by Simon Levack
‘That’s all right,’ Handy was saying. ‘I really appreciate what you’re doing for us. I mean, I know it isn’t a nice thing to have to do.’
‘I had to do worse things as a priest,’ I said lightly. ‘Compared to sticking maguey spines through my tongue or wading through ice-cold lake water, I’m sure this is nothing! But are you certain you need me? Can’t any of your sons help, or your brothers?’
‘My sons are too young, apart from Cuicuilticuauhtli.’ The young man’s name meant ‘Spotted Eagle’. ‘My brother-in-law – Goose’s husband, Xochipepe – will help. I’ve no brothers living, though, and by the time my father-in-law’s finished with them I don’t suppose any of my wife’s relatives will talk to me. And it’s a difficult thing to ask of a friend or a neighbour.’ I wondered what that made me, in Handy’s estimation, but before I could voice the question aloud, we were interrupted.
‘What about me?’
Both Handy and I started at the sound of a man’s voice. A moment later I heard Goose crying shrilly: ‘You can’t come in here! Don’t you know what’s happened?’
‘Oh, yes, I know,’ said the stranger grimly.
I turned around to see a tall, heavily built man whose weathered skin and grey-streaked hair were those of someone of about the same age as Handy and I. He was formally dressed: barefoot, because he was a commoner and so forbidden sandals in the city, but his carmine coloured cape with its tasselled orange border marked him as a Master of Youths, a soldier who had taken three war captives. His entry into the courtyard was curious: he moved with determination but also with a limp, and he had Goose scampering anxiously behind him, her hands waving and all but clutching at the trailing hem of his cloak. He seemed unsure of himself. His head kept jerking from side to side as if looking for signs of an ambush.
Handy was on his feet. ‘What do you want, Tlapallalo?’
The newcomer took a step backwards, almost colliding with Goose. ‘I came to help… and to say goodbye.’
‘Goodbye it is,’ Handy said coldly.
The man whose name meant ‘Red Macaw’ looked at the ground for a moment. When he looked up again I saw that his eyes were raw, and he was biting his lower lip. He took a deep breath. ‘Look – I know we’ve had our differences. But I want to help now. You’re short-handed for the burial.’
‘No I’m not,’ Handy snapped. ‘And why should I give a shit for what you want? Goodbye, I said. Now get out of my house!’
He took a step towards Red Macaw. For a moment I thought the other man was going to retreat, but he stood his ground. They ended up with their noses almost touching, baring their teeth at each other. I got to my feet, wary of the fight that seemed to be about to break out, while Goose scurried around the two men, pleading with them both to calm down for her sister’s sake.
‘Why do you think I came here?’ asked Red Macaw, without taking his eyes off his antagonist.
Handy responded: ‘I don’t know why you came here. There’s nothing you can do. There never was, Red Macaw. Now get out, before Yaotl and I throw you out!’
‘Wait a moment!’ I spluttered indignantly. ‘I may help you bury your wife but nobody said anything about joining in a fight! I’m in enough trouble already!’
Red Macaw seemed to notice me for the first time then. He looked me up and down and was clearly not impressed by what he saw. ‘So who’s this then?’
‘None of your business!’ snapped Handy.
‘Listen, both of you.’ I could hear my voice going up in pitch, in bafflement and confusion. ‘Handy, if you expect me to help you shove this man out into the street you might at least tell me why. And as for you, Red Macaw, I don’t know why you came here or what Handy has against you…’
‘You mind your own business too, Yaotl,’ Handy said menacingly.
I could only stare at him, suddenly lost for words. Fortunately Goose chose that moment to intervene again. Stepping up to the two men until she was all but standing between them – indeed I was sure she would have stood between them, if there had been space enough – she looked imploringly up at them both: ‘Please, remember Star. Would she have wanted this?’
For a long moment no-one moved or spoke.
When the tension was finally broken it was by Red Macaw, who lowered his eyes from Handy’s face and squeezed them shut as if to hold back a rush of tears. He turned away.
