Feeling his cinch strap slip, Manuel got off, checked the strap and yanked it up a notch. A shot rang out as he pulled the leather.
Raul felt something burn his shoulder; he felt he had been slapped by a heavy branch; then he remembered that they had not been moving and put his hand to his shoulder and saw blood.
Swiftly, throwing himself off his saddle, he lay on the ground and shouted:
"Down, Manuel. They hit me!"
Manuel let go his bridle and yanked his rifle, tearing it from its scabbard. With rifle in his arms, he looped his bridle over Chico's head and then—all in a rolling motion—buried himself in the bush.
Quietly, he asked:
"Can you shoot, Don Raul? See anyone?"
Raul hunched along the sand, dug his toes and squirmed behind a heap of vines and bush.
"Hope they don't get our horses," he muttered.
Pain drenched in a kind of perspiration over his brain and he lay motionless, eyes shut, gasping for breath. He thought: It's Pedro ... if I could only get him! It's no good, I've got to sit up, think straight. That damn bullet can't be so bad. Can't seem to see clearly. Now ... now, that's better. Cabrones, to chase us, hunt us. God damn them! Ai, chingado!
Manuel had begun firing, shooting across the trail, picking at trees and vines. His bullets clicked dry stuff and some of it shattered and the dry shattering sound emphasized the danger. A parrot squawked. A couple of shots spanged near Raul and he rolled on his uninjured side, forced himself to sit up and saw three men rushing through the bush, bent double.
"There they go!" he shouted.
Manuel fired several times, his old Remington shooting fast ... then silence.
Raul could hear Manuel crawling toward him; the horses were moving noisily, tangled among bushes; he recognized Chico's snuffling; Manuel's gun clicked against a rock; leaves scraped close by; his head appeared.
"Where did you get hit?" he asked, dragging himself closer.
"My shoulder."
"How does it feel?"
"Can scarcely see ... for the pain."
"I saw the men, had a good look. Who the hell does Pedro think he is! Here, let me pull open your shirt, Raul. You're bleeding."
"A handkerchief in my back pocket."
"I'll need it for the wound."
"Wait ... have to move," said Raul, sitting up, so Manuel could pull out the handkerchief. "Got to move more ... this way ... try to shake the pain."
"Do you think you'll be able to ride?"
"Later ... I'll manage."
"You're hit deep.... Let me tear the handkerchief and make a wad."
"Aah ... aah ... I taste blood."
"You're not hit in the chest. You're imagining that. Here, I'll tear my shirt and bind your chest and shoulder."
He was aware of the darkening sky as he ripped the shirt. He was aware, too, of the dark stalks of cactus and bush around them, the nervousness of the horses. All right, it was going to rain. All right, they'd be on their way soon enough. He'd have to steady Raul, help him mount. Lucienne's place was the closest. Tighten the bandage, help him get up. That crazy Chico might refuse to stand. All right, he would use his own horse.
Rifle in hand, he walked alongside Raul, his eyes mere slits. Raul rocked in his saddle, pain making it impossible for him to sit erect.
"Slow enough?" asked Manuel.
"It's not bad."
"I'm taking you to Doña Lucienne's. It's the nearest place. Chico's coming along behind."
"We'd better ride home," said Raul.
"It's too far to Petaca."
"I can make it."
"No, it's much too far."
The horse shied at something and the jerk cracked pain throughout Raul's body; without Manuel he would have fallen. They rode in silence, the rain coming in little spurts. Manuel sniffed the air—his nose opening wide.
"The rain smells bitter with smoke," Manuel said. "Can you taste it? Let me get in front, to keep the branches from hitting you."
From time to time he stopped, suspecting ambush; he wanted a chance to think out his route, make it as short and easy as possible for Raul, whose gray, tense face haunted him. Such a tortured look! What an unlucky day—the eruption, the shoulder wound. It was as if old Don Fernando had power over everything.
Had he clipped one of Fernando's men? Pedro's silver-buttoned trousers had seemed close. But firing, lying down on rough ground, wasn't accurate. A bush could deflect a shot.
In a gully, among mesquite, cacti and palms, Manuel removed the bloody handkerchiefs, brushed off ticks, and wadded a strip of shirt. Their water gourd held half and he made Raul drink and then sopped the inside of his hat.
To Raul, for all the pain, the care meant a great deal, it slid him back into the past, when he had broken his arm while playing ball with Manuel; he recalled another morning on the lagoon, when the canoe had overturned ... he grinned at Manuel.
"You've been around a long time," he managed.
"Got to take care of you. Can you ride again?"
