Taino (42 page)

“Guaikán, uncle, I see you again,” he said, but heavily, not his usual light singsong greeting.

“
Behike
,” I responded. “I find you in a place of beauty.”

“We are in the enchantment now,” he said, still serious.

“And how is our serene
cacique
?” I asked.

Baiguanex asked us into the cave, which smelled of
cohoba
mixture and old fires. At the rear of the cave, an opening from the top let the sun shine in. Enriquillo lay curled beneath a sheet, his lower body in the sunshine. The
cacique
slept with abandon, his breath pulling and blowing in long, rythmic aspirations. “Three nights he has been in
cohoba
,” Baiguanex said.

Baiguanex led me to a ledge at the cave's entrance. This side of the cave is high on a steep promontory that juts out to sea.

“Seven days we have been here, four in fasting and three in
cohoba
. He has one more to go.”

“So much
cohoba
for the
cacique
?”

“He requests it. As you see him sleep now, he has not rested in many years.”

Two hundred five.
More
cohoba
revelations.

I smoked with Baiguanex. He grew his own and rolled tobaccos like an old Cuban. We faced the ocean, and he would not look at me.

“The
cacique
is tired. His young body has lived in perpetual alertness.”

“It is good to see him rest.”

“
Cohoba
forced him. For two nights he saw nothing, heard nothing. They filled his mind with night and collapsed him. On the third day, I fed him. He ate a
cassabe
tort and drank fresh water from this well. Then I gave him a piece of roasted iguana. He sprang to life like a gray-tailed hawk. At noon, he danced for me, low on the ground, swooping at the earth. That night, two evenings ago, they talked to him. They thanked him for what he has done, and they gave him permission on his new path.”

Baiguanex scratched his back against the rock, watching the ocean. “Then, last night, he saw the ocean and a Spanish ship coming toward him. It was coming from Spain, for him. The ship, they told him, has the answer he desires.”

“Barrionuevo's ship,” I said.

Baiguanex looked up, but past me. “And then this morning, this morning early, as he napped again, I saw the ship. Right out there. The Spanish ship of his
cohoba
vision.”

“A long one, with three main sails?”

“Yes. And a second one, a coastal launch with one sail.”

“Exactly. Barrionuevo's ship. You actually saw it.”

The
behike
nodded. “That much I think is good,” he said.

Two hundred six.
Details of contact.

Enriquillo awakened an hour later. He called the
behike
, who brought him water and a
cassabe
tort. Then he came out to the pool and greeted me with eyes deep set, holding a dream.

“I am to meet the Castilian captain,” he said. “Have you prepared a way?”

I gave him the details of the contact with Barrionuevo, how I sailed with him, how Catalina's daughter, Julia, will be sent by Barrionuevo's guides.

“And is this captain from the king?” he asked.

“He is that,” I said. “Even the ship he commands is the king's own.”

“Can he enforce the king's law?”

“Yes,
cacique
, he can.”

“Your path crosses with my
cohoba
, uncle,” he said then. “I need your heart's eye on this man.”

“Barrionuevo I felt in my being,” I told him. “I believe he would be true to his word.”

“We will guide him in then. Wherever he lands, we will have men chopping wood, calling attention to themselves. They will bring him to the edge of our lake. Julia can be sent for me from there. I will send Romero to set up the parley. Myself I will come down when this captain is settled on our lake.”

Two hundred seven.
A hint of reversal.

“I am ready to help with all that,” I said. “The songs of Guarionex I have rehearsed. A peaceful moment we can make—”

But Enriquillo looked up, and I felt Baiguanex behind me.

Baiguanex touched my shoulder silently.

“I should tell you, Guaikán,” Enriquillo said, for the first time ever calling my own name to me. “Many runners have come, from dozens of families, maybe hundreds, who want to join us if a peace is made. A very complex thing will peace be now for this
cacique
.”

“Do you doubt that peace can be made,
cacique
?” I asked.

