The City of Palaces (26 page)

“Señora, how may I help you?”

“I wish to buy some of your Yaquis,” she replied, as if negotiating for bolts of cloth. “I will pay gold coin—none of this worthless paper—and I will pay well, assuming you haven't starved or beaten the goods half to death.”

The captain said, “Señora, that is not possible.” His tone, she noted with relief, was deferential, that of a servant unable to comply with his mistress's request for an out-of-season fruit.

She made a dismissive noise. “Not possible? These men are destined to be sold to the henequen hacendados in the Yucatán. My family needs workers to harvest our maguey crop. Why should we not also benefit from the Yaquis' labor? I am told one Yaqui works harder than ten Mexicans.”

“But, Señora, these men must all be accounted for when I reach Mérida.” Now his voice was nearly a whine.

“Oh, come now, Captain,” she sneered. “You have never had any escapes? Some of them don't die en route? We both know there are a hundred ways to put your thumb on the scales.” She opened the purse she had brought with her, withdrew a dozen gold pesos, and tossed them into his lap. “This is a gratuity.”

He picked up a coin. “Solid gold,” he remarked.

“What did you expect? Tin?” She sighed loudly. “Make up your mind, Captain. I can't sit here in the rain all day.”

He gathered up the coins and clanked them together in the palm of his hand. After a moment, he said, “I can give you ten without raising suspicion.”

“Well, that's a start,” she said. “But our fields are vast and we need a regular supply. Will there be other shipments?”

“Once a month,” he said. “I will let you know.”

“No, not me, Captain. My majordomo,” she said. “Work out the details with him. Pedro!”

Cáceres came to the window. “Yes, Doña.”

“Captain—what is your name?”

“Henriquez, Señora.”

“Yes, Captain Henriquez has agreed to provide us with some livestock. Go with him and pick them and arrange for payment and transport. And remember, Pedro, strong backs!”

“Yes, Doña,” he said.

“Thank you, Captain,” she said, dismissing him. After he left, she fell back against the cushion and exhaled, her heart beating so hard she wondered how the soldier could not have heard it.

R
ain dripped from the ceiling in José's bedroom into an eighteenth-century delft chamber pot depicting a trio of wispily bearded Chinese sages ascending a mountain path. He stood in front of his mirror, fingers glistening with pomade, which he worked into his tumble of hair until it lay flat on his head, and then, like David, he parted it in the middle. He imitated the older boy's habitual half-smile and ran downstairs to the
sala
to practice “Claire de Lune” before David arrived. El Morito was asleep on the sofa. As José began to play, the cat lifted its small black head and listened with sharply pointed ears. A moment later, José felt the cat rubbing itself against his ankles.

“Stop it, Morito,” he said, but it was he who stopped to stroke his cat's soft fur. The cat jumped into his lap and purred.

“So you like Debussy,” he said. “Can you see the moonlight on the roofs of the city? I can, but don't tell David. He says only girls make pictures in their head when they listen to music. He says music is mathematics.”

“Are you talking to the cat?” David asked, behind him.

José turned so abruptly that El Morito, startled, hopped off his lap and ran beneath a cabinet. The older boy was drenched, rain having plastered his hair to his head and soaked his coat and trousers. He removed his mud-splattered coat and boots, hanging the coat over the back of a chair and setting his boots against the wall. José noticed the hole in his stocking where his big toe poked through. His shirtfront was wet, the white linen transparent against his chest, revealing two dark nipples and a triangle of wiry black hair. When he sat down on the bench beside José, he smelled of rain and sweat and tobacco, and heat seemed to rise from his flesh like steam. José scooted closer to him.

“You're dripping,” he said.

“Brilliant observation, peanut,” David replied. “I got caught in the rain on my bicycle and was nearly killed by a streetcar that sprayed me with mud. Come on, let's start, I want to get home to take a bath. Play for me.”

José began the piece. David listened for a moment, stopped him, and had him replay a phrase.

“No, José,” he said impatiently. “Like this.”

