fail, I will have lost only the steps I took from there to here and the words I said to him, she replied, Yes, but we'll be in deep trouble if the angel goes and denounces us to the lord, What, more trouble than we're in already, with no way of earning our living, with no food, no roof over our heads and no clothes worthy of the name, how much more trouble could we be in, the lord has already punished us by expelling us from the garden of eden, and I can't imagine anything worse than that, We have no way of knowing what the lord can or cannot do, In that case, we should demand that he explain himself, and the first thing he should tell us is why he did what he did and to what purpose, You're mad, Better mad than fainthearted, Don't you be disrespectful to me, shouted adam angrily, besides, I'm not fainthearted and I'm not afraid, Well, neither am I, so that makes us even, and there's nothing more to be said, Fine, but don't you forget that I'm the one who gives the orders around here, So the lord said, agreed eve with the look of someone who has uttered not a word. When the sun had lost some of its strength, she set off wearing her skirt and with one of the lighter skins draped over her shoulders. She looked, you might say, very proper, although she could do nothing about her bare breasts, which bobbed about as she walked. She couldn't help it, nor did she even give it a thought, after all, there was no one around to be attracted by them, and, at the time, breasts served only for suckling and little more. She was surprised at herself, at how freely and fearlessly she had replied to her husband, without having to choose her words, merely saying what, in her view, the case merited. It was as if there were another woman inside her, quite independent of the lord and of the husband he had given her, a woman, in short, who had decided to make full use of the tongue and the language that the lord had, in a manner of speaking, stuck down her throat. She crossed the stream, enjoying the coolness of the water that seemed to spread through her veins and simultaneously experiencing something that might have been happiness, well, something, at least, that bore a close resemblance to that word. Then she felt a pang of hunger, this was hardly the moment for such positive thoughts. She waded out of the stream and picked a few sour berries which, although they weren't exactly nourishing, did for a while, a very short while, assuage the need to eat. The garden of eden is very close now, you can clearly see the tops of the tallest trees. Eve is walking more slowly than before and not because she's feeling tired. If adam were here, he would laugh at her, Where's all your bravery now, you're really scared. Yes, she was scared, scared of failing, scared that she wouldn't find the right words to persuade the guard, in fact, she felt so discouraged that she found herself muttering, It would be much easier if I were a man. There is the angel, and in his right hand, the flaming sword shines with a malevolent light. Eve tried to cover her breasts and then went over to him. What do you want, asked the angel, I'm hungry, said the woman, There's nothing here for you to eat, But I'm hungry, she insisted, You and your husband were driven out of the garden of eden by the lord and there is no appeal against that sentence, go away, Would you kill me if I tried to go in, asked eve, That's why I was placed here on guard, You didn't answer my question, Those are my orders, To kill me, Yes, And would you obey that order. The angel did not respond. He merely moved his arm, and the flaming sword in his hand hissed like a serpent. That was his reply. Eve took a step nearer. Stop, said the angel, You'll have to kill me, then, because I won't stop, and she took another step, you'll be left guarding an orchard of rotten fruit that no one will want to eat, god's orchard, the lord's orchard, she added. What do you want, asked the angel again, apparently unaware that repeating the question would be interpreted as a sign of weakness, As I said, I'm hungry, Well, I assumed you'd both be far away by now, Where would we go, asked eve, we're in the middle of a strange desert with not a single path or road, where we haven't seen another living soul all the time we've been here, we sleep in a hole, we eat grass, just as the lord promised, and we have diarrhoea, What's diarrhoea, asked the angel, Another word for it is the runs, the vocabulary the lord taught us has a word for everything, having diarrhoea or the runs, if you prefer that term, means that you can't retain the shit you have inside you, What does that mean, Ah, that's the advantage of being an angel, said eve, and smiled. The angel liked that smile. In heaven, people smiled a lot too, but always seraphically and with the slightly embarrassed look of someone apologising for being so contented, if you could call it contentment. Eve had won the dialectic battle, now she just had to win the battle for food. The angel said, All right, I'll bring you some fruit, but don't tell anyone, My lips are sealed, although my husband will have to know, Come back here with him tomorrow, we need to talk. Eve removed the skin from around her shoulders and said, Use this to carry the fruit in. She was naked from the waist up. The sword hissed more loudly as if it had received a sudden influx of energy, the same energy that led the angel to take a step forward, the same that made him raise his left hand and touch the woman's breast. Nothing else happened, nothing else could happen, angels, as long as they are angels, are forbidden any carnal commerce, only fallen angels were free to get together with whoever they wanted or whoever wanted them. Eve smiled and placed her hand on the angel's hand and pressed it gently to her breast. Her body was grimy, her nails were as black as if she had been using them to dig the earth, her hair was like a tangled nest of eels, but she was a woman, the only one. The angel had gone into the garden, where he took his time picking the most nutritious and luscious of fruits, before returning laden down with a goodly burden. Here you are, he said, and eve asked, What's your name, and he replied, My name is azael, Thank you for the fruit, azael, Well, I could hardly let the creatures whom the lord created starve, The lord will be grateful to you, but it's best you don't tell him about this. The angel either appeared not to hear or really didn't hear, occupied as he was in helping eve put the bulging load on her back, meanwhile saying, Come back tomorrow with adam, there are a few things you need to know, We'll be here, she said.
