The War of the End of the World

Returning to the conversation months later between the baron and the journalist, they discuss an attack on a monarchist newspaper in Rio. Whipped into a frenzy by conspiratorial propaganda, a mob burnt down the paper’s offices. The owner was Gentil de Castro, a naïve friend of the baron. After the attack, he was smuggled to the station to escape Rio, but it was late and nearby demonstrators spotted Gentil and shot him. The journalist brings up the dead of Canudos: He estimates the number of fallen to be at between 25,000 and 30,000. He says only seven people survived, including him.

Pajeú struggles not to think about Jurema, as he leads 300 men to draw the soldiers toward A Favela, where an ambush lies in wait. When they return, he thinks, he will ask her name. Observing the advance, he realizes they are taking a longer route than the previous expeditions, because the terrain is flatter. To avoid giving away their position, his men must stand by and watch as one of them is killed by a cavalryman. The soldiers are hauling an enormous cannon, which the jagunços nickname A Matadeira—the Killer. Jurema appears in Pajeú’s dreams that night. In the morning, they meet with another patrol. Swapping news, Pajeú notices a half-Indian boy crying: The jagunço killed by the cavalryman was his father. Keen to avenge him, the boy agrees to Pajeú’s plan: He will let himself be captured and tortured in order to guide the army to A Favela. The groups ambush the soldiers, retreating fast and leaving the boy behind. Hours later they see the result: the column is heading toward A Favela. That night, they meet up with Abbot João to plan the upcoming attack. The plan is put into action the next day: Pajeú’s men attack in order to make the route they are guarding seem impassable, diverting the soldiers toward Abbot João. It works.

Jurema agrees to go with the Sardelinha sisters, wives of the Vilanova brothers, to cook for the men out harassing the advancing soldiers. The Dwarf and the nearsighted journalist follow her. They meet up with the Vilanovas and are soon caught in a battle. The journalist clings to her, as she remembers his helpless terror the last few weeks. “My poor son,” she thinks (404). The situation is grave as ammunition runs low. The women who came to cook begin to run. Jurema follows, thinking they are fleeing, but soon realizes they’re heading toward the battle to see their men for the last time. Falling into a hole with one living and one dead jagunço, Jurema hands him rounds, anticipating that she is about to die. But then it falls silent and the soldiers move away.

The narrative perspective shifts to one of the soldiers, Sergeant Frutuoso Medrado, revealing why they are retreating despite being on the verge of victory: Pajeú’s ambush has surrounded the soldiers coming from Queimadas, and the battalions marching from the north must reroute to help them. They will march through the night. Medrado feels affection for his troops, especially Private Coríntio, with whose wife he is having an affair. He tries to keep their morale up by making jokes. Hours into the forced march, they are ambushed. Medrado is run through with a lance, but still alive. A captain from the baggage train they were sent to rescue weeps that the jagunços have stolen all their supplies, before falling dead. Coríntio appears; instead of helping Medrado, he drives his bayonet into his throat. He knew about the affair after all.

The conversation between the baron and journalist continues. They discuss the impact of the press on public opinion and how the mob in Rio was brought to believe in the conspiracy between England and the monarchists. The journalist discusses his replacement at Gonçalves’s paper, who accompanied the final expedition and wrote of seeing English officers: “The simple fact is he didn’t write what he saw but what he felt and believed” (416). The replacement never mentioned the priests in Canudos, such as Father Joaquim. The baron met him once and recalls his debauched ways. The journalist insists he was a coward, whom the Counselor turned into a brave man, “the most difficult conversion of all” (418). They consider whether the Counselor was in fact sent by God. Another person present in Canudos, whom both men knew from before, was “the filicide of Salvador,” a maidservant who suffocated her son out of fear his crying would lead to her being fired (420). The journalist concludes that Canudos “changed my ideas about history, about Brazil, about men. But above all about myself” (423).

Big João discusses tactics with old Joaquim Macambira, who is anxious about A Matadeira (a cannon dubbed “the killer” in English) destroying the towers of the Temple. They discuss with admiration Abbot João’s plan to pin down the troops at A Favela and send a raiding party to loot the baggage train. On returning to Canudos, they learn that the plan was a success: One hundred head of cattle and even more rifles are in the possession of the defenders. However, A Matadeira begins to bombard Canudos, and they realize they have to neutralize it. Joaquim Macambira and his sons plan to climb the hill and sabotage it. Big João begs Abbot João to accompany them, but he is needed to defend the Counselor. Abbot João and old Macambira argue about the need for him and his sons to disguise themselves in soldiers’ uniforms. The old man refuses for fear he will be “condemned to hell” (435). After the Macambiras have departed, a child guide who helped them climb the hill reports to Big João that, after a firefight, he thinks they were all killed.

The Dwarf helps the nearsighted journalist back to Canudos, where they reunite with Jurema. At the Vilanovas’ storehouse, they help pack ammunition. One night Pajeú returns and asks Jurema to be his wife. The Dwarf is surprised at feeling pity for him; he realizes that until now “his life had been empty of love” (438). The journalist groans, and Pajeú asks if he is Jurema’s husband; she replies he is like her son. Shots ring out and Pajeú leaves without receiving an answer. Jurema admits that she does not want to marry him. A few days later, the Dwarf sees Jurema and the journalist talking with Father Joaquim. He says they will break her refusal slowly, but first she must bring him food in the trenches; “Give him that pleasure” (443). The journalist begs his help to leave; without his glasses he is blind and cannot do it alone. But the priest refuses sadly, advising the journalist to put his faith in God. Later, the Dwarf accompanies Jurema to the trench. They ask Pajeú about A Matadeira: It exploded a few days after the Macambiras were killed. Pajeú is venturing out on another raid; he will be gone several days.

A young army doctor, Teotônio Cavalcanti, is now in charge of the field hospital because his superior has been killed. Since joining the army from medical school, “certain beliefs of his that seemed rock solid have been profoundly undermined” (450). He is depressed by sordid business deals that go against patriotic principles: how petty goods are resold for tremendous sums. Making his rounds, Pires Ferreira calls him to his bedside. He has been blinded and lost both hands. He asks Teotônio to kill him. The doctor tries to persuade him otherwise, but Pires Ferreira is insistent, and eventually he agrees.