“‘Don’t shoot him,’ I said. ‘He obeys me. Tony, go home,’ I begged more than ordered him, pointing down the path toward the cabin, and this blessed Tony obeyed, lucky for him.”
“This same dog?”
“This one.”
“An obedient dog.”
“That was four years ago, the same day they took Marcos Saldarriaga.”
“Who could have imagined it, the very same day? Nobody told me that.”
“Because I never told anyone, to stay out of trouble.”
“Of course.”
“After walking all night, when it was starting to get light, we stopped in that place they call the Three Crosses.”
“They took you that far?”
“And I saw him there, sitting on the ground, Marcos Saldarriaga. They took him further, not me.”
“And how was he, what did he say?”
“He didn’t even recognize me.”
Maestro Claudino’s voice is pained:
“He was crying. Remember he is, or was, pretty fat, twice the size of his wife. He just couldn’t go on. They were looking for a mule to carry him. There was a woman as welclass="underline" Carmina Lucero, the baker, remember her? From San Vicente, Otilia’s town. Otilia must know her, how is Otilia?”
“The same.”
“That means she’s still well. The last time I saw her was at the market. She was buying leeks, how did she cook them?”
“I don’t remember.”
“They took the baker too, poor thing.”
“Carmina?”
“Carmina Lucero. Someone told me she died in captivity, after two years. I still didn’t know who they were, whether they were guerrillas or paras. Nor did I ask them.
“The one in charge reprimanded the boys.
“He said: ‘Morons, what did you bring this old guy for? Who the fuck is he?’
“‘They say he’s a healer,’ one of them said.
“So they do know me, I thought.
“‘Healer?’ the one in charge yelled. ‘What he wants is a doctor.’
“‘He?’ I thought. ‘Who is he?’ Must be someone in charge of the one in charge.
“But at that moment I heard the one in charge tell them: ‘Get rid of this old man.’
“And when he said Get rid of this old man a boy put the muzzle of his rifle to the back of my neck. That’s when I felt as you did a little while ago, Ismael.”
“That I was dead.”
“Thank God I still had the strength to be grateful that it wasn’t a machete on my neck, instead of that rifle. How many have they just slashed without even giving them a coup de grâce afterward?”
“Almost all of them.”
“All of them, Ismael.”
“It must be better to die of a gunshot than by machete. How was it they didn’t kill you?”
“The one in charge said to the boy: ‘I didn’t tell you to kill him, idiot.’ He said that, thank God. ‘He’s so old he’ll save us a bullet, or the effort,’ he said. ‘Get lost.’
“‘In any event,’ I answered him, and I still don’t know why I opened my mouth, ‘if I can help in some way, I won’t have come all this way for nothing. Who needs curing?’
“‘Nobody, old man. Get lost.’ And they kicked me out.
“I was starting to find my way, to come home, when they ordered me to return. Now the boys took me to where the ill man was, the real big boss. He was some way off lying in a tent. A girl, in military uniform, on her knees, was cutting his toenails.
“‘So?’ the boss said when he saw me arrive. ‘You’re the healer.’
“‘Yes, sir.’
“‘And how do you heal?’
“‘Tell them to bring an empty bottle, and urinate in it. There I’ll see.’
“‘The boss burst out laughing. But a moment later he became serious.’
“‘Take this skeleton away,’ he shouted. ‘What I can’t do is piss, for fuck’s sake.’
“I wanted to propose a different remedy, now that I knew what was wrong, but the man gestured with his hand and the girl who had been cutting his nails pushed me out of the tent with the butt of her rifle.”
“And they put a gun to you again?”
“No,” the Maestro’s voice turned bitter. “The boss missed his chance for help.”
“And what happened to Marcos Saldarriaga?”
“He stayed there, crying, and him such a proud man. It was pitiful. You couldn’t help but notice, not even the woman from the bakery was crying.”
I stopped. I wished I could do away with my leg. I wanted to be rid of that pain.
“Up, up, Ismael,” the Maestro said to me laughing. “We’re almost there.”
The cabin at last appeared around a corner, the light of a candle flickering in the only window, just when I was going to collapse on the ground, sleep, die, forget, whatever, anything not to feel my knee. He made me lie down in the hammock and went into the kitchen. I could see him. He put some roots on the stove to boil. I touched my face: I thought I was sweating from the heat. It was not the heat. At that hour, on the mountain — one of the highest in the range — it was cold. I had a fever. The dog would not let me sleep, he licked the sweat from my hands, put his paw on my chest; I’d catch sight of his eyes like two sparkling flames. The Maestro put a poultice on my knee and tied it in place with a strip of cloth.
“Now we have to wait,” he said, “an hour, at least.”
“Does Otilia know you came up here?”
“No.”
“Oh, she’s going to scold you, Ismael.”
And he gave me a gourd of cane liquor to drink.
“It’s strong,” I said. “I’d rather have coffee.”
“Absolutely not. You have to drink it, so your soul will sleep and you won’t feel anything.”
“I’ll be drunk.”
“No. You’re just going to have a waking sleep, but you must drink it down in one gulp, not in little sips.”
With trust I drank the contents of the gourd. I do not know how much time passed, nor when the pain disappeared, along with the swelling. Maestro Claudino squatted, looking at the night. His old tiple guitar was hanging on one of the walls. The dog had gone to sleep, curled up at his feet.
“It doesn’t hurt anymore,” I said. “I can go now.”
“No, Ismael. The best is yet to come.”
And he brought a stool up beside the hammock and made me stretch out my leg to rest on it. Then he stood astride my leg, but without putting any weight on it, just pinning it between his knees.
“Bite on a piece of your shirt, if you want, Ismael, so you won’t hear yourself scream,” and I shuddered, remembering his cures, which I had witnessed on occasion, but never experienced in my own flesh: dislocated elbows, necks, ankles, fingers, thrown-out backs, broken legs, and I remembered how his patients had screamed, how the walls had rocked.
As soon as I had clenched the sleeve of my shirt in my teeth his wiry fingers alighted on my knee like birds’ talons, felt around, recognized it and, all of a sudden, squeezed, grabbing the bone or the bones and I do not know when or how they opened and closed the knee, as if putting together the pieces of that puzzle of bone and cartilage that was my knee, that was me, worse than the dentist, I got as far as thinking, and though I bit the shirt I could hear my scream.
“That’s it.”
I looked at him stunned, trembling with fever.
“I should have another shot of liquor.”
“No.”
The pain had disappeared, there was no pain. Very gingerly I began to lower myself out of the hammock and, still not believing it, stood up and put weight on my leg. Nothing. No pain. I walked, from here to there, from there to here.