"Dear María,
"I have come back to Petaca for a while because I have quarreled with Estelle, a bitter, bitter quarrel and all because she says I see a dog following me about. But I didn't, I don't see a dog. Why does she say that, María? I beg you to go and speak to her, for me. She has another friend right now, but surely she will listen to me. I want to make up with Estelle...."
Without reading any further, Raul knew what was happening to her. An icy sensation closed over his brain, a fear for her sanity, a fear he had never experienced before ... a fear tied in with a dog with bones of glass. What could he say to her? What could he do to help her? Gabriel? Velasco? María? Perhaps María could care for her in Guadalajara. He would confide in María. He must get her away from Petaca, as soon as possible. But how? With trains running irregularly.
That Sunday was the longest day in his life. He could not eat. He went about shrouded in anguish. He tried to resolve problems of defense for the house. He tried to talk normally with Manuel, Gabriel, Salvador, Velasco, and Angelina. He tried to hide in his room, tried to hide in the garden. He tried to reinterpret Angelina's letter differently, calling his deduction an error.
That night, after Raul had gone to sleep, Angelina stole downstairs and entered the chapel. Fear gripped her, the same fear that had overtaken her in Guadalajara, at Estelle's, the same night fear. Now, as she hesitated in the chapel, she saw Mona beside her, transparent.
Calling Mona, she went toward the altar: she knew that thieves were stealing the Virgin's jewels. Someone must protect her. Lighting a taper, she hurried to the front of the chapel. The Virgin was intact under her watermelon dome of glass. Her tiny olivewood face smiled serenely, and Angelina felt happy. In the wavering light, the diamonds and rubies sparkled, and Angelina knelt in prayer.
She thanked God for the Virgin's safety and then burst out:
"Oh, Virgin, help me! I have had a terrible quarrel with Estelle. We were so dear to each other. I want so to have at least one friend, someone to love me ... and—and take Mona away from me. Take her away!"
She thought she heard a sharp sound. She gathered her nightgown about her and stood up. Carrying the taper, she rushed toward the door, where she listened, her ear against the wood.
Perhaps Raul had missed her?
Frightened, she thought of going to Vicente's room, seeing his face, touching him. No, he was at school in Colima. She remembered the phantom dog, expecting to see it, and sobbed.
Stealing back into the house, she heard Don Fernando coughing. It sounded as though he were in pain, and so she lit a night lamp and took him a glass of water and held it patiently.
"Thanks. My throat ... gets dry. What time is it?"
"It's night ... sometime in the night."
"Go back to bed," he told her.
"But I can't sleep," she said softly.
He tried to see her, but without his glasses he saw only a white blur.
"I've been awake a long time," he said. "A long time."
"Are you in pain?"
"No. But I keep seeing things," he said.
"What kind of things?" she said.
"People ... faces mostly. People I've known."
"Oh," she said.
"Do you remember Lola Navarro?" he asked.
"No," she said. The darkness of the room, pierced at either end by the window and the door, seemed to tremble as a breeze came through.
"You were just married when Lola lived here with me," he said.
"I remember," she said, half-remembering. It felt good to be able to speak, to say anything at all.
"Do you remember how well she rode?" He paused, the dark room bothering him. "I miss Caterina..." he said, and his coughing started again and she held the glass, making an effort to steady her hand.
Presently, she asked, "Are you asleep?"
"No."
"I thought you'd fallen asleep."
"I wish I could."
"I've had a quarrel with Estelle."
"You shouldn't have brought her here."
"I didn't bring her."
"Women without men are no good," he said.
Back in bed, she fell into a troubled sleep until peacocks and roosters woke her. She dressed and the shrill pot-rack, pot-rack of the guinea hen annoyed her; it seemed to her the most hideous of hacienda noises. Raul got up and dressed rapidly and as he dressed he told her that he and his men must drive three hundred head of cattle to Colima. At breakfast, he still could not tell her about Refugio.
She toyed with her dish of fruit, thinking of Estelle, remembering Guadalajara people.
Such a sad face, he thought.
"Couldn't you and Gabriel do something with some of the children?" he suggested.
"Perhaps we could. I ... I'll talk to Gabriel."
He gulped his food: eggs and bread.
"Bring my coffee," he said to Chavela.
His chewing annoyed her and she wanted to leave the table.
"Why do we change so?" she asked.
"Many things are changing," he said, not following her.
"I don't mean that." She poured herself water.
He got up and drank his coffee standing. "Have to go," he mumbled. "I hear the cattle in the court. Goodbye."
Raul overtook the cattle outside the hacienda gate: Esteban had the group in front, Manuel worked the rear, and other cowboys covered the sides, to pick up strays and keep them moving.
Raul and Manuel rode side by side a while.
"Have we got them all?"
"So far, so good. A fine bunch," said Manuel. "Are we sure of railroad cars?"
"General Matanzas promised cars. He gets a cut."
"Engines too?" joked Manuel.
"Well, they're going through to Guadalajara."
The cattle followed a narrow road through palmera, fronds roofing the trail, dumping dust and dirt on the riders. The hoofs drummed a hollow insistence, hollower in rocky places, where boulders towered. Between houselike rocks lay the ruins of a temple, ancient limestone walls in stubble, weeds and bushes, a circular platform partially terraced. Years ago, Raul had planned to dig there. What for? he asked himself as he rode by. Bones, old pots, an idol? Let the temple keep its secrets.... A young doe, crouched among stones, eyes shifting, ears up. Raul liked this route to Colima, seldom used because it was too rough for carriages and wagons.
In Colima, the promised cars lay on a siding and, after checking the cattle into the loading pen, Raul and Manuel rode to the Hotel Ruiz, a shabby white stucco building overlooking the plaza. The town heat was oppressive, and when Raul had eaten in the flyspecked dining room, where not a breath stirred, he sought the square. There, the iron swans spewed water through misshapen beaks into a mossy fountain; dried bougainvillaea flowers blew about from little piles left by the gardener. The clock—pasted in the Presidencia wall—bonged the hour.
