This is the power of the heavens. It is, besides, an oft-repeated story. The men are in the hut, exhausted, still clothed, some are sleeping, others can’t sleep at all, and through the gaps in the cane walls there enters a never-before-seen light, the morning is still far off, so it’s not the morning light, one of the men goes outside and stands frozen with fear, because the whole sky is a shower of stars, falling like lanterns, and the earth is lit more brightly than by any moonlight. Everyone comes out to look, some are really terrified, and the stars fall silently, the world is going to end, or perhaps begin at last. One man, with a reputation as a sage, says, When the stars are restless, so is the earth. They are standing close together, looking up, their heads right back, and they receive on their grubby faces the luminous dust from the falling stars, an incomparable rain that leaves the earth with a different and much greater thirst. And a rather dim laborer who passed through there the following day swore on his mother’s life that those celestial signs were announcing that in a ruined shepherd’s hut, three leagues from there, a child had been born of another mother, probably not a virgin, a child who couldn’t be said to be Jesus Christ only because he had been baptized with another name. No one believed him, and that general skepticism aided Father Agamedes, who, on the following Sunday in a church unusually full and abuzz with excitement, mocked the fools who believe that Jesus will return to the earth just like that, I, your priest, am here to tell you what he would say, I have my holy orders and instructions and am mandated by the Holy Roman Catholic Apostolic Church, do you hear, because if you can’t, I’ll open another ear on the top of your head.
He was quite right, that wise man who predicted that if the stars are restless, then the earth will be too, the Abyssinians were the first to confirm this, immediately followed by the Spaniards, and later by half the world. Here, the earth is moving according to the old customs. Saturday comes and brings with it the market, but so poorly stocked that it’s hard to know how one will fill next week’s lunch sacks, it makes you shudder to think of it. A woman went to the grocer and said, Can I owe you for this week’s groceries, we’ve had a terrible week because of the bad weather. Or she would say the same thing in different words, but starting in the same way, Can I owe you for this week’s groceries, there was no work this week and my husband hasn’t earned a thing. Or perhaps, staring shamefaced at the counter, like someone with not a penny more to her name, Sir, my husband will earn more come the summer, then he’ll sort things out with you and pay what he owes. And the grocer, thumping his account book with his fist, would reply, Don’t come to me with that old story, I’ve heard it before, the summer comes and goes and the dog will still be barking, because debts are like dogs, a funny idea, I wonder who first thought of it, this is a people who come up with these sharp, urgent images, they imagine the account book of the grocer or the baker, the large numbers written in pencil, this much and this much, yes, it’s like a small, soft puppy that can grow into a beast with wolf’s teeth, last year’s still unpaid debt, Pay up or I’ll cancel your credit, But my children are hungry, and some are ill, my husband has no work, where can we find money, Too bad, you get nothing without paying for it. Everywhere the dogs are barking, we can hear them at the doors, they pursue those who can’t pay, bite their shins, bite their souls, and the grocer comes out into the street and says loudly enough for everyone to hear, Tell your husband, and we know the rest. Some people peer out of their doors to see who is being shamed, a poor person’s malice, today it’s me, tomorrow it could be you, you can’t really blame them.
When a man complains, it’s because something must be hurting him. We are complaining about this nameless cruelty, and it’s a pity it has no name, What will become of us today, this is all the money we have, and we’re weeks behind in paying, the grocer won’t give us any more credit, and every time I go there, he threatens to cut it off completely, not a penny more, Go and try again, the husband says, but that’s just for the sake of saying something, he doesn’t really have a stone for a heart, No, not on my own, I can’t face going through that door again, only if you come with me, Then we’ll both go, but men are not much good at these things, their job is to earn the money and the wife’s to make it stretch, besides, women are used to it, they protest, swear, bargain, cry, are capable even of falling to the floor, give the poor woman a drink of water, she’s fainted, but a man goes in there and he’s shaking, because he should be earning and he isn’t, because he should be keeping his family in food and he isn’t, How can I do what I said I’d do when I married, Father Agamedes, tell me that. We reach the shop, and other customers are there, some are leaving, some are going in, not all are there simply to buy, and we keep getting pushed to the back of the queue, standing here in this corner next to a sack of beans, let’s hope he doesn’t think we’re going to steal it. Finally, the other customers
