‘With all respect, Don Ramón, I disagree.’
‘I doubt that I could ever give my consent.’ But he liked the young man’s spirit and did not try to prevent him from taking rooms at the same inn.
Now began a clever game of cat and mouse, with the Frenchman testing every gambit to place himself alone with Trinidad, and her grandfather using his talents to outwit him. Alas, Don Ramón’s own grandchild sided with the enemy, exchanging surreptitious messages of love and stolen kisses. But with Engracia’s determined help, Saldaña did succeed in protecting his child’s honor.
After four days of this he suggested bluntly that D’Ambreuze move on: ‘Your business waits,’ and to his surprise the brash young fellow said: ‘It does indeed. But I also shall wait … in the capital.’ And he was off, this time without escort, for south of Potosí, El Camino Real became a major road in the silver trade, and soldiers guarded it on a permanent basis.
Two weeks later the Saldañas started their own hundred-and-twenty-league trip south, which they took at a pace more leisurely than before, so that it was early August before they entered upon that splendid final plateau on which stood the marvel of the New World.
If Trinidad had been impressed by Saltillo as a major center, she was dumfounded by the capital, for it exceeded even the stories that soldiers had recited during the long journey. The cathedral was three times the size of the lovely church in Saltillo, the plaza fifteen or twenty times larger, and if the shops in the northern town had been lavish, the ones in Mexico City were true cornucopias, crowded with elegant wares from all over Europe: brocades and silks and intricately woven cottons and hammered gold for women; guns and silver-handled swords and burnished leatherware from Toledo and fine suitings for the men.
What made the capital even more exciting was that on the second morning René-Claude appeared at the Saldañas’ inn, prepared to escort Trinidad and her mother to various parts of the metropolis: the bullring, where masters from Spain performed; the concert halls, where fine singers from all over Europe entertained; and those unique taverns which started serving delectable dinners at eleven o’clock at night. Here Trinidad could listen to the wandering Negro poets recite impudent impromptu verses cataloguing the scandals of the day. Standing before her table one night, the best of the black poets cried with obvious joy:
‘Little girl with the laughing smile,
Please stay among us for a while.
Mexico is criminal, it’s true,
That’s why we need a pretty little …
That’s why we need a witty little …
That’s why we need a lovely little girl like you.’
The poetry wasn’t very good, but it was delivered with great enthusiasm and considerable boldness. To Don Ramón, the poet declaimed:
‘While you spend money wildly in the city,
The clerks back home are checking on your books.
They scratch their heads and say “The pity:
These figures prove that you’re the chief of crooks.” ’
At this sally the crowded tavern applauded, and other diners pointed their fingers at Don Ramón and chided him for being a thief. He was required to nod and smile and tip the insulting poet handsomely, for if he failed to do any of these things, the black man would remain there shouting really damaging verses. However, on this occasion the minstrel achieved his greatest success with the lines he launched at René-Claude:
‘My fine young lad with eyes of blue,
I see you come from France.
But our police are on to you,
So do not take a chance.
‘For if you try to steal our girl
This entire town will rise,
And knock your head into a whirl
And boot you to the skies.
Take my advice, young man of France,
Forget the old man’s threats.
Lead forth your lady to the dance
And you will cash your bets.’
With this, he threw his arms wide, reached down and kissed Trinidad, embraced René-Claude, and after gathering coins from the latter, danced his way through the restaurant, a figure of whirling grace, black as the night and free to exercise privileges no one else in that room would have dared. At the exit he leaped, turned in midair, and threw the entire assembly kisses with his long, agile fingers.
There was nothing in Tejas like this black poet, nor was there anything like the grandeur of Mexico City or its university more than two centuries old, and as Trinidad came to know the metropolis in which she would remain for half a year, she also came to understand something of Spain’s glory. She knew now why her grandfather was so proud of his heritage and wanted her to share it with a Spanish husband who might even take her back to the homeland. One night, after they had attended one of the city’s dozen theaters for a program of one-act plays and singing, she confided: ‘It seems so old and so learned and the buildings so important … It’s not at all like our poor Tejas,’ and Don Ramón said: ‘Spain itself is even better.’