On a bench, Raul smoked and listened to Colimans argue: a bearded fellow was peeved over domino rules. He clacked a domino up and down at his rustic playing table under a laurel tree. His fat partner scowled and talked back. Across the plaza, in the house of Doña Camila, somebody struggled with a guitar.
Colima—he had been here so many times!
Colima—narrow streets, simple one- and two-story homes, red-tiled roofs, whitewashed fronts, patios with banana, breadfruit, coco palms, bamboo and mango. A little town that fought earthquakes and hurricanes, a sugar-cane town with a few coffee plantations nearby.
He smoked and listened to the badly strummed guitar (the domino players had gone); he thought of Angelina.... Kindness, could that help?
He loved Lucienne for her auburn beauty, her even temper, her grace, her humor.
He strolled down a shady street and circled back to the plaza and noticed a band of armed men alongside the church, sitting on the curb, leaning against the wall; most of them had carbines. At first he disregarded them, and then felt concerned.
In the hotel, he mentioned the band of men to Manuel and Esteban, and the three talked it over with the manager. He was a huge, high-strung Spaniard, sallow, fish-eyed, egg-chinned; he said that the hoodlums ought to be strung up and that if they entered the hotel he'd shoot them "one by one." Manuel winked at Raul.
During the night Raul heard rifle shots but in the morning no one had any information. "Drunkards," the manager conjectured.
Raul paid a call on Federicka. In her shady bamboo-slatted living room, he read a letter Lucienne had written him, telling him why she had gone hastily to Guanajuato, her handwriting more of a gardener's scribble: "They say the trains will start running regularly in 1912.... I think I had better find a lead mine, for bullets...." Her humor was there, even in her concern.
"What a foolish thing, to go to Guanajuato at this time," he said.
"I begged her not to go," Federicka said.
She gave him a venison lunch and then they went to see Vicente, at his school, where the sisters and students were blissfully unaware of Mexico's impending disaster. Federicka, too, shrugged a provincial shrug.
Raul, alone for a moment with Vicente, thought: My God, the boy resembles Angelina, face, body, her posture even! Putting a rough arm about him, he hugged him close.
Late in the afternoon, the postmaster showed Raul a newspaper from Guadalajara, brought in by a horseman. It reported street fighting. Raul found many Colima friends who were sorely distressed, who predicted tragedy, who blamed foreign governments and thehacendados.
Raul described a cartoon, in the Guadalajara newspaper, to Manuel, as they rode out of Colima, for Petaca.
"It showed a butterfly of death hovering above an hacienda," said Raul.
"How does the song go about the butterfly of death?" asked Manuel, hitching his gun belt, kicking his horse with his spurs.
"I don't remember," said Raul.
"I should remember," Manuel laughed. "I used to sing it to you."
Raul chuckled. "That was quite a time ago."
"It's a Chiapan song about a loco butterfly that went after men, poisoning them on the trail ... 'A touch of the wing, just a touch of the wing,'" Manuel sang.
Outside Colima, children played ball in the yard of a Jesuit school; a priest—robe flung open—drowsed on a swing. Workers trudged along one side of the yard, toward town, bunches of green bananas suspended between them. White oxen wandered by.
Raul's cowboys came up behind them, riding at a leisurely pace, some of them singing, one playing a harmonica.
Raul and Manuel trotted down a long hill and began to climb. Suddenly, Chico drew close to Manuel's mare. He reared, throwing himself on his hind legs and hurled Raul to the road. The blow knocked the wind out of him and pain wired his shoulder to the ground. He thought of his bullet wound. For a few seconds he lay motionless but by the time Manuel reached his side, he was able to stagger to his feet. Chico was standing calmly under a tree.
"Are you hurt?" asked Manuel.
"No ... just stunned."
"That damn' Chico! You cabrón!" Manuel cried, rushing angrily toward the horse, whip in hand. "God damn you!"
"Leave him alone," commanded Raul. "You can't teach him by beating him. He's too old to change. No, Manuel!"
Manuel, helping Raul mount, thought of the Petacan beatings, the men, even boys ... now all that had been stopped by Raul. Teach a horse. Maybe not one as old as Chico. Teach people, maybe so! But it was too late to change the haciendas. The butterfly was over Petaca.
A bullet crashed through a front window, as Angelina wrote a letter to Estelle. She had been having trouble with her pen point and was picking at it with her fingernail. At the thud of lead and crackle of glass, she dropped her pen and stared about her as if she had never seen the room before. A second bullet smashed another pane and embedded itself in a wall. Snatching her brass desk bell, she clanged it frantically. Her letter fluttered to the floor. Another bullet shattered glass. Sliding from her chair she began to crawl toward the wall where there were no windows. Servants screamed in the patio. Single shots became a volley, then silence.
She remembered childhood stories of bandits, sordid crimes; all kinds of fears crosshatched her brain; she hunched herself forward on hands and knees, certain she was going mad. When she reached the wall she stood, then sank, crumpled, doll-like, her legs of no use. She reached for the cross on her gold neck chain, but found she had forgotten it. Closing her eyes, she prayed.
A shot spanged prisms off the chandelier, and pieces of glass thumped the wall near her. Opening her eyes, she picked up a fragment of glass with shaky fingers; as she stared at it she saw Raul.
"Raul!" she screamed.
"Stay on the floor!" he shouted.
"Raul ... what's happening?"
Raul and Manuel paused a second in the patio doorway. Raul held his Mauser. Manuel had a carbine. With a rush, bending low, Raul made for the front windows, telling Manuel to get close to the door so he would be protected by the wall. Raul fired out the broken window, then squatted to reload. Manuel aimed and fired; he was slower, steadier, searching for someone on top of the wall. Smoke choked the room.
"What's wrong?" Angelina cried. "Who is it?"
"We don't know who it is," Raul yelled. He crossed the room and knelt beside his wife. "Stay here by the wall. I have men all around the house. Somebody got on our wall and fired down on us, maybe several men. We'll drive them off. Listen ... the shooting has stopped."
"There goes somebody—along the wall," Manuel shouted, and fired through window glass, fragments flying about him.
