We went onto the streets dressed as léperos, our swords hidden under ragged cloaks. We headed for the marketplace where maize would be sold. What we found there was turmoil. A large crowd had gathered before the stalls of the maize sellers. The dealers were literally auctioning off the maize to the highest bidders. And the bidders were the servants from the wealthiest families in town.
"Nothing will be left for us," I heard people mutter.
"It's not fair!" Mateo shouted. "My babies will starve! Food and justice!"
"My family's hungry!" I roared. "What can I feed them? The soles of my shoes?"
"The viceroy's men fired the warehouse to raise prices!" That from someone, I imagined, who had been paid by us.
A group of ten guards from the viceroy's palace stood by at the edge of the crowd, uneasy. They were outnumbered by fifty to one. An officer on horseback watched me and Mateo.
"We will all starve!" Mateo shouted. "It's the viceroy's fault. He eats fatted calves while our children cry and die in our arms!"
"I need food for my babies!" an old hag yelled. The woman looked many years from having birthed any babies, but I took up her cry and soon other women were shouting for food.
Arguments broke out between the food sellers, and people demanding they be sold maize at an affordable price. Pushing and shoving ensued and tempers flared. The crowd was already enraged, and with each new indignity, the fury grew, people gathering strength from others around them. People who would normally scurry away like whipped dogs from a spur wearer's whip were shouting for food and justice.
The officer ordered his men to follow him as he cut through the crowd in a straight line for Mateo and me. We pried stones from the pavement and let them fly. The crowd parted as the officer quickened his horse. My stone went wide, but Mateo's hit the man's helmet. As he came up to us, Mateo pulled the officer from the horse.
A musket went off and the old hag crying about her imaginary babies fell to the pavement.
"Murder!" Mateo shouted. "Murder!"
The cry was picked up by a hundred voices. Violence spread like the fire in the warehouse. As the other soldados came forward, pushing their way through the crowd to try and reach their officer, people grabbed them. The last I saw of the viceroy's men was a mob of street people beating them.
The anger and frustrations, not just of a food shortage, but a lifetime of being treated as little more than curs, erupted like a volcano. People attacked the stalls of the maize merchants.
Mateo climbed onto the officer's horse and raised his sword. "To the viceroy's palace," he shouted, "for food and justice!"
He helped me up behind him on the horse. The mob followed us out of the marketplace, growing bigger with every step it took. Soon it was a thousand strong, then two thousand as it poured into the main plaza, looting merchant shops.
A wild frenzy seized the crowd as it neared the palace.
"Gold!" Mateo shouted and pointed at the palace. "Gold and food!"
The cry was picked up by the mob and shouted by thousands of voices.
The palace was not a fortress. The city had no walls, and the palace walls were designed more for privacy than protection. The city was in the center of New Spain, a week's journey at least for any invading force. No one had ever challenged the city, so there had been no need for a fortress.
The viceroy's gates offered little resistance to the mob. A cart filled with paving stones being used by laborers to repair ruts was grabbed and slammed through the gate; nor did the vastly outnumbered palace guards, who melted away at the sight of two thousand angry people marching at them, offer resistance. Not even the futile shots that would have been fired at foreign invaders were expended at the crowd.
"That bench!" Mateo shouted at those who followed us to the front door of the palace, "we'll use it to knock down the door!"
A dozen hands lifted the heavy wooden bench and sent it crashing against the tall double doors. Two more times it was rammed before the doors flew open. Mateo and I rode the horse into the palace, followed by an army of looters.
While the mob surged down the great hall, we dismounted and went up the stairway. Coming out of the viceroy's chambers at the top, I saw a group of people: The viceroy, archbishop, and aides were hurrying down the upstairs hallway. Behind them came Ramon, Luis, and Eléna.
"Eléna!" I shouted.
The three of them turned to us. Mateo and I saluted the two men with our swords.
"Go!" Mateo yelled. "Run like women from their husbands' penes. Return with a rolling pin to fight us."