Even though his fingers touched the same keys as José had touched, the music had a seamless quality that eluded José.

“I can't make it sound like that,” José complained.

David got up, stood behind José, and then, leaning down, placed his fingers over José's, almost covering them. José could feel the subtle gradations in pressure as David pressed down on his fingers, manipulating them as if they were a part of the instrument. His breath grazed José's neck. For a second José imagined that David was going to kiss him, and he had to press his legs together to keep from squirming with pleasure.

“What is this?” At the sound of La Niña's voice, David snapped upright. “You use my chair as a clothesline and remove your boots as if you were in your own home?”

“Señora Marquesa,” David stammered. “I am so sorry.”

“You are covered with mud, boy! No gentleman would enter a house in such a state,” she said, planting herself on a settee. “Please get dressed.”

David pulled on his filthy jacket and boots. He bowed. “I apologize again, Señora.”

“I should send you home,” she said.

“No, Abuelita,” José exclaimed. “It's not David's fault he got mud on him. We just started my lesson.”

“Very well,” she said. “Finish the boy's lesson, but mind my furniture.”

David resumed his seat on the bench, but José could detect his anxiety. His grandmother's occasional appearances during their lessons had had that effect on David since the first time he met her. She had interrogated him about his family and his background so relentlessly that he was soaked in sweat when she finished.

“And your father, tell me again, what does he do?”

“He is a postal clerk, Señora Marquesa.”

“A postal clerk.” She repeated each word slowly and distinctly as if they described a species with which she was unfamiliar. “Where is your family's house?”

“In Colonia San Rafael,” he replied nervously. “Not a house, but an apartment, in a building with other apartments. Nothing as grand as this.”

She made a dismissive sound. “You study at the conservatory?”

“Yes, Señora Marquesa. I hope to become a concert pianist.” He smiled at her and said with enthusiasm, “José is very talented. He could also become a professional musician.”

“To play in front of strangers, for money? My grandson is being raised to be a gentleman, not an organ grinder's monkey.”

“Yes, Señora Marquesa,” David replied, completely deflated.

José had listened to the exchange and understood that David was being, in some manner, reproached by his grandmother, but he did not know how David had given offense and so could offer no excuses for him. All he knew was that David behaved with uncharacteristic formality when she was in the room. Now he asked José to continue playing “Claire de Lune,” but instead of his usual caustic corrections, he said little, except to praise him loudly enough for La Niña to hear.

Y
our grandmother doesn't like me,” David told him. They were sitting on a bench in the Alameda a few days later, on a Sunday afternoon. David's bicycle was propped up beside them. The rain had broken and the summer sky was crystalline. The volcanoes rose in the distance, still snowcapped in June. The tree-lined walkways of the gracious old park were filled with well-dressed strollers: men in summer suits and women corseted into the fashionable hourglass shape, carrying fringed parasols. Indian vendors patrolled the park selling ice cream out of pushcarts. José was finishing a cup of chocolate ice cream, while David had eaten strawberry.

“What do you mean?” José asked.

“She doesn't think I'm good enough to be your friend,” he said. “Not the son of a postal clerk.”

“But you are my friend,” José insisted. “Aren't you?”

“Of course I am, peanut,” he said, patting José's head. “Hey, look at those girls coming this way.
Qúe lindas, no?
” He threw his arm around José's shoulder. “Smile at them when they pass, okay?”

“Okay,” he said.

The two girls, one dark, the other blonde, were David's age. They wore candy-colored lacy confections, the dark girl in pink, and the blonde girl in mint. The prettier of the two, the dark-haired, olive-skinned one, stopped when José smiled, exclaiming, “Oh, what a beautiful little boy!” To David, she said, “Is he your brother?”

Before José could respond, David said, “Yes, miss. This is my
hermanito
José.”

“He's a perfect doll,” the blonde girl said.

“My name is David,” he said. “I have been teaching my brother how to ride a bicycle. Would you like to see him?”

