FELISBERTO HERNANDEZ
403
which expl a in ed the mirrors. There were three in hi s room , whi ch
loo ked its bes t in the larges t one, by the bed . So tha t was the one he
wa tched , wonderin g for how man y lon g years it had been refl ec ting the
same vaguely Chinese sceneri es . The ga udy red wa llpaper was faded by
now , but, accordin g to the mirror, still showed traces of wha t looked
like ye ll owish bridges with cherry trees sunk in the bOllom o f a lake.
He go t into bed and put out the light, but went on see ing things in the
glow tha t came in from the stree t. H e had the fee lin g he 'd been taken
into the bosom of a poor famil y, where a ll things were fri ends and had
aged toge ther. But the windows were still young and looked out; they
were twins, like Mar y's ma ids , and dressed a like, in clin g in g lace
curta ins and velvet drapes ga thered a t the edges. It a ll gave him a
strangely borrowed sense of wellbein g, as if he were in someone else's
body. The loud sil ence made hi s ears hum and he rea li zed he was
missing the no ise of the machines and tha t he was g lad he'd left it
behind
in
th e black
house.
If
onl y he had Mary
at
his side
now, he'd
be
compl etely happy. As soon as she came back he' d have her spend a
night with him in the h o tel. But then he dozed of[ thinking of the
blonde do ll , and dreamed of a white arm fl oa ting around in a sort o f
dark h aze. A sound of steps in a neighboring room woke him up. H e
go t out of bed, on bare feet, and paced the ru g, but saw a white spot
foll owin g him , and recognized hi s face, refl ec ted in the mirro r over the
fireplace. H e wondered wh y someone didn 't invent a mirror tha t
showed objec ts but no t people; though of course tha t was absurd ; no t
to
menti on the fact th a t a man without an image in the mirro r wo uld
have
to
be dead. He lay down aga in , just as someone turned on a li ght
across the street. The li ght fell on the mirror by the bed; and he thought
of his childhood, and o ther mirro rs he'd known , and fe ll as leep.
VI
Horace now slept in the hotel; and the same pa ttern of events
repeated itself every ni ght. : windows went on across the stree t and the
light fell on his mirrors; or he wo ke up and found the windows as leep.
One ni ght he hea rd cri es and saw fl ames in hi s mirror. At first he
wa tched them as if they were fli ckers on a screen ; but then he rea lized if
they showed in the mirror they must be somewhere, and springin g up
he saw them dancing in one of the rooms across the street, like tin y
dev il s in a puppet show. He jumped o ut of bed, threw o n hi s robe and
put his face to a window. The fl ashes in the g lass made the window
seem as fri g htened as he was. There was a crowd down below-he was
