Bridge in the Jungle

by B. TRAVEN

  The greatest ambition of all the boys in that jungle region was to become a railroad man, as this was the highest position in the world they could think of and was certainly far higher than working for an oil company. But when the agrarista came and sang his hymns the boys changed their ambition and wished to be nothing better than a funeral singer as great and as famous as the agrarista.

  When the first stanza had started, the Garcia, in her hut, screamed as if she were going mad. The women around her took her in their arms and kissed her. She grew quiet and only sobbed after a while. But when other men and women joined the singer and the whole yard was filled with the voices of the visitors, she was again overwhelmed by her grief. She fell into a terrible rage and with both her fists she hammered her skull. Grasping her hair, she pulled it so fiercely that the scalp seemed about to be torn off. Suddenly she threw the whole weight of her body upon the table, which answered with threatening cracking sounds. Two men jumped close and held the legs of the table straight. Over and over again she threw her body upon her baby. Had he been alive she would have crushed his ribs, so violent was her outburst. And she yelled: “Chico mio, my little beloved! My sweet only baby! Why? Why did you go and leave your poor mother alone? Why? Why? Oh, Holy Mother of the Lord, why did you do this to me? Why? Why?” Whereupon she began to swear in the most horrible manner, cursing all the saints in heaven and the devil in hell. With her fists she hammered upon the kid’s chest as if she meant to punish him for what he had done to her. When she did this a man seized her, dragged her back from the table, pushed back her head so that her mouth was straight up, and with his other hand grabbed a mescal-bottle. He forced the mouth of the bottle between her teeth, pushing the bottle in so that she could not turn away from it. She refused to take the brandy and struggled against both man and bottle. But another man went behind her and pressed her arms down, so that now she was defenseless. After that she got her mouth so full of that aguardiente that she could not help swallowing it in big gulps. The man did not let go until the bottle was nearly empty.

  This medicine, however, was of little use. The woman didn’t even get dull from the drink. And whenever she again became aware of the people singing hymns, she again got wild.

  The women inside the hut could no longer resist the temptation to sing also, and so they fell in with the crowd singing in the yard. That caused the Garcia to shriek more than ever. Her crying was so loud and penetrating that for many minutes it drowned the voices of the singing women inside. Then she got weak and had to calm down. The women went on singing, considering it their duty to do so whether the mother spoiled the hymns by her yelling or not. The Lord would forgive the mother for her almost sacrilegious behavior.

  By now the mescal which had been poured into the Garcia began to show some effect. She was getting a bit foggy. Stroking back her hair, she glanced around and tried to remember what had happened. With blank eyes she looked at the women and apparently wondered what these people were doing here, how they came to be here, and what they wanted. She made a gesture as if she were going to say: “Out of here, all of you! Get out of my house and leave me alone!” Then she shrugged her shoulders as if to say: “What do I care? Let them stay here; perhaps they have no place to go while it is still night.” She turned to the table and gazed at the body, and then she said: “Who is that kid, anyway?” The women stopped singing.

  Hardly had she spoken thus when her whole body jerked. She blew her nose with a gesture of anger. Now she said in a very low voice: “Oh, my little baby, why didn’t you wait for me? We would have crossed the bridge all right had you only waited and let me take you by your hand.”

  She looked at the women, who had stopped singing, and said: “It’s in fun, isn’t it? Say it’s all in fun, please say it.” No one answered.

  The pump-master woman rose from her knees, took the Garcia woman in her arms, kissed her, and murmured: “Don’t be that way, Carmelita, you’ll soon have another one. God will send you one right from heaven.”

  Through her sobs the Garcia answered: “Don’t say so, woman, I never wish to have another one in all my life. I’ll kill it before it ever comes to light.” She wept bitterly and said to the pump-master woman: “Forgive me, comadre, I didn’t mean to say that. You see, here in my heart there is so much pain. I really don’t know what I am saying. The kid pained me so much when he came, and now it pains a hundred thousand times more when he goes. Forgive me, please. Tomorrow it will be different. It’s only now, tonight, that I can’t get over it. Only a few hours ago he was shouting and laughing and running, and now look what is left of him. And only a few hours.” She sobbed on the breast of the pump-master woman.

