I opened my eyes and looked up at the general. “I don’t know, excelencia. I woke when I heard the first shots. When I became aware that the house was burning I went out the window into the ditch. Then I saw Amparo, and I grabbed her and we fled.”
The general stared at me for a moment. “You did well.” He covered my hand again, his touch curiously soft and gentle. “My sons are dead but their spirit and courage lives on—in you. I shall always think of you now as my son.”
With surprise I noticed the beginning of tears in those pale-gray eyes. The general could not be crying. Men did not weep; he had told me so himself. “Thank you, excelencia.”
He nodded and, straightening up, started for the door. He turned at the portal and looked back. “I leave you to your lunch.”
Then I remembered. “How is Amparo?”
He smiled. “She is up and about. I am taking her back to Curatu with me. Get well soon and you will join us.”
I could hear his boots echoing down the hall as I turned to Fat Cat. His face was still pale but he was smiling. “You have given me back my shirt,” he said.
I don’t know why but suddenly I was angry. “I have given you back your head!” I pushed the tray back toward him. “Take it away, I’m not hungry.”
Silently he left the room, and I turned my head toward the window. But I didn’t notice the blue sky and the sunshine, nor did I hear the soft twittering of the birds. All I could see was el coronel, and all I could hear was that detestable voice. The black hatred again rose in me, bringing the bitter taste of bile into my mouth. If he was alive, someday I would search him out and kill him!
A few weeks later I was in Curatu. Father had found a house on the side of the hill looking out over the sea not far from where his parents had lived. Soon after that I was registered in the same Jesuit school that he had attended as a boy, and the same monseñor who had registered him was now impressing upon me my failures as a student.
Unwillingly I forced my attention back to his droning voice. “You show promise,” he was concluding, “but you must work harder to achieve a standing over which your father can take pride.”
“I will, Monseñor. I shall work very hard.”
He smiled. “Bueno. Go then in peace, my son.”
“Gracias, Monseñor.”
I left the small room which served as his office and fled down the corridor. I blinked my eyes at the sudden brightness of the sun as Fat Cat came over from his crowd of admirers. “The car is waiting, excelencito.”
Ever since Estanza he no longer called me by name. I had become “excelencito”—little excellency. I could go nowhere, do nothing, without his being around. Once he had told me that the general and my father had assigned him to be my bodyguard and I had laughed. I did not need a bodyguard. I could take care of myself. But that hadn’t changed things. Fat Cat was always around.
I looked over at the black Hudson limousine with a uniformed chauffeur seated behind the wheel. I gave Fat Cat my books. “I don’t want the car. I feel like walking.”
I turned and started down the hill toward the city. A moment later I heard the purr of a motor behind me. I glanced back. The car was following, crawling slowly down the hill, the chauffeur and Fat Cat in the front seat. I smiled to myself. In that at least Fat Cat hadn’t changed. He would still rather ride than walk.
Later I sat on a piling at the end of the dock and watched a freighter being unloaded. I could hear the sailors cursing, the longshoremen in French and the answering insults in Spanish. My French teacher would truly be surprised at my knowledge of that language if he ever heard me repeat some of their obscenities.
I looked up at the red, white, and blue tricolor flying from the mast. There was a breeze coming in from the sea and it fluttered proudly. I surveyed the port. There were only two other ships being unloaded. One flew the flag of Panama, the other was Greek.
Before the revolution, I had been told, there were never fewer than twenty ships. Mostly norteamericano and English. Now both the United States and Great Britain forbade our ports to their ships. My father said it was because they had alliances with the former government and had not yet recognized our new one. I didn’t see what that had to do with it. Especially when bananas rotted on the docks, they burned the sugarcane in the fields, and the coffee beans turned brown and maggoty in their bags in the warehouses.
I heard footsteps behind me and turned. Two boys were coming toward me. They wore the torn and ragged clothing that seemed the common garb in this part of the town. They stopped in front of me, and one of them took off his hat and addressed me respectfully. “A few centavos, excelencia, for our hunger.”
I felt embarrassed. I had no money. I had no need of it. Whatever I wanted Fat Cat got for me. “I haven’t any,” I said curtly, to cover my embarrassment.
“Just one centavo, señor. For the grace of God.”
I climbed down from the piling. “I’m sorry, I haven’t any money.”
I saw them exchange disbelieving looks. I felt strange. They weren’t much older than I and yet their manner had been subservient, almost wheedling. Now they stood directly in front of me on the narrow catwalk leading back to the main dock and there wasn’t room to pass.
“Excuse me,” I said.
I saw a sullen look come over their faces. They didn’t move. “What do you want?” I asked. “I told you I haven’t any money.”
They didn’t answer.
“Let me pass,” I repeated, beginning to get angry. Did these fools think if I did have a few centavos I wouldn’t give it to them?
“He wants to pass,” the larger said mockingly. The smaller smiled nastily, and echoed the other in a mocking sissy voice.