Ramon stared down at us calmly. "You two have caused me a great deal of trouble, but killing you will be worth something."
He came down the hallway with Luis beside him as we went up the stairs. I stole one frantic glance at Eléna in her wedding dress before we met the two swordsmen.
Mateo was a step ahead of me and immediately engaged Ramon as I squared off against Luis. The sound of our striking blades played above the sounds of the mob below. We heard musket shots. Apparently the viceroy's guards had decided to take a stand.
Luis's features were contorted with hate yet also a strange sort of glee.
"I'm going to show my new bride how a gentleman handles lépero scum," he said.
His swordsmanship was dazzling. He was far better than I would ever be. I could not believe my own rage had sucked me into this. I would be cut to pieces in front of Eléna. Only raw hate kept me going, giving me speed and strength and cunning I never dreamed I had. Still it was not enough. He slashed my forearm, cut my right shoulder, and reopened the wound I had gotten from the Veracruz pirate.
"I am going to carve you into pieces, not kill you quickly," Luis said. "I want her to see every drop of your tainted blood spill."
His blade sliced my knee. I was bleeding in four places, and he was backing me up with sword work I could never hope to match. He touched his newly shaved cheek with his sword—the cheek I had impaled with my writing quill.
"Sí, you cut my face so I would look like you, and I hate you even more for that," he said. He backed me against a wall, and his blade cut my other knee. My leg collapsed, and I went down on one knee.
"Now your eyes and then your throat," he said.
He suddenly expelled air from his mouth as if he had been struck in the back and lost his breath. He stared at me with wide eyes and then slowly turned around.
Eléna was standing behind him.
As he turned, I saw the dagger in his back. It had not gone in far and, he shook it off.
"Bitch!" he screamed.
I leaped forward and hit him with my shoulder. He flew backward and hit the railing. I kept my momentum going and hit him again. He burst through the railing and fell to the floor below. I staggered to the edge and looked down. He was on his back, still alive, moaning and moving his arms and legs, but nearly unconscious. The pox marks on his face were not visible from the top of the stairs. With his shaven face and cheek scar, it was as if I was looking down at myself.
Luis had made the same mistake that the pirate had: He had underestimated a woman.
"Eléna." I held out my hand to her. She grabbed me around the waist and I leaned on her for a few seconds before pulling away. "I must help Mateo."
The picaro was faring no better with Ramon than I had with Luis. Mateo was a better swordsman than I, an extraordinary bladesman for certain, but Ramon was said to be the best sword fighter in all New Spain.
As I limped toward the action, Mateo suddenly moved into the circle of death, lunging at Ramon. Ramon's blade swung around to Mateo's neck, and Mateo's left arm went up and caught the blade against his forearm. At the same time Mateo stuck his dagger in the man's abdomen.
The two stood face-to-face, almost nose to nose, Ramon staring at Mateo in wide-eyed disbelief, unable to accept that he'd been bested, let alone killed. Mateo's thrust had set the man onto his tiptoes.
Mateo twisted the dagger.
"This is for Don Julio."
&
nbsp; He twisted the dagger again.
"For Fray Antonio."
He stepped back and faced Ramon, who rocked back and forth on his heels, the dagger still stuck in him. He grinned at Ramon and held up his forearm, pulling back his sleeve to expose the metal guard on the arm. "I regret that I am no gentleman."
Ramon collapsed.
Musket sounds became epidemic, and the mob was pouring out of the palace in retreat from the palace guards.
"Take him out of here," Mateo told Eléna. "Get him to the stables and into a carriage. Get him away from here."
"Where are you going?" I asked.
"I have an idea." He whispered to Eléna, not letting me hear.
Before we went out the door I turned back and saw Mateo bending over Luis. He stood up and shouted to guards coming down the hallway.
"Here! Take this man! It's Cristo the Bandito!"
ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-ONE
Eléna commandeered a coach and frightened coachman, instructing him to take us out of the city. We went to a hacienda owned by Luis. It was the closest place where we could find shelter and help with my wounds.
"Luis rarely visited the hacienda. He had only recently acquired this one and seldom visited any of them."
"The people there, they'll know I'm not Luis."
"The servants and vaqueros would not know you from Luis. If we say you are Luis, they will not question it. The majordomo was recently fired. Luis frequently fired majordomos."
She wrapped a piece of petticoat around my face after staining it with blood from my other wounds. "There. I could tell them you were the viceroy, and they would not know the difference."
She refused to tell me what Mateo had whispered to her.
She doctored my wounds again, just as she had after I was wounded in Veracruz. I lay in bed all day, healing.
To me it was a temporary sojourn from reality. I expected at any time that the viceroy's men would be coming to get me. Mateo had erred in not killing Luis. The idea that he would turn the man over to the guards and they would accept the fact that Luis was Cristo the Bastardo was nonsense. There was a physical resemblance but the moment Luis recovered his senses he would tell them who he was.
I cursed Mateo for his stupidity.
Several days later Eléna came to the room. She looked a little distraught.
"He is dead."
"Who?"
"Cristo the Bastardo. My uncle had him almost immediately put to death as a lesson to the rioters."
"You mean Luis? But... how? How could they not believe him when he told them who he really was?"
"I don't know."
She cried, and I held her in my arms.
"I know he was the devil," she said, "but I blame that evil grandmother of his as much as I do him. I never loved him. In truth, he was not really even likable. He had no true friends, which was one reason I tried to be his friend. But he has been with me almost all of my life. And no matter how he talked, I know that his love for me was real."
There was more news. Mateo had been rewarded by the viceroy. He was a hero of the city, having almost single-handedly driven the mob from the palace and capturing Cristo the Bastardo after the bandit killed Ramon de Alva.
I gaped when I heard the story. Dios mio! Why would it surprise me? No doubt Mateo had written the act as part of his original plan for the riot.
That night, when I was tucked in bed, Eléna had a servant bring a pot of boiling hot oil. After the servant left, Eléna barred the door. She sat down beside me on the bed.
"You asked me what Mateo whispered. He gave me instructions, ones that will hurt you."
I looked over at the hot oil. "You're not intending to cauterize my wounds with that—"
"No, you've told me that is not the proper way. I'm going to drip the oil on your face."
¡Santa Maria!
"Have you gone as loco as Mateo? You intend to conceal my identity by wiping away my face."
She leaned down and kissed me with soft, cool lips. Then she caressed my cheeks with her fingers. "Remember when I told you that you reminded me of someone?"
"Yes, first I assumed it was that lépero swine, Cristo the Bastardo, whom you helped to escape. Now I know my resemblance to Don Eduardo inspired you."
"No, Don Cristo-Carlos-Luis, whatever your name is, it was none of those. It took a long time for me to realize that you reminded me of Luis. Neither of you were as handsome as Don Eduardo."
"Thank you."
"But you both shared some of his features."
I looked back at the hot oil. She was going to scar my face with pox marks.
"No, I won't let you do it."
"You must. It is the only way. It will not hurt for long."
"It will be with me the rest of my life. Each time I see those pox marks, I will think of Luis and hate my own face."
"It is the only way."
"It'll fool no one."
"Cri—uh, Luis, think about this. He had no close friends except Ramon, and that mal hombre is in hell. He has no more family except relatives in Spain, none of whom have seen him for years. My uncle was the only one who even knew him reasonably well. Luis was a man who did not seek the company of others, not even women. His grandmother, and myself to a lesser extent, were the only ones with whom he was close."
"You said it yourself, your uncle would recognize him. He's seen both of us together."
"And what is my uncle to report to the king? That he mistook a marqués for a beggar-bandit and imprudently hanged him? My uncle will not blink an eye when my husband, Luis, returns to the city after his wounds heal. I will let him know subtly before you walk into his presence, so he will not faint dead when he sees you."
