In the depths of his soul the Indian believes more in the power of his destiny than in that of any god whatever. He knows that, do what he may, he cannot escape that destiny. When he senses its approach, the Indian comports himself like all human beings: the purely biological instinct of self-preservation drives him to resist by all available means, by whatever methods he imagines can help him, including invocations to the saints—who communicate, as everyone knows, with God. But he understands perfectly that he is like a lost sentinel and that if he opposes his destiny, it is merely to delay its action a little.
When Marcelina, Cándido’s wife, fell suddenly ill and none of the usual remedies proved effective in easing her pains, Cándido felt intuitively that he had reached a decisive moment in his life. Marcelina had a horrible pain in the right side of her belly. She said she felt as if she was swelling up so much that it seemed she was going to burst. The old family midwife declared that her intestines had got themselves into a knot. To untie them she prescribed purges strong enough to empty the belly of an elephant, but they only doubled the sick woman’s pains and wails. Marcelina felt as though her intestines were on fire and about to be torn apart.
The midwife then gave it as her opinion that this was the sign of approaching death, and advised that they send one of the children to Mateo to set him to making a coffin so that poor Marcelina should have a Christian burial. But Cándido was far from satisfied by this solution. He loved his wife and was not disposed to see her taken from him so easily. He decided to take Marcelina on muleback to Jovel to see a real doctor.
He collected every centavo he could find in the house. He counted and recounted the money and convinced himself that his fortune consisted of eighteen pesos. Cándido was not unaware that doctors are like priests and never do anything for nothing. Besides, he knew that Marcelina’s illness was not one of those for which the doctors accepted the usual fee of one peso.
Every step of the mule tore cries of pain from the unhappy woman. When the trail became rougher, Cándido decided to carry his wife on his shoulders and lead the mule by the bridle. But this did not improve matters for Marcelina; on the contrary, it made them worse, for now the weight of her body pressed her belly against her husband’s body, and her sufferings were so atrocious that she begged Cándido to put her back on the mule. Finally she begged her husband to put her down on the road, where she could stretch out to die in peace, for she felt that her end was near.
They remained thus for more than half an hour: she stretched out on her back and he seated by her side at the edge of the road, not knowing which saint to invoke. Every now and then he went to fetch her a few swallows of tepid water from the brook on the other side of the road. At last a group of Indians came along—men, women, and children returning from the market. They were Tsotsils belonging to the same village as Cándido. They all stopped to refresh themselves at the brook.
“Where are you going, Cándido?” one of them asked. “The market stalls were closed quite a while ago.”
“Marcelina is very sick. I think she’s going to die. I wanted to take her to Jovel to see a doctor who can take the knots out of her intestines. But I can’t carry her on my shoulder because she screams, and on the mule’s back she suffers so. She’s already half dead. Now I’m just waiting—because if it happens I’ll be able to put her on the mule and take her back to the house. What a pity—she’s so young and so amiable! She keeps our house so well, does so much work! Furthermore, the children will be left without a mother.”
“No need to give up hope, Cándido,” replied one of the Indians. “Naturally, if Marcelina has to die, she’ll die. But that’s not certain yet. Wait a minute, we’ll give you a hand.” He called his companions together. They talked among themselves for a few moments and then walked back to Cándido. “Look, we’re going to carry her to Jovel. We’ll do it so carefully she won’t know we’re carrying her.”
Cándido thanked them silently with a movement of his head.
The men went a little way into the underbrush, cut branches, and wove and fastened them together, improvising a stretcher on which they placed the sick woman. The women and children meanwhile took charge of the various objects carried by the caravan, which began the return trip to Jovel.
Night was already falling when Marcelina finally reached the house of the doctor, who, after feeling the painful spot, declared: “It’s necessary to operate immediately. I must open the belly to remove part of the intestine that is infected and will bring about her death in less than twelve hours if I don’t operate. How much can you pay me, fellow?”
“Eighteen pesos, my doctor and patron,” Cándido told him.
“But don’t you realize that just the cotton, the alcohol, and the iodoform gauze cost me more than eighteen pesos? Not counting the chloroform, which will cost ten pesos at least.”
