Eleven Minutes Read Online Free PDF

worried, and so, since Maria kept insisting on the need to talk to her family, he decided
     to buy two plane tickets and go with her to the place where she had been born - as long as it could all be resolved in fortyeight hours and they could still travel to Europe the following week, as agreed. With a smile here and a smile there, she was beginning to understand that this was all in the documents she had signed and that, when it came to seductions, feelings and contracts, one should never play around.
    It was a surprise and a source of pride to the small town to see its lovely daughter Maria arrive accompanied by a
     foreigner who wanted to make her a big star in Europe. The whole neighbourhood knew, and her old schoolfriends asked:
    'How did it happen?'
    'I was just lucky.'
    They wanted to know if such things were always happening
     in Rio de Janeiro, because they had seen similar scenarios in
     TV soaps. Maria would not be pinned down, wanting to place a high value on her personal experience and thus convince her friends that she was someone special.
    She and the man went to her house where he handed round leaflets, with Brasil spelled with a 'z', and the contract, while Maria explained that she had an agent now and intended following a career as an actress. Her mother, seeing the diminutive bikinis worn by the girls in the photos that the foreigner was showing her, immediately gave them back and preferred to ask no questions; all that mattered was that her daughter should be happy and rich, or unhappy, but at least rich.
    'What's his name?'
    'Roger.'
    'Rogerio! I had a cousin called Rogerio!'
    The man smiled and clapped, and they all realised that he hadn't understood a word. Maria's father said:
    'He's about the same age as me.'
    Her mother told him not to interfere with their daughter's happiness. Since all seamstresses talk a great deal to their customers and acquire a great deal of knowledge about
     marriage and love, her advice to Maria was this:
    'My dear, it's better to be unhappy with a rich man than happy with a poor man, and over there you'll have far more chance of becoming an unhappy rich woman. Besides, if it
     doesn't work out, you can just get on the bus and come home.'
    Maria might be a girl from the backlands, but she was more intelligent than her mother or her future husband imagined, and she said, simply to be provocative:
    'Mama, there isn't a bus from Europe to Brazil. Besides, I
     want a career as a performer, I'm not looking for marriage.' Her mother gave her a look of near despair.
    'If you can go there, you can always come back. Being a performer, an actress, is fine for a young woman, but it only lasts as long as your looks, and they start to fade when
     you're about thirty. So make the most of things now. Find someone who's honest and loving, and marry him. Love isn't
     that important. I didn't love your father at first, but money buys everything, even true love. And look at your father, he's not even rich!'
    It was bad advice from a friend, but good advice from a mother. Forty-eight hours later, Maria was back in Rio, though not without first having made a visit, alone, to her
     old place of work in order to hand in her resignation and to hear the owner of the shop say:
    'Yes, I'd heard that a big French impresario wanted to
     take you off to Paris. I can't stop you going in pursuit of
     your happiness, but I want you to know something before you leave.'
    He took a medal on a chain out of his pocket.
    'It's the Miraculous Medal of Our Lady of the Graces. She has a church in Paris, so go there and pray for her
     protection. Look, there are some words engraved around the Virgin.'
    Maria read: 'Hail Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who turn to you. Amen.'
    'Remember to say those words at least once a day. And...' He hesitated, but it was getting late.
    '... if one day you come back, I'll be waiting for you. I missed my chance to tell you something very simple: I love you. It may be too late