  If the singing stopped for a while, the cracking of the fireworks outside reminded the Garcia anew that the kid was awaited by the angels. She never got a chance to forget.

  The singing, when it was a new entertainment, had aroused the people, but now it had lost its attraction; everyone got sleepier than before. Many threw themselves flat on the ground. Others squatted, embraced their knees, and put their heads on them and then fell asleep immediately. A few men and women stayed awake, not because they were not sleepy but because there was still something left in the bottles—and it is an old saying that he who sleeps cannot drink.

  Inside the hut the women were no less weary and sleepy than the people in the yard. Two women had already taken possession of the corrupted shakedown which the Garcias called their bed. Fully dressed, they lay there snoring like soldiers after a battle.

  The little fire on the floor of the hut smoldered lazily. If it had been a cat it would surely have yawned. A few pots were standing close to it. Nobody cared what they were for, what was in them, or who had set them by the fire. Nobody asked. Indeed, nobody seemed to be interested in anything. Sleep, or at least the desire to sleep, ruled the scene.

  28

  During the past half-hour the agrarista had sung with difficulty. He had become hoarse. All who were still awake shuffled about and tried to sneak out of the hut without hurting the Garcia’s feelings. Some were talking just to keep awake.

  The agrarista and the men who had come with him entered the hut. They looked at the kid for the last time. They shook hands with the mother and told her again how sorry they were and then praised her for being so brave.

  The Garcia said to each one of them: “Muchas, muchas gracias, señor! Vaya con Dios! The Lord be with you on your way home! I thank you for your visit and for the beautiful songs you have sung in honor of my baby. Adiós, señores!”

  When the last of these men had gone, the Garcia remained standing limply and stared vacantly at the door. The men went to their horses and, with many loud adioses, rode off. The Garcia still gazed after them.

  The misty gown of the new day slowly descended upon the earth. Millions of pearls gleamed on the grass, on the leaves of the trees, and in the folds of the flowers, all of which were awaiting the kiss of the sun. Then the morning breeze dissolved the mist, and the new day was born.

  The Garcia shivered in the cool morning wind. She went to the door and ran her eyes over the crowd sleeping in the yard. She felt alone and forgotten.

  A golden spark leaped into the air from beyond the prairie. It seemed but a moment later that the sun rose over the jungle.

  The Garcia turned around and saw that her hut was filled with daylight, in which the smoking, flickering candles looked ghostly. Although the daylight entered the hut only through the open door, it changed the whole interior, leaving nothing in it untouched.

  The light of the few candles had been unable to reach the corners of the hut and so everything which otherwise would have looked ugly had been mercifully hidden. The home had not been without a certain beauty—like that of a very poor chapel—but the daylight destroyed the illusion. The hut now looked gloomy and unpleasant.

  The Garcia’s face was haggard and swollen from so much weeping; her eyes were dry, dull, and inflamed and they were sunk in deep black hollows. She lo
oked like a wax mask carved by an insane sculptor. She was still wearing her green gauze dress. The flowers at her girdle were torn and withered. The flowers in her hair had fallen long before. At night the dress had seemed quite becoming, but now it looked as if it did not belong to her. It only followed her, but was not worn by her. The woman was still the mother of the kid, but the dress no longer covered the mother. It was a stained, ugly corpse of a dress which trailed after her wherever she went.

  The kid, who had been a very beautiful sight at night, was now an ordinary carcass—a carcass dressed up in a monkey suit. His mouth was green, and matter was running out of his smashed jaw. The strings which held his hands together were cutting deep scars into his wrists. His little folded hands looked as if they had been tied together by a professional tormentor.

