The revolutions and counter-revolutions that swept over Mexico following the downfall of Don Porfirio Diaz in 1911 did more than topple a dictatorship, oppressive and harsh for the masses, with the wealth of Mexico going to a favored few.
For decades the Mexican peasant suffered indignities at the hands of the haceridados and autocratic landowners. His land was stolen and his women violated. He had to stand by, silent and without recourse, while the young women of his family were used casually for a moment of pleasure by those who ruled his destiny.
At every turn his manhood, the very roots of his masculinity, was denied him. He was worse than impoverished, for he was made to be less than a man.
The bitterness of decades exploded with primitive violence when the revolutions came. Rape and pillage have always been a routine part of any war, an accepted reward for the conquerors of the moment. But the Mexican peon, at long last given the means to fight back against his oppressors, had a deeper and more personal motivation. He had no need to rape to satisfy his animal instincts, for his sexual needs were satisfied by the soldaderas the women camp followers-who served the forces of Pancho Villa and Zapata.
For him rape was not unleashed sexual passion, but revenge -- revenge for the violation of his own womenfolk that he had been forced to witness silently in the past, revenge for the castration of his male dignity, revenge for the impotency of his previous existence.
The sex sadism that ran rampant during that bloody period did not stem from the perverted instincts of a more sophisticated people. Men acted like animals because they had long been treated like animals.
To strip bare the captured women of the overlords to ravish and rape was not alone a brute pleasure.
The act was a symbol-a symbol of regained manhood and human dignity.
CHAPTER ONE
Pancho Contreras tipped the bottle of tequila carefully, enough to moisten the piece of dirty cotton in his hand.
His face was grim and it flinched with pain as he rubbed the alcoholic beverage from about the middle of his forehead, down his right cheek, to about half an inch below his lower lip.
It was a hideous cut the Vargas boy had given him.
He should have killed the boy! His face had been ugly even without the cut. But now! Now his face was truly a nightmare.
He forced a smile. His revenge had been better than just simply killing him. To reassure himself he looked at the woman again.
She was naked. Her legs were flat on the mattress but spread out wide so each leg came to the side of the bed. Each of her ankles was secured with a rope that went under the bed in a tight knot, the rope continuing the length of the bed, coming up again at the front of the bed and there forming a tight hold on the woman's extended arms.
Biting his inner, lower lip, he reproached himself. The boy had escaped during the night. He should have been more careful. A boy like him could mean trouble.
The woman let out a moan, shaking her head.
"Ah, Bonita," he said, bringing the bottle up to his distorted lips and swallowing a long, hard drink. "Beautiful, you're awake again. That's good."
The woman saw him approach her again and she closed her eyes tightly.
He knelt right in front of her between her legs. Leisurely he placed both his hands under her buttocks securing a tight grasp.
Slowly he brought her forward against himself and at the same time himself moving forward against her.
He started a slow, unrelenting movement, his hands rotating under her buttocks easily and smoothly.
He felt the woman's muscles down there. Involuntary muscles, contracting and expanding. Contracting and expanding. And he moved faster and faster and faster.
Enjoying his immense satisfaction he moved back and rested the upper part of his body on top of the woman, his head lying softly between her breasts.
Petting the woman's hips, he said, "You know I am not so terrible. I am only a soldier, a poor soldier who has to follow orders."
The woman said nothing. Her eyes were fixed on the ceiling of her small hut.
"I wouldn't have been sent here," he continued apologetically. "It was your husband's fault, you know. He should have been an obedient peasant. Nobody-likes disobedient peasants, least of all the government."
The woman's head suddenly sprang up, like a coiled snake, and spat in his face. "Monstruo!", she screamed. "You ugly, ugly monster ! "
Enraged he jumped up and slapped her hard in the face.
Monstruo! Ever since he could remember, he had been called a monster.
"Estupida," he hissed, running his hand over his face. "My troops will rip you apart!"
Quickly he got into his tan uniform, the uniform of the Mexican soldier.
He opened the door and for a moment stared at the dead man's face. A pitchfork was deeply embedded across his forehead.
He stepped over the dead man's chest and called out at the top of his lungs, motioning with his hands. "Muchachos!"
The twenty men under his command reacted immediately, and came running towards the hut.
"She's all yours," said the Captain, pointing to the open door.
With the slow, easy movements of a contented man, he strolled towards the campfire. He smiled when he heard the woman's screams.
He picked up a tin cup of steaming coffee, left by one of his men, and drank it down leisurely. The screams had stopped and only the lusty laughter of his men remained.
An uncanny feeling came over him and moving slowly towards the hut he pretended an indifference which he did not feel.
Someone, some person or beast, was observing his every movement. And he had been a soldier too long. His life was in danger. His senses never betrayed him.
"Bueno!" he barked, his animal eyes going over every tree and bush. "Basta. That's enough. Put the bitch out of her ecstasy, and vamanos!"
He heard the woman groan faintly but urgently. And as his men came out of the hut, one by one, their faces flushed and their eyes sparkling like stars, he knew the woman was dead.
They saddled their horses in silence, each man cherishing his memories. Capitan Contreras, ex-priest, soldier, dedicated animal, mounted his black stallion and frowned. It was time to return to the garrison, it was time to report to their idiot Colonel.
Colonel Sanchez was a fat, bald, pompous gentleman who pretended considerable powers of concentration though by inclination he was neither an intellectual nor a soldier. He rather loved the easy, soft life and liked to think himself an unfortunate man caught in unfortunate times. Being a Colonel these days wasn't exactly his cup of tea. But life could always offer worse situations. The life of a Colonel wasn't as good as the life of a General but it was certainly easier than the life of a Captain. And being a Captain was much better than being a common private. Even a common private was a hundred times better off than a civilian was in the burning oven of the times.
No, he was determined to remain in the army with the rank of Colonel as long as possible. But how? He didn't have any friends left in Mexico City. His boyhood friend and comrade-at-arms, Victoriano Huerta, had been forced to resign from the presidency back in July. And now, at the beginning of the new year, his poor friend was living somewhere in Jamaica.
Colonel Sanchez looked at the several military-directives lying on his desk. And the realization that Obregon and Carranza were now running the whole show, militarily and politically, made him swear. "Poor friend, my ass!" he whispered savagely. "I pleaded with the damn marijuano. I begged him not to fool with the gringos."
But no, not Huerta, not that power-crazy marijuano. Why should he act with prudence, he had said. Had he not beaten the Maya and Yaqui Indians in combat? Hadn't Don Porfirio Diaz congratulated him personally scores of times for his personal bravery? Hadn't he out-maneuvered Madero, the mouse, out of the presidency itself?
Why then should he, Victoriano Huerta, bow down to the wishes of President Wilson? Who did that gringo think he was ordering him, Huerta, to hold general elections and not to include himself as a candidate. It was ridiculous.
The Veracruz incident flashed through the Colonel's mind. What a disaster that had been. That day in April had been the beginning of the end. Huerta had been worried and angry because the armies of the Constitutionalists, headed by Carranza, Obregon, Villa, and Zapata, were fast approaching Mexico City from all directions. Huerta's army, the federal army, needed weapons and it needed them badly. And like an answer to a prayer, a German submarine loaded with weapons arrived in Veracruz. But the American Navy, appearing from nowhere, was suddenly there. And the Americans were threatening to blow the German submarine to hell, if so much as one rifle was unloaded.
While this confrontation was going on, several American sailors came ashore to obtain oil supplies. When Huerta was given this communication, he was outraged. He ordered that the fairy-looking bastards be arrested. By God, he was going to humiliate the blonde son-of-a-bitches from the north.
Admiral Henry Mayo demanded the immediate release of his sailors. He also deemed this whole affair an insult and demanded an apology and a twenty-one gun salute to the American flag.
Huerta farted and told him to go to hell.
Colonel Sanchez smiled as he remembered that fart. That damn fart, he thought, changed my entire future.
Huerta had beaten the Maya and Yaqui Indians. But savage as those Indians were, they didn't have naval and artillery power.
Veracruz was bombarded by American warships and after considerable bloodshed the town was taken by an American landing party.
This was too much for Mexican pride. Huerta immediately lost what little support he had had in Mexico City. And the armies of the Constitutionalists were getting nearer and nearer. It reached the point where Huerta was smelling his enemies everywhere, and when the day came he wasn't even enjoying his marijuana cigarettes anymore, he decided to go into exile. He had invited Colonel Sanchez to go with him. "We have been together since we graduated from Chapultepec," Huerta reminded him.
"Si, cierto," the Colonel had replied, "but I am growing old, I am going on sixty, too old to be playing games."
"I am going on sixty, too," Huerta answered, inhaling marijuana smoke. "But this marijuana keeps me going."