“But, for the love of God, my doctor and chief, I can’t let my wife suffer like a dog!”
“Listen, fellow. If God our Lord will pay my back rent, my account for light, my debts to the provision store, the butcher shop, the bakery, and the tailor shop, then, yes, I could operate on your wife for the love of God. But you must know, fellow, that I have more confidence in the silver and in the solid promises you can give me than in the love of God our Lord. He takes care of lots of things, but not of a poor doctor overwhelmed by debts. I got myself into these debts in order to study, and if I have not been able to pay them it’s because here there are many doctors and few sick people with any money.”
“But, my doctor, if you don’t operate on my wife, she’s going to die.”
“And I, fellow, if I operate without charge, I’m going to die of hunger. All I can say to you is that an operation like this costs three hundred pesos. But just to show you that I’m not a wicked man capable of allowing anybody—even the wife of an ignorant Indian—to die, I’ll do something for you. I won’t charge you more than two hundred pesos. It’s a scandalous price, and I run the risk that they’ll throw me out of the association for lowering the price so much. Nevertheless, I’ll do it for only two hundred pesos. But you must bring me the money within three hours at the outside, for otherwise the operation will be useless. I’m not going to tell you pretty stories or perform an operation for love of the art. If I take your money, I’ll give you my work in return and restore your wife’s health. If she doesn’t come out of the operation well, I won’t charge you. That’s the most I can do. You don’t give away your corn, your cotton, or your pigs. Isn’t that true? Then why should you want me to give you my work and my medicines?”
While this conversation was taking place, Marcelina remained stretched out on a straw mat on the floor of the portico. The Indians who had brought her on the stretcher loitered near by, talking in low tones and smoking their cigarettes.
What could they have done? Even by putting together all the money they possessed they could not have raised the two hundred pesos—no, nor even by selling all their sheep. As for Cándido, he knew neither how nor where to come by the sum demanded.
Having fixed the price of the operation and assured himself that nobody else was waiting for him in his consulting room, the doctor picked up his hat, put it on, and went out to the street. He felt the need to assure himself once more that the town’s old houses were still in their usual places and, above all, to learn whether in the last three hours some event worthy of comment in the cantina had occurred. Perhaps Doña Adelina had at last found out that her husband spent every second evening in the house of the amiable Doña Pilar, who had been a widow scarcely four months. The fact that Doña Pilar gladdened herself with Don Pablo, though he was married, was not the most scandalous aspect of the thing. What was deplorable was that she had not waited to do so until at least one year of the mourning she should have observed for her husband’s death had gone by. The whole town was up to date on Don Pablo’s evening visits—except, naturally, Doña Adelina. As sensational events never happened in the town, and as the only thing worth discussing was an occasional robbery, the townspeople were eagerly awaiting the moment when Doña Adelina would become aware that she was neither the preferred nor the only woman with the right and pleasure of consoling herself with Don Pablo for the sadnesses of this poor world. If two men met in the cantina, if two women ran across each other in the market or chatted in front of a door, they came, after a brief consideration of the temperature, to the inevitable question: “Has Doña Adelina found out at last?”
Nobody found anything immoral in the extramarital visits of Don Pablo, because everybody was healthy enough in spirit and normal enough to admit that Doña Pilar was doing nothing more than take advantage of a natural right; and as nobody before Don Pablo had undertaken to console the solitary lady, he was playing the providential role. In the bottom of her heart every married woman of Jovel rejoiced that the place had been taken by someone other than her own husband. The neighbors awaited the scandal, not for love of scandal, but because they wished ardently to be present at the scene that Doña Adelina would feel obliged to stage in order to safeguard her dignity. Nevertheless, there was one black spot. It was very possible that she knew already and was deliberately avoiding scandal. In that case all hope of witnessing a tragicomedy was gone.
Before going to take a stroll through the plaza, the doctor called at the house of Don Luis the pharmacist, his best friend and associate, to wish him good evening. When pharmacist and doctor thoroughly understand one another, business is profitable for both. If on the other hand they are at loggerheads, invalids get fat and live to old age and German manufacturers of pharmaceutical products discharge their workers.
