The Angel’s Game, by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Standing behind the high altar in Prato Cathedral last week, binoculars trained on a fresco some 40 feet above, I found myself puzzling over a barely discernible detail in a scene of the nativity of St Stephen. At the foot of the new mother’s bed a winged figure, knees bent in a gesture of tender genuflection, cradles in his left arm a haloed baby. With his right he touches another baby, swaddled like the first, and lying on a crib. The angel — as he appears to be — has a sorrowful expression, and is an attractive dark green, like the patination of an ancient bronze. Slowly, other details emerge from the gloom to disturb the first engaging impression: he has no halo, his feet are clawed and he sports a tail.
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