A Tranquil Star by Primo Levi Page B

thin balance wheel that never stopped, the tiny rubies, and then his own fingers: impossible! The same, or almost, happened with the tape recorder, which,however, Achtiti didn’t want to touch: he made Wilkins pick it up himself, and stopped up his ears for fear of hearing his voice. And the knife? Achtiti seemed to want them to understand that it was a sort of makeup exam, that is, an elementary test, basic enough for any simpleton, sorcerer or no: go ahead, make a knife. A knife, look, isn’t a kind of little beast with a beating heart, which is easy to kill but very difficult to bring back to life: it doesn’t move, it doesn’t make noise, and it’s got only two parts—the Siriono themselves had three or four of them, which they had bought ten years earlier and had paid very little for, just an armful of papayas and two caiman skins.
    â€œYou answer—I’ve had enough.” Goldbaum displayed less talent for mimickry and diplomacy than his colleague. He waved his arms vainly, in a gesture that not even Wilkins understood, and Achtiti, for the first time, burst into laughter; but it was not a reassuring laugh.
    â€œWhat are you trying to tell him?”
    â€œThat perhaps we would manage to make a knife, but that we need some special rocks, rocks that burn and that aren’t found in this country, plus time and a hot fire.”
    â€œI didn’t understand, but he probably did. He was right to laugh: he must have thought that we just wanted to gain time until they come to get us. It’s the number-one trick of all sorcerers and prophets.”
    Achtiti called out, and seven or eight robust warriors appeared. They seized the two men and shut them up in a hut of solid tree trunks. There were no openings; light enteredonly through the chinks in the roof. Goldbaum asked, “Do you think we’ll be here long?” Wilkins answered, “I fear no; I hope yes.”
    But the Siriono are not a fierce people. They were content to leave them there to expiate their lies, providing them with plenty of water and a little food. For some obscure reason, perhaps because he felt offended, Achtiti no longer came to see them.
    Goldbaum said, “I’m a good photographer, but without lenses and without film… Maybe I could make a camera obscura. What do you say?”
    â€œThat would amuse them. But they are asking us for something more: that we demonstrate, concretely, that our civilization is superior to theirs, that our sorcerers are more powerful than theirs.”
    â€œIt’s not as if I knew how to make many other things with my hands. I know how to drive a car. I also know how to change a light bulb or a fuse. Unclog a sink, sew on a button. But here there are neither sinks nor needles.”
    Wilkins meditated. “No,” he said, “here it would take something more essential. If they let us out, I could try to take apart the magnetic tape recorder. How it’s put together inside I don’t know, but if there’s a permanent magnet we’re in business. We can make it float in a bowl of water and give them the compass, and at the same time show them the art of making a compass.”
    â€œEven though it’s called a magnetic tape recorder, I don’t think there are magnets inside,” Goldbaum answered. “AndI’m not even sure that a compass would be very useful to the Siriono. For them the sun is enough: they aren’t navigators, and when they set out into the forest they follow the marked trails.”
    â€œHow do you make gunpowder? Maybe that’s not too hard. Don’t you just mix carbon, sulfur, and saltpeter?”
    â€œTheoretically, yes. But where would you find saltpeter here, in the middle of the swamps? And there might be sulfur, but who knows where? And, finally, what use would gunpowder be, if they don’t have an ordinary gun barrel?”
    â€œI have an idea. People here can die as a result of a