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Cerveira Lobo and Zeferino left for Braga on Friday morning. They intended to stay in the city until dawn on Saturday. Afterwards, they would continue to Póvoa de Lanhoso. They carried exactly three contos de réis, still undelivered to the impostor. The money was in pounds, divided between the two men's pockets. A servant accompanied them in an old livery trimmed with blue. The servant wore high boots and a leather hat. All three carried blunderbusses fastened to their saddles. They went to rest and dine at the Dois Amigos inn. Cerveira wore a very shiny coat and a cambric cravat. His new boots creaked, and his yellow spurs made a great noise.
A starched shirtfront, a velvet waistcoat and broad trousers completed his outfit. His hat had springs that made its crown jump up. Zeferino said that the hat looked like a stage prop. At four o'clock, the landowner and the mason sat at the common table. Braga already knew that Cerveira Lobo was in the city. He had not left the manor house at Vermoim since 1835. Some cousins visited him, and Legitimist families sent him notes.
Zeferino was tired of so much ceremony and wanted to leave. He called the Sotomaior, Peixota and Meneses ladies older than the cathedral. Cerveira whispered old adventures from his youth in Braga into his ear. He laughed proudly as he exaggerated his stories. When the roast arrived, a lieutenant from the 8th Regiment came in. The lieutenant told a friend that a prisoner had reached the Civil Government. The prisoner came from Póvoa de Lanhoso and claimed to be Dom Miguel. A royalist had seen the real king in Rome three years earlier. According to the lieutenant, that royalist thought the prisoner looked quite like him.
Cerveira stood up in astonishment, and everyone noticed. The officer watched him with ironic curiosity. Every eye turned towards the man with the respectable beard. Cerveira asked whether that prisoner really was Dom Miguel. The lieutenant replied that the man claimed to be the king. He added that the Civil Government would investigate the case. A Latin teacher recalled the three false Dom Sebastiãos. Cerveira looked sideways at him and left with Zeferino. Both men were deeply embarrassed. Cerveira lamented that everything was lost. He said that the king was imprisoned and that Minho was not rising. He wanted to see the prisoner and try to speak to him. He promised to enter Braga with ten thousand men within three days. He also promised to destroy the prison. He made the crown of his hat spring up and went into the street, panting.
Campo de Santa Ana looked like a great fair. The two sides of Braga had gathered there. The loyalist side was rural, wealthy and full of landowners and clergy. The liberal side was smaller and relied on the 8th Infantry Regiment. That group included graduates, officials, small shopkeepers and teachers. They all surrounded Canon Monte Alverne, a very excitable man. Months later, he would command a popular brigade.
Cerveira dominated the crowd with his beard and shining clothes. His spurs struck with a metallic clatter. The crowd made way for him, and the leading royalists surrounded him. They included men from the Vasconcelos, Magalhães, Freire and Cunha families. The narrator called them the centre of that enormous royalist group. Cerveira kept asking his friends whether the prisoner was the king. Some shrugged, while others shook their heads. Cerveira ordered them to believe that it really was him. Manuel de Magalhães privately told Henrique Freire that Cerveira was an idiot. Bernardo de Barros had been a cavalry captain. He told Cerveira that the real king would never be within the crowd's reach. Some fashionable young men came closer to mock Cerveira. One of them wore a tea rose on his blue coat.
Soon afterwards, the crowd surged outside the Civil Government. The soldiers pushed people back with their rifle butts. The escort formed, and the prisoner came out with his head held high. Cerveira stared at him with great anxiety. He thought the man looked alike and almost swore that he was Dom Miguel. At that moment, the major from Vila Verde recognised the prisoner. The major called him a great scoundrel in front of everyone. The crowd asked who that man was. The major replied that he was Veríssimo, a former quartermaster sergeant in his company. He also said that Veríssimo had served with Remexido. The major accused him of fleeing Messines with the guerrillas' pay. Cerveira leant towards Zeferino and asked whether he had heard. Zeferino replied that he was stunned. Cerveira reminded him of the danger to the three contos. Zeferino cursed the Devil to express all his anguish.
