The Moors Last Sigh

Aurora could hear the tiny click of Epifania’s ruby rosary beads. The young girl, not wishing the matriarch to become aware of her presence, began to back out of the room. Just then, in complete silence, Epifania Menezes da Gama fell sideways and lay still.
    ‘ One day you will killofy my heart .’
    ‘ Patience is a virtue. I’ll just bide-o my time. ’
    How did Aurora approach her fallen grandmother? Did she, like a loving child, run forward, raising a stricken hand to her lips?
    She approached slowly, circling along the walls of the chapel, moving in towards the immobile form in gradual, deliberate steps .
    Did she cry out, beat a gong (there was a gong in the chapel) or in other ways do her level best to sound the alarm?
    She did not .
    Perhaps there was no point in doing so; perhaps it was plain that Epifania was already beyond help: that death had been swift and merciful?
    When Aurora reached Epifania, she saw that the hand that held the rosary was still twitching feebly at the beads; that the old woman’s eyes were open, and met hers with recognition; that the old woman’s lips moved faintly, though no audible word emerged .
    And on seeing her grandmother still alive, did she then act to save her life?
    She paused .
    And, after pausing? Granted, she was young; a certain paralysis can be attributed to youthful panic, and forgiven, but, after pausing, she quickly summoned the household, so that help could be provided … did she not?
    After pausing, she took two steps backwards; and sat down, cross-legged, on the floor; and watched .
    Did she feel no pity, no shame, no fear?
    She was worried, it’s true. If Epifania’s seizure proved to be less than fatal, then her own behaviour would count against her; even her father would be angry. She knew that .
    No more than that?
    She worried about discovery; and so she went and closed the chapel doors .
    Why not go the whole hog, in that case; why not blow out the candles and turn out the electric lights?
    All must be left as Epifania left it .
    This was cold-blooded murder, then. Calculations were being made.
    If murder can be committed by inaction, then yes. If Epifania had suffered so great a blow that she could not have survived, then no. The point is moot .
    Did Epifania die?
    After an hour, her mouth moved one last time; her eyes turned again to her grandchild. Whose ear, placed against dying lips, heard her grandmother’s curse .
    And the murderess? Or, in fairness: the maybe-murderess?
    Left the chapel doors wide open, as she found them; and went back to sleep  …
     … Surely she could not …?
     … and slept, as soundly as a child. And woke up on Christmas morn .

    One hard truth must be spoken: after Epifania died, life increased. Some long-sequestered sprite, of gaiety perhaps, returned to Cabral Island. It was obvious to everyone that the quality of the light had changed, as if some filter had been removed from the air; brightness burst out, like a birth. In the new year the gardeners reported unprecedented levels of growth, along with a marked decline in infestations, and even the least horticultural of eyes could see the great cascades of bougainvillaea, even the least sensitive of noses could smell the newly resplendent growths of jasmine and lily-of-the-valley and orchids and queen-of-the-night. The old house itself seemed to be humming with a new excitement, a new sense of possibility; a certain morbidity had departed from its courts. Even Jawaharlal the bulldog seemed to mellow in this new age.
    Visitors became as frequent as they had been during Francisco’s glory days. Boatloads of young people came over to marvel at Aurora’s Room and to spend the evenings in the surviving Corbusier house, which with the zeal of youth they quickly set to rights; once again there was music on the island, and the latest dance crazes. Even Great-Aunt Sahara, Carmen da Gama, got into the mood, and under the pretext of acting as the young folks’ chaperone she assisted at these gatherings, until at length she was tempted by a handsome youth to cut a pshawing, tut-tutting but surprisingly limber figure on the dance-floor. It turned out Carmen had rhythm, and in the evenings that followed, as Aurora’s young fellows queued up to ask her to dance, it was possible to see the masquerade of antiquity dropping away from Mrs Aires da Gama, to see the stoop straightening and the eyes ceasing to squint and the hangdog expression being replaced by a