Dan Simmons: Two Minutes Forty-Five Seconds

Roger Colvin closed his eyes and the steel bar clamped down across his lap and they began the steep climb. He could hear the rattle of the heavy chain and the creek of steel wheels on steel rails as they clanked up the first hill of the rollercoaster. Someone behind him laughed ner-vously. Terrified of heights, heart pounding painfully against his ribs, Colvin peeked out from between spread fingers. The metal rails and white wooden frame rose steeply ahead of him. Colvin was in the first car. He lowered both hands and tightly gripped the metal restraining bar, feeling the dried sweat of past palms there. Someone giggled in the car behind him. He

turned his head only far enough to peer over the side of the rails. They were very high and still rising. The midway and parking lots grew smaller, individuals growing too tiny to be seen and the crowds becoming mere carpets of color, fading into a larger mosaic of geometries of streets and lights as the entire city became visible, then the entire county. They clanked higher. The sky darkened to a deeper blue. Colvin could see the curve of the earth in the haze-blued distance. He realized that they were far out over the edge of a lake now as he caught the glimmer of light on wavetops miles below through the wooden ties. Colvin closed his eyes as

they briefly passed through the cold breath of a cloud, then snapped them open again as the pitch of chain rumble changed, as the steep gradient less-ened, as they reached the top.

And went over.

There was nothing beyond. The two rails curved out and down and ended in air. Colvin gripped the restraining bar as the car pitched forward and over. He opened his mouth to scream. The fall began.

"Hey, the worst part's over." Colvin opened his eyes to see Bill Montgomery handing him a drink. The sound of the Gulfstream's jet engines was a dull rumble under the gentle hissing of air from the overhead ventilator nozzle. Colvin took the drink, turned down the flow of air, and glanced out the window. Logan International was already out of sight behind them and Colvin could make out Nantasket Beach below, a score of small white triangles of sail in the expanse of bay and ocean beyond. They were still climbing.

"Damn, we're glad you decided to come with us this time, Roger," Montgomery said to Colvin. "It's good hav-ing the whole team together again. Like the old days."

Montgomery smiled. The three other men in the cabin raised their glasses. Colvin played with the calculator in his lap and sipped his vodka. He took a breath and closed his eyes.

Salvador Elizondo: Futuro imperfecto

a María del Carmen Millán

La naturaleza retrocesiva y preteritante que la mera noción “el futuro” proyecta sobre lo a priori, como si la naturaleza del curso del mundo marchara en el sentido inverso al que siguen las manecillas del reloj, bastaría para concebir o formular las bases de una literatura que tiene el mismo carácter y alienta con el mismo principio que “la máquina del tiempo”. Basta correr la palanquita situada frente al asiento de bicicleta, hasta que el indicador quede colocado en P si se quiere visitar el pasado o en F si se quiere visitar cualquiera de las consecuencias de nuestra estupidez presente en el porvenir. Con sólo hacer girar la perilla reguladora hasta que la aguja señale la fecha de nuestro destino para que zarpemos y el viaje se inicie. El gobernador automático de la máquina se encarga del resto. Para volver al presente sólo se requiere volver la palanca a A. El mecanismo que regula la operación de regreso al ahora adolece todavía de algunas fallas y es difícil colocarla en la posición requerida si no se tiene experiencia en su manejo. La fotografía y todos los procedimientos de re-presentación fenomenológica se ponen al servicio del perfeccionamiento de este mecanismo que rige la vuelta al ahora. Cuando falla, unos golpecitos del puño en el tablero son suficientes, casi siempre, para que la nave vire.

