by tiffy
ʺThis is the Indian village, segregated to the south of the main capital. The civilized Indians who pioneered north with the first Spanish settlers live here.
They are the servants and artisans of the city, Doña Orlena,ʺ Lieutenant Rodriguez said, trying to soften the blow for the beautiful Spanish noblewoman.
ʺThere are well over two thousand souls living in the city proper. The Church of Our Lady of Light is very beautiful, and the governorʹs palace sits at the north side of the main street on a magnificent plaza.ʺ
Orlena observed the water of the Rio Santa Fe, which looked narrow and sluggish in the late fall drought. Her eager young escort had assured her that the riverʹs source in the mountains was snow‐fed and never went dry. Trout and other delicacies abounded in its cooler, clear waters at higher elevations.
Beyond the river lay the city proper, strung in a characteristically haphazard manner along the banks of the stream. The houses were far larger than the rude adobe huts of the paisanos, but still the buildings had flat, low roofs with exposed wooden rafters. The ceilings were made of woven willow boughs sealed with a paste of mud and ashes. The outlying homes had fortified towers at each corner, with gun portholes. Both Comanche and Apache made frequent raids. Their large, well‐armed escort only reinforced that frightening reality for Orlena.
Unbidden, the image of the green‐eyed stranger flashed in her mind. But he was a civilized Indian who spoke fluent Spanish, she reminded herself. Still, something about his bearing belied his gentility, as did the swift and efficient way he had killed her assailants.
Men in decorated buckskin trousers and women with their heads and shoulders swathed in long rebozos came out to greet the cavalcade of the new governor.
Everyone seemed friendly, but Orlena felt she was an alien in the austere frontier land. She had watched the gradual changes in the peasant population as they wended their tortuous way into New Mexico. The percentage of Indians and mixed bloods had increased, as did Indian influences in speech and dress.
Handmade copper and turquoise jewelry adorned the men as well as the women. All the peasants wore moccasins instead of leather sandals.
When they reached the main plaza, she did grudgingly agree that it had a quaint charm in spite of the pueblo look of the city. The long, low governorʹs palace was shaded by dense rows of poplars and willows, and the Church of Our Lady with its tall towers was impressive. Even the presidio barracks looked orderly and secure.
ʺWhile I greet the mayor and his assistant and all my new functionaries, you take Santiago and decide on where you want us ensconced in the palace,ʺ Conal instructed Orlena in the midst of the noisy welcome.
Several formally dressed, officious‐looking men were approaching them. All too glad of the respite from the blazing sun, Orlena nodded and motioned to her brother. Escorted by Lieutenant Rodriguez, they pulled away from the greeting committee, rode up in front of the governorʹs palace and dismounted. The wide porch fronting the building looked cool and welcoming. The thin, hatchet‐faced woman standing in the doorway did not. She scowled and raised a beringed hand to smooth her iron‐gray hair, already severely contained in a tight knot of braids.
ʺI am Señora Dolores Cruciaga. I am in charge of the staff of the palace. Has Don Conal arrived?ʺ She looked past the dusty young woman and boy.
Orlena drew herself up haughtily. ʺI am Doña Orlena Anamaria Luisa Valdéz, Don Conalʹs stepdaughter. This is the governorʹs son, Don Santiago. I wish to inspect the palace and decide upon quarters for our family. You will show me about.ʺ Without waiting to observe the womanʹs reaction, Orlena turned to Santiago and said, ʺWhy donʹt you go to the courtyard and wait by the fountain?
I am certain Lieutenant Rodriguez will instruct a kitchen servant to bring refreshments. I will join you shortly.ʺ
By evening, Orlena had selected quarters for each of them and met all the servants, most of whom were Indians and half‐castes. She decided the palace was habitable. The central courtyard was filled with flowers and palms surrounding a lovely stone fountain. All the rooms had newly whitewashed walls and polished adobe brick floors. They were surprisingly spacious and cool if one opened the mica windows to let the evening breeze inside.
She would reconcile herself to the massive, splintery oak furniture and rough, brightly dyed wool rugs. Sipping her wine, Orlena surveyed the evening meal Señora Cruciaga had the cooks prepare to welcome the new governor. After months of refried beans and tortillas, the grilled fish, roast beef, and fresh fruits were delectable. The wine was a bit sour, but nothing could be done for that. It, like most other things, was made in the province.