Minutes later, Father Rocha took Cerveira aside. He asked whether Cerveira was now convinced. Rocha said that his friend's trust had placed him under a duty. He had saved Cerveira from losing the three contos and from shame. For Rocha, handing the impostor to justice served the real Dom Miguel. He told Cerveira to return home and wait for the right moment. Only then could he draw his sword. Cerveira embraced Rocha and called him an honourable friend. Veríssimo entered Braga prison. At dawn the next day, he was transferred to the Porto Court of Appeal.
The narrative now moves back in time to explain who the prisoner was and how the fraud began. The names he had given at the Civil Government were genuine: Veríssimo Borges Camelo da Mesquita. Veríssimo had been born in 1806 at Alvações do Corgo in the Douro. In 1827, he was studying humanities at Coimbra in preparation for law. In 1828, politics drew him away from study and into violence. In 1829, he left the University and joined the infantry. During the siege of Porto, he was already a sergeant cadet and fought bravely.
He was wounded in one leg and left with a slight limp. He was a handsome man with an oval face and fine eyes. People said that he was the living image of Dom Miguel. After the convention, he returned to Alvações do Corgo. In October 1835, he went to Braga to study theology. There he met Torcato Nunes Elias, a former sergeant in the same regiment. The two men became inseparable and abandoned their studies. In 1836, they joined Remexido's guerrilla force in the Algarve.
The leader welcomed them and appointed them captains. In a letter to his father, Veríssimo presented that choice as a heroic destiny. When the force broke up, Veríssimo and Nunes fled. The narrator treats the accusation about the guerrillas' money with irony. Veríssimo went to Alvações, while Nunes went to São Gens. From Póvoa, Nunes wrote that he lived in poverty and had neither clothes nor work. Veríssimo invited him to Alvações, clothed him and helped him to study. Later, Veríssimo lost everything through gambling.
Nunes then began sharing his small earnings with him. The narrator says that the two friends truly loved one another. He compares them to castaways sharing the same plank of salvation. Later, Veríssimo met Libânia de Covas, a weaver. In 1844, she followed him to Porto. Libânia had already spent fifteen moedas on him and sold her gold. Veríssimo tried teaching, but eventually began training as a dentist. During that training, he met Nunes at the Tivoli, asking for money. Nunes had a wife and two children and wanted to seek his fortune in Brazil.
Veríssimo admitted that he too had no money. He needed twelve thousand réis to buy a dentist's kit. Nunes promised to fetch his wife's gold cord the following day. The cord weighed three moedas. Later, the three of them had supper in Veríssimo's poor home. Libânia declared that she would never leave her Veríssimo. Nunes suggested that all three of them should go to Brazil. Libânia asked where they would find the money. Nunes promised one conto de réis within a month.
Veríssimo mocked him: two bottles had produced that fantasy of one conto. Nunes insisted that he was not drunk and asked to speak. Veríssimo grasped the idea at once and asked whether he would be proclaimed king. He called Dona Maria II his niece and offered her the rights for one conto. He even promised to offer a lower price. Nunes lost patience and wanted to continue the next day. Libânia told Veríssimo to let Nunes speak. Nunes then explained the plan and eventually convinced Veríssimo.
The two men would have to leave for the Alto Minho. Libânia would go to Ramalde to work at Grainha's looms. She would receive food, a bed and twelve vinténs a day. They would sell the furniture to dress Veríssimo respectably. They would buy clean clothes, a hat and a coat, and repair his boots. On Shrove Thursday, Libânia bravely went to Ramalde. Grainha had already offered her honest work, food and clean sheets.
Nunes and Veríssimo travelled together as far as the outskirts of Braga. Nunes turned towards his home in Calvos. On Shrove Saturday, Veríssimo left for Póvoa de Lanhoso.