The People of Paper

The opening story of this chapter concerns Baby Nostradamus, whose mother has died and who has been adopted by Apolonio. Baby Nostradamus communicates with Little Merced through telepathy and teaches her how to shield her thoughts. The shielded thoughts are represented by redacted sections of text.

Meanwhile, in addition to her paper body wearing away from friction, Merced de Papel catches fire. She puts out the fire but must patch herself back together. It is a crude repair, but now her skin changes “with the news of the world” because she has used the Sunday edition of the newspaper for her repair (164). Later, Merced reflects on the many lovers she has had. All of them suffer paper cuts and are scarred by their experience with a paper woman; however, she “never underst[ands] the contrived melancholy of those she had dismissed, or their insistence on sending her letters years after they had parted” (168). The men were often cruel, and their letters and gifts are performative, saying more about the giver than the recipient.

In the same chapter, Smiley watches Federico and Froggy play dominoes and declares that dominoes is an absurd game. He quits the EMF.

This chapter has only three short paragraphs and is directly connected to the previous chapter and the letters sent to Merced de Papel. Saturn sends a letter to Cameroon, although he has no idea where she is.

In a first-person narration, Apolonio describes the Church of Thieves, where everything is bolted down and the thieves are so daring that they even steal the shoes off people who do not double knot them. Apolonio says that he comes to the Church of Thieves “because [he] was a fugitive from the Church, wanted for failing to report the apparition of the Virgin of Trinidad and for being a curandero” (175). Although this church only loosely follows Catholicism, Apolonio is uneasy. He has brought the Baby Nostradamus to the church to be baptized in accordance with the wishes of the baby’s fortune-telling mother, who has died, leaving the baby in Apolonio’s care. The Cardinal charges the baby to only prophesize prosperity and righteousness.

Nothing appears in this one-page chapter except a drawing of three bass clef staves without musical notes. The musical score bears the name “The Ballad of Perfidy.” A note under the title calls this “[t]he silent hymn sung on the days of cold and bees” (179).

The text returns to the three-column format, and Saturn and Little Merced resume their positions narrating the first two columns. The members of the EMF, who have returned to living under lead and shielding their thoughts, fall ill from lead poisoning. Saturn has returned to watching them, but the EMF members, including Federico de la Fe, must remove the lead from their homes to survive. They have not won the war after all. Apolonio is able to cure them of their illness with the help of Little Merced, who is the first to recover.

Little Merced is learning to shield her thoughts. She finds herself growing in resentment not only toward Saturn but also toward the readers of the novel. She hates that they can see her father engaging in his addictive self-burning, and she does her best to protect him. More and more of Little Merced’s columns are obscured under black rectangles. However, she reveals that she knows that the real reason her mother left them so many years before was because she fell in love with another man. She does not share this information with Federico.

Froggy comes up with a new strategy to fight Saturn. He believes that they must no longer hide and shield their thoughts but instead speak out against Saturn and push him out of the book.

This is another very short chapter, comprising of lists of “Metric Conversions” from Smiley’s notebook, entries from the Bible, and passages from the imaginary The Book of Incandescent Light. The last entry reads, “a phone call in which she says I don’t want this book to ruin my life = It won’t, he says” (194). The implication is that the real-life Liz has telephoned Plascencia.

Little Merced dies of citric poisoning, an overdose resulting from her addiction to limes. Everyone grieves her death, and Federico de la Fe writes a letter to Merced to let her know that their daughter has died. However, Little Merced only remains dead for five days. When she is resurrected, the nun who has been saying the rosary over her wants to report the miracle to the Vatican. Froggy threatens her life to prevent this.

Meanwhile, Merced de Papel is in a car wreck and dies. The men who memorialize her ensure “that the soul of Merced de Papel, a soul that took the shape not of a dove but of an origami swan, [is] safely received by the soft hands of the Holy Mother” (201). The chapter concludes with her creator Antonio’s memory of her walking out of the factory where she was made.

In a two-page chapter, Federico de la Fe narrates from the first-person point of view. Little Merced, although resurrected, still smells like death. The only thing Apolonio can recommend for her is to chew mint leaves and rose petals. Federico also consults with Apolonio about the likelihood that Merced will return to him. Apolonio says sometimes women return on their knees to ask for forgiveness and sometimes they never come back. Federico works on his lawn so that it will be soft and easy on Merced’s knees should she return.

In this chapter, Plascencia experiments further with the format and typography, beginning with three columns narrated by Saturn, Little Merced, and Froggy. Saturn receives a postcard from the EMF addressed not to Saturn but to Sal Plascencia. It is the first blow in the next EMF assault on Saturn. The EMF has learned that silence is not the way to fight Saturn and that using their voices will be more effective. As a result, many narrators begin crowding the pages of the chapter, sometimes in very short paragraphs and sometimes sideways on the page.

Sandra reports that she has knocked on Liz’s door. When Saturn hears this, he turns away from battle preparation and begins to write Liz a love letter. Meanwhile, virtually every narrator who has appeared in the novel up until this point, even the monks from the Prologue, take a turn at narrating the story. As their voices crowd the page, Saturn gets pushed to the margins and begins to disintegrate. The blue sky above El Monte begins to crumble away. The Legal Counsel for the Landin Foundation withdraws funding and writes that they are not responsible for the war or any injury it might have caused. The last voices in the chapter are those of Ralph and Elisa Landin, who say, “And if we had learned anything from this story it was to be cautious of paper—to be mindful of its fragile construction and sharp edges, but mostly to be cautious of what is written there” (219). These comments serve as a summary of sorts about the power of language and storytelling.

The Pope sends Cardinal Mahony to his posting at the Church of Thieves under the crumbling and collapsing sky. “Shreds of Saturn” fall on Apolonio (223), who finds himself the subject of Vatican scrutiny. Cardinal Mahony and Vatican troops raid his shop and excommunicate Apolonio.

Meanwhile, Cameroon discovers that she has been killed off in the novel to become food for fish. This makes her very angry, and she composes a postcard “addressed to Saturn” but calling him “many different names: Salvador, Sal, Chava, and […] other names, crude, but deserved” (226). Like Liz, she resents being made a part of the novel. She knows that, as the author, Plascencia is a dictator and can make the characters do whatever he wants them to do.

The last chapter of the novel opens with a long letter from Jonathan Mead to his daughter Cameroon, whom he has sought but been unable to locate. He refers to the creation of Adam and Eve in the country of Cameroon. Like Adam, Jonathan imagines that he has been exiled from Eden, and he begs Cameroon to let him return.

Amidst the cacophony of narrative voices, Saturn identifies himself with Samson and the wreckage of Samson’s temple with the wreckage of his writing. The sky continues to fall and break apart. As he attempts to reconcile himself with his characters through love, Saturn begins to grow stronger. Baby Nostradamus speaks to him for the first time and says, “It is Saturn who wins the war” (241).

Back in control of the novel, Saturn thinks of Liz with love and imagines a future where she returns to him. In the last paragraph of the novel, Federico de la Fe and Little Merced “walk[] south, and off the page, leaving no footprints that Saturn could track. There would be no sequel to sadness” (245). Thus, the novel and Plascencia end the sadness.