The Compass of His Bones and Other Stories (2 page)

The dancers had adorned themselves in the rags of old ceremonial dress, clothing that still glittered with iridescent reds and greens, where it was not torn and resewn. The women, stooped and folded in on themselves, stank from years of labor in the mercury mines. Miraculous that they walked at all, and they danced like scarecrows on a puppeteer’s strings, their jerky strides worn down to a caricature of normal human motion. To me they appeared bewitched, their twitches and stumbles those of a people caught forever in trance.

The men blended in with the women, except for one, who looked up at Pizarro astride his horse. Age had hardened this man until his true nature had retreated into the wrinkles and taut skin around the bone: one last rear guard against death. One could not guess whether he was happy or sad or merely indifferent, for his face had become such a mask that even ennui was a carefully guarded secret. And yet, if one discounted the faded rags, the dull eyes, this man resembled Pizarro closely enough to be his brother — and Pizarro must have recognized this, for he turned quickly away and muttered to me, “Do not stop here. Do not stop. Go on. Go on!” and urged his nag forward at a pace I could hardly match.

When, after several strides, I glanced back, I saw that the man stood in the middle of the highway, staring at us. His gaze stabbed into my proud Pizarro’s back like a dagger blunted by ill use, though why the similarity in their faces should frighten the Spaniard I did not know.

That night we camped in the sandy soil beside a patch of thorny yuccas. Though our clothing barely protected us from the chill, the Conquistador refused to unpack the blankets. He seemed to invite the cold, to embrace it, as if seeking penance. But for what? Because a mirror had been held up to him?

He remained awake for a long time, watching the stars glint like the eyes of gods. In his face, I still saw the ghosts of the men from the dance, and realized they haunted him. His prayers that night, conducted in a whisper I strained to understand, were for his wife and children in Spain.

Ever upward we climbed. I led now, despite his map, for the road contained treacherous potholes, overgrown with eel grass and other weeds that disguised ruts until too late. On the fifth day, I brought down a wild pig with my bolas to supplement his supplies. Always we went higher. Always higher. However we traveled — slow or fast, on foot or leading his horse — we went higher.

“The air is thinner here,” he said, wheezing.

“Yes, it is.”

“How much longer?”

He asked this question often and I had no ready reply. Who could predict what obstacles we might encounter? Our conversations consisted of little else, and this depressed me, for I was normally talkative and animated with my clients. But when I asked Pizarro, he had no stories, no descriptions of his country. At most he might say, “Where I live it is beautiful this time of year.” Or, “Churches are the only bastions of faith left, the only strength left in Spain.” Once he said, “You will never go to Spain. Why do you ask?” He said this so matter-of-factly that I determined that I would travel to Spain, if only to spite this stupid old man who really thought his map and his alone led to the lost treasure of the Incas.

Now the mists began to roll in: thick soups that our weak eyes could not penetrate. We traveled through this underworld with no anchor to secure our senses. In the absence of taste, touch, hearing, we became each a ghost to the other, a form in the mist. Only sharp sounds — the jingle of bit and harness, the creak of leather saddle — pierced the whiteness. It did not, of course, affect our camaraderie, because our camaraderie would have fit into the space between his saddle and his horse’s back.

Pizarro’s nose bled copiously in the thin air. He tried, and failed, to staunch the flow with his spare shirt. The white fabric was soon clotted red as if he had suffered a fatal wound.

I had many strange thoughts. Disembodied by the mist, not even able to see our own feet, I found that my imagination tried to compensate for the loss of sight. Soon, every tree root under my tread was a human bone — here a thighbone, there a spine. Helmets, too, I found aplenty with my feet, no doubt only rocks.

The only relief from the mist came in the form of lakes so blue and deep that they seemed black; so thickly placid that a skipping stone would only
plunk
and disappear, leaving no ripple to mark its entrance. The bones and treasure of many Inca lay at the bottom of such lakes, and I felt in my heart that a man would fare no better than the stones. The lakes were all graveyards without markers.

I told this to the Conquistador and he laughed.

“Think of the gold,” he said. “If only we could find a way to raise the gold.”

I began to fear his determination, his single-mindedness, his refusal to make camp until after the moon rose high above the mountain peaks. He was old and yet by strength of will refused to allow his body to betray him.

On the seventh day, when the silence and the mist made me both jumpy and melancholy, he asked me to tell him a story. I told him it was an odd request.

