Who He Is
A fifteen-year-old from Minas Gerais, son of an important farmer and client of Miranda, who comes to the Court to finish his preparatory studies for the Medical Academy and lodges at the townhouse. Of shy and delicate manner, he is the student whom Botelho catches with Dona Estela, who goes to the overgrown lot with the washerwoman Leocádia, and who reappears years later, in his fourth year of medicine, riding in a carriage with Pombinha.
Trajectory
He arrives from Minas recommended to Miranda, who lodges him because his father brings good profits to the house. He seems careful in his studies, not a spendthrift, and Estela, who takes charge of his allowance, shows an almost motherly fondness for him (chapter II).
Botelho catches him with Estela in the backyard and, instead of denouncing him, advises him and promises to protect his dealings with the lady (chapter II).
o estudante, fugindo-lhe das mãos, afastou-se com um gesto de repugnância e desprezo, the student, slipping from his hands, moved away with a gesture of repugnance and contempt.
In the morning, he goes out with Miranda to the store and to classes (chapter III). At the father's shout from the window, he appears for a moment, good-looking (chapter VII).
E via-se de relance Dona Estela, com a sua palidez de flor meia fanada, e Zulmira, lívida, um ar de fastio a fazê-la feia, e o Henriquinho, cada vez mais bonito, e o velho Botelho, indiferente, a olhar para toda esta porcaria do mundo com o profundo desprezo dos que já não esperam nada dos outros, nem de si próprios., And one glimpsed Dona Estela, with her pallor of a half-withered flower, and Zulmira, livid, with an air of boredom that made her ugly, and little Henrique, ever more handsome, and the old Botelho, indifferent, looking at all this filth of the world with the deep contempt of those who no longer expect anything from others, nor from themselves.
He makes signs to Leocádia while she washes, and on the day of the white rabbit, by gesture, proposes the condition of the gift (chapter VIII).
Este, sempre com seu sistema de conversar por mímica, declarou com um gesto qual era a condição da dádiva., This one, always with his system of conversing by mime, declared with a gesture what the condition of the gift was.
Bruno, the husband, catches them, and Henrique escapes without being recognized (chapter VIII). He flirts with Pombinha from the window on the morning of the title party (chapter X). Years later, in his fourth year of medicine, he drives past with her, who is covered in jewels (chapter XXIII).
Dentro do carro ia Pombinha, coberta de joias, ao lado de Henrique; ambos muito alegres, em pândega. O estudante, agora no seu quarto ano de medicina, vivia à solta com outros da mesma idade e pagava ao Rio de Janeiro o seu tributo de rapazola rico., Inside the carriage rode Pombinha, covered in jewels, beside Henrique; both very cheerful, on a spree. The student, now in his fourth year of medicine, lived loose with others of his age and paid to Rio de Janeiro his tribute as a wealthy young man.
Themes Embodied
The standard themes that run through him are Sexuality and Social Class. He is the young outsider whom the townhouse lodges for commercial reasons and who comes to live loose in the city.
Henrique is more acted upon than acting. In each scene someone guides him: Estela, who looks after what he spends, Botelho, who advises him, Leocádia, who holds him responsible for her son, and his own gesture is the mime with which he proposes the gift and the recoil with which he rejects the old man.
The text presents him as shy, with a girl's delicacy, and shows him making signs to the washerwoman and fleeing from her husband; it does not judge him, only exposes him. His repugnance before Botelho can be read as the limit of someone who accepts what is offered but refuses to be treated as an accomplice, or as the fright of a young man before a man who has seen too much.
Relationships
- Dona Estela: the woman who looks after his allowance and with whom Botelho catches him.
- Botelho: the old man who advises him and whom he rejects.
- Miranda: the trader who lodges him and whose wife looks after his allowance.
- Pombinha: the tenement girl he flirts with from the window and with whom he rides in a carriage.