I needed no further invitation. The pent-up rage roared inside me. A moment later the smaller one was flying from the catwalk into the water and the larger one screamed as the toe of my shoe caught him in the cojones. He fell to his knees on the catwalk, clutching at his groin, and as I kicked him in the side he too went over into the water.
While I stood looking down at them as they struggled toward a piling I heard footsteps behind me.
“What happened?” Fat Cat asked.
“They would not let me pass.”
“Campesinos!” Fat Cat spat into the water after them.
I started back to the shore, Fat Cat following me. The big black limousine was waiting at the edge of the dock. I turned to Fat Cat before I got into the car.
“Why do they beg?”
“Who?”
“Them.” I pointed to the two boys climbing back onto the dock.
Fat Cat shrugged. “There are always beggars.”
“They said they were hungry.”
“There are always the hungry.”
“But there aren’t supposed to be. That’s what the whole revolution was about.”
Fat Cat looked at me, a strange look in his eyes. “I, myself, have been in three revolutions. Yet I never knew of one that put food in the bellies of the campesinos. Campesinos are born to starve.”
“Then why did we fight?”
Fat Cat smiled. “So that we would not be like them and have to beg for our bread.”
I stared at him for a moment, then took my foot off the running board. “Do you have any change?”
He nodded.
I held out my hand.
He put his hand into his pocket and dropped some coins into my open palm. I closed my fist around them and walked back down the dock. The two boys watched me warily, fear clouding their eyes. The bigger one was still holding himself. The smaller spat at my feet.
“Campesinos!” I threw the coins down at them and turned and walked away.
73
The Palacio del Presidente was in the center of the town. It occupied two city blocks and was surrounded by an eighteen-foot brick-and-concrete wall, which effectively cut off the building from the streets. There were but two entrances, one on the north side facing the mountains at the rear of the city, the ot
her on the south looking toward the sea. It was a fortress within itself. There were always guards at the iron gates and sentries who patrolled the walks atop the high walls.
By a decree of one of the former presidents, who had had a shot fired at him from a nearby building while he was walking from the residencia to the offices, all the buildings for two blocks square surrounding the palace had been razed. This kept any windows from overlooking the presidential enclosure. It did not, however, keep that particular president from assassination. After several months of brooding humiliation over his taking a mistress, his own wife had shot him.
The soldados at the South Gate snapped to attention as the big black limousine rolled through. I looked out at them carelessly from the backseat. The car turned right and headed for the residencia, a white stone building in the southeast corner. When it stopped in the driveway the soldiers there looked at me without curiosity, for my regular weekly visit to Amparo was by then routine.
Amparo’s apartamiento was in the right wing. The left belonged to her father, and the center of the building contained the public rooms. I was ushered into the large corner room that served as her sitting room. As usual I had to wait. La princesa, as she had come to be called, was never on time.
I was standing at the window looking out on the grounds when she came in followed by her dueña. She came toward me in a fine white dress, her long blond hair falling to her shoulders and her hand outstretched imperiously.
As was the custom, I kissed her hand. “Amparo,” I said gravely.
“Dax.” She smiled. “It was good of you to come.”
We said the same things each week and now we waited for la dueña’s customary words. They came right on schedule. “I shall leave you children to your play.”
Amparo nodded. We waited until the old woman closed the door behind her, then turned to each other, grinning. In a moment we were at the window looking down.
Sure enough, la dueña came out the side entrance. Fat Cat was waiting there, his uniform cap in his hand, and together they turned and hurried to la dueña’s small apartment in the servants’ building.
Amparo burst out laughing. “She waits all week for your visit.”
“Not mine,” I replied dryly.
She laughed again and turned to me. “Shall we watch them?”
I shook my head. I didn’t feel like it today. Sometimes we would run into Amparo’s bedroom, where from one window we could look down through a skylight just over the bed in la dueña’s room. It was dull. They always did the same thing. I couldn’t understand why Fat Cat didn’t get as bored with it as we did at watching them.
“What do you want to do then?”
“I don’t know.” I stood at the window looking out.
“You’re not much fun.”
I looked around at her. Amparo at nine was growing into a more beautiful child each time I saw her. And well aware of it. But she was alone too much. She was not allowed outside the walls of the palace. Not even to attend school. Tutors and teachers were brought in.
Every afternoon selected and approved playmates were allowed to visit. Señor Moncada’s two daughters, now at a private school in Curatu, came once a week; other children of the local aristócratas and políticos also had their turn. Once a month there was a party which we all attended.
Beyond that Amparo lived in a world completely peopled by adults. There were times when I felt she was much older than I. She seemed to know so much more about what went on in the world. She was always filled with tiny malicious bits of gossip about people.
She went now to the couch and sat down. “What did the monseñor say to you?”
I looked at her in surprise. “How did you know he sent for me?”
She laughed. “La dueña. I heard her say that if it weren’t for your father you would have been sent down.”
“Where did she hear that?”