“No, but I know I won't live long enough to see it survive.”

Two hundred eight.
Guarocuya does a hawk dance, he takes me out.

The Guarocuya boy danced at noon again. He is a hawk when he dances, pure hawk spirit and motion. Baiguanex beat the drum, and Enriquillo twirled left and right, first one leg then the other, twirling and looking, swooping at the ground and pecking. I could see the hawk mind in his eyes that no longer would focus. Then, he slept.

When he awoke, he called me to him. “Uncle. Everything is set,” he said. “This Barrionuevo I will meet. I am ready for peace if he is and if the king's word he carries. If so, I will make peace with the sovereigns and see what of our people can be settled, that at least a town of us could survive, a place we can gather our survivors.”

“A town may be too big a project,” I said. “But at least your band here could get a farm. There is talk of a farm at Azua.”

“We will have a town,” he said calmly and with total assurance. “The Indians on the island, the ones of us from here and the ones like you and so many others brought here from the islands and from the mainland, all will come to our free land.”

“If the
cacique
says so,” I said.

“Yes. And the Africans, the ones that came to us in '22, after the rebellion of the slaves on the second admiral's sugar mill. They must have a place in this town. So will you and Catalina.”

“It is a dream of mine to live among Taíno again,” I said, though in my heart, at that moment, I did not believe it. I have thought more in a pardon for Enriquillo. What the
cacique
now envisioned implied the end of the
encomienda
in Española.

“Possibly Barrionuevo is not authorized for suggesting a community scheme or a refuge for Indians. This is what Las Casas throws at them and arouses their anger.”

“The good friar is accusatory and he angers everyone,” Enriquillo said. “But he was right to push for abolishing the
encomienda
.”

I nodded, thinking briefly of the good friar, where he might be at that very minute. I thought of Tamayo, too, and Valenzuela and Pero Lopez. There was agitation and cross-purposes in my mind suddenly where before I felt the medicine to make the peace pact.

“With careful words, I am sure, you opened my path to this new captain,” Enriquillo said. “This means that twice you have saved me, uncle. I thank you. Our people thank you twice.”

The words had a finality to them I did not like.

“There is more to be done,” I said. “The negotiation is ahead, and the settlement—”

“My message is clear, uncle,” he said, in that way of Enriquillo, that sense of knowing exactly the road to follow. “Your part of the task is done.”

I felt very old suddenly. I felt his truth, that my part was done. I felt maybe my life was done.

“My
cacique
,” I said feebly. “I know Barrionuevo now. Even his main guard is an old friend of mine, Rodrigo Gallego—”

“The
cohoba
says no. Your path is blocked now.”

And I felt exactly that way, blocked. I had felt greatly needed, central, and now I am out of the events I have been fashioning. Over and over have I prepared for the pact, reflecting on the ways taught to me by Guarionex, thinking the words aloud.

“Forgive me, Enrique,” I tried one more time. “I need to continue in the making of this…”

“It cannot be,” he said and walked back into the cave.

Two hundred nine.
The
behike
explains.

I sat on the outside of the cave, looking out to ocean. Silverio readied our things to lead me back to Mencia's camp. Baiguanex came to say farewell, bringing two tobaccos for me.

“We follow the old ways here,” he said. “The priests will never know it, not even the one they call good friar, but this great
cacique
of ours is guided by the
cohoba
. The time you came and were in
cohoba
with us you also helped us see the past and the future. You have brought much, Guaikán, but the spirits don't want you near it now. The
cohoba
says: take the edge now, not the point.”

“I have done no wrong,
behike
,” I said.

“No wrong,” he said. “But you have worked too long in the devious mind of the covered men.”

“I have learned to spin a web of scheme,” I said. “I know that. But I do it for this purpose—”

“It is complicated, Guaikán, and we appreciate you. But you are not to come. Your heart is not right in this cycle. Now is time for you to smooth and comb your mind,” Baiguanex said. “Pray for this peace and go home. The
cacique
will take the words from here.”