Don Eleazor, the alcalde, smiled across the table at her. ʺHow do you find our city of the Holy Faith, Doña Orlena?ʺ
Orlena took a sip of wine while she framed a politic reply. Conal watched her from the head of the table with an amused smirk on his face. ʺIt is most unusual, but exceedingly fair. The churches are lovely and the plaza is quite grand. But I did wonder at the way the houses at the outer parts of the city are fortified like miniature presidios, with gun towers on their walls. Are the Indians such a menace?ʺ
ʺNever fear, my dear young woman,ʺ Don Rubin said. As the senior officer in charge of the presidio under Commandant Quinn, the lieutenant was a self-important, boastful man. Casting a glance toward Conal he continued, ʺThe Comanche are no longer a problem. Weer, the preceding governor and I dealt with them last year. To date they have held to their treaty. Our campaigns are now against the accursed Apache.ʺ
Conal swirled the thin red wine around in his goblet and said with an arched brow, ʺIt has been my understanding that the present commandant general, and even the viceroy now, want us to set Apache against Comanche. We are to incite each to war on the other and to create dependency on us for essentials such as iron tools, knives, even crude guns and limited supplies of ammunition.ʺ His sharp gaze swept the assembly of dignitaries as he waited for a reaction.
The lieutenant smirked. ʺNot only do we make them dependent on us for tools and weapons, but for food and whiskey as well. That way they sink further into their own depravity.ʺ
ʺSoon they will either butcher one another to extinction or starve in a drunken stupor,ʺ Don Alejandro, a wealthy rancher, added venomously.
ʺWhy, that is horrible! Giving savages guns and whiskey. What is to keep them from uniting against us in a drunken fury and killing us with our own weapons?ʺ Orlena questioned.
Several of the older matrons around the table looked at her as if she had grown two heads. No lady interjected political opinions into the gentlemenʹs conversation! The most unorthodox upbringing of the governorʹs indulged stepdaughter created problems everywhere she went.
Conal interrupted the silence with a hearty laugh and said, ʺI fear she is quite outspoken for a female, but only instruct her logically and she may well surprise you.ʺ
Orlena gave him a grateful smile as the debate over Indian policy continued.
<><><><><><><><><><><><> ʺI still think it is lunacy to arm or inebriate savages,ʺ
Orlena said the next morning. ʺBesides, it is morally wrong to set out to kill off a whole race. The Church should convert them to peaceful ways. That is what His Majesty wishes.ʺ
ʺAh, but that is not what the men who must survive in this wilderness wish. I rose to power from obscure origins because I fought Indians in New Spain, Butterfly.ʺ
ʺBut you fought as a soldier, honorably. You were not a merchant selling them whiskey or weapons,ʺ she remonstrated.
Conalʹs eyes became opaque as he stood up, shoving his chair back from the table. Swallowing the last of his breakfast chocolate, he replaced the cup in its saucer and looked down at her. ʺThere is much of this bloody, hellish land that you do not understand. I would prefer it remain that way.ʺ
A chill ran down Orlenaʹs spine as Conal walked through the doorway. Never before had he been so abrupt with her and never had his face looked so coldly forbidding. His Gaelic anger she was
used toher own Spanish temper was volatile as well. They had clashed often. Many of her scandalous escapades had triggered shouting and ranting and dire threats of punishment. But Orlena sensed instinctively that this was different.
ʺThis accursed place is to blame, so isolated and alien. Damn Ignacio and his sycophants who banished Conal to this purgatory!ʺ
The passing days were to reinforce Orlenaʹs feelings a hundredfold. At the idle Spanish court, Conal had indulged Santiago and her, riding with them, squiring her to balls, even taking them to the secret gaming halls of the nobility. But here his duties as governor and presidio commandant were time‐consuming and dangerous. He seldom allowed Santiago to go with him when he rode to inspect military outposts. He was becoming a stranger, preoccupied and distant.
Orlena was left entirely to her own devices, which were few indeed. The ladies of Santa Fe were crude colonials, narrow‐minded and abysmally educated. She had yet to find a woman, even of the purest Spanish bloodlines, who could read and write. They sewed, gossiped, and discussed their childrenwhen they were not at their prayers.