"Yes."
"Have some more water."
"I can't. You drink, Manuel."
"I can wait. Let's go on, to Lucienne's."
Raul wondered, as they rode, whether neighborhood haciendas had been damaged by the shocks: maybe San Cayetano, Palma Sola, Fortaleza, Santa Cruz del Valle.
At del Valle the Jesuits had amayordomonobody could reason with; someday, when things calmed down a little, he would visit Señor Oc. This Farias trouble had to be thrashed out. The hacienda folk mentioned Pedro, not Oc. Was that out of fear? He knew he wasn't thinking clearly. These border fracases were bound to lead to serious complications. Everyone said the Jesuits mismanaged del Valle through absentee supervision but something had to be done.
Jab after jab of horseback pain did away with his thinking. His eyes fogged. Clinging to the pommel, he ducked when Manuel directed, let himself be supported, swayed, straightened. Lucienne's? Where? When? They could miss the hacienda in the growing dark. The rain was turning cold.
But, as they neared the ocean, the rain stopped and the sky cleared and shortly after dusk they reached her home. A frenzy of dog barks met them, then they heard the surf and then they heard women wailing in the open, in front of the chapel. Two bodies lay just inside the door, covered with burlap, candles beside them.
Built in 1820, Palma Sola had the white spread of seaside haciendas of that period: its porch stalked on salt gnawed posts, its Marseilles tiled roof defied storm and quake, every wall was thick and every window deep set. Grilles were salty green and shutters were paintless. Nestled under palms, Palma Sola looked as though it could last another hundred years.
Manuel and a servant helped Raul into the living room, and Lucienne hurried in.
"What happened, Raul? Is he badly hurt, Manuel?"
"It's his shoulder, Doña Lucienne."
"Did Chico throw you? No—there's blood."
"Sit down, Don Raul," said Manuel, helping him.
"Not bad," said Raul.
"Sit here," said Lucienne, pulling up a chair.
Raul felt around for the chair. Dimly, he made out Lucienne; then, as strength returned, as he drank water, he saw her, her auburn hair, her look of concern. She touched him and at the same time he received a shock for there, at his feet, sat Mona, Caterina's fuzzy dog, tongue lolling. She barked happily; the bullet pain dug deeper; he tried to rise.
"Please sit down, Raul," said Lucienne, restraining him. "Jesús Peza is here. He can help you. Marta, run for Jesús."
Marta, a pigtailed girl, Lucienne's maid, dashed out of the living room, with Mona at her heels.
Raul fought his dizziness and tugged at his belt.
"Drink this," said Lucienne.
Someone had brought tequila.
Raul smelled it and the strong smell helped him before he could get it to his lips: tequila almendrada: he let the fiery stuff grab him. Why not get drunk? Why not wipe out pain that way? What could Peza do?
"Here's Peza," said Manuel, stripping off Raul's wet shirt.
"Well, Raul, what happened, man? I see you got drenched."
"Hello, Jesús."
"Where are you hit?"
"In the shoulder," said Manuel.
"Shoulder ... hmm, hmm," said Jesús, and peered into his friend's face. "The last time I saw you was when I filled a molar. A month ago, maybe two, wasn't it? Well, I can help you. I'll fix your shoulder.... You just settle back in that chair."
Jesús Peza had fixed many wounds in and around Colima:tequilawounds, dog bites, stone wounds, wire, gun, knife and horse wounds: as dentist, teeth and mouth often came last. He had not brought his kit to Palma Sola but borrowed a poniard-like knife from Ponchito, Lucienne's gardener. Jesús had the head of a gamecock and as he pecked at Raul's wound he talked fast:
"Fetch me several clean towels, Marta.... Hmm, I tell you that was a bad-enough earthquake; I don't know what's got into that volcano lately.... Fetch me a basin of water and some soap, Manuel.... Hmm, this knife is not so damn dull.... Hell broke loose in Colima, they say; I've got to get back.... Did you hear about the church, Raul ... hmm?"
"No," moaned Raul, barely hearing anything he said.
"Don't be brutal," said Lucienne, backing away.
"I'm not brutal," Jesús objected. "People who don't know anything about surgery always accuse me of being brutal. Hmm, the probe is already underneath the bullet. It's not so deep. I'll wiggle the thing out in a jiffy ... now, a towel, please. Madre de Dios, no, don't tell me I'm brutal; it would be brutal to leave the bullet in...."
Raul gasped.
"Whose bullet is it?" Jesús asked. "A friend of yours, maybe."