Con relación al futuro todo es a priori o pasado. Cuando aparezca el asterisco:… (*) hará exactamente 3 semanas 4 días 17 horas 15 minutos 21 segundos desde que Ramón Xirau me pidió estas notas sobre el futuro para el número 36 de su revista que estaría dedicado a este asunto apasionante. No fue la menor de las sorpresas que el encargo de la redacción de estas notas me produjo, la de percatarme en ese momento de que ya en el pasado me había ocupado del futuro forzando las conjeturas, a veces, hasta los extremos y permaneciendo siempre, como en esta ocasión, en el centro absoluto del presente de indicativo que el escritor ocupa entre el pretérito remoto de los orígenes, por el encargo del editor, de la escritura que el lector tiene en estos (¿estos?) momentos ante los ojos, y el futuro conjetural dentro del que el escritor, en estos (¿éstos?) momentos, ahora que esto escribe, concibe al lector que ahora (¿entonces!) está (o estará) leyendo estas líneas.

Esta imbricada relación, que sólo tiene una expresión sintáctica o retórica, es la única que permite delimitar claramente ese campo temporal en el que la misteriosa relación entre la escritura y la lectura se dirime y que, también, es la única que permite definir a la escritura como el pasado de la lectura y a ésta como el futuro de aquélla. El lector habita en el futuro; es el futuro de un libro y también el instrumento mediante el cual el libro se traslada al pasado y se convierte en una experiencia.

Damon Knight: Not with a Bang

Ten months after the last plane passed over, Rolf Smith knew beyond doubt that only one other human being had survived. Her name was Louise Oliver, and he was sitting opposite her in a department-store cafe in Salt Lake City. They were eating canned Vienna sausages and drinking coffee.

Sunlight struck through a broken pane like a judgment. Inside and outside, there was no sound; only a stifling rumor of absence. The clatter of dishware in the kitchen, the heavy rumble of streetcars: never again. There was sunlight; and silence; and the watery, astonished eyes of Louise Oliver. He leaned forward, trying to capture the attention of those fishlike eyes for a second. "Darling," he said, "I respect your views, naturally. But I've got to make you see that they're impractical."

She looked at him with faint surprise, then away again. Her head shook slightly. No. No, Rolf, I will not live with you in sin.

Smith thought of the women of France, of Russia, of Mexico, of the South Seas. He had spent three months in the ruined studios of a radio station in Rochester, listening to the voices until they stopped. There had been a large colony in Sweden, including an English cabinet minister. They reported that Europe was gone. Simply gone; there was not an acre that had not been swept clean by radioactive dust.

They had two planes and enough fuel to take them anywhere on the Continent; but there was nowhere to go. Three of them had the plague; then eleven; then all. There was a bomber pilot who had fallen near a government radio station in Palestine. He did not last long, because he had broken some bones in the crash; but he had seen the vacant waters where the Pacific Islands should have been. It was his guess that the Arctic ice fields had been bombed. There were no reports from Washington, from New York, from London, Paris, Moscow, Chungking, Sydney. You could not tell who had been destroyed by disease, who by

the dust, who by bombs.

Smith himself had been a laboratory assistant in a team that was trying to find an antibiotic for the plague. His

superiors had found one that worked sometimes, but it was a little too late. When he left, Smith took along with him all there was of itforty ampoules, enough to last him for years. Louise had been a nurse in a genteel hospital near Denver. According to her, something rather odd had happened to the hospital as she was approaching it the morning of the attack. She was quite calm when she said this, but a vague look came into her eyes and her shattered expression seemed to slip a little more. Smith did not press her for an explanation.

Kahlil Gibran ( جبران خليل جبران ) : Vestiduras (اﻟﻤـــﻼ ﺑﺲ )

