Heavens on Earth
Page 26
I will recount what they said against him to convince Archbishop Zumárraga to take him to the bonfire. Gerónimo de Pomar testified that there were idols in a house called Tecuancale (that nobody was living in), and that Talchachi, Don Carlos’s uncle, had put them there and that they made up part of the very walls, and that the vacant house was furnished with mats and wicker and leather chairs, and that there was a fire in there every night because some people met there to worship their idols or chalchuyes.
Lorenzo Mixcoatlaylotla testified that it was seventeen years ago that Tlachachi, Don Carlos’s uncle, had put the idols in the house, but that he only put them there as a joke and he used them only because they were stone. No one paid any attention to him, but at the end of the trial they made him walk through the procession of flagellants, hitting himself, not for reasons of faith and in order to achieve a true purity in his spirit, but instead to make him punish himself for having taken the wrong side.
Doña María, widow of Don Pedro, former governor of Tezcoco, testified that one night when she was sleeping with the other women, she heard footsteps in the bedroom, and that she ordered one of the Indian women who was next to her to light an ocote pine torch because she heard footsteps. As soon as there was light, she saw Don Carlos. No one knows how he got in there unless he was helped by the devil. And it was not the first time that Don Carlos had bothered her even though she was his niece, because he wanted to make her his wife even though he already had one. That time, they removed him from her room by pushing and shoving him.
There were two or three testimonies that destroyed him. One of those was that of Melchor Ixiptlatzin, that childhood friend of mine who was taking such poor care of the mules the day the Franciscans came to Tezcoco to pick up the one they thought I was, the one whose place I took. Melchor Ixiptlatzin testified out of hate and malice and enmity. If, on the day the Franciscans took me from Tezcoco, Melchor had said, “Carlos Ometochtzin, you only wish you were a piece of shit, because that’s better than what you really are,” now he smeared him with shit by the handful. I later discovered that his contempt for Ometochtzin came from his family, because years ago his mother had taken Don Carlos’s father to court—I am not sure for what household affairs, what she wanted that he did not want to give her—though nobody testified to this at the time of the trial. I did let Sahagún know, though not in front of the other boys. Don Carlos’s situation was so delicate that it even gave pause to a Tezcocan. I told him when we were alone and he looked at me with such sadness in his eyes and said: “Nothing can be done, nothing can be done, what a shame, it is human nature.” Then, days later, when I insisted that we had to do something, that we could not let someone so envious cruelly attack him, Fray Bernardino said to me:
—Hijo, you are too young to understand, but it is more complicated than you imagine. Maybe it is entirely true that this boy Melchor testified against him because he does not like him, but maybe it is not. How can we know? What I do know is true, because I witnessed it with my own eyes and cannot deny it, is that the one time that the Franciscan brothers, finding ourselves in a predicament, appealed to his generosity so that he might help us with some small thing, given that he was the brother of the lord of Tezcoco and because he had been educated by those of our order, his only response to us was mockery and that he did not have the heart to convey our message, though I do not know precisely what that might be. I do not think Carlos has an evil heart. Why would I need to go around saying that he does if I cannot prove it? But what I do know is that he does not have much respect for the Franciscans who educated him; that we are not worthy of his respect does not have to matter to us, but considering that he paid us with such poor currency, what can you expect from a young man like that? We can expect that his impetuous actions have caused him to make more enemies than those he could have earned by being more prudent, cautious, or generous.
I do not know if, over the years, Carlos was generous or cautious or prudent, but he was a handsome and arrogant young man of seventeen, protected by his parents, educated by the Franciscans, who had not thought, at that point, of malice or of the foolish powers of envy and vengeance.
Melchor was the one who testified that when Don Carlos went to visit his sister in the pueblo of Chiconabtla—also in Tezcoco, where she is the wife of the cacique of the pueblo—he observed the proceedings ordered by the provincial padre because many people had died because there was no water due to a lack of rain. After the proceedings, Don Carlos said, in front of Don Alonso, his brother-in-law, and Don Cristóbal and two other noblemen of Tezcoco:
“You will be sorry. What are you doing with these Indians, what are you doing, do you think you are doing something…do you want to make these people believe what the padres preach and say? You are being deceived; what the friars do, it is their job to do, but it is meaningless. What are the things of God? They are nothing: fortunately we discovered what we have, what was written by our ancestors: I will have you know that my father and my grandfather were great prophets, and they said many things of the past and for the future, and neither one said anything of this, and if any of this were true, what you and others say of this doctrine, they would have said it, as they said many other things, and this Christian Doctrine is nothing, and what the friars say is not perfect: there is more than what the Viceroy and the Bishop and the friars say, all of it matters little and it is nothing, except that you and others praise it and authorize it and build it up with so many words, and what I am saying I know better than you because you are a boy; this is why you should let go of those things that are in vain, and do not continue with this, I tell you as an uncle to his nephew, or make the Indians believe what the friars say, they are doing their job, but not because what they say is true, that is why you should stop and not continue with it, instead see to your house and take care of your hacienda.”32
Even his own wife, Doña María, testified against him. According her, Don Carlos had a mistress named Doña Inés, and some one hundred and forty days ago, more or less, Don Carlos, finding himself ill, had this Doña Inés brought to his house, and he had her in his bedroom with him some days, and Doña Inés was forced to make them food and to serve them, and when he was better he took her back to her house, and, to make him look worse in the eyes of the judge, she said that Doña Inés was Don Carlos’s niece, although, again, these stories do not sit well with me, because Doña Inés was the same age as the accused.
