'What are you saying?' Dancy asked; he leaned closerstill to catch the man's words. Cherrick's mouth trailedbloody spittle, but no sound came.

Locke stepped in, pushing Dancy aside. Flies werealready flitting around Cherrick's face. Locke thrust hisbull-necked head into Cherrick's view. 'You hear me?'he said.

The body grunted.

'You know me?'

Again, a grunt.

'You want to give me your share of the land?'

The grunt was lighter this time; almost a sigh.

There's witnesses here,' Locke said. 'Just say yes.They'll hear you. Just say yes.'

The body was trying its best. It opened its mourh alittle wider.

'Dancy -' said Locke. 'You hear what he said?'

Dancy could not disguise his horror at Locke'sinsistence, but he nodded.

'You're a witness.'

'If you must,' said the Englishman.

Deep in his body Cherrick felt the fish-bone he'd firstchoked on in the village twist itself about one final time,and extinguish him.

'Did he say yes, Dancy?' Tetelman asked.

Dancy felt the physical proximity of the brute kneelingbeside him. He didn't know what the dead man hadsaid, but what did it matter? Locke would have theland anyway, wouldn't he?

'He said yes.'

Locke stood up, and went in search of a fresh cup ofcoffee.

Without thinking, Dancy put his fingers on Cherrick'slids to seal his empty gaze. Under that lightest of touchesthe lids broke open and blood tainted the tears that hadswelled where Cherrick's sight had been.

They had buried him towards evening. The corpse,though it had lain through the noon-heat in the coolestpart of the store, amongst the dried goods, had begunto putrefy by the time it was sewn up in canvas forthe burial. The night following, Stumpf had come toLocke and offered him the last third of the territoryto add to Cherrick's share, and Locke, ever the realist,had accepted. The terms, which were punitive, had beenworked out the next day. In the evening of that day, asStumpf had hoped, the supply plane came in. Locke,bored with Tetelman's contemptuous looks, had alsoelected to fly back to Santarem, there to drink the jungleout of his system for a few days, and return refreshed. Heintended to buy up fresh supplies, and, if possible, hire areliable driver and gunman.

The flight was noisy, cramped and tedious; the twomen exchanged no words for its full duration. Stumpfjust kept his eyes on the tracts of unfelled wilderness theypassed over, though from one hour to the next the scenescarcely changed. A panorama of sable green, brokenon occasion by a glint of water; perhaps a column ofblue smoke rising here and there, where land was beingcleared; little else.

At Santarem they parted with a single handshakewhich left every nerve in Stumpf s hand scourged, andan open cut in the tender flesh between index finger andthumb.Santarem wasn't Rio, Locke mused as he made his waydown to a bar at the south end of the town, run by aveteran of Vietnam who had a taste for ad hoc animalshows. It was one of Locke's few certain pleasures, andone he never tired of, to watch a local woman, face deadas a cold manioc cake, submit to a dog or a donkey forafew grubby dollar bills. The women of Santarem were,on the whole, as unpalatable as the beer, but Locke hadno eye for beauty in the opposite sex: it mattered onlythat their bodies be in reasonable working order, andnot diseased. He found the bar, and settled down foran evening exchanging dirt with the American. Whenhe tired of that - some time after midnight - he boughta bottle of whisky and went out looking for a face topress his heat upon.

The woman with the squint was about to accede to aparticular peccadillo of Locke's - one which she hadresolutely refused until drunkenness persuaded ner toabandon what little hope of dignity she had - when therecame a rap on the door.

'Fuck,' said Locke.

'Si,' said the woman. 'Fook. Fook.' It seemed to bethe only word she knew in anything resembling English.Locke ignored her and crawled drunkenly to the edge ofthe stained mattress. Again, the rap on the door.

'Who is it?' he said.

'Senhor Locke?' The voice from the hallway was thatof a young boy.

'Yes?' said Locke. His trousers had become lost in thetangle of sheets. 'Yes? What do you want?'

'Mensagem,' the boy said. 'Urgente. Urgente.'

'For me?' He had found his trousers, and was pullingthem on. The woman, not at all disgruntled by thisdesertion, watched him from the head of the bed,toying with an empty bottle. Buttoning up, Lockecrossed from bed to door, a matter of three steps. Heunlocked it. The boy in the darkened hallway was ofIndian extraction to judge by the blackness of his eyes,and that peculiar lustre his skin owned. He was dressedin a T-shirt bearing the Coca-Cola motif.

'Mensagem, Senhor Locke,' he said again, '... dohospital.'

The boy was staring past Locke at the woman on thebed. He grinned from ear to ear at her cavortings.

'Hospital?' said Locke.

''Sim. Hospital "Sacrado Coraqa de Maria".'

It could only be Stumpf, Locke thought. Who else didhe know in this corner of Hell who'd call upon him?Nobody. He looked down at the leering child.

'Vem comigo,' the boy said, 'vem comigo. Urgente.'

'No,' said Locke. 'I'm not coming. Not now. Youunderstand? Later. Later.'

The boy shrugged. '... Ta morrendo,' he said.

'Dying?' said Locke.

'Sim. Ta morrendo.'

'Well, let him. Understand me? You go back, and tellhim, I won't come until I'm ready.'

Again, the boy shrugged. 'E meu dinheiro? he said, asLocke went to close the door.

'You go to Hell,' Locke replied, and slammed it in thechild's face.

When, two hours and one ungainly act of passionlesssex later, Locke unlocked the door, he discovered thatthe child, by way of revenge, had defecated on thethreshold.

The hospital 'Sacrado Coraqa de Maria' was no place tofall ill; better, thought Locke, as he made his way downthe dingy corridors, to die in your own bed with yourown sweat for company than come here. The stench ofdisinfectant could not entirely mask the odour of humanpain. The walls were ingrained with it; it formed a greaseon the lamps, it slickened the unwashed floors. Whathad happened to Stumpf to bring him here? a bar-roombrawl, an argument with a pimp about the price of awoman? The German was just damn fool enough to gethimself stuck in the gut over something so petty. 'SenhorStumpf?' he asked of a woman in white he accosted in thecorridor. 'I'm looking for Senhor Stumpf.'

The woman shook her head, and pointed towards aharried-looking man further down the corridor, whowas taking a moment to light a small cigar. He letgo the nurse's arm and approached the fellow. He wasenveloped in a stinking cloud of smoke.

'I'm looking for Senhor Stumpf,' he said.

The man peered at him quizzically.

'You are Locke?' he asked.

'Yes.'

'Ah.' He drew on the cigar. The pungency of theexpelled smoke would surely have brought on a relapsein the hardiest patient. Tm Doctor Edson Costa,' theman said, offering his clammy hand to Locke. 'Yourfriend has been waiting for you to come all night.'

'What's wrong with him?'

'He's hurt his eye,' Edson Costa replied, clearly indifferent to Stumpf s condition. 'And he has some minorabrasions on his hands and face. But he won't haveanyone go near him. He doctored himself.'

'Why?' Locke asked.

The doctor looked flummoxed. 'He pays to go in aclean room. Pays plenty. So I put him in. You want tosee him? Maybe take him away?'

'Maybe,' said Locke, unenthusiastically.

'His head ...' said the doctor. 'He has delusions.'

Without offering further explanation, the man led offat a considerable rate, trailing tobacco-smoke as he went.The route, that wound out of the main building andacross a small internal courtyard, ended at a room witha glass partition in the door.