The saying goes that no misfortune lasts forever, although judging by the weariness misfortune brings in its train, one is sometimes tempted to believe otherwise, what is certain is that good fortune does not last forever. A man is enjoying the most delightful slumber as he listens to the cicadas, and if the meal was not exactly lavish, a stomach accustomed to hunger is satisfied with very little, besides, the sunshine is also nourishing, when his peace is rudely interrupted by the blare of a trumpet, were we in the Valley of jehoshaphat we should awaken the dead, but here there is no alternative other than for the living to rouse themselves. The various tools are checked and loaded onto the carts, for everything has to be accounted for in the inventory, the knots are checked, the cables are attached to the cart, and with another cry of Heave, the restless oxen start to pull unevenly, their hooves getting stuck on the irregular surface of the quarry, the ox-goads sting their necks, and the cart moves forward slowly, as if it were being drawn from the furnace of the earth, its wheels grind the marble splinters scattered on the ground, no stone as large as the one we are transporting today has ever been excavated from this quarry. The inspector and some of his qualified assistants have already mounted the mules, while others will make the journey on foot, in keeping with their rank as subalterns, although all of them can boast of some expertise and authority, the expertise because of their authority, the authority because of their expertise, but the same cannot be said of this encampment of men and oxen, who are simply under orders, the former as much as the latter, and any status they enjoy depends on the strength they can muster. Some additional skills, however, are expected of these men, for example, not to pull in the wrong direction, to put the wedge under the wheel in good time, to master the expressions that help encourage the animals, to know how to join strength to strength and multiply both, which, after all, is no mean feat. The cart has already progressed halfway up the track, some fifty paces at most, and it continues to sway awkwardly on the stones, for this is no royal coach or episcopal litter that is sprung as God intended. Here the axles are rigid, the wheels like weights, there are no brightly polished harnesses to admire on the backs of the oxen, or smart uniforms worn by the men as they go about their duties, this is a rabble, which one would never associate with a triumphal march or be likely to find taking part in the Corpus Christi procession. It is one thing to transport the stone for the balcony from where the Patriarch will give all of us his blessing in a few years' time, but it would be something else, and infinitely preferable, if we were both the blessing and the giver of that blessing, like sowing bread and eating it.
It is going to be a fine journey. From here to Mafra, even though the King has ordered the pavements to be repaired, the road is awkward, an endless climbing and descending, a constant skirting of valleys, scaling of heights, and plunging into depths, if there was any error in the counting of those four hundred oxen and six hundred men, it was to have underestimated their numbers, not that they are in any way superfluous. The inhabitants of Pêro Pinheiro went down to the road to admire the procession, they had never seen so many oxen assembled since the work first started, or heard such a commotion, some, however, felt a tinge of sadness as they watched the departure of that magnificent stone, which had been extracted from the earth here in Pêro Pinheiro, may it reach its destination in one piece, otherwise it would have been preferable to leave it undisturbed beneath the soil. The inspector was already heading the convoy like a general marching into battle with his captains, adjutants, and orderlies, they are about to reconnoitre the terrain, to measure the curve in the road, assess the slope, and choose a site for the encampment. Then they go back to meet the cart, to establish how far it has progressed, if it has left Pêro Pinheiro or is still there. By the end of the first day, it had only advanced some five hundred paces. The road was narrow, the yokes of oxen kept jostling each other, with a rope on each side, little room for manoeuvre, and half of the force of traction was lost because they were pulling in disarray and orders could scarcely be heard. And there was the incredible weight of the stone. Whenever the cart had to pause, either because a wheel got stuck in a hole in the road, or because the oxen were straining as they tried to tackle some slope, it looked as if the stone would move no further. When it did finally advance, all the planking creaked as if it were about to free itself from the iron plates and clamps. But there would be even greater difficulties ahead.
That night the oxen were unyoked and left to rove freely, without being confined to a pen. When the moon finally appeared, many of the men were already asleep, their heads resting on their boots, if they were fortunate enough to possess boots. Some were drawn by that ghostly phosphorescence and saw the figure, clearly reflected in the moon, of the man who had gathered brambles on a Sunday and whom the Lord had punished by sentencing him to carry that bundle for all eternity, so that, condemned to lunar exile, his image became a visible symbol of divine justice and a warning to those guilty of irreverence. Baltasar went in search of José Pequeno, and they both came across Francisco Marques and several others who were gathered around a bonfire, for the night had become cool. They were later joined by Manuel Milho, who began to tell them a story. There was once a queen who lived with her royal consort in a palace along with their children, an infante and an infanta who stood this high, and the King is said to have enjoyed being king, but the Queen could not make up her mind whether or not she was satisfied with being queen, since she had never been prepared for any other role, therefore she found it difficult to decide whether she could honestly say, I prefer to be queen, even though her situation was no different from that of the King, who enjoyed being what he was, since he, too, had been prepared for nothing else, but the Queen felt differently, had she felt the same as the King, there would be no story to tell, now, it so happened that in their kingdom there was a hermit who had lived an adventurous life, and after many, many years spent in pursuit of adventures, he had withdrawn into a cave on the mountainside, if I haven't already mentioned that, but he was not one of those hermits devoted to prayers and penance, he was known as a hermit simply because he lived in isolation, he ate whatever food he managed to find, and though he never refused anything he was offered, he never begged for alms, now one day the Queen passed nearby with her retinue, and she confided in the oldest of her ladies-in-waiting that she wished to speak to the hermit and ask him a question, and the lady-in-waiting warned her, Your Majesty should know that this hermit is not a holy man, but a man just like any other, the only difference being that he lives alone in a cave, this is what the lady-in-waiting told her, as we already know, and the Queen replied, The question I wish to ask him has nothing to do with religion, and so they walked on, and when they reached the entrance to the cave, a page called inside and the hermit appeared, he was a man already advanced in years but strongly built, like some sacred tree at the crossroads, and as he appeared he asked, Who is calling me, and the page said, Her Majesty, your Queen, and that's enough for today, so let's try to get some sleep. The others protested, because they wanted to know the rest of the story about the Queen and the hermit, but Manuel Milho could not be persuaded, tomorrow was another day, so they had to resign themselves, each man went off to find himself a place to sleep, and each man's thoughts about the story reflected his own inclinations, José Pequeno mused that the King probably no longer made love to the Queen, and if the hermit was an old man, how could he, Baltasar imagined that the Queen was Blimunda and he himself the hermit, and why not, if this was a story about a man and a woman, despite some notable differences, Francisco Marques decided, I know how this story is going to end, and when I get to Cheleiros I'll explain everything. The moon is already travelling over there, not that a bundle of brambles weighs much, worst of all are the thorns, and Christ seems determined to avenge the crown of thorns that was placed on His head.