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“What’s wrong?” I asked.<br />
“I have had this terrible pain in my belly all night,” he whispered. “I<br />
feel like there is a tiger in my guts. The pain is unbearable.”<br />
I took his pulse, said the prayers for ciro, and massaged his abdomen.<br />
Then I ran into the kitchen hut, started a fire, scooped out a gourd of Man<br />
Vine from a sack, and put it on to boil.<br />
“I am on death’s doorstep now,” Don Elijio wailed as I spooned the tea<br />
between his dry, rubbery lips. “I can see Saint Peter beckoning to me,<br />
calling me home. Last week I saw Chinda in my dreams, Rosita, for the first<br />
time since she died. She looked so fat and well. She told me I looked pale<br />
and thin. She whispered, ‘I’ll come to get you soon, sweetheart. Not long to<br />
go now.’ I got up from the hammock to embrace her, but she said, ‘No, not<br />
yet,’ and disappeared.<br />
“I begged her to return but she didn’t,” he said as he clutched his belly.<br />
Now that I had done what I learned from him, I decided to try an<br />
additional therapy that I had found worked well in cases of stomach cramps.<br />
I heated castor oil in a small clay pot over the fire and soaked a cotton cloth<br />
in the warm oil. Then I put the cloth on his abdomen and placed a hot water<br />
bottle that I had once given him over it.<br />
The castor oil pack was to be on for an hour, so I sat on a stool next to<br />
the hammock.<br />
He was very depressed. “What’s wrong <strong>with</strong> me is old age and<br />
loneliness,” he moaned pitifully. “Where I find the cure for this is six feet<br />
underground. Has Saint Peter forgotten to call my name? What is an old<br />
man to do? I am ready to die.”<br />
He told me he wasn’t afraid of dying but he was worried about his sins.<br />
Had he done enough goodness to make up for his transgressions?<br />
“What do you mean, papá?” I asked, stroking his forehead.<br />
“I was a drunk and I know that made Chinda suffer,” he cried. “<strong>My</strong><br />
horse would come home alone, and she had to ride out to find me sleeping<br />
in a ditch. All alone she would pick me up, put me on the horse, carry me<br />
home, put me to bed, and make teas for my hangover.”<br />
“But you stopped drinking,” I said.<br />
“Not until after poor Chinda died,” he said.<br />
“We are all capable of sinning, papá,” I said. “I know that God sees the<br />
good you have done. Just think of the thousands you have lifted up.”