Even after dark night had spread her ebony-black wings over the surface of the earth, Anfriso kept up soothingly sung and even more mellifluously yodeled laments.

My old mistress would also work in the shepherd Elicio, who, even more lovesick than intrepid, nevertheless put aside his love and his flock to rescue his friends from nefarious evil. She also said how the great shepherd of Filida, a peerless painter of portraits, had been more trusting than fortunate. For Sireno’s swoonings and Diana’s regrets, she thanked almighty God and the wise Felicia—who, with her miracle elixir, dissolved the spiderwebs that bound her and brought light to the perilous labyrinth. I recall many other books in this style that she read, but they’re not worth dredging up from memory.

Scipio: There you’re taking my advice, Berganza: snipe if you have to, even sting a little, but then move on. Keep your nose clean, even if your mouth gets a little dirty.

Berganza: If something uncharitable slips out, I can’t very well plead innocence. But in case I insult anybody carelessly or maliciously, my alibi will be like Mauleon’s, that buffoonish poetaster from the Imitators Academy, who, when somebody asked him what dies irae meant, he said it meant “days of Ira.”

Scipio: That’s the answer of an idiot. But you, if you’re smart or you want to be, don’t ever say anything you’ll have to apologize for. Go on.

Berganza: All I mean is, everything I’ve been saying made me see how different the practices of my shepherds and their sort were from what I’d heard that shepherds in books did. If mine ever sang, they were songs neither memorable nor well-composed, but more like “Look out for the wolf, Joannie!” and so forth. And not to the strains of rebecs and flutes, but to the beating of one shepherd’s crook against another, or to conkers. Not with delicate and mellifluous voices, either, but with cracked caterwauling, whether solo or approximately together, that sounded less like singing than like shouting or gargling. They spent most of the day scratching fleas or patching their sandals. None among them were like Amaryllis, Filida, Galatea or Diana, nor were there any Lisardos, Lausos, Jacintos or Riselos. No, they all went by Anton, Domingo, Pablo or Llorente. All this persuaded me of something that I think everybody should accept: all those books are dreamy things, well enough written for the diversion of layabouts, but without a whit of truth. If they were true, my shepherds would have at least a vestige of that supremely happy life, of those pleasant meadows, vast forests, sacred mountains, beautiful gardens, clear streams, and crystalline fountains, those professions of love even more honest than well-phrased—a lovestruck shepherd here, his shepherdess there, and yonder the echo of the panpipes, elsewhere the flageolet.

Scipio: Enough, Berganza. Take up your thread and quit tripping over it.

Berganza: I thank you, friend Scipio. If you didn’t warn me, I’d keep running my mouth until I described an entire book like the ones I used to fall for. But the time will come when I’ll tell you everything more sensibly and eloquently than I’m doing now.

Scipio: Just keep a hand on the reins and watch the road, Berganza. Remember you’re still a dumb animal, and if you seem to have anything on the ball tonight, we agree it’s a supernatural thing, never seen before.

Berganza: That might be the case if I were still wet behind the ears. But now that I recall some things I should have mentioned at the beginning of our chat, it’s no wonder I can talk—I’m only mortified at all I’m leaving out.

Scipio: Well, can’t you just work them in now?

Berganza: There is a certain story that happened to me involving a famous witch, a handmaiden of Camacha de Montilla.

Scipio: Then get it over with before you go any further with the story of your life.

Berganza: I won’t do that until its proper time comes around. Be patient and listen to all my doings in order. You’ll get more out of them that way—if you haven’t already worn yourself out wanting to know the middle before the beginning.

Scipio: Well hurry up, and tell what you want however you want to.

Berganza: As I was saying, I was well cut out for the job of guarding the flock, because I felt that I was earning the fruits of my labors, and that I was a stranger to laziness, the root and mother of all vice. If by day I rested, at night I didn’t sleep, what with striking out and giving chase to the wolves. The shepherds had hardly cried, “After him, Barcino!” when I took off, outpacing the other dogs to wherever they said the wolf was. I ranged over valleys, scoured the mountains, plunged through forests, jumped gullies, crossed highways. In the morning I’d return to the fold without finding any trace of a wolf, panting, tired, stumbling, my paws torn by thorns—only to discover, right there in the flock, a dead sheep or a gutted lamb, half-eaten by the wolf. I despaired to see how little good my fanatical care and attention were doing. Then the owner would appear. The shepherds would approach him with the pelt from the carcass.