The man who’d been hit by my dart was in the lead, walking in the direction of the beach, but faced back toward his friends, making fun of himself, laughing as he mimicked his own puking. Mouth stretched open wide, far exceeding the width of the man’s head, the jaguar left the ground as if gravity did not concern her. Her yellow fangs gleamed as she flew toward the man’s bare neck. He must have died instantly, he made no noise. His limbs flopped back and forth as the animal shook him like a toy, not pausing before dragging him toward the jungle.

All the men raised their weapons at once—even the man who carried Beya let her roll out of his arms as he snatched at his gun and trained it at the quickly disappearing beast.

But none of the men got to have their shot. One by one, their bodies stiffened and froze, guns tumbled out of their hands. They fell forward onto their knees as one, two, and in some cases half a dozen yard-long blowdarts porcupined their chests, as an army of Tatinga men stepped out of the forest from the dark perimeter of the village.

Fat Carlos turned in a slow beat, watching the last man fall, before raising up his hand as if beseeching the stars and sharp sickle moon to stop the swift dart from flying through his trembling throat.

FORTY-FIVE

On my last night in Ayachero, just one week later, the rain fell in torrents, beating down the banana leaves that draped themselves over the railing of the longhouse. No more fifteen-minute downpours; men’s rain now lasted hours at a time. The river rose daily by half a foot or more, steadily erasing the beach.

Enveloped by the familiar smells of grilling meat and boiled yucca, the air clouded with tobacco, I watched electric-blue lightning flash in the canopy, obliterating for seconds at a time the darkness that reigned in the understory. I lay in a hammock listening to For God’s Sake spin tales about his month away. He’d come back just in time, bringing, among other things, antibiotics that FrannyA desperately needed to beat back a secondary infection.

He sat on a stool next to me, wringing his hands as he gazed at the glowing coals in the oven. “My wife was very sick, you know, and I couldn’t leave her. My three children had no one to take care of them and so I became the mother, you know?” he said with a little laugh. “I put on an apron like a woman and cooked the meals and washed the clothes and took them to school so she could rest, and I see, wow, this being a mother is very hard work, and I look at my wife with new eyes now, over.”

Grinning as he listened, Franz crouched on a section of palm-thatch roofing he was repairing. “Sounds like they miss you a lot back home.”

“Yes, or I should probably say, maybe. I know that when I’m gone my wife is so happy because I’m not there talking to her nonstop all day long and getting in the way. But I am happy to be back. I miss my important job here. I miss the river and I miss being the best river driver and supplier for Ayachero. It is my destiny, over.”