Like a wraith, Fernando pushed through the patio entrance in his wheel chair, shoving with one hand, groaning. Manuel saw him in the direct line of fire from the wall and scuttled toward the chair, grabbed it and rolled it near Angelina and Raul.
"Father!" said Raul. "You shouldn't be here."
"You want them to come in my room and kill me. Who is it? What is all this? I, you ... why...." His white face and eyeglassless eyes shocked Angelina and she knelt beside him. "You should have stayed in your room," she said. "Who helped you?"
"Who's out there?" Fernando asked. "What's happening?"
"There are a lot of men. Pedro ... many men ... I don't know just who they are."
"So Pedro has turned against me, the god-damn' bastard. I—"
A volley of shots tore into the house, and Raul and Manuel returned the fire. Rifle bullets cracked above, sounding steadily.
"Our men are shooting from the roof," Raul said to Manuel.
The old man coughed and tried to see; he blinked and tugged at his chair.
Raul, tormented by the firing, his father's presence, the destruction, fired recklessly.
"Take it slow, Raul," Manuel said. "First thing you know, you'll be taking chances."
Raul nodded.
Crawling to the far end of the room, he opened a French door and aimed carefully at a man on the wall; as he shot, he noticed one of Petaca's guards firing from the corner turret.
"Some of our men are in the turrets," he said.
Esteban soon appeared in the patio door.
"We're driving them away!" he shouted. "Our men are on the roof. They're leaving Petaca ... we've got them on the run!" He pointed his pistol at the walls.
"Good—we've got them on the run," said Raul to Manuel,
"Kill them!" cried Fernando.
"You must be quiet, ssh," said Angelina, shoving his chair nearer to the wall and sitting beside it.
Other Petaca men took over the outside wall, firing. Raul, at one end of the room and Manuel, at the other, watched and waited. The quiet was strange. Holding on to the wheel chair, Angelina began to cry. Raul, flattened against the wall, stared at her, hating her lack of courage and control. Why wasn't she in Guadalajara?
Raul checked his supply of bullets and then wheeled his father to his bedroom and with the help of Angelina and Chavela, got him into bed. Fernando was silent, very weak.
Mounting the defense wall, Raul learned that twenty-five or thirty men had attacked the hacienda; the appearance of some rurales—a handful of them—had discouraged the attack. But Raul could not be sure the report about the rurales was more than a rumor. Esteban insisted that the firing from the roof had driven off the attackers. Two men had been killed and Raul ordered them buried ... two men in white, one young, one middle-aged. Several of Raul's people had been wounded and Velasco dressed their wounds in the small patio.
Gabriel rode in later and seemed less astounded at the attack than anyone. Limping about the patio, helping the wounded, he said Pedro had not led this attack.
"What if he was with the men who attacked us! He didn't supply those guns, we know that. Raul took his guns. The hacienda of Primavera has been burned. I saw it in the Ciudad Guzman newspaper. Did Pedro do that, too? He can't be everywhere."
"I saw him here," said Raul.
"It's a good thing you had guards posted," said Velasco.
"We'd have lost the place without them," said Raul, rolling a bandage. "I'll have to hand out more guns. There are still some in the game room."
"Keep men on the walls and in the turrets," said Gabriel.
Dr. Velasco's goatee quivered over a wounded youngster. "Can't you hold still? Damn you!" he grumbled.
Instrument in hand, the thin wrist swiveling, he probed for a fragment.
"I feel it," he said.
The youngster moaned.
"Shut up," Velasco said, on edge. "Somebody light me a cigarette."
Back of all this mess, Raul saw his father. Full of bitterness, he walked to the living room and examined the smashed windows, the pocked walls, the damaged chandelier. He asked a scared maid to sweep up the smashed glass. Together they knocked out damaged panes. That job done, he sat down, but he had scarcely caught his breath when Gabriel came in, looking beaten.
"Let's both have a brandy," said Raul. "I was thinking..."
"No, not now. I..."
"What is it?"
"Two of our people were shot, a few minutes ago."
"I heard no shooting. Where?"
"Behind the corral."
"Who got shot?"
"Teresa and María Eugenia. They're dead."
"Two women—the scum ... to shoot women!" Raul exclaimed. The last time he had seen María and Teresa they had been preparing food in the kitchen.
"So somebody shot them," Raul said, barely opening his lips.
"It was no accident," said Gabriel.
"Deliberate."
"Yes."
"My Petaca is taking a beating."
Gabriel turned to go.
"What can I do?" asked Raul.
"Nothing now. I want to see their families. Perhaps..." But he did not bother to finish; instead he read Raul's face, the pain, the struggle for hope.
Shortly after Gabriel had gone, Salvador tramped in, boots clacking. A ricochet bullet had hit him in the head and he had a bloody rag around his skull. A bandolier x'd his chest; he carried a Winchester; his trousers, ripped on the side, sagged over his stomach.
"I have two men at each turret now," he said. "They all have extra bullets. We're ready." He grinned, obviously enjoying himself.
"That should be all right," said Raul. "I wish we could spare a few men and go after Pedro."
"Where would we find him?"
"A couple of men might turn up information."
"Spies?"
"Why not? Let's also find out where the attackers went. We've lots of friends; let's use them. We can't wait for the rurales."
"I'd like to get Pedro, you know that," said Salvador.
"See what you can learn. This may be revolution. We've got to know how things stand." He smelled Salvador's sweat and liked it.
"I'll see what I can find out," said Salvador.
"If you can, contact the rurales; get some of them here."
"Hell, they ran off," he scoffed. Settling his belt over his shoulder, he stalked away. His hat, dangling from a cord around his neck, banged the doorframe as he went out.
When Raul went upstairs he found Angelina in bed, a tray of untouched food on the side table; two maids were with her; one of them was offering her a cup of tea.
"How's everything?" she asked quietly.
"We have men in the turrets and there are men at the gate," he said, making an effort to be calm.
"Will they come back?"
"It's not at all likely."
