Some months later, he died. His wife and sister-in-law were present in the room. Moments before passing, Dr Antoine Girodet had shouted, ‘His little finger!’ and then exhaled his last breath. The two women, hands clasped and praying in the close silence, had jumped out of their skins (the doctor hadn’t spoken for days). They could not imagine what he’d meant, nor would they have understood had Girodet been able to explain. How he’d helped Josephine cut off the white man’s finger and pare away the flesh, so she could make herself an obia from the bone.

THE WIDOW

In Valdivia, her dead husband’s family were cold (the youngest sister the coldest) and later, when it was clear that Elisabeth Montoya wished to stay in the city and continue living in her husband’s house, they were unforgiving and vindictive. They treated Elisabeth as though she herself had killed their son and brother. Through lawyers and important contacts in the city hierarchy of aristocrats and politicians, they tried to prevent her from claiming anything of Alejandro’s estate (even applying for bailiffs to remove her from the house, though this was unsuccessful). They were tenacious and unchristian. They filed lawsuits and spread terrible rumours about her all over the city. They paid for anonymous articles in the newspapers, sowed scandal and innuendo, careful only not to name her directly, though it was clear who their subject was. They even hired a parade of actresses to knock on the door, claiming to be former lovers, weeping and dressed in black, to ask Elisabeth to respectfully return some item they had given Alejandro as a gift.

If at first she appeared stubborn and determined to the public observing the battle, who could only interpret Elisabeth’s refusal to leave the house and abandon her claim as blatant and shameful profiteering (a whore’s profiteering), then it was only because the girl was in shock and alone and exhausted by her grief. But the Montoya family’s assault was relentless and soon enough Elisabeth did become both stubborn and determined. It was a natural von Hoffmann tendency besides, one she shared with her aunt Margaretha.

She wrote to Ojeda in Caracas, who recommended a young lawyer, Agustin José Larrain. ‘He is keen and capable,’ Ojeda replied. ‘Keep faith, dear Elisabeth!’