ﺗﻼﻗﻰ اﻟﺠﻤﺎل واﻟﻘﺒﺢ ذات ﻳﻮم ﻋﻠﻰ ﺷﺎﻃﺊ اﻟﺒﺤﺮ. ﻓﻘﺎل ﻛﻞ ﻣﻨﻬﻤﺎ ﻟﻶﺧﺮ: " ﻫﻞ ﻟﻚ أن ﺗﺴﺒﺢ؟". ﺛﻢ ﺧﻠﻌﺎ ﻣﻼﺑﺴﻬﻤﺎ، وﺧﺎﺿﺎ اﻟﻌﺒﺎب. وﺑﻌﺪ ﺑﺮﻫﺔ ﻋﺎد اﻟﻘﺒﺢ إﻟﻰ اﻟﺸﺎﻃﺊ وارﺗﺪى ﺛﻴﺎب اﻟﺠﻤﺎل، وﻣﻀﻰ ﻓﻲ ﺳﺒﻴﻠﻪ. وﺟﺎء اﻟﺠﻤﺎل أﻳﻀﺎ ﻣﻦ اﻟﺒﺤﺮ، وﻟﻢ ﻳﺠﺪ ﻟﺒﺎﺳﻪ، وﺧﺠﻞ ﻛﻞ اﻟﺨﺠﻞ أن ﻳﻜﻮن ﻋﺎرﻳﺎ، وﻟﺬﻟﻚ ﻟﺒﺲ رداء اﻟﻘﺒﺢ، وﻣﻀﻰ ﻓﻲ ﺳﺒﻴﻠﻪ. وﻣﻨﺬ ذﻟﻚ اﻟﻴﻮم، واﻟﺮﺟﺎل واﻟﻨﺴﺎء ﻳﺨﻄﺌﻮن ﻛﻠﻤﺎ ﺗﻼﻗﻮا ﻓﻲ ﻣﻌﺮﻓﺔ ﺑﻌﻀﻬﻢ اﻟﺒﻌﺾ. ﻏﻴﺮ أن ﻫﻨﺎﻟﻚ ﻧﻔﺮا ﻣﻤﻦ ﻳﻔﺘﺮﺳﻮن ﻓﻲ وﺟﻪ اﻟﺠﻤﺎل، وﻳﻌﺮﻓﻮﻧﻪ رﻏﻢ ﺛﻴﺎﺑﻪ، وﺛﻤﺔ ﻧﻔﺮ ﻳﻌﺮﻓﻮن وﺟﻪ اﻟﻘﺒﺢ، واﻟﺜﻮب اﻟﺬي ﻳﻠﺒﺴﻪ ﻻ ﻳﺨﻔﻴﻪ ﻋﻦ أﻋﻴﻨﻬﻢ.

Horacio Quiroga: El conductor del rápido

Desde 1905 hasta 1925 han ingresado en el Hospicio de las Mercedes 108 maquinistas atacados de alienación mental

Cierta mañana llegó al manicomio un hombre escuálido, de rostro macilento, que se tenía malamente en pie. Estaba cubierto de andrajos y articulaba tan mal sus palabras que era necesario descubrir lo que decía. Y, sin embargo, según afirmaba con cierto alarde su mujer al internarlo, ese maquinista había guiado su máquina hasta pocas horas antes.

En un momento dado de aquel lapso de tiempo, un señalero y un cambista alienados trabajaban en la misma línea y al mismo tiempo que dos conductores, también alienados.

Es hora, pues, dados los copiosos hechos apuntados, de meditar ante las actitudes fácilmente imaginables en que podría incurrir un maquinista alienado que conduce un tren.

Tal es lo que leo en una revista de criminología, psiquiatría y medicina legal, que tengo bajo mis ojos mientras me desayuno.

Perfecto. Yo soy uno de esos maquinistas. Más aun: soy conductor del rápido del Continental. Leo, pues, el anterior estudio con una atención también fácilmente imaginable.

Hombres, mujeres, niños, niñitos, presidentes y estabiloques: desconfiad de los psiquiatras como de toda policía. Ellos ejercen el contralor mental de la humanidad, y ganan con ello: ¡ojo! Yo no conozco las estadísticas de alienación en el personal de los hospicios; pero no cambio los posibles trastornos que mi locomotora con un loco a horcajadas pudiera discurrir por los caminos, con los de cualquier deprimido psiquiatra al frente de un manicomio.

