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By Root 1086 0

detail men in the warehouse of the Bayer Laboratories, he surprised himself by digging down in his memory in search of a detail, a gesture, a motive for what had happened that would allow him to introduce a variation, to prolong his re-creations of events when he got home that evening. On seeing little wooden figurines and little plastic toy cars all over the living room/dining room floor, the cleaning woman asked him if he was thinking of adopting a child, warning him that, if so, she would charge more. In accordance with the progression outlined in the “Exercises,” he was now staging sixteen reconstructions of the—accident?—on a Lilliputian scale each night.

The section of the “Exercises for learning how to live sincerely” having to do with children seemed even more preposterous to him than the business with the figurines, but (the inertia that leads to vice or the curiosity that is responsible for scientific progress?) he faithfully followed it as well. It was subdivided into two parts: “Theoretical Exercises” and “Practical Exercises” and Dr. Acémila pointed out that it was imperative that the former precede the latter, for wasn’t man a rational being whose ideas preceded his acts? The theoretical part left ample scope for the pharmaceutical representative’s gift for observation and speculative turn of mind. All it prescribed was: “Reflect daily on the disasters to humanity caused by children.” He was to do so systematically, at all hours, and wherever he might be.

“What harm did innocent little children do humanity? Were they not grace, purity, happiness, life itself?” Lucho Abril Marroquín asked himself on the morning of the first theoretical exercise as he walked the five kilometers to his office. But, more out of a desire to make this exercise assigned him as interesting as possible than out of heartfelt conviction, he admitted to himself that at times they could be very noisy. As a matter of fact, they cried a lot, at all hours, for all sorts of reasons, and since they were not yet rational creatures, they did not realize the harm caused by this propensity, nor could they be persuaded of the virtues of silence. He then remembered the case of that worker who, after his exhausting day’s work in the mine, returned home and was unable to sleep because of the frantic wailing of his newborn baby, whom he had finally—murdered? How many millions of similar cases occurred around the globe? How many manual laborers, peasants, shopkeepers, office clerks, who—the high cost of living, low salaries, lack of adequate housing—lived in tiny apartments and shared their cramped quarters with their offspring, were prevented from enjoying a well-deserved night’s sleep by the howls of a baby incapable of telling its progenitors whether its bawling meant it had diarrhea or wanted to be nursed again?

Thoroughly searching his mind that evening as he walked the five kilometers home, Lucho Abril Marroquín discovered that they could be held responsible for causing a great deal of havoc. Unlike any animal, it took them much too long before they could manage on their own without being watched every minute, and how much damage resulted from this shortcoming! They broke everything, from artistic bibelots to rock-crystal vases, they pulled down curtains that the mistress of the house had strained her eyes sewing, and without the slightest embarrassment placed their hands smeared with number two on the starched tablecloth or the lace mantilla purchased with love and privation. Not to mention the fact that they were in the habit of sticking their fingers in light sockets and causing short circuits, or stupidly electrocuting themselves, with all that that implied for the family: a little white coffin, a grave, a wake, a death announcement in El Comercio, mourning dress, bereavement.

He acquired the habit of devoting himself to these mental gymnastics as he walked to and from the Laboratories and San Miguel. In order not to repeat himself, he began by making a rapid summary of the charges leveled at them in the previous reflection and then proceeded