I thought I saw him shrug through the mist as he said, “My father once told me stories to pass the time when we went out into the fields — to oversee the men. This mist unsettles me.” And then in a whisper, “Please.” I wondered if he saw the ghost dancer in his dreams, if the man stood in the ruins of the old Incan highway and stared at Pizarro, night after night.

I thought for a moment and then said, “I shall tell you a tale from the beginning of the end of our reign.”

He nodded, motioned for me to continue.

And so I launched into my tale, determined to drive away the mist that clotted my eyes and stole my breath . . .

III

They journeyed to see the toad that lived in the maggot-cleansed eye of an eagle. This eagle had died high above a granite canyon, and already on the trek all seven llamas had been lost to thirst and fatigue. The meat was rationed by the seven Quichua who walked the ancient paths. These paths had been laid down long before the Inca rulers had arrived at Machu Picchu and built the city of Vilcapampa. The paths never remained the same — carefully chosen stones led the uninitiated to ravines, or places where the earth buckled, cracked, as mountains tossed and turned in fitful sleep.

One Quichua, Melchor Arteaga, was a lunatic. He danced the dance of the Emerald Beetle, Conchame, bringer of drunkenness and shortened breath. Twelve days before, Melchor had been struck by a Spanish musket load near Vitcos, where even now refugees straggled in ahead of the conquerors. The left side of the lunatic’s head had darkened; he moved jerkily. His eyes darted back and forth, perhaps following a hummingbird’s frantic flight from flower to flower. By nightfall, Melchor would be dead. By nightfall, the toad would have told them what they wished to know.

Two men, nobles, had already died, but three strong men carried the corpses on shrouded litters, muscles straining, faces long since stripped of any fat. Captain Rimachi Yupanqui, oldest of them all, had suffered through Inca Atahualpa’s capture by Pizarro. He of narrow eye and hawkish nose had seen the old king butchered once he filled a room with gold. Rimachi remembered the delicate butterflies, beetles, alpacas: children’s toys. The metal work had bought nothing. It never would. Rimachi walked with a soldier’s sense of fixed steps. His companions, Sayric Tupac and Titi Cusi, sons of the seventh man, had witnessed excesses themselves on the fields outside Cuzco; they listened with hatred when Rimachi spoke of Pizarro, the man who had robbed them of their birthright. All three carried bolas at their waists, the stones flaked with dried blood.

The seventh man was the king, Manco. His army awaited his return, bearing the oracle of the toad. The toad had always decided the punishment of the worst evildoers. Manco staggered forward, clutching his side, Rimachi supporting him at intervals. The wound would heal in time. But the king’s eyes were hollow and the clear, cold air cut through his robes. He shivered.

“Treachery,” Manco muttered, speaking to the sky. After raising the banner of revolt, many Quichua had joined him. But the Spanish had routed Manco near Cuzco and he had fled to the Urubamba Valley; the safety of fortress-capital Vilcapampa reassured him. Steep drops, raging rivers, and passes three miles high would hinder pursuit. But his forces needed a sign as the Spaniards approached, stripping bodies of metal, their thirst for gold unslaked. Manco made this pilgrimage because his captains had lost faith, and he himself refused to be ruler over the solitary mountain peak of Machu Picchu. Manco still hoped the toad who watched from the eagle’s eye, the oracle of the Quichua, would shed some wisdom on this crisis. Certainly the resident priest could help him understand.

So, sliding and stumbling, seven men lost themselves on the paths. Squinting, Manco pressed forward in the glare of the morning sun. Melchor followed, giggling and clutching his broken head. Behind both, the king’s sons and his captain dragged the dead nobles; they would be placed near the oracle, buried under rocks. No one spoke, though once or twice Rimachi would mutter a word to Titi, staring with concern at Manco. They ate as they moved, llama meat and
quinoa,
the cereal-like seeds kept in waist pouches. The sun eclipsed Melchor’s face. Manco allowed himself a smile, his callused feet lifting more easily with each step. They were close. Rimachi smiled too, a guarded smile. He knew the odds, had known them since Manco had cast off the role of puppet king.