"Tomorrow anything can happen," she murmured, refusing the tea. "I'm worried about Vicente. What's happening in Colima?" Her nervousness increased the huskiness of her voice. "All this mob, all these killings."
"Vicente's probably all right. The revolutionists won't harm Colima."
"Then what? Is it truly revolution, Raul?"
He sat by the window, bent forward, trying to puzzle it out. He did not answer her because he did not know the answer.
The servants left the room.
"Just as soon as I can, I'll go with you to Guadalajara, just as soon as the railroad operates again. They'll be running cars soon. You'll be all right there, with María. You mustn't stay here." He remembered the newspaper account of street fighting, and asked himself where she should go to be safe.
"Can I take Vicente with me?"
He wanted to encourage her as much as possible. "If you want to, take him," he said.
"Surely the troubled times won't last long," she said, hoping.
She wanted to sob into her pillows: she peered at shadows created by the evening lamp, curious forms on the ceiling: she separated the forms: evil faces, women's faces, Estelle laughing at her, everyone ridiculing her for being so weak. She buried herself in her pillows.
"Raul, Raul," she whispered. "Chavela told me what took place at Refugio.... Take me away."
Morning sun polished one of the wooden dragons on Fernando's wardrobe.
"... I can remember Andrea. As blind as I am, I can see her. I wanted to marry her, but you know all that folly. That was the year we got almost no corn at all." Bitterness and rotten teeth and food left over from breakfast clogged his speech and yet Angelina understood him and listened because she felt sick and lonely.
"What a stupid man I was." He chuckled. "I sold her, sold my Andrea. Slave ... I was her slave and I sold her. What if she loved somebody else? I still wanted her. Can you remember a beautiful face?" He stirred painfully on his bed. "I was nineteen—that was the year I killed my father. Out of my head ... I sold her." His voice had slowed, the gravity of those days pressing him. "God, that was a dreadful year...."
"What ever became of Andrea?" Angelina asked, taking a piece of toast from his tray. They were having breakfast together.
"She died in Manzanillo ... typhoid."
He felt the weight of Angelina's body on the bed and groped to touch her.
"My eyes are worse today. Those glasses haven't helped much. I'll have to have another pair made."
Angelina forgot to listen; Chavela came for the dishes, rattling things and talking at the same time. "There's no beef to eat today," she said. "Marcelino says there's been no slaughtering."
"We must have some eggs," said Angelina. "Chickens lay eggs even when there's shooting. I suppose you could have someone kill a chicken or two."
Chavela inspected her tray of soiled dishes blankly. "An omelette," she suggested.
"Better a hen," said Angelina.
"Chavela ... cigarette," said Fernando.
Chavela gazed questioningly at Angelina.
"Give him a cigarette, Chavela."
"Sí ... right away."
Chavela's bare feet retreated soundlessly, the dishes rattling. She wondered if all of them were to be killed at Petaca, ignominiously, falling about the fountain, bleeding on the cobbles, moaning. She tripped on a crack, hurt her toe and swore furiously.
Angelina lost herself in reverie. She saw the rays of sun, the bedroom, a picture on the wall; she saw Petaca as a fort and imagined herself stealthily opening the gate, fleeing across fields to the lagoon; she would cross it in a dugout ... on the other side it was dark; she was alone, weeping. She felt her way through the bush and a hand reached toward her, the fingers transparent, evolving into a dog's paw ... finally, a dog trotted beside her.
"Mona, la Mona," she whispered.
"What did you say?" Fernando asked.
"Nothing," she said.
She walked to the door and went slowly toward the serpentine fountain and leaned over it and stared at the fish that huddled under greenery. Sloshing water with her hand, she gazed about her. The dog was there. It followed her upstairs, to her door.
Breathlessly, she slammed the door.
Breathing fast, she opened her wardrobe and removed her fur; she stroked it and kissed it and laid it on the bed. Lying beside it, she said:
"We'll be going to Guadalajara soon. We'll be going there to stay. We'll be at María's. I'll be all right there.... You'll see. What a fine time we're going to have...."
Raul found her there, asleep. Sitting beside her, he gently woke her.
"It's time to eat," he said.
"What?" she asked.
"Lunch is ready."
"Oh ... I've slept all morning."
"Let me help you up."
"Everything's so quiet," she said.
"Everything's all right."
"I'm glad," she said.
"I've heard from General Matanzas. Troops are all around the country; a number rode by Petaca this morning. They'll protect us, Angelina."
She sat at her dressing table, blinking. Taking her powder puff, she began to powder her throat and neck, wanting to waken gradually.
Raul stood near her, thinking of other years, time by the window, time in the garden, time to play games, to sit with a baby in his lap. Nothing would recapture those days.
"Vicente is downstairs," he said, knowing how pleased she would be.
"He's downstairs! Darling, why didn't you tell me?" she cried happily, holding her puff motionless. "How did he come?"
"He came with Octavio."
"Who's Octavio—a schoolmate?"
"Yes."
"They rode here on horseback?"
"Yes."
"They might have been shot," she murmured, thinking of those who had died at Refugio.
They were facing one another in the mirror.
"They followed the back roads. They knew how to manage."
"Good for Vicente," she said.
"He wants to stay at Petaca," Raul said.
"You mean he won't go with me to Guadalajara? I need him."
"I think we can change his mind."
She called Vicente from the door and he came leaping upstairs, his hair badly combed, his tropic clothes in a mess. He kissed his mother dutifully, then turned to his father and said:
"Tell me about the shooting, the fight here." His energy flashed into his gestures. "It must have been exciting. And to think that you drove the soldiers away!" He beamed proudly.
"They weren't soldiers," said Raul.
"They were rabble," said Angelina.
"I'll tell you all about it later," Raul promised.
"I'm so glad you and Octavio got through safely," said Angelina.
"It was easy, Mother," said Vicente.
"Did anybody bother you?"
"No, Mother. And now everybody in Colima knows that Petaca beat off the—the others. We're safe here."
"You and Octavio get washed for lunch," said Raul. "Aren't you hungry?"
"Sure we're hungry."
