by Vella Munn
“I will return there,” he’d said, “and use my eyes and ears to learn all I can. I have no wisdom about the soldiers’ ways. I thought I could turn them in the direction I want, but I was wrong. If their anger is such that they punish the Hopi—” He’d faltered over that. “If that has happened, their actions will tell me much about what exists in their hearts.”
Drums No More insisted that the soldiers didn’t have hearts, but although he was afraid for Cougar, he’d seen the wisdom in his grandson’s plan. As a result, the old man, rested and determined, was now on his way home while Cougar was nearly back at Oraibi. All day, he’d kept his senses turned for any sign of the soldiers, but there had been none. It was inconceivable that the Spanish wouldn’t be determined to avenge the death of one of their own . . .
From where he stood in the sheltering and welcome dark, he could just make out a faint glow near where the padre had set up his tent. Uninterested in what the man was doing, he made his way toward where the soldiers slept. As he did, his ears absorbed wolf howls and drum sounds from the top of the Hopi mesa. The message wasn’t that of the Navajo, and yet the deep notes made him think of home and belonging. He prayed Morning Butterfly was up there, safe, surrounded by her family. He also prayed she knew he was alive, and that the knowledge had given her joy.
The soldiers weren’t there. He couldn’t hear them and their smell had faded so much that the land had nearly absorbed it. The corral didn’t contain as many horses as it had yesterday.
Patient in the way of one who has learned that patience means life, he waited for the moon to spread its silver light before taking the final steps that brought him to Captain Lopez’s tent. Then he nodded in understanding. The ground had recently been trampled by numerous hooves.
Bending low, he followed the trail of disturbed pebbles. At first he had difficulty determining which marks were new and which had been placed there earlier, but it soon became clear that many horses had gone in one direction at the same time. He was loping now, bending low, running like a wolf on a scent. The thought that he resembled a wolf gave him pause, but he couldn’t stop, couldn’t turn from his task. If he ceased to be a Navajo warrior and became a chindi-wolf, so be it.
His breath came faster and his back had started to ache but at last he knew—knew—that the soldiers had left Oraibi. They weren’t on their way to his village; instead, their tracks headed toward the great canyon.
Stopping, he lifted his head to the night, opened his mouth, and howled like the wolf he’d become.
From inside his tent, Fray Angelico heard the howl and shivered.
And, high on the mesa, Morning Butterfly thought she caught the note of something both animal and human.
• • •
The next morning, Fray Angelico instructed both Mexican Indian servants to once again set off for Santa Fe. His orders were simple: They were to safeguard this latest letter to the governor and return as soon as they’d received a response. Once the frightened but obedient Indians were gone, the padre drove himself nearly to distraction trying to get the Hopi he’d managed to gather around him to understand what he wanted them to do. They couldn’t already have forgotten what size and shape stones he needed, or where to search for them, but even when they fell to their knees and bowed their heads as he prayed over them, he doubted their sincerity.
Struggling between his impatience to get the job done and his fear that the Hopis might rebel, or worse, if he pushed too hard, he ordered each and every one of them to relay to Morning Butterfly the message that he had urgent need of her. Although they nodded their heads like weeds bobbing in the wind, as soon as he’d finished, they wandered off instead of going in search of her. If this was deliberate disobedience on their part, the day would come when they would regret their actions. And if they were simply too limited in intelligence to grasp the simplest command, he prayed for patience.
Most of all he prayed for an end to his isolation.
• • •
Morning Butterfly had spent the three days at Oraibi since the Navajos’ escape and the soldiers’ subsequent departure. Like Singer of Songs, she gave thanks that the captain and his demands no longer impacted on their lives, but while Singer of Songs was content to learn from the women about what to expect as her pregnancy progressed, Morning Butterfly paid close attention to what others told her about the padre’s state of mind.
He was, they all agreed, an impatient man who was also as nervous as a young deer stalked by a wolf pack. He prayed more than before, his prayers louder and longer as well. He sometimes lost his temper and yelled at those he’d commandeered to build his church, then his tone turned into that a parent uses when trying to get a small child to stop playing and help with chores.
The padre’s behavior was a source of great amusement, and despite her unease, Morning Butterfly laughed at some of what she was told. She knew that she would have to present herself to the man before his threats of punishment became reality, but she put it off as long as possible.
The end of her reprieve came on the afternoon of the fourth day, when she heard a child crying as she clambered up the ladder to Oraibi. She looked around for the little girl’s mother, but Slow Walker was nowhere in sight.
“Why are you alone?” she asked the little girl.
Between hiccups, the girl explained that she and her mother had been collecting water from one of the few springs that had survived summer when the padre approached. Although Slow Walker had attempted to avoid him, he’d ordered her to give him a drink. After that, he’d made it clear that Slow Walker would supply water for his workers as well. He’d grabbed Slow Walker’s hair and started to drag her with him. Afraid, Slow Walker had ordered her daughter to run home.
