No one had fought longer or more ferociously for the cross than Poot. She couldn’t imperil him, but in the moment of speaking, she hadn’t had time to reflect on all the possibilities. Dread made her break into perspiration at the chance that jarring the leaders’ memory about La Quinta might make them decide that while Poot had owed a debt to Zane’s father, it didn’t extend to the son.
Her fingers were clumsy and trembled as she spread the clothes on several bushes and turned to the tata nohoch zul.
“Arrange your hair,” he ordered critically. “For the fiancée of a rich man, you wear shabby rags. Have you nothing better?”
She shook her head, angry, yet somewhat amused that she was evidently supposed to preen for this interrogation. He glanced around the bare hut and looked even more disgusted, since there was no place where anything could be hidden.
He picked up and examined her books, squinted at her father’s letters, and scowled at the Badianus excerpts. “These are in Texas language?”
“English. Our language is like that of the English in Belize.”
“Say some,” he directed. “Speak this English.”
Dumbfounded, she said the first thing that came into her head. “I’m Mercy Cameron, from Texas, and though England is across the water, English is the language I speak.”
“It is not!” said the man combatively. “I‘ve been much in Belize and understand many words, though. I don’t speak it. Your language may be a debased dialect. It isn’t English.”
Mercy couldn’t keep from laughing, though the situation was far from humorous. “I’m sure the English people would agree with you! But, you see, the eastern part of our country was settled mostly by people who were English. I would suppose that Spanish-speaking people here sound different from those in Castile.”
He studied her suspiciously and peered again at the books. “What are these about?”
“They tell about cures and medicines. My father was a doctor.”
“An H-men?”
“No. He only tried to make people well. He couldn’t see the future or make spells.”
“Could he raise the dead?”
The question was as sudden as a blow. “He couldn’t,” said Mercy, “and I don’t think anyone else can.”
After a long, piercing stare, the chief spy dropped the books and letters. “Come,” he said. “The tatich is waiting.”
20
Bonifacio Novelo, one of the few survivors from the early times of the War of the Castes, was priest-king of his people, supreme military and spiritual commander of the Cruzob. He was reclining in a hammock within the arcade of his palace, savoring a sliced mango, and though he didn’t rise at Mercy’s appearance, his smile was affable.
“Be seated, señora,” he invited. “Will you have hot chocolate? Coffee?”
“No, thank you.” Mercy didn’t want to be served by one of the slaves, either white or native, and the thought crossed her mind that slavery in the South would have ended at once if all the dominant race had undergone a stretch of bondage.
The tatich was heavy-fleshed, perhaps sixty, wearing cotton trousers embellished with lace from the knee down, embossed sandals, a brightly striped shirt, and a sash. Around his neck hung an enormous gold cross on a chain of massive links. He had been known twenty years ago as the “assassin of Valladolid.” The blood of hundreds of helpless women, children, and aged victims was upon him, and yet the expression on his handsome weathered face was frank and genial.
“Then you must taste my fruit,” he said. Leaning forward, he pressed a mellow slice against her lips so that she had no polite choice except to eat it.
The tata nohoch zul spoke in such rapid Mayan that Mercy comprehended only that he was summarizing her answers to his questions. The tatich nodded thoughtfully and gave her a smile of great charm.
“You learned your skills from your father?”
“Yes, and from a Mayan woman at La Quinta. She taught me much about herbs.”
“The child you breathed life into—where did you learn that?”
“From my father. But the child wasn’t dead, señor.”
“Some say he was.”
“I was afraid so, too, but I started his breathing by forcing air in and out of his lungs—like a bellows—and it worked.”
Did he believe her? Mercy’s palms were clammy, but she made herself sit in a relaxed fashion, as if this were a social call. It was impossible to guess from the tatich’s bland face what he thought.
“If you were to marry the owner of La Quinta, how did you become a captive of the batab of Macanche, who’s been in Belize?”
