The Day It Snowed Tortillas / El día que nevó tortilla

by Joe Hayes

  Al fin el muchacho se enojó. Les dijo a los otros obreros: —Digan lo que quieran, pero yo estoy casado con una princesa. ¿Acaso alguno de ustedes puede decir lo mismo?

  Por supuesto que los otros trabajadores no le creyeron. Uno le llevó el chisme al rey de que el muchacho estaba fanfarroneando que su mujer era una princesa.

  El rey se puso furioso y mandó llamar al muchacho. Pero cuando vio que era un tipo corriente se echó a reír. Dijo: —Así que tú dices que eres de sangre real.

  —No, Su Majestad —replicó el muchacho—. Pero mi esposa sí es una princesa.

  El rey rió más fuerte, pero el muchacho le dijo:

  —Si usted no me cree, espere hasta el mediodía. Verá quién me trae el almuerzo.

  El rey se molestó. —Está bien —le dijo—. Espero hasta el mediodía, y si no veo venir a una princesa con tu almuerzo, puedes conformarte con pasar el resto de la vida en el calabozo.

  —Muy bien —dijo el muchacho—. Y si usted ve a una princesa, ¿qué me va a dar?

  El rey perdió los estribos—. Si tú estás casado con una princesa —bramó—, te doy tu propio peso en oro.

  El muchacho volvió a trabajar en levantar la pared, y a las doce del mediodía le dijo a los obreros: —¡Miren! Ahí viene mi esposa.

  Por el camino se acercó un carruaje tirado por doce caballos blancos. Por delante cabalgaron cincuenta soldados y otros cincuenta seguieron por detrás. El carruaje se detuvo ante los obreros y la princesa bajó y le entregó la comida al muchacho.

  El rey vigilaba desde la ventana del palacio y cuando vio a la princesa se puso a maldecir y renegar entre dientes, pero no podía más que cumplir con el compromiso.

  Trajeron una balanza grande y el muchacho se sentó en un lado. En el otro lado amontonaron oro de la tesorería del rey hasta que los dos lados quedaron perfectamente parejos.

  El muchacho regresó a casa con la princesa, y como vivieron felices el resto de sus vidas, en realidad, ya no queda más por contar de ellos.

  THE CRICKET

  This is a story about two men who were compadres. They were godfathers to each other’s children.

  The one man was rich. He had a fine ranch with a big herd of cattle. And he had one mule that was his pride and joy. It was a prize-winning animal.

  His compadre was very poor. And he was lazy. He never worked, never paid his bills. And he was always talking and talking. The people gave him a nickname. They called him El Grillo, “the Cricket”, because he would never be quiet, just as a cricket won’t quiet down when you’re trying to get to sleep at night.

  One of the foolish things that The Cricket was always saying was that he was un adivino, a seer, and that he could solve mysteries and find things that were lost. He used that idea to play a trick on his rich compadre.

  Whenever The Cricket would get far behind in his bills and owe a lot of money, he would go out to his rich campadre’s ranch. He would catch the prize-winning mule and lead it into the mountains and hide it.

  The rich man would look all over his ranch for the mule. Then he would go call on The Cricket. “Can you help me?” he would ask. “My mule is lost. I can’t find him anywhere on the ranch. Could you use your powers as a seer and find out where that mule is?”

  The Cricket would say, “Oh, that doesn’t sound too hard. I think I can help solve this mystery. But you know, I need some help too. Could you just pay off a few of my bills?”

  The rich man would pay The Cricket’s bills, and the poor man would go back to the mountains and get the mule and lead it home. Over and over he played the trick on his compadre. But his mischief almost caught up with him.

  One day the rich man was visiting the governor at his palace, and the governor was very upset. “Oh,” he sighed. “I have lost a ring that I’ve owned since I was a child. I can’t find it anywhere in the palace.”

  The rich man reassured him. “I can help you. My compadre is a seer. He can solve mysteries and find things that are lost. I’ll tell him to come find your ring.”

  So the next day The Cricket had to go to the palace to find the ring. Now the pressure was really on him. He would have to find something that was truly lost. So he tried to get out of it.

  The governor said, “I understand that you are un adivino, that you can find lost articles.”

  “Oh, no, Your Excellency,” The Cricket said. “Sometimes I’ve been lucky and found something that was lost, but that doesn’t mean I’m a seer, or have any special powers.”

