In Evil Hour by Gabriel García Márquez, Gregory Rabassa

in the last civil war, had slept on that balcony one night during a time when there weren’t any towns for many leagues around. It was the same building then, with wooden walls and a zinc roof, with the same dining room and the same cardboard partitions, except with no electricity or sanitary services. An old traveling salesman recounted that until the turn of the century there had been a collection of masks hanging in the dining room at the disposal of the customers, and that the masked guests took care of their needs in the courtyard in full view of everyone.
    The mayor had to unbutton his collar in order to finish the soup. After the news bulletin there was a record with rhyming commercials. Then a sentimental bolero. A man with a mentholated voice, dying with love, has decided to travel around the world in pursuit of a woman. The mayor gave his attention to the room while he waited for the rest of his meal; he even saw two children with two chairs and a rocker pass in front of the hotel. Behind came two women and a man with pots and tubs and the rest of the furniture.
    He went to the door, shouting:
    “Where did you steal that junk?”
    The women stopped. The man explained to him that they were transferring their house to higher ground. The mayor asked where they’d taken it and the man pointed toward the south with his hat:
    “Up there, to a lot that Don Sabas rented us for thirty pesos.”
    The mayor examined the furniture. A rocker that was
falling apart at the joints, broken pots: poor people’s things. He reflected for an instant. Finally he said:
    “Take those houses and all your goods to the vacant lot beside the cemetery.”
    The man became confused.
    “It’s town land and it won’t cost you anything,” the mayor said. “The town government gives it to you.”
    Then, turning to the women, he added: “And tell Don Sabas that I send him a message not to be a highway robber.”
    He finished his lunch without tasting the food. Then he lighted a cigarette. He lighted another with the butt and was thoughtful for a long time, resting his elbows on the table while the radio ground out sentimental boleros.
    “What are you thinking about?” the girl asked, clearing away the empty plates.
    The mayor didn’t blink.
    “Those poor people.”
    He put on his cap and crossed the room. Turning around from the door, he said:
    “We’ve got to make this town a decent sort of mess.”
    A bloody dogfight interrupted his passage as he turned the corner. He saw a knot of backs and legs in a whirlwind of howls and then bared teeth and one dog dragging a limb, its tail between its legs. The mayor stepped to one side and went along the boardwalk toward the police barracks.
    A woman was shouting in the lockup, while the guard was sleeping his siesta lying face down on a cot. The mayor kicked the leg of the cot. The guard awoke with a leap.
    “Who’s she?” the mayor asked.
    The guard came to attention.
    “The woman who was putting up the lampoons.”
    The mayor broke out in curses against his subordinates. He wanted to know who’d brought the woman there and
under whose orders they’d put her in the lockup. The policemen gave an extravagant explanation.
    “When did you lock her up?”
    They had jailed her Saturday night.
    “Well, she comes out and one of you goes in,” the mayor shouted. “That woman was asleep in the lockup and the whole town woke up papered.”
    As soon as the heavy iron door was opened, a mature woman with pronounced bones and a bumptious bun held in place by a comb came shouting out of the cell.
    “You can go to hell,” she said to the mayor.
    The woman loosened the bun, shook her long, abundant hair several times, and went down the stairs like a stampede, shouting: “Whore, whore.” The mayor leaned over the railing and shouted with all the power of his voice, as if not only the woman and his men but the whole town were meant to hear him:
    “And stop fucking me up with those damned