“From one of Papá’s aides. Papá always asks for your school report.”
El Presidente had many more important things on his mind than my marks at school. Why this interest in me?
“Papá thinks of you often. He says that if my brothers had lived they would have been like you.” She looked down at her hands, and a wistful note came into her voice. “Sometimes I wish I had been a boy. Then maybe Papá wouldn’t feel so badly.”
“He would rather have you than any of them,” I said.
Her face brightened. “Do you really think so?”
“Of course.”
“I’m going to be very smart, he’ll see. I’ll be able to do as much as any boy.”
“I’m sure you will,” I answered. It was always safe to agree with Amparo. That way we didn’t get into any arguments.
“When are you leaving for Paris?”
This time I was really surprised. “Paris?”
“You’re going to Paris,” she said positively. “I heard my father say so. Your father is going there on a trade mission. Los Estados Unidos and Great Britain refuse to send their ships to trade with us. We must find new markets for our products or we will not survive. France seems most logical.”
“Perhaps my father is going without me.”
She shook her head. “No. He will be gone for several years. Besides, I heard Papá say that he will arrange for you to attend a school there.”
“It’s funny he never said anything to me.”
“It was only settled this morning,” she said. “I heard them talking at breakfast.”
I thought of the French freighter I had seen at the docks. I wondered if we might be sailing on her. I walked to the window and looked out toward the port. I couldn’t see her at the pier. She must already have gone.
Amparo came and stood beside me. “Shall we go outside for a walk?”
“If you like.”
We went downstairs and out her private entrance, which opened onto a small garden. As we came out of the building two soldiers fell in behind us just out of earshot. We went through the iron gate and strolled down the path toward the administración building. Soldiers snapped to attention and saluted as we passed.
A car had pulled up in front of the “little palace,” as the guest house was now called. A man got out and hurried into the building. I couldn’t see his face. “Who was that?”
Amparo shrugged. “I have seen him several times. I think he is the manager of La Cora.”
I knew who La Cora was. She was the latest in a series of residents of the little palace. El Presidente liked to have things brought to him.
“I don’t think he will be going there much longer,” Amparo said suddenly.
“Why?”
“I think Papá is already getting bored with La Cora. He has had dinner with me almost every night this week.” There was a faintly malicious sound of triumph in her voice.
I knew, of course, about the women who had come to the little palace in a steady procession. They stayed an average of six weeks, then disappeared. A few days later another would appear. Our Presidente was a man of diversified tastes. La Cora had lasted longer than most; she had been in residence almost two months. “I wonder what she looks like.”
“She’s not very pretty,” Amparo replied disdainfully.
“I heard she was.”
“I don’t think so,” Amparo answered. “She has big tetas. They’re out to here.” She held her hands out a foot in front of her chest.
“I like big tetas.”
She looked down at herself. Her own breasts were just beginning to form. “I shall have big tetas,” she said, “bigger than hers.”
“I’m sure you will,” I answered soothingly.
“Would you like to see her?”
“Yes.”
Amparo turned and walked up to the entrance of the little palace. The soldier on duty saluted, then opened the door. We went into the house, where a majordomo greeted us.
Amparo looked down her nose at him. “I have come to call on La Cora.”
The servant stood there hes
itantly. I could see that he did not know what to do. Amparo, however, was used to having her own way. “I am not used to waiting!”
The majordomo bowed. “Of course, Princesa. If you will follow me?”
He led us to an apartamiento in the left wing of the building, and paused outside the door. Through it we could hear the faint murmur of voices. He knocked.
The voices fell silent. A moment later a woman called, “Who is it?”
“La princesa está aquí.”
“La princesa?”
“Sí, señorita. She wishes to see you.”
There was a quick murmur of voices again, and the door opened. A tall woman with large dark eyes and black hair gathered into a chignon stood in the doorway. She looked at Amparo, then stepped back. “I am honored, Princesa.”
Amparo swept into the room as if it were her own. “I thought it might be nice if we had tea together.”
The woman glanced at the man by the window fleetingly. I saw him nod impersonally. His face was thin and he wore a Vandyke beard. His eyes were very dark and glittered.
“It will be my pleasure, Princesa.” La Cora clapped her hands, and the majordomo came to the door. “Tea, please, Juan.”
Amparo said, “I would like to present my friend, Don Diogenes Alejandro Xenos.”
La Cora curtsied, and I bowed. “My pleasure, señorita.”
“May I present my manager, Señor Guardas?”
The manager bowed, his heels clicking audibly in the military fashion. “A su servicio.” He straightened up and looked at La Cora. “I trust you can persuade his excellency to attend. I have arranged a special entertainment for tonight.”
“He will attend.”
Señor Guardas walked to the door. “I must now excuse myself. I have many pressing engagements.”
Amparo nodded, and he bowed again as he went out the door. I watched until it had closed behind him. There was no doubt in my mind that he had once been a soldier. It showed in his carriage, the military cadence of his walk.
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