“You’re not mistaken, Mister Coliqueo, at least as far as I am able to judge. I saw some of it in the few hours I spent in their court. But the picture you paint is too gloomy: the Huilliches seem happy enough, superstition or no superstition.”
“Good for them.”
“They have a particular devotion to personal hygiene.”
“To me, politics comes first. Hygiene is secondary.”
“Well, it all depends on what your definition of politics is. For example, I interpreted your earlier words as denigrating the weight that the politics of magic has for them.”
“That’s not politics, it’s hocus-pocus!”
“What if it works?”
“Don’t make me laugh! Do you think it means it’s effective, if their chieftain disappears into thin air in front of his subjects’ noses? They’re condemned to live in a system which is constantly feeding his lunacy. I’m sure for example that this latest episode has given rise to a whole series of laughable exorcisms by his shamans. They’ll climb yet another rung of the ridiculous. It’s effective in a kind of way, I agree, but it’s absurd. But tell me, who is it they suspect?”
“They weren’t blaming ghosts, I can assure you. They presumed — I have no idea with what degree of accuracy or truth — that it had been a woman. .”
“Rondeau’s Widow! I don’t believe it! They really can’t see beyond their own mad ideas, can they?”
“Is it such a remote possibility?”
“There is no possibility at all. To accuse the Widow is no more than hot air. It’s like saying that a story can become real just like that, because they say so. That’s a good example of their ‘effectiveness’ for you. They’re so far gone they take their own fantasies seriously.”
“What makes you so sure in this case?”
“Because the Widow came through here about a week ago, and she is concerned with other things; if her body — and I can swear to it — never came within a hundred leagues of Cafulcurá, her mind has been a thousand leagues away of late. She was going to join her daughter to celebrate her fifteenth birthday. And it’s not that I’m trying to excuse that viper, much less be her accomplice. On the contrary, I’d be more than pleased if they accused her, pursued her, and wiped her out. It would be one less problem. If I ever get my hands on her. .”
Clarke thought Coliqueo was contradicting himself, because he had just asserted that the Widow had paid him a visit only a few days earlier. He made no comment. Coliqueo had started up again, this time with one of his leading questions:
“Do you want to know what happened to Cafulcurá?”
“Of course.”
“One of his sons killed him: Namuncurá or Alvarito Reymacurá.”
“Well. . Namuncurá was not in Salinas Grandes.”
“Where else could he have been? He must have been hidden. They spend the whole time saying the same thing: that the ‘princes of peace’ chase women, that they pursue shimmering illusions like migratory storks. . It’s all lies. That farce about twins. The duck’s egg. The hare. The blue gallstone. Pure bunkum! That poor old man is probably paying for his sins buried somewhere on the outskirts of their camp. And his sons are about to gouge each other’s eyes out. What an edifying spectacle that will be!”
“Whose side will you be on?”
“Me? Nobody’s. It’s for them to sort it out.”
“Begging your pardon, your Majesty, but you said you were interested in foreign affairs. That’s quite logical. All the more so considering the fact that the Mapuche federation is in a state of organic equilibrium from Tierra del Fuego up to Córdoba. I don’t understand therefore how you cannot be concerned about the key element in that equilibrium, which is Cafulcurá.”
“That’s because I base my effectiveness on other premises. To be concerned about one individual thing is to lose sight of the whole. Take you, for example, what is it you do?”
At last he’s asking me, thought Clarke. “I’m an English naturalist.”
“A contemplative person?”
“To some extent. It could be said I practice an active kind of contemplation.”
“What area do you work in?”
“Animals, mostly. Although it’s impossible to rule out everything else, because Nature, as you just pointed out, is a whole.”
“Did I say that? Look, what do you think about the duck?”
“What duck?”
Coliqueo thought for a moment. Eventually he said:
“Cafulcurá is full of animal stories. He must have told you lots.”
“Some, but not all that many. One of his shamans told me more. .”
“Which one?”
“One called Mallén.”
“Is that cheap charlatan still around? I can just see him, forever
peddling his stale repertoire of worthless tricks. Goodness, what a sad lot they are. They’re caught in a mechanism where they can’t change any of the parts, because none of them is real. You’re a scientist: you see one animal for example, then another. . you make a note of the first, then the second, you think about it, you trust in the grandeur and variety of the world. But them. . what a difference!”
“They’re different cultures.”
“No, sir. That is to use the concept of culture as an excuse to sanction mediocrity, to persist in superstition and brutishness. They are like children, fascinated by their toys.”
By this point Clarke, a victim of his companion’s supreme self-deception, had come to regard him as wise and thoughtful. He yielded to this optimism:
“My position as observer, Mister Coliqueo, allows me to take advantage of whatever perspective the people I meet have adopted. The Huilliches’ is one of many. Yours is another, much more rational one. . ”
“Look, you and I understand each other. You wouldn’t have time to do a spot of work for me, would you? I could pay you well, and I’m sure your studies would benefit from it.”
“Well. . I’m in the middle of an investigation.”
“You aren’t looking for Cafulcurá, are you?” the chieftain asked jokingly.
“What work is it?”
“It concerns everlasting peace, no less. You would be performing a true service for these lands, with little effort, and at the same time it would remove you from that circle of nonsense which, whatever you may say, your Huilliche friends must have ensnared you in. I’m talking about reality, tangible things, things that can be thought about without a sense of shame. I suppose you have heard about the question of everlasting peace. The Mapuche federation, which has fought within itself for centuries, has finally brought the clearest of its logic to bear on that radiant point which is everlasting peace: the end of time, the dawn of life. Do you believe it’s possible?”
Clarke did not know whether to say yes or no.
“I’m glad you’re hesitating,” Coliqueo said, “because in fact the reply lies elsewhere. Did you believe those animal legends that Mallén told you?”
“Of course not.” How stupid of him! Clarke thought afterward. He had walked straight into the trap.
“Good for you. One of those legends is that of a duck’s egg with two yolks, from which will come two identical ducks, who will swim at dawn on a secret southern lake: and that will be the day of everlasting peace.”
A silence. Clarke had not the faintest notion of what was coming next.
“Well, the job I had in mind is for you to get that duck’s egg for me. With all your knowledge, and with time at your disposal which I don’t have because of all the problems I have to contend with here, and above all with a mind like yours free from prejudice, you’ll find it in no time. And then I’ll be the true emperor.”