That morning when Juan went out to the fields everything was calm and peaceful. The mountain was no longer there. Before him stretched nothing but plains, magnificent and new, going on forever and ever, under the sun of the new born day.

As far back as the memory of man a mountain had stood there, enormous and misshapen a dirty cone of earth, ugly and useless. Now, at dawn, it had disappeared.

It seemed right to Juan. At last something had happened that was enormous, magnificent; something that was truly worthwhile; something in accordance with his ideas.

"I told you so," he said to his wife.

"Well, you were right," she replied. "Now we can get to my sister's house that much faster."

"El Monte", ©, Max Aub
From Feet First
English translation © 1995, Will Kirkland

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