I bowed, took his hand, and put it to my head. “Taíno-ti, Baiguanex,” I said to this young man, then got up to leave.

“When you get back to her camp,” he instructed. “Ask Mencia to send for Tamayo, who has been by here already. He has something to tell you.”

(My supply of paper is running low. I have so much I want to write. And even back at the convent, I have but a few more sheets stashed away.)

Two hundred ten.
Tamayo's report.

Mencia sent for Tamayo. Cao came with him. Both men were cordial but formal. Tamayo was sterner than usual.

“I thank you for your clever scheme, Guaikán,” Tamayo began, and I understood completely why I could not be a peacemaker this season, why, as Baiguanex said, my “heart is not right.”

“The piece of gold led the pale ones to us like the flower calls the hummingbird,” Tamayo said.

I looked away. He would have to tell me his report, and I would have to hear it, just now. In my anticipation I felt deeply chagrined. I took Tamayo and Cao, and we walked up a nearby hill. The two tobaccos of Baiguanex we smoked.

Tamayo waited. When he told me, he relished the telling. He had killed for me, and he would have me hear it all. I will write this about it: Pero Lopez died quickly. He begged not for his life, and they were kind to him. They didn't stretch him up but put him on a horse. His neck snapped in the fall. (It is true, I could not resist feeling satisfaction when I heard it. The
behike
is right, I receive this death gladly in my heart.)

Valenzuela and his servant managed to break free, Tamayo said. They grabbed weapons and put up a strong fight. Cao himself was cut in the face before both men were run through with lances and daggers and Cao wrestled the servant down and cut his throat.

“Valenzuela lived the whole night,” Tamayo said. “He cried for water all night.”

The old war captain grinned at me. He has scars on both cheeks and an eyelid that dangles from an old wound. “The Castilian dog was gut wounded but didn't bleed much,” he said. “He dried out quickly. You should have heard him cry for water.”

The remark slightly sickened me. I have seen Valenzuela many times. I could see the scene before my eyes. Shameless he was and assassin he would have been, but I still could sense him and I could feel his
goeiz
on my neck and right shoulder.

“Like a bee to yellow petals, he came into our trap seeking the yellow nectar,” Tamayo said, “the only one that can cure the malady in their hearts.”

I saw Cao smile now behind him. Old Tamayo leaned forward, looking at me directly. “You saw everything before its time, Guaikán Columbus,” he said. “I must grant you that. But you are not worth a crap as a
behike
man. You hurried my ceremony, put it through before its time, and my mind is very confused. Why did you open my heart only to set me up to kill?”

I could only look away. I knew, of course, he was right. I should have waited and seen the sequence better. In the midst of my peacemaking I doubted not my own revenge.

Tamayo continued. “I am not angry with you,” he said. “I found my own way to make peace. I thought to myself: Tamayo, this Castilian might be the last one you get to kill. I wondered: what should I give a dying Castilian that he can take with him? And I had an idea. So we made a hot fire, found a large sun-caved stone and heated it red. And there I melted the gold bar. I melted it and melted it.

“Then, it was morning. Once more, Valenzuela cried for water. I opened his mouth and gave him the molten gold.”

He saw me grimace and glared hard at me. He was right. I had no call to grimace, since he had done my bidding.

“And how did he like the golden water?” I asked, acknowledging his right to exalt in the cruelty.

“You know,” Tamayo relished the moment. “He didn't like it much.”

The warriors both laughed, and I joined them. I wasn't reluctant anymore but laughed sincerely at the perfect irony of Tamayo's torture. It is true: no peacemaker am I, not now, not anymore.

The two men told me the rest, too, how they disposed of the bodies and how they swore to secrecy their whole group, all the captains and Cao. I recognized their valor. “You have saved your
cacique
,” I told them.

“In the next few days, we are to go prepare for the peace parley by the lake,” Tamayo told me more directly, obviously feeling better for having reported the deed. “I think it may have been our last ambush.”