good face on a bad business, he dredged up some energy from nowhere and quickened his pace, expecting at any moment to see a house, signs of life, a man mounted on a donkey or a woman carrying a pitcher on her head. He still had to walk a long way though. The old man who finally appeared was on foot and leading two sheep along on a rope. Cain greeted him as warmly as his vocabulary allowed, but the man did not reciprocate. What's that mark on your forehead, he asked. Taken by surprise, cain asked in turn, What mark, That one, said the man, raising his hand to his own head, It's a birthmark, replied cain, You're obviously not a good man, Who told you, how do you know, answered cain unwisely, As the old saying goes, the devil marks those he finds fault with, Oh, I'm no better or worse than anyone else, I'm just looking for work, said cain, trying to lead the conversation in the direction that best suited him, There's no shortage of work around here, what can you do, asked the old man, I'm a farmer, We've got enough farmers, you won't find any of that kind of work, besides, you're on your own, no family, No, I lost mine, How, I just lost them, that's all, In that case, I'll leave you, I don't like the look of you or that mark on your forehead. He was about to move off when cain stopped him, Don't go, at least tell me the name of this place, They call it the land of nod, And what does nod mean, It means the land of fugitives or wanderers, and seeing as how you're here, tell me, what are you fleeing from and why are you a wanderer, Look, I'm not going to tell my life story to someone I happen to meet on the road, a man leading two sheep along by a rope, besides, I don't know you, I owe you no particular respect and am under no obligation to answer your questions, We'll meet again, Who knows, I might not find work here and have to move on, If you can make adobe bricks and build a wall, this is the place for you, Where should I go, then, asked cain, Take the next road on the right, at the bottom is a square, and there you'll find your answer, Goodbye, old man, Goodbye, and may you never be old yourself, What do you mean by that, That the mark on your forehead is no birthmark, that you didn't put it there yourself, and that nothing you have told me is true,
Perhaps my truth is your lie, Perhaps, but doubt is the privilege of those who have lived a long time, that's why you couldn't persuade me to accept as truths what seemed to me more like falsehoods, Who are you, asked cain, Careful, lad, if you ask me who I am, you'll be acknowledging my right to ask you who you are, Nothing will force me to tell you that, You're about to enter this city, you're going to stay here, sooner or later everything will be known, Only if there's no other way and certainly not from my lips, At least tell me your name, My name is abel, said cain.
While the false abel is walking towards the square where, according to the old man, his destiny awaits him, let us attend to the extremely pertinent observation made by a few of our more vigilant and attentive readers, who consider that the dialogue we have just set down would be historically and culturally impossible, that a farmer with little and now no land and an old man with no apparent means of support would never think or speak like that. They are quite right, of course, however, it's not so much a question of them having or not having the ideas and the necessary vocabulary to express those ideas, but of our own capacity to accept, even if only out of simple human empathy and intellectual generosity, that a peasant from the very earliest times and an old man leading two sheep along by a piece of rope, with only a limited knowledge and a language that is still only taking its first tentative steps, were driven by the need to try out ways of expressing premonitions and intuitions apparently beyond their reach. Obviously, they didn't say those actual words, but the doubts, suspicions, perplexities, argumentative advances and retreats were nevertheless there. All we did was put into a modern idiom the twofold and, for us, insoluble mystery of the language and thought of the time. If the result is coherent now, it would have been then, given that we're all of us muleteers travelling down the same road. All of us, both the learned and the ignorant.