Mercy gave the essentials of her abduction by Eric, but she omitted having known Dionisio on the estate, simply saying that she had run off and, freed by the Icaiche raid, he’d come upon her and made her come with him.
“But you, of course, wish to return to your fiancé?”
“Of course.” Mercy didn’t know what more to say without creating problems for Dionisio.
The tatich asked her questions about Texas and about how she came to Yucatán, then roared with laughter when he pried out of her the admission that her husband had lost her to Zane at cards. “For one who looks so young and innocent, you’ve had adventures!” he said. “And you may have more. Many women have wished to marry the batab since his wife died, but it’s said he looked at no one till he turned up with you.” The tatich frowned. “How do you know your fiancé is alive?”
“I hope it very much.”
The huge mestizo shrugged. “It is a pity the ladinos don’t finish each other off. If they hadn’t warred so much, always struggling for power, Campeche against Mérida, one general against another, they could have wiped us out. But now we’re too strong.”
He and the chief spy harked back to former battles, comrades, and foes, both dead and alive. “Cecilio Chi—now, there was a strategist!” sighed the tatich. “He’d fought in Yucatán’s war against Mexico and he knew how to take a city. When we came down on Valladolid late in 1847, he first burned the outlying haciendas, took the cattle, cotton, honey, coffee, and money and sent them to be traded for weapons in Belize. Next he burned the villages and crushed small outposts, but he never tried to fight a large attack; he just melted into the trees till he had the ladinos scattered along narrow trails where a rush with machetes would wipe them out! A real general, Cecilio!”
“Dead for a woman!” said the chief spy with a scornful glance at Mercy. “But at least his whoring wife didn’t outlive him long!”
Talk turned to the present and Mercy learned that Santa Ana, being deported by Juárez, had been taken off a United States steamship near Sisal and ordered shot by Colonel Peraza. Zane’s commander! Apparently Peraza’s advisors (could that include Zane?) had warned him that since the old dictator had been taken from the protection of the U.S. flag, his execution could cause international problems, so Santa Ana’s life had been spared.
“I’d take a machete to that one,” said the tata nohoch zul. “He gave his favorites the proceeds from selling Mayan slaves to Cuba.”
“He will die in his bed,” predicted the tatich and looked accusingly at Mercy. “You of Texas should have killed him when you had the chance.”
“That might have saved Mexico and Yucatán a lot of trouble,” Mercy agreed.
So the fighting was still going on at Mérida. Zane would be there unless he was dead or wounded. Though she mourned his continuing danger, she rejoiced that he probably hadn’t seen her letter or been told about her apparent departure for the United States. With luck, if she got out of Chan Santa Cruz, she might be at La Quinta when he came home!
This was such a heady, dizzying thought that she didn’t realize the interview was at an end. The spy touched her bare arm with his cold machete blade and jerked his head toward the plaza.
“Good-bye,” said the tatich paternally, reaching for another mango and swinging himself gently. “It has been interesting to speak of your country, yes, and interesting to meet such
a valuable woman.”
Confused, Mercy protested. “Señor, I’m not rich. I have nothing.”
“Too modest!” he teased, shaking a finger. “You seem to be worth a great deal to at least three men, though it’s likely the Icaiche killed your Englishman. So do we ask ransom from your fiancé? Do we tell your batab the cost of keeping you is a stronger alliance, utter commitment? Or would the prestige of the cross be enhanced by having a healer at the shrine city?”
“I’m not that experienced, señor!” Mercy cried, appalled. “Many of your H-men can do as much or more.”
The tatich smiled. “None of them has restored a child to life. Yes, you might be the most valuable of all to attract rich offerings to the shrine. I will think about it.”
He raised his plump hand in dismissal.
“But, señor …” Mercy began.
The tata nohoch zul gripped her arm and moved her from the arcade. “You’ve been honored to see the tatich. He will consider your best use for the cross.” A smile made those straight lips more cruel than ever. “Whatever your future, woman, it should be interesting.”
