“I would never have doubted it,” the Indian said as he left.
The three white men were untied. The four Indians who had brought them did not comment on the situation beyond giving a few nervous laughs, then offering them a drink. Clarke refused, but when Gauna took one, he changed his mind. He felt relaxed, and even slightly amused at how nervous the gaucho was. He wondered what it would be like to meet a half-sister for the first time, and decided it must be even odder than meeting a full sister. In the latter case, the encounter would completely fill the gap, whereas if it were only half a relationship, the missing half would continue to cast its shadow. . Clarke’s mind drifted off into these somewhat irrelevant speculations. The three of them were seated comfortably with their backs against a rock; Clarke in the middle, Gauna sweaty and agitated on his right, Carlos on his left. Clarke realized Carlos was nodding off.
“If you’re sleepy,” he said, “go ahead and sleep.”
“Not on your life. I wouldn’t miss Gauna’s meeting with his sister for anything in the world.”
Clarke felt himself obliged to turn to his companion on the right and say: “If you prefer to see her on your own. .”
“No.”
The Indians had moved some distance away and were talking in whispers. The moon had passed through various changes, and was now high above the mountain, not because it had risen in the sky but because in the last stretch of their walk, when they had been tied up, they had traveled along the rim of an imaginary conical section, so they had almost gone right round the mountain. A vast landscape lay before them: a huge chamber of dark air, whose sides were mountain slopes gleaming brightly like silver, while above and below all was pitch black. But what was down below was in a kind of corridor which led the gaze back to the foreground, with moonlit slopes on both sides — none other than those they had seen in the first place. This nocturnal alternation of planes produced a pleasant sense of confusion.
The individual who had spoken to them earlier returned, together with a female figure; they realized it was not the Widow, although the half-light did not allow them to see her clearly. She was too tall, too formidable. The three men stood up respectfully. After exchanging a few words with the woman, the Indian hung back, and she came on toward them. When she was close to him, with the moon illuminating her fine, proud features, Clarke recognized her with the same leap of emotion as he had felt the first time he had caught sight of her. It was Juana Pitiley, Cafulcurá’s legendary wife. Their adventure was taking yet another unexpected turn. The three men thought she was going to come to a halt, but she kept advancing until she was only a few inches from Clarke, whom she was staring at intently. The Englishman was nervous, unable to move. He wondered if the woman was shortsighted. He thought that all her life she had been a queen, and so he should not be surprised that she behaved like one; he was an unusual object, and she saw no reason not to examine him closely. She was so near, he could not avoid studying her as well. There was something strangely familiar about her; she was too intense and beautiful, and he was compelled to lower his gaze. She gave a faint smile, and stepped back. Then she asked them to sit down again, and did the same herself. She sat opposite Clarke, whom she had not taken her eyes off. When she spoke, her voice was deep and soft:
“Mister Clarke, I believe?” Clarke nodded. “The son of Nehemias Clarke?” This was quite incredible, and presaged some fresh revelation. “I knew your father,” the woman said, “many years ago, in a place west of here. Is he still alive?”
“He died almost twenty years ago,” said Clarke.
“I’m sorry to hear it. We knew each other only for a few days, and in very special circumstances. But we were united by a gift I made him, and which I sincerely thought I would never regain. I suppose he never mentioned it.”
“No, he didn’t.”
“That was what he promised.”
His father had told him a lot about his adventures in the Americas, but Clarke had always had the impression that there was a blind spot in them, and this was what was being revealed now. Juana Pitiley sat in silence for a while, recalling those distant events. Then she raised her eyes and stared up at a point near the mountain summit. The Englishman kept his lips sealed; he knew it was not the moment to ask questions.
“It was many years ago, and right here.” She lowered her gaze, and stared once again at Clarke. “There’s even a legend, the legend of the Legibrerian Hare, which arose from what happened here thirty-five years ago. A month ago when I heard in Salinas Grandes that someone had come in search of the Hare, an Englishman who bore a supernatural resemblance to my eldest son, I could see it all, as if I had always been expecting it. The paths of fable are usually the most real ones.”
“And you,” Clarke said, with tremulous voice, “you conceived a child on the summit of this mountain. . ”
“Ah, I see you’ve heard the old story. Yes, this is where my wedding night took place. It was here I rescued my husband from his captors, it was these mountain sides we scoured in search of a place of refuge, which we found in the gap pierced at the top. When we came down the next day I was already bearing my offspring in my womb. You will also have heard of the lengthy flight that followed, and of the gap that there is in the story, when I became separated from my husband before I gave birth. He arrived alone at Salinas Grandes, thinking me dead, and I appeared a couple of months later with a child in my arms: Namuncurá. And I suppose they couldn’t resist insinuating what has by now become a common belief: that Namuncurá is not in fact my child, and so on. Since I had no more children, the logical thing has been to assume that I was sterile, but that since I needed to be the mother of a legal heir to strengthen my political position, I dreamt up this hare-brained scheme so as to pass a foundling off as my own son. I preferred to let this inept lie circulate rather than have anyone suspect the truth, which nobody has guessed at. . not even now.”
She fell silent for a long time. So long in fact, that it seemed as if her tale was over. Clarke did not dare move, speak, think, hardly even breathe. He held his breath for so long he almost passed out. A remote part of his brain, the most English part, was aware of the effect that Juana Pitiley’s words were having on the other two. Gauna seemed thunderstruck; Carlos Alzaga Prior was beside himself with excitement, and in anticipation of the great revelation was glancing first at Juana and then at Clarke, eyes shining.
“It was during that interval,” she said, “that I met the person who from that moment on became your father, Nehemias Clarke. I had just given birth, not entirely on my own as legend has it, but in quite primitive conditions. When I met him, I had already decided to give up one of the twins, and the possibility that he would be going somewhere far from me and all the Mapuches finally convinced me to give him the boy. He was a silent, modest, crazily romantic man. There was never anything between us of course (the fact that I was so recently a mother prevented all thought of that) but I could tell he had fallen in love with me, and without the slightest cynicism on my part (or at least so I believe), I understood that this love was a guarantee for my plans. I made him promise he would never tell the boy of his true identity, that he would bring him up in England, where his childless wife was waiting for him, and that he would never return to America. He left at once, and I can see he was as good as his word.”
The moonlight took on a fresh meaning for Clarke. He knew deep down that it was no longer a question of seeming ridiculous or not. He felt calm and collected again, in a way that left all confusion behind.
“So then,” he said, “ you are. . my mother.”