When they finished eating, Octaviano stood up like a child being punished with no dessert—he, who would have wanted Tirso to be denied his dessert. He tied a kerchief around his neck and left as he always did. Tirso followed him. He began to write his name on the statues with red chalk, and Octaviano thought he would go mad with shame. Tirso was evicting him, stealing his tranquility, murdering him by undermining him, and Tirso was as impervious and independent as only major criminals can be. When he went back to bed and tried to close the door to his room, he felt a giant’s strength holding on to the door. He made futile attempts to close it, until suddenly, unexpectedly, it came down on him, almost crushing his arm. A few minutes later the door opened again. There was no need to see who had opened the door with such force, it could only be Tirso—and this scene, like others, happened again and again every night. The first few times he tried to gather all his strength in his eyes to stare him down, but Tirso’s eyes were as hard as metal doors. He had eyes that must have never cried, and only by killing him could one hurt him just a little.

At the far end of the lumberyard was a large shed where the desperate man took refuge one night. Tirso, when he saw that the statue salesman wasn’t there, left in disappointment. But he kept galloping every night. He began to notice that his actions were as invisible as his body; he never found the names he had written on the statues the night before, which is why he took out his penknife to carve them, as on trees, to make sure it worked.

One loud night when the dogs were barking at the moon, the statue salesman retired earlier than usual, taking shelter in his shed. Tirso didn’t want to get off the lion, but finally he began to trot in crazy circles and semicircles, dragging rusty iron chains noisily against the ground. After a while the statue salesman heard nothing more; silence and a sense of well-being took over the night. He was going to come out of the shed when he heard the key turning twice, locking him in.

Very little breathable air was left, perhaps enough for a few more hours of life: he heard all the statues he had sold and hadn’t sold throughout his life marching in single file. A cemetery angel approached, pointing the way to heaven. He had a name written on his forehead. He was afraid: he took off the kerchief and slowly erased the name in the darkness of the shed where the last drops of air and light were fading.

Saint’s Day

It was her saint’s day, and it was a day like any other. A waltz flowed in waves from the house next door; it wasn’t the radio, it must have been someone practicing the piano, following the notes of a tune sprinkled with indecisions. And every day it was that same waltz, never learned, that peeked through the shutters and filtered in through the walls of the neighboring house. That music reached back to the day of her birth and played every year on her saint’s day, always devoid of gifts. A month ago she had been invited to Fulgencia’s birthday party, and there were enough presents to fill a toy store window. Celinita wore new booties but longed for her bare feet and the days when they ran around like two doves on flower-patterned tiles—two doves afraid of slipping on the waxed floors.