When they asked Doña María if her marriage to Don Carlos had been good, she replied that they had been happily married for the first two years, but that from then until now she said Don Carlos had been abusive to her; that she did not know anything about idols, or that he sacrificed to them, or that he venerated them.
The false Franciscan priest, Francisco, the man to whom his mother had been married by the Franciscans, Don Francisco Maldonado, native of Chiconabtal, returned to testify against him and said—among many other things, all to make him look bad—that Don Carlos had said: “Notice that the friars and clerics all have their own way of penance: the friars of San Francisco have one form of doctrine and way of life, and manner of dress, and form of prayer; and those of Saint Augustine have another way; and those of Saint Dominic have another; and the priests have another, as we all see, and likewise among those who took care of our gods: those from Mexico had a manner of dress, and a form of praying, and offering, and that is the way the friars and the clerics do it, none of them agree with the other; we follow what our ancestors followed, and in the way they lived, we live, and this has to be understood like this…each one willingly follows the law they want and the customs and the ceremonies…
Do not do what the Viceroy and the Bishop or the Provincial tell you to do, or continue to name them, I too was raised in the church and the house of God like you, but I do not live and do like you: what more do you want? Do you not fear and obey those of Chiconabtla? Do you not have food and drink? What more do you want? Why do you go around saying what you are s
aying?…Brother, what do women and wine do to men? Is it by chance the Christians do not have many women and they get inebriated and the religious fathers cannot prevent it? We eat and drink and enjoy ourselves, and become inebriated like we used to. See what you are, sir; and you, nephew Francisco, see that you receive and obey my words…the land is ours and belongs to us…None of those liars have reached our heights, nor are they with us, nor do they join with those who obey and follow our enemies…”33 Needless to say or imagine how these words fell on the ears of the judge, because it appears to be seditious, an insurrection against the king. This is what the real or fake idols found at the foot of the crosses led to.
The men who worked for him, those who were in his service, those who owed him loyalty also testified against him. With each testimony they invented more sins, with a speed that no soul, not even the most sinful, could have committed in real life. They made Don Carlos an assassin, they said he carried out human sacrifices, they made him irritable when he was not, they filled him with vices and sins of the flesh and the spirit; people who in other times called themselves his friends and in-laws, the noble lords of his kingdom, were testifying against him…And for what? That spittle that the Indian Melchor spat on the ground upon seeing him when we were children and we ran into him makes me question whether there was an inch of truth in all he spat then. Cristóbal, resident of Chicnautla, said that Don Carlos said: “I am lord of Tezcoco, and there is Yoanizi, lord of Mexico, and there is my nephew Tezapili, who is lord of Tacuba; and we have not allowed anyone to come between us or be our equals. After we are dead it might well be, but right now we are here and this land is ours and our grandfathers and our ancestors left it to us: brother Francisco, what are you doing, what do you want to do, do you perchance want to be a priest? Are those priests our relatives or were they born among us? If I saw that my fathers and ancestors were in agreement with this law of God, perchance I would keep it and respect it. But, brothers, we keep and hold what our ancestors held and kept, and we give ourselves to pleasure and have our women as our fathers had them…”34
If he said it like that, he had more than one reason to say it, and his words do not sound foolish, but the Indian in front of the judge of the Inquisition does sound foolish in repeating them. Why would they go in front of the judges and say that? Were they perhaps afraid that the judges would also accuse them of the sins mounted against Don Carlos? Did they want to obtain some favor from the Bishop, and in attacking Don Carlos were they hoping to please him? Some were forced to testify by the firm persuasion of the Viceroy’s guards, others were pushed by their wives, some had other motives to testify, others had been given money to testify; the teeth of one were chattering out of fear while he was talking; another did not show it, except that in squinting his little eyes between sentences he seemed about to laugh at the slightest provocation and said, by the way, that he did not find it easy…They testified without understanding that their words, instead of saving them, would come back against them over time. They were Indians, and their blows would come back against the Indians. They wanted to protect themselves from the Hispanics by striking at each other. Envy, that dark bird that likes to live in these lands, persuaded them, with soft words, to serve her.