The men were consumed with the daily tasks of survival in this unforgiving wilderness. Even her younger brother, a boon companion of childhood, deserted her to spend hours with the soldiers, learning how to load and fire a musket, couch a lance, and wield a saber.
Señora Cruciaga marshaled the household servants like a presidio sergeant, leaving Orlena to embroider, pace the halls . . . and sweat. After her disastrous brush with death that day in Chihuahua City, she had been forbidden to ride without an armed escort, and of course the soldiers seldom had free time to perform that duty. She was at least able to cajole Conal on one of their rare evenings of dining alone to allow her to walk through the plaza and about a few specified side streetson her solemn oath to take a well‐armed soldier with her.
Conal assigned a battle‐toughened old sergeant of Spanish and Tlaxcaltecan blood as her escort.
The Tlaxcaltecs were civilized Indians from the far southern provinces who had intermarried with the lower ranks of Spaniards and pioneered north with them in New Mexico. Many castas such as Sergeant Ruiz were descended from generations of career soldiers. The thickset, swarthy man proved to be unlike most of the other mixed‐bloods she had encountered. He was actually willing to look her in the eye and answer her questions directly. She grew to like his blunt honesty and sense of humor.
They strolled across the plaza early one crisp October morning as the market stalls were opening and vendors were setting out their wares. ʹʹSo many new sightspeople, livestock, trade goods. It is because of the caravan to Chihuahua, is it not, Sergeant?ʺ
He nodded. ʺYes, Doña Orlena. Every day for the next week or two, the traders from Taos will come with their wares to sell in the south. Other trappers and ranchers from all across the province join them. Soonʺ
ʺOh!ʺ Orlena flinched as she interrupted his explanation. A man dressed in fringed buckskins and mounted on a splendid black stallion rode slowly across the plaza. He had in tow a long procession of savages in chains, dressed only in breechclouts and moccasins. Their long hair hung shaggily below their whip-scarred shoulders, and they walked awkwardly as heavy manacles clanked about their wrists and ankles. Remembering the unconscious grace of her rescuer, she had a flash of insight about how such a one would feel encumbered with chains.
ʺThey are most cruelly abused, Sergeant. Look you at their thinness. They have been whipped and starved!ʺ
ʺThey are Apaches,ʺ he replied, surprising her with the venom in his voice.
ʺThat is no reason to torture them.ʺ
ʺIt is enough in this land. When they capture us, it goes far worse for us. This is not a subject for a gently reared lady to consider.ʺ
She snorted in disgust at his uncharacteristic remarks. Like Conal, when the subject of Apaches was raised, his manner became shuttered and unreasoning.
ʺNo man, savage or civilized, should be treated so by civilized people. If they know no better, we do! Where are they being taken?ʺ
Ruiz shrugged. ʺFor now, to the guard house on that hill.ʺ He pointed northwest to a small promontory, where a prison with a stone tower and chapel stood. It was where condemned men were incarcerated before being executed. ʺWhen the caravan is ready to head for Chihuahua, they will be taken along and sold in the south.ʺ
ʺWho would dare buy them?ʺ she questioned, almost to herself, for they were unbroken. In spite of humiliation and abuse, their fierce obsidian eyes glared with fathomless hate in otherwise expressionless faces. She shivered.
ʺThey will not make household servants, Doña Orlena, you are right. No, some will be sold to labor in the fields, but mostly they go to the mines. They do not last long,ʺ he added impassively.
ʺYou will not! I forbid it!ʺ Conal thundered, nearly knocking over an inkwell from his desk.
Orlena stood her ground. ʺI can take the sergeant with me. Santiago has agreed to help. It is scarcely as if I wanted to take the savages into our home. I only want decent food and medicines taken to them. How can they walk across a desert hundreds of miles and live to be sold if they die of starvation or infected wounds?ʺ
Conalʹs face twisted in anger. ʺYou do not know them as I do, Orlena. They can ride a horse until it drops from abuse, then eat the carcass raw and run afoot for days. They live with wounds that would kill a white man, eat cactus, and even exist on the moisture from it when all water is absent in the desert. They will survive. All too many of the bloody bastards do.ʺ ʺFather Anselmo from the Church of St. Francis has agreed to help. At this moment he is talking to the mayor. They will be here shortly.ʺ
Conal swore and began to pace across his office. Her outflanking maneuver had been well planned, for she knew how all New Mexicans felt about Apaches. Only the clergyand a minority of them at thatagreed with Charles IIIʹs enlightened edicts regarding humane treatment of savages. She had pleaded her case to the priests at both the garrison Church of Our Lady and the parish Church of St.