Octavio was an older boy, with pained saddle-leather face and down-twisted mouth. "Is it going to be a revolution?" he asked, at lunch.
"I don't know," said Raul.
"People in Colima say no," said Octavio certainly.
Raul served macaroni and chicken to the boys, helping them bountifully.
"The men who attacked Petaca weren't soldiers, were they?" asked Octavio.
"Just peons with guns," said Angelina, wishing she could forget.
"But, but ... then it is revolution. They're sore at us," said Octavio, rolling his eyes.
"In Colima they say the rurales will finish off the peons quickly," said Vicente.
"Federal troops are moving to Colima from the new garrison at Ciudad Guzman," said Octavio. "General Matanzas issued a paper or something. It's on the door of the..."
The rest of his words were garbled by macaroni, but Raul understood them. He felt his appetite die; these boys were trying to talk like men; chaos was a man's business not a boy's. He poked at his food and said:
"Vicente, I'm sending you to Guadalajara with your mother. She needs you there, for an escort. You and she and some of our servants will go together. I can't get away now that things are so bad at Petaca. You'll be helpful in Guadalajara, and you can continue your schooling there."
No one spoke.
Unable to eat, Raul wondered what kind of solution Guadalajara would prove to be: no further bad news had appeared in the papers that he had seen. He wondered what might have occurred in other cities: Tepic, Celaya, Guanajuato? Was Lucienne involved in this same nightmare? He had sent men to Palma Sola and Colima, but she had not returned. Nor was there any letter.
After the others had finished, Raul went into the garden and smoked. Ducks paddled and fed in the pool, their white bottoms twitching. Overhead, buzzards patrolled. Men guarded the wall. The volcano, in the cloudy atmosphere, wore a pall of gray and straws of light sucked at the farthest slope.
He did not see Angelina, watching him from the doorway.
Worried about Lucienne, he walked toward the stone Christ and then retraced his steps to the pool. His stout face had lost flesh; his tobacco eyebrows seemed less twisted; his mouth had grown sterner and he wore a look of pain and sullen anger.
A frog jumped into the pool, swam a short distance and then, without submerging, faced Raul. A bubble formed as it slowly submerged, as if drawn from below.
God, thought Raul, we think we can help men, determine their tomorrows, and yet we don't know ten things about a frog.
It was a comfort to be alone, close to nature.... Also alone, Gabriel knelt in the chapel, praying for his people, particularly for Angelina. The confessional had told him her hallucination ... María, Teresa ... Raul ... Vicente ... Octavio ... his children.
As he knelt, he recalled what it was to be a child, in Italy. He shook his head to jar away his reveries but they continued. He was carrying a basket through an olive grove and it was a large basket for a boy of twelve. The clock in the Amalfi tower boomed ten, ten grave notes, and his mother crossed herself and said something....
Outside, a rifle shot cracked—very close.
Tugging his robe about him, Gabriel prayed for those who had been harmed by the revolutionists. Surely it was God's destiny to free mankind. He prayed for guidance, for patience. An act of kindness might save a nation.
An old man entered the chapel and shut the door behind him, fumbling with the latch. Slowly, he staggered toward the altar, a serape over his left shoulder.
In the candlelight, where vigil cups burned, Gabriel took in his bristling beard and tousled hair.
Miguel Calvo, the sheepherder, Gabriel told himself.
Miguel knelt laboriously, his lips moving soundlessly. He motioned to Gabriel, and then fell.
"What's wrong, Miguel?" said Gabriel, going to him.
"Someone..." Miguel's face wrinkled with pain; his jaw clamped.
"Are you sick, Miguel?"
Gabriel tried to make the man comfortable by pushing his serape under him. His hand found the bullet wound. Blood sopped Miguel's neck and shoulder.
"You've been shot," said Gabriel.
"Sí," said Miguel. "Don't leave ... the chapel...."
"I want to get Dr. Velasco."
"No."
"Here—I'll stop the blood with my undershirt."
In a few seconds he had yanked off his undershirt. With a jerk, he tore it and began to bind Miguel's head.
"You'll be all right. God will help you."
"Can you stop the blood?"
"Yes. Hold that piece of cloth. How did it happen?"
"As I walked past ... the chapel."
Gabriel worked swiftly.
"Lie still, Miguel. Hold it. I'll tie this around your head."
"All right."
"I want it tight."
"It's tight."
"Now, I'll get Dr. Velasco."
"No," groaned Miguel.
Gabriel struggled into his robe and stood. "I'll open the side window, by the altar; I can climb out."
"No," said the old peasant, wanting to protect his priest.
Gabriel had no fear. He hated fear. Opening the window, he climbed out and crossed the cobbled courtyard, trying to minimize his limp. Another man was crossing the court, crates of chickens on his tump line. A dog began to bark near the chapel, his yaps becoming more and more frantic.
As Gabriel mounted the veranda steps, a shot rang out; he felt something gnaw his leg and put out his arms to break his fall, wondering why the dog had bitten him. Sprawled on the steps, he yanked up his robe and examined his leg—a bullet, right above the ankle ... what a shame!
Servants helped him into the house where he asked for Manuel or Raul. Then, gathering his wits, he told the servants about Miguel Calvo, and his head wound.
"... it may be serious. Get Dr. Velasco."
He gripped his leg, where the pain dug sharply, widening.
"Get somebody to find that sharpshooter," he said.
He sat on a sofa and began to dress his own wound, Chavela whimpering over a bowl of water, soap and rag. On the mantel, the Swiss clock chimed and he glanced at it, feeling hungry.
"Don't be a ninny, Chavela. And get me some tortillas."
"I will, Padre, I will," said Chavela, glad to escape to the kitchen.
"Bring some beans, too," said Gabriel, sighing. His glasses had become smudged and he wiped the old lenses on his robe, blew on them, wiped them again.
The pain became excruciating as he waited and he rocked from side to side. He had not felt such pain since his barranca mule had crashed on the rocks with him and broken his ankle not long after he had come to Mexico.
"Where did they shoot you?" asked Raul hurrying in.
It took several seconds for Father Gabriel to answer.
