276
PARTISAN REVIEW
to be mounted. The rider managed to reach the saddlebow with one
hand, and then to spring into the mount. He went on with the infant
in his arms, but now he was happy and smiling.
The horse went along, rearing and bounding, refusing to go
forward, or going forward by leaps only to back up and stall ob–
stinately. The rider chastised it with his whip. Finally he succeeded
in subduing the horse, and looking at the child who seemed to have
fallen asleep, he thought, "This road withholds inexpressible surprise;
this is undoubtedly the right one." But the twilight lengthened without
falling into night. Although he should have reached home he saw
nothing before him but the deserted road, and here and there in
the slight breeze little whirlwinds of dust strewing the earth.
He spurred
his
horse, which hastened its pace, and looking at
the child, he said, "Would you like to come home with me? Would
you like to live with me?"
The child answered with the voice of a grown-up, the voice
of a person prematurely old, "Yes, but look at my teeth."
Opening
its
mouth,
it
showed
its
teeth, yellow and fierce, like
those of an old sheep dog. The rider threw the child from him, and
the horse reared when it felt the bundle rolling down its haunches.
Rider and horse began to fly toward the west. Behind him the
rider could hear the white heron's laughter, the tapping of the cane,
and the pitiful howl of the coyote. The rising moon wore the blue
rabbit in its face, and the bush behind
him
kept asking, "Where
is
your road?"
The rider thought of the infant's voice, which reminded him of
the voice of the old man whose mouth had passed down to his hand.
Having lost the last road, rider and horse wandered aimlessly there–
after. When the Indians listen attentively at sundown they hear the
sound of the horse's hoofs, always near and always far away.
(Translated from the Spanish
by
Edwin Honig)
