It was not possible for Esteban to continue talking, nor for Fabián and Santa to continue listening. Unconsciously, they took each other's hands, and the three of them leaned against the wall, to which Santa pressed the bare skin of her back, left uncovered by her evening gown, and Fabián and Esteban inclined their robust, black-clad shoulders. The three of them wept: the two men, serenely, without handkerchiefs, allowing their large tears to roll slowly down their cheeks into their beards; Santa, like a woman suffering intensely, wracked by sobs, with a great profusion of tears that, having saturated her lace handkerchief, she wiped from her face with the quilted lining of her splendid silk jacket. One of her elegant admirers appeared at the door between the bar and the courtyard, wondering what had become of Santa, but after contemplating the scene from a distance, he quietly returned to the table. The drunk embracing the tree began to vomit noisily as the orchestra played another danzón, the dining rooms resounded with shouts and laughter, and the fountain continued to sputter in the center of the garden.

Esteban was the first to recover and, noticing that Santa was holding his hand, he withdrew it and obliged Fabián to do the same. Santa understood, and raised her hands to cover her face without ceasing to cry. Fresh from contemplating his recent loss, Esteban's thoughts had turned again to Santa, to what she had become, to what her luxurious attire made so plain and public. He remembered the sad end of old Agustina, who died disconsolate because her daughter was not at her side to comfort her during her agony. The memories revived Esteban's anger, and aware that certain onlookers had detected something unusual and were trying to discover the nature of their conversation, he turned to Santa and spoke quickly, hoarsely, with knitted brow:

“Mother, poor thing, did not curse you. She called for you. Understand? She called for you and told us that, if we saw you, we should say that she had forgiven everything … hear? Everything! And when she was dying and gave us her blessing, she asked God to protect you, too, just as much as the two of us who were there kneeling at her side … So now we've told you, and we'll go. But if our mother did not curse you, Santa, we do! Hear? Don't ever look for us or even think about us ever again. As far as you're concerned, we're dead, too … and may God help you … Come on, Fabián, let's go!”

And the two implacable brothers walked out of the establishment, solemn, erect, vengeful, without looking back at Santa, who found no words with which to defend herself but felt the impulse to follow them and implore them not to curse her, to feel at least, if not affection, then pity, a little bit of pity …

Without caring what her wealthy friends might think, Santa went out into the street, but she did not see her brothers. The great urban whirlpool had swallowed them up. And just as a few minutes before she had felt herself to be a queen, an empress, she now felt like what she really was: a bit of human mud, a clod of earth, pestilent and miserable, gradually disintegrating and dropping dirt as it gets kicked around. But why, dear Lord, does a lump of mud have a heart and a conscience? So miserable did she feel that, gripping the grate of a nearby window, she threw back her head and gazed at the stars in the heavens, the only place that might offer her some comfort …