He’d enjoy her pleading, which would gain nothing, and stood braced with his legs apart, arms folded, barring her from the tatich, who had killed so many, seen so many of his own die, that any person must be to him little more than a pawn.
She reached the shade of her street, but even as she turned into the hut, she felt the spy watching her, and even within the walls, she felt that he could see her.
“He’s not tata nohoch zul for nothing,” reminded Dionisio when she told him of this uncanny fear after his first outrage at her interrogation had been controlled. “He is a careful man, and”—the batab finished somberly—“he will be watching you … and me.”
“All this because I helped a little boy!”
“It’s necessary to your tamen, your harmony, to heal when you can.” He drew her against him, stroking her hair and shoulders, thinking aloud. “For protection from the Icaiches, my council of elders has been favoring closer bonds with the Cruzob. Anything I negotiate must be approved by them, of course, but perhaps the best thing is for me to go at once to the tatich and offer him a company for guard duty one month of the year and our full support in battle against whatever enemy.”
“You mustn’t involve your people for my sake.”
He stiffened in offense. “I’m a batab. If the good of my people required it, I would machete you myself. That’s my tamen. But a stronger alliance will be, I think, to the benefit of Macanche. I can offer it in good conscience. The tatich knows it must be approved by the council.”
“Do you think he’ll accept?”
Diohisio spread his hands. “Such a binding would be more valuable than any ransom paid in money, especially if the Icaiches grow strong enough to challenge the Cruzob for their old lands. And it’s possible that once the Juaristas consolidate their power, Mexico might help Mérida try to crush Chan Santa Cruz.”
“Then the alliance should be tempting, certainly.”
“Yes. But a healer at the shrine might be even more useful. Besides an increased flow of offerings, the mystery and power of the cross would be enhanced, knitting the empire more closely together, cutting the chance of vassal batabs building their own strength to the detriment of Chan Santa Cruz. The cross united and heartened a defeated fugitive people. But fresh miracles give new life to old ones, true?”
Mercy saw the logic of that. “Dionisio, what do you think he’ll decide?”
“He won’t decide till he’s had time to think over and test the appeal of a mystical shrine healer. He’ll gain this by telling me that he can’t seriously consider an alliance till it’s confirmed by the council, which means that I’ll have to travel to my village and back.”
“I can’t go with you?”
“Unless the alliance is accepted, they’ll never let you out of Chan Santa Cruz. You won’t be able to step from the hut without the tata nohoch zul hearing of it almost at once.”
“What if the tatich decides your people will make the alliance sooner or later, anyway, and he wants to keep me here?”
“I swore to take you to your own place. It may take a while, but you’ll go free, Ixchel, if it takes my life.”
His eyes caressed her from across the room. Before she could move to him, he turned and strode toward the plaza.
Dionisio’s acumen was proved. The tatich did exactly as he’d predicted, withholding a decision until Dionisio could present an official offer approved by the council of elders.
“And he’s delaying all he can,” Dionisio said bitterly. “I asked to go at once to Macanche and serve the rest of my guard time when I returned, but he wouldn’t permit it.”
“I’m glad you’re not going just yet,” Mercy said with a small shudder. “Maybe by the time you leave I’ll have gotten used to being spied on, but right now I’m afraid!”
He took her cold hands, warming them in his. “No need to fear their hurting you. You’re precious as jade, as treasured as quetzal plumes!”
“But what if I’m asked to treat someone I can’t help?”
“The tatich will announce that your medicine was impotent because the cross knew the patient was a sinner or doomed to terrible trials if he lived.” Dionisio chuckled. “Don’t worry. It’s to the tatich’s best interests to stress your successes and bury your failures—quietly.”
“But I hate for people to think I can do more than I really can! Suppose they carried a dead baby in from some far-off village or someone died making the journey who might have lived otherwise? What if …”
Shaking his head, Dionisio hushed her lips with his fingers. “Your father was a wise, good man. Did none of his patients die?”
“Of course, but … he was a real doctor!”
