272
Ramon
J.
Sender
TALE OF THE HOT LAND
When the tree of fire began to bloom, the man took
his
horse and went off to the neighboring market place. He had often
seen the tree bloom near the door of his house.
Each morning the tree of fire opened its blossoms, and precisely
at that moment the man went out, mounted
his
horse, and said,
"Giddap, old boy."
He pricked the horse's
flank
with his spur, and the horse went
off at a lazy trot.
The man's complexion was sallow, his skin dry and parched like
the tobacco leaves sold in the square of the near-by town. When he
returned from the market place at sundown, he found himself hesi–
tating. At that indecisive hour everything became blurred and he
didn't know which road to take from among the seven which led
by different ways to his house. .
Six years ago he had had to give up one of these roads because
when he drew near
his
house, the sun having set, he saw an animal,
the color of the earth, which in the twilight seemed to be a coyote.
But he could never tell whether it was a coyote or a dog. When
the animal came up beside him and looked at him submissively,
his horse whinnied, refusing to go any farther. Finally the horse
veered off the road and galloped away. Then the man heard cries
far away, like an injured child's, and among those cries a voice
which said:
0, how the day falls,
0, how fast the night comes.
He didn't know whether
it
was a human being or a coyote, and
even if
it
w.as a coyote, he couldn't tell whether it was the same
animal he had just seen or some other one. At that hour everything
was blurred.
