The Clouds (14 page)

We left, then, at dawn on the first of August, 1804. If anything, of the many incidents, difficulties, anomalies—or however you'd like to call them—that made up our travels—if anything, as I said, could sum up what was to come, perhaps the absurd fact that inaugurated our journey would be enough: Namely, while our destination lay to the south, our caravan started off north, and we had to travel that way for a few days before veering west to seek our true course. The party from Asunción had been forced to backtrack across the Salado River a bit farther northward, as it splits into two branches near the mouth, and both were equally flooded, turning the entire region into an expanse of water two or three leagues wide, rendering it impossible to make out the riverbed. When he came across the flood, Osuna had explored the field upstream to find a relatively dry patch, narrow and sandy enough for canoes to pass through. For that reason we had to first head north past the fork in the river, farther up the floodplain, to the winding places that stalled the current, and, after a less-than-easy crossing, bear west for a stretch, only then to return south, swinging parallel to the water several leagues inland. There, according to Osuna and others who knew the region well (though not quite as well as the
usual post-road), without too much difficulty we would cross the endless line of streams, brooks, and rivers that cut across the plain from west to east and flow into the currents of the Paraná.

Although horses, not oxen, drew the covered wagons, we inched forward: First of all, in the wake of those steady rains, the state of the roads—if the winding tracks we followed in open country could be called roads—hindered our progress; but at the outset, our convoy was to have consisted of a fleet little group of carts to advance along the line of outposts that hugged the river, a few leagues from one to the next, until at last we reached the white building at Las Tres Acacias ten or twelve days later. However, I must admit that our convoy instead became an unwieldy caravan, lagging and long, slowed by perpetual indecision like a clumsy, hesitant snake, whose belly and tail each fancy themselves as much in charge as the head. I do not mean to say that any one member of the convoy, sound of body and mind (if, under the circumstances of our crossing, such a phrase still held meaning), tried to replace the deliberative triumvirate formed by Sergeant Lucero, Osuna, and myself, to which we sometimes added an Indian who accompanied the troops. Rather, I mean that in such a large group of people, thirty-six altogether, everyone's desires could not very well go hand in hand at every moment of a journey that announced itself from the start as lengthy and difficult.

Apart from the six wagons, one for each patient plus my own, driven by cart-men from the transport company that would return them from Buenos Aires to Asunción with different cargo, there were two more carts designated for our needs en route. One was a sort of grocer, general store, and galley, whose proprietor, a Basque man who had spent years trekking across America, had actually made a living from his mobile warehouse. As he told me one night, he would accompany troops of soldiers, merchant caravans, or simple travelers to Brazil, Paraguay, or Santiago in Chile, from the
other side of the mountains. He had all manner of wares in his cart, which had a raised side-panel supported by an iron rod that hooked around to the opening's lower edge, which could tilt over the outside almost like wings, leaving real shelving and a narrow counter in view, over which he sold
yerba mate
, sugar, sponge cake, brandy, wine, tobacco, thread, buttons, and much more, or if those wouldn't do, on the counter were an assortment of drinks and bits of cheese or sliced meats. In one corner of the wagon he had his bunk, and a little mirror hung on the wall where he would take pains to shave every morning. Many in the region, and likely in the south of the continent, knew of him, and according to Osuna, he'd grown rich from usury. In the other cart traveled three women who first had me believe that they were the wives of three soldiers who always brought them along on deployments. Once the trip was underway, though, I realized they were prostitutes, and that the three soldiers who had been passing as their husbands were common pimps. Sergeant Lucero explained that such women following military companies on the plain were a common sight in the region, and that sometimes they might really be wives, or even both at once. Resigned to how easily I'd been duped, I thought how what perplexed me would have charmed Dr. Weiss, as that wife-harlot combination the sergeant spoke of was, in a way, the incarnation of his ideal woman. One of the three was French, and blonde to boot, and she stood out from the other two who had dark skin, high cheekbones, straight black hair, with aquiline features that made them look so much like serving girls or, if you prefer, like Egyptian queens and goddesses. Despite her fair hair and skin, it did not initially occur to me that such a woman might come from France, but she overheard me correcting Troncoso's abysmal French one day and approached me with the unmistakable accent of the Parisian working-class. This was a curious experience for me, as the words she uttered felt out of tune with
the countryside, even as they gave me the chance to practice the language of Rousseau and Buffon in the middle of the desert. She came to my cart several times to relay the wild adventures that had led to her current situation, but after two or three conversations the versions began to differ, so I doubted their truthfulness. Our bond was broken altogether when one day, on the fourth or fifth visit, she hinted that she was actually working, and that I ought to pay for the time we had spent in my cart as if such visits were professional ones. That shameful moment could have incensed me, but it became clear that, though outward circumstances do indeed shape our lives, there is always something within us that makes us lose sight of those circumstances and colors them with our perceptions—and our perceptions, though we never realize it, are tarnished by pure delirium. (Speaking of those three women, I must say that they were trounced on their own ground by Sister Teresita; she visited them often at first, but they came to spurn her for what we might term
unfair competition
. My French confidante came to tell me one day that she'd stumbled onto the little nun with two soldiers, lying among the grasses some distance from camp. She was aghast, shaking her head and repeating at every turn:
Tous les deux, monsieur, tous les deux! Ce n'est pas malheureux?
When I told the story one night back at the Casa de Salud, Dr. Weiss laughed, remarking:
One of the most surprising aspects of theology is the prodigious work theologians do to elaborate a system that has at its foundation an unutterable experience. Saint Thomas suspended the composition of the
Summa Theologica
, after all that sweat, the day he finally had a genuine mystical experience. Such an important fact as the certainty of the existence of the divine can dispense with any commentary. Theology, which is essentially political, troubles no one. Mysticism, on the other hand, is empirical theology, and I've always thought its practical application capable of sowing panic in the Church, in the Court, and in the brothel.
)

