His prudence, his foresight—all of it—went to the barren hearts. The news of the imprisoned angel spread so quickly that within a few hours the courtyard was filled with the hustle and bustle of a large bazaar, and the army had to be called in to clear the crowd, otherwise they would have nearly demolished the house. Elisandra's spine seemed to be twisted from sweeping away so much of the rubbish in this bazaar; at last it occurred to her, "Hey, if you put a fence around the courtyard, you could charge five cents for a visit from everyone."
The curious came from far and wide. A traveling circus also arrived, with a flying clown, who buzzed over the crowd several times, but no one paid any attention to him - for his wings were not at all like those of an angel - but rather looked like those of a starry bat. The most unfortunate and infirm in the world came in search of health; there was a poor girl who had been counting the beats of her chest since birth, and who had now exhausted all the numbers she had counted; there was a Portuguese who could never sleep at all, because the noise of the stars only disturbed his sleep; there was a sleepwalker who got up in a dream at night and did all that he had done during the day; and there were many others, who did not have such terrible diseases. Amidst the chaos of the shipwreck that shook the world, Pelaio and Elisenda were happy in their fatigue, for before the week was out they had all their houses in tatters, and
The pilgrim's ashes, waiting outside for their turn to enter, have even gone beyond the horizon.
This angel was the only one who took no part in his own ghastly drama. He spent all his time trying to find some comfort in his borrowed nest - the hellish heat and blazing of the oil lamps or the candles of the liturgy, which were burning all the time in that wire cage, almost made him dizzy. At first they tried to feed him naphthalene, which according to the wisdom of that all-wise neighbor was supposed to be the food of angels. But he refused it, just as he refused the papal feasts, which the penitents had brought to him as a means of atonement; and they could never understand that he ate nothing but eggplant, whether he was an angel or an old man with crooked teeth. But his only supernatural power seemed to be his patience. Especially in the early days, when the chickens pecked at him for the stars that had grown on his wings, and the cripples plucked his feathers to touch their mangled limbs, and even when the kindest people threw stones at him to see what he would look like when he got up and stood up - he remained calm. The only time they managed to provoke him was when they burned his side with the hot iron they used to brand the oxen with - because he lay so still that they thought he was dead. He had woken up in a panic, his Buddha had screamed and blabbered in an incomprehensible, unfamiliar language, his eyes were watering, and he had flapped his wings twice, which had sent up a whirlwind of chicken droppings and moon dust, and had given off a gust of terror that seemed out of this world. Although many had thought his response was not one of anger, but rather of irritation, of pain. And from then on they had become wary of teasing him like that again, because most people understood that his passive indifference was not the rest of a hero at all, but rather the sleep of a great flood.
Padre Gonzaga had kept the crowd at bay by all the clues that the housewives had inspired. He was waiting for the final verdict on the nature of the prisoner. But the letter from Rome showed no urgency. They spent their time wondering whether the prisoner had an umbilical cord, whether his speech had any connection with the ancient language of Sirius, whether a few heads like him could fit on the point of a pin, or whether he was simply a Norwegian with wings on his body. Those insignificant, very brief letters might have continued to circulate until the end of time, had not a fateful event put an end to all the unpleasant perils of Padre Gonzaga.