"Pedro Chávez," said Manuel, rolling and lighting a cigarette, wanting to give it to Raul.
"Bad chap, that Pedro. The rurales should kill him," said Jesús, and he sucked through his stained teeth for the bleeding annoyed him. His gamecock head bobbed; his comb of hair leaned to one side; he grunted and pushed.
Lucienne held another glass of tequila for Raul; she wanted to run because she could no longer look.
"Ah," said Raul, blacking out.
"Almost two hundred people were killed in the cathedral," Jesús went on, speaking of the Colima church. "Funeral ... that stupid rich Navarro died and everybody went to the funeral and the roof caved in on the people ... hmm, bad, very bad."
"Is it bad, Raul?" asked Lucienne.
"Hmm ... one should never go to funerals; I tell all my friends that. See, look, here I have it. Here's your bullet! Rifle bullet. Quite a chunk. I thought so. No wonder it went in deep." Jesús juggled the bullet in his palm and poked it with the point of the poniard, one eye shut. He was a connoisseur of bullets. Crimes of every sort interested him. Grumbling about powder and various calibers, he worked over Raul, stopped the bleeding and bandaged the shoulder.
Gradually, Raul sensed relief. Shifting in his chair he inspected the servants who had been watching. Lucienne ordered Marta to clean up, and the bloody towels and bowl disappeared. Peza, still grumbling, went outside for a cigarette. For the moment, the cool, long room, with its gray shuttered windows, belonged to Raul and Lucienne. She helped him to her sofa, backed him with pillows and opened windows. A glass between her fingers, she sipped and talked. The sea rolled its watery sound. Raul let his eyes close, and tried to imagine he had no branding iron of pain.
"... Two men died at the mill, when beams dropped and part of the mill fell on them. You remember Ortiz and Gonzales?"
She was dressed in dark gray, a flowing pleated skirt with a pleated jacket.
"... The men are lying in the chapel....
"... Jesús is going back to Colima right away. He's worried."
He tried to say he was worried about Petaca but he couldn't manage a word.
"Some of the chapel walls have cracked," she said, still standing by him.
Voices outside the house rose: a man shouted and boys began an altercation; a dog started barking.
Lucienne sat on the sofa, touched his face, his hands. For a second, she felt he was hers and the illusion pleased her; the day's trials dropped away and left her thinking of another day, on the beach. Tide low, they had walked to a cove where red-barked trees shaded the sand. Some baby manta rays had been washed onto the beach; seagulls flew low ... Raul had said....
Jesús was saying goodbye.
"Goodbye, Jesús," said Lucienne. "Thank you so much. I hope everything's all right at your home in Colima, with your family. Tell the padre about Ortiz and Gonzales. Perhaps he can send someone to bury them tomorrow. If not, we'll bury them without a priest. What else can we do?"
Jesús wore boots of brown English leather and seemed to be memorizing their creases as Lucienne spoke. His small figure, in neat khaki trousers and blue shirt, looked pitiful.
When he had gone, Raul had a cognac. He asked himself whether any bones had been broken? By the shot or by the fall, when he hurled himself from the saddle.
A white peacock perched in a long open window. It was quiet now and the surf-sound fumbled over the dark furnishings, desks, tables, chairs and sofas from the 70's. Things had not been well cared for and yet their good craftsmanship fought neglect and climate. The woods were mahogany, oak, rosamorada and magnolia. On the walls hung Directoire prints, oil portraits and a poor copy of an Ingres nude, all of them palely lit by a brass center lamp that swung from the ceiling on a brass chain.
"Are you feeling any better?" she asked, from a high armchair. "How far you had to ride to get here. Manuel is wonderful to you...."
"We should have been more alert."
"You can't always be," she said.
"I suppose not. Anything can happen in the campo."
"I'll fix you something to eat. Manuel must get you out of those wet trousers."
"Lucienne ... you must send word to Petaca."
"Should Manuel go?"
"I think that's best."
"Try to rest.... I'll see about it," she said.
Pain kept Raul awake most of the night. All her doctoring helped very little; again and again he saw Lucienne by the lamplight of the adjoining bedroom; she would come and bend over him and whisper something.
"Try to sleep....
"Are you thirsty?"
In the dim light, his face had about it the tragic quality that had haunted her at the burial. Death was such a wearisome thing. Dear Raul, sleep, sleep. This is really your home. We've always been kind to one another ... we can go on being kind. We have that assurance. Only a little while ago you and I were children, playing together.... I can see you in the dining-room doorway, tears streaming down your face, Mama and Papa lying dead on the floor, just as they were when they took them from the sea. Oh, love, I want to share your pain. "Let me get a hammock for you," she said, "to let the air come all around you. Maybe that will help you rest."
