José Arcadio Segundo never finds out that his brother had shared Petra Cotes with him. Aureliano Segundo secretly is cured of his sickness separately from José Arcadio. He begs forgiveness from Petra Cotes and once they live with each other, their animals begin to proliferate at an alarming rate. A fortune is made by selling the extra animals and through raffles.
Aureliano takes advantage of his shared physical appearance with his brother in order to sleep with a woman. Furthermore, he neither informs his brother, nor the woman he "loves" that there he is a third party in the relationship. An interesting element of the passage involves Petra Cotes' name. Aureliano Segundo describes the entire situation and after the line "Aureliano Segundo obtained her pardon and stayed with her until his death" a new paragraph begins with "Her name was Petra Cotes". Aureliano Segundo's future with Petra is revealed to the reader before her name is. Does this suggest that her name is an unimportant detail according to the Aureliano? Considering Aureliano Segundo irresponsibly doesn't inform Petra that he and his brother are sharing her it is a possible assumption. Without respect for the truth, he may not have respect for the woman involved. A deeper level involved with Petra's name is that it means "rock" in Spanish. She could be considered the "philosopher stone" of the novel due to this association and her purpose in the story. Petra Cotes (the rock or stone) brings wealth to Aureliano Segundo. The philosopher's stone is a magical substance in alchemy which will cause the transmutation of metals (e.g. a plentiful supply of aluminum into gold), is a cure for all problems and can provide immortality. This substance, however, exists only in the imagination. It is relevant because Petra can propagate money (gold) by her supernaturally rapid animal breeding. Also related to the stone is Aureliano Segundo's preoccupation with alchemy prior to Petra's arrival, and his later obsession with making gold fish in his laboratory.