"My leg ... nothing."
"Let me see."
"No. I bandaged it."
"Is Velasco coming?" Raul asked. He saw tears of pain behind Gabriel's glasses.
"He has gone to Miguel."
"Who?"
"Miguel Calvo."
"Where's Miguel?"
"In the chapel."
"Hurt?"
"Hit in the head."
Chavela set down tortillas, beans and a glass of milk.
"Oh ... I can eat now," said Gabriel.
Gun shots cracked.
"Someone shot me as I crossed the court and shot Calvo in front of the chapel.... I sent someone to find that fellow." Storni's words ran together.
Raul, armed with a .38, stepped to the front windows. They won't get any more of us, Raul thought. I've got more men on the walls. Someone sneaked in, over the wall. He won't last long.
Shoulder against wall, Raul watched: he moved the length of the room, stationed himself near the front door, then slipped outside and hid behind the arches. He began to work his way the length of the veranda.
Sure, they wanted corn of their own, beef of their own, pulque, eggs, whisky, land—they wanted what any man deserved. They could have part of Petaca, but not all. Salvador rushed up the veranda steps toward Raul, his rifle on its sling. He waved, thumped himself on the chest and roared: "I got him. He's dead."
"Who's dead?"
"Ignacio Raza. The fellow on the wall, the one who did the shooting."
"How did he get inside?" asked Raul, going toward Salvador, clicking the safety.
"I don't know," said Salvador.
They went into the living room to be with Gabriel.
Manuel had come in and was bending over him.
"How are you feeling, Father?" he asked. "Velasco's in the chapel, taking care of Calvo. He'll be here soon."
"Show me where you got hit," said Salvador, clattering his spurs and squatting in front of Gabriel.
"I'd rather wait for Velasco," said Gabriel, perspiration on his glasses.
"Sure," said Salvador, agreeably.
"So you killed that man.... Another man has gone.... That's not the way it should be.... We aren't thinking wisely."
Salvador was amused, and said: "I know.... It's easy to kill a man.... But he shouldn't have come over the wall."
It was not till late that night that Miguel and Gabriel were settled comfortably. The old sheepherder had not been seriously injured. Faint from loss of blood, he had asked to be left in the chapel till next day. They set up a cot for Gabriel in the dining room, close to the kitchen in case he needed someone. Raul sat down to read to him. They had agreed onDon Quixote. He found the place where he had left off weeks ago and his eyes slid over familiar paragraphs. Had Cervantes writtenDon Quixotein prison? Then he should at least be able to read aloud under stress ... smoke curled from his pipe ... Gabriel slept.... A night bird called repetitive notes.
In a day or two, soldiers might improve local conditions. He must get Angelina to Guadalajara somehow ... tomorrow ... next day. She had grown violently hysterical when she learned that Gabriel and Calvo had been shot.
He dimmed the light and laid his book on the buffet and saw his old pipe, a favorite. Manuel had given it to him when Caterina was a baby. Manuel had carved P/C on the bowl, Petaca's cattle brand. He had been clever at carving, but he didn't do any handcraft any more.... His face had lost its smile.... So many, many things had vanished, or changed. Raul paused in the living room by his desk where his revolver gleamed.
In the bedroom, his father coughed his dry cough.
Gravely concerned for Lucienne, he lit his pipe and stepped to the fireplace. Perhaps the clock needed winding: yes, he wound it carefully, as if for the last time.
Someone was coming up the steps.
"Don Raul?"
"Manuel."
"I went to see Calvo."
"How is he?"
"He's all right."
"We must get Angelina's things packed tomorrow."
"I'm ready to help you."
"Thank you for getting Vicente back to Colima safely. That's an accomplishment these days."
"Let's make the rounds together," said Manuel.
"It's no world for Angelina," Raul said. "We must get her to Guadalajara."
"Have you heard from Palma Sola?"
"Not a word."
"Esteban has gone there again."
"I don't like the silence," Raul exclaimed.
"Shall I ride to Colima?"
"Wait till tomorrow. After breakfast we must work at the packing. Have the carriage in front of the house. Let's do everything to get Angelina off. Organize her guards, six or eight men. If we can get to Colima tomorrow, I'll see about Lucienne."
It seemed to Raul, as he helped load the carriage in the morning, that he might fall asleep as he worked. He had slept little. Even the rain did not revive him, a warm, pleasant rain, slanting in long, insistent lines. He had passed most of the night on the sofa in the living room. The clock had said: Tighten that strap; put that valise on top; go see about Angelina.
Someone spoke.
"Yes," said Raul, strapping a valise.
"I just came from Palma Sola."
"Yes," said Raul, looking at a rain-streaked, mustached face, with a scar over one eye.
"Doña Lucienne is all right and the hacienda has not been bothered. Federicka and some of her people are with Doña Lucienne."
The rain was a benediction after that: such a great weight had been lifted. He went into the house with a lighter step.
"We're ready now, Angelina," he called presently.
Tears trickled down Fernando's face as Angelina said goodbye; he could not see her; it was goodbye to a voice, to a memory.... After she had gone—he listened carefully to her footsteps, the banging of carriage doors, clatter of horses—he struggled to sit up: If I can sit up, I can still help Petaca. Petaca needs me, with people leaving, Raul away, Manuel ... I must help out.
In his gray world, he puttered with his nervous hands and tugged at his sheet but he could not sit up. Calling weakly to Chavela, he begged a cigarette; she had to put it in his mouth, take it out, put it back; she was still afraid of him, afraid of his closeness to death now. She shuffled uneasily by his bed, sat down, got up.
Raul and Angelina tried to make themselves comfortable, with a valise between them. The luggage on top rolled and thumped. Angelina clutched her mother's jewel case in her lap, a box covered with pink leather.
"Raul, I don't see how I can make it. The rain has made the road so much rougher."
"It is worse on such a bad day. But the train's running again."
"Won't all my luggage get soaked?"
"The tarpaulin's new," he said. "Try to rest against the cushions."
"There's no room. Will I ever get there?"
"I'll take off my poncho. That will make more room."