D.H. Lawrence: The Rocking-Horse Winner

There was a woman who was beautiful, who started with all the advantages, yet she had no luck. She married for love, and the love turned to dust. She had bonny children, yet she felt they had been thrust upon her, and she could not love them. They looked at her coldly, as if they were finding fault with her. And hurriedly she felt she must cover up some fault in herself. Yet what it was that she must cover up she never knew. Nevertheless, when her children were present, she always felt the centre of her heart go hard. This troubled her, and in her manner she was all the more gentle and anxious for her children, as if she loved them very much. Only she herself knew that at the centre of her heart was a hard little place that could not feel love, no, not for anybody. Everybody else said of her: "She is such a good mother. She adores her children." Only she herself, and her children themselves, knew it was not so. They read it in each other's eyes.

There were a boy and two little girls. They lived in a pleasant house, with a garden, and they had discreet servants, and felt themselves superior to anyone in the neighbourhood.

Although they lived in style, they felt always an anxiety in the house. There was never enough money. The mother had a small income, and the father had a small income, but not nearly enough for the social position which they had to keep up. The father went in to town to some office. But though he had good prospects, these prospects never materialized. There was always the grinding sense of the shortage of money, though the style was always kept up.

At last the mother said: "I will see if I can't make something." But she did not know where to begin. She racked her brains, and tried this thing and the other, but could not find anything successful. The failure made deep lines come into her face. Her children were growing up, they would have to go to school. There must be more money, there must be more money. The father, who was always very handsome and expensive in his tastes, seemed as if he never would be able to do anything worth doing. And the mother, who had a great belief in herself, did not succeed any better, and her tastes were just as expensive.

José de la Colina: La ley de la herencia

Durante más de diez años habíamos vivido sin problemas en este edificio habitado por empleados gubernamentales o profesores de escuela como yo hasta que un día en el terreno baldío que se ve desde la ventana de nuestro piso apareció una vieja y esquelética mendiga despiojándose al sol y como nos dios lástima le llevábamos por las noches mi mujer o yo las sobras de nuestra comida a aquel lugar de muebles despanzurrados y maquinarias paralíticas y latas herrumbrosas y ratas furtivas y la mendiga se arrojaba al plato de cartón apenas lo poníamos en el suelo y devoraba el contenido lanzando temerosas miradas a un lado y a otro como si alguien fuese a robarla pero al poco tiempo ya no se resignaba a esperarnos y poco después de caer la noche la oíamos subir la escalera con sus pies pesados y tocaba a nuestra puerta y gemía larga y rítmicamente si tardábamos en abrir y presentarle lo que sin duda ya consideraba un obligado tributo y así una noche tras otra y a veces nos hundíamos en la habitación más retirada conteniendo el aliento y mi mujer apretándose temblorosa contra mi pecho mientras la mendiga permanecía allá junto a la puerta del departamento lloriqueando sin pausa y mecánicamente de modo que como temíamos el escándalo de los vecinos, terminábamos saliendo y dándole la pitanza bajando los ojos ante los suyos resentidos o irónicos y ella se alejaba envolviendo el plato en su raída y remendada y sucia capa bajo cuyo peso se inclinaba y así inexorablemente por no sabemos cuánto tiempo hasta que los vecinos que ya se quejaban mucho ante nosotros hicieron que la policía se llevara a la mendiga y con algun remordimiento nos sentimos exentos de aquella servidumbre sin prever que una semana después se presentaría un hombre con aspecto de pulcro burócrata que decía venir de cierta Sociedad y nos entregó una caja con unos sucios andrajos que fácilmente reconocimos sobretodo por la remendada caja y nos hizo firmar un recibo informándonos de que éramos depositarios de esos bienes y no lo entendimos del todo sino hasta unos días después cuando mi mujer se asomó a la ventana y lanzó un grito y empezó a llorar y yo me asomé y allí en el terreno baldío había otra mendiga tal vez menos vieja y menos flaca enteramente desnuda y rascándose las costras y mirando hacia nuestra ventana y entonces comprendimos que había que bajar llevando mi mujer el plato de sobras y yo la caja con los andrajos y que no serviría de nada cambiarse de casa ni de colonia ni de ciudad ni tal vez de país.

