Free The Mystery of Rio by Alberto Mussa, Alex Ladd Page A

book’s thesis—that the history of a city is the history of its crimes—cannot be proven merely by presenting one case study, I have decided to mix into the larger narrative certain reports of crimes that, in a sense, foreshadow it. They are what I would call “predicate crimes.” I will begin with one that might have been titled
The Birth of the Tragedy.
    In the 1800s, in the coastal region of Gávea Parish (known as Praia Grande do Arpoador), in wetlands crisscrossed by inlets and mangroves, between the sand bank of the lagoon and the Dois Irmãos cliffs, just below the settlement of Pau, there was a hamlet of
caiçaras
—fishermen and shellfish gatherers who inhabited fifty rustic huts, from the time when the gunpowder factory was built on the lands of Rodrigo de Freitas.
    For nearly three centuries they lived rather secludedly, almost lost in time, in a strictly endogamous environment. And though they had regular contact with the townspeople, bartering fish for tools and household instruments, and though they barely spoke their ancient gibberish anymore, they had still managed to preserve their somewhat exotic customs, which often were in conflict with the laws of the Empire.
    Two of those customs are of particular interest: that of providing graves only to those who died of old age and of natural causes, while ingesting the flesh, blood, and ashes of the victims of any kind of accident; and that of submitting women to the control of a particular caste of men: the shark hunters. Saying “hunters” here is not inappropriate, because these animals were caught by hand.
    It was an amazing feat: the
caiçara
who truly coveted a particular woman needed to take a stick with a stiff, razor-sharp tip and swim into the ocean, naked, to wait for an attack. He could take bait (for example, a guinea pig or a baby paca), and bleed it out on the high seas.
    When the shark attacked and bared its teeth, the
caiçara
would jab the sharpened stick perpendicularly into the jaw, locking the shark’s teeth shut and capturing the prey.
    From that moment on, this
caiçara
was entitled to the woman he wanted (if she were available). For a girl, to be chosen was considered the highest honor.
    Men who did not undergo this test would only get a wife if a father, an uncle, or a brother were sufficiently generous. Women obtained in this fashion, in general, were of lower quality.
    That is what happened in 1830 with one of these
caiçaras
, Conhé, who won the virgin Merã, a young, restless, and misty-eyed woman. Life can be funny: Conhé already had a first wife, given to him as a present by an uncle, but it was Merã, and not the first one, who soon became pregnant.
    Conhé exhibited with pride, for nine moons, the necklace and harpoons made of shark’s teeth. Merã did not have much to her name, but she had a beautiful smile.
    The change happened on the day she gave birth: when her water broke, Merã writhed in pain, and the child would not come out. The first wife sat back and watched the ordeal unfold, and when she sensed the outcome, she rushed out laughing and began spreading the news to the neighbors.
    Those
caiçaras
considered any incident that diverged from the natural course of events and that could cause any kind of harm to an individual, especially death, to be demeaning. In a word: they disdained misfortune.
    Thus, anyone who drowned, was murdered, was attacked by predators or poisonous snakes, lost their honor. This is why, if they were fit for consumption, they were eaten—even the ashes of their bones. Therefore, neither Merã nor anyone else in that situation would be considered worthy of saving. And the vengeful first wife ran through the entire village looking for Conhé.
    The shark hunter learned of the disgrace while bartering at the Três Vendas Square with the slaves of architect Grandjean de Montigny, of the French Artistic Mission, who since 1826