  When he heard that, the governor became suspicious. He thought, This man sounds like a fraud to me. He sounds like a cheat.

  He told The Cricket, “I’m going to lock you in a room for three days. If at the end of that time you can tell me where my ring is, you’ll get a rich reward. But if you fail, then I’ll know you’ve been lying to the people. And you’ll get the proper punishment.”

  So The Cricket was locked in a room, and of course, he had no idea where the ring was or how he might find out.

  Now, the truth of the matter was that three of the kitchen servants had stolen the ring. And it just so happened that on the evening of the first day one of those servants was sent up to The Cricket’s room to serve the prisoner his supper.

  The servant entered and placed the food on the table, and when The Cricket saw his evening meal before him, a thought hit—he had only three days in which to solve the mystery, and already it was suppertime, the end of the first day!

  So as the servant was leaving the room, The Cricket shook his head and muttered to himself, “¡Ay! Of the three of them, that’s the first one!”

  He was talking about the first of the three days, but when the servant heard him, he thought The Cricket had recognized him as one of the three thieves. He ran back to the kitchen and said to his friends, “That man in the room really is a seer. As I was leaving I heard him say, ‘Of the three, there goes the first.’ He knew that I was one of the thieves!”

  “Don’t jump to conclusions,” the other two advised. “It’s probably just a coincidence. Tomorrow a different one of us will take him his food. We’ll see what he says then.”

  The next day a second servant took the evening meal to The Cricket’s room. Again, when The Cricket saw his supper before him, the truth struck. He had only three days to save himself, and the second was gone. As the servant was going through the door, The Cricket sighed, “¡Ay! Of the three of them, that’s the second one!”

  The servant ran back to his friends. “There’s no doubt about it. He knows! As I was leaving he said, ‘Of the three, there goes the second one.’ He knew that I was one of the thieves too.”

  So on the third day, when the third servant took The Cricket his food, he just fell on his knees and pleaded, “Please don’t turn us in to the governor. We know that you know about us, but if you tell the governor, he’ll have our heads cut off.”

  The Cricket realized what the man was talking about. “I won’t turn you in,” he assured the servant, “if you do exactly as I say. Take the ring out to the barnyard and throw it on the ground in front of the fattest goose in the flock. Make sure the goose swallows the ring.”

  The servant did as he was told. Later, the governor brought The Cricket out of the room and said, “Well, what can you tell me about my ring?”

  The Cricket told him, “Your Excellency, this is very strange, but I had a vision while I was in that room. I saw your barnyard and the pen where the geese are kept. And the ring was in the belly of the fattest goose!”

  The governor laughed, “How would it get there?” But he ordered that the goose be brought in and its stomach opened. There was the ring!

  That made a believer of the governor. “Well done!” he said and slapped The Cricket on the back. He rewarded The Cricket with gold. He even gave him the goose to take home for his wife to cook.

  As he left the palace The Cricket promised himself, “Never again will I call myself a seer.” But it wasn’t so easy to get out of it.

  A few week
s later the governor of Chihuahua was in New Mexico visiting at the palace, and the governor of New Mexico just had to brag about The Cricket.

  “Living in this province of New Mexico is a man who is un adivino,” he boasted to the governor of Chihuahua. “He can solve mysteries and find things that are lost. He could tell you what was hidden in some secret place.”

  The governor of Chuhuahua laughed, “Adivino, indeed! There’s no such thing.”

  The two men started to argue, and before long they made a bet. They bet a thousand dollars apiece. The arrangement was that the governor of Chihuahua would hide something in a box, and they would run the box to the top of the flagpole. The Cricket would have to stand on the ground at the bottom of the flagpole and tell what was inside the box.

  The day of the contest arrived, and the governor of Chihuahua got a clever idea. He took a big box and put a smaller box inside it, then a smaller box inside that, and so on, until at last he put in a very tiny box.

  “He’ll think it’s something big in this large box,” the governor laughed. “I’ll get something very small to go in this tiny box.”

  He went out to the garden to look for something small, and just then a little cricket went hopping across the path. The governor caught it and put it in the smallest box. He sealed all the boxes and raised them to the top of the flagpole. The guards went to get The Cricket.

  There the poor Cricket stood at the bottom of the flagpole without a clue what was in the box. But the governor of New Mexico and the governor of Chihuahua stood before him, and there were soldiers all around. He couldn’t run.

