The scene takes place in February 1857, in the central square of Vassouras, in the interior of Rio de Janeiro. Vale do Paraíba then lived to the rhythm of coffee, dust, heat and the violence of a system based on slavery.
That morning, men, women and children were displayed on a wooden platform, treated like cattle under the gaze of buyers. The auctioneer, a fat man with a curved mustache and a high-pitched voice, announced each lot with the energy of a merchant sure of his merchandise.
When Benedita’s turn came, silence fell. Not out of admiration, but out of unease.
She was about 1.95m tall, maybe more. His shoulders were broad, his hands immense, his bare feet deeply marked the wood of the platform. His torn raw cotton garment barely covered his angular body, scarred by hunger, forced labor and scarring.
Her black hair was shaved very short. His dark eyes didn’t rest on anyone. They seemed to be staring at an invisible horizon, as if it were already elsewhere.
The auctioneer announced his name, his age and his origin: Benedita, twenty-three years old, from Recôncavo baiano. Strong as an ox, but deemed impossible to control. She had already been sent to four properties. No foreman, it was said, had succeeded in taming it.
Nobody wanted her.
Prices fell. Five reis, three reis, two reis, one reis. Still nothing.
Then a deep voice rose at the back of the square:
“Seven cents. “
Joaquim Lacerda, the man who experiences something else
The voice belonged to Joaquim Lacerda, owner of the quinta de Santo António, an average coffee farm of 320 hectares, with around eighty forced laborers.
Joaquim was a little over fifty years old. His hair was graying, his beard was neat, his clothes simple but clean. He was neither one of the richest nor one of the most powerful. He was a man who survived on a land in debt, calculating every expense, every harvest, every possible loss.
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