The Colonel had remembered his new eighteen-year-old bride, and he knew what kept him going. "No, mi general," he told Huerta. "I had better stay here and keep you informed about the political situation." Besides, he had been a professional soldier all his life. Now that he was approaching retirement age, it would be imprudent to join a man going into exile.
"My enemies may kill you or destroy you," Huerta had pointed out. "After all, you have been closely connected with me."
"Si," Colonel Sanchez had agreed, "officially I was connected to you in a military function and not assigned to perform political tasks. Did I not serve Don Porfirio Diaz for thirty-five years, and then did I not also serve Madero for a year and a half?"
"My friend, you are naive and stupid," Huerta had laughed. "They will not kill you right out but they will assign you to some post where you are sure to be killed."
The Colonel felt a cold chill run up and down his spine. He looked at the wall map and then at the several directives on top of his desk, and he knew this was the place where death awaited.
The political situation was running true to form. It was clear as mud. And as usual, everybody was seeking a military solution.
One month after Huerta went into exile Carranza entered Mexico City. The people cheered him; he had done something truly magnificent. Carranza had actually united all the different and ambitious and rebellious generals from across the land to smash Huerta into submission.
The people went home to dream and to wait. The verdict was not long in coming. The revolution was not over. Villa and Zapata split the coalition Carranza had so patiently formed.
Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata called together a convention of generals to meet at Aguascalientes, and during this convention they proclaimed Eulatio Gutierrez as president.
Carranza retired to Veracruz and made it his temporary capital and headquarters, while Obregon agreed to stay on as commander of the federal forces and defend Mexico City.
Meanwhile, Villa and Zapata were in the process of enforcing their resolutions. Zapata and his peasant army was fast-approaching Mexico City, coming from the southeast in a northwesternly flood.
The impact of what was coming made Colonel Sanchez sweat big drops of stinking salt. His garrison was right in the path of the angry, killing flood, and what were Obregon's directives? He was to dispatch all available troops to the garrison bordering the states of Puebla and Morelos and to defend his own garrison to the last man!
He had already dispatched some two thousand troops, leaving him with some thirty troops to defend the garrison. But no, absolutely not, he was not willing to defend it to the last man. He would have to think more like his friend Huerta, if he was going to find a solution to this predicament. Yes, that Huerta was a real weasel. Why, if he had been placed between two enraged bulls, he would have...
"Mi Coronel," the Corporal of the guard interrupted. "Captain Contreras wishes to report."
Contreras followed the Corporal and stood at attention. He clicked his heels Prussian style and faced the Colonel's contempt without flinching a muscle. The Colonel made no effort to twitch his nose, but it was twitching violently. Every time this ugly Captain came before him, his sense of esthetics became chaotic. He was so repulsed by the Captain's harelip that, at first, he failed to notice the hideous cut. But even on the Captain's gorilla-like face the cut was clear and prominent.
"Did you have trouble?" the Colonel finally asked.
"No, sir," Contreras lied softly and clearly. "The Vargas family are in no position to give further trouble."
"Good, muy bien hecho," the Colonel allowed himself to say, but without any enthusiasm. He wrote down a notation to remind himself he must let Don Rivera know that his rebellious peasant had been straightened out.
"Do you wish to hear the details?" Contreras asked hopefully. Nothing would give him greater pleasure now than to see the Colonel squirm.
"No," the Colonel almost screamed. He controlled himself. "No," he said, "that will be all, Cantain."
Captain Contreras clicked his heels again, made a turn-about face, and walked out. He was followed by the Corporal.
Colonel Sanchez suddenly felt mentally and emotionally exhausted, and he knew it was time for his daily siesta. He moved his enormous bulk into the back room where he and his young bride, Marina, lived. Marina was already lying on their bed, her very prominent and beautiful behind sticking out in the air. The Colonel smiled and took his boots off.
He stretched out next to her and placed his hand on her buttocks. Her soft, bulging, flesh felt nice. Very nice, but she didn't respond, and soon he was thinking that if only he thought more like Huerta, he would find a solution to his problems.
He remembered how Huerta had once turned his darkest defeat into his most brilliant victory. Madero had assumed the office of president in October, 1911. But he soon proved unable to fulfill the many different desires which were boiling to be satisfied. Within three months the regime was plagued with uprisings. The most serious rebellion, however, was being led by General Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa. They had the whole state of Chihuahua in turmoil.
The military establishment chose Huerta to suppress the uprising. But after six months of a very costly and indecisive campaign, Huerta was recalled to the Capitol and temporarily suspended from duty.
Not long after, perhaps a day or two after Huerta had arrived in the Capitol, Colonel Sanchez saw his friend in a very rare mood. Huerta was feeling sorry for himself. "I wasn't even bending over," he had raved at his friend Sanchez, "and I have been fucked, my friend, I was fucked but good!" Huerta was convinced his military career was finished.
Colonel Sanchez was at the time commander of the Tacubaya garrison and he knew from first-hand experience that most of the officers there were extremely dissatisfied with the Madero regime. He mentioned this to Huerta once or twice. Huerta just listened, but Sanchez thought he could feel the Huerta mind grinding. Months passed and nothing was mentioned again. Huerta seemed to be enjoying his forced vacation.
Then in the beginning of February Colonel Sanchez was on leave in Mexico City, and he stopped to visit his friend Huerta. At the end of that meeting, Huerta asked the Colonel if it would be all right if he, Huerta, went to the Tacubaya garrison, that he had some friends there he wanted to visit. Colonel Sanchez produced a visitor's card, signed it, and gave it to Huerta. "But don't start any rebellions," he had told Huerta jokingly.
Sanchez could never prove it, even to himself, but a rebellion was just what Huerta started.
A few days after their first visit, Huerta came to the Hotel Regis where Sanchez was impatiently waiting for his young bride-to-be. Marina had already landed at the Veracruz harbor and she was on her way to Mexico City.
While Huerta smoked his marijuana cigarettes and Sanchez trembled with anticipation their conversation gradually revolved around the Madero regime. "Listen, my friend," Huerta had said in a moment of exhilaration. "Nobody loves that little shrimp. The army despises him. The rich are worried about him. The
Church could do without him. And the poor grow to hate him more and more every day.
"He's still the President," Sanchez had replied. It made him nervous to talk politics.
Huerta roared with crazy laughter for some ten minutes. His face became bright red for lack of oxygen. "But not for long." Huerta had said it almost like a promise before taking his leave.
Two days later, while Sanchez was enjoying his brand new wife in the big double bed, the entire Tacubaya garrison marched forth and headed to the jailhouse at Tlatelolco to release Bernardo Reyes and Felix Diaz.
General Bernardo Reyes was in jail for inciting a rebellion in Nuevo Leon. And General Felix Diaz, nephew of the recently exiled old dictator, had unsuccessfully carried out a rebellion in Veracruz.
Under the leadership of these two men, the troops entered Mexico City and approached the National Palace.
General Villar, commander of the government palace, refused to surrender the building. Then all hell broke loose.
Artillery fire was exchanged by both sides and soldiers and civilians were slaughtered wholesale.
While this inferno was going on in the streets, Madero called for Huerta. Huerta would save him. Hadn't Huerta told him a thousand times he was loyal to him, to call on him any time he was desperate for an ally?
Huerta was immediately there, before Madero, and he accepted command of the federal troops. He must have smiled, that old marijuano. Everything was going his way.
Within the next few days, Huerta smashed the rebellion, and was ready for the next step. He ordered the Palace Guard to surround Madero and Pino Suarez, the vice-president, and then instructed the guards to beat the hell out of them. This was done, and by February 18, Huerta had forced the resignation of both men.
When Sanchez saw Huerta again, the old marijuano had maneuvered himself into the post of provisional president. Huerta had invited him to the National Palace to "see the mouse squirming."
Sanchez managed to take a peek at the two former executives. They were being held in a prison behind the palace. The Colonel was astonished to discover that neither man showed any bruises. "But I thought you had them tortured," he asked Huerta.
Huerta laughed in that astonished manner which only he knew so well. "If you were to take their pants off," he informed' Sanchez, "you would find their balls have been roasted over a fire of tizones."
Sanchez asked what was to become of them now. Huerta, pretending sincerity, sounded silly. "Why," he said, " I am going to let them go."
"Do you think that is wise?" Sanchez said stupidly.
Huerta roared with laughter again. "But, of course, mi Coronet," he said, "I am even going to provide for their transportation from here to Veracruz. From there, they are on their own.
It's a big ocean and they can go anywhere they want."
That same night Colonel Sanchez was witness to the assassination of the two former executives. The two men were being transferred from prison to the train which was to take them to Veracruz and exile when, suddenly, the guards who were presumably there for their protection turned on them and mowed them down.
