The guitar was out. For half an hour the long fingers of the player searched out chord after chord. One by one the riders of the desert came closer to the fire. Cigarettes glowed. A final extemporizing chord and a dozen voices, without an apparent signal, were singing——
The moon made a Japanese print of the sky. It hung like a burnished bronze shield on a velvet curtain. The sky seemed very near to the earth and always drawing nearer. The stars glittered radiantly. They touched the deformities of the pageant of crippled plants. The strange procession kept closing in from all directions on the camp.
A yipping call from a far coyote. In the procession of desert shapes a sound of gristle and dry feathers stirring. These were two buzzards, old-time, patient gamblers.
OUR GODS
The cathedral on the edge of the Plaza is centuries old. There was no wooden scaffold when it was built. As each layer of stones was rolled into place a layer of earth was raised to reach the next level of the walls. By the time the towers were completed, the cathedral was covered by a giant mound of earth that had to be cut away.
Mining men say that it would pay to demolish the cathedral and run its rock through an ore-crusher for the silver in it. They say that of all the stone buildings in this part of the country.
Cortez’ Spaniards and other religious pioneers knew the wealth of Mexican mines. There is the legend of the richest silver mine in the world, sealed and lost. It was these early miners of the church who started the cathedral.
The old cathedral has looked down on swift and colorful history. From the time of the conquerors who wrested the slave-whip from the Aztec princes to the newest rebel chief striking a vague and vain blow for phantom liberty.
This day in the Easter season it looks on a quiet scene. A scene that should touch its gray, stone heart.
There is a little procession moving across the Plaza. The sun, through the plaza trees, dapples the slow marchers with gold. Soldiers in baggy, weather-stained, khaki uniforms. Their great sombreros are off. With shocks of black, straight hair, twisted into a sort of cone by the funnels of their big hats, they look more than ever like boys playing soldier. Two days ago they were in the bloodiest of fighting in the outskirts of the city. Not all the stains on their faded uniforms are from the sun and the rain.
In back of the soldados walk a crowd of women. They wear rebozos, shawls of blue, red, black, yellow, all colors, twisted around their breasts and waists.
Six of the soldiers, with cartridge belts crisscrossed over their shoulders, wear knots of red, white and green ribbons on their sleeves. Three of them wear the ribbons on their left arms. Three on the right.
Very carefully the ribboned six hoist an oblong, flat litter to their shoulders. It, too, is decorated with the national colors. Flowers of carmine, yellow and purple are strewn at the feet of the plaster statue that rides the litter.
It is the image of Jesus Cristo, about four feet high. It is done in the barbaric colors chosen by the factories that mold these images for religious folk. A stiff robe, the red of blood clotting in sand, with a gilt border. A chorusgirl complexion over a fastidious beard. The effigy has been retouched for the occasion. The cheeks have been made very rosy.
About the throat of the statue is a modern linen collar of the high, “turn-over” sort. To it is fastened a made-up, four-in-hand tie, blue and polka-dotted.
Does one smile at such an incongruity? Does one see sacrilege in this effort to adorn their Saviour? Then look once more at these men and women with the eyes of wondering children.
And pass with them into the shadowy cathedral. There is a thin smell of incense, an exhausted odor. Many little candles burn. Near the dim altar is a glass case. On one side the glass is shattered. A bullet, from the fighting in the street a week ago, made this its target. It tore the arm from a statuette of the Virgin Mary and crumbled the figure of the Christchild inside the case.
This accident has been repaired. The gap left by the missing arm is covered with a spangled bit of white satin. The whole figure of the Virgin has been draped in a clumsily-sewed evening gown, palpably copied from some stray fashion magazine. A tiny bridal veil streams from the bowed head.
In the lap of the Virgin Mother rests a naked doll of celluloid. It has an unmistakably German face. It is the sort of doll guaranteed to float in a bath-tub, to the delight of pink-skinned babies.
