Free Forest of the Pygmies by Isabel Allende Page A

waggling a piece of canvas. The beast stopped short, swerved, and threw itself at the missionary, but at the instant of contact he sidestepped gracefully. The boar lunged past, furious, and charged anew, but once again its only victim was the canvas; it didn’t even graze its true target. In the interim Angie had retrieved her revolver, but she didn’t dare shoot because the animal was circling around Brother Fernando, so close that the two were a single swirl of movement.
    The travelers realized that they were witnessing the most original “bull” fight ever. The missionary was flourishing the canvas as he would a scarlet cape, provoking the beast and goading it with shouts of “Olé!” and “Toro! Toro!” He was bamboozling it, he was dancing before it, he was maddening it. In ashort time, he had exhausted the boar; it was drooling, near collapse, its legs trembling. At that point Brother Fernando turned his back and, with the supreme arrogance of a torero, walked a few steps away, dragging his cape, as the boar tottered on its feet. Angie seized the instant to kill it with two shots to the head. A loud chorus of applause and cheers greeted Brother Fernando’s daring feat.
    “What good fun that was! It’s been thirty-five years since I had a chance to do that,” he exclaimed.
    He smiled for the first time since they had met him, and he told them that his childhood dream had been to follow in the footsteps of his father, a famous torero, but God had had other plans for him. He had fallen victim to a terrible fever that left him nearly blind, so he couldn’t pursue that career. He was wondering what he was going to do with his life when he learned through the parish priest in his village that the church was recruiting missionaries to serve in Africa. He had answered the call only out of the despair of not being able to be a toreador, but soon he discovered he had found his vocation. Being a missionary required the same talents as bullfighting: courage, endurance, and the faith to confront difficulties.
    “Fighting bulls is easy. Serving Christ is a little more complex,” Brother Fernando concluded.
    “To judge by the demonstration you gave us, apparently good eyesight isn’t a requirement for either,” Angie said warmly—he had saved her life.
    “We’ll have enough meat for several days, but we need to cook it so it will last a little longer,” said Brother Fernando.
    “Did you get photographs of the corrida? ” Kate asked Joel.
    The poor fellow had to admit that in the excitement of the moment he had completely forgotten his obligation.
    “I have pictures!” shouted Alexander, waving the tiny camera he always had with him.
    The only person who knew how to skin and gut the wild boar turned out to be Brother Fernando; he’d seen hogs slaughtered many times in his village. He took off his shirt and got down to work. He didn’t have the right knives, so the task was slow and grubby. As he worked, Alexander and Joel, armed with long sticks, beat off the buzzards circling just above their heads. After an hour the edible meat was dressed. They threw the rest into the river, in order not to attract the flies and carnivores that would be drawn by the scent of blood. The missionary dug out the wild pig’s tusks and after cleaning them with sand gave them to Alexander and Nadia.
    “These are for you to take back to the States as a souvenir,” he said.
    “That’s if we get out of here alive,” Angie added.
    Brief but heavy rain showers fell through most of the night, making it difficult to keep the fire going. They set a canvas over it, but it kept going out, and finally they resigned themselves to letting it die. The only incident occurred during Angie’s shift, something she later described as “a miraculous escape.” A crocodile frustrated at not catching its prey at the riverbank was brazen enough to approach the faint glow of the coals and the oil lamp. Angie, crouching beneath a piece of plastic