“Someone . . . help!”
The music and laughter inside the vessel were so loud nobody seemed to hear my pleas. The two of them were rolling on the ground again. Cristóbal’s body hit the railing.
I looked around for something I could use to hit the man. There was a lifeboat suspended by ropes not too far from us. I staggered toward it and climbed on the banister to reach the inside of the lifeboat. After another coughing spell, I grabbed an oar with both hands and hopped back to the deck.
Cristóbal now stood close to the edge of the ship. Something flipped inside my stomach when I saw him there, so close to falling into the immensity of the ocean. My assailant had somehow gotten a hold of the knife and stood in front of my husband, prodding at him with it. Only the handrail stood between the two of them. Cristóbal dodged the tip of the knife, holding on to the metal bar.
I lifted the oar to hit the man, but he was too close to Cristóbal and I didn’t want to hurt my husband. I pointed at an opening in the railing.
“Cristóbal! There!”
Cristóbal glanced at the opening but before he could inch toward it, the man dug the knife in my husband’s stomach.
“No!” I screamed, smashing the son of a bitch in the head with the oar.
The man folded over the banister, unconscious, and fell into the water, face first. Cristóbal brought his hands to the knife’s handle, now buried in the depths of his abdomen. His eyes opened so wide I could barely recognize his familiar face, engulfed in agony and fear.
“Cristóbal!” I darted toward him, reaching out my hand to him, but a wave hit the side of the hull, making Cristóbal lose his balance and tumble into the sea, right after the other man.
I screamed so loud my throat felt as though I’d torn a vocal cord. It would take a long time for me to be able to speak again without pain.
CHAPTER 3
Guayas River
April 1920
En route to Vinces, I noticed two things: The first was the cacophony of birds flying above our heads, as though we’d intruded upon a land ruled by animals and they disapproved of our presence. The second thing was how wobbly the canoe taking us up the Río Guayas was.
Neither my father’s lawyer nor the young man rowing made any attempt to help me onto the boat. For years, I’d taken men’s gallantry for granted. I’d never realized how much I’d relied on them, how Cristóbal always rushed to open any door I happened to be standing by, how he unscrewed a bottle of wine, opened a jar of preserves, or carried logs for our chimney.
Just thinking about Cristóbal brought an enormous lump to my throat. How could I ever move forward when everything reminded me of him?
I lowered my head to hide my tears.
I missed his company, his eagerness to please me, his sympathetic ear (when he was listening). Strange how self-sufficient men were. It was both an advantage and a disadvantage. In my case, a clear disadvantage as both of these men had looked at me as though I was less of a person when I struggled to keep my balance aboard and carry my luggage into the canoe at the same time.
Aquilino rested the side of his hand on his forehead and looked at the flock of seagulls passing by. He was sitting across from me, his legs crossed awkwardly and his long, skinny arm busily swatting mosquitoes every few minutes.
The young man taking us to Vinces couldn’t have been older than seventeen. He said his name was Paco as he pushed my trunk to the back of the canoe. I supposed I should have been grateful for his help even though I sensed it had more to do with his own comfort than mine. He wore a white shirt soaked with sweat. I wondered why he even bothered wearing it as the fabric had become nearly transparent. As he rowed vigorously, two wet circles—as round and as dark as two pans—grew under his armpits. The skin on his face was hepatitis pale and his short, curly hair covered his head like moss.
“We’ll go up the river,” Aquilino said, pointing north. “That’s where all the cacao plantations are. We call our cacao Arriba because of its location in relation to this river.”
My father had mentioned this fact to my mother in the letters he’d sent when he first arrived. But that was when she still read his letters. After a few years, she stopped opening them and simply buried them inside a wicker basket until they turned yellow. I only read them after she passed away, though I’d been dying to open them all along.
“Our cacao is one of the best in the world,” the lawyer said matter-of-factly.
“Yes, I’ve heard.” It was becoming easier to speak in a lower tone. My voice had never been as high as other women’s. My assistant at the chocolate shop, La Cordobesa, would never have been able to pull this off since she was so fond of screeching.
Paco didn’t look at me once, which told me my disguise had fooled him. This fact was confirmed when he scratched his crotch enthusiastically.
From what the two of them explained, we were to navigate from river to river until we reached the Río Vinces. The Guayas River was the longest, they said. Brown and vast, it was surrounded by abundant vegetation. I thought of the yellow plains and olive trees in my native Andalucía. How different these two landscapes were. Here, the trees along the river stretched out from the earth as if yawning. They carried luscious leaves that spread indiscriminately.
“Once we reach Vinces,” Aquilino said, “we’ll meet Don Armand’s administrator. He’ll take us to the plantation.”
Paco pointed at a tree filled with yellow oval-sized fruits hanging around its thick trunk.