Jaime awoke naked in the forest clearing. Tralaf, next to the black rock, was playing something that looked like a violin: a bow of bone held by a single string of woven hair that he leaned against his upper incisors to play with another identical bow, making arise from the instrument a wail that was between human and divine. Jaime had never known that enormous feeling. His thoracic cage was beating as if his trunk had become a single heart. He felt he had no head, decapitated. He was viscera with arms and feet, nothing more. All his life he thought that he lacked sensitivity, that he was emotionally dead, but now he realized that he’d been asleep. Now he expanded, ceaselessly giving.
His spirit belonged to another world, outside of forms. He perceived everything as presences, energies, entities that had no relation to the size of the bodies in which they manifested themselves. An immense raulí tree mattered less to him than a baby eagle that landed on his shaved head. That was because the ancient tree bent over, transformed into a thin hair of violet light, while the bird gave off golden rays in all directions of space. He began to vomit coagulated blood. The Mapuche held his head.
“Like the tiger, you looked, opening your eyes halfway but choosing the fattest llamas. He who decides to live never again breathes the breath of Death. Since the war is over, you shall dance as long as you have heart. Good work, huinca. Cheer up: you returned from the zone of the ancient gods; you will no longer be the same. You will go on fighting, acquiring, but you will be from far off, because you know that everything is changing, fading, and that any tie is a trick.”
The gagging ceased, and Jaime, his stomach empty, without pain in his head, felt rested, tranquil, in peace.
“Thank you, Tralaf. Your drug has cleansed and enriched me. I’ll never go back to the circus. Something mysterious is asking me to go north. That there, at the far end of the nation, my realization awaits me.”
Obviously, it was I who, taking advantage of that magnificent occasion when my future father delivered himself to lunar reception, incited him to embark on that pilgrimage so he would again give me the possibility of being incarnate. Jaime dressed, bade a thankful farewell to the Indian, and set out on the return road. As he advanced along the narrow path, the virgin forest did not seem dark, dangerous, or strange. For the first time, he felt he owned the earth, with roots as deep as those trees that caressed him with a thousand different vibrations. He was going along like that, enjoying the openness of his senses, when a tremendous roar made him stop short. Right before him stood a puma showing him his teeth. Abandoning prudence, he turned on his heel to try a vain run. He collided with Tralaf.
“So the huinca thought he was leaving without paying me!”
“I’m sorry my friend, I had no idea. I came without money.”
“That I know. When you were out of your head, I checked your pockets. Zero! Nor did I find a bottle or two of pisco, which is the custom. You’re the kind that always thinks they deserve everything free. That the knowledge you give them, you get just like that without lifting a finger.”
“Forgive me.”
“Excuses are worth nothing. I spent a good part of my life suffering horrors to obtain what I gave you once. If you get it for nothing, what value will it have for you? Do you know how far I had to walk through the mountains to find that bark you ate? Try to catch just one leech. Find the cavern of the ancient gods. A lifetime wouldn’t be enough for you to reach it.”
“Calm down that puma of yours, please. Let me go. I’ll work for a few weeks and come right back to give you whatever I’ve saved.”
“If you know you have to give it, you’ll never earn any money. That’s how you huincas are. You hate to pay your debts.”
“Not me!”
“You’re lying. You’ve been lent a life, and you spend all your time complaining because someday you’ll have to give it up. If you don’t pay me right now, I’ll set the puma on you!”
The puma, as if to confirm the witchdoctor’s threat, came forward, growling, toward Jaime. Then it went up on its hind legs and rested its huge front paws on Jaime’s shoulders. With the beast’s huge maw in front of his face and its three hundred pounds resting on him, my father weakened and sank to his knees.
The Mapuche said, “Tüngn.” And the animal stepped back to leap onto the trail, sniffing the maqui bushes. Tralaf pulled a necklace of human teeth out of his jacket.
“I need one molar to make it complete. When I have it, I’ll be the owner of my soul. I’ll be able to enter and leave the huenu, the place of the spirits who know. Give me that tooth! You’ll be left with a hole in your gums and that will always remind you of the freedom you obtained.”
Jaime said nothing. He opened his mouth wide. The Indian chewed some herbs, spit them out in the form of a paste, coated the base of the molar with that green material, and then, tying it up with a little hair rope, pulled it out with one yank. Jaime, who had his eyes closed, suffered not one bit. When he finally raised his eyelids, neither the puma nor Tralaf was there.
Returning seemed easy; all he had to do was to follow the tracks he himself had made on the muddy path. Unfortunately, it began to rain. In a short while, the ground turned into a long puddle, erasing the path. When the rain stopped, a dense mist darkened the forest. Jaime began to walk without knowing where he was going. He walked for hours. A glacial cold hardened his wet clothes.
Worn-out, he finally found himself in an esplanade where a church stood. He ran to beg refuge. The three doors of the wide portico were locked, as were the windows. On both sides of the wooden building, the roof hung down, providing some protection. He stretched out there to rest on the dry ground. He slept deeply until the cold woke him. It was snowing. He could barely feel his feet. If he stayed there any longer, he would die frozen. With strength drawn from desperation, he kicked open the main panel of the central door and entered the nave.
Judging by the amount of dust that had accumulated, it was clear that no one had visited the place in a long time. Jaime undressed and used a small lace mantle that was spread over the altar to dry himself. Suddenly he felt he was being watched. From a corner, half-hidden by the semidarkness, a priest was watching him. My father, naked as he was, hiding his sex with his hands, walked toward the priest to apologize. He found himself facing a cast-iron Saint Francis, dressed in a wool cassock.
Laughing like a madman, he stripped the statue of its cassock and put it on. The wool heated him a bit, but the temperature went on dropping. He searched the church. In a small armoire, he found candles and matches. He broke up two chairs, piled the pieces on the altar, and made a fire. The heat lulled him. He sat down at the foot of the cross that was on the back wall and, accompanied by the serene gaze of the wooden Christ, went back to sleep.
A gust of wind came through the broken door and made the flames fly up. Jaime awoke in the middle of a fire. The avid flames were devouring the temple. Half of the roof collapsed. Amid sparks, flames, and tongues of smoke, almost blind, Jaime, who knows why, instead of escaping immediately, fought to pull off the wall the cross, which along with its Christ must have weighed more than a hundred pounds. Finally, carrying it on his back, he managed, with a few light burns, to make his way to the esplanade.
The building was a total loss. By daybreak, it had become a large rectangle of ash and blackened beams. As the sun rose, amid a deafening chorus of birds, the heat came. Jaime found himself clean shaven, dressed as a Franciscan monk, and without a penny. If he didn’t want to return to the circus, the only possibility he had to get some money was the crucifix. Then the thought came to him: