by The Power
The soldiers were here yesterday, the old man said. He blew on the fire: smoke poured up and filled the hut. The priest began to cough, and the rat moved quickly like the shadow of a hand into the stack.
The boy, father, has not been baptized. The last priest who was here wanted two pesos. I had only one peso. Now I have only fifty centavos.
Tomorrow, the priest said wearily. Will you say Mass, father, in the morning?
Yes, yes.
And Confession, father, will you hear our confessions?
Yes, but let me sleep first. He turned on his back and closed his eyes to keep out the smoke.
[39] We have no money, father, to give you. The other priest, Padre José ...
Give me some clothes instead, he said impatiently.
But we have only what we wear.
Take mine in exchange.
The old man hummed dubiously to himself, glancing sideways at what the fire showed of the black torn cloth. If I must, father, he said. He blew quietly at the fire for a few minutes. The priest's eyes closed again.
After five years there is so much to confess.
The priest sat up quickly. What was that? he said.
You were dreaming, father. The boy will warn us if the soldiers come. I was only saying-
Can't you let me sleep for five minutes? He lay down again: somewhere, in one of the women's huts, someone was singing- I went down to my field and there I found a rose.
The old man said softly: It would be a pity if the soldiers came before we had time ... such a burden on poor souls, father … The priest shouldered himself upright against the wall and said furiously: Very well. Begin. I will hear your confession. The rats scuffled in the maize. Go on then, he said. Don't waste time. Hurry. When did you last ... The old man knelt beside the fire, and across the clearing the woman sang: I went down to my field and the rose was withered.
Five years ago. He paused and blew at the fire. It's hard to remember, father.
Have you sinned against purity?
The priest leant against the wall with his legs drawn up beneath him, and the rats accustomed to the voices moved again in the maize. The old man picked out his sins with difficulty, blowing at the fire. Make a good act of contrition, the priest said, and say-say-have you a rosary?-then say the Joyful Mysteries. His eyes closed, his lips and tongue stumbled over the Absolution, failed to finish ... he sprang awake again.
Can I bring the women? the old man was saying. It is five years ...
Oh, let them come. Let them all come! the priest cried angrily. I am your servant. He put his hand over his eyes and began to weep. The old man opened the door: it was [40] not completely dark outside under the enormous arc of starry ill-lit sky. He went across to the women's huts and knocked. Come, he said. You must say your confessions. It is only polite to the father. They wailed at him that they were tired ... the morning would do. Would you insult him? he said. What do you think he has come here for? He is a very holy father. There he is in my hut now weeping for our sins. He hustled them out: one by one they picked their way across the clearing towards the hut: and the old man set off down the path towards the river to take the place of the boy who watched the ford for soldiers.
Chapter Four
IT WAS years since Mr. Tench had written a letter. He sat before the work-table sucking at a steel nib-an old impulse had come to him to project this stray letter towards the last address he had-in Southend. Who knew who was alive still? He tried to begin: it was like breaking the ice at a party where you knew nobody. He began to write the envelope-Mrs. Henry Tench, care of Mrs. Marsdyke, 3, The Avenue, Westcliffe. It was her mother's house: the dominating, interfering creature who had induced him to set up his plate in Southend for a fatal while. Please forward, he wrote. She wouldn't do it if she knew, but she had probably forgotten-by this time-his handwriting.
He sucked the inky nib-how to go on? It would have been easier if there had been some purpose behind it other than the vague desire to put on record-to somebody-that he was still alive. It might prove awkward, if she had married again, but in that case she wouldn't t hesitate to tear the letter up. He wrote: Dear Sylvia, in a big clear immature script, listening to the furnace purring on the bench. He was making a gold alloy-there were no depots here where he could buy his material ready-made. Besides, the depots didn't favour 14-carat gold for dental work, and he couldn't afford finer material.
[41] The trouble was-nothing ever happened here. His life was as sober, respectable, regular as even Mrs. Marsdyke could require.
He took a look at the crucible: the gold was on the point of fusion with the alloy, so he flung in a spoonful of vegetable charcoal to protect the mixture from the air, took up his pen again and sat mooning over the paper. He couldn't remember his wife clearly-only the hats she wore. How surprised she would be at hearing from him after this long while: there had been one letter written by each of them since the little boy died. The years really meant nothing to him-they drifted fairly rapidly by without changing a habit. He had meant to leave six years ago, but the peso dropped with a revolution, and so he had come south. Now he had more money saved, but a month ago the peso had dropped again-another revolution somewhere. There was nothing to do but wait ... the nib went back between his teeth and memory melted in the little hot room. Why write at all? He couldn't remember now what had given him the odd idea. Somebody knocked on the outer door and he left the letter on the bench- Dear Sylvia, staring up, big and bold and hopeless. A boat's bell, rang by the riverside: it was the General Obregon back from Vera Cruz. A memory stirred: it was as if something alive and in pain moved in the little front room among the rocking-chairs- an interesting afternoon: what happened to him, I wonder, when -then died, or got away: Mr. Tench was used to pain, it was his profession. He waited cautiously till a hand beat on the door again and a voice said: Con amistad -there was no trust anywhere-before he drew the bolts and opened up, to admit a patient.
Padre José went in, under the big classical gateway marked in black letters Silencio, to what people used to call the Garden of God. It was like a building estate where nobody had paid attention to the architecture of the next house. The big stone tombs of above-ground burial were any height and any shape: sometimes an angel stood on the roof with lichenous wings: sometimes through a glass window you could see some rusting metal flowers upon a shelf-it was like looking into the kitchen of a house whose owners have moved on, [42] forgetting to clean out the vases. There was a sense of intimacy-you could go anywhere and see anything. Life here had withdrawn altogether.
He walked very slowly among the tombs because of his bulk: he could be alone here, there were no children about, and he could waken a faint sense of homesickness which was better than no feeling at all. He had buried some of these people. His small inflamed eyes turned here and there. Coming round the huge grey bulk of the Lopez tomb-a merchant family which fifty years ago had owned the only hotel in the capital-he found he was not alone. A grave was being dug at the edge of the cemetery next the wall: two men were working rapidly: a woman stood by and an old man. A child's coffin lay at their feet-it took no time at all in the spongy soil to get down far enough: a little water collected; that was why those who could afford it lay above ground.
They all paused a moment and looked at Padre José, and he sidled back towards the Lopez tomb as if he were an intruder. There was no sign of grief anywhere in the bright hot day: a buzzard sat on a roof outside the cemetery. Somebody said: Father.
Padre José put up his hand deprecatingly as if he were trying to indicate that he was not there, that he was gone, away, out of sight.
The old man said: Padre José. They all watched him hungrily: they had been quite resigned until he had appeared, but now they were anxious, eager. ... He ducked and dodged away from them. Padre José, the old man repeated. A prayer? They smiled at him, waiting. They were quite accustomed to people dying, but an unforeseen hope of happiness had bobbed up among the tom
bs: they could boast after this that one at least of their family had gone into the ground with an official prayer.
It's impossible, Padre José said.
Yesterday was her saint's day, the woman said, as if that made a difference. She was five. She was one of those garrulous women who show to strangers the photographs of their children: but all she had to show was a coffin.
I am sorry.
The old man pushed the coffin aside with his foot the better [43] to approach Padre José: it was small and light and might have contained nothing but bones. Not a whole service, you understand-just a prayer. She was-innocent, he said. The word sounded odd and archaic and local in the little stony town, outdated like the Lopez tomb, belonging only here.
It is against the law.
Her name, the woman went on, was Anita. I was sick when I had her, she explained, as if to excuse the child's delicacy which had led to all this inconvenience.
The law ...
The old man put his finger to his nose. You can trust us. It is just the case of a short prayer. I am her grandfather. This is her mother, her father, her uncle. You can trust us.
But that was the trouble-he could trust no one. As soon as they got back home one or other of them would certainly begin to boast. He walked backwards all the time, weaving his plump fingers, shaking his head, nearly bumping into the Lopez tomb. He was scared, and yet a curious pride bubbled in his throat, because he was being treated as a priest again, with respect. If I could, he said, my children ...
Suddenly and unexpectedly there was agony in the cemetery. They had been used to losing children, but they hadn't been used to what the rest of the world knows best of all-the hope which peters out. The woman began to cry-dryly, without tears, the trapped noise of something wanting to be released; the old man fell on his knees with his hands held out. Padre José, he said, there is no one else ... He looked as if he were asking for a miracle. An enormous temptation came to Padre José to take the risk and say a prayer over the grave: he felt the wild attraction of doing one's duty and stretched a sign of the cross in the air; then fear came back, like a drug. Contempt and safety waited for him down by the quay: he wanted to get away. He sank hopelessly down on his knees and entreated them: Leave me alone. He said: I am unworthy. Can't you see? I am a coward. The two old men faced each other on their knees among the tombs, the small coffin shoved aside like a pretext an absurd spectacle. He knew it was absurd: a lifetime of self-analysis enabled him to see himself as he was, fat and ugly and old and humiliated. It was as if a whole seducing choir of angels had silently [44] with-drawn and left the voices of the children in the patio- Come to bed, José, come to bed, sharp and shrill and worse than they had ever been. He knew he was in the grip of the unforgivable sin, despair.
'At last the blessed day arrived,' the mother read aloud, 'when the days of Juan's novitiate were over. Oh, what a joyful day was that for his mother and sister! And a little sad too, for the flesh cannot always be strong and how could they help mourning awhile in their hearts for the loss of a small son and an elder brother? Ah, if they had known that they were gaining that day a saint in heaven to pray for them.'
The younger girl on the bed said: Have we got a saint?
Of course.
Why did they want another saint?
The mother went on reading: 'Next day the whole family received communion from the hands of a son and brother. Then they said a fond good-bye-they little knew that it was the last-to the new soldier of Christ and returned to their home in Morelos. Already clouds were darkening the heavens, and President Calles was discussing the anti-Catholic laws in the Palace at Chapultepec. The devil was ready to assail poor Mexico.'
Is the shooting going to begin soon? the boy asked, moving restlessly against the wall. His mother went relentlessly on: 'Juan, unknown to all but his Confessor, was preparing himself for the evil days ahead with the most rigorous mortifications. His companions suspected nothing, for he was always the heart and soul of every merry conversation, and on the feast-day of the founder of the Order it was he ...'
I know, I know, the boy said. He acted a play. The little girls opened astounded eyes.
And why not, Luis? the mother said, pausing with her finger on the prohibited book. He stared sullenly back at her. And why not, Luis? she repeated. She waited awhile, and then read on: the little girls watched their brother with horror and admiration. 'It was he,' she said, 'who obtained permission to perform a little one-act play founded on ...'
I know, I know, the boy said. The catacombs.
The mother, compressing her lips, continued: '... the [45] persecution of the Early Christians. Perhaps he remembered that occasion in his boyhood when he acted Nero before the good old Bishop, but this time he insisted on taking the comic part of a Roman fishmonger ...'
I don't believe a word of it, the boy said, with sullen fury, not a word of it.
How dare you!
Nobody could be such a fool.
The little girls sat motionless, their eyes large and brown and pious, enjoying themselves like Hell.
Go to your father.
Anything to get away from this-this- the boy said.
Tell him what you've told me.
This...
Leave the room.
He slammed the door behind him: his father stood at the barred window of the sala, looking out: the beetles detonated against the oil-lamp and crawled with broken wings across the stone floor. The boy said: My mother told me to tell you that I told her that I didn't believe that the book she's reading ...
What book?
The Holy Book
He said sadly: Oh, that. Nobody passed in the street, nothing happened: it was after nine-thirty and all the lights were out. He said: You must make allowances. For us, you know, everything seems over. That book-it is like our own childhood.
It sounds so silly.
You don't remember the time when the Church was here. I was a bad Catholic, but it meant well, music, lights, a place where you could sit out of this heat-and for your mother, well, there was always something for her to do. If we had a theatre, anything at all instead, we shouldn't feel so-left.
But this Juan, the boy said. He sounds so silly.
He was killed, wasn't he?
Oh, so were Villa, Obregon, Madero ...
Who tells you about them?
We all of us play them. Yesterday I was Madero. They shot me in the plaza-the law of flight. Somewhere in the heavy night a drum beat: the sour river smell filled the room: it was [46] familiar, like the taste of soot in cities. We tossed up. I was Madero: Pedro had to be Huerta. He fled to Vera Cruz down by the river. Manuel chased him-he was Carranza. His father struck a beetle off his shirt, staring into the street: the sound of marching feet came nearer. He said: I suppose your mother's angry.
You aren't, the boy said.
What's the good? It's not your fault. We have been deserted.
The soldiers went by, returning to barracks, up the hill near what had once been the cathedral: they marched out of step in spite of the drum beat, they looked undernourished, they hadn't yet made much of war. They passed lethargically by in the dark street and the boy watched them out of sight with excited and hopeful eyes.
Mrs. Fellows rocked backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards. 'And so Lord Palmerston said if the Greek Government didn't do right to Don Pacifico ...' She said: My darling, I've got such a headache I think we must stop today.
Of course. I have a little one too.
I expect yours will be better soon. Would you mind putting the books away? The little shabby books had come by post from a firm in Paternoster Row called Private Tutorials, Ltd.-a whole education which began with Reading without Tears and went methodically on to the Reform Bill and Lord Palmerston and the poems of Victor Hugo. Once every six months an examination paper was delivered, and Mrs. Fellows laboriously worked through the answers and awarded marks. These she sent back to Paternoster Row, an
d there, weeks later, they were filed: once she had forgotten her duty when there was shooting in Zapata, and had received a printed slip beginning: Dear Parent, I regret to see ... The trouble was, they were years ahead of schedule by now-there were so few other books to read-and so the examination papers were years behind. Sometimes the firm sent embossed certificates for framing, announcing that Miss Coral Fellows had passed third with honours into the second grade, signed with a rubber stamp Henry Beckley, B.A., Director of Private Tutorials, Ltd., and sometimes there would be little personal letters typewritten, with the same blue [47] smudgy signature, saying: Dear Pupil, I think you should pay more attention this week to … The letters were always six weeks out of date.
My darling, Mrs. Fellows said, will you see the cook and order lunch? Just yourself. I can't eat a thing, and your father's out on the plantation.
Mother, the child said, do you believe there's a God? The question scared Mrs. Fellows. She rocked furiously up and down and said: Of course.
I mean the Virgin Birth-and everything.
My dear, what a thing to ask. Whom have you been talking to?
Oh, she said, I've been thinking, that's all. She didn't wait for any further answer: she knew quite well there would be none-it was always her job to make decisions. Henry Beckley, B.A., had put it all into an early lesson-it hadn't been any more difficult to accept then than the giant at the top of the beanstalk, and at the age of ten she had discarded both relentlessly. By that time she was starting algebra.
Surely your father hasn't ...
Oh, no.
She put on her sun-helmet and went out into the blazing ten o'clock heat to find the cook-she looked more fragile than ever and more indomitable. When she had given her orders she went to the warehouse to inspect the alligator skins tacked out on a wall, then to the stables to see that the mules were in good shape. She carried her responsibilities carefully like crockery across the hot yard: there was no question she wasn't prepared to answer: the vultures rose languidly at her approach.