What a man, that Huerta, Colonel Sanchez was thinking now. What a ninspiration! By God, he would try to think more like Huerta from now on. Somehow he would weasel out of his predicament. He would remain a soldier and find a way not to die.
He felt much better now, even though he had not napped and he squeezed his wife's buttocks. She screamed "Ouch," and slapped his hand away.
He laughed and started to put his boots back on. Well, he resigned himself, at his age he shouldn't really expect to be doing it all the time.
He got back to his desk, and a few minutes later he ran across the notation he had made earlier. Report to Don Rivera. He felt a ride in the open air might do him good. Clarify his mind as to what he was going to do to stay alive. And besides, it was his duty to report to Don Rivera that his troublesome peasant had been corrected. He ordered the Corporal of the guard to saddle his horse.
Had Colonel Sanchez known that at this very moment Don Rivera was foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog, he would have probably smashed the door to his living quarters and insisted his wife perform her duties.
* * *
Don Rivera was a small man, not more than five feet, four inches tall. But he was a giant in arrogance and well engrained in the ways of power. In all Mexico there were some nine hundred men just like Don Rivera. They, along with the Church, owned most of the land and they were masters of everything on it, living and non-living and everything in-between. For thirty-five years, before the regime of Don Porfirio Diaz was overthrown by Madero, fifteen million Mexicans paid homage, willingly or unwillingly, to men such as Don Rivera.
The revolution, which meant different things to different people, had begun to change Don Rivera's status, at least in theory, for in practice Don Rivera and his peers were still very much in control of their lands. But like animals they sensed what the revolution was trying to accomplish. Fifteen million Mexicans were groping blindly; some were doing it with weapons, others were doing it with words, while still others were just taking advantage of the chaotic situation. But no matter how they were doing it. The important thing was that they were all doing the same thing. Fifteen million angry Mexicans were running away from their unbearable discontent. And sooner or later these fifteen million hating Mexicans would destroy the source of their consuming hell.
This very afternoon Don Rivera had been confronted by one all-hating peasant. And when Colonel Sanchez rode into the hacienda, Don Ramirez was still trembling with rage.
The Colonel wanted to get his duty done with, and was hoping he and Don Rivera would then settle down and have a sociable chat. Sanchez clicked his heels and with great pomposity reported, "Don Rivera, the Vargas family will give you no further trouble!"
The small man jumped from his chair and charged the Colonel. "You imbecile," he screamed, slapping Sanchez in the face back and forth, "you incompetent idiot!"
The Colonel was taken back. "I don't-I don't understand," he stammered.
"You don't understand!" the little man raged, his face red, fists flying in the air. "The Vargas boy," he said, trying hard to understand what he was saying. "He came into my own house, into my very room. And he tried to-" Don Rivera couldn't finish. He was suddenly embarrassed, and he turned away from Colonel Sanchez.
"What-what did he try?" the Colonel finally asked, terrified to really know the answer.
Don Rivera said it in a whimpering whisper. "He tried-he tried to-to castrate me."
While Colonel Sanchez was gasping for air, a man on horseback approached the hacienda at full speed. It was the local priest, Padre Perez. He dismounted and ran in a stagger towards the two men. His face was black and blue and blood was running down his nose. "Don Rivera," he cried, "Don Rivera, look, look what one of your peasants has done to me!"
"Which peasant?" Don Rivera demanded.
"The Vargas boy," Padre Perez replied, shaking from head to foot.
Don Rivera looked lividly at the Colonel and then at the priest. "You're damn lucky," he fumed, walking away from the men. "He might have castrated you!"
Suddenly a shot rang out, and Don Rivera fell. He was dead. Simultaneously, both the Colonel and the priest ran and hid behind a tree. They both heard, and then saw a man riding away on horseback.
The Colonel looked at the priest and the Padre looked at the Colonel. "Well," Padre Perez finally found the courage to say, "you're the soldier. Aren't you going to chase him?"
"Yes," Colonel Sanchez smiled faintly, "yes, of course." He walked slowly towards his horse and after what seemed an eternity mounted the stallion.
With no great urgency he followed tracks for some two hours, until it was dark. Well, I have done my duty, he thought. And he turned back, feeling a deep sense of relief. The Vargas boy wouldn't be giving anyone any trouble around here, he decided. According to the tracks the boy was heading straight east, probably to join Zapata's army.
CHAPTER TWO
The early morning was unmercifully uncomfortable. The humidity was choking, suffocating. Formidable black clouds covered the Mexican sky. Between heaven and earth the sound of war, the roar of cannons, the unrelentless beat of drums, penetrated the hot, windless air.
It was a moment of tension, one moment before death.
Down there, on the trembling earth, a man on a white stallion stood before his troops.
Emiliano Zapata, leader of the people, brandished his rifle high into the air. From his dry, weary lips came the battle cry. "Por tierra y libertad!"
From the left rushed a thousand men to outflank the enemy's right wing. Men with rifles, some with knives. Men with machetes, some with stones. Angry men, all filled with hate.
"Viva La Revolution! Muerte a los Pelones!"
The man on the white stallion moved forward and behind him another thousand men flooded into the enemy's entrenchment.
The sound of thunder, the distorted sound of pain; no other sound was there to be heard.
Wet rain, hot tears, cold steel, intolerable burning sensations; nothing else could be felt.
Brown mud and red blood, scared faces and dead faces; nothing else was there to see.
And the smell of death was brought in with each lungful of air. And it didn't make any difference because hate, above all, was there. Each man had his own hate and it was bigger that he and it was all that really mattered.
To hell with life. Kill! Kill! And kill some more! Smash the enemy! Tear him to pieces!
He has raped our women, stolen our lands and crops, reduced us to pigs. No more! God, not ever again!
The place is here, the time is now. Feel his throat. Press on the Adam's apple. Harder! Oh, much harder! See how the pig chokes. See how his greedy eyes plead for mercy. Harder! Harder! Ahhh...
But don't despair. There's another one. Hit him! Hit him again! And again and again! See how his filthy brain is splattered over the ground. Pay, you dirty bastards, pay!
There's one already wounded. Shove your rifle into his mouth. Shove! Pull the trigger! Dirty, filthy leeches!
"Viva La Revolution! Muerte a los Pelones!"
The battle was like a tide, like a moment of passion. It reached a peak and then it subsided abruptly leaving the survivors completely exhausted. Here, there and everywhere men fell to the ground-some to cry, others to laugh, some to rest.
Pablo Vargas, aged seventeen, did not cry. His hate was too monstrous. This had been his first battle and he had killed three men. His blood was still boiling and his muscles were tense.
Urgently and with purpose he walked throughout the battlefield, observing, studying, searching the dead bodies of the enemy. He was looking for one particular body, dead or alive.
The man with the long ugly scar on his right cheek who had a harelip. This was the man Pablo had to find and kill a thousand times. To kill this man but once would never be enough.
Disappointed, he fell under a tree and closed his eyes and wept.
Las soldaderas, the camp-followers, were now throughout the battlefield looking for their men. With them they brought water, food, and their bodies. And they gave their men what comfort they could.
The man on the white stallion and two of his Capitanes rode throughout the camp, evaluating the losses of their peasant army. The leathery face of El Caudillo was hard and sober. His people wanted land and liberty. The price was revolution and death and tears.
They rode by Pablo and saw him weeping. And they understood. Tears were the only thing the endless centuries had given generously to the descendants of the ancient Aztecs.
The tears stopped as suddenly as they had come and when Pablo opened his eyes he saw a young woman digging a grave with a knife' and her bare hands.
A mild rain was falling now and a weak wind was blowing. Her uncombed hair was over her face her senses were concentrated on the ground. Pablo helped her with the grave and with the body. And when it was all done she looked at Pablo for the first time.
"You have a woman?" she asked, studying his face carefully.
He blushed and shook his head. He had never kissed a woman, much less anything else.
Her brown eyes were half-dead, half-alive, and she forced a smile.
"I am yours now," she said simply, taking his shy hand.
They walked away from the rain, under a tree and threw a blanket around themselves. She took some beef jerky from a pouch hanging from her shoulder and offered him some.
"I am Patricia Diaz," she said. "And that was my man."
She stared at the grave for a long time. "And you?"
"Pablo Vargas," he said, feeling warm and comfortable with this woman, this stranger.
"How old are you?" he asked, and then felt foolish for having asked.
"Twenty," she said, chewing hungrily on the jerky. "You?! "
Embarrassed and feeling very stupid he felt himself blushing. "What's the difference," he mumbled, "I am a man."
She looked at him and smiled warmly, revealing an even set of white teeth. "Yes, you are a man," she agreed.
They ate the rest of the jerky in silence and by then the rain had stopped. She threw the blanket to one side and took some dry papers from her pouch and started a fire. "Be back in a few minutes," she said.
She came back with a mule loaded with provisions and pots and pans. She placed the coffee pot over the fire and she motioned to Pablo to come and sit with her.
Feeling warm and drowsy he could almost forget the revolution, but not quite. The ugly face of the man with the scar and the harelip was always in his mind.
"How long have you been una soldadera?" he asked, holding her hand and feeling its warmth and smoothness.
"Eight months." She decided against telling him she had outlived three men.
When the coffee was boiling hot she poured some into two tin cups and then she searched the mule until she found a bottle of mescal and poured some of it into the coffee.
It was delicious. Before long Pablo had drunk three cups of coffee and mescal and felt dizzy enough to tell Patricia she was beautiful.
Sitting there, next to her, he could hardly ignore the fact that her dress had moved up her legs and bronze, soft thighs seemed to be inviting him.
She smiled. "Tonight," she whispered.
He blushed. He had been looking out of the corner of his eyes and didn't think she had noticed it.
"How long have you been with us?" she asked, struggling with herself not to laugh at his innocent shyness. "I haven't seen you before."
"Two weeks," he answered, looking into the fire. For a moment he saw the ugly face with the hideous scar and monstrous harelip. And the face was laughing, mocking him.
Por Dios! God, how he wished that monster was in the fire burning!
She squeezed his hand and lay back on the ground. "Better sleep while you can," she suggested.
He made himself comfortable and she snuggled herself close to him. "Tonight," she promised again.
She was asleep almost immediately. But Pablo remained awake for a long time. His whole being was geared to hating one man.
The ugly man who had raped his mother. The ugly beast with the ugly scar and ugly harelip.
He thought of the many tortures he would apply on the monster and finally he slept.
The day wore on lazily and very late in the afternoon one of the capitanes had the drummer boy beat the drums.
The martial beat penetrated Pablo's sleep and when his senses reacted to the drums he hated to answer its summons. Patricia was resting her head on his shoulder and her left arm lay on his chest. With her left leg she had an iron grip on the lower part of his body.
He could feel her every curve straining against him.
He managed to get up without waking her and headed towards the center of the camp.
The Captain was pulling at his heavy black mustache as he talked. "Today," he said. "We captured forty-three pelones. We have tried them and sentenced them to death. We need five volunteers to form a firing squad."
Immediately Pablo stepped forward and was soon followed by four other men.
El Capitan marched the five men about a mile north of the camp where the forty-three prisoners had been herded together like cattle. The whole camp followed. The spectacle of killing Pelones was not one to be missed.
All the prisoners wore the tan-colored uniform of the federal government and the hair on each man was very closely cut, which is why they were called Pelones.
The Pelones were to be shot five at a time, except the last group to be shot.
A sergeant marched the first group directly below a tree. He offered to bind their eyes. They all refused.
"Atencion!" ordered the Captain, standing erect both out of hate and respect.
"Apunten!"
Pablo aimed his rifle directly at the man's face. How he hated the bastards!
"Fuego!"
Pablo pressed the trigger and smiled when he saw the blood shoot out like water from a fountain.
Thirty-five men were dead in less than ten minutes time. Pablo had shot seven men in the face. How he wished the harelipped Pelon had been one of them! His turn would soon come. Some day, somewhere.
When the eighth group was marched out below the tree an old peasant from the crowd came running, screaming, pointing an accusing finger at one of the Pelones about to be shot.
"Malvado!" cursed the old man. "Villain, now you are going to pay!"
The young Pelon was amused and as the old man came near him, he spat on him.
"Mi Capitan," choked the old man with anger. "Do not shoot this man. Let me kill him."
"What is your case against this Pelon, old man?" asked the Captain.
"Three years ago," shouted the old man, visibly shaken. "I went to see this Pelon's father, Don Ramon. Don Ramon was my patron, my landlord, and he had taken all the maiz I had harvested that year. My family was starving. I went to plead with Don Ramon to let me have part of what was rightfully mine. But his son, this Pelon here, kicked me out of his house even before I could talk with his father. My youngest daughter died that year. She died because she was starved."
"Very well," said the Captain. "He's yours. We'll help you kill him in whatever way you think just."
When the rest of the Pelones had been shot, the Captain asked the old man. "Well, have you decided how he's to be killed?"
"Si, mi Capitan," replied the old man, hate glittering in his eyes. "I will need ten pounds of salt, a knife and eight strong hands."
The salt was brought to him and he asked that it be spread out on the ground in a straight line measuring half a meter wide. This was done. He then asked that a sharp knife be placed over a hot flame for at least twenty minutes. And so it was done.
The old man then asked each of the four men at his disposal to hold the Pelon down. He then proceeded by taking the Pelon's boots off. And then his socks. The Pelon was sweating and his eyes wide with fear.
"The knife," demanded the old man, hardly containing the joy in his voice.
Meticulously and with great skill the old man went to work on the flesh of the soles and heels of the Pelon's bare feet.
The Pelon screamed bloody, panicky sounds which were no longer human.
When the flesh on each foot had been completely peeled off, the old man asked the four men to force the Pelon to walk over the salt.
The Pelon cried and wept and pleaded for mercy and the old man was king.
The sun was well on its way under the horizon. And the inhuman screams of the Pelon blended with the twilight.
Soon it was dark and the old man had been cleansed of his diabolical hate and asked that the Pelon be shot.
Pablo came forward and pointed his rifle down at the Pelon's face that was a distorted mask of pain.
Pablo waited. He waited until the Pelon opened his eyes and saw clearly what was pointed at him. And then Pablo shot him through the nostrils.
He envied the old man. But he swore by the Devil that his revenge would be no less diabolical.
Patricia had been waiting patiently under the tree. She had made beans, tortillas and more coffee.
They ate slowly and in silence. Now and then they looked at each other and smiled. The night would be long and exciting.
Guitar music pervaded the night air and they sat next to each other and listened and felt the warmth of each other's body.
"Come," she said, offering him her hand.
"I know a place where we will not be disturbed."
He stood up and, followed her, wondering, how it would feel to hold a woman's naked body.
He made an effort to forget the monster. The monster who had raped his mother. The monster who had made him watch.
* * *
The monster.
"Leave me alone," the woman was screaming deep from within her lungs. "Monstruo, don't you understand! I can't stand the touch of you!"
The woman was struggling with all her strength against the tight grasp of the ugly man's hands. He had one arm around her waist and the other one around her bulging breasts.
"My money is as good as anybody else's," he pleaded.
Pancho turned her around in the circle of his gorilla-like arms and attempted to kiss her. But the woman brought her right knee up to his groin.
Releasing his hold on the woman he doubled up in pain. Some of the men in the cantina laughed. The others who knew him did not dare.
"Even for money, you're too ugly," screamed the frightened woman, moving away from him and running up the stairs.
The pain moved slowly from Pancho's groin to his stomach and up his barrel chest. Manfully he contained the urge to scream. like everything else in this world, the pain would pass.
Groping around, his back still bent, he found an empty chair. With bitter resentment in his heart, he looked angrily at those who were laughing.
Bastards! All of them, bastards! What did they know? Was it his fault he was born ugly? Had he created that terrible harelip that distorted his whole face?
Running his hand over the fresh scar which formed half a circle around his face, he ordered a bottle of tequila.
Bitterly he thought of the boy who had cut his face. He should have killed him for making him even uglier.
Enviously he glanced across the cantina, to the couple who were making love in the dark corner of the room.
The man's chair was tilted against the corner, his back leaning against the wall and his legs resting on the table. The woman was on top him, her crotch and thighs firmly entrenched below his waist.
She was riding him like a man on a bouncing horse.
Pancho swallowed a long, hard drink of tequila. And he wondered. He became fascinated by his idea as he had done so many other times. What was it like? What was it really like?
It must be wonderful to make love to a woman who was really willing.
He didn't know. Never but never had a woman willingly made love to him. Neither for love nor for money.
He had raped them all. Any woman who knew the touch of his hand had been forced into submission.
But it was part of his job. All the same, he was sick of it. Often he had dreamed of a woman who would love him, harelip and ugliness and all.
Slowly he shook his head. Even his own mother, his very own mother, had been repulsed by his ugliness.
He hated the bitches! They only loved the beautiful, the attractive things in life. And it wasn't fair. God, it just wasn't fair!
Well, to hell with them! He'll keep on raping the bitches. Even that was better than no way at all.
Colonel Sanchez had not called on him lately. It bothered him. It had been more than two weeks since his last assignment. And he needed a woman badly.
He glanced across the room again and thought of the Vargas woman. She had been nice, really nice.
Her stupid husband had argued with his landlord. An idiotic argument, really. Colonel Sanchez had told him the nature of the argument but he had forgotten what it was.
The landlord, Don Rivera, had complained to the authorities and Colonel Sanchez had called on him as he usually did in such cases.
"Make an example of this disobedient peasant," ordered the Colonel. "These people must constantly be shown their place or else they will soon be at our throats."
And by God, it was all right with him! These missions were his salvation.
He always killed the accused victim. And then he raped his woman, by now his widow. After that sometimes he killed the widow, sometimes not.
It all depended on how they reacted to him, his face, his ugliness.
A fist fight broke out between two privates who but a few minutes before had been playing a game of cards with each other.
Captain Contreras noted with special delight that one of the privates had laughed at him when the prostitute had kicked him in the groin.
The bartender was about to vault over the bar and put a halt to the fighting. He was responsible for the whole establishment, and the two men would surely destroy government property.
But Contreras swiftly stood up and was in the middle of the room, waiting patiently, brandishing the bottle of tequila.
He swung the bottle down, hard, smashing it on top of the private's head. The private who hadn't known better, the private who had dared to laugh, fell on the dirt floor, unconscious and bleeding.
Contreras smiled. He did not feel sorry for the bleeding pig. Any man who laughed at the misfortune of others deserved to be treated like a swine.
"Throw the bleeding pig in the tank," he ordered, indicating the man on the floor.
A corporal, a friend of the man, tenderly lifted his companion and carried him out of the bar.
Not quite satisfied, Contreras called after the corporal. "And when he wakes up he is to be given twenty lashes!"
More restless than ever, Contreras ordered another bottle of tequila.
He was undecided. God, he needed a woman! Tonight he was lonely. Tonight his whole being yearned for affection, for a tender touch.
But he was afraid. God, he was afraid. If he tried again, again he would be rejected. All his miserable life he had been rejected!
If only somewhere there was a woman who would love him, if only there was, he would give anything for that woman. Anything!
Afraid, but determined, he stood up and he knew he would try again and again, and again. All his life he would search for someone to accept him.
He was about to approach another prostitute who was already giving him an expression of misgiving, when a corporal entered the cantina and with a loud, sharp voice asked for Capitan Contreras.
"Coronel Sanchez requests the immediate presence of Capitan Contreras!"
Relieved and breathing easily now, he followed the Corporal through the big, open rectangular space inside the fort.
At last! At long last! Coronel Sanchez had another mission for him!
It would have to do. Until he found that woman, that elusive creature of his dreams, that woman who would love him, until that day, he would go on raping and ravaging.
* * *
Ravaged! All day Colonel Sanchez had been in a trance. The entire Amada garrison had been destroyed by Zapata's army. like a woman it had been ravaged. And now, there was nothing between Zapata's army and his own garrison.
"Madre mia," he had prayed all day long. "What am I to do?"
The military directive from Obregon was clear and to the point. "If Zapata's army smashes through the Amada garrison, you are to hold your own to the last man."
He could resign from the army and forever be disgraced and with no pension. He could follow his orders and forever be dead. Or-
Yes, by God, he would act according to the Huerta mind. He would not follow orders and would come out a hero!
And now that Capitan Contreras was here, he would implement his plan.
The important thing was to impress upon people the idea you always knew what you were doing.
Deliberately ignoring Captain Contreras, who was standing at attention, cold and erect like a stone, he pretended great interest in the wall map directly behind his desk.
The other point to keep in mind was to keep your subordinates as uncomfortable as possible. Let them sweat it out, lest they feel fraternal and equal and the rest of all that crap that was tearing the country apart.
At great length, he finally spoke, as if to himself, but addressing Captain Contreras and conveying a great deal of concentration.
"Captain Contreras," he said, indicating the map, "these are the states of Morelos, in the center, Mexico to the left, and Puebla to the right. And here is our garrison, five miles east of the city of Cuernavaca.
"I received grievous news this morning," he continued impersonally. "This morning Zapata smashed our garrison, midpoint between Puebla and Morelos."
He expressed grave concern now and his voice became warm and personal. "Captain! Between Zapata's forces and our garrison there stands nothing in his way.
"Therefore," he said decisively, as if he had full control of the situation. "Therefore, I have decided to attack him before he can move against us." He paused, then for the first time looked directly at Contreras. "Captain, you are to take out the entire division, this very night, this very hour, and find, engage, and destroy the enemy!"
"And where will you be?" Contreras found the courage to ask.
"Why, I shall remain here," Sanchez snapped. What was Mexico coming to? Even the common dogs were catching the democratic disease, daring to question the intentions of their superiors.
He intended to be as far away from the battlefield as possible, but it was none of the Captain's business.
But the main thing to remember was to offer a reward, the type which corrupts, lest the underlings begin to feel morally superior.
"Captain," he said, radiating a warm smile, "When your mission is completed I do not at all care what becomes of the soldaderas."
Attack Zapata! With thirty men, and this idiot Colonel calls it a division! The Colonel must think me a fool, thought Captain Contreras. Certainly, he needed a woman tonight. But did the fool Colonel think he needed one that bad?
"Find, engage, and destroy the enemy," the fool Colonel had said.
"And after that is done," he mumbled to himself as he walked back to his quarters, "We'll all be dead."
"Did you say something, sir?" asked the Corporal standing at attention beside the entrance.
"Huh, oh yes," he replied. "Ask Sergeant Lopez to report to me at my headquarters immediately."
"Yes, sir," saluted the Corporal, clicking his heels together, taking off at a double step.
There were less than thirty men in the whole garrison, the rest had been marched to Mexico City. And the fool Colonel had ordered him to attack Zapata's army with thirty men, half of whom were drunk!
No sir! He needed a woman and somehow he was going to get one tonight. But if he followed the fool Colonel's orders he would never see another woman!
No sir! That would never do. He needed a plan and he needed one fast.
All in all, there were thirty-four people in the garrison. Twenty-eight were soldiers, one blacksmith, one bartender, three prostitutes, and the Colonel's wife.
The Colonel's wife!
The Colonel and his wife would be leaving at any moment. He was sure of it! And they would probably be leaving alone as the Colonel wouldn't want any witnesses to embarrass him.
He was, after all, running away from the field of battle.
All sorts of sordid visions flashed across the Captain's mind. Oh wouldn't it be a beautiful revenge! To rape the Colonel's wife, that pretentious and fastidious bitch!
It would be right. It would be just. After all, hadn't the Colonel sentenced him to a senseless and almost certain death ?
He would have to kill the Colonel, though. That would be an absolute must. But it would be no problem. The Colonel was old, fat, and flabby.
His wife, though, ah, she was young and beautiful! Probably young enough to be the Colonel's granddaughter. But she was no lady, that bitch. Other officers had always been welcome at the Colonel's quarters. But not he, not Captain Contreras, his harelip wasn't socially acceptable.
A plan, he thought. Must formulate a plan. First things first. Would he get away with it? Why not?
No reason against it-none at all. All the men sent out to fight Zapata would be slaughtered, that was for certain.
If the Colonel's disappearance was ever investigated it would be a reasonable assumption to believe that the Colonel had died a glorious death beside his soldiers.
What about the Colonel's wife? Hmm, that would be a problem. Or would it? If the troops sent out to attack Zapata were destroyed, as they no doubt would be, there would be nothing to stop the Zapata forces from capturing this garrison, and they would certainly do that too.
Perfect! If anyone ever bothered to question her disappearance it could easily be explained. She was kidnapped by the rebel forces.
Now the most difficult part. How would he explain himself, the only survivor?
The hideous scar on his face! Simple! Fantastically simple! Besides the Vargas boy the only other people who knew about his scar were in this garrison.
If ever questioned, and he would be, he would explain that during hand to hand combat he was bayoneted across the face and left for dead when he lost consciousness. When he came to, he would explain, all his companions were dead and his only concern from thereon was to escape from behind the enemy lines. Perfect!
The only problem which remained was how he was going to get out of leading the damn troops to their death.
Sergeant Lopez knocked and asked for permission to come in.
"Come in, Sergeant," he hollered. "Come in!"
The Sergeant came in and stood at attention, firmly fixing his eyes on Captain Contreras.
"Sergeant," Captain Contreras said decisively, without hesitation. "We have reports on a small rebel force, not more than fifteen men, operating northeast of here. You are to take every man in the garrison and find this force and destroy it. Leave at once, Sergeant, at once!"
"Si, mi Capitan," answered the Sergeant, clicking his heels, without questioning his orders.
A good soldier, thought Captain Contreras.
Too bad. The good ones always die. Or did they die because they were stupid?