When Cándido saw the doctor leave, he wondered again what he ought to do. He decided to go out to see where the doctor was going. He did not for one moment think of consulting another doctor, as he knew very well that in the matter of fees they were all the same. He had sought out this one because he was the one whom the Indians of the town and the surrounding villages were accustomed to consult. The Indians do not change their medical man except when he has killed one of them. Then they try another until the next death comes, and so on, successively. At the end of a few months they have gone through the whole local membership of the medical profession, and there is nothing else to do but to go back to the first doctor.
The Indians were the preferred patients of Jovel’s doctors because they paid spot cash and were never given credit. At the exact moment when the Indian crossed the threshold of the consulting room, and even before the doctor spoke the slightest word to him, the Indian had to deposit his peso or whatever portion of it corresponded to the special price the doctor usually made him.
Cándido had left Marcelina lying in the portico in the care of his friends. He himself stood immobile in the middle of the street, not knowing which way to go. Obsessed by his wife’s sufferings, he set out instinctively for the nearest drugstore with the idea that the pharmacist could give him some remedy. He nursed the vague hope of being able to buy some beneficent medicine with his eighteen pesos. On seeing Cándido enter, Don Luis asked him: “What do you want, fellow, ammonia or camphor?”
“What good would that be to me? I want something for my wife, who has a terrible bellyache on the right side.”
He explained the situation. When he finished, the pharmacist told him that he had no remedy for a case like that. He was an honest man. From Cándido’s account he understood the illness Marcelina suffered from, and in his opinion only an operation could save her.
“Ask a doctor,” he told Cándido.
At that precise moment the doctor entered the drugstore with the object of hearing from Don Luis what sensational event had occurred during the four hours since they had last seen each other.
“I know this fellow,” the doctor said. “His wife is laid out in the portico of my house. She has appendicitis. I’ve put ice on her belly, but that can’t cure her. If I don’t operate, she’ll die. But how can I operate if this fellow has only eighteen pesos?”
The pharmacist let loose a roar of laughter.
“That’s clear. How could you operate on her at that price? But tell me, fellow, don’t you know anybody who will lend you two hundred pesos to save your wife?”
“Who’s going to lend me two hundred pesos?” replied Cándido in a voice that betrayed neither his despair nor his emotion, a voice so neutral that it seemed to mean: “So it is, and there’s nothing I can do.”
“You could get yourself engaged as a coffee-picker in Soconusco. The hiring boss won’t refuse to lend you two hundred pesos,” suggested the pharmacist.
Cándido shook his head, saying: “No, I don’t want to go to Soconusco. There are Germans there. They own the coffee plantations. They’re crueler than animals in the forest and treat one like a dog. That’s impossible. If I went to work on the coffee plantations I’d kill some German with my machete if I saw him mistreating one of us.”
“In that case, fellow, I don’t see any possibility of helping you, and your wife will die.”
“She’ll die, there’s no doubt, my chief,” declared Cándido in as indifferent a tone as though he were discussing a stranger.
Then, leaning against the door jamb, he passed his hand through his hair and spat out into the street, which was lighted by a few lanterns that blinked sadly here and there.
With his two arms perilously leaning on the showcase and the cigarette traveling from one side of his mouth to the other, the pharmacist also looked toward the street from time to time. It ran into the plaza, and his shop was located on a corner. The big square was shaded by century-old trees with thick foliage. On the west side arose the Municipal Palace; on the north the cathedral; the other two sides were lined by the illuminated windows of the town’s principal stores.
The doctor sat back on the safe. He felt the need of relaxation after the fatigues of a day’s work. Languidly he too placed his elbows on the showcase and put his right foot on a package that had been brought to the shop that morning and had not even been unwrapped.
“How goes the matter of Doña Amalia?” asked the pharmacist.
In reality Don Luis scoffed crazily at the question of that old woman’s health: she had never entrusted him with the smallest prescription. He put the question merely for the sake of saying something. It is a curious fact that the majority of men who know one another find themselves uncomfortable if they have nothing to talk about. That is why they indulge in so many stupidities when they get together that their words are even more empty than the gossipings of women.