There is the square. Calling this place a city was something of an exaggeration. A few higgledy-piggledly earth-built houses, a few children playing some game or other, a few adults moving about like sleepwalkers, a few donkeys that seem to go wherever they wish and not where they're supposed to, no city worthy of the name would recognise itself in the primitive scene before us now, there are no cars or buses, no road signs, no traffic lights, no underpasses, no billboards on the frontages or the roofs of houses, in a word, no modernity, no modern life. They'll get there though, progress, as it will come to be known later on, is inevitable, as inevitable as death. And as life. At the far end of the square, a building is under construction, a kind of rustic two-storey palace, although nothing to compare with the likes of mafra or versailles or buckingham palace, on which dozens of bricklayers and their assistants are labouring, the latter carrying adobe bricks on their backs, the former laying them out in regular lines. Cain knows nothing about building work, advanced or otherwise, but his destiny is waiting for him here, however bitter it may turn out to be, but that's something you only know when it's too late to change and you have no option but to confront it. Like a man. Doing his best to disguise his nervousness and the hunger that was making his legs tremble, he went over to the building site. At first, the workmen, who didn't know him, assumed he was one of those idle individuals who, throughout the ages, have enjoyed watching other people work, but they were quick to realise that he was simply another victim of the crisis, a poor man in search of work and salvation. Almost without cain having to say why he was there, they directed him to the overseer in charge, Talk to him, they said. Cain did as they advised, climbed up to the observer's perch and, after exchanging the usual greetings, explained that he was looking for work. The overseer asked, What can you do, and cain answered, I'm a farmer by trade, but I imagine you could always use an extra pair of hands, Not a pair of hands, no, given that you know nothing about laying bricks, but a pair of feet perhaps, Feet, asked cain, uncomprehending, Yes, a pair of feet to tread the mud, Ah, Wait here, I'll talk to the clerk of works. He was already walking away when he turned his head to ask, What's your name, Abel, answered cain. The overseer was not gone long, You can start work right away, I'll take you to the treading pit, How much will I earn, asked cain, The treaders all earn the same, Yes, but how much, That's not my business, besides, if you want my advice, don't ask, they don't like it, first you have to show what you're worth, in fact, don't ask anything, just wait until they pay you, Well, if you think that's wisest, I'll do as you say, but it doesn't seem fair, It's best not to be impatient here, Who does the city belong to, what's their name, asked cain, What, the name of the city or its owner, Both, The city doesn't yet have a name, some call it one thing and others another, but this area is known as the land of nod, Yes, an old man I met when I arrived told me, Was he an old man leading two sheep by a piece of rope, asked the overseer, Yes, He turns up now and then, but he doesn't live around here, And the owner, who's that, The owner is a woman, and her name is lilith, Doesn't she have a husband, asked cain, Well, I've heard tell his name is noah, but she's in charge of the flock, said the overseer, and then announced, Here's the treading pit. A group of men with their tunics tied in a knot above their knees were trudging round and round on a thick layer of mud, straw and sand, determinedly trampling it down, in the absence of any machine, to make it as homogeneous as possible. It wasn't a job that required much knowledge, just a pair of good, solid legs, and, if possible, a full stomach, which, as we know, was not the case with cain. The overseer said, In you go and just do what the others do, Look, I haven't eaten for three days, and I'm afraid my strength might give out and I'd end up in the mud, said cain, Come with me, But I haven't any money, You can pay later, come with me. They went over to a kind of kiosk on one side of the square, where they sold food. Not wishing to overload the story with unnecessary historical detail, we will not describe the modest menu, whose ingredients, at least in some cases, we would be unable to identify. The food seemed tasty enough, though, and cain tucked into it with a will. Then the overseer asked, What's that mark on your forehead, it doesn't look natural, It may not look natural, but it is, I was born with it, It's as if someone had put it there, That's what the old man with the two sheep said as well, but he was wrong, as are you, If you say so, Yes, I do and I'll repeat it as often as I have to, but I would prefer to be left in peace, after all, if, instead of this mark, I was lame, you wouldn't keep pointing it out to me, You're right, I won't bother you again, You're not bothering me, indeed, I should thank you for all your help, for the job, for this food, which is rapidly setting body and soul to rights, and perhaps for one thing more, What's that, Somewhere to sleep, Oh, that's easy enough, I can get you a mat and there's an inn over there, I'll talk to the owner, You really are a good samaritan, said cain, A samaritan, asked the overseer, intrigued, what's that, You know, I'm not sure, the word just came out, I don't know what it means either, You obviously have more things in your head than one would think to look at you, You mean this filthy tunic, Don't worry, I'll give you a clean one of mine, you can use the one you're wearing to work in, From what I know of the world, there can't be many good men in it and yet I've been lucky enough to meet one of them, Have you finished, asked the overseer somewhat abruptly, as if he disliked compliments, Yes, I can't eat another mouthful, I don't remember ever having eaten so much, Now, to work. They returned to the palace, this time walking past the section that had been built before the wing that was currently under construction, and there, on a balcony, they saw a woman dressed in what must have been the height of fashion at the time, and that woman, who, even from a distance, seemed very beautiful, was staring at them, as if she were looking straight through them, Who's that, asked cain, That's lilith, the owner of the palace and the city, just pray she doesn't take a fancy to you, Why, asked