* * *
Colonel Sanchez certainly didn't think of himself as being stupid. If he was going to be a hero, then everybody should know it. So before his troops rode out, he sent General Obregon the following communication:
"Following the highest dictates of our noble profession, I have decided it would be cowardly to wait for the enemy to attack. I have therefore decided to attack Zapata's army. Farewell and Viva Mexico."
And now, his every movement being observed, the unsuspecting Colonel Sanchez threw away the last batch of documents into the fireplace. Of course, later on he would have to explain why he, the commander of the noble troops who had given their all, had not been killed. But there would be ample time ahead to think about that little problem and to come up with a satisfactory answer.
He should have been pleased with himself. It hadn't been easy but he had followed Obregon's orders to the letter. Almost. But something was bothering him.
Scratching his enormous behind, his mouth opened wide in an uncontrollable yawn.
Not that he really gave a damn about any one of his soldiers, their lives, their miserable well-being. But, after all, he had come from a good Christian, Spanish family. It was always in bad taste to send men to their certain death.
But no, he wasn't to blame. It was the Revolution and he could understand that.
Unfortunate, very unfortunate. But wealth was after all much more important, much more important than a few miserable lives. He could understand that.
"Hurry, dear," he called to his wife, who was in the adjoining room packing a few of their personal things. "We should be leaving as soon as possible."
Serving himself a double shot of imported scotch, he promised himself a hot bath when this ordeal came to a happy conclusion.
Yes, he could certainly understand. The Revolution would soon come to an end. It could have come to an end for quite some time now. The secret was there, he thought. Some people were waiting for the right moment, that moment when a few people would make vast fortunes, before bringing the actual fighting to a satisfactory conclusion.
His guess was that the Americans to the North, as well as the French and the English, would soon recognize the Carranza regime. Once that happened, of course, these parties would aid Carranza. In order to protect their several investments these countries would give the Carranza regime materials, weapons, loans, gifts, and what not. There was certainly going to be a great deal of money unaccounted for.
He, himself, would not benefit from any of these goings-on, but he was certainly not going to contribute his life to the dubious business, either.
He was too old to be inspired by all this crap of dying for democracy, duty, or any other bullshit which happened to come along.
He was, after all, doing what anybody with any sense was doing, and many were; he was looking out for number one.
His orders were to defend this garrison. Well, he was doing just that, and more. He was defending this garrison aggressively. He had not waited for the enemy to strike first. He had gone after the enemy. Leadership! That's what it was. It would look good on his record.
"I'm ready, dear," said his wife, coming into the room to join him. "Where are we going?" She kissed him on the forehead.
This is what he wanted. To live his remaining years in peace and quiet and to screw his young wife every time he possibly could.
"Away from here," he replied, enjoying her youth, her fresh beauty. "To Acapulco, perhaps. Soon it will be dawn," he went on, kissing her hand. "It's best if we go now."
Dreading the long trip ahead of them, he slowly got himself into his tan coat.
"I'll be back in a few minutes." he said. "The horses have to be saddled. I am so sorry, all the discomfort you will have to bear. But it can't be helped."
He thought he saw a shadow, something moving. Impossible! Must be his imagination. Outside of the prostitutes, everyone else had left an hour before.
Yes. They would go to Acapulco. His brother had an hacienda near the sea.
It would be the perfect place to rest and think and wait.
He found a horse and a donkey. Well, it would have to do, until they reached the first village or town. Then they would travel in something more comfortable.
A scream! His wife? Yes! His wife was screaming! Running as hard as his short legs would carry him, which was not very fast, he reached his quarters. His wife was crying.
"I thought I saw someone looking in," she sobbed, indicating the small window.
"Everything's ready," he said, placing his fat arm around her small shoulders. "Come on. We'll have a great deal of fun at my brother's hacienda."
* * *
The Colonel's wife had been right. Captain Contreras was lurking in the shadows outside, looking in.
He had been watching their every move, the tiniest details of their very existence.
He had been right, of course. The fat Colonel had intended to pull out all the time while ordering his own men to certain death.
Damn, this bastard Colonel! He had the patience of an old lady. For over an hour now he had been burning papers from his file, scratching his fat ass, sipping liquor from a delicate-looking glass, and yawning.
All that yawning was even making him sleepy. He wished the Colonel would get off his fat ass and start moving. The sun would be coming up soon and the farther away they were from this garrison by then, the better.
Through the small window he could barely see the Colonel's wife in the inner room, walking back and forth. Her image was blurry but just thinking about what he was going to do to the big-breasted bitch was making him horny.
Should he kill the bastard Colonel before or after? Thoughtfully he ran his hand over the semi-circular scar, his hand trembling a little.
More than ever now, he wished he had never allowed the Vargas boy to escape. The fewer enemies one had, the more comfortable life could be.
It was still beyond him, how the boy had managed to throw himself at him, the way he had been tied to that chair. But while he had been screwing the woman, the boy had landed on top of him chair and all.
He should have killed him, right there and then; instead, he had thrown the boy bodily through the door.
No. It would be best to kill the Colonel right off. It would be more fun, anyway. Without any noisy spectators the creamy-looking bitch might even respond passionately. It had happened before with other women. These women, they hated him for his ugliness, for what he was doing to them; and yet, during the act itself they responded!
At last! The Colonel was getting into his coat. But to hell with him. Look at that ass on his beautiful bitch!
Oh God, he was going to kiss that ass, bite it, run his tongue over it!
Run! Run to the corner of the building! The Colonel came out, hesitating a moment and proceeded in the direction of the stables.
Careful now. Don't let the fast bastard see you now. Slowly now, very, very slowly. Let's see what the bitch is doing now that she is alone.
She was in the other room, a little bit beyond the door separating the two rooms. She was taking her dress and slip off and putting on a pair of pants.
Oh, God! Will you look at that! Should he do it now? Should he?
Careful, you anxious idiot! Now you've done it. She saw you! Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!
Hide! Run and hide, quickly! Maybe, she'll think she just imagined she saw someone.
Better stay hidden. Any time now, they'll be coming out. Any time now, he was going to be squeezing that gorgeous ass, sucking those unbelievable tits, enjoying her cries and moans. Anv time now!
Hurry it up, you fat bald bastard! The penis can wait only so long. And this penis is already roaring to go!
A mile or two away from the garrison would do. There wasn't a house or hut for at least five miles around the garrison. And there were plenty of trees and underbrush and gullies a-round here. Any place would do.
Ahh, careful now. Here they come. Say your prayers, Colonel. Say your prayers because where you're going you won't need that fat piece of ass any more.
Yes. He would kill the Colonel quickly, as soon as possible. Only one point he insisted upon. The Colonel must know he intended to rape his wife. Then he would kill him.
The Colonel helped his wife mount the donkey, walked both his horse and the burro to the gate.
He would give the Colonel a ten minute head-start. And within twenty to thirty minutes from now he would be on top of the bitch, screwing her good. He could promise her that much. It would be the best screwing she ever got!
Slowly, quietly, the Colonel moved the huge wooden gate open. The two animals walked through the small opening, and the big gate closed behind them.
Before following the Colonel, there was something he had a sudden urge to do, to kill the no good whore who earlier in the evening had humiliated him.
No. It was best not to obey this urge. What if the two other whores woke up? They would make one hell of a racket.
No. Some other time he would get even with that no good whore, if the Zapata troops didn't tear her insides out first.
Better concentrate on the Colonel. Should he approach him directly, with some excuse, or would it be better to hide somewhere along the way and jump him?
Yes. It would be more fun to approach him directly. What excuse ?
"We met Zapata troops two hours distance from the garrison," he would tell the Colonel. "With the exception of myself, every man was wiped out. And they are coming, Colonel, in great force. I suggest we hide immediately, or else they will see us, as the sun is already coming up. We can escape later, tonight. Anywhere will do, Colonel, anywhere, preferably a gulley."
Perfect! Perfect approach. And there in the gulley he would pull a gun on him. Beautiful plan!
The ugly Captain ran across the open square of the garrison, climbed the steps to one of the guard towers and gazed in every direction.
There was very little light as yet but he immediately spotted the two shadows moving in a south-westernly direction, nearly leaving the open space behind them and approaching the forest.
He ran down the stairs, three steps at a time and mounted his black stallion which he had tied to one of the steps under the caseway. He rode up to the gate and quickly opened it.
"Coronel!" he screamed, riding his stallion as if it were part of his body. "Coronel! Don't shoot, Coronel! It's me. Captain Contreras!"
The sound of hoofs hitting dirt and rock slowly crept its way into the Colonel's brain.
Numbly, almost stupidly, he looked at his wife. Poor woman, she was frightened, her eyes enlarged with fear.
Drawing out his hip revolver, he pointed towards the forest about fifty feet away. "Hide behind those trees," he whispered, kicking the donkey's rear with his left foot.