  The rays of the sun came like spears through the sticks of the walls.

  The Garcia saw the rays touch the body. For the first time she now saw what all the others had seen long ago, that her baby was gone, was no longer with her in the hut. The little heap of flesh lying on the table could no longer be kissed. The morning breeze, blowing through the walls and coming in through the door, brought the odor of death to her nostrils. She shuddered, turned away from her child, and moaned in despair.

  When she looked at him again she noticed that big green flies were beginning to settle on the body. She hurried to pick up a piece of cloth to cover the little face. But after that she could look no more at her child.

  Luckily for her, she had no time to sit down and brood over things which could not be undone. For with the new day a great number of new visitors had arrived and more were expected. The news of the drowning and the miraculous discovery of the body had spread. No sooner did the people hear the story than they mounted their burros, mules, or horses and left home to visit the unhappy mother, to tell her that everybody loved her dearly and that whoever had a soul and a heart was weeping with her. Since it was Sunday it was easy for people to come, and the crowd was growing bigger with every half-hour.

  The men dismounted, helped their womenfolk and children off the animals, tied the animals to posts, trees, or shrubs or let them roam on their own, rolled cigarettes, and started talking to the other men.

  The women, one after another, entered the hut. Here they greeted the mother, embraced her, kissed her, and then looked at the little body. Their eyes became wet. The Garcia shrieked: “Why did this have to happen? Why, tell me, why? Isn’t there any longer a God in heaven?”

  She took the cloth off the face so that the newcomers could look at the kid. Although they were terribly shocked on seeing the ugly face, they suppressed their feelings, and invariably they said: “He looks beautiful! Such a sweet little angel he is now! Doesn’t he look sweet and beautiful?” And the other women answered: “Yes, indeed, he is a little angel, on angelito muy lindo.”

  Many of the women now arriving brought armfuls of flowers; others brought wreaths hastily made of twigs and covered with gold and silver paper. They put the flowers and wreaths aside without mentioning their gifts so as to spare the Garcia the pain of thanking them. These poor people, so very sincere in their sympathies, did not know the custom of the civilized of putting engraved cards on their flowers so that the family would know who gave what and who gave nothing, and so that the names of the mourners might be properly spelled when they were printed in the social columns. Here no one cared who brought flowers or other gifts and who did not. If one did not give something it was because he had nothing to give. But he was honored just as much as those who had brought things. Whatever the visitors, the mourners, the neighbors did, they did out of pure love for the mother.

  “Yes,” repeated a woman, “yes, it is true he looks beautiful, the little Carlosito does, just like an angel, only with his wings not fully grown yet.” Another one said: “To tell the truth, I’ve never in all my life seen such a beautiful little boy.”

  The Garcia woman had already heard the praise. But she was a woman even in sorrow; she waited for more praise. She stopped her sobbing, grasped the hands of all the women around her, and said: “Muchas gracias! O mil, mil gracias for your kindness. You women make me so very happy, very, very happy, thank you ever so much!”

  She meant it because she was really grateful for the admiration rendered her dolled-up baby and she accepted the approval as if it were given for something she herself had achieved.

  The exclamations of the women were not empty flattery. They praised the kid partly out of an inborn courtesy, but to some extent they felt as they said they did. To them the little prince with the golden crown on his head and the golden scepter in his hand was something quite beautiful. He reminded them of the crowned little Jesus child held in the arms of His Holy Mother, which they saw in church and knelt before in prayer.

  All the visitors were unbelievably poor. The women who had just arrived were barefooted. Their bodies were covered with thin, worn-out cotton dresses that were full of holes. The thorns take no pity on the poverty of an Indian woman who has to ride through the jungle. They wore black gauze shawls on their heads to protect them against the sun.

  Most of the women had brought their babies with them. Sitting by the corpse, they pulled down their dresses and gave their babies to drink. At the same time they wept and sobbed. At intervals they interrupted their lamentations to blow their noses and ask the Garcia how it had happened and how the kid had been found.