The following day, adam went with his wife to the garden of eden. At her suggestion, they had washed themselves as best they could in the stream, although their best was very little, almost nothing really, because without the aid of soap, water can give only an illusion of cleanliness. They sat down on the ground and discovered that the angel azael wasn't one to beat about the bush, You are not the only human beings on earth, he began, Not the only ones, exclaimed adam, astonished, Please, don't make me repeat myself, Who created those other beings, where are they, They're everywhere, Did the lord create them as he created us, asked eve, That I can't say, and if you ask the same question again, our conversation will end right here, and we will each go our separate ways, I to my job of guarding the garden of eden and you to your cave and your hunger, In that case, we'll be dead in no time, said adam, no one has ever taught me how to do anything, I can't dig or work the land because I have no hoe and no plough, and if I had, I would have to learn how to use them and there's no one in this desert to teach me, we would be better off as the dust we came from, with no will and no desire, You speak like a book, said the angel, and adam felt pleased to have spoken like a book, he who had never studied. Then eve asked, If other human beings already exist, why did the lord make us, As you know, the ways of the lord are mysterious, but, as far as I can make out, you were an experiment, Us, an experiment, exclaimed adam, an experiment to prove what, Since I do not know for certain, I cannot tell you, but the lord must have his reasons for keeping silent on the matter, We aren't a matter, we are two people who don't know how we're going to survive, said eve, Wait, I haven't yet finished, said the angel, Speak then, and please give us some scrap of good news, however insignificant, Not far from here is a road occasionally frequented by caravans of traders travelling back and forth to the markets, and my idea is that you should light a fire that produces a lot of smoke, enough to be seen from a distance, We haven't anything to light it with, said eve, You don't, but I do, What, This burning sword, which will finally be of some use, I just need to apply the tip to some dry thistles and some straw and you'll have a bonfire that can be seen not just by a passing caravan, but even from the moon itself, although you must take care not to let the fire spread, because a bonfire is one thing and a whole desert in flames quite another, it might reach the garden of eden, and then I'd be out of a job, And what if no one comes, asked eve, Oh, they will, they will, don't you worry about that, replied azael, human beings are naturally curious, they'll want to know who lit that fire and why, And then, asked adam, Then it's up to you, I can't do anything more, you simply have to find a way of joining the caravan, just tell them that you'll work for your keep, I'm sure that two pairs of hands in exchange for a dish of lentils would be a good deal for all concerned, both for employer and employee, but when that happens, don't forget to put out the fire, that way I'll know you've gone, and that, adam, will be your chance to learn all the things you don't know. It was an excellent plan, some cherubim are a real boon, and whereas the lord, at least as regards this experiment, cared nothing about the future of his two creations, azael, the angelic guard charged with keeping them out of the garden of eden, welcomed them in christian fashion, gave them food and, above all, equipped them for life with a few precious practical ideas, a true road to salvation for the body and, therefore, the soul. The couple could not thank him enough, eve even shed a few tears when she embraced azael, a display of affection that greatly displeased her husband, and later on, he couldn't help but ask the question that was bursting to be asked, Did you give him something in exchange, What and to whom, asked eve, knowing full well what her husband meant, Who do you think, to him, azael, said adam, carefully omitting the first part of the question, He's an angel, one of the cherubim, replied eve, and felt it unnecessary to say anything more. Some say that this was the day on which the battle of the sexes really began. The first caravan of traders did not appear for three weeks.