She slung a long white hammock for him and he found it more restful lying crosswise, swaying a little....
Mona wandered in and licked his fingers, when his hand hung over the side of the hammock. She lay underneath, on the cool tiles.
Strange, lying here in her bedroom, strange to be alive, strange that Caterina is dead ... stranger still is Angelina's coldness, her sorrow, her introversion ... what is it we say to one another, or don't say? What is it that heals us? Something for one, something else for another. She wouldn't like to care for me but she would like to look after a child. Strange sound the sea makes, strange what life is.
In a few days I'll be back at Petaca. I'll see her and she'll ask about my shoulder and I'll ask about the earthquake. There must be a way to change ourselves. Lucienne says there is no God. How does she know? Has she searched? She spends her time with her plants and her friends. Gabriel has said "God is." For him it's as simple as that. And I must talk to him, to change myself. Caterina didn't live for nothing. Her faith was real to her....
Lying alone in Lucienne's tiny servant's room (a room that had no furniture), Manuel saw his soul sitting in front of him, about three feet high, made of clay. He had often seen it. It had a bulging forehead, close cropped hair and scraggly beard. It spoke in an African tongue, faintly. He listened and tried to understand. Wasn't it repeating the same things? The voice rose. The soul seemed to grapple with something; it snuffed the air ... Manuel, breathing hard, turned restlessly on a dusty straw mat, woke and gazed about at the tiny room.
Up long before dawn, he washed in the sea, ate, talked with Lucienne about Raul's condition and then saddled his horse for Petaca.
Flashes of lightning streaked the gray sky and before he had ridden far it began to rain. He welcomed it, glad the stink of smoke and ash would vanish. A borrowed poncho wrapped around him, he felt warm and comfortable; he was sure none of Pedro's men would be out in the downpour. Passing a stone roadside cross, he thought of Ortiz and Gonzalez, dead in Lucienne's chapel. A man's luck gave out at the strangest moments. Raul's luck had died out yesterday. He would have to fight back....
Slashes of rain struck across the road and men on burros appeared out of the rain, the riders crouched under raincoats of palm, fibrous, soppy masses. Each man bore a hoe. The burros trotted wearily, heads down.
An embankment, gutted by years of erosion, led onto a bridge of sixteenth century red masonry, crumbling and narrow. In the center, on a limestone panel, a Humboldt had had a sonnet carved, before his sugar plantation had collapsed or before his mine had petered out in Jalisco. Empire builders, those Humboldts. Beyond the bridge, sweeping over fields, the rain rippled over sugar cane, breast high. Above, on a rocky hill, was the stone fence line of the Medina property, a great crooked L.
For Manuel, the green sweep of cane held a promise: he hoped for a few acres and felt that Raul would let him have them soon. Many men hoped for acres of their own. Pedro had promised land, if men sided with him, land he had never owned.
Ping of a muzzle-loader stirred a flock of duck from a Medina pond and a scrawny, lame man popped out of bushes and hailed Manuel, a duck slapping his leg.
"Cubo," said Manuel.
"Manuel—que tal?"
Manuel rolled a cigarette, the man walking toward him.
"Any word about Farias?" he asked of this family servant.
"Not a word."
"Raul was shot by one of Pedro's men. He's at Palma Sola. I've just come from there."
"Is he badly hurt?"
"Pretty bad. In the shoulder."
"Madre de Dios."
His old musket and old bare legs and thin arms seemed to have been eaten by the rain. His torn whites stuck to the quivering bird. Thinking of Raul, he rubbed his fingers over his powder horn.
By the time Manuel reached Petaca it was nearly noon; pigeons drowsed on the roof; dogs snoozed on the cobbles. Manuel stabled and rubbed his horse and, while he rubbed the flanks, whistling a little, a man hurried in: El Cisne, the stable hands called him, a flour-skinned fellow, young, tubercular looking.
"Farias is back," he said. "And Luis, too."
"Good," said Manuel. "I want to talk to Farias. Where is he?"
"He's at the mill."
Manuel's horse pushed her nose against her feedbox to ward off flies.
"I'll be right along."
"Where's Don Raul?"
"Injured—at Palma Sola."
"Qué malo!"
They walked toward the mill, the flour-skinned fellow behind Manuel, his whites billowing with air as he strode.