Our escort was made up of sixteen soldiers, with Sergeant Lucero to command them, and the Indian, Sirirí, a docile Mocoví whose two primary traits, I would say, were prudishness and hatred for Chief Josesito; the mere mention of him in Sirirí's presence darkened his face. The more unreasonable demands of the Catholic Church, which at that time were not taken seriously even in Rome, seemed to have found in Sirirí the proper soil to take root and flourish to the point of caricature. He did not drink, smoke, curse, nor swear in vain, and it suited him to cross himself on any pretext and kiss a little gold medallion that hung around his neck. Sergeant Lucero, who valued him because he was in fact a trusty guide as well as an interpreter, said—when Sirirí was not around, of course—that as a boy he had swallowed a catechism and had yet to finish digesting it. When he spoke of Chief Josesito, Sirirí's hateful expression became so disturbing that one began to feel kind toward the musical murderer, who, by contrast, at least displayed a certain humanity when he was drunk or set to playing the violin. Sirirí's principles, strict as they were, suffered many grueling tests over the trip, during which there was not only prostitution, alcohol, and violence to weaken his moral foundations, but also the addition of madness to dash the walls of the doorless, windowless building in which religion had caged his wild and fateful soul. Osuna, who was like two different people depending on whether he was drunk or sober, respected him by day for of his knowledge of the desert and loathed him by night.

We were a diverse and colorful convoy: One part of the escort went before us and the other brought up the rear. My carriage came at the head, and those of the five patients followed behind, then the Basque's warehouse, and finally the women's wagon. Of the carrt-dwellers, only Troncoso and I traveled by horse, he on his tall and skittish blue roan, so tense and lively it was nearly always reined in and ready to break into a gallop at any moment.
It seemed also to have contracted its rider's strange ailment, held in a state of exaggerated activity, morbid and unceasing. The escort soldiers did not wear uniforms, but dressed more capriciously, and though several tattered, faded military garments had made it into that ragged assemblage, the diversity of the rest ultimately caused it to lose all unity. From that haphazard motley, diametrically opposed to the careful design implied by the uniform, which seeks repetition, order, and symmetry, no doubt gave off an equally lively effect, especially from the colors and designs on the ponchos—solid, striped, dark or light, fringed or unfringed—that, in the desert's empty space, seemed to take on additional clarity, especially in those early days, when they swelled in the icy southerly wind or fluttered over the backs of their owners. The wagons shone dimly at first, too, as they had been cleaned, oiled, and partially repainted with the company colors by their own cart-men on their arrival from Paraguay. Following the last of the soldiers, a herd of fresh horses went meekly, driven by the horsemen who would take turns at the task. And, finally, ten or twelve stray dogs followed us with the same stubbornness, need, and eagerness as seagulls trailing a ship's wake in search of sustenance.

As a doctor, my primary responsibility was, of course, to busy myself with my patients, but as Osuna hinted, and I came to understand, the posture of a leader or master was expected of me, so I locked myself in my carriage to ponder how I might display that posture more clearly, concluding that the best way was to underline the fact that it was I who paid the expenses for our expedition, though I later realized that those ragged mercenaries we called our escort—some of whom barely understood a word of Castilian because they came from Corrientes and Asunción and their mother tongue was the native language, Guaraní—expected me to make the necessary decisions about the direction of our unusual caravan. As it was impossible for me to carry out that
duty without Osuna and the sergeant, I decided to adopt a distant and thoughtful attitude, delaying my response to their proposals and pretending rather to weigh the
pro
and
contra
of each before making a firm decision. I must say my farce yielded a far better result than expected, since the one who seemed to have the most doubts about my abilities, which is to say Osuna himself, turned out to be the most gullible of all. Many years later, he would still speak of me as a man of the plains, though never in my presence. In reality, I do not know if my authority prevailed because the wages were paid in the promised amounts and terms, or thanks to my professional reputation, for I was able to treat all the maladies those rustics endured over the long month of our trip with my little valet case of medical instruments and emergency remedies. Colds, diarrhea, scrapes, boils, insect stings, fever, back pain or hemorrhoids, or else old complaints, already bound to the bodies of their victims, flared up with the bustle of the trip, and not a single day went by in which one of those
gauchos
—thirty years later I use this word cautiously, although I know it has lost the somewhat insulting sense it had in those days—did not come to my carriage, embarrassed but helpless, to consult me.

