During the week, the enormous plaza surrounding the church was kept relatively clean because there was not much traffic of men and flocks through it. But on Sunday, everyone, even those from the most remote parts of the region, gathered there very early, doubled over beneath the weight of the goods they wanted to sell or exchange. Without caring about the mud or the incessant rain, they spread the merchandise out on the ground and huddled next to it, abandoning the children to their play. As the hours passed, this multitude could be seen shifting itself like a great animal made ungainly by its own size and weight. The men came and went, aimlessly by now, swaying from the alcohol gulped down at the conclusion of an agreement, leaning on their wives who were just as drunk or on small children who fell, dragged down by the strength of their elders. Mud was everywhere. They thrashed around in it in fist-fights, in lewd acts, splashing blood and filth all about them. Asking the guardians of order for help would only add another element to the general unrest, for the guardian came to deliver blows right and left with his staff of authority. And then he demanded a brimming measure of aguardiente in payment, or else he would haul one of them (anyone, whoever happened to be closest at hand) off to jail.

The project of attracting the Indians to religion and transforming them into conscientious and active members of the Church seemed more unfeasible than ever to Padre Manuel. But although this conviction had ascended by now from the mute depths of his being to his brain, where it took shape in words, those words were not set down in the letter the priest wrote to Don Alfonso. An incomprehensible coyness, a sharp jab of pride rejected them and replaced them with others that were vague and routine.

And there was the letter, already folded, more concrete, more real than the events it did not mention; with a weight and a truth to it that the doubts and misgivings of the person who had written it would never be able to achieve. There it was, ready to be sent. The piece of paper would go off, light and easy, while Padre Manuel was condemned to remain in San Juan, wildly striking out around him with a stick, as in the parties of his childhood when, blindfolded, he tried to break the piñata.

“I never hit it,” he thought in sad self-mockery. “It was probably just as well. I’m one of those people who don’t know how to duck away from catastrophes in time. If the piñata had broken, it would have fallen on top of me.”