Here and there, tiles had crashed during the quake; an adobe hut, where plows were stored, had collapsed, dumping adobes like dominoes. From a distance, the residence seemed to have escaped. Manuel did not question El Cisne. The path led quickly through an orange grove to the mill, an eighteenth century building, with French earmarks, even a few fleurs-de-lis. A Medina had hired a Gascon architect to do both mill and house but the French influence had long ago disappeared from the house, due to quakes and remodelings.
New ragged cracks appeared in the east wall of the mill, Manuel noted. Men sat by the pool, Farias among them. He and Manuel greeted each other heartily, slapping each other on the back.
"Tell me what happened."
"Pedro tried to keep me, a deliberate mix-up with some del Valle men, to cause trouble. It's just as Luis told you. They'd have kept us both if they could."
"You got away today?"
"I got away yesterday, but it took time to reach Petaca."
"The fools—to keep you. Raul is wounded and at Palma Sola. Pedro tried to get him when we were riding in the campo."
Several workers stood up. One of them stopped whittling.
"What's that?" demanded Farias, instantly blaming Don Fernando. "Tell us again."
"They tried to get Raul, out in the campo. A rifle shot. It's a nasty wound ... deep in the shoulder."
"Did you see Pedro's men?" someone asked.
"Sure, we saw them," said Manuel.
"God damn that Chávez," a man cried.
"Jesús Peza removed the bullet.... When did Luis come in?" Manuel asked Farias. "We lost him day before yesterday."
"He came in yesterday," said Farias. "He's dog tired but he's all right. They stole his horse."
Above the mill, the volcano released streamers of smoke, smoke that fanned wider and wider as it climbed. It had commenced as they talked; now everyone saw it, considered it silently, as if hypnotized. Manuel thought, as he looked, Raul will die. The haciendas will fall. In the smoke he saw the bodies of peasants, dead cattle, rifles, machetes, trees, women, children. Destiny ... the force that takes us, one by one.
Farias stepped up close to Manuel.
"The Clarín tried to kill Raul," he said. "The man's insane." Years of resentment went into his remark; he rubbed chaffed wrists and galled hands and regarded his Petacan friends, most of them bearded, in their fifties and sixties; they had stomached Don Fernando with patient desperation; all of them craved freedom.
"Don Fernando wanted another killing," someone said.
"You'd think he'd have enough by now."
"Of course he put Pedro up to it."
"His own son ... anything to have power over us."
"Times will go worse for us, now that Raul's wounded," said a one-eyed man, with machete dangling from a cord around his neck.
Almost superstitiously, they felt the old man would regain his power and impose his violence. Hunger, sickness and fear had crucified their faces and yet there seemed to be room for this new dread. A paunched man tipped back his hat and fumbled a cigarette. Another coughed and spat....
Ashes from the volcano sifted on the pool, gray, powder-fine, moving in tiny eddies; the same ash flecked the men's hats, beards, shoulders and sleeves. A swallow dipped over the pool and then banked away, as if repulsed by the ash. Silence kicked at the walls of the mill, at the jacarandas and palms, at the fields beyond them.
"I must go and speak to the señora about Don Raul," Manuel said, heading toward the main house. "See me later, in the kitchen, Farias."
Sitting in a hammock on Lucienne's porch facing the ocean, Raul saw himself, a self-portrait: the slightly over-fleshed face, brown skin, tough hands, twisted eyebrows. Not a big man, part Spanish, part Indian. His eyes had taken on a hurt look these days, his mouth had hardened, shoulder muscles had sagged. Briefly amused, he saw himself as a Colonial canvas—reading in a stiff-backed chair, a cat on the floor at his feet, a vase of paper roses on a side table.
Tomorrow, Lucienne's victoria would take him home, away from lolling hammock, the sound of the ocean, back to his people. He thought of his wife, of her discontent. Petaca's deed, in its cedar box, had been the deed to many souls. Yes, Petaca had drained away her spirit, warped her. It had changed her, a painful change.... Her rebellions had been brushed aside. The weather was bad, the food was monotonous. She said: But I haven't any friends here. I said: Can't you read something! Go look at the stars.
But it's so dark outside, Raul, so dark.... I love the stars, but if we could just go to the theater tonight. I want to see a play. Remember that play set in Salamanca.... We liked that play, remember? You have your work. I don't see what's wrong with my wanting friends. I went to school with them. Remember, I'm from Guadalajara.... I like Estelle.... She's....
Slowly, Raul got up and circled the house, to the garden side. Lucienne was talking to her gardener. He had been clipping hedges and they walked among them, stepping over little heaps, pointing, gesturing. Barefooted, wearing light blue, she laughed gayly at something he said. Her hair blazed against the dark hedge, beside the gardener, a wizened, half-naked man.