‘You’re wrong. There’s something I can do – more than I can tell you. But if you won’t let me… Look, just guard her very carefully, won’t you? There could be trouble tonight.’
‘Sod off,’ Handy growled quietly.
With that the other man limped out of the courtyard, the pain of whatever injury he had sustained obvious now, and without a backward glance. The last words I heard him mutter were: ‘You say there never was anything I could do… That isn’t true, and you all know it.’
I stared after him, aware that my mouth was gaping like an idiot’s but lacking the will to do anything about it. Slowly, I turned towards Handy, to see him glaring fiercely at me.
‘Don’t ask me, Yaotl,’ he said simply. ‘Just don’t even ask, that’s all.’
‘What did he mean about trouble, though?’
‘I’ve no idea. Like I said, don’t ask!’
Bewildered, I looked at Goose, but she was already hurrying indoors, muttering something about tortillas.
4
There was nothing else to be done at Handy’s house that day except eat and wait for nightfall. That seemed to be enough for the commoner, who soon lapsed into a torpor, slumped against the wall of his courtyard with eyes wide open but focused on nothing.
I had other concerns, however. I was no nearer to finding out the truth behind the chief minister’s warning, or to alerting my family to the danger. And I was concerned about Lily. I had promised to return to her that night. Every moment I was delayed would be torment for her, and if I did nothing else, I had to let her know what I was up to, and reassure her that I was safe. I could not do any of these things in Handy’s courtyard.
I stood up and looked down at the other man. ‘I have to go,’ I said hesitantly. ‘I’ll come back, but there are a couple of matters I have to attend to first. I don’t know how long it’ll take, though – I mean, I’ll be back tonight, of course. But I’ve got to see my family, and get a message to Lily, the sooner the better.
Handy became animated. He sat upright and looked at me with narrowed eyes. ‘Don’t worry about Lily. I’ll send one my sons. It’s not as if I’m going to get any other work out them today.’ He paused. ‘But are you sure it’s wise, going to see your parents? What if old Black Feathers is right? What if the captain’s watching their house? It’s too dangerous.’
‘Old Black Feathers has men watching my back, remember.’
‘Does he? They must be well hidden, then!’
I chose not to respond to that; it echoed my own fears too faithfully. Instead I said obstinately: ‘I’ve got to warn my parents. The otomi might get bored, just watching their house.’
‘But you don’t even like your family.’
‘That’s not true!’ I cried, in a wounded tone. ‘Well, I’m quite fond of my little sister, anyway.’
‘The last time you saw them you tried to push your father into a fire! I know, I was there.’
‘I was only making a point, and anyway, he started it.’ I laughed nervously. ‘You’re just afraid I’m going to get myself killed before tonight and the funeral.’
For a moment he looked as shocked as if he had been stung by some insect he had previously failed to notice. Then his features settled into a grime smile. ‘Well, you’d be no use to Star dead.’
I was spared from having to think of a reply by the dead woman’s sister.
I had not noticed her come back out into the courtyard, and nor probably had Handy. She asked us what we were talking about. This startled us both and had the effect of prompting us to appeal to her like two litigants before a judge.
&nb
sp; ‘He’s trying to run away!’ said the commoner.
‘No, I’m not,’ I protested. ‘I have to see my family. I’ll be back.’
Goose looked at me shrewdly. ‘Will you, though?’ she asked.
‘Of course! I’ll eat earth…’ My voice trailed off before the woman’s unblinking gaze.
‘Go ahead then,’ she commanded me quietly. ‘Eat earth.’
Goose’s was not obviously a large or imposing presence, but there was something about her stern, unflinching stare that compelled me to obey. I found myself performing the ritual, stooping to touch the ground with my fingertip, and bringing the fingertip to my mouth, and feeling all the time that the anger of the gods might be the least of my worries if I broke my oath. And getting killed would not be taken as an excuse.