The rebels! Had they destroyed Captain Contreras already? Were they here, so soon!
Only one man though. Who could it be? It made no difference. Shoot him down and ask questions later!
Quickly he placed the revolver back in its holster and pulled out a rifle hanging from the right side of the saddle.
Slowly he aimed the weapon at the rapidly approaching man-beast. The trigger felt cold and hard and his left eye twitched a little.
"Don't shoot!" he heard a familiar voice resounding in his eardrums. "Don't shoot, Coro-nel! It's me, Captain Contreras."
Captain Contreras! Now what in God's name was he doing here, riding like Satan himself, scaring him and his wife half to death? And where were the rest of the men!
"Run for your life!" he heard, and a chill ran up and down his spine. "The rebels are coming! Run for your life! The rebels are coming!"
Oh, God! What would they do to him, to his wife! Run! Yes, you bloody fool! Run for your life!
Momentarily stunned, his heart frozen with fear. With fumbling hands, he placed the rifle back in its holster.
"Run!" echoed the frenzied voice. "Run! Run! Run!"
With amazing agility the Colonel lifted both legs and brought them down, hard, on the animal's sides. And on top of the mad, wild, bouncing animal he hung on for dear life.
The Captain's stallion was now running side to side with the Colonel's animal. His face was a mask of drunken excitement.
"Hide as soon as possible!" screamed the Captain at the top of his lungs. "It's the only chance we have!"
Yes! Yes, of course! They must hide! Anywhere! Inside the forest there were a million different places where they could hide.
Bless his soul, the ugly Captain. Ugly but efficient. How could he ever thank him. Had he not warned them, they could easily have walked into the path of an enemy patrol. Thank God, he came along.
The Colonel's wife, badly frightened and gasping for air, was waiting a few feet inside the entrance to the forest.
"We must hide all day," Captain Contreras said, riding his horse deeper into the forest. The Colonel and his wife followed sheepishly.
"We never had a chance, Coronel," the Captain called back, riding on. "We hadn't gone four miles when we were ambushed by an overwhelming force. So far as I know," he continued, pretending to be deeply moved, "None of the other men escaped.
"I was lucky," he explained. "I was about a hundred feet behind the rest of the troops, when the attack came. We had just crossed a stream," he said with great apology, "and my horse. Thank God, but my horse was still thirsty!"
The sun was now beginning its eternal route, its rays visible like giant spears forming an enormous crown.
"The sooner we find a place, the better," Captain Contreras lamented. "That damn sun could very well cost us our lives."
"I know an excellent place which will conceal us," suggested the Colonel's wife, a little more color in her face now that her terrible fright had passed, "There's a cave about half a mile from here. I found it one day when we came on a picnic."
"Yes, by all means lead us to it," ordered the Colonel. "But hurry, dear! Hurry!"
"Yes, by all means lead us to it," repeated the ugly Captain, his monstrous face melting in an amused grin.
They followed her to the bottom of a small hill, which was surrounded by great trees, almost concealed by them. "It's on the other side," she said, frowning when she looked at Captain Contreras. "I'm afraid the animals won't be able to get through all that." She pointed out the heavy underbrush and very rocky terrain.
"Well, this looks like a good place," sighed the Colonel. "Captain, take care of the animals ! "
"Come on, dear," he said, dismounting his enormous weight and then helping his wife off the dumb-looking burro. "Let's see what this cave of yours is like."
With great difficulty the Colonel and his wife made their way through the underbrush, slowly making their way over the sharp rocks, around the side of the gray green colored hill.
"There it is," called his wife, pointing to the bottom of the hill, where it appeared as though part of the hill had been eaten away by some giant rodent.
They made their way down, the jagged rocks trying to cut through the soles of their footwear. When they reached the side of the inward dent the Colonel slipped and slid on his behind over a considerable distance of small sharp rocks.
"Ay!" he screamed in agony. "Ay! Ay! Ay!" Reaching the bottom of what now appeared to be a small dead-end valley, he jumped to his feet and started to hop back and forth, both hands rubbing his bleeding behind.
His wife made her way down considerably easier than he and was trying to calm him down when a harsh voice sounded over them.
"All right!" menaced the Captain, a rifle in his hands standing tall over them. "The god damn clowning is over!"
What? Had he heard correctly! The Colonel turned purple with rage. How dare the ugly bastard talk to him in that tone and manner! Was he crazy as well as ugly?
The Captain made his way down the slope, easily, solidly. "All right!" His voice was cold and cruel. "You don't have much time to live, you fat bastard. Before I make love to your big-assed bitch here, I want you to see her naked one last time. Take her clothes off!"
"You're crazy!" The Colonel's voice trembled with rage. "I'll have you hung by your tongue!"
Contreras replied with a blast from the rifle. The bullet dug into the ground inches from the Colonel's foot.
"Take her clothes off!" Contreras ordered again.
like hell he would! Who the hell did he think he was talking to!
"He'll kill us!" his wife broke down crying. "Do as he says."
"Do as he says!" The Colonel was shocked. "Are you crazy, too!"
"I don't want to die!" she cried hysterically. "I don't want to die!"
Die! To die here, in the middle of nowhere! No! He didn't want to die either.
But this was his wife; his young, beautiful wife. Undress her? No! Never! This woman was his. It was his ass, his breasts, everything his.
"Anything else," he pleaded. "Anything you want. But not this. You want money? Land? Name what you want!"
"I want your big-assed bitch! Now take her clothes off!"
The Colonel looked at his wife. She was crying like a child. Was there nothing he could do? Something? Anything!
He looked at the man in front of him. Cold, brutal, determined eyes.
"No," he said defeated, crying. "I can't. I can't do what you ask."
He tried hard, harder than he had ever tried anything, to draw his revolver at his side.
Contreras pulled the trigger. The bullet tore through the Colonel's neck. He swayed upright for a moment, then toppled over.
"I didn't think the bastard cared about anything." Contreras smiled triumphantly. "Off with your clothes!"
Shocked out of her senses, she obeyed automatically. Sobbing, shaking, her eyes shut tight, she removed her coat, climbed out of her pants, and took off her blouse.
He put the rifle down and stripped off his uniform and underwear.
"Everything," he said, not so harshly now. But she just stood there, sobbing, her eyes shut, a magnificent body of a woman.
He walked up to her and placed his gorilla-like hands on her small waist. Slowly his hands moved outward, down her curvaceous hips, inward down her beautiful legs, her panties rolling down with the weight of his hands.
He stood up and walked around her, his eyes filled with lust, his mind appreciating every inch of her. He stopped behind her, his penis poking her pear-shaped rear. Leisurely he unhooked the brassiere, and allowed it to fall down by her panties.
He placed both hands around her breasts and squeezed them for a while.
He moved backward, his mind now insane with the feel of the young woman's flesh and lifted her gently into his arms, slowly resting her trembling body on the ground.
CHAPTER THREE
When the thirty-five year old General Obregon received the communication sent him by Colonel Sanchez, he felt completely awed. And then he was nauseated, especially so because he never intended to hold on to Mexico City.
Obregon was a former businessman from Los Alamos, Sonora. And being a businessman he always performed under two plans. Always, he held an alternative plan in view. Thus he was always prepared to meet any eventuality.
His short-term objective was to hold Mexico City until the right moment. At this point, his two plans would blend and he would apply his forces to realize the long-term objective: the destruction of the Villa and Zapata armies.
In effect, he wanted to hold Mexico City long enough to serve as the bait that would bring Villa's army flowing down south from the north while Zapata's army rushed north from the south. It was a risky business, but under no circumstances did he intend to lose the harbors of Tampico and Veracruz. Once he abandoned Mexico City and President Carranza had provided them with more arms, he would have his forces from Tampico move into Leon and Celaya. Thus he would control Central Mexico.
At the same time, he would move his forces from Veracruz back to Mexico City. And thus he would crush the rebel armies.
In the meantime, however, he was trying to do everything possible to save Zapata from his own destruction. He sympathized with Zapata on one significant point.
Back in 1910 when he decided to join the Madero movement against the dictatorship of Don Porfirio Diaz, one of the main factors entering into his decision had been the dreadful and wretched condition of the common peasant.
To be sure, he was a businessman and he believed in the profit system. But what Don Porfirio Diaz and his Cientificos, Diaz' economic advisers, had done to the Mexican Indian was very bad business. The Cientificos were great patrons of material development but regarded the Mexican Indian as being less than civilized. So they were convinced that Mexico's only hope of progress lay in the importation of foreign capital. Accordingly their policies promoted crass materialism, which made the rich richer and the poor poorer.