Gerald Kersh: Men without Bones

We were loading bananas into the Claire Dodge at Puerto Pobre, when a feverish little fellow came aboard. Everyone stepped aside to let him pass—even the soldiers who guard the port with nickel-plated Remington rifles, and who go barefoot but wear polished leather leggings. They stood back from him because they believed that he was afflicted-of-God, mad; harmless but dangerous; best left alone.

All the time the naphtha flares were hissing, and from the hold came the reverberation of the roaring voice of the foreman of the gang down below crying: "Fruta! Fruta! FRUTA!" The leader of the dock gang bellowed the same cry, throwing down stem after stem of brilliant green bananas. The occasion would be memorable for this, if for nothing else—the magnificence of the night, the bronze of the Negro foreman shining under the flares, the jade green of that fruit, and the mixed odors of the waterfront. Out of one stem of bananas ran a hairy grey spider, which frightened the crew and broke the banana-chain, until a Nicaraguan boy, with a laugh, killed it with his foot. It was harmless, he said.

It was about then that the madman came aboard, unhindered, and asked me: "Bound for where?"

He spoke quietly and in a carefully modulated voice; but there was a certain blank, lost look in his eyes that suggested to me that I keep within ducking distance of his restless hands which, now that I think of them, put me in mind of that gray, hairy, bird-eating spider.

"Mobile, Alabama," I said.

"Take me along?" he asked.

"None of my affair. Sorry. Passenger myself," I said. "The skipper's ashore. Better wait for him on the wharf. He's the boss."

"Would you happen, by any chance, to have a drink about you?"

Giving him some rum, I asked: "How come they let you aboard?"

Hernan Casciari: Ropa sucia

Ya de entrada caí mal parado. Vine al mundo justo el año en que todos éramos más pobres que de costumbre, cuando hasta los ricos y los catinga estaban también con hambre. A esa época después la iban a bautizar como el tiempo del quita y pon. Nací justo el año que el Gobierno mantuvo a la gente ocupada con el azadón para evitar los alborotos. Todos hacían trabajo inútil: los cabeza de familia, sus mujeres, y los hijos de ocho en adelante. Yo no hacía esos trabajos porque estaba recién nacido.

Mi papá y mis hermanos grandes, junto con otra mucha gente, salían por la mañana a poner baldosones de pasto en la plaza: le pagaban a cada uno cien sanmartines la media jornada. Cien sanmartines era el pan del día, o quince bambú sin filtro. Por la tarde, las mujeres y los críos estaban empleados para quitar de la plaza el pasto que habían puesto los hombres; debían echarlos en los canastos, a cincuenta sanmartines por tarde. Eran los mismos terrones manoseados que la otra mitad del pueblo colocaría de nuevo desde el día siguiente. Así una y otra vez.

El hermano que venía antes que yo iba a llamarse Gracián Galíndez, porque ya estaba planeado que llegase un 12 de agosto, que es san Gracián; pero nació muerto. Entonces me pusieron a mí el nombre, aunque nací el 3 de noviembre del otro año, y debí de haberme llamado Galindo Galíndez, que es mucho más sonoro. De todas maneras, Gracián o Galindo, el destino ya quería que todos me conocieran como el Rengo, por el problema que tengo en el talón.

Esa época de los terrones de pasto duró un año largo. El Gobierno no quería dar subsidios ni entregar los puros alimentos básicos porque temía que los más pobres, sin trabajo fijo ni actividad del cuerpo, se dieran al vino o a la insurrección. Por eso se crearon aquellos oficios de quita y pon, que así se llamaron, y que dieron que hablar mucho en la época que nací.

Mi mamá quiso que al menos dos de sus muchos hijos supieran leer y escribir, y ni el toto sabe los esfuerzos que hizo para mandarnos a clases, a la Eugenia y a mí. Su sacrificio no fue de dinero, puesto que la educación todavía era liberada, sino porque nosotros nos escondíamos para escaparle a la milonga de la escuela. Yo no sé por qué mi hermana fue tan retobada para ir a clases; mi desapego era a causa de las bromas de los otros. Eso de Rengo Galíndez me lo pusieron allí, y tuvieron que pasar muchos años, y una peste, para que me sonara afectuoso.