It was her fault, Morning Butterfly knew. By avoiding the padre, she’d put her people at risk. After entrusting the girl to an aunt’s care, she gave her pueblo a last look and did what she had to do.
She had no trouble finding the padre, since she heard him before she could single him out from the men working in the afternoon sun. Two had lifted a boulder onto the church wall, but the boulder had no level side and kept threatening to fall off. Fray Angelico, his face streaming sweat and his hood thrown back to reveal his tangled hair, was berating the men over their choice of a stone.
“Please,” she said, “let them stop before they hurt themselves.”
Fray Angelico whirled on her. Then he composed his features, but not before she saw an expression that made her think a chindi might look like him.
“Where have you been?” he demanded. “I have been asking for you for days. Surely—”
“You could have come to Oraibi yourself.”
Something flickered in his eyes but was gone before she could make sense of it. He still put her in mind of a chindi, and she took the warning to heart.
“My sister needed me,” she said, her half lie coming almost without thought. Then, studying his reaction, she explained that Singer of Songs carried Captain Lopez’s child.
“By all that is holy! The man’s debauchery knows no bounds.”
Although she’d never heard the word debauchery before, she had no doubt of its meaning. Hoping to keep him from asking too many questions about her sister, she repeated her concern for the Hopi men’s safety.
“You tell them,” he insisted, “that they are doing this all wrong. I am so glad you are here.” As if emphasizing his point, he flattened a hand against his chest. “My patience has never been tested like this and without God on my side, I would have given up. I cannot understand how people who can build an extensive village have no comprehension of what I require.”
Because they choose not. “Their minds are elsewhere,” she said, “on their need to harvest their crops.”
“Morning Butterfly, I am not going to debate this with you any more than I was willing to debate it with the captain. The Lord’s work has priority. Until His majesty has manifested into something tangible, until this church is completed,
the converting of souls cannot truly begin.”
His hand had dropped to his side, but now he placed it over his heart again. “If only I could make your people understand that this is my life’s work . . . If only they could comprehend the extent of their reward for having bent their backs so God’s glory can be fully realized . . . Why do I bother?” he asked with a groan.
For a heartbeat she felt sorry for this man who was so alone. In truth, the ways and whys of his religion interested her just as she’d been fascinated by everything Cougar had told her, but if she told the padre that, he would force his beliefs on her until their weight crushed her. If only he would open himself to Hopi wisdom, maybe the two of them could sit down together and hand each other their gifts.
Sighing, she acknowledged that that could never be and turned the conversation to the subject of Captain Lopez. As she suspected, Angelico didn’t know when, or if, to expect his return.
“If he does come back,” he said, “it will not be for long.”
The two men charged with trying to lift the too-awkward boulder had set it down and now each propped a leg on it. Others had also ceased working. If they started to walk away, if they refused to obey the padre, he couldn’t stop them. It was as Cougar had said; the Hopi did not have to see themselves as animals. They could fight.
With a start, she realized the padre was speaking. Still trapped by the enormity of her revelation, she struggled to keep up.
“. . . not as all-powerful as he believes himself to be,” Fray Angelico was saying. “He believes I will blindly accept his every decision, but he is wrong.”
“How is he wrong?”
“I have influence. He chooses to discount that influence, but he will live to regret his decision because I have set certain things in motion.”
She’d never heard of this thing called a letter, and wasn’t sure what it had to do with what he called “bringing pressures to bear,” but that didn’t matter as much as his final comment.
“It is my fervent prayer, my hope that, within the month, Captain Lopez and his troops will be replaced by others who put God’s work before all else.”
Her dream of seeing her people walk away from Fray Angelico and again take up the pattern and tempo of their lives spluttered, threatened to die.
“Within the month?” she repeated, although she had no idea what that meant.
“Perhaps sooner, but these things take time. It is not as if this new colony is overrun with soldiers awaiting assignments, but the Crown is committed to working with the Church to civilize the natives and make the land ready for Christianity, so yes, I do not anticipate having to wait overly long.”
Dizzy from the effort of trying to make sense of everything he’d told her, she nodded.
“In the meantime, God’s work will continue. I vow this! With you passing along the necessary elements of what is required . . .”
Tell him you will not do this.
But if you anger him and he passes his rage onto new soldiers, what price will your people pay?
“Cannot the work wait until—” she began, but instantly his features became shadowed as if a great bird had flown between him and the sun. Stunned by this evidence of his mood, she fell silent.
“It should be enough that I am the emissary of God’s word and was chosen for this great work,” he muttered. “And yet . . .”
He lifted his hand to his forehead and pinched the sides with his long, bony fingers, his expression pained, and she reminded herself that he’d never physically harmed one of her people. She remembered his gentle, loving eyes when he’d just baptized someone, particularly a child.
“God came to you, told you what he wanted you to do?” she asked.