“Doña Amalia?” asked the doctor. “To which one do you refer?”
“To the one who has an old cancer of the womb.”
“Well, if we were to go by the scientific laws of medicine and have faith in the prognoses of the best disciples of Aesculapius, Doña Amalia ought to have been under the ground for at least ten years. But there you have her, with as much energy as you and me put together. One has to admit that the people are right when they insist that medical science is no more advanced than it was three thousand years ago. Speaking frankly, that’s what I think.”
The doctor was getting ready to propound other philosophical truths when he was interrupted by the arrival of a man who emerged brusquely from the darkness of the street.
“Ah, Don Gabriel!” exclaimed the doctor. “Where do you come from? Did you come to take a little walk around town?”
Don Gabriel stood still, hesitated a little, and then decided to enter, saying: “Good evening, gentlemen.” Then with a movement of the hand he pushed back the brim of his hat and said: “What a mess! I came in just to cash the lumber camps’ checks, and I find that Don Manuel hasn’t enough cash.”
“Can’t he give you a check on his own bank?” asked the pharmacist.
“Naturally, and he’s willing to. But what I need is hard cash, and that he won’t have for six days. In the meantime I’ll have to wait; that’ll mean wasting too much time.”
To raise Don Gabriel’s morale, Don Luis said: “I’m going to make one of those famous cocktails which only we pharmacists know how to fix, and which have the virtue of making everything come out all right.”
He went into the prescription room, his sanctum, as he called it, where he compounded his pills and mixed the potions ordered by the doctors.
“What’s that fellow waiting for?” asked Don Gabriel.
“His wife has appendicitis and has to have an operation. I have offered to relieve her of a bit of guts for two hundred miserable pesos. If I don’t, her number’s up. But where can this boy get such a sum?” said the doctor.
Don Gabriel immediately seemed to take a deep personal interest in the Indian’s case.
“Don’t you know anybody in the city who would lend you the two hundred pesos?” he asked Cándido.
“No, my chief, nobody,” replied Cándido, underlining his answer with another energetic expectoration. Then he pulled hard on his cigarette and seemed to regard the matter as finally settled.
Don Gabriel was a good Christian and a still better Catholic. He religiously observed the precepts of the Bible and lent his services to his neighbor every time the opportunity occurred. “Listen here, fellow. I’ll lend you the two hundred pesos, and even fifty more, and besides that I’ll give you two bottles of aguardiente so that you can treat the friends who helped you bring your wife here. You’re not going to let them go home without showing them your gratitude, are you?”
Cándido could neither read nor write. He did not give the impression of being either more or less intelligent than the majority of his kind. On the other hand, he possessed one faculty more precious for everyday life than all the sciences. He had the natural gift of discerning what men’s words might conceal and a wide experience of his fellows and, above all, of white men. He knew, without fear of ever making a mistake, that if a white man offered him one peso and he tempted bad fortune by accepting it, he would have to repay at least ten pesos; so he did not have to beat about the bush much before going straight to the point: “If it means working in Soconusco with the Germans, I won’t go. I wouldn’t do that even for five hundred pesos.”
Just then the druggist came out of his sanctum shaking a mysterious beverage in a great tumbler and, blinking his eyes like an enamored crow, said: “Gentlemen, here’s a cocktail you won’t forget for a week, I give you my word. And I wouldn’t give you the recipe for twenty-five pesos. So that you can get some idea how complicated it is, it’s enough for you to know that it contains rosewater and an infinitesimal quantity of benzoin.”
But when Don Gabriel was dealing with a matter of business, not even the most mysterious drink in the world could distract him from the juicy profit he foresaw. A new cocktail is delightful, but a substantial profit comforts the heart.
“To Soconusco with the Germans?” he said in a tone of surprise. “But, fellow, there’s no question of the coffee plantations. Those people don’t know how to pay, and they behave like brutes. They’re always carrying a whip in their hands and landing it on the backs of the poor Indians who die in order to earn a few miserable pennies.”
“You’re right, my chief. But where am I going to get the two hundred pesos if not on the coffee plantations?”