  He just stood there. An hour passed, and then another. Finally the governor of Chihuahua started to laugh. “This man is a fraud, just as I told you.” He turned to the governor of New Mexico. “Pay the bet and let’s be done with it.”

  Now the governor of New Mexico grew impatient. “Speak up,” he told The Cricket. “Tell us what’s in the box. Speak!” Finally he roared, “I’ll give you one more minute to speak. If you don’t, I’ll have you shot!”

  The Cricket had to say something. He stuttered and fumbled, “In the box. . .in the box. . .in the box. . .in the box. . .”

  “What?” gasped the governor of Chihuahua. “How does he know there’s a box inside a box inside a box inside a box. . .?”

  And just then, thinking of himself, The Cricket hung his head and cried, “Oh no! They’ve got you this time, you poor little Cricket!”

  The governor of Chihuahua’s jaw fell. “If I hadn’t heard that with my own ears, I never would have believed it!” He drew out his wallet and paid a thousand dollars to the governor of New Mexico.

  The governor of New Mexico gave five hundred of those dollars to The Cricket. He shook his hand and slapped him on the back. “Well done once again!” he said and sent him home.

  That was too close a call for The Cricket. “Never, ever again in my whole life,” he said, “will I tell anyone I have any special powers whatever!”

  But the boys on his street had always liked to make fun of The Cricket. That day they had filled a big gunny sack with garbage, and as The Cricket started down the street they ran out to meet him. They waved the gunny sack in front of him.

  “Adivino,” they taunted, “use your secret powers. Tell us what’s inside this gunny sack.”

  “Don’t call me adivino,” The Cricket snapped. “I don’t believe in that any more. It’s nothing but a bunch of garbage. Leave me alone!”

  The boys stared at him in amazement. “How did he know it was garbage? He really is a seer! We thought he was just an old fool.”

  So from that day on, it didn’t matter how hard The Cricket tried to tell people that he wasn’t a seer and had no special powers at all, no one believed him.

  Every time a housewife lost a spoon, she would come to him to find it. The governor kept calling on him to solve mysteries.

  Finally, in order to have any peace at all, he had to take his family, and move far away from New Mexico, to a place where they hadn’t heard of men who are called adivinos, or seers. And if he hasn’t died, he must still be living there.

  EL GRILLO

  Éstos eran dos hombres que eran compadres, pues el uno era padrino de los hijos del otro.

  Uno de ellos era rico. Tenía un rancho muy fino y mucho ganado. Y tenía una mula que era su verdadero orgullo. Era una bestia de competencia.

  Su compadre era muy pobre y flojo. Nunca trabajaba, ni pagaba las deudas. Se pasaba el tiempo hablando, por lo que la gente le puso un apodo. Le decía “el Grillo” porque nunca se callaba, como un grillo que no deja de chillar cuando uno se quiere dormir.

  Una de las locuras que decía el Grillo era que tenía el don de adivino, que sabía aclarar misterios y hallar cosas perdidas. Se aprovechaba de esa idea para engañar a su compadre rico.

  Siempre que el Grillo se encontraba muy atrasado en el pago de las cuentas y debía mucho dinero, iba al rancho del compadre rico. Atrapaba la mula preciada y la llevaba a la sierra y allí la escondía.

  El rico buscaba la mula por todo el rancho. Luego iba a ver al Grillo. Le decía: —¿Me puedes ayudar en algo? Mi mula está perdida. No la puedo encontrar en ningún lado del rancho. ¿Puedes valer de tu talento de adivino para descubrir dónde se encuentra?

  El Grillo le decía: —Eso no me parece muy difícil. Creo que puedo resolver este asunto. Pero ¿sabes?, a mí también me hace falta un poco de ayuda. ¿Puedes pagar unas cuantas deudas que tengo pendientes?

  El rico pagaba las deudas y el pobre iba a la sierra para recuperar la mula y devolverla al rancho. Una y otra vez engañó así a su compadre. Pero una vez por poco cae en su propia trampa.

  Un día el rico fue a visitar al gobernador en su palacio, y el gobernador estaba muy consternado.

  —Ay —suspiraba—, perdí un anillo que he tenido desde la niñez. No lo puedo encontrar en ningún rincón del palacio.

  El rico lo alentó: —Yo lo puedo ayudar. Mi compadre es un adivino. Sabe revelar los misterios y hallar lo perdido. Le digo que venga para encontrar su anillo.