Is there still a smile? Or a vague indignation as might come at the sight of sacrilege? Then there is no need of looking again at the dark faces raised in humble adoration. There is no use to see tears in the black, believing eyes.
Surely there will be no effort to make a sermon out of these simple ones who die and worship so fervently; to point out how desperately they cling to this hope less solid than the scribblings of incense in the murk of the cathedral; that they hold to these symbols of the buen Dios, who sometimes seems forgetful, as their fathers held to more colorful and, mayhap, more generous gods.
To those who smile, this Trinity is only a cheap image made cheaper, an incongruity in white-spangled satin and a ridiculous patent doll.
To those in the Easter procession it is the Saviour, the Holy Virgin and the Infant Jesus. To whom they give the best that is left them.
Let them have their cynicism who will. We who believe, are happy with our gods and grateful for our simple miracles.
FAREWELL AND HAIL
The big cathedral would assay richly in the ore-crusher, eh? Well, why not? It might be amusing as well as profitable. If he had a fancy that way, there was nothing to stop him from making the experiment. He was the ruler of the north. And it wouldn’t be long before he sat on the gilt throne in Mexico City——
That would be later. This was the city of his dreams. This was the city he had fought the long campaign to take. And here he was, riding into it at the head of his army——
Don Pancho grinned under the wide, straight brim of his white sombrero. Later, that sombrero was to become famous. When Don Pancho, invited across to El Paso for an official reception, refused to take it off in the presence of gringo officers and their ladies. With the explanation that it was a very excellent sombrero and, besides, that Don Pancho took off his hat to no man.
That was to be later. Now Don Pancho’s grin was that of a mischievous boy, with a strong hint of the obstinate, juvenile bully in it.
It was good to feel the dorados at his back. No conquering king ever owned such a guard of honor. Sixty men tempered and tried as Damascus swords. The stubborn blades might be bent until the points kissed the hilts. But always they would spring straight and true again——
Tonight, if it was his wish, his band would play nothing but La Cucaracha in the Plaza Mayor. Excellent idea! Once when he had looked on the Plaza—! The thick scent of jasmina came from the alameda. Like a woman too heavily perfumed. Not too heavily for Don Pancho, though. He might want the flowers of the alameda torn up by the roots and brought to him. Heavily perfumed women——
Later on. Later. For a while there must be order. This had been his command. He had sworn to show the world that he was not a swaggering bandit, with more than his share of good luck. He was a soldier and patriot. A great general. His men must behave or he would have them shot down in regiments. There must be no disorder. No looting. No small lootings. There were rich men still in the north. They would be taxed—they would be made to pay——
In the republic to the north the newspapers called him a Mexican Napoleon. He had inquired. It appeared that Napoleon was a good general, too. But where was Napoleon now?
And here was Don Pancho riding to take possession.
First of all, there was one gesture he must make. One thing he must do. He had promised himself this treat. The little, carefully rehearsed scene at the Café Maxim. He had waited a long time. It would be an historical gesture—and, very shortly, a legend——
The world knew of him. Great foreign governments sent representatives to him. Men came from long distances to beg his favor. M
instrels sang his praises. Mexican mothers no longer told their black-eyed niños of the Don Pancho that would come galloping out of the hills if they were naughty and eat them all up. But of the benevolent Don Pancho who would bring them rich gifts if they were good.
All as Don Pancho had dreamed. Only in dreams there was not the sharp, smacking taste of this reality.
There was no boyishness in the grin as the rebel army wound through the narrow streets toward the heart of the city. It was the grin that is on the jaws of the gray wolf. The grin that comes after the first slash of fangs, as the gray wolf prepares to strike again, more deliberately.
Not so many months ago Don Pancho had been the outlaw of the Sierra Madre. There had been a price on his head. He had been hunted like an animal. In this very city——
Men remembered that brave act. Every soldier, every citizen, had been ordered to shoot him down as mercilessly as they would a coyote. This city had been placarded with decretos offering gold for his head.