She came toward Raul. "Don't the hedge leaves smell wonderful?" she asked, wrinkling her nose.
"Like the woods," he said.
"Let's go together one of these days," she suggested. "Way up the volcano, the way we used to ... after the fire and smoke have gone."
"Will the fire and smoke ever go?" he said, letting his discouragement get the better of him.
"That's no way to talk." She kissed him. "Sit on the bench, there," she said, quietly. "Maybe you shouldn't be walking around. I'll change the bandage soon."
"We can skip that.... Let's leave it."
"Who'll change the bandage at Petaca?"
"Manuel."
"Not Angelina?"
"She doesn't like blood."
"Stay with me a while longer."
"I can't, Lucienne. Who knows what my father may do? With me away, he may press every advantage."
"You must turn Pedro over to the rurales."
"I know," he said.
"Don't wait."
"I've waited too long already," he said. "But Pedro's not hanging around Petaca, waiting to be turned over to the rurales. They'll have to get him."
A banging started beyond the hedge, where the gardener had resumed his clipping. Raul glanced in the direction of the noise.
"They're trying to mend a damaged spring in the victoria," she explained. "I want them to do something to it, to make it better, for your trip tomorrow. It will be a hard-enough trip for you, I'm afraid." She sat by him, smiling.
"As long as it doesn't fall apart," he said.
She played with his fingers. Through his open shirt, his gold cross dangled on his chest, reminding her she had once shared his faith, when they were youngsters, before her belief had been destroyed in Europe. It seemed to her everyone she had met abroad had been either agnostic or atheist. Viewing Mexico from across the sea, the country's peasant credulity had gradually become absurd. Within a few years, she had ridiculed its faith.
"Raul, I'll miss you."
"You have your friends."
"No friends are like you."
"Ride to Petaca with me, Chula."
"I can't.... I must see the families of the dead. There are many things to look after. I wonder what happened at Petaca?"
"We're buried in duties," he said too loudly.
"Is your shoulder better than yesterday?"
"Yes.... Yes."
The worker banged at the damaged spring.
"I wish we could meet soon in Colima," she said. "Will Angelina be going away ... perhaps?"
"To Guadalajara?"
"Yes."
"Since Caterina's death, she doesn't seem to want to go away," he said. "I've suggested it.... No, she refused."
"How long has she known about us, do you suppose? Do we know how difficult we've made her life?"
He didn't know, but he knew he should never have married Angelina, that he had been carried away by her prettiness, by fancy, by passion, lopsided but nonetheless real, nonetheless foolish, passion for her city manners, her frailty....
Really, how long had Angelina known?
Lucienne felt they had been considerate, as she thought about it, but she wasn't sure. It struck her, with brief but keen poignancy, that Angelina had never been married to Raul. What about her charming, corrupt friend, little Estelle, her secrets?
Her head against him, her hand in his, he sensed the beauty of her garden, tall poinsettias, cerise bougainvillaea, roses, honeysuckle,azucenas. A row of lilies crossed a stretch of grass under crooked cypress.... This was Lucienne's workshop. She neglected her friends for her garden, a collector's garden: rare columbine, carnations, violets, asters, unusual willows, acacia, papaya, fig, breadfruit and zapote. She grew pittosporum, succulents and cacti. She had Humboldt fever ... her hands felt rough. Something was always germinating in her glasshouses. When she had come back from Europe, along with her Parisian lingerie, Swiss jackets, and Italian hats, she had smuggled seeds or plants. A Japanese rosewood on one trip, a Greek olive tree on another.
"What happened to the camellias, the northern ones?" he asked, after a long silence.
"They seem to be doing all right.... Will you be good to yourself, Raul? I'm worried about your shoulder. I won't know how you're getting along. Get well!"
The worker banged at the broken spring.
"With all these troubled times, Petaca gets farther and farther away from me. I think about you in so many ways," she said. "Your quarrels with your father. Pedro. Your Caterina. Ah, darling...."
"Do you really think I'll succeed in helping Petaca? All my efforts can amount to very little in the end."
"That's all any of us can hope for," she said, "a little progress."
"I wish I had your help."
"But I'm no hacendada. I have my servants, my flowers, my trees." She eyed her garden, its paths, its shade patterns, its sun. "Nobody is treated badly here.... I've just four regular men now. Gonzalez and Ortiz will have to be replaced. My women come and go. I guess I live too near Colima to keep them long. When my old Guanajuato mine stops paying me dividends, then I'll have to become an hacendada.... Just now, I live in peace ... just enough ... you know, my dear."
