Summary

The story begins with Pepe the Cop reflecting on his name: “it’s like tossing affection and fear, desire and abuse into the same dark bag” (45). He reflects that he was “one of Josephine Singer’s nephews” (46). As a police officer, Pepe wanders the sewers and drains. He reflects on how few rats have an artistic or musical sensibility: “if, for example, a poet or even just a reciter of poetry comes along,… we pity them because we know that they are condemned to solitude” (48). Pepe reflects that he and the other rats live in “a collective, and what the collective depends on is, above all, the daily labor, the ceaseless activity of each of its members, working towards a goal that transcends our individual aspirations” (49). His aunt Josephine was the greatest artist of their kind.

One day, a young rat named Elisa...