“Alta told me many times about her life in Clipperton, without hate, without regrets. She did not mind her sad past anymore because her present was so happy. She would talk about it because she liked to reminisce. She lived to an old age and was a bit crazy, but she was happy. Her life was like a fairy tale, with a lot of suffering, but a happy marriage afterward. I cannot tell you any more, because I had a brain seizure that made me lose my memory,” Guillermina Yamada tells me once more, wringing her beautiful hands.
Clipperton, 1916
TAKING HER LAST CHANCE against death, Alicia climbed to the lighthouse to make signals to the approaching vessel. She heard voices coming from below, from the beach. The rest of the women had already seen the ship and were frantically shouting for help. If we all see it, she thought, then it must be real. While she was waving the sheet, the idea of a rescue became a real possibility. Her father, Orizaba, a school for the children, and so many ghosts that had become parts of an abandoned dream were suddenly taking substantial form again. Nobody could keep that ship from reaching the shore. The only thing to do was to pray for time to pass quickly, to precipitate the end without her having to go through the preliminaries: the wait that burned her throat, the smarting anxiety that made her eyes hurt. This time nobody could prevent it, it was enough to extend her arm to reach salvation. Nobody would stand in the way. Nobody.
Except Victoriano Alvarez. Like a vulture flying low and hitting her with its wing, the thought of Victoriano threatening to kill all of them before they could be rescued — so they couldn’t denounce him — jolted Alicia like a bolt.
She let herself go downhill, running without looking where she placed her feet, without stopping, and still struggling to keep her body wrapped in the sheet, getting up quickly every time she stumbled, without feeling the sharp rocks cutting her ankles, her legs, her knees. After reaching her three children, she untied Angel from the sling on her back, and laying him down on a safe spot, told her son Ramón:
“Now you stay here and keep an eye on the baby and on your sisters. We might be rescued, but we’ll have to do things very carefully. Swear to me, Ramoncito, that none of you are going to move away from here until I come back.”
She kept on going down without waiting for the child’s reply. I always climb this rocky cliff full of reasons to stop living, and I go down again full of reasons to keep on living, was what came to her mind as she descended, half running, half sliding. She saw Tirsa trying to light a bonfire on the beach, surely in order to make signals, and she called her, catching her voice, not daring to shout. Victoriano’s lair was on the other side of the rock, and he should be there if he was still sleeping. She was afraid the wind would carry their voices and wake him up.
“Tirsa,” she said when she got close to her, “we must kill Victoriano. Right now, before he kills us.”
“He wouldn’t dare, the boat is too close.”
“Yes he would, because he’s insane. He will shoot us, as he promised, and then he will hide, or he will leave, he alone. Let’s go, we have no time to waste.”
“How do we kill him?
“I buried Ramón’s sword next to the house—”
“No, we can’t use that. It has to be something we can hide so he doesn’t see it. We better hit him on the head with a rock.”
They chose a medium-sized rock, sharp-edged, with a pointed end. They got close to the lighthouse lair and called Victoriano. Tirsa hid the rock behind her, and Alicia walked in Tirsa’s shadow. They could feel the irregular pounding of their blood, and everything seemed unreal, like someone else’s nightmare. Nobody answered, and they called again. Altagracia came out and said the man was not there. She had not seen the ship, nor heard the shouts. She was not aware of anything.
“Do you think Victoriano has found out?” asked Alicia.
“No, surely he hasn’t either. A while ago he took his harpoons and walked north to go fishing.”
“Will you help us, Alta? We’re going to kill him.”
“How?”
“Whatever way we can.”
“But look at your legs, Señora Alicia, you’re bleeding. You’d better wash first, and calm down. If he sees you like that, so nervous, he’s going to suspect your intentions.”
“That’s right,” Tirsa said, “to kill him, we have to trick him. We have to think this out better.”
“We have no time to think anything. We have to go and hit him, and that’s it.” Alicia did not want to say more and started walking. “If you’re not coming, I’ll go alone.”
Tirsa grabbed her arm.
“Do you want us to commit suicide at the last minute? Calm down, Alicia, you need a cool head. While you tempt him, I’ll kill him.”
“I tempt him? In five minutes? What do you want me to do?”
“You tell him you’ll marry him, or that he is looking very handsome, or you ask him to kiss you. Tell him whatever you want: you distract him while I hit him.”
“He’s not armed. He locked up the knives and guns before he left, but he left this out,” Altagracia said, and handed Tirsa the mallet Victoriano used to open coconuts.
They agreed that if they were going to speak to him of love, Altagracia should not accompany them. Alicia alone should face him, and Tirsa should sneak up later from behind. Altagracia should instead go and bring the children down, before they fell off the cliff.
Tirsa tied a rope around her waist to hold the mallet hidden in back while Alicia rinsed her legs in seawater and fixed her hair with her hand. They walked north as they discussed how best to approach him: together, alone, together, alone. Together. This continued until they saw him, about seventy feet ahead, sitting on the beach, with his reddish, corn-husk hair, his ashen skin, and his arthritic, bent legs. They slowed down, held and squeezed each other’s hand, and letting go, moved closer to him.
“He is going to know because when I speak to him my voice will tremble,” whispered Alicia.
“Your voice will not tremble when you speak to him, and my hand will not tremble when I hit him. All these months we have behaved like idiots. Now it’s time to act and do things right.”
Victoriano was baiting his fishing hooks when he sensed their presence.
“What do I tell him, Tirsa—” Alicia asked between her teeth.
“Anything, it doesn’t matter. Go on! Now!”
“Victoriano!” Alicia shouted. “I need to talk to you.”
“Go ahead, ma’am.”
“Aren’t you going to invite me to sit down?”
“Since when do you need permission to sit on the ground?”
“It’s something important, Victoriano.”
“Sit down, then,” and he made a pompous gesture with his arm, pointing at the sand.
“I’m coming to tell you that I want to marry you.”
“That you what?”
“That I want to marry you.”
“Oh, that’s good. Until yesterday we were ready to kill each other, and today, we’re ready to get married.”
“That’s true. We have been thinking, Tirsa and I, that since we are going to live out all our lives on this isle, it’s better we do it like civilized people and put an end to this war between you and us. I mean, for us to solve our problems peacefully.”