One Hundred Years of Solitude

Gabriel José de la Concordia García Márquez

   “Very well, my friend,?Jos?Arcadio Buendía said, “you may stay here, not because you have those bandits with shotguns at the door, but out of consideration for your wife and daughters.?
   Don Apolinar Moscote was upset, but Jos?Arcadio Buendía did not give him time to reply. “We only make two conditions,?he went on. “The first: that everyone can paint his house the color he feels like. The second: that the soldiers leave at once. We will guarantee order for you.?The magistrate raised his right hand with all the fingers extended.
   “Your word of honor??
   “The word of your enemy,?Jos?Arcadio Buendía said. And he added in a bitter tone: “Because I must tell you one thing: you and I are still enemies.?
   The soldiers left that same afternoon. A few days later Jos?Arcadio Buendía found a house for the magistrate’s family. Everybody was at peace except Aureliano. The image of Remedios, the magistrate’s younger daughter, who, because of her age, could have been his daughter, kept paining him in some part of his body. It was a physical sensation that almost bothered him when he walked, like a pebble in his shoe.
 
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