Into this gold-baited trap Don Pancho had ridden. Straight into the jaws of the trap. Through the crowds that assembled at the Plaza Mayor and the carriages that moved to the theatres.
By some magic of the gods that guard outlaws, he had not been recognized. He had strode into the Café Maxim. There had been a gay crowd there. And music. Don Pancho had eaten, grinning at the crowd.
The waiter had brought him the check. Don Pancho had asked for a pencil to sign it, as other patrons did. He had scrawled in wide, wavering characters his name that he had laboriously learned to write——
He remembered the waiter’s expression as he read it. The waiter’s eyes made wide, frightened circles and his mouth opened like the mouth of a foolish fish.
The restaurant had been hushed and motionless as he left. They feared him. Not a man had moved to halt him. And there had been many federalista officers in the restaurant. The orchestra had gone dumb.
He still wondered how the amazing news had travelled so swiftly. The streets had been empty when he left the restaurant. Except for the mozo who held his horse. The city had been hushed in its fright——
His horse’s hoofs on the cobbled calle had made a swift, metallic pulsing. Don Pancho had fled to his familiar hills below the city. On the crest of the greatest of these he had pulled his panting horse to its haunches. He had shaken his fist at the lights of the city below him. They had flashed like chaste jewels spread in careful disorder for the eyes of a beautiful woman.
The lights that were precious gems in the setting of the city where he was a hunted animal. There the gringos loitered in the Foreign Club and made plans to rob his country. There, in the jungle of the alameda, wandered youths of the city who had never known the loneliness of a night in the desert, where the black sky bends down to smother a man. The hated rich ones sat in the theater and heard the voices of singers from foreign lands. Young men and women strolled to the melancholy cadence of the band playing a tragic love song in the Plaza——
Don Pancho had shouted vile epithets at them until his voice cracked. A lone wolf howling in the night——
“I am coming back, Chihuahua swine!” he screamed. “I am coming back. And when I return I will not be Pancho the bandit but General Pancho el valiente—ai, the ruler of Mexico!”
Well, he was back as he told them that night. He had shown them——
The first ranks of the army turned past the street on which he caught a glimpse of the Foreign Club. They swung into the street on which was the Café Maxim.
This was the moment! Don Pancho’s right arm went up into the air. The signal to halt. The right arms of his officers repeated the signal and embellished it with tenor commands. Very military. Slowly the marching army, turning and twisting through the streets like a serpent, wriggled coil by coil to a halt.
Don Pancho dismounted. Fierro the Butcher followed without a signal from his chief. It was his simple duty. Don Pancho gestured to Capitan Santiago, who rode by his side. And to Teniente Sancho Mendez, who was known as a composer of witty verses. There must be a fitting record of this little play.
Don Pancho went directly into the Café Maxim, which was gloomily deserted. The proprietor came forward in a series of trembling bows that looked like hesitant waves.
“I am your poor servant, my general!” he exclaimed. “May such an unworthy one be so bold as to welcome you to the city that is yours?”
“It is a small enough favor,” replied Don Pancho, “after the welcome that the dogs of federalistas had been shooting at me for three weeks.”
“They were hated in the city,” declared the proprietor of the Café Maxim.
“That is as it should be,” said Don Pancho. “But this is not the time for idle gossip. I have come here as a gentleman comes to pay his accounting.”
“Your accounting? You owe nothing here, my general,” protested the proprietor. “Dios forbid——”
“You are most generous,” interrupted Don Pancho, “but I have a better memory. You have yet to learn of Don Pancho’s memory. He pays for everything he gets. He pays both friends and enemies, each in the coin of their own minting.”
“But the restaurant is yours, my valiant general,” the proprietor insisted.
Don Pancho ignored him. He had his minutely-rehearsed lines to deliver.
“Let’s see, was it last night I was here?” he mused, aloud. “No, it must have been the night before that. Or maybe it was last April. Or last year. Anyway, it was an excellent enough meal. Only your patrons made it almost impossible to keep food in the stomach. Federalista officers and their pocky women. Many of your patrons that night I have since made into meals for the vultures. The poor birds became very sick and had to vomit.