5
Toltenco meant ‘At the Edge of the Rushes’. My home parish had been built on low-lying, marshy ground that Lake Tetzcoco continually threatened to reclaim for its own, and in fact some of the houses at its edge stood on stilts.
The place where I had grown up lay at the southern edge of the city, and it was past noon by the time I reached it, after threading my way along narrow canal paths and across still narrower bridges. It would have been quicker if I had not been casting continual nervous glances over my shoulder, ever on the look-out for a giant with murder in his sole eye. I saw no sign of him. What was less reassuring was that I saw no sign of the men lord Feathered in Black was supposed to have following me, either. I was becoming more and more convinced that these men had never existed.
After a while I stopped worrying about what my former master might or might not be up to and turned my thoughts instead to the things I had seen and heard that morning. I recalled Star’s death, and what had surrounded it: the absence of her own midwife; her father’s furious reproaches to her husband and Handy’s own row with Red Macaw; my getting caught up, against my better judgement, in the funeral arrangements.
I knew what Kindly would have made of it all, had he been there. Fate, he would have called it: an instance of the gods making the cocoa bean stand up on its end. How else had a strong woman, who had already brought nine healthy children into the World, suddenly been taken ill? And just when the midwife who attended her could not be found? Coming on top of my own troubles, at the very moment when I had been forced back into Mexico to confront my enemy, it surely showed Tezcatlipoca, the Smoking Mirror, the god of chance, at his most malicious.
I had always been less ready then Lily’s father to accept chance and fate as the rulers of our lives. As a priest, I had been dedicated to Tezcatlipoca, and I knew the god well. I thought I knew when his influence was making itself felt and when it was not and when some human agency seemed to be at work. What had happened in the last few days surely had to be coincidence: there was no way Star’s death could be connected with my return to the city. However, something about it made me uneasy. In some way I could not have explained, it did not feel like the work of a god.
I toyed with these ideas as I walked, until at last I found myself within a few streets of my family’s home, experiencing the familiar sensation of not having the vaguest idea of what to do next.
The obvious course of action was to walk directly to my parents’ house, which was only a few streets away, and deliver my warning, but I felt wary of doing that. I had had enough surprises for one morning. ‘Too obvious,’ I muttered. ‘What if there’s someone watching the entrance? Or both of them?’ The house had a street entrance direct into the principal room, which in turn gave onto a small courtyard surrounded by other rooms, and at the rear of the courtyard was a second opening that led, via a small wooden landing stage, to a canal. If one was being watched then it was safe to assume that both were.
‘Think about this, Yaotl,’ I told myself. ‘You can’t walk in through the doorway. So what’s left? Over the wall?’ I tried to picture the area around the house. There were no trees overhanging the courtyard, and it stood apart from its neighbours, so that I could not hope to drop in from next door’s rooftop. I would not have wanted to try it anyway. It would have meant trying to creep into a stranger’s property unobserved, and I had no desire to be taken for a thief.
Thoughts of somehow trying to get into the house from above prompted me to glance in the direction of Toltenco’s temple, a small shrine with a threadbare thatched roof that stood on top of a stumpy pyramid in the centre of the parish. It was just high enough to provide a vantage point from which I could see into the surrounding streets and canal-paths. If there were any dangerous characters loitering in the vicinity, I thought, it would be good to be able to spot them before they caught sight of me. And I had known the priest, Imacaxtli, ‘the Worthy Man’, ever since I was a child. Even if I could not see much from the shrine, it would be worth talking to him anyway. Very little happened in his parish without his knowing about it.
The pyramid stood in the middle of a little plaza that had weeds growing up between its flagstones. It was not an impressive sight. Most of my memories of it were from childhood and it had seemed much taller then. Even the thread of dried sacrificial blood running down its side seemed thinner than it had used to.
I began striding purposefully in the direction of the little pyramid. However, I was too nervous about being seen to keep this up. By the time I got there, I was shuffling, bent over as though that would somehow make me less visible. It was probably a good disguise as it must have made me look like a cripple. I stayed in the shadows for as long as I could, slipping furtively between them whenever I had to cross open ground. There were a few people about, standing or squatting in what passed for the marketplace in this parish, but from what I could see of them none looked like a warrior, and none of them took any notice of me.
