Jean-Marie Blas De Robles - Where Tigers Are at Home

“True,” Kircher said with a smile, “but such an unfortunate person would always be free to blame the machine itself, in which case its inventor would defend it by arguing that it was only designed for amusement & that God alone knows the purposes of Providence.”

“Indeed, my friend,” the Cardinal said, also smiling. “Still, out of pure curiosity I would very much like to see you try it out.”

“Your wish is my command, Monsignore. Now let us see, what question shall I ask this glass pythoness?” Kircher concentrated for a while, then his face lit up. “Does this toy, produced by my imagination to illustrate the secret powers of nature, have access to the truth? That is my question. I will therefore put it to the alphabetical sphere in order to get a written response. Caspar, a blindfold, a pen & some paper.”

I hurried to fetch the objects my master had asked for from a servant. Then I had to blindfold him &, after the Cardinal had checked that he could not see, sit him down facing the cursor. Athanasius moved it. All the little figures started to revolve jerkily. When, after a few seconds, they were back in balance, the Cardinal announced the letter “N.” I immediately noted it down, while my master operated the cursor a second time.

After a half hour of this, Kircher, exhausted by the effort of concentration it demanded, declared that he would stop there & removed his blindfold. Cardinal Barberini took the sheet of paper from me &, in a half-amused, half-sardonic voice, read out the following as if he were reading a verse from the Gospel: “natu ranatu ragau deth …”

“There, Reverend Father,” he said, handing the paper to my master, “is a perfect illustration of what I was saying just now. I’m afraid you are not quite in tune with the Universal Lodestone.”

Kircher frowned & I blushed for him, less at his failure — which was, after all, foreseeable — than at the prelate’s acid remark.

In silence, my master read again the sibylline text the machine had produced &, still without saying a word, calmly took up the pen, drew four lines on the sheet & handed it back to the Cardinal.

However, dear reader, if you want to learn the surprising consequences of this action, you will have to wait until the next chapter …

Once the gunboat had passed the nest of machine guns, the burst of fire became less accurate, then stopped: overconfident, the hunters only controlled the river downstream; the straight arm of the river, which widened out up to their camp, curved upstream of it, reducing the firing angle. It took a few seconds before Petersen realized he was confusing the hammering of the motor with the sound of automatic rifles. Recovering from the shock of the attack, he cautiously stood up. The boat was now out of range, but a plume of thick smoke was rising from the rear deck … the fire extinguisher! He dashed off toward the bridge, stumbling over Dietlev, who was lying on the floor, grimacing and groaning, clutching in both hands a bloody mass of pulp which he seemed to be trying to compress with all his strength … Herman swore silently, then leaned over the guardrail: “Up here, you two,” he shouted to Mauro and Elaine. “Dietlev’s been wounded, he needs a tourniquet. Get your asses up here, for God’s sake.”

Petersen continued on his way. The sheets of steel all around him were vibrating as if the whole structure were about to fall apart at any moment. “Slow down, you stupid bastard!” he yelled as he came to the wheelhouse. “Shut off the engine!”

Since Yurupig, paralyzed at the helm, didn’t move, he reduced the throttle himself.

The gunboat continued to make headway, wallowing in the water.

“Where’s Hernando?” Petersen asked, taking down the fire extinguisher. Almost simultaneously he saw the body of the Paraguayan: in the shadow on the other side of the wheelhouse, his eyes apparently staring in wonder into space, the man was lying on his back, his throat cut.

“I don’t believe it,” Herman stammered, feeling sick. “Fucking hell, what on earth got into you?”

Yurupig turned his head toward him, but just stared at him for a few seconds like a delirious priest, a madman on the edge of catalepsy.

“We’ll sort that out later,” Petersen said, all the more viciously, as he felt intimidated. “For now you leave it in gear and continue to go upriver slowly. Understood?”

Back on the rear deck, he wrapped an old cloth around his hand before opening the hatch to the hold. At the indraft the fire, which was smoldering under the deck, flared up, but Petersen sprayed the contents of the extinguisher on it until the blaze was put out. A piece of luck this old thing worked …

“Right, that’s that,” he muttered. Inspect the tanks once the smoke’s dispersed … For the moment he had to see to Dietlev. In a bad way, if you wanted his opinion .

Milton’s body, all twisted from the bullets, came to mind. He’d seen enough corpses in his life to recognize the improbable angle of death. He’d had it, he could wait …

“Herman!” Mauro shouted, running to meet him. There was urgency in his voice.

“What is it now?”

“A leak! Follow me, quick!”

Petersen followed him as he hurried to the top. One glance told him the extent of the damage: the water had reached the table in the cabin.

“The bastards, the fucking bastards! That was all we needed!”

“Get a move on,” Mauro urged. “Where are the pumps?”

“Too late. We’ll never manage to stem the inflow … We’ll have to run aground, and quick.”

Mauro grabbed Petersen by the arm. “The life jackets?”

“There aren’t any. Warn the others and let me get on with it, OK?”

Once back in the wheelhouse, Petersen took the helm from Yurupig and examined the river in front: on that section of the Rio Paraguay the right bank’s nothing but a marsh, a vast expanse of gorse and aquatic plants, impossible to land there; on the other bank, however — for a hundred yards at most — the whitish color of the water indicated shallows, alongside the forest. Wondering what was the best way of landing, Herman turned the wheel and accelerated to force the boat, already too heavy to be maneuverable, to point its prow in that direction. The gunboat was so slow to respond, he opened the throttle fully and headed straight for the sandbank.

WHEN PETERSEN CALLED for help, Elaine was still in a state of shock; huddled up in Mauro’s arms, she was drifting, immersed in a flood of disjointed images, her sole sensation that of her skirt wet at the crotch. Dietlev’s name in combination with a tourniquet had the effect of a slap on the face; on her feet at once, she rushed over to the gangway ladder, acting instinctively but determined to face up to the challenge.

“Go and find the first-aid kit,” she said to Mauro as soon as she’d examined Dietlev’s leg. “In trunk 6, with the maps … But do hurry, please!”

Without paying him any further attention, she undid her blouse and, with a trick only women can manage, pulled out her brassiere. She then proceeded to tie this improvised tourniquet around Dietlev’s thigh, fairly high up underneath his shorts, and pulled it tight until it stopped the spasmodic flow adding to the pool of blood around him.

“It’ll be all right,” she said, taking Dietlev’s hand.

Clenching his jaws, his face flushed with pain, he managed to sketch a smile. “It’s bad?”

“Impressive, that’s all. No need to panic.”

She kept her eye open for Mauro; finally she saw him coming back with the first-aid kit.