There the man sat, and lifted his gaze to look at him. . it was he himself, his perfect double, more like Clarke than Clarke himself, because he was wearing his clothes and smoking his pipe. An English traveler, a gentleman, whereas he stood there naked and dripping wet, looking like the most wretched of savages. He stammered out:
“What are you doing here?” What he would really have liked to ask was: “Who are you?”
“So you’re the Englishman?” the man identical to Clarke said. The latter nodded agreement, more with his gaping mouth than with his head. “I must excuse myself for taking your clothes, but I couldn’t find anything else to keep me warm. I’ll give them back straight away.”
“There’s no need.”
“. . But I’m warm now.” So saying, he took off the clothes.
“I can see you’re out on your feet. I’d heard you looked like me, but I didn’t imagine you were identical. We can talk tomorrow.” He stood up. The small fire on the ground threw up shadows on the tent walls flapping from the rain.
“You’re leaving?”
“There’s a battle going on out there! I’ve already lost enough time as it is.”
The other Clarke came up to the first; his voice was deep, worried, almost inaudible in the thunderstorm.
“The Widow can’t stand me.”
Clarke collapsed on to the floor, so groggy that it was worse than if he had already been asleep. The other man went out. Clarke fell into a deep sleep.
By the time he woke up, it was all over. As he later learned, the everlasting peace had been reestablished, on terms detrimental to the honor and finances of Coliqueo, who fled to seek refuge among his white allies. Every chieftain left taking his tribe with him, without even bothering to attend the celebrations organized in Salinas Grandes. Clarke woke up thirty hours after he had fallen asleep, all alone, on a splendid morning with a clear sky and with the sun shining at last over the wet plain. In fact, it was the sun that woke him, because his companions had dismantled the tent when they left. He could see no trace of Maciel, but was not surprised: hastily made friendships were the first to dissolve. He woke up slowly, thoughts drifting through his mind. He was not upset about having been forgotten, quite the contrary. Apart from feeling slightly hungry, he was fine; Repetido and his other ponies were grazing nearby. He supposed that everything was over; he could well imagine the outcome, and all he had to do now was to decide which direction to head in. The most logical thing would be to make for Salinas Grandes, but the idea of seeing more Indians was wearisome. Well, he would see. For now, he went to bathe in the stream, scraped the remaining grease off his skin, dried himself while smoking a pipe in the sun, then got dressed. His clothes were scattered on the ground, which meant that some at least of the confused memory he had of the stranger who was also himself had not been a dream. Yet it still might be. A second pipe. The birds were singing in the trees. Idly, he picked up a stone and threw it at a tree trunk. A mouse scuttled off, terrified. Clarke allowed his mind to roam aimlessly. His main feeling was a vague sense of shame, not so much for having charged about naked and smeared with grease at the head of crazy hordes of savages, but for all the rest, all the improbable things he had witnessed and accepted: ducks as big as people, impromptu throat-slittings, a drunk flying over his head, a column of warriors riding through underground tunnels, his double rising to meet him at midnight. . man, he philosophized, can get used to anything. . because he starts by getting used to taking reality for real. What if he tried fishing? In the shady waters of the stream he could see the moving outlines of some fat, long-toothed fish. He had some hooks in his saddlebags, but he would wager that the Indians had stolen them by now. It would be easier to shoot a brace of coots, but then he would have to pluck them. . but of course, he would have to scale the fish in any case. . sometimes at least there was something to be said for polygyny, having thirty-two, or at least seventeen wives.
Clarke was mulling over his choices when he heard the sound of galloping close by. He got up to see who it was. A skinny Indian with a troop of magnificent ponies behind him. As he drew closer, Clarke could see he was wearing clothes. Closer still, and it was Carlos Alzaga Prior, with a smile from ear to ear, and one of those ears bandaged. They each raised a hand in greeting at the same moment, and laughed nervously together. It was a pleasure to see the boy, despite all his craziness and his endless chatter, especially because the pleasure was mutual, and sincere. Carlos leapt to the ground and gave him an extravagant embrace, even though they had seen each other barely three days before.
“Vale, vale, salutis, Clarkenius!”
“Hello there, madcap.”
“Don’t pretend to be so cool! You’re a hero! You’re being talked about everywhere! You’re the new Hannibal!”
“Come off it. I’ve been asleep for I don’t know how many. .”
“You deserve it. And you haven’t got a scratch, as far as I can see. Have you been hiding in a gopher hole? Hahaha.”
“What about your ear? Did someone chop it off?”
“No, don’t worry. They overdid the bandaging, that’s all.”
“But what was it? A lance? If it was, it just missed your ideas.”
“No, no such luck. I’m ashamed to tell you. What happened was that I wanted to have my ear pierced so I could wear a ring, and the brute who stuck the needle in made a mess of it. You can’t imagine how it bled!”
Clarke lifted his eyes to the heavens. The two of them sat down on a bank strewn with violets which, after a week’s constant watering, gave off a strong perfume. It was then that the Englishman learned of the Vorogas’ surrender, of the armies going their different ways, of the celebrations that must by now be going on in Salinas Grandes, even though Cafulcurá had still not reappeared. Carlos had heard that Namuncurá had turned up though, and had taken control.
“So they don’t need me any more,” Clarke said.
“They’ll always need you, those blockheads.”
“Where did you get so many splendid horses from?”
“There was an amazing share-out! I made sure I laid my hands on a few, because I reckoned that a bohemian like you would be on his uppers by now.”
Clarke observed that Carlos was more grown-up, more self-confident, that he considered himself an adult, his equal, as he launched into his overwhelming stream of anecdotes.
“By the way, aren’t you the slightest bit hungry?”
“Ravenous. When you appeared I was just thinking of hunting or fishing something.”
“Don’t be so primitive! Do you take this for the Stone Age? I brought some roast birds, and I don’t know how I managed not to eat them on the way.”
“How did you know I was here?”
“Some Indians told me. Just as well I believed them, even though I’d seen you head off in the opposite direction.”
When he came back with the food, he asked curiously:
“Am I mistaken, or did you say you spent the whole of yesterday asleep?”