Mercedes Peralta accompanied me on my last visit to Guido Miconi's house. When we were about to return to town at the end of the day, Roraima took me by the hand, and led me through a patch of canebrake up a narrow trail to a small clearing enclosed by yucca plants whose flowers, straight and white, made me think of rows of candles on an altar.
"Do you like it?" Roraima asked, pointing to a seed bed roofed with a framework of thin, dry branches that were held at the corners by slender, forked poles.
"It looks like a doll's vegetable patch!" I exclaimed, examining the ground covered with feathery carrot shoots, tiny heart-shaped lettuce leaves, and curly, lacy parsley sprigs.
Beaming with delight, Roraima walked up and down the neatly ploughed rows in the adjacent field. Pieces of dry leaves and bits of twigs clung to her long skirt.
Each time she pointed out the spot where she would plant a lettuce, a radish, a cauliflower, she turned toward me, her mouth arched in a faint, ethereal smile, her sharp eyes glinting between lids half-closed against the already low afternoon sun.
"I know that whatever I have is due to a witch's intervention," she suddenly exclaimed. "The only good point that I have is that I know that."
Before I had a chance to take in what she had said, she approached me with her arms wide open in an expansive gesture of affection.
"I hope you don't forget us," she said and led me to my jeep.
Mercedes Peralta, seated in the front seat, her head reclining on the backrest, was sound asleep.
Leaning out from one of the upstairs windows was Guido Miconi, waving farewell in a gesture that was more a beckoning than a good-bye.
Shortly before we reached Curmina, Mercedes Peralta stirred. She yawned loudly, then absentmindedly looked out the window.
"Do you know what really happened to Guido Miconi?" she asked.
"No," I said. "All I know is that both Miconi and Roraima call it a witch's intervention."
Dona Mercedes giggled. "It certainly was a witch's intervention," she said. "Candelaria already told you that when witches intervene it's said that they do it with their shadows.
"Candelaria made a link, a junction for her father: She made him live a dream. Since she is a witch, she moved the wheel of chance.
"Victor Julio also made a link, and he also moved the wheel of chance, but since Victor Julio wasn't a witch, the dream of Octavio Cantu- although it is both as real and unreal as Miconi's dream- is longer and more painful."
"How did Candelaria intervene?"
"Certain children," dona Mercedes explained, "have the strength to wish something with great passion for a long period of time."
She settled back in her seat and closed her eyes. "Candelaria was such a child. She was born that way.
"She wished her father to stay, and she wished it without a single doubt. That dedication, that determination, is what witches call a witch's shadow. It was that shadow that wouldn't let Miconi go."
We drove the rest of the way in silence. I wanted to digest her words. Before we went into her house, I asked her one final question.
"How did Miconi have such a detailed dream?"
"Miconi never wanted to leave, not really," dona Mercedes replied. "So that offered an opening to Candelaria's unwavering wish. The details of the dream itself, well, that part had nothing to do with the witch's intervention: That was Miconi's imagination."