Dante and the boy paddled them by. The jaguars had long carried off Captain van der Velde’s bones (his hands, which had been sold in Paramaribo, were lost now, too). All that remained was his Bible, in the sack by Krüger’s foot, and some of the gold coins his electrical eels had earned, snug in the secret board sleeves.

And Josephine, maybe, somewhere up ahead.

CRUCIFIXION

The Indians sometimes came and stood on the riverbanks as they canoed by, appearing like ghosts out of the forest, but they hadn’t seen any for some days now.

The river cut deeper into the forest floor. The trees were taller, looming, the sky was only a thin speckle of pale blue through the darkened treetops. Around them the forest was an even more tightly woven mass of lush green. Clouds of mosquitoes attacked them, flew into their ears, eyes, their mouths. The heat sapped Krüger day and night.

They paddled into a chasm of sheer rock. The river slowed and seemed to work against them, as though they were climbing uphill. Dante and Aranjo rested, the boy curling up to sleep, his father with the food sack in his lap. He’d killed and salted a howler monkey some miles back and now removed an arm from inside the hessian. Snapping off the hand at the wrist, he tapped Krüger on the shoulder and held it out to him. The Prussian looked at the raw skinless fingers and yellow fat, the knuckles, the strands of sinew hanging from the wrist, shook his head and turned away before he began to retch. It was exactly as a child’s hand. He leaned over the side of the canoe and splashed water onto his face.

Dante frowned at him, threw the hand back into the sack and began to eat, gnawing at the thin meat of the howler monkey’s forearm.

The river was very deep and cold and there was nowhere to climb out. The boy woke a little while later and again he and his father stroked their paddles through the water.

Krüger dozed; over hours, days, weeks, he had no idea. When he opened his eyes, everything was different and yet always the same. Time didn’t pass but seemed to hover over them like a cloud, like mist, changing shape imperceptibly.

Ten miles on, he woke to the roar of water. Dante pointed ahead, then slapped the side of the canoe, showed Krüger how to grip it. ‘Hold good!’ he said. His face was drawn tight, his eyes wide and awake, brow ridged.

A few times they crashed and scraped against the walls of rock. Dante and the boy had to use the paddles to get them away, careful not to push too hard, capsize the canoe. Then, in a moment, they hit the rapids with a shock. The force of the river was immense, the noise unbelievable.