📸 Photo

or pork — only if an animal gets sick and dies. Once I raised a pig in my yard,’ he went on. ‘She had a litter of three. When the señor came back, he told the foreman to shoot them. That’s the only time we ever had good meat. I don’t mind working for the señor, but I want him to keep his promise. I want a piece of land of my own so I can grow rice and yucca and raise a few chickens and pigs. That’s all.’

‘Doesn’t he pay you anything?’ Kevin asked.
‘He says he pays us, but he uses our money to buy our food. We never get any cash. Kind sirs, maybe you could help me to persuade the master. Just one little plot is all I want. The master has land, much land.’

We were shocked by his tale. Marcus took out a notebook and pen.
‘What’s his name?’ He wrote down the name. The man didn’t know the address. He only knew that the señor lived in La Paz.

Marcus was infuriated. ‘When I find the owner of the ranch, I’ll spit right in his eye. What a lousy bastard! I mean, it’s really incredible.’
‘That’s just the way things are,’ Karl said. ‘It’s sad, but there’s nothing we can do about it.’
‘I’ll get the owner’s address from the señora,’ Marcus said.
‘Don’t, she won’t like it. Anyway she’ll never give you the address.’
‘You know,’ said Karl, ‘when I got my degree in agronomy —’