But his search for a Spanish son-in-law was not going well, and he was relieved when D’Ambreuze announced that he must go down to Vera Cruz to supervise the arrival of mining equipment from France, but was appalled when the young man suggested that the Saldañas accompany him, for it would be a distance of some seventy leagues through fever-ridden jungle. However, Trinidad made such an outcry about wishing to visit Puebla, one of the most gracious cities in the entire Spanish empire, that he did agree to lead his family that far. There, in what was called the City of the Angels, with the great volcanoes looming over the myriad churches—three hundred and sixty-five in outlying Cholula alone—they said farewell to D’Ambreuze. Don Ramón saluted him, Engracia allowed him to kiss her, and Trinidad clung to him as the horses were brought up for the dangerous journey down to where the ships from Europe arrived almost every week.
Back in the capital, Don Ramón made serious inquiry concerning D’Ambreuze, and learned from officials who had served in both Spain and New Orleans that he did indeed come from an excellent family and that his people in Louisiana had been among the first to accept Spanish rule back in the 1760s.
One diplomat said: ‘We had to hang a dozen French leaders, you know. They were stubborn, would accept nothing Spanish, so we strung them up. But the D’Ambreuze clan were different. Good Frenchmen. Good Catholics. And now they’re good Spaniards. There’s been talk that René-Claude’s father, or perhaps René-Claude himself, in due course, might be our Spanish governor in New Orleans. So the young man is not a nobody, of that you can be sure, Don Ramón.’
Over the weeks Saldaña pondered his problem, and one afternoon when Trinidad was out with friends visiting the architectural masterpieces of the capital, he said to her mother: ‘By sixteen our precious little lady ought to be married. I’m afraid my dream of Spain was fruitless. I have the sad feeling that our good friend Veramendi was correct when he predicted that the real power would be coming down El Camino Real from the north and not up from the south.’
‘Are you saying …?’
‘I’m saying that when I study the decline of Spain in the New World, our young French friend begins to look better every day.’
‘Oh dear.’ Engracia was not prepared for a French son-in-law, nor for the French to have a foothold of any kind in Mexico, especially Tejas. ‘In the old days things were so much simpler.’
When D’Ambreuze returned from Vera Cruz, bronzed and temporarily underweight because of fever, so that he seemed almost a wraith, he insisted that everyone accompany him on an expedition to the ruins of some pyramids north of the city. A field trip involving many horses and servants was arranged, and when the Saldañas stood at the base of the major pyramid, its sides encrusted with growing trees and small shrubs, they marveled at the building talents of the ancients. For the first time Don Ramón contemplated the fact that before the Spanish came to Mexico, Indians of great ability must have lived here, capable of building edifices ten times m
ore grand than anything yet seen in Tejas. It was a disturbing thought to a man who had always scorned Indians, but the impact of the pyramids was even greater on Trinidad, for she could not believe that these wonders looming out of the wasteland could have been built by the ancestors of the Indians she had known, and a most strange thought occurred to her, which she shared with her parents: ‘They must have been different Indians from the ones we see. That Indian maiden who married the Spanish soldier Garza, she must have been quite different.’ And when she returned to the city she began looking into the faces of the Indians, staring at them impolitely, trying to find in them any indication of the master-builders who had constructed those pyramids.
When the Saldañas returned to the capital from this excursion, Don Ramón slumped in a chair and told Engracia: ‘I don’t think we’re going to find a proper husband for Trinidad.’
‘Not here,’ she agreed. ‘It looks as if Spain has already surrendered Mexico. She’s surely not sending any young officers here.’
