I slapped his chest with my hands, tears trickling. “You brought this on! Out of jealousy! Because you wanted the plantation for yourself! This is all your fault.”

He let me hit him, and then, when I was exhausted, when the tears were so abundant that I could no longer see the sadness in his eyes, I took a step back.

“I need to get out of here,” I said, turning around.

He called my name, but I left the house before he could say anything else. I left knowing that he was right, that I’d lost everything before I ever had it.

CHAPTER 44

CHAPTER 44

I didn’t want to believe Martin. I walked around the plantation for hours. I talked to every worker I could find and demanded that he show me the disease up close. My former informant, Don Pepe, pulled out a cacao pod and showed me the white, moldy spots spreading all over the fruit. I looked around me: leaves were withering, pods were filling with fungus, the entire region was rotting, like my family.

No, I couldn’t accept this. My father didn’t abandon us, he didn’t work for twenty-five years, so fungi would wipe it all away. On my way to my neighbor’s house, I encountered dozens of workers walking toward Vinces along the dirt road, their heads lowered, their feet dragging. They carried with them all of their belongings.

Don Fernando del Río confirmed that everything Martin had said was true. He also seemed anxious, but in a different way than Martin. Instead of drinking, he was pacing his living room like a madman. He was still wearing his night robe and he would twitch and talk to himself. Any minute now, he would lose his mind and would have to be admitted to an asylum. I tried to calm him, asked him to sit down, to have a valeriana tea for his nerves, but he barely listened, he kept repeating something about the witches’-broom, and calling it a curse, he went as far as blaming Soledad, the town’s curandera, who at Angélica’s request must have done something to the plants.

Yes, that was his explanation for things. Those women were witches and they’d cursed the entire region. When there was nothing else I could do or say to calm him, I left his house and went home.

The hacienda felt lonelier than ever. Prior to leaving the house, my sisters had apparently fired Rosita, the cook. But little did I care now about food or housekeeping. I collapsed on the sofa, watching the bottle of aguardiente on the coffee table and Martin’s empty glass. I hugged my knees and gently rocked back and forth until the night closed in.

CHAPTER 45

CHAPTER 45