We have wished, señores, to write you this letter so that you see what is our goal in calling this Junta, and those who fear to venture their persons, and those who suspect the loss of their properties, will not be cured by following us in this undertaking, or even less in coming to the Junta, because as these are heroic acts, only very exalted hearts may undertake them, between the two, La Señora and her mandrake, the homunculus with vaguely defined features, cherries for eyes, a radish for a mouth, crumbs for hair, a root for a body, his monstrous appearance hidden as much as possible beneath high boots, heavy breeches, a bejeweled doublet, a loose cap with an eyeshade and long ear flaps, gloves embroidered with precious stones, ruffles on his wrists and a high ruff beneath his chin, between them they lifted the mummy made of royal bits and pieces from the bed in the Arabic chamber, and the little dwarf said, Señora, a great silence reigns now, night has fallen, this is the time to do what I have recommended to you, help me carry your Prometheus, you take his arms and I his feet, he is well joined, his parts well adhered thanks to the storax gum and resinous cáncamo, quietly, Señora, we shall leave together, through the galleries, halls, and small courtyards they went, carrying the mummy, first the feet, carried by the homunculus who was leading, through severe cloisters of strong, square pillars, through forests of arches, beneath the carved ceilings of the storerooms, through a series of eleven doors, until they reached a vast gallery La Señora had never seen, two hundred feet long and thirty feet high, the fronts, sides, and domed ceiling covered by painting, columns embedded in the walls embellished with fascia, jambs, lintels, and railings in a row, in the manner of balconies, the ceiling and the dome with grotesque and elaborate plaster ornamentation, a thousand variations on real and fictional figures, plaster medallions and niches, pedestals, men, women, children, monsters, birds, horses, fruits and flowers, draperies and festoons, and a hundred other bizarre inventions, and at the rear of the room a Gothic throne of roughly worked stone, and behind the throne a semicircular wall with feigned painting of two draperies hanging from their spikes, with flounces and fringe, look, Señora, it seems so real, it deceives many until they come to draw them and touch them; La Señora and her dwarf carried the inert body of royal bits and pieces, fashioned from the worm-eaten nose of the Arian King, an ear from the Queen who stitched flags with the colors of her blood and tears, the very flag that El Señor had one day cast into the putrid moat of the conquered Flemish city, another from the astrologer King who complained that God had not consulted him about the creation of the earth, one black eye from the fratricidal King and a white eye from the rebellious Infanta, the livid tongue of the cruel King who had forced his courtiers to drink the bath water of his concubine, the mummified arms of the rebellious King who had risen in arms against the stepfather who murdered his mother, the blackened torso of the King who violated his own daughter and who died between flaming sheets, the skull of the Suffering and the shriveled sex of the Impotent King, a shinbone from the virgin Queen murdered by the King’s halberdier while she prayed, another shinbone from the Mad Lady, a relic of the sacrifice of the present Señor’s mother, the twisted lips of the Reprieved, the murderer of his brothers, found dead in his bed after the thirty-three and a half days of the justice of God had passed, the silky hair of the kidnapped Princes whose throats were slit by Hebrews by the light of the moon, the rotted teeth of the King who employed all the days of his reign in celebrating his own funerals, and the feet of the most chaste Queen who never changed her clothing and whose shoes had to be pried off with a spatula when she died, they seated this creature on the throne, the homunculus ran behind the throne, picked up a golden crown encrusted with sapphire, pearl, agate, and rock crystal, a mantle of opaque purple, a scepter and a sphere, and he said to La Señora, you have invoked all the arts of the Devil, you have called upon them all, my mistress, you have attempted everything, except the simplest and most apparent: do it yourself, as this your mummy is seated on the most ancient throne of Spain, crown him yourself, thus, wrap him in the royal mantle, that’s it, pry open his afflicted fingers and close them again upon this orb and scepter, La Señora did as he advised, and that very instant the royal mummy blinked, his eyes filled with turbid light, his arm creaked as he raised the scepter, the backs of his knees squeaked, the twisted lips opened, the livid tongue moved, the homunculus shrieked with joy, words tumbled from the crowned mummy’s lips, he spoke contradictory words, close, Santiago, after them, I live without living in myself, plus ultra, plus ultra, in my hunger I command, dominate, Castile, dominate, you, the dominant, scorn what you do not know, and since from Spain we come, let us resemble what we were, La Señora fell to her knees and murmured, thank you, thank you, she kissed the hand of the King of Kings, now Spain has an eternal King, a Holy, Caesarian, Catholic Majesty, We do not doubt, señores, that in our wills both here and there we are one; but the distances of lands forbid communication of persons; from which follows no little harm for the enterprise we have undertaken, to mend the kingdom, for very arduous affairs are long in their conclusion when there are long roads to travel, and let it not be said of us what Don Pedro of Toledo once said, that he hoped death would come to him from Spain, so that it might come to him very late. Only that to the messengers who carry these words you give your entire faith in these words, El Señor has been magnanimous, too benevolent, said Guzmán, for I have never tired of warning him that the innocent, once pardoned, will not tarry in making themselves his enemy and very quickly will assume the guilt of the accusation, and in my opinion all of you are guilty, faithful allies of the seditious rebels who yesterday fell into our trap, but I am still more faithful to the desires of my Señor, you are free, you, blind man, and you, girl, and you, monk from pestilent cities, the fever of rebellion spreads throughout the kingdom and I am sure that we soon will meet again, you, up to your elbows in intrigue, by the side of the insurgent townsmen of the cities of Castile, I by the side of my King, Guzmán is patient, we will settle our accounts then, and my son? pleaded Ludovico, he has done nothing, he is innocent, he can be accused of nothing, will he not be freed? yes, laughed Guzmán, but not now, not with you, I shall free him in my own way, El Señor has granted me that kindness, Celestina kissed the forehead of the pilgrim from the new world, clasped the youth’s hands in hers, spoke into his ear, we shall wait, one day we shall triumph, we shall await the new millennium, I give you this appointment, far from here in another city Ludovico has told me of, Paris, the fountain of all wisdom, the fourteenth of July, when this millennium is dying, the fourteenth of July of 1999, I shall look for you, I shall find you, all waters communicate with each other, we shall find one another over the waters, we shall arrive by water, water passes from the Cantabrian to the Seine, from the Tiber to the Dead Sea, from the Nile to the gulfs of the new world, I shall look for you, I shall find you, upon a bridge, I shall pass my memory and my life to another woman, kissing her upon the lips, my lips are my memory, try to remember me, I shall look for you, Guzmán ordered the halberdiers to take Celestina, Ludovico, and Simón from the donjon, lead them to the plain, and abandon them with a week’s provisions, he did not understand why El Señor was pardoning them, Guzmán would have subjected them to the rack, the same as the ringleader, Jerónimo, when the two of them remained alone in the cell, Guzmán stared with derision and amusement at the youth,