Someone called Lucienne, and she went into the house.
Raul appreciated Palma Sola. Nowhere in Europe had he discovered such a spot and he doubted whether one existed, such a tropic garden where ocean sucked at discontent. Here palmera, garden and ocean talked together—like old friends. As pain returned, he forced himself to listen to the fronds; their brushing fingers made the sound of falling water.
But there was more to Palma Sola than serenity: there was heat, when the only possible relief was a dip; there were storms; there were cloud banks and scattered fogs; there were phosphorescent waves that swallowed the horizon.
The pain moved in again and Raul thought of Pedro. He wanted him out of the way. Perhaps the Yaqui had murdered somebody. At the earliest opportunity, he would spend a day in Colima, butter some palms and put the rurales wise: the gray-uniformed men would tip their caps and Pedro would be a marked man.
A marked man, for a dozen crimes ... the criminal instinct, nothing else. Protected by my father. How can there be law and justice when a single person can dictate? Yet I will be dictating when I summon the rurales ... the law protects me against the lawless ... and the church has a law against divorce. So I am dictated to, in turn.... Well, I must get up and walk around, toughen myself for that long ride tomorrow.
He got away early, before the sun broke through the low mist. He leaned out of the victoria and called goodbye.
"I hope that spring doesn't come apart," she said.
"Simon's a good driver," Raul said. "We have at least one good spring. We'll make out fine."
"I love you...."
"Goodbye."
"'Bye, Chulo.... Write me...."
It was a superb morning, the sun barely topping the palmera, mist blurring the ocean, haze concealing the volcano. Silver trimming on the guard's saddle sparkled. Creaking and bumping, sagging on its weak spring, the victoria rolled out of the sand, one of the horses whinnying. Sand gave way to hard ground and Simon cracked his whip.
"Vamos!" he shouted to his team.
Parrots, scarcely larger than hummingbirds, flicked out of the trees and seemed about to strike the carriage. The victoria traveled slowly, swaying from side to side like an old fat man. Little by little, the gray trunks of the palmera hid the beach and house.
Raul tried to make himself comfortable by pushing his good shoulder into the cushion. I'll get used to it. Simon knows what he's doing. There will be good stretches of road. Damn these annoyances.
Before long, they passed a family riding on burros, then several oxcarts loaded with firewood. At noon, they saw Indian women, spinning flax as they trudged along, their bare feet stubbing through deep sand. Later in the afternoon, they met a hill Indian, in buckskin, bow and quiver over his shoulder ... he dog-trotted past, saluting no one.
At dusk, they drove through a herd of belled goats. Their shepherds had black and white serapes over their shoulders. By a campfire alongside the road, Raul noticed a youngster with two honey bears on a rope—cubs the size of house cats.
I'll buy one for Vicente, he thought, and leaned out of the window and called the youngster. The carriage slumped into a pothole, and a spring seemed to snap. Simon bellowed angrily at his horses and the campers howled with laughter. Raul asked the boy how much he wanted for one of his bears.
"You may have them both, patrón."
Raul recognized that hacienda courtesy.
"I want one for my son."
"They're both yours," insisted the boy, rising, drowning disappointment behind a wooden grin. His small body might have been put together out of muscled vines.
"For one bear," said Raul, and handed him some pesos.
The boy reached out, his pets tugging him; he bumped against the wheel of the victoria. Raul felt the cool snout of the cub; quickly, he drew the animal inside, where it sniffed and pawed excitedly at the closed window.
Simon whipped up his horses.
Cuddling the furry ball under his good arm, rolling on through the night, Raul leaned back in his seat, pleased he had something for Vicente. Then he remembered that Vicente would be in Colima, at school. A flash thought said: Earthquake, and he wondered what had happened to Vicente and his school?
He hoped Angelina would greet him happily at Petaca. Why not one more illusion? Life had so many disillusions in it before the end. He told himself he must confess to Gabriel: or had his confessions, through the years, been altogether too revealing? The victoria swayed and he groaned and hugged the bear.
At Petaca, he brushed dust and hair from his freshly laundered suit and, holding the bear under one arm, mounted the lantern-lighted veranda steps. A number of servants greeted him. Instead of returning their greetings, he stared at the earthquake damage: the east wing of the veranda had crumbled into a heap of rubble; the cross of Palenque on the roof line had fallen; a section of the garden wall had toppled; stones, adobe, bougainvillaea and honeysuckle lay on the ground.
