The Appointment in Manaus - Pt. 5 (Nash Davis) (1/2) I woke up and the sun blinded me for a while. What had happened? I remembered the police control. Then Tobiah had ran away. I had started running in the opposite direction. There had been two policemen following me. In one moment I had truned my head to see if they had been catching up and then... nothing. Darkness. I looked around. Behind me was a precipice about ten feet high. I looked up. I must have hit that branch with my head and fallen down here. Therefore I got out of their sight and they gave up. I heard a sudden rattle-like noise quite close to me. I turned back. There was a rattlesnake in front of me. I crawled a few steps backwards. The snake followed me. If he bites me, I'm dead. I instinctively strated crawling further from the snake when I felt something in my hand. I looked at it. It was a cudgel. I remembred my baseball training. I looked at the snake. He seemed to be petrified for a while but then he moved a bit closer again. 'Now or never!' I thought. I hit hard the snakes's head and rushed back towards the highway. I was walking along the roadside, occasionally trying to stop a car to hitch a ride. I was extremely thirsty. The sun had been beating down on me for about three hours now. A car passed by. I had a terrible headache. Another car. The time seemed to halt. How many miles could I have walked? Ten? Fifteen? The highway was always the same - an asphalt road with forest around. Blue sky above. Sun shining. That goddamn sun. My legs crossed, I stumbled and kissed the asphalt. I got up too quickly, my head swirled and I fell again. It was quite comfortable to lie down. 'No! I have to get up,' I thought. I raised my head. My feet hurt. 'I'll just rest for a while...' "Aaaaah!" I was woken up by a splash of water. "Whoa... What?" I rubbed my eyes, looked around and found myself in the back part of a pickup truck sitting on a heap of potatoes, carrots and cabbages. In front of me was a man as old as the mountains smoking a pipe and holding an empty bucket. "Me ajude," said he and started filling a wooden crate with the potatoes. I staggered out of the truck and started putting the cabbages into another crate. We were on a farm. There was a lovely white house and on the porch were two rockers. In one of them was an old woman broidering. All around were fields. About fifty yards from here was a forest. There was only one cart track, probably leading to the highway. The whole place was so calm.