“Last night or last year. Anyway, there was a bill. Two pesos and ten centavos.”
“It is nothing,” stammered the proprietor.
“But you have the bill,” said Don Pancho. In his voice crept a sterner note but still he grinned. “It has come to my ears that you have even had it put into a frame to exhibit to other patrons. Is it thus that you treat the private accounts of a gentleman who condescends to dine at your restaurant?”
“I was proud of your patronage, my general——”
“Where is the bill?” demanded Don Pancho.
The tone of his voice stopped all protestation. The proprietor went to an inner room and returned with the framed dinner check. Across it was sprawled the stumbling signature of the outlaw of the Sierra Madre who had become commander of the north.
Don Pancho carefully counted out two pesos and ten centavos.
Before sundown Teniente Sancho Mendez had composed three new verses to celebrate the event of the Café Maxim. Minstrels wove the episode into a long ballad over their guitars.
Not long after sundown Don Pancho, who paid enemies and friends in coin of their own minting, sat in the gloomy executive chamber of the governor’s palace. His uniform coat, made after the manner of European army officers, was unbuttoned. Underneath it was a striped and collarless shirt. The cartridge belt was twisted around so that one of his revolvers rested handily in his lap.
In back of him, glowering, stood Fierro the Butcher. He was impatient of the whim of his chief that insisted on ornately-worded diplomacy. Looting was simpler.
Across the long, carved table from Don Pancho sat one of the wealthiest land-holders of the north country. He was bent in an attitude of crushed resignation while Don Pancho spoke.
From the plaza came the distant sound of the rebel band, playing La Cucaracha again and again. It made an accompaniment for Don Pancho’s heavily diplomatic words. He explained that, as a patriot, who sought only the liberty of Mexico, the land-holder must feel honored to deliver one hundred thousand pesos gold into the hands of Don Pancho.
ENTER YOUR HOUSE
Superior gringo eyes find it hard to forgive gentle manners. They do not understand—nor care to understand—the graceful instinct that provides an eloquent gesture for every phrase; an illumi
nating flourish for each emotion. And as for a country where men—grown-up men, too, with fierce mustachios—embrace each other
Gringo eyes wrinkle in disgust at the decorations which the Mexican, with graceful hands, paints on the delicate design of syllables which is the language of the country.
Once the gringo accepted the peon’s humble removal of his sombrero and his standing aside when the two met on the walk of the narrow calle. He complains now that the peon no longer does this. He declares it is a symptom of the moral breakdown which he believes has been visited on a people who had a civilization centuries before the gringo existed. He snorts indignantly at the suggestion that perhaps his countrymen have sacrificed the right to this formality of respect.
Take the most common of Mexican courtesies. The invitation at the doorway of the Mexican’s home, although the Mexican, strangely enough, has no exact word for “home.” To greet you the Mexican says: “Enter your house!” Admire the Mexican’s horse and he says: “The horse is yours, señor”
To the gringo this is part of the deceit and treachery which he insists is the character of the fiercest and gentlest of people. The gringo never surrenders his platitudes. The biased, wrong-headed convictions of his fathers are good enough for him. Twenty years of idyllic life in Mexico, accepting the unfailing decencies of Mexicans and suffering nothing but his own sense of superiority, will not change his ready-to-wear viewpoint.
Enter your house, indeed! The horse is yours, señor! Try and get ’em. The gringo feels it is impossible to trust such sinister makers of gifts; such pleasant weavers of charming words. One gathers that in his own country one can rely to the last on the man who says: “Any time I can do anything for you, old man, just call me up.” In that land an inquiring friend is sincerely desolated at the news that one’s Aunt Agatha has suffered a return of her old nervous headaches. And the child there is taking a vow when he replies to the kindly relative that he is Uncle Harry’s little boy.
The Little Tigress: Tales out of the Dust of Old Mexico Page 9