“I’ll be able to get you a job in the lumber camps.”
Don Gabriel calmly rolled a cigarette.
“You are going to find me a guarantor. You’ll surely find one among the friends who carried your wife. Tell me your name and where you live so that I can draw up our contract immediately. As soon as you’ve signed it, I’ll give you the two hundred and fifty pesos without further formalities.”
“You’d do well to accept right away,” the druggist put in. “The doctor has already told you that it’s necessary to relieve your wife of a piece of rotten intestine within two hours. Otherwise by morning you’ll have nothing to do but bury her, and you’ll be a widower.”
“And your children won’t have any mother,” added the doctor, who, as was natural, did not lose sight of his own interests.
Even while Cándido’s brain was undergoing the hard test of weighing the pros and cons of Don Gabriel’s proposition, he did not forget that he was not the only person involved in the situation. The remark made by the doctor had turned his thoughts back to his wife and his children. A means of salvation was being offered him. This means, apparently sent by God and His saints—could he reject it to spare himself an arduous life without thereby committing a great sin? If he refused to sign, he would be allowing the providential help to escape and would be condemning to death the mother of his children. He would be her assassin. But if he accepted, long years of labor awaited him in the lumber camps, far from his wife, his children, and his land. And if, as a consequence of his refusal, his wife died, who would be able to save him? His conscience would give him no peace. Night and day the specter of the dead woman would torment him and overwhelm him with reproaches. In vain he looked for a way out. What would happen to his wife and children when he was away? No, he would not abandon them. He would leave to God the responsibility of his wife’s death.
But Cándido had not counted on the astuteness of Don Gabriel, who had also seen the way by which Cándido could escape and who hastened to block it.
“Who told you that you’d have to abandon your family, fellow?” asked Don Gabriel, raising his eyebrows in surprise. “I never said anything of the sort.”
Cándido stood looking at Don Gabriel, his mouth open, his expression questioning. He did not believe in miracles. Nevertheless, would it not be a miracle to find the means of obtaining the money for the operation and at the same time be able to remain at home with his family? How could it be possible? Evidently Cándido could not understand it quickly; it was too difficult. Furthermore, before he had time to ask any questions, Don Gabriel had got ahead of him, saying: “It’s quite simple, fellow. You’ll take your wife and children with you to the lumber camps.”
Cándido was surprised by this solution, which had not remotely occurred to him. He realized immediately that it would be impossible for him to turn it down, because at one stroke it closed the last exit left him. For a moment he was struck by the idea of claiming that he could not abandon his land because he would lose it forever. But he felt that this argument would carry no weight—Don Gabriel would take care to let him know nobody would want to acquire his land, not even if it were for sale for fifty pesos: it was nothing but stones, and anyone could find a piece just as good whenever he wished merely by paying fifty centavos survey tax.
Furthermore, Don Gabriel did not give him more than one second for reflection, immediately asking his name, that of the place where he lived, and that of the friend he wished to act as his guarantor. He made careful notations in his little book and took off the leather belt that he wore under his shirt, in which, like the merchants, cattlemen, and landowners who travel about, he carried his money.
Don Gabriel slipped fifty silver coins out of the belt, counted them, and put them in a pile on the counter.
“Here you have an advance of fifty pesos. As regards the rest, I’ll arrange with the doctor, to whom I’ll deliver them tomorrow. Do you agree, doctor?”
“Certainly,” said the doctor, and added, addressing the pharmacist: “Don Luis, will you make up this prescription immediately?” handing him a piece of paper on which he had just scribbled some hieroglyphics.
“Of course; in ten minutes you’ll have it at your house. And now, gentlemen, we can at least honor this cocktail on which I have spent so much work and talent.”
“Excellent,” said Don Gabriel, clicking his tongue after he had emptied his glass in one swallow.
“There’s some left,” said Don Luis, filling the glasses a second time.
While the gentlemen were singing the praises of the cocktail and its creator, Cándido was busy placing the fifty pesos in the folds of his red woolen sash. When he had finished, he slipped toward the exit and, without taking leave of anybody, disappeared into the night.