Therefore, Don Ramón did not immediately reject René-Claude’s impertinent suggestion that he accompany the Saldaña expedition back to Béjar, but something the young man said alerted the old man to the fact that the young couple were rather more deeply in love than he had anticipated: ‘I had planned to sail back to France, report to my uncles, and return to my job in New Orleans.’
‘Why did you change your plans?’
‘I wrote my uncles that I had found in Mexico the girl I wanted to marry, and that I would seek to go home your way.’
‘You may join us,’ Don Ramón conceded, without enthusiasm, but the young man realized that to win Trinidad, he must please her grandfather, so he said brightly: ‘In Vera Cruz a man at the port told me to ask when I next saw you …’ And here he took out a worn slip of paper: ‘Are you really an Hidalgo de Bragueta?’
Don Ramón straightened as if he were about to salute the king: ‘I am indeed.’ Then he chuckled: ‘Self-appointed, you might say.’
‘And what is it? The banker wouldn’t tell me.’
‘It means that the king himself would have granted me the right to use the title Don, if I lived in Spain.’
‘For what?’
‘For siring seven sons in a row. No daughters.’ But as soon as he said this he added: ‘I did have seven sons, and all died, but not one of them gave me the extreme joy my granddaughter does.’
D’Ambreuze rose, stood at attention, and said: ‘Don Ramón, I salute you, and I hope that I shall be allowed to give you seven great-grandchildren.’
But Ramón de Saldaña was no fool, and he knew well that young men often woo young girls with faithless promises, then leave them in despair, and both he and Engracia began telling Trinidad, when they had her alone, of that endless chain of tragedies in which unsuspecting girls were betrayed: ‘There was the Escobár girl in Zacatecas when I was young. This high official of the court in Madrid came out to try a case of thievery from the silver mines …’ It mattered not who was doing the preaching, the histories were all the same: ‘Shortly after my father took command at the presidio in Béjar … I was just a boy, but I remember this girl Eufemia, sent up from Postosí to stay with her brother, who was our lieutenant, while she had her baby. It was a baby boy, and after Uncle Damián christened him, with her brother attending … Well, the lieutenant asked for leave. My father granted it and three months later the young man returned to Béjar with the simple announcement “I killed him,” and we were all happy that his honor and that of his sister had been restored.’
In conjunction with his moralizing stories Don Ramón kept a severe watch upon his granddaughter, and this was effective in San Luis Potosí and during the long march north of there. But now, as the young people approached Saltillo, a magical city even if one were not in love, it was obvious that the lovers had reached a point of commitment; they were determined to marry and they wanted that mutual promise publicly announced, so Don Ramón watched with extra diligence.
As they entered the city and Trinidad saw once more the plaza where she had met René-Claude, a frightening thought overtook her, for she remembered that it had been Dorotéa Galíndez whom he had kissed in Saltillo, and she wondered what might happen when the two met again. But when they reached the inn she heard Dorotéa’s hearty cry: ‘My dearest friend Trinidad! Meet my husband!’ So that danger dissolved.
It had been a long day’s ride, this final stage to Saltillo, and at midnight Don Ramón was truly fatigued; he slept so soundly that he did not hear Trinidad slip down the tiled hall and out through a window where D’Ambreuze was waiting. They walked back to the plaza where they had met and saw two beggars, their clothes in tatters, sleeping in a doorway. They saw the verger swing shut the gates of the church and wend his way home. They heard the nightwatchman, who would query them if he found them in the streets, and then they discovered an alleyway leading to a sheltered garden, and when they were under the trees René-Claude put cupped hands to his mouth as if he were going to shout. Instead he whispered: ‘Don Ramón, heaven is my witness that we are not in your castle!’ Then he told Trinidad: ‘I am free to make you my wife,’ and there they sealed their love.