“Oh.” Dionisio’s brow puckered. “You mean he’d accept and do his best for people who he knew were going to die? He could endure their deaths because, perhaps, he made these easier, and there were other people he could help?”
Mercy bit her lip. “I don’t think I’d be a good doctor. Maybe I never can accept that there’ll be those I can’t do anything for. The reason I worked with Juanito so long was that I couldn’t bear to get up and face his mother.”
“A good thing in his case.” Dionisio held her and she wondered why, though he was only a few years older than she, he often seemed so wise, possessed of a fatalistic understanding that made her feel childish and spoiled. “Don’t be troubled, my heart. Until he decides what to do, the tatich won’t make an effort to spread tales of your powers. You won’t suddenly be surrounded by the ailing. Let me give you a thought. It’s from our prophet, Chilam Balam. It helped me heal from Señor Kensington’s whipping, and also when my wife and our child died.” Dionisio’s voice softened. “‘His word was a measure of grace, and he broke and pierced the backbone of the mountains.… Who? Father, Thou knowest: He who is tender in heaven.…’”
She received his gift, this talisman that couldn’t be stolen. Tender in heaven. The words were like him. They lay down in his hammock, sweetly close. He talked to her in Mayan, as he often did, telling her stories—children’s stories of gods, animals, and mortals. For that night, he could have been an older brother, cheering her in the darkness.
Early in June Dionisio’s service was completed and he set out for Macanche with his rifle, machete, bag of corn-meal, and water gourd. “I’ll return as quickly as I can,” he said. “But councils enjoy long arguments and persuadings. Be patient.”
He held her, his arms warm and strong and cherishing. She walked with him to the western way out of the village and watched till he turned at the edge of the forest and raised a hand in farewell before he vanished. Her throat burned and she fought back tears.
He’d be back. There was an excellent chance that the tatich would consider the alliance more useful than a dzul healer, that Dionisio would be able to take her straightaway to La Quinta.
And then?
Then
he’d go to his own village. In a year or two he’d marry and have children, just as she hoped to have babies with Zane, at least one with hair and eyes like his. But she’d never forget Dionisio, his forest, his people, and all that he’d taught her.
If Zane could accept—and she wasn’t sure he could—that she’d been used repeatedly by Eric Kensington, he should be able to accept the good and natural thing between her and the batab, though she hoped Zane would never question her till she had to lie or try to explain. Zane was her lover, her man. But she loved Dionisio as she did the sun and flowers and birds, knowing they weren’t hers.
As she turned from the western boundary, the tata nohoch zul stood in her way, his stout, hard belly protruding under his bright sash, his eyes narrow as he smiled.
“You’re sad at your master’s leaving? He’s young and lusty, yes? But save your tears for later. The tatich would speak with you now.”
She fought down the urge to cry out to Dionisio. Braced for almost anything, she followed the chief spy to the long arcaded palace. The supreme leader again occupied his hammock, enjoying fruit, crusty bread with honey, and aromatic coffee. He wore lace-trimmed white trousers still, but this time his shirt also was white, richly embroidered.
He motioned for her to take a stool near the hammock. “The bread is fresh-baked,” he said. “And you like coffee, don’t you?”
The golden-brown loaf-did smell tantalizing but it must have been made by one of the women in the slave compound. Mercy declined it and the coffee, also.
“The batab’s departure has left you too sad to eat?” chided the tatich; devouring alternate bites of honeycomb and mango. “Strange, when you are affianced to another man.” His eyelids drooped and a slow, sensual smile curved his lips. “Possibly you cling to whatever man is closest.”
There was no mistaking the suggestion in the deep, pleasant voice. Mercy went cold. If he wanted her, she was completely in his power. The Cruzob priesthood wasn’t celibate. Under the ladino clergy, villagers had preferred a priest to have one woman so that he’d leave the others alone. There were no moral checks on the Great Father. Mercy stared beyond him, at the execution tree in the plaza, summoning her courage, trying to still her careening thoughts.
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