Dom Casmurro 14.4 · 14.4

The single physical action of the chapter: Bento jumps. Machado gives it one blunt verb, 'Dei um pulo,' and then a race against Capitú's hand, which is already moving to erase what she wrote. The whole erotic charge of the scene is compressed into this contest of speed — he must read before she scrubs the evidence out.

The wall, 'o muro,' is the recurring membrane of these early chapters: it divides the two houses and yet carries their messages, the surface where the neighbour children write to each other. Capitú's instinct to scrape her own words away is pure Capitú — bolder than Bento, quicker to act, and already practised at controlling what others are allowed to see. He leaps to catch what she would hide.

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