The catatombe!

My aunt was nervous. To begin with, we were all locked up. Now I had to see my uncle Rafa all day, and that tires. But she was also worried about what we could call the turn events were taking.

My predecessor as mayor, and main local businessman, owner of the sawmill, said that in La Cañada we had the toughest confinement in the world. Apparently, my aunt told me, some commented that my transfer to Lourdes's house had broken the confinement rules and in any case it was not a moral thing, although, as I have explained, it was justified because Lourdes's house was in a place much more central and in a situation like the pandemic, speed of response is essential.

The rumors were happening. Conspiracy theories began to circulate. For example, the daughter of Adoración told Adoración that it was absurd to have such drastic protection measures in La Cañada because from 1,000 meters the virus did not survive and we were 1,115. Adoración told his sister, Isabel, who later told her daughter and daughter-in-law that they were getting along but her son had already gone to bed, and from there things began to flow from one telephone in town to another. Others said it was the soy milk that the Chinese and the hippies drank. Some said it was from washing too much. And others that it was the fault of those of La Valredonda. One night, at the hour of the jacks, Miguel Ángel sang:

MORE INFORMATION

• Quarantine in empty Spain 1: The 'hipster' notebook
• Quarantine in empty Spain 2: No spitting
• Quarantine in empty Spain 3: "Someone from abroad always comes to fuck the sow"
• Quarantine in empty Spain 4: Paco Martínez Soria 'meets' JG Ballard

This coronavirus thing
I can't start in Wuhan:
Surely
Soros and a Catalan are involved

I thought it was dangerous for prejudice and conspiracy theories to spread. I considered the possibility of writing some groups to deny those rumors. But I was concerned that they would help spread them rather than stop them. It is difficult to fight with the hoaxes that are transmitted through the old technologies.

One morning, when I went to talk to the strangers, that is to say with Javi and Lina, through the window grill, as in a folklore story, Lina told me that Javi was still coughing. The only thing missing was that we had an outbreak in La Cañada, and that on top of it my supposed best friend caught her, who might have been involved with my ex-girlfriend.

"I think it's pure air," Javi said. I'm not used to it.

"It may be the pig," my aunt said when she found out.

In the afternoon, we saw another ominous sign. Some mountain goats appeared on the roofs of the houses, in the part of the ages, as in Auden's poem about the fall of the Roman Empire. According to Uncle Jeremías, together with the suspension of the San Isidro festivities, it was a bad omen.

At night, above Budo head, I thought I saw a strange light. David, the town schizophrenic, who they call The Abductee, ran down the street saying it was the UFO of the same aliens who had taken him thirty years ago.

His father came out, slapped him, and brought him home again, but I couldn't sleep.

I left home first thing in the morning to see if the goats would return.

I am a rational guy. I am not a fan of the narrow and sterile Western worldview, naturally, but I consider myself a down-to-earth, practical person, the typical simple man concerned with the most pressing problems of humanity. However, at that moment I wondered if John Gray and Thomas were right, who, seeing the goats the previous afternoon, had shouted:

"The catatombe!"

I thought maybe there was no other way. It seemed clear that the world would end before my term as mayor. That is, the world as we had known it. How would the collapse of globalization, the mistrust between the United States and China affect La Cañada, with the consequent effects on the production and distribution chains? I was in the Well of the Ages and suddenly I found another meaning to the name: I was at the sinkhole of history. The performative value of language assails you when you least expect it. Could the names of the places end up becoming a speech act of destiny, alien to the typification of JL Austin? What would remain of our world after the pandemic? He procés, but what else?

Then the phone rang.