“Well,” the dark girl said, “I don't know. We aren't supposed to talk to boys. But all right, just for a minute. Josélito, show me how you ride a bicycle.”

José, eager to show off his skill, mounted the bicycle. David pushed him down the path and whispered, “I want you to ride around the fountain and the bandstand very slowly.” He let go. After a few panicked, wobbly seconds, José steadied himself and found his stride. He pedaled down the broad path, steering out of the way of baby prams and other cyclists. He reached the fountain where water roared from the mouths of stone lions, circled it, and rode back toward David, who, as José passed, was deep in conversation with the two girls and did not see him wave. He turned around again at the bandstand, where a police band was warming up, and when he came around the second time, David was waiting for him, alone. He caught the bicycle and helped José off.

“Did you see me go by? I waved at you.”

“Of course, peanut, didn't you see me wave back?”

“No, you didn't. You were talking to those girls. Why did you tell them I was your brother?”

“Because you're like my little brother,” David said and pecked the top of José's head. “Whatever your old witch of a grandmother thinks.”

David had kissed him! He thought his heart would burst from happiness.

T
he last of the Gaviláns' lands that had not been confiscated or sold in the dark days after Maximiliano's fall was an ancient country house in the village of Coyoacán. In colonial days, the Gaviláns had used it as a summer retreat before the civil wars that followed independence made the roads impassable. By the time the roads had been cleared of bandits and mercenaries, the family was out of the habit of making the hour-long journey from city to country. For fifty years, the house had stood unused and dilapidated on a dirt road bordered by tall cactuses, the ochre-colored walls peeling, the carved doors worn away by the elements, the gardens turned to jungle, and the rooms filled with moth-eaten carpets and termite-eaten furniture.

Discreetly, Alicia had opened the house and hired workmen to repair the kitchen, prop up walls and pillars, and join the two largest rooms into a single long gallery that she filled with beds, converting it into a hospital ward. Cáceres found a cook and a half-dozen other trustworthy servants to staff the house. It was soon filled with the Yaquis whose freedom Alicia had purchased from corrupt Captain Henriquez. The manor's isolation and the status of its owners protected the men from prying officials and neighborhood gossip. The Yaquis remained sequestered at the house until they were fit to travel. They left at night, with forged identity papers, money, and a third-class railway ticket to the American border. All this had taken time to work out and it had to be done in the utmost secrecy.

Alicia, who deplored falsehood, had needed to become a convincing liar. The deceptions weighed on her conscience, particularly her lies to Miguel. She longed to tell her husband about the house in Coyoacán, but she refrained, fearing not his anger but his powers of reason. She had no doubt he would raise a hundred irrefutable reasons why she was acting foolishly. Even in her own mind, the faith that had inspired her to help the Yaquis wavered as she came to know them.

For as she heard their stories, she realized that, with a few exceptions, the men were warriors. Some of them had been fighting against the Mexicans for decades in defense of their homeland. In that long war, they had killed not only Mexican soldiers but the Mexican settlers to whom the Díaz government had given their land, including women and children. The men were grimly unapologetic for these atrocities and they made it clear that they intended to resume the war as soon as they returned to their land. She began to see how naive she had been. Not only was assisting these men treasonous but by becoming an accomplice to their violence, she endangered her soul.

She turned to Cáceres, her spiritual guide and confessor, as they sat at the kitchen table, where she peeled potatoes for the evening meal. He listened to her intently and then said, “Doña, do you not recall that the hardest teaching in all the Gospels is to love your enemies? ‘Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them who persecute you.' Isn't that what you are doing here, for these men?”

“I can't believe that God intends for us to save their lives so they can return home and kill others.”

“You must not presume to know the mind of God,” Cáceres said sharply. “Of course, it is not his will to continue the cycle of violence between the Yaquis and ourselves.” Then, more gently, he continued, “That is the very reason we are called upon to love them and to help them. We free ourselves from that cycle of killing by saving their lives, and in this way we follow Christ's directive to do good to those who would hate us.”