Ray Bradbury: The lake

The wave shut me off from the world, from the birds in the sky, the children on the beach, my mother on the shore. There was a moment of green silence. Then the wave gave me back to the sky, the sand, the children yelling. I came out of the lake and the world was waiting for me, having hardly moved since I went away.

I ran up on the beach.

Mama swabbed me with a furry towel. "Stand there and dry," she said.

I stood there, watching the sun take away the water beads on my arms. I replaced them with goose-pimples.

"My, there's a wind," said Mama. "Put on your sweater."

"Wait'll I watch my goose-bumps," I said.

"Harold," said Mama.

I put the sweater on and watched the waves come up and fall down on the beach. But not clumsily. On purpose, with a green sort of elegance. Even a drunken man could not collapse with such elegance as those waves.

It was September. In the last days when things are getting sad for no reason. The beach was so long and lonely with only about six people on it. The kids quit bouncing the ball because somehow the wind made them sad, too, whistling the way it did, and the kids sat down and felt autumn come along the endless shore.

All of the hot-dog stands were boarded up with strips of golden planking, sealing in all the mustard, onion, meat odors of the long, joyful summer. It was like nailing summer into a series of coffins. One by one the places slammed their covers down, padlocked their doors, and the wind came and touched the sand, blowing away all of the million footprints of July and August. It got so that now, in September, there was nothing but the mark of my rubber tennis shoes and Donald and Delaus Arnold's feet, down by the water curve.

Salomé Guadalupe Ingelmo: In vitro

La jaula está llena de sangre. Los cuerpos descuartizados, inmóviles, se desperdigan aquí y allá sobre el heno. Aún conservan el calor de cuando estaban vivos. Pero esa ficción no durará mucho tiempo. El pequeño Ray contempla horrorizado la monstruosa escena.

–Muchos roedores se comen a sus crías nada más nacer. Es la naturaleza, cariño –trata de consolarle su madre.

Pero él no está dispuesto a aceptarlo. Él no se conforma con acatar sumiso como la mayoría de sus compañeros. Y entonces surge en su mente la idea de hacer justicia, de vengar a esas pequeñas vidas mutiladas; de pervertir las normas tan arbitrariamente impuestas. De dar forma a otro mundo con el que compensar las carencias y errores de éste.

Ten cuidado con lo que deseas. O con lo que imaginas, advierte inútilmente la voz de su instinto.

“Para el siguiente número necesitaré un voluntario. Y ahora mi ayudante y yo, ante sus atónitos ojos, haremos desaparecer este elefante.”

“De mayor serás un estupendo ilusionista”, le felicita Blackstone tras el espectáculo. “Toma, te mereces un regalo. Se llama Tilly”. De regreso a casa, con la hermosa coneja blanca entre los brazos, el pequeño Ray comprende que su destino finalmente le ha encontrado.

En un momento de debilidad, los recuerdos de la infancia han distraído su atención. Pero la risa sofocada y el ruido amortiguado del cuerpo menudo gateando sobre la moqueta lo devuelven a la realidad. Él lo espera agazapado aún en algún lugar de la casa. Como siempre. Un padre no puede abandonar a sus hijos. Aunque un día éstos acaben comiéndoselo. El escritor está cansado; desde hace algún tiempo no puede prescindir de la silla de ruedas. Y aun así va en su busca. Sabe que será su último encuentro. En ese enfrentamiento, sólo puede quedar uno.

Ambrose Bierce: A Wireless Message

In the summer of 1896 Mr. William Holt, a wealthy manufacturer of Chicago, was living temporarily in a little town of central New York, the name of which the writer’s memory has not retained. Mr. Holt had had “trouble with his wife,” from whom he had parted a year before. Whether the trouble was anything more serious than “incompatibility of temper,” he is probably the only living person that knows: he is not addicted to the vice of confidences. Yet he has related the incident herein set down to at least one person without exacting a pledge of secrecy. He is now living in Europe.

