In chapter XIII, Bentinho sees Capitu scratching the backyard wall with a nail. She leans against it to hide it and, when the boy notices the marks, she runs and tries to erase what she wrote. In chapter XIV, he leaps and reads, before she scrapes the wall, the two names carved with a nail and fused into a single word: BENTOCAPITOLINA.
It is the first writing of Capitu's in the book and works as a declaration made by her, alone, before any word from Bentinho. The two look at each other, and their hands reach out and clasp. The old narrator cuts the scene: "Childhood confessions, you would be worth two or three pages, but I want to be spared." He says they said nothing, that the wall spoke for them.
In the next chapter, when Pádua appears at the back door, Capitu erases the names, scratches out a profile that she says is her father's portrait, and answers for both of them that they were playing siso. The inscription shows, in small form, the book's method: the narrator shows enough and cuts the rest.