Cándido met his friends in the portico of the doctor’s house. They were huddled together and seemed to be watching over Marcelina, but they maintained so deep a silence that Cándido thought they were asleep, as it was not customary for any group of people from his village to remain silent, looking stupidly at one another. On the contrary, when Indians from the south get together, they talk interminably. They talk late into the night, and when sleep overtakes them, some will wake up every half hour to make remarks about those who are sleeping. On the day following, they will hardly have opened their eyes before they loosen their tongues again. Only when they are on the road, during their work, or in the presence of strangers do these Indians withdraw into an obstinate, ferocious silence that gives the impression that they are mutes.
Cándido, approaching the group, could scarcely make them out in the light cast over the portico by a little oil lamp in one of the windows. He stumbled among the squatting men and became aware that they formed a circle around his wife’s stretched-out form. He realized immediately that something had happened. He sat down beside the nearest Indian, touched him lightly on the shoulder, and asked in a feeble voice: “When did she leave me?”
“About half an hour ago. She woke up and began to complain greatly of the pain. Then she asked: ‘Cándido, my husband, where is he?’ Then she stretched herself out and died.”
The doctor arrived, opened the heavy entrance gate, and shouted in the direction of the Indians: “Bring her into the consulting room. I’m going to operate on her.” And not stopping, he went with long strides into the interior of the house, opening the door and calling out: “Hi! Rodolfa! You cursed sleepy hen! Put six candles in the necks of empty bottles and bring them to me. I’ve got to do an operation. And a bucketful of hot water, too. Hurry! Do you hear?”
The doctor left the door of the consulting room wide open while he lighted a candle fixed in a pewter candlestick from which the enamel had been chipped away on all sides. Against the wall was a small glass cupboard in which could be seen rows of bottles filled with dark liquids and bearing labels marked with skulls. Those small bottles produced an extraordinary effect on his patients, and for that reason he had placed them in the front of the cupboard. Elsewhere in the cabinet could be seen, carefully laid out, his instruments, which seemed to be mostly scissors and pincers for pulling teeth rather than surgical instruments. When they were examined closely, it could be seen that the nickel plating had all disappeared and that many of them were rusty. On a little table half painted white and covered with a piece of oilcloth of doubtful cleanliness, larger instruments were spread out, looking like a blacksmith’s tools. But vague traces of nickel plating among the rust indicated their obscure origin.
The doctor lit a cigarette and went over to the cupboard. From it he took a bottle of considerable size, on the label of which the inscription “Hennessy” could be clearly read. He raised it to the level of the candle flame, looked through it to verify its contents, poured a half-tumblerful into a mug, swallowed it in two gulps, smacked his tongue, and coughed to clear his throat.
“The devil,” he murmured. “I’ll have to buy another tomorrow. This is like hot oil. Unless that sow of a servant is helping herself while she does the cleaning. I’ll stick a label on it marked ‘Poison.’ Then she won’t dare.”
He coughed vigorously and went to the table on which were the scissors, pincers, and blacksmith’s implements and began to rub them with gauze. He was about halfway through this work when he remembered that the sick woman was still stretched out in the portico. He went rapidly toward the door, shouting: “What the devil’s the matter with you? Are you going to bring her in or not?”
Nobody replied. Then he crossed the threshold, went out to the portico, and approached the circle of Indians. The men looked at him without uttering a word. He bent over and let the light from his candle fall on Marcelina’s face. He smacked her cheeks, raised one of her eyelids, and said: “Well, well, it was to be expected.”
His face betrayed a deep disappointment. He felt himself somehow frustrated by this woman. Still hoping to carve up her body, he placed a hand on Marcelina’s breast. Then he quickly withdrew his hand and began vigorously pinching her cheeks. But he could not make one drop of blood flow. Brusquely he asked Cándido: “Why didn’t you come sooner?”
“But, doctor, I arrived on time!” Cándido protested softly.
“To hell with it! Shut your mouth. And you—all of you—take this away from here.”
“With your permission, doctor, we are going to take her home.”
Cándido caressed his wife’s face and covered her naked breasts with his sarape. The other Indians wrapped the body in the straw mat it had been lying on, tied it up like a bale, and placed it on the improvised stretcher. Cándido went toward the gate and showed the way to the others.