Rain drummed all the way and the road became a mire in places. They had to pull off to bypass a wagon and the carriage sank to the hubs. Manuel put his cowboy escort to work, but it was a difficult job, with one of the whippletrees splintered. Angelina sat on a valise under her umbrella, a shawl around her, hating the rain and mud.
Colima's streets and houses were a glad sight, but at the railway station they learned from the telegraph operator that the rails had been ripped up by rebels, somewhere miles along the line.
"It will be days before a train can get through," he explained, wanting to be sympathetic.
Raul slipped some money into his hands.
"Keep me informed," he said. "I'll be in touch with you."
He took Angelina to Federicka's, but she could not shake her pessimism; she felt defeated, fated to die at Petaca; she complained of a sick stomach; her head ached. When Federicka urged her to remain in Colima she consented, sullen, ready to go to bed, unwilling to say goodbye to Raul. She shut herself in her room, telling herself: I'll stay here till the train runs.
Raul learned every inch of Colima's time-gnawed station before the train ran again: the scaled walls, the stink of urine, the fruit peels on the floor, peasants sleeping among cockroaches.... Vicente sometimes waited with him, disgusted, a boy in school clothes. Raul was usually hatless, in tight gray trousers and a snow-white pocketed jacket-shirt.
Vicente chewed sugar cane. "It's going to be bad in Guadalajara," he said.
"It may be bad here."
"I don't like the Colegio Francés."
"But you can't stay at Petaca, as it is."
They spoke angrily:
"Mama's getting sicker."
"She'll be better in Guadalajara."
"But she needs you!"
"No, she doesn't need me. You can help."
"But I don't want to go," Vicente exclaimed.
"You're going anyway, to help Mama."
"You help Mama.... You go!"
Buzzards perched on the galvanized iron roof, and Vicente threw rotten oranges at them. When the telegraph operator came out of his room, he said that the train might come tomorrow. "No use waiting any longer. There's no chance today."
Raul gave him cigars.
"Vicente—let's go back to your school. I'll come alone tomorrow."
Angelina had stored her luggage at the hotel, ready for departure, since a train could come at any hour. When it finally arrived, late at night, Raul was on hand. He took both her hands in his, loving her for all she had been to him.
"A good trip, Angelina," he said, as train smoke blew about them.
"Good luck, Raul," she said in her lovely voice, her fingers stealing away from him, to the brooch on her blouse.
"You'll be safe," he said.
"Watch out for yourself at Petaca."
"You too, in Guadalajara. Look after Vicente. The Colegio will be good for him."
"Yes."
She wanted to kiss him but the world inside her talked of many things; she wanted to mention Caterina, wishing she could purge herself of anguish; she wanted to speak of Fernando; she felt she could not breathe. Raul stood out plainly enough—his white shirt flapping—yet he was many Rauls.
She took Vicente's hand.
"Goodbye, Papa."
"Goodbye, son."
Sofía, Lucienne's maid, brought Raul a letter, arriving early at Petaca, her face, hair and hands wet with mist. She gave it to him in the living room.
"Dearest Raul," the letter began, "We are all right here at Palma Sola. Don't worry about us. I had no luck in Guanajuato. The manager is honest but afraid. I will tell you more about it when we meet.
"I have heard that things have been bad with you at Petaca and I am sorry, darling. Sorry for you, Angelina, and all concerned. I know how much the hacienda means to you. Everything done to Petaca is something done to you.
"The Kolbs are here with me, as you know, and none of my servants has deserted me. Payno and Otello say we won't have any trouble. I hope they're right.
"My love for Palma Sola knows no bounds these precarious days. I'm so glad to be back. I go about gathering flowers for my vases, setting out new plants, sorting seeds, fixing glass broken by the quakes.
"Darling, write to me, by Sofía. She is a palmera woman and knows every trail and I trust her. I love you."
Raul read, sitting on a chair, while Sofía stood behind staring at her feet. She was a lanky woman, with loosely combed hair.
"Go to the kitchen and eat. Wait for me there," he said, folding the letter. "Have anything you want." He drew a sheet of stationery out of the desk drawer, and sat down and wet his pen in the inkwell.
He felt troubled and could not concentrate for he had just left Gabriel: he and Velasco had cupped pus from his wound, dousing it with peroxide and iodine.
"Feel it burning?" he had asked.
"It's burning."
"Good," Velasco had said. "That means live tissue. Your leg will get all right."
Only a few days ago, Gabriel had spoken in chapel of the revolution, warning everyone of its insanities. He had pleaded for sanity....
On that very day Captain Cerro had been hanged by a mob on a tree less than two miles away.
Raul bit the top of his penholder and began to write. Before he had written five lines, he crumpled the sheet and strode to the kitchen, where Sofía was eating.
"I'm going to Palma Sola now," he said. "I'm sending men to look after Lucienne and her place. I'll have my horse saddled. Rest a while here. You needn't hurry."
With Captain Cerro dead, trouble could break out anywhere. He would choose good men for Palma Sola.
Sanity—there was not much sanity. Yet he felt saner as he rode Chico toward Palma Sola through the mist.
Sanity ... was it sanity, taking men from Petaca to guard Palma Sola? he wondered.
But it was something like sanity, seeing Lucienne sitting by her front window, at her piano. The green ocean was calm, swirling its pale color out to the horizon.
Smiling, joyous, she waited for him to dismount and come inside. She was alone.
His spurs clicked, as he came in.
"Darling," she said.
"Lucienne, I..." He kissed her lovingly.
"So sweet of you to come."
"I couldn't write. I tried. I had to come."
"Sit down. Why, you're soaking wet! Was it raining?"
"The palmera, the mist," he said.
"Come and change."
"Not yet."
He put his cheek against hers, his arms about her. Her arms went around him for an instant. Then they heard the sounds of horses arriving and people talking.
"Those are my men outside. I brought help, in case there's any need."
"What shall I do with your men, darling? How shall I feed them?"
"They've brought food. I'll send any further provisions they need. You'll keep them here, as long as you stay."
"How are things at Petaca?"