  Así que al otro día el Grillo tuvo que ir al palacio para encontrar el anillo. Ahora no tenía salida. Tenía que encontrar algo que estaba perdido de verdad. Trató de esquivar.

  El gobernador le dijo: —Tengo entendido que usted es un adivino, que puede encontrar los artículos perdidos.

  —Oh no, Su Excelencia —respondió el Grillo—. Una y otra vez he tenido la suerte de encontrar alguna cosa perdida, pero eso no quiere decir que sea adivino o que tenga ningún don especial.

  Cuando el gobernador oyó eso, comenzó a desconfiar. Pensó “este hombre me parece embustero, me parece estafador”.

  Le dijo al Grillo: —Lo voy a encerrar en un cuarto por tres días. Si al cabo de este plazo me puede decir dónde encontrar mi anillo, le recompenso ampliamente. Pero si no lo puede hacer, lo juzgo mentiroso y le pongo el castigo que corresponde.

  Así que encerraron al Grillo en un cuarto, y por supuesto que no tenía ni idea dónde se encontraba el anillo ni cómo averiguarlo.

  Bueno, la verdad era que tres sirvientes de la cocina se habían robado el anillo. Y tocó la casualidad que al final del primer día del encierro mandaron a uno de esos sirvientes al cuarto del Grillo para darle la cena.

  El sirviente entró en el cuarto y puso la comida en la mesa y cuando el Grillo vio la cena por delante, se le ocurrió que sólo le habían dado tres días para aclarar el asunto, y ya era la hora de la cena, el final del primer día.

  Así que cuando el sirviente salía del cuarto el Grillo agachó la cabeza y murmuró para sí:

  —¡Ay! De los tres, ya está el primero.

  Quería decir que de los tres días el primero había terminado, pero cuando el sirviente lo oyó decir eso creía que el Grillo lo había reconocido como uno de los tres ladrones. Corrió a la cocina y les dijo a sus amigos: —Ese hombre sí es adivino. Cuando salía del cuarto lo oí decir “De los tres, ya está el primero”. Me reconoció como ladrón.

  —No
estés tan seguro —los otros aconsejaron—. Sería coincidencia. Mañana otro le lleva la cena. A ver qué dice entonces.

  Al siguiente día el segundo sirviente llevó la comida al cuarto del Grillo. Otra vez, cuando el Grillo vio la cena pensó que sólo le concedieron tres días para salvarse y ya se le había ido el segundo. Mientras el sirviente salía del cuarto el Grillo suspiró y dijo: —¡Ay! De los tres, ya está el segundo.

  El sirviente regresó corriendo donde sus amigos—. Ya no cabe duda —les dijo—. Lo sabe todo. Cuando salí del cuarto lo oí decir “de los tres, ya está el segundo”. Sabía que yo también era ladrón.

  Así que al tercer día cuando el tercer sirviente le llevó la comida al Grillo se arrodilló y le rogó: —Por favor, no nos denuncie. Ya sabemos que usted sabe todo de nosotros, pero si nos delata, el gobernador nos mandará degollar.

  El Grillo entendió lo que quería decir el hombre. —No los voy a descubrir —afirmó al sirviente—, si haces lo que te digo. Lleva el anillo al corral y tíralo delante del ganso más gordo de todos. Asegúrate que el ganso se lo trague.

  El sirviente hizo lo mandado. Poco después el gobernador sacó al Grillo del cuarto y le dijo: —Bueno, ¿qué me puede decir del anillo?

  El Grillo le respondió: —Su Excelencia, es muy raro, pero me vino una visión cuando estaba en el cuarto. Vi el corral y el rincón en donde estaban los gansos. Y el anillo estaba en el buche del ganso más gordo.

  El gobernador se rió. —¡Cómo ha de estar ahí?

  Pero mandó que agarraran el ganso y le abrieran el buche. Y ¡ahí estaba el anillo!

  Eso convenció al gobernador—. ¡Bien hecho! —le dijo al Grillo, dándole palmadas en la espalda. Gratificó al Grillo con oro. Hasta le dijo que se llevara el ganso a casa, para que su mujer lo asara.

  Al salir del palacio, el Grillo se prometió: Nunca más vuelvo a decir que soy adivino. Pero no era tan fácil dejarlo.