They reached the bridge that joined the two sides of the canyon. Its liana cord made it durable, but the ropes swung and groaned in the wind. Manco crossed first, bracing himself against the gusts, planting one foot in front of the other. Melchor ran across, nearly ramming a foot through the webbing. When everyone had reached the other side, Manco said, “We will cut the bridge once we cross over again. We will cut every bridge . . . ” He looked to Rimachi, who nodded his approval. Manco glanced at his sons, then moved forward.

The stone hut next to the bridge was empty. The priest who had stood guard was discovered by Rimachi. He pointed downward to the base of the cliffs. The man was dead, sprawled with arms outstretched, his robes a blur of blood. Manco frowned, and said, “Leave him.”

Together, they made their way to the toad’s alcove, their bolas held ready. The alcove lay in a grotto which had been hollowed out at eye level above a shelf of rock. From the shelf, the men could see the stacked range of mountains fading into the distance, clouds stalking from above. The valleys beneath them were green smudges, the rivers sinuous lines broken by the white interruptions of rapids.

Although Rimachi and Titi searched, fanning out to cover the shelf’s rim, no enemy could be found. A cold wind blew out of the west and Manco shivered again. He called his son and captain back and, bravely, he approached the alcove. A judgment would be passed down. Behind him, Rimachi watched, a grimace forcing its way through wrinkles; the death of the priest made him wary. Sayric and Titi stood frozen, their burdens temporarily forgotten. Melchor picked a flower from behind two stones.

Manco peered into the hole. Within lay the toad, staring out from the eagle’s eye. How it sparkled in the sunlight!

Manco’s shoulders slumped. He sank to his knees, a sigh and snarl of exhaustion on his lips. Rimachi cursed, kicking at the ground. Sayric and Titi dropped their burdens. The dead men tumbled over the edge of the rock shelf, falling until they disappeared from sight.

Melchor laughed, as though Conchame, the Emerald Beetle, was buzzing in his ear, and brought his musician’s pipes to his mouth. Whirling, flailing, Melchor pawed at his head. A hollow sound, slow and melancholy, crept into the air, a counterpoint to his crazy dance. Manco, knowing he would never reclaim his lands no matter how hard he fought, raised his head to catch the notes. He nodded wryly as Rimachi helped him to his feet and his sons wept. A dirge. How fitting.

For the toad had turned to gold.

IV

I told this tale as a warning. If it marked centuries of slow decline and failure for the Inca, it also foretold a punishment for the Spanish: to be enraptured and consumed by their obsession with gold. Pizarro did not take it as such. He was silent for a long time, so long that I thought he had fallen asleep on his horse.

But then he said, haltingly, as if explaining to an idiot, “I studied at the military academy in Barcelona many years ago. You must understand that war is not a game for children.”

“Thank you for your wisdom, but I do not see it that way,” I said.

To which he replied, “That is why I am upon this horse and you are my guide.”

I kicked at the skulls that must have been roots or rocks, and cursed myself for telling such a story at all. The Spaniard was without subtlety and I without patience.

The sparse yucca and scraggly herds of wild alpaca gave way to bleak ice and snow, without the mist, which we soon learned had been a blessing, for now we saw each other more clearly, and neither of us could more than tolerate the other. Myself, because the Spaniard was conservative and withdrawn. The Spaniard, because I refused to agree with him and told him stories with no useful moral.

We argued about supplies.

“Surely there is wild game about,” he said when I suggested his dry beef and water skins would only last the journey if we turned back within three days.

“Look around you,” I whispered, afraid of avalanche. “Look around you! Do you see any trees? Any bushes? Anything for an animal to eat? Do you?”

We were tiptoeing through a field framed by abutting mountains whose flanks raced upward toward the sun. Not a blade of grass, and no water, except in the form of ice. Beneath the ice, more ice.

“How do you know?” he said.

“Because I live here,” I said.

He shivered, nudged his horse forward, its hooves making soft scrunching sounds in the snow.

An hour later, we came upon a frozen waterfall.

The Spaniard, complaining of the cold, trailed off in mid-insult, saying, “My God!” A solid wall of ice confronted us. In the center of this wall, a doorway had been covered over by water that had once flowed in a river down the mountainside and now formed a facade of ice. A man, frozen through, looked down at us from within the doorway. At first I thought he was floating in the ice, but as we moved closer I saw the frayed end of a rope. The man had been hung by the neck and the passage sealed with him inside it. The man wore a Conquistador’s armor and his head lolled; his helmet had frozen to his forehead and his arms hung limply at his sides.