They were about to leave when the doctor called to Cándido: “Listen, fellow, are you thinking of leaving without paying your debts?”
Cándido retraced his steps. “I forgot, doctor. Excuse me. How much do I owe you?”
“Five pesos for the first consultation and five for the postmortem examination—that is, for having verified the death.”
“Excuse me, doctor, but you didn’t cure her. You did nothing to ease her pain.”
“Didn’t I examine her carefully and tell you that it was necessary to operate on her?”
“Yes, my chief.”
“Good! You don’t call that work?”
“Certainly, doctor, it was work, but work that served no purpose. As you see, she died in spite of everything.”
“Friend, I’ve enough other things to do without arguing with you. Either you pay me the ten pesos you owe me, or I’ll put you in jail. Is that clear? And your wife’s body won’t leave here until you’ve paid your debts. I’m a reasonable man, and I have the kindest feelings toward the Indians and toward you in particular. Any other doctor would have charged you ten pesos more for having kept your wife in the portico. Don’t overlook that I must have the place where she died cleaned with disinfectant. That’s an order of the health department, of which I am director. And you can be sure that nobody will make me a present of disinfectant.”
The doctor held out his open hand toward Cándido to make him understand that he must not argue further and that the open hand must be filled. Cándido began to unroll his woolen sash. He took out ten pesos, which he deposited one by one in the doctor’s hand. As he was counting the money and thinking of what he had to do to earn a single peso by selling in the market the produce from his miserable patch of land, his friends, bearing the body, passed through the gateway. They would wait for Cándido in the street.
Funeral establishments are open day and night, because the climate demands that a corpse be interred within twelve hours, and sometimes sooner. So Cándido easily found one open. The cheapest coffin was a rectangular wooden case badly painted black. The artisan who had made it received a laughable wage, and he satisfied himself with a few brush-strokes, leaving the natural color of the wood showing through in many places and the bottom not even daubed.
“This coffin costs four pesos,” said the employee.
“Good. I’ll take it.”
“But I’m afraid it’s very small for your wife,” the salesman continued, seeing that Cándido had enough money to buy one costing more.
One of the Indians measured the body and the wooden case with his arms and declared: “The coffin is big enough, Cándido.”
The businessman felt that he was going to lose the opportunity of making a more advantageous sale. Slapping Cándido’s back affectionately, he said: “Listen, fellow, you can’t bury the mother of your children in a coffin as ugly as that. What would the holy Virgin think when she saw her in it? She is quite capable of not letting her enter heaven, and I don’t believe that you’re ready to leave your wife hanging around the gates of paradise in the company of sinners, bandits, and assassins. This box you want to buy is intended for corpses of unknown people found on the roads. Look at this other coffin, how pretty it is. You’re not obliged to buy it, but at least look at it. Don’t you believe that your wife would rest better in it? And I assure you that when the most holy Virgin sees this lovely box, she’ll go up to your wife and take her by the hand to lead her into paradise herself. That’s sure, because she’ll see immediately that the deceased is not a lost sinner but a good Christian who was baptized. I suppose that your wife was baptized?”
“Yes, my chief, when she was a child.”
“Then you can’t bury her in that common coffin. The other box is well made, beautifully painted black outside and white inside; it’s lined with lace paper, fine Chinese paper.”
“How much does it cost?” asked Cándido.
“Twenty pesos, fellow.”
The Indian looked at him in consternation. Whereupon the salesman immediately abandoned his commercial tone and said to him in a voice full of compassion: “It’s hard, my friend, to lose one’s wife. I know that better than anybody, because I’ve been widowed twice, and as I’m being considerate of you, I’ll let you have the coffin for only seventeen pesos. At that price I make nothing. I swear by the most holy Virgin that it cost me sixteen pesos and fifty centavos.”
They began to bargain, and when at last the Indian could lay the body of Marcelina in the bottom of the coffin, it was because he had paid out thirteen pesos. He still had to buy blessed candles and the aguardiente needed if his friends were not to leave with dry throats.