Worthy, the old priest, was standing in front of the shrine at the summit of the pyramid. He was not an imposing figure: he was a little shorter than I and running slightly to fat, which made me suspect that he did not always fast as rigorously as he ought to. However, his hair was as long and unkempt as any priest’s, and a black scab on his cheek showed where he had recently pierced his earlobe to offer his blood to the gods. His face was stained with pitch, which made it hard to read the expression on it as his eyes tracked my approach.
I halted just short of the top step.
‘Do you remember me, Worthy One?’
‘Cemiquiztli Yaotl?’ He called me by my full name: the date of my birth, One Death, followed by my given name: Yaotl, ‘The Enemy’: one of the things we called the god to whom I was dedicated. ‘Of course I remember you. But we all thought you were due to be sacrificed!’
‘I believe that’s what lord Feathered in Black had in mind at the time. It didn’t appeal to me, though.’
The old man chuckled. ‘Really? You surprise me. Still that’s the young all over, isn’t it? No sense of obligation.’
‘Shocking, isn’t it? I blame the parents.’
‘Ah, talking of which, have you been to see your family, yet? They seemed quite worried about you last time I spoke to them.’
This surprised me, since my father in particular seemed unable ever to set eyes on me without flying into a rage. I cast an involuntary glance in the direction of my family’s home.
‘No, I haven’t. In fact, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.’
‘I have things to do first.’ He regarded me shrewdly for a moment before going on: ‘Do you remember what today is?’
I frowned, puzzled. I glanced about me, noting the poles standing in the courtyards around us. ‘It’s the month of the Ceasing of Water,’ I offered hesitantly.
‘Yes, yes, of course. But that wasn’t what I asked. What day is it? One Flint Knife!’
I remembered then. ‘The sacrifice to the war god!’ I cried, like a child repeating a lesson.
It was the day sacred to Huitzilopochtli, the god who had guided my ancestors through all the long years when they had wandered as outcasts, before showing them where they were t
o found their city, granting them the vision of an eagle perched upon a cactus as a sign that this was the place. All over Mexico, on this day, the images of the War God were taken out, cleaned and exposed to the sun; for the War God was the sun, and so it was as if he were being asked to inspect them, to satisfy himself that they were being taken care of by his people.
The old priest sighed wistfully. ‘In another life, I might have been officiating in Huitzilopochtli’s temple at the top of the great pyramid, offering the god flowers and food and feathered cloaks. But I was never ambitious enough. Still, even in this parish we can manage a quail. You can help me – if you want.’
The old priest knew what had happened to me. He had been instrumental in getting me into the harsh school for priests we called the House of Tears. I would not have thanked him for that at the time, but I had been a priest for a score of years, and for all its rigours, squalor and privations – the long ritual fasts, the daily offerings of my own blood to the gods and the poverty – I had grown to love the life. It did not matter that my cloak was threadbare and stained with blood and sweat, or that my hair was tangled and greasy, when the mere sight of these things would make commoners jump out of my way and lords speak my name with respect.
Worthy also knew how it had ended, when I had been judged inadequate and purged from the priesthood for a violation of ritual. Now he could not fail to know what he was offering me, when he handed me his long-handled incense ladle and a bag of copal resin. ‘You know what to do,’ he said quietly.
I looked wonderingly at him before taking the ladle. As he turned away to attend to the evening’s sacrifice, I thrust the ladle into the brazier, scooping up a bowlful of hot coals and throwing the resin over them. As I held it aloft, the air around me filled with a cloying aroma. I raised it four times towards the eastern horizon, then four times towards the west, and repeated the gesture in the other two directions: the Left Hand of the Earth, which was South, and the Right, or North. Finally, with a cracking noise and a shower of sparks, I cast the contents of the censer back into the fire.