Carlos Ometochtzin was condemned to be burned at the stake. Contrary to what Zumárraga hoped to achieve with his sacrifice, the enemies of the Colegio de Santa Cruz grew stronger. They sharpened the claws of their souls. The Franciscans also lost. It is true that nobody accused Fray Juan of being millenarian or seditious again, but instead they went at the Indians harder, and due to having gone too far in their punishment, a short time later the order to stop judging the Indians in the Inquisition arrived, in the fear that if an Indian burning were carried out it would make even Emperor Charles feel guilty during his long meditations on death.
Slosos keston de Hernando
32In Spanish in the original. Estela’s note.
33In Spanish in the original. Estela’s Note.
34In Spanish in the original. Estela’s note.
EKFLOROS KESTON DE LEARO
Even though I didn’t sleep well at all again last night, I was able to sleep deeply this morning. I was already late when I found Rosete at the entrance to my room, turning slowly around in circles like a demented person. What was he doing?
—Why are you turning around in circles, Rosete?
He didn’t answer me, but I answered myself. I remembered that in their code this movement, the one that repeatedly turns slowly around, means: “I came to tell you.”
But who came? Rosete hadn’t come in to see me. He was stranded there where nobody would have found him and where I came across him by chance because I was leaving so much later than usual. And to say what? Even though I almost bumped into him, he didn’t say anything when he saw me, aside from stupidly turning around and around in circles, his body bent to one side, his hand hanging, and the other one half bent, as if he was afflicted by some kind of awful muscular disease.
His repetitive motion exasperated me. I tried to stop him, first with my voice (“stop it, Rosete, stand still!”), then I used all of my strength—both of my arms, my core, my legs, my whole body—to keep him still so that he would stop because the inertia of his stupidity had trapped him in the movement.
—What did you come to tell me?
Nothing. He didn’t say anything. I looked into his eyes.
That beautiful pair of sparkling and teasing eyes looked dull, dead. There used to be so much life in his eyes, just like his words used to create waves in the air.
—What’s wrong, Rosete? Are you sad?
Once again he didn’t answer. He had remained just as I had left him, suspended in his stupid movement. The once-animated Rosete had turned into a mannequin, but not in a way that had preserved his radiant appearance. My graceful Rosete was no more than a preternatural mannequin. His skin looked dried out, and here and there he had some pinkish spots that seemed to be caused by irritation or neglect. I opened his mouth without any resistance from him. Not like he was a slave (he couldn’t understand my words because he couldn’t hear them), it was more like he had just turned into a puppet. The mucous membrane inside his mouth was split in countless places. On the inside wall of the right cheek (the one with the biggest red spot) was a huge, open sore that had almost perforated the flesh.
I became enraged. Why was he hurting himself like this? Yes, this really was my business, it concerned me, why injure something that I love, something that also belongs to me? Yes, Rosete is mine; he is part of me. I’ve known him all my life, he’s part of my childhood, my being, my personal memory, in a way that the mother and father I don’t have could be only artificially. And furthermore Rosete is handsome. Or he was handsome.
—You haven’t used substance 234 to absorb the radiation. You go out, go down to the Earth, and you don’t protect yourself. What are you thinking?—Again, no response.
I shook him forcefully, roughly pulling each arm, to the point that I could have even hurt him. Nothing. He didn’t react. He didn’t hear, didn’t feel, didn’t notice me, didn’t know I was right beside him. He probably wasn’t even there, he was someplace else, maybe…
I set aside my unproductive rage.
—Doesn’t it hurt, Rosete?—I asked, softening the tone of my voice. But, to whom was I speaking? Rosete seemed to be incapable of understanding me.
He started turning around and around in circles again, resuming his mindless motion, brainless, lifeless…What other words can I use to describe the expression of their code? “I came to tell you, I came to tell you, I came to tell you…”
I hurried away from there to get back to my workplace. I’ll immerse myself in my books. If Rosete could speak, if he could remember language, he might cite Catherine Linton-Earnshaw-Brontë:
“What in the name of all that feels, has he to do with books, when I am dying?”
Slosos keston de Learo
EKFLOROS KESTON DE HERNANDO
At that time, as he was doing his utmost to spend much of his own wealth, along with others’ wealth as well, the Viceroy was going by way of Nueva Granada looking for a port of entry for his return from the expedition to Cíbola.
Fray Andrés de Olmos, Fray Bernardino, Fray Juan de Gaona went to work on the presentation, along with Fray Juan Foscher, of course, and we students suggested a word or two. We rehearsed several days. It was an allegory about the education of the Indians and the Christianization of the lands—ours—that King Carlos had gained for his Crown and that had recently been revealed to Europe. As it was only a game, we did not wear costumes, or disguises, or use axes, or lights; we wore only our purple cassocks and two little-friar habits.