“How little you understand of the Lord’s work.” He sighed, but no longer looked anguished. “God’s ways are mysterious indeed. I was brought into my calling when I was but a child and have wanted no other life, cannot remember anything else, but even I do not pretend to have God’s ear.”
Once again confused, she tried to nod.
“The work to which I devote my life is easily stated. I am here to free the natives from the miserable slavery of the demon and from the obscure darkness of their idolatry.”
His words had a rote-like quality, as if he’d heard them countless times and was simply repeating what he’d memorized.
“Who is this demon?” she asked, even though she wasn’t sure she wanted to know.
“The devil, of course! Surely you have grasped that simple fact. My child, your people are of vicious and ferocious habits; they know no law but force and must be rescued from their barbarism. It is my burden, my duty to punish those who worship the devil so they will not infect others with their wicked ways.”
She felt as if she was sinking into his words, surrounded by swirling dust, bombarded by nonsense that, nevertheless, carried the core of his belief.
“Before I came here,” he continued, “I committed the theology of this mission to heart. What I know, what I embrace with all my heart, is the truth—the absolute truth.”
“The truth?”
“That those who could prevent a given sin and fail to do so cooperate in the offense committed against God and therefore share in the guilt.”
“Guilt?”
“Not embracing the Lord God. Child, child, you are a Hopi of rare intellect. Nothing would gladden my heart more than having you as my most devout convert, your praise of the Lord Jesus Christ ringing from the mountaintops.”
Spittle had formed at the corners of his mouth, and his eyes didn’t seem to focus on anything. His sparse body trembled and, alarmed, she reached to steady him, but his eyes suddenly became intense, and once again she wondered if a bird’s shadow had passed over his features.
“The promise of showing the Hopi of Oraibi the road to eternal life fills me with the greatest joy, but joy unshared is lonely. So lonely.” Without warning, he grabbed for her, raking her forearm with his nails. Somehow, she yanked free.
“Padre,” she warned. “I am not my sister and you are not Captain Lopez.”
• • •
Would weaknesses of the flesh never be done with him? Anguished, Fray Angelico ripped off his robe, leaving himself naked in the wilderness with God knew how many savages watching. His mind screaming denial, and praying for forgiveness, he yanked a needle-encrusted bush out of the ground and slapped his back with it over and over again until his world turned red with pain and his flesh bled. Only then did he pick up his robe and stumble away.
He’d been walking for what seemed forever when self-hatred and doubt faded, to be replaced by cold realization. It wasn’t his flesh that was weak, not at all. Rather, being surrounded by savages had brought him too close to the devil’s clutches.
The devil would not win! No matter what the effort, a lifetime of devotion to God would sustain him and he would come through the test all the stronger for the effort!
Stopping, he looked around, more than a little disconcerted to realize he could barely see Oraibi in the distance. As for the remaining horses and his barely-begun church, there was no sign they’d ever existed.
Only—
Only faint hoofbeats coming closer.
Chapter Nineteen
Panicked and nearly breathless, Fray Angelico raced for the dubious safety of a large, seemingly dead bush. As he crouched behind it, he yanked his robe on, gasping in pain as the rough fabric caught on his flayed back. Prayers multiplied inside him, but the threat of death left him unable to decide which of them was most likely to convince his maker.
Something seemed wrong about the sound, or rather the direction it was coming from, but his mind refused to take hold of these pieces of knowledge. Impelled by an instinct for self-preservation he hadn’t known he possessed, he made himself as small as possible. The bush’s upper branches reached out in all directions and would have afforded him adequate protection if the base hadn’t been so spindly.
Through an act of will that g
ave him a small measure of pride, he forced himself to focus on the approaching dust. Whoever was out there moved slowly, saddle creaking and—
A saddle? The Navajo hadn’t stolen any, had they?
Just as panic had, relief now nearly robbed him of the ability to breathe. At the same time, it would take more than this to put an end to his fear.
Was that a glint of metal? Leaning to one side of the bush, he struggled to make sense of what he’d spotted. When the glint reappeared, for a moment he was convinced his prayers had been answered and that these were new troops. Then reality once again intruded; he’d heard the sound of a single horse.
Madariaga de Oñate took an impossibly long time to reach him, time Angelico used to mull over the reason for the young soldier’s return. If something had happened to the rest of the troop . . .
Angelico stood and positioned himself so Madariaga couldn’t see his back and the blood soaking through his garment. The soldier immediately slid off his horse, dropped to his knees and touched his forehead to the ground. Pleased, Angelico placed his hand on his shoulder.
“Welcome, my son, welcome,” he said. “I will pray for you.”
“I . . . I need prayers.”
“There has been an . . . accident? You and the others were attacked by hostile Indians?”
“No,” Madariaga reassured him. He remained bent so low that Angelico had to strain to hear him. “The captain ordered me to return.”
“Because he believed I needed protection?”
With a low groan, Madariaga straightened. He looked older, drawn and fired. “No,” he whispered. “Because I have displeased him. He—he no longer assumes responsibility for me, does not want me in his sight.”