“An octopus sucked her dry.”
“No,” Tirsa said slowly and with sorrow. “Victoriano beat her up, then killed her. And he’s coming to take another one of us with him.”
That same night, they heard him come near, invisible in the dark. When the air turned rancid and they heard femurs and tibias clatter, Alicia and Tirsa came out to face him, pushing their big pregnant bellies ahead of them.
“You are a murderer, and you’re not coming into the house.”
“I can go in anywhere I want to, because now I am the governor.”
The clouds that were hiding the moon parted like a curtain, and a chalky light spread over everything. They were then able to see the ferocious aspect of the tattered leper pirate: he had three daggers tucked under his belt, a rifle in bandolier, and he was wielding a heavy club.
“Why did you kill her?”
“I killed her for being a disrespectful lazybones. Now I am the governor, see. I’m in command, and all the women are mine for whatever I want. I’ll take you two with me after you give birth.”
“You will pay for your crimes, Victoriano,” Alicia threatened.
“Oh really, ma’am. And who will make me pay? You?”
“Justice, when we are rescued.”
“Nobody is going to come, and if they do, I’ll kill all of you first, so there will be no tattletales left. If you don’t want a beating now, don’t stand in my way, because I’m going in.”
With a hard swipe of his left arm, he broke into the house and grabbed Altagracia. He jostled her, brought her down, and dragged her by the hair. Her long, blue-black, shiny hair.
“I’m taking this one with me,” he said, “so she can cook for me and be my woman.”
He walked away, tottering painfully on his shaky legs, with Altagracia on his shoulder. Eyes closed, ears and mind closed in order not to see, not to hear, not to feel, she let herself be carried like a sack of flour. Her hair was dragging, sweeping the floor and leaving a track through the pebbles and seashells.
A few hours later, Alicia went into labor prematurely. It was a baby boy, ethereal and fragile like a sigh, and no one doubted that such an angelical face would soon return to heaven. In order not to let him be held back halfway there, suffering in purgatory, they baptized him immediately with water on his head and salt on his mouth, and they named him Angel Miguel after Ramón father. Alicia was not even able to breast-feed him.
“You’re so anguished the milk cannot come down,” Tirsa told her.
The baby was kept alive with teaspoonfuls of coconut water and booby egg whites until Tirsa’s delivery. She had a baby girl, big and strong, and named her Guadalupe Cardona. Tirsa breast-fed both babies and neither was ever satisfied. They cried all the time. Lupe screamed loudly, and the boy squealed like a sick little bird. But neither wanted to die, and both consciously clung to life.
Alicia and Tirsa knew that the time had come to face Victoriano. They had some weapons, a few guns and regulation rifles, but no ammunition. They had run out of that years before.
“It is as useless as still keeping your mother after she’s dead,” Tirsa commented.
In spite of his condition, Victoriano was still powerful and an excellent shot. Adversity had made him evil, cruel, and fierce. He presented a terrible challenge for them, like an unconquerable mountain.
“We must kill him, no matter what. It’s our duty.” Tirsa was really firm on this.
“Our only duty is to stay alive, for the sake of our children,” Alicia countered, equally firm.
Their disagreement and their fright paralyzed them, and even though they were overwhelmed by the certainty that for Altagracia each minute could be her last one, they spent evenings discussing what to do, but without taking any action. They finally found a compromise. They would try to kill him, but without risking getting killed by him.
“Poison,” Alicia said, running in search of whatever remained of Ramón’s pharmacy. Most of the bottles were broken, empty, or dry, but the blue flask she was looking for was intact. It had never even been opened. It still had its original labeclass="underline" “Agua zafia (Arandula vertiginosa),” and Arnaud’s handwritten red label, which read, “Potentially lethal,” and included instructions for its use: “One drop dissolved in a half cup of water taken after meals, good for heartburn; two drops, at eleven, improves appetite; five drops, excellent aphrodisiac; ten drops taken daily, great tonic for the heart, prolongs life; but thirty drops taken at once endanger it; two tablespoons of agua zafia will kill anybody.”*
They needed Altagracia’s complicity, and they were looking for a way to communicate with her without Victoriano’s knowing. They discovered that the best time was early in the morning while he was in deepest sleep. They found Altagracia turned inward; protected, aloof, and untouchable in the fortress of her dreams.
“Is he hurting you much?” they whispered, not to wake up the man.
“He only hurts my body,” she answered, “because my mind thinks of the one who loves me, and it escapes with him very far away from here.”
“The memory of your German fellow saves you,” Alicia told her, “and you are the one who is going to save us.”
They prepared two full tablespoons of agua zafia dissolved into a thick fish soup and explained to Altagracia that for him to die, she had to make him eat it. That she should not taste it, not even a sip. She could tell him she had prepared it especially for him.
“He’s not going to believe me,” protested Altagracia. “I don’t cook for him, even when he hits me for it.”
They convinced her, embraced her, gave her their blessings, and returned home. For the following two days they had no news, either from Altagracia or from Victoriano, and they tormented themselves with the possibilities.
“He must have swallowed only enough for the dose to be an aphrodisiac, and he’s going to come now and rape us all.”
“Or maybe he took the dose that prolongs life, and then not even a bolt of lightning could touch him.”
“Or the poison opened his appetite, and he wants more soup. ..”
On the third day he reappeared, furious like a wild beast, more haggard and horrible than before because, he growled, he had eaten the soup and kept vomiting, nonstop, for three days. He beat up all the women, dragged them by the hair, and then took away all the rifles, guns, tools, and even kitchen knives so that they could not use any of them against him.
“Bitches, you wanted to kill me! I’m going to kill you all, and save your tender daughters for later. I’ll teach them to love me while they are still young, and not to stab me in the back.”
One day Alicia woke up quite determined. She could find no rest after Victoriano had threatened the girls. She had a responsibility, even though it meant doing something horrible. At dawn, she prepared her children’s breakfast. She wrapped Angel in a rebozo and slung him on her back as the women had shown her. She grabbed Ramón by the hand and called Alicia and Olga.
“Where are we going, Mom?”
“To the southern rock.”
The children were happy, remembering the times their father used to go on outings with them. Though their mother did that frequently now, it was not the same. When they got to the top of the rock, she would stand at the edge of the cliff in utter silence. She did not show them the stars, as he used to, or talk to them about the direction of the winds. She just stood there, lost in thought, while they played. Then suddenly she would say, “Let’s go back home, children, our excursion is over,” and it was of no use to plead with her to stay a little while longer, or to ask her to let them go down to the bottom of the rock through the center hole. But it didn’t matter: they were happy to go anyway.