Francis. Only the latter would hear her out and dared to confront the city officials and the governor.
After a stormy session and much compromise, Father Anselmo was allowed to visit the prison, taking food and medicine with him. Orlena and Santiago were forbidden to accompany Father Anselmo and the soldiers. But the following evening, when the priest reported the extent of the prisonersʹ injuries and the abusive way the guards treated them, Orlena decided to risk Conalʹs wrath.
ʺAre you certain you wish to do this, Doña Orlena?ʺ Father Anselmo asked again nervously as they led the patient burro up the hill toward the cold stone walls of the ominous‐looking prison.
Dawn had just begun to break over the eastern mountains, casting deep purple shadows between their peaks. The air was chill and Orlena stifled a shiver. ʺYes, I am certain, Father. Let that corporal of the guards try to treat the governorʹs daughter as they did you!ʺ She did not add that if Conal learned she had slipped out unescorted, he would flay her.
Her haughty Spanish court manners cowed Corporal Muñez. He bobbed his head and let her pass with mumbled apologies.
Once inside the high stone enclosure, Orlena looked at the dusty bare earth of the small courtyard. Not so much as a sprig of greasewood grew anywhere. The well in the center of the yard stank when she stood over it and peered into its murky depths. ʺThis water is sewage!ʺ With a swish of her skirts, she turned imperiously, motioning the priest and the presidio guards to follow her.
The windows of the cells ringing the yard were so narrow they had no need for bars. Once inside the dark interior, she could smell rotted food and excrement.
ʺDoña Orlena, I beg you, do not go into the cells,ʺ one young soldier pleaded.
ʺThe Apaches are dangerous.ʺ
ʺAre they not chained?ʺ At his nod, she asked dismissively, ʺThen how can they be a danger? Unlock the first cell.ʺ
There were three men sitting on the squalid floor. Squinting to see in the gloom, she stepped into the
cell and called for a torch. Even at full daylight, the windows would not give sufficient light.
Once the torch was brought, Orlena steeled herself at the horror before her.
ʺThey have been chained to the walls and allowed to lie in their own filth!ʺ she hissed at the prison guard standing with the keys in his hand. Although he did not dare to meet her eyes, she could tell he was lazy and insolent. ʺI will have these prisoners taken into the compound and given clean water to scour the filth from their bodies. Then we will treat their wounds,ʺ she said, looking at the weals and abrasions covering them. ʹʹSend another two of your soldiers,ʺshe emphasized the word scornfullyʺto clean up this abomination while we are outdoors. Now!ʺ
At the flash of gold fire in her eyes, the guard nodded and slunk off quickly to do her bidding. Old Shoe, a Mescalero, and Cloth Fox, a Lipan, understood Spanish. The third captive, Vision Seer, another Lipan, did not. ʺWhat does the white woman say? Why do the soldiers listen to such a shrewish one?ʺ
Old Shoe grimaced a slight smile. ʺShe is the governorʹs daughter. Her soft womanʹs heart has caused her to speak to the governor in our behalf. We are to be fed and bathed, our wounds treated.ʺ
The younger Cloth Fox scoffed in disbelief, his black eyes coldly fixed on the golden‐haired woman. ʺYesterday their own holy man could do no more than leave us some tortillas and beans, which the guards stole from us as soon as he departed.ʺ He watched skeptically as the guards unfastened the manacles from the walls and then yanked on the chain so they had to follow him, single file, from the cell.
Once in the courtyard the extent of their injuries became even more apparent. At first, none would talk with Orlena, even though two of the three understood her, but after they were offered water to wash the filth from their bodies, were given food, and had bandages and salves applied, Old Shoe spoke. ʺWe thank you, daughter of governor. Why you do this? Only woman in black robes do this.ʺ
Orlena smiled. ʺAs you can tell, I am not a nun, but I do believe in honorable treatment for prisoners. We are Spaniards, not savages.ʺ