with the darkness and the silence, but it was impossible to move. His legs didnât respond and when he tried to shout, his throat went dry like a desert sandpit. There was nothing to be done. An evil force was leading him to the thick rock, which he was supposed to blow up with dynamite. His sweaty hands grasped the dynamite stick while Alcón, his mine buddy, chipped away at the rock with a pick. Alcón was making strange noises that sounded like wails. When he determined that the dynamite had been inserted deep enough into the rocky wall, he lit a match and they both started to run. The nightmare would pause there, with him escaping in slow motion. Then the other nightmare would begin, the one Rocha would see while waking up. The subsoil was slippery, the sticky underbelly of a mountain suffering at the hands of men tearing apart its insides. Rocha was desperately stumbling and falling. He would try to pull himself up, but he had lost time. No sooner did he succeed in standing up, than he heard the boom of the explosion and the burning gust propelled him several yards forward. Alcón shouted and pointed to the arch above, which was coming undone in thick and rough sheets of rock that were crashing down on both his legs. He managed to save his right leg, but his left leg got jammed under an enormous rock, turning it into a gelatinous, irrecoverable mass.
Itâs all that assholeâs fault. If he hadnât sent me into the mines, Iâd still be standing on two legs.
Rocha placed the crutches under his armpits and started to move from one side of the cabin to the other. Someone knocked on the door. The slightest noise could provoke a certain desperation in him.
âWho is it?â
âI have your lunch.â
Rocha opened the door and let the waiter enter.
âOne chairo soup, one large plate of meat, and a cup of applesauce.â
âWhat time is it?â
âOne oâclock, señor. You said you wanted the late lunch.â
âRight . . . right,â Rocha said, then handed the waiter a tip and closed the door.
He ate the soup and devoured the meat and accompanying French fries. As he savored the dessert, he thought again about his tragedy.
My nightmares end tonight. Once I take him out, Iâll go back to sleeping like I used to. Iâll sleep for hours and Iâll dream about quiet lakes and beautiful eyes that love me. About the lush forests of Beni and rivers that look like the sea. All the things I lost because of that bastardâ
Moments later, another knock on the door. It was the waiter coming to retrieve the tray.
âCan I get you anything else?â
âNo . . . nothing,â Rocha said. âIâm going to rest.â
âAre you all right?â
âI have a fever,â Rocha lied. âBut Iâm sure that tomorrow, on the coast, Iâll feel better.â
âThereâs nothing like being on the coast,â the waiter said, and disappeared.
Rocha lay down. It was cold and his stump hurt. Sharp, stabbing pain shot up and down his leg. He rubbed the affected area with some ointment, then propped his head on a pillow and tried to picture Alderete, just as he was the day he went to visit the guy in the mining company office to ask him for a job. Alderete was his half-brother. They shared the same mother, an indigenous woman who had been the lover of Nazarioâs father. Edmundoâs father was a carpenter from Oruro who died of a lung infection. Before succumbing to a terminal illness, his mother had advised Rocha to visit his half-brother, who seemed to have a good thing going in the mineral trade. He was an accountant and handled a lot of money. Rocha, who was going through hard times, had become little more than a drunken hobo who wandered from one place to another selling textiles and other odds and ends. He didnât think twice, and as soon as he had collected a few pesos, he headed for PotosÃ. Alderete worked