"So-so."
"That's not much of an answer."
"Gabriel has a badly infected leg, caused by a bullet wound."
"I heard that someone shot him. How much worse can it get?"
"We'll have to talk about those things," he said, "but not now. I'll see about my men, where they are to stay, what they can do to help."
"Then some brandy and dry clothes."
"Fine."
Over their brandy, he talked about protecting Palma Sola; he felt that the presence of his men would be sufficient; in all likelihood, there would be no trouble.
"This way I can take you to Colima and feel that everything is all right."
"I wish I could feel that way, Raul. All my things are here, the Humboldt things." She gestured toward the furnishings.
"Where are Federicka and her family and friends?"
"Down on the beach. They'll be back later."
The brandy nipped the edges of her tongue. She thought: Brandy, just the two of us, for a few moments. She was disturbed by new lines in his face, his restless gaze. She took his hand and led him to the dining table, so beautiful in the midst of dark green plants.
"Some more brandy," she suggested.
He nodded toward a newspaper, spread on the table.
"Is it recent?"
"It's from Colima ... a couple of days old."
"Any news from General Matanzas?"
"No. But there's plenty from outside places. In Morelos, several haciendas have been burned. In Guanajuato, owners have been driven away."
"Here at Palma Sola these tragedies seem remote," he said.
"I hope we can keep it that way."
"How's your father?"
"He can't get out of bed any more. He can't sit up, even in bed. He'll die soon, Lucienne."
"I hope I'll be missed when I'm gone," she said. "Me and my trees and my flowers. Do you think I'll ever be able to send my lovely jacaranda seedlings to Guadalajara? The governor wanted them. Ah, these are hard times, for even such simple things as trees."
Raul thought: How fine she is, how much a woman! And he put his mouth on hers; they were friends and lovers; in the warmth and strength of their embrace they found hope.
He decided to remain at Palma Sola a while, maybe no more than three days. He wanted to forget. Together they would see pelicans lurch into the sea, frigate birds ride the wind, herons take the sun. Together they would walk on the beach or go out to sea, in a dugout, trolling.
In the morning, lying close to her open window facing the ocean, he traced the copper coloring of her throat, his fingers moving lightly. Her long hair tangled his arms. His mouth sought her breast.
The ocean breeze tossed the curtains and moved her hair. He drew her, half asleep, underneath him. It had been a long time since they had loved each other in the early morning; laughter bubbled out of her, slowly, slowly. Palma Sola, single tree, phallic, alive. She groaned and laughed against his neck. His body grew tense with joy.
There was nothing to get them up till late. In the afternoon, Federicka and her family went to Colima. The weather was perfect, a little of spring, a little of summer.
The next day, Lucienne said, "Tomorrow we'll go to Colima," and then postponed then: departure. So, for several days they rode horseback, fished, lolled on the beach, and took walks together. The newspapers carried distressing news and when they read them together they were perplexed and saddened. They knew time was ebbing away.
"Of course I must go," said Raul, after another paper had arrived. "I must get back to Petaca.... We must go. I'll leave you in Colima."
"We've been lucky," she said.
"I think so."
"I'll tell Otello to scrape the rust from the carriage."
"Let's go on horseback," he said.
"No, in the victoria. I have too much luggage. Anyhow, I'm sick of Chico. You should get rid of him. Let him drag along behind us."
"He's a good horse."
"What was he like as a colt?"
"No better."
"I thought so."
"He'll get better."
They were in the old-fashioned room, Raul in seersucker trousers and plaid shirt, Lucienne in gay clothes, a turtleshell comb over one ear, sandals laced high up her ankles.
"I suppose you love Chico in a way. I wish we could keep all the things we love," she said, with quiet passion.
"I wish we could too," he said.
"I hope we're lucky, you and I," she said.
"Yes ... lucky, with you, Lucienne. It hasn't been that way with Angelina. She's had her secrets. They are destroying her.... I'm not sure there can be any adjustment. She goes to her room and locks her door. She walks about, talks to herself, comes downstairs with a strangeness about her. I—I think she's out of her mind. Strange ... how she writes. She acts as if I didn't exist, as if I were half alive...."
She was surprised by his candor, by his revelations, by his concern.
"Will the change to Guadalajara help?"
"I doubt it. I really don't know. She may go mad."
"Darling, hush, I think you're needlessly alarmed."
"No. And I can't talk about it any more ... not now.... But, Lucienne, I need you."
"You have me, Raul."
"Not by my side."
"Maybe it's better that way."
"Better?" he asked.
"For all of us. Angelina, Vicente."
He realized she was straining a point for his sake; her face, her hands, told him she was nervous. They had been seated together. He cupped his chin in his hand.
"You're wonderful," he said. "I love you because you stay the same, taking the good and the bad as it comes."
"I wish I were really like that," she said.
"You've been like that all these years."
They loaded the rusty victoria and headed for Colima, riders trailing behind, with Chico yanking angrily. A cave-shaped cloud held a fragment of a rainbow in its arms; then, in the opposite direction, to the north, the volcano rose above a forest of palms, a peculiar light on its upper slopes, a vaporish yellow. For Raul, the light was startling. It was as if he were seeing the volcano from his garden, the evening the yellow scum had covered the lagoon. He thought of mentioning the coincidence to Lucienne, but decided not to speak of it. Later in the evening, in Colima, he would look at the peak again.
In Colima, they visited friends. Obviously, trouble was everywhere. People tried to be cheerful, particularly those who could not see thehacendados'plight. At Federicka's they had drinks behind the cool bamboo slats, and someone played an accordion. Together, they went to the cathedral. The ugly silence of death pervaded the place. Raul wanted peace but not an ominous peace. At Federicka's, late at night, when others had gone to sleep, he went up on the roof-top to study the volcano.
His pipe lit, he watched. Presently, he saw another red bowl of fire ... that dangerous aerial red, a wisp of smoke above it.
God, he thought, not another eruption! He longed to be able to strike back at the subterranean power; he wanted to dominate it, extinguish it. How dreadful to wait and wait.
An owl cried dismally.