I shook my head. "This is insanity. I cannot just take the place of another man. The last time I tried this it got me into more trouble than it was worth."
"That is what is wonderful about this plan of Mateo's. Who is the Marqués de la Cerda?"
"The marqués? Why I... I..."
"Say it."
"I am the rightful Marqués de la Cerda—by birth."
"Can't you see? My love, you will be impersonating yourself! "
I thought for a moment.
"I am also your lawful wedded husband. It is time I claimed my conjugal rights." I pulled her to me and began removing her clothes.
"Wait," she said. She pushed me away. "As your wife, will I be allowed to read what I like and write what I wish?"
"As long as I get what I want, you may read and write."
"To make sure I get what I want," she said, "I shall keep a dagger hidden in my petticoats."
¡Ay de mí! I had married a jungle cat.
ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-TWO
Five months later, recovered from my wounds—and the hot oil to my face—we left the City of Mexico to board the treasure fleet at Veracruz.
Don Diego had welcomed me into the family without meeting my eye. Mateo had contrived a heroic feat for me in the riots, one only slightly less awesome than his own singlehanded defense of the palace. With my ancient bloodline, which was in a small way tied to the throne of Spain, and my recent act of heroism—along with a substantial contribution to the king's war purse—I was ordered to the Royal Court in Madrid to assume a position on the Council of the Indies for three years. With the travel time between Europe and the colony, and visits to my peninsular relatives, it would be a good five years before we returned. By that time, all but the legend of Cristo the Bastardo will have faded.
Mateo sailed on the same ship. Extricating our secret hoard from the cave, he boasted that he would build a great arena and fill it with water in Madrid. Then he would perform before the king the great sea battle for Tenochtitlan. Would I worry what mischief this would result in? Sí.
You say this is all a fairy tale? That the poor street child cannot become a nobleman with a beautiful wife? Eh, amigos, was not Amadis of Gaul cast out as a child? And did he not win a princess and a kingdom?
Do you e
xpect any less from Cristo the Bastardo?
Have you forgotten that a great autor of plays was manipulating all the events to ensure that there was a happy ending? I told you it was a wondrous tale, as colorful and exciting as any of the chivalric romances that drove poor Don Quixote loco.
And in truth, I have not told it all. I could not, of course. You see, like Jaime the lépero, I am such a product of my youth on the streets that I could not help lying. Amigos, forgive me, but I confess that sometimes in my secret narrative, I have even lied to you.
I leave now—
Eh, wait, you say. I have left out part of the story. You want to know why the guards did not believe Luis when he told them that he was not Cristo the Bastardo.
Well, you see, he never told them he was really Luis. He tried, but the words would never come out. Mateo told me the reason before Eléna and I boarded the galleon for Seville. When he bent over Luis on the floor of the viceroy's palace, he cut out Luis's tongue.
It is now time to put down my pen. As a high nobleman of Spain and New Spain, I am now a man of the sword and not the quill.
¡Vaya con Dios, amigos!
AFTERWORD
The major historic events related in the novel occurred during the seventeenth century in Mexico, then known as New Spain. Incidents such as the manipulation of the price of maize resulting in the food riot in which the viceroy's palace was attacked, the pirate raid on Veracruz, the Jaguar Knight murder cult, and the adventures of the nun-bandit Catalina de Erauso were of this period.
Eléna, of course, was inspired by Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz. Beautiful, brilliant, a bastarda ("daughter of the Church" was how her birth certificate put it), the great poetess threatened to disguise herself as a man and sneak into a university because women were not permitted an education.
The author has been liberal in presenting the chronology of the events.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Gary Jennings was known for his intensive research, which often included rigorous and sometimes hazardous travels—exploring every corner of Mexico for his Aztec novels, retracing the wanderings of Marco Polo for The Journeyer, joining nine different circuses for Spangle, and roaming the Balkans writing Raptor.
Aztec Blood a-3 Page 72