One day south of Béjar, when Don Ramón had about decided that he must soon discuss with René-Claude the size of Trinidad’s dowry, most of the soldiers galloped ahead to inform the town of the Saldañas’ return, and while the reduced caravan was in the process of fording the Medina prior to reentering Tejas, the Apache struck. There were more than two dozen warriors, and Trinidad would have been carried off had not Don Ramón defended her valiantly, but the Apache, having seen how young she was, stopped fighting the soldiers and tried again to capture her, for she would be a prize among the campfires.
But now René-Claude, only twenty years old, galloped directly at them, drove them back, and took three arrows through his chest. His horse ran blindly on, taking him closer to the Indians, who sought to take him alive for the protracted tortures they enjoyed, but with his dying strength he struck at them until they had to cut his throat to subdue him.
When the Saldañas brought Trinidad to their house in the church plaza, she passed into a kind of coma, unwilling to believe that her chivalric, loving young man had somehow vanished from the earth, as dead as those shadowy figures who had built the pyramids, and she remained in this condition for several days. Fray Ildefonso from Santa Teresa came to talk with her, but she stared right past him and would say nothing. Finally, on the fifth day, he shook her and said sternly: ‘Each morning the rooster crows, and you’ve lost five of his days. Now get up and get dressed.’ And he stayed right there in the low-ceilinged room until she left her bed.
When her mother’s nourishing meals had restored her strength she ventured into the plaza, but seeing the church at one end and a bed of flowers beside the governor’s residence at the other, she imagined that she was back in Saltillo, and sorrow overcame her and she fled back to her room, where she would have returned to her bed had not Fray Ildefonso given strict orders that this must not be permitted.
So she walked like a forlorn ghost through the beautiful rooms of her home and gradually regained control of herself. René-Claude was dead, and a large part of her heart was dead, too. But Fray Ildefonso’s sagacious counsel helped her to see her inescapable situation: ‘You’re fifteen years old. Four times that many years lie ahead, and you must use them wisely. God intended you to be the guiding spirit of a Christian household, the mother of children who will help build His world. That is your proud destiny, and you must work toward it. Sew, cook for the poor, help at the mission.’
It was repugnant to contemplate the full resumption of life after so grievous a loss, and the idea that she should in the future encounter someone whom she might want to marry was inconceivable, but her common sense affirmed Ildefonso’s basic counsel that she must reintroduce herself into the mainstream of life. Few girls of fifteen in northern Mexico had ever seen so clearly the grand design of life, so she squared her s
houlders and prepared to take her place within it.
What appealed to her most, after her profound experience at the pyramids, was to work at Misión Santa Teresa, for there she could help the Indian mothers care for their babies. But the new priest in town, this Father Ybarra, who had come north to see if the missions should be closed down, absolutely forbade her to step foot inside Santa Teresa: ‘This place is not for women. If God had intended you to enter these precincts, he would have made women friars.’
When Fray Ildefonso explained that this poor child of God needed such work in order to protect her sanity, Father Ybarra, a member of the secular clergy who had never liked Franciscans to begin with, told the gentle friar to mind his own business, and within a week Fray Ildefonso was on his way back to the college in Zacatecas. In his absence Father Ybarra was even harsher with Trinidad: ‘Stay where you belong. Pray. Strive to regain God’s grace.’
Such orders Trinidad refused to obey, and with obvious distaste Father Ybarra watched her moving about the village as if she were a married woman, and for no specific reason he conceived a great dislike for this girl with the twisted mouth who always seemed to be smirking sardonically at what he said. In church on Wednesdays and Sundays he tried not to look at her, for he was obsessed with the idea that she was somehow allied with the devil. When one of the Saldaña servants informed him that in Saltillo on the way north ‘some funny business happened on several nights when the young one slipped past the sleeping Don Ramón,’ he began to watch her closely, hoping that she was pregnant. He practiced the anathema he would hurl at her from his pulpit when her shame was known—hussy, slut, harlot and wanton featured heavily—and he was disappointed when it became obvious that she was not with child.
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