One evening he had left the house of a brother whom he was visiting, for a stroll in the country. It may be assumed - whatever the value of the assumption in connection with what is said to have occurred - that his mind was occupied with reflections on his domestic infelicities and the distressing changes that they had wrought in his life.

Whatever may have been his thoughts, they so possessed him that he observed neither the lapse of time nor whither his feet were carrying him; he knew only that he had passed far beyond the town limits and was traversing a lonely region by a road that bore no resemblance to the one by which he had left the village. In brief, he was “lost.”

Realizing his mischance, he smiled; central New York is not a region of perils, nor does one long remain lost in it. He turned about and went back the way that he had come. Before he had gone far he observed that the landscape was growing more distinct - was brightening. Everything was suffused with a soft, red glow in which he saw his shadow projected in the road before him. “The moon is rising,” he said to himself. Then he remembered that it was about the time of the new moon, and if that tricksy orb was in one of its stages of visibility it had set long before. He stopped and faced about, seeking the source of the rapidly broadening light. As he did so, his shadow turned and lay along the road in front of him as before. The light still came from behind him. That was surprising; he could not understand. Again he turned, and again, facing successively to every point of the horizon. Always the shadow was before - always the light behind, “a still and awful red.”

Fernando Iwasaki: Ya no quiero a mi hermano

«Carlitos está aquí», dijo la médium con su voz de drácula, y de pronto se transformó y puso cara de buena. Entonces mamá le hizo muchas preguntas y el espíritu respondía a través de la señora. Seguro que era Carlitos porque sabía dónde estaba el robot y cuántas monedas había en su alcancía, dijo cuál era su postre favorito y también los nombres de sus amigos.

Cuando la médium nos miró haciendo las muecas de Carlitos papá empezó a llorar y mamá le pidió por favor, por favor que no se fuera. Las luces se apagaban y encendían, los cuadros se caían de las paredes y los vasos temblaban sobre la mesa. Me acuerdo que la señora se desmayó y que una luz atravesó a mamá como en las películas. «Carlitos está aquí», dijo con cara de felicidad.

Desde entonces hemos vuelto a compartir el cuarto y los juguetes, el ordenador y la Play-Station, pero la bicicleta no. Mamá quiere que sea bueno con Carlitos aunque me dé miedo. No me gusta su voz de drácula. Y además huele a vieja.

Irvin S. Cobb: Fishhead

IT GOES past the powers of my pen to try to describe Reelfoot Lake for you so that you, reading this, will get the picture of it in your mind as I have it in mine.

For Reelfoot Lake is like no other lake that I know anything about. It is an after-thought of Creation.

The rest of this continent was made and had dried in the sun for thousands of years-millions of years, for all I know-before Reelfoot came to be. It's the newest big thing in nature on this hemisphere, probably, for it was formed by the great earthquake of 1811.

That earthquake of 1811 surely altered the face of the earth on the then far frontier of this country.

It changed the course of rivers, it converted hills into what are now the sunk lands of three states, and it turned the solid ground to jelly and made it roll in waves like the sea.

And in the midst of the retching of the land and the vomiting of the waters it depressed to varying depths a section of the earth crust sixty miles long, taking it down -- trees, hills, hollows, and all, and a crack broke through to the Mississippi River so that for three days the river ran up stream, filling the hole.

The result was the largest lake south of the Ohio, lying mostly in Tennessee, but extending up across what is now the Kentucky line, and taking its name from a fancied resemblance in its outline to the splay, reeled foot of a cornfield negro. Niggerwool Swamp, not so far away, may have got its name from the same man who christened Reelfoot: at least so it sounds.

Reelfoot is, and has always been, a lake of mystery.

In places it is bottomless. Other places the skeletons of the cypress-trees that went down when the earth sank, still stand upright so that if the sun shines from the right quarter, and the water is less muddy than common, a man, peering face downward into its depths, sees, or thinks he sees, down below him the bare top-limbs upstretching like drowned men's fingers, all coated with the mud of years and bandaged with pennons of the green lake slime.