  The Garcia had covered the kid’s face right after the last woman had paid him her respects.

  Staying in the hut was becoming a real torture as the sun rose higher. The stench of death was making breathing difficult. Two women with child got pale and had to be led out to recover. The smoking candles, the heavy perfume around the masses of flowers which were dying so painfully and which refused to die so soon, the drifting smoke produced by the bonfire outside, the smell of mescal, coffee, and tobacco, and the odor of the many unwashed men and women crowded in that small hut, all this thick, almost suffocating air accumulated under the grass roof and could not drift away. But the people stayed there, out of politeness and out of respect for the suffering mother.

  In two hours the morning breeze would cease. After that, until eleven in the morning, there would be not even the slightest bit of wind. By that time the interior of the hut would resemble a furnace in which a carcass had been burned. But whatever happened and no matter how unbearable the air in the hut might become, as long as the Garcia stayed inside, all the others would stay too.

  The men who had come with the women and who were still outside had finished their cigarettes. They took their hats off and entered the hut. They came like frightened little boys late for school. One went to the body and took the piece of cloth away from the face. All the men came close, gazed at the corpse, stood around for two minutes, and left again. It appeared they were not sure whether they should shake hands with the mother or ask her how it had happened or talk to her about nothing in particular or keep silent altogether. But the fact was that none was really embarrassed. These people were very seldom or never embarrassed. Their behavior was determined by one thought only: what to do to make the mother forget her loss. So in this case they had decided not to shake hands with the mother and not to ask questions which they were sure the mother had had to answer a hundred times already and they had also decided not even to tell the mother how beautiful they thought the baby looked. His mother knew that well enough. That was the reason they kept silent, and by so doing they were convinced that they had shown best their deep sympathy for the mother.

  Whatever these people did or said, nothing was a cold formula which had been taught them. It all came out of their hearts. Their hearts were speaking, their hearts were ordering them to go on a long trip to console the mother, their hearts were commanding them to be silent when they felt it showed deeper sympathy to be silent. On leaving his host none would say: “I’ve had a lovely time,” if he did not feel that way. In such a case he would rather say: “
Sorry, I think I’ve got to beat it now, for work is waiting back home. I hope to see you soon in my humble house, which is yours and where you’re welcome whenever it pleases you to come.”

  This knowledge of their good taste and of their delicate tact when meeting their fellow men had come to me bit by bit during the past twelve hours through observing them and taking notice of all their doings and sayings. When I had first come here, I had seen in these people the simple Indian peasants with ordinary courtesy such as one might find all over Spanish America in places where American tourists had never come to ruin the landscapes and try to make natives understand how glorious civilization is and tell them ten times a day how dirty and filthy they are and how badly organized their country is. It seemed that an occasion such as the one I had witnessed was necessary if one wanted to see those people as they really were, to see not only their dirt and their rags, but, what was more, their hearts and souls, the only things in man which count. Radios, Fords, and speed records do not count at all; they are but garbage when it comes to the final balance sheet.

  It is religion that makes men love their neighbors and that dries the tears of a mother who has lost her baby and that makes you who have two shirts give one to the poor who has nothing with which to cover his nakedness. Is it religion? Death is usually an occasion for lip religion to show off in all its splendor. And here, where death marched silently into a gay party all set for a merry week-end of dancing, I could not see a glimpse of the white man’s great religion. I had heard no prayers so far. Nobody had fingered a rosary. The singing of hymns by the communist agrarista was only very superficially connected with the Catholic religion because his singing had the eternal worldly meaning of good will to all men, and the Holy Virgin was called upon merely to inform her of what was happening, not to come down and help a poor Indian mother out of her sorrows. And it was because religion as we understand it had not entered either the hearts or the inner minds of these people that they could preserve hearts and souls overflowing with kindness and love.