After a quick breakfast, the long wooden table is cleared and wiped clean, ready to receive the corpse of the victim, a poor ignorant innocent. Little light enters the musty kitchen where all the meals are taken together. Through the side door near the orange tree, heavy with fruit (like a Christmas tree with the bulbs switched off) dark, agitated shadows can be seen. The early morning sun is just beginning to draw out a thin sweat. A band of young campesinos, brandishing various tools of destruction, like conspirators planning their attack on a hated dictator. Suddenly with a cheer they break up and head off in search of the appointed offering. There is a pagan gleam in their eyes, a wild joy as the pig with its front trotters tied together, is dragged by its hind legs through the grass to the execution spot. The string is then removed as a jeering circle is formed around the creature, a large meat knife catching the morning light, an axe, someone with a small revolver. Meanwhile the wood collected earlier has been piled up to make a fire, the flames of which are now licking upwards, crackling; and a huge bowl containing oil is placed over the fire in preparation for the chicharron to be fried. The pig watches these pro ceedings with unease and while the boys are lost in their own excitement it spies a gap and makes a bolt for freedom, heading downhill and through a hole in the fence. The fence, however, is no guarantee of political immunity; the boys chase after it, one grabbing its tail and a fierce struggle ensues (amid panic stricken squeals) to get the pig back through the hole in the fence. The revolver is placed by its head, fired and echoes in a shout of glee from the boys which dies almost as rapidly as the pig’s legs give way: it is all over.