ach lot with the energy of a merchant confident in his wares.
When Benedita’s turn came, silence fell. Not from admiration, but from concern.
She was about six feet tall, maybe more. She had broad shoulders, enormous hands, and her bare feet had left deep imprints on the wooden platform. Her tattered, raw cotton clothes barely covered her angular body, marked by hunger, forced labor, and scars.
Her black hair was shaved bald. Her dark eyes didn’t rest on anyone. They seemed to gaze at an invisible horizon, as if it already existed somewhere else.
The auctioneer announced her name, age, and origin: Benedita, twenty-three years old, from Recôncavo, Bahia. Strong as an ox, but considered untamable. She had already been sent to four different farms. No foreman, it was said, had managed to tame her.
Nobody wanted her.
The prices dropped. Five reis, three reis, two reis, one reis. Still nothing.
Then, a deep voice rose from the back of the square:
“Seven cents.”
Joaquim Lacerda, the man who lives a different life
