on his abdomen that would remain with him for life. Destiny, however, appears to have decided that his meeting with death was to be on Carnival Monday, for thirty-four years later, on 15 February 1999 – another Carnival Monday – Luís Cláudio, by this time a businessman, and married with two daughters, was dragged from his house in Araruama by two masked men with guns, who were apparently in the pay of a group of hijackers of transport lorries. He was viciously tortured, then tied up, soaked in petrol, set alight and burned to death.
Claudinho’s survival in 1965 did nothing to improve Pedro Coelho’s mood. When Paulo returned to Rio, he learned that, as a punishment for having caused the accident and for having lied, he would not be allowed out at night for a month. Added to this, his allowance, which he had regained after leaving his job on the dredger in December, was once again to be stopped until he had repaid his father the 100,000 cruzeiros (some US$1,750 in today’s terms) for the hospital fees.
Two months after the beginning of term, the first report from Andrews College revived the hopes of the Coelho family: although he had done badly in some subjects, their son had received such good marks in Portuguese, philosophy and chemistry that his average had risen to 6.1, which may have been only so-so, but was certainly an improvement for someone who hadn’t even been able to manage a 5. Everyone was hopeful: but in his second report, his average dropped to 4.6 and in the third he managed only 2.5. The days when the reports arrived became days of retribution for Paulo. Pedro Coelho would rant and rave, take away more of Paulo’s privileges and threaten even worse punishments. Paulo, however, appeared indifferent to all of this. ‘I’m fed up with school,’ he would tell his friends. ‘I’ll leave as soon as I can.’
He channelled all the energy and enthusiasm he failed to put into his schoolwork into the idea of becoming a writer. Unwilling to accept the fact that he was not yet a famous author, and convinced of his own talent, he had decided that his problem could be summed up in four words: a lack of publicity. At the beginning of 1965, he would take long walks with his friend Eduardo Jardim along Copacabana beach, during which he would ponder what he called ‘the problem of establishing myself as a recognized writer’.
His argument was a simple one: with the world becoming more and more materialistic (whether through communism or capitalism, it made no difference), the natural tendency was for the arts to disappear and, with them, literature. Only publicity could save them from a cultural Armageddon. His main preoccupation was with the written word, as he frequently explained to Jardim. Since it wasn’t as widely disseminated as music, literature was failing to find fertile ground among the young. ‘If someone doesn’t enthuse this generation with a love of literature,’ he would tell his friend, ‘it won’t be around much longer.’ To conclude, he revealed the secret of success: ‘That’s why publicity is going to be the main element in my literary programme. And I’m going to control it. I’m going to use publicity to force the public to read and judge what I write. That way my books will sell more, but, more importantly, I’ll arouse people’s curiosity about my ideas and theories.’ In spite of Jardim’s look of astonishment when he heard this, Paulo continued with his plans for the final phase of his conquest of the reading public: ‘Then, like Balzac, I shall write articles under a pseudonym both attacking and defending my work, but that’s a different matter.’
Jardim did not appear to agree with anything he was hearing: ‘You’re thinking like a businessman, Paulo. Remember, publicity is an artificial thing