Inside the living room, a hole gaped at the east end.
Chavela approached him—as he inspected the damage—her big hands bulging behind her apron.
"Don Raul, I ... Madre de Dios, que pasó! Were you badly hurt?"
"I'm better."
"You were shot ... they shot you, patrón."
"Yes ... but where's Angelina? The house has been badly damaged."
"She's upstairs, in bed. She's..."
"Is she ill? Was she hurt? Why wasn't word sent to me!"
"She feels weak, after the quakes, the volcano smoke. We had it bad here."
"Take the honey bear, Chavela. Keep it for Vicente."
She unwrapped her damp hands and grasped the bear, frowning; she hated all pets, feeling that they stole food from the mouths of children. Her arms smothered the bear, and it clawed futilely.
Without saying more, Raul ascended the stairs, glad Angelina had not met the victoria, knowing how painful the sight of it would have been to her....
Above Angelina's bed, there was a jagged plaster crack, where a picture had hung. Propped against bolsters, she held out her hand to him.
"Raul, how are you?"
"My shoulder's about well."
"Manuel said it was a rifle bullet."
"Jesús Peza fixed me. Lucky for me he was at Palma Sola."
"Sit down, won't you?"
"How are you, Angelina? Why are you in bed?"
"The quakes. Have you seen what they did to us?"
"I've seen some of the damage ... I just came in."
She sat up higher, her dark hair flowing around her, her eyes extra brilliant, her willowy body showing through a gauzy pink gown. He sat beside her and tried to enjoy her beauty, the fragrance of her perfume and powder.
"What have you heard from Vicente?" he asked.
"He's all right. We've heard from the school." Her words came slowly.
"Who found out about him?"
"Esteban. I sent him."
"And the school itself?"
"The upper floor was damaged. Several were killed at Mountain Rancheria.... Petaca is ruined ... what happened at Palma Sola?" Her nose wings widened and her mouth trembled.
"Two men were killed there. I hear it was very bad in Colima. But you must know about that."
"Yes ... yes, I heard," she said, indifferently, and her indifference, so sudden and so cold, made him feel like a stranger.
"I heard that maybe two hundred died," he said.
"Is it true that Pedro's men ... ah, shot you?"
"There's no doubt about it. Manuel and I saw them. Pedro was there."
"When Manuel came to me, I sent him to your father."
"I'll speak to my father soon."
He wanted to smoke but did not care to let her see how his arm movements pained him. He clenched and unclenched one hand, staring at the wall.
"Why haven't men been put to work on the roof of the living room? A rain will come and we'll be flooded." He stood. "I'll see to things."
She gazed past him, at the opposite wall, and saw herself wearing a fur coat, entering the theater.... She smiled and arranged her hair.
"I'll find Manuel," he said.
"Yes, he's around," she answered, the words curt. "Let's have time to talk one of these days. I'd like to plan to leave soon. The quakes, the smoke, the dead ... I don't seem to be much help." She picked at her fingernails. "You'll find time for the house ... for Manuel."
In the game room, Raul got Manuel to change his shoulder dressing. Leaning on the pool table, he fought the pain.
"The carriage ride messed you up."
"I suppose so."
"I'll change the dressing again first thing in the morning. Hold still."
"I'm riding to Colima tomorrow to see the rurales."
"Pedro's not here. Wait a day or two."
"Is the hole in my shoulder so bad?"
"Bad enough."
"Then I'll see Jesús in Colima ... let me sit on the edge of the table, Manuel."
"Better?"
"Better."
"Colima got it bad, so Esteban says. Many buildings wrecked."
"So bad as that?"
"Stores have been knocked apart. The Sangre de Cristo church lost its roof. The hospital had the upper floor damaged. Houses have gone to pieces. People are camping in the Plaza; there's almost no water...."
"Take it easy with that bandage. We'll have to send men to help in the town; I'll talk to Pepe, Flores and Tonal; they can help. Maybe we can go to town together. If the rurales can't see me I can leave my request in writing.... We'll see an end to Pedro...."
"The bastard," snapped Manuel, helping Raul put on his shirt.
"Not so fast!"
"I've just come from the graveyard," said Manuel, trying to sound matter of fact.
Raul forgot his shoulder.
"What happened there, in God's name?"
"Some of the graves opened ... the quake."
"Caterina's?"
"I, I filled her grave ... took care of the others ... have almost finished."
They glanced at one another, the glance of brothers, the glance of men who had seen a great deal of life and death. Raul's hand felt for Manuel's arm and gripped it with gratitude and affection.