We had barely left the city when, as I have prematurely mentioned, the evolution of young Prudencio Parra took an unexpected turn: I had found him completely prostrate in his bed, fist gripped tightly, gaze fixed upon the void, deep creases on his forehead and between the brows to give him that suffering and lifeless expression, and this gave way to a certain animation—as I dare call it only in comparison to the months-long, total stillness—whose singular feature was the series of movements he made with his hands, repeating them incessantly, even at meals, which he absorbed meekly and indifferently. He would sit up in his bunk, and, unbothered by the jostling, would begin his movements, which he could replicate for hours like a machine, every so often
casting a slow and serious glance at his hands, followed by the faintest of sad smiles.

He would extend the fingers of his right hand and then slowly contract them, until it gave his hand the look of a claw, though soft and never threatening; after a brief pause he'd continue the same movement until he closed his fist completely. And finally, when his fist had been closed for several seconds, his left hand would cover it and squeeze it hard. All day long, whenever anyone was present (since, mad or sane, it is difficult to know how a person acts when he is alone) he would make those gestures. While they surprised me at first, I came to think of them before falling asleep, and I realized that they were familiar to me, and, though I did not know why, this brought to mind the arcades of Alcalá de Henares one sunny spring noontime, giving rise to an agreeable sensation in me. When I woke the next morning and my mind, locked at night by the keys of sleep, opened to wakefulness, the first thing that awaited me was the answer to that mysterious sense of familiarity: In philosophy, we had studied Cicero's
Academica
, and as the exam period drew near, I went strolling down Alcalá's main street with a friend, memorizing that page where Cicero describes how Zeno the Stoic showed his disciples the four stages of knowledge: Fingers extended signified Conception (
visum
); when he folded them in a bit was Assent (
assensus
), by which Conception becomes patent in our spirit; then, with closed fist, Zeno tried to show how, by way of Assent, one arrives at Firm Conviction (
comprehensio
) of said Conceptions. And, in the end, raising his left hand to his fist, enveloping it and squeezing forcefully, he showed that motion to his students and told them that it was Knowledge (
scientia
). On remembering this, I leapt out of bed, and having dressed myself summarily, barreled down to young Prudencio's wagon where he, in that early hour, was asleep and peaceful-looking. His open hands rested palms-down on the gray poncho that covered him.
The Paraguayan soldier who had been an army nurse, and as such was entrusted with the care of the Verde brothers, and whose duty it was to look after the patients with another of his comrades, had ably tidied up the bunk. Again I noticed, as I had already several times in his home that, judging by the state of his bed each morning, young Prudencio's nights must have been restful indeed. I stayed, hoping he would rouse himself, for I was keen to observe him pass from sleep to waking, to see how the strange machinery of his hands would set itself in motion. After a long time, he rasied his eyelids, as was his custom, and if my presence startled him he made no sign of it. He sat up slowly in bed, eyes hooded, and, resting his back against the carriage wallboard, began to stretch out the fingers of his right hand, preparing his left in the air so that, when the first three movements of the cycle had been completed, the fourth, in which he covered his right fist with his left hand and pressed forcefully, might be performed. The points of the two ever-present bits of white cloth stuck out from his ears, for whenever anyone tried to take them Prudencio would howl piteously, forcing me to order his release. But the impressively sunken area from cheekbone to jaw, the recessed cheek, had filled out somewhat, and his face, still so pale, looked unquestionably rounder and healthier. As was customary, he made as if to ignore me, but something told me that, from the remote location where he had been inwardly secluded for several months to escape the tumult within himself and in the world, the remnants of his self, abandoned perhaps in the blackest corner of the universe, were broadcasting signs of life. That his movements were completely identical with the gestures that served Zeno the Stoic to enact the phases of knowledge for his disciples (according to Cicero), I had not attributed
a priori
to some inconceivable coincidence between the ravings of a sick boy and the imagery wrought by the father of the Stoics at the height of his faculties, as if logic and madness
might arrive at the same symbols by different roads—which can happen more often than one might think—but rather attributed it to the more easily explainable fact that in his period of avid and haphazard reading, young Parra might have one day encountered in a paragraph of Cicero, immediately making it his own, the explication of that inextricable world in whose disorder his fragile mind, astonished and terrified, had been awakened without knowing why.