And, by God, it was bad business. He had crossed the border into the United States many times and with his own eyes he had seen that a huge middle class with money made for great national prosperity. But as it was, Mexico was actually a very poor country. There were fifteen million Mexicans who couldn't even be considered a market of one because not one of them had a centavo to spend. To be really ridiculous but nevertheless true, all of Mexico could be considered as a market of about one thousand people, since only about one thousand people, Mexicans and foreigners, controlled all the wealth they were the only ones with money to spend.
So he sympathized with Zapata and his followers. The government should decree a law which would return to many Indians their communal lands. Back in the 1890's Don Porfirio Diaz had confiscated all communal lands held by Indian villages. And the government should also assume the obligation of breaking up the great landed estates to provide plots for all those people who were now peones.
The trouble was that Zapata and his followers wanted their lands and their liberty now-not tomorrow, nor an hour from the present, but now. And the point was that even if the government was willing to do right, it would take it decades of argument and compromise.
No, he did not want to destroy Zapata if he could help it. He hoped Zapata would pay heed to a communication he had earlier dispatched to him. But for now, he would proceed with his campaign. He ordered the main body of his troops to retreat to Veracruz and Tampico, leaving only enough troops in Mexico to offer a fierce and convincing resistance. And he sent Carranza a communique advising him of his retreat. He hoped Carranza would not give him any difficulty on this intention. As far as he was concerned Mexico City had no significance, except political. But then, Carranza was very much a politician.
Zapata was, however, no politician and at this moment he was a very tired soldier.
Compelled by an intrinsic restlessness, too weary to sleep, over-awed by his responsibilities: Zapata, chosen leader of his people, gazed upward at the dark, impersonal, sky of his beloved Mexico.
"God," he whispered emotionally. "How long? How long will this senseless slaughter go on?"
Once he had believed. The one way of making people share the land and wealth of Mexico: the one way of forcing people to care: the one and only way to hurt them, and to hurt them badly. This he had believed.
And God knew, and well He must know, the common people had been exploited far too long, God's own church helping the landlords to enslave the people.
Zapata didn't know anymore. It had lasted too long and nothing had been accomplished. He had waged the Revolution for nearly four years and it had achieved but one thing.
That was the corruption of nearly all the revolutionary leaders. The people wanted land and liberty, and by every right, land and liberty should be theirs. And while the people still starved for their rights, what had the revolutionary leaders done? With the possible exception of Pancho Villa, the other leaders were after their own selfish ends.
After the betrayal of Madero, there had come Huerta, whose only interest had been the sheer joy of power. And now Carranza had named himself President. It would not do, for Carranza. was not at all interested in the poor and downtrodden of Mexico.
No. He did not know anymore. The Revolution had become bigger than life, too vital, too complex for any one person to control. But he was determined to fight all the way up to Mexico co City and there destroy the forces of Obregon.
To protect his rear he would leave behind a force of five hundred men, and dispatch them westward to destroy the garrison near Cuernavaca. At the break of dawn, he and the remainder of his troops would move northwest towards Mexico City.
"But dear God," he mumbled. "For what? Were I to destroy both Carranza and Obregon, what then?"
Suddenly he burst out in hysterical laughter, shaking his head, and was even embarrassed before himself. Had he really been that foolish once? Had he really thought once the Diaz dictatorship was crushed that everything good would follow? Had he really felt that?
Yes! In the name of a thousand devils, yes! Had he but known! Had he but guessed that every man, that every leader and follower, were but after his own goal, his own desires! Had he known, he would never have helped unleash this monster, this disease that was corrupting his Mexico!
No. He did not know where it would all end. But this he knew. The monster was unleashed. It was there. And he was mounted on it, and he dared not get off it.
He closed his tired eyes and tried to sleep. But he kept thinking of Madero, the little man who convinced the people that land and liberty would be theirs. Of all the betrayers he had been the worse. He had seemed so God damn sincere! What had the lying son-of-a-no-good whore told him. "Emiliano, you start a rebellion in the south and land and liberty will be ours." So he had believed the little bastard and while
Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa raised hell all over Chihuahua he carried out his rebellion for Morelos.
What had the little man told him after he was elected president. "Yes, Emiliano, yes, I know I have not carried out my promise. But you don't know, you just don't know what I am facing here. The conservative element keeps blocking me at every turn, the State Department of the United States insists every minute of the day that I must not jeopardize American property. Even my own father and brother keep threatening me that I must not destroy what took Don Porfirio Diaz thirty-five years to build."
Well-what the hell did he care. Either Madero was his own man or he wasn't. "Yes," the little man had said nervously, "I will keep my promise, but I must have more time."
More time! No! No! No! "Not one second more," he had screamed at Madero.
And he had thought that Madero understood the people: their hunger, their humiliation, their chains. But the son-of-a-bitch had understood nothing.
So he started another rebellion, this time against Madero. But before his movement had gone very far, Huerta disposed of Madero.
Then Carranza had gotten in touch with him. "We must coordinate our rebellion," he had said, "take my word for it, Emiliano, Huerta represents the conservative element and he will carry on in the tradition of Don Porfirio Diaz."
Nothing more needed to be said. The fight against Huerta had been as all struggles are, hard and bitter. But when Huerta had been defeated and Carranza had been named provisional president, Pancho Villa had asked, "Now, mi Presidente, what about land and liberty."
"Yes, of course," had been the answer, "Land and liberty will follow an orderly process of laws and regulations."
"And how long will this take?" Zapata had demanded.
"Five, ten years," Carranza had answered, "maybe even longer."
* * *
Zapata opened his eyes and stood up. He felt much, very much older than his thirty-two years. He felt as ancient as the rocks; but like a woman who is nine months pregnant, he felt he had a job to do. And he ordered the mobilization of his troops. It was dawn and for many it was time to get up, only to go and die.
The rebel column had been on its kill or die march for some twenty minutes when a lone rider was spotted.
"There, over there," said the Captain riding next to Zapata. "Do you see him!"
Zapata spotted the tan uniformed man bearing a white flag, his horse running fast and hard.
"Should I shoot him?" asked the short, heavy-bearded Captain.
"No!" snapped Zapata. "Let's see what he wants."
"I think I should shoot him." insisted the little Captain, remembering the many times the white flag had been dishonored.
Zapata turned to the Captain, his eyes burning and furious. "No! He's bearing the white flag!"
The Captain spat twice, two times hitting the same stone, but obeyed. "Si, mi General!"
The man bearing the white flag came to a sudden stop some thirty feet away and then proceeded at a slow trot. "General Zapata?" he asked, his voice trembling slightly. "I have a message from General Obregon."
Zapata received a bright red, very impressive-looking envelope. Breaking the seal he unfolded a sheet of very delicate paper.
"Read it to me," he ordered, handing the perfumed piece of paper to the heavy bearded Captain.
"I can't read," replied the little Captain, wrinkling his nose nervously.
"Ignorante," smiled Zapata. "You!" he said to the messenger. "You read it!"
The messenger took the letter and while his fingers played nervously with it, he read it in a steady voice.
"General Zapata. You cannot win. Return to the mountains, return to your home. And advise your people to do the same.
"You cannot win. You cannot win for you are no longer fighting for the people.
"No. You cannot win because you are now fighting against the people.
"Go home before you and your followers are declared criminals.
"The power to decide the destiny of this land is now in the hands of the Convention of National Delegates. It is they who represent all the peoples of this land; and it is they who will now argue and negotiate among themselves as to how best implement the ideas of the Revolution.
"Good friend, you have already done more than enough. To the people you are the spirit of the Revolution. It was you who stood proud and strong at a time when it was supremely dangerous to do so.
"But don't spoil it now. Don't try to force your singular ideas, no matter how noble they may be, upon a whole nation. Let this nation decide for itself, and according to its own best interests.
"The Convention of National Delegates have refused to recognize the claims of Gutierrez to be president. This refusal does not mean that they have also refused to recognize the claims of many people to own their own piece of land. It does mean that they have decided that other matters have priority in the overall interests of Mexico itself."
The heavy bearded Captain interrupted furiously, spitting in the messenger's face. "Other priorities," he almost gagged. "Thousands upon thousands of men died because they wanted a miserable piece of land and to be free of the Dons! And this miserable burro claims there are other priorities! Por Dios, I am going to cut your tongue out!"
"No!" screamed Zapata. "Let him finish."
He was sweating under the morning sun and he finished in a nervous voice.
"And you will understand, therefore, that you are no longer fighting against Carranza the individual or Obregon the individual nor their personal aspirations but fighting in fact against a Convention of National Delegates representing the peoples of Mexico and therefore their combined interests.
"You have fought long and well. The Revolution has spawned many excellent ideas which in time will become realities. If you sincerely desire to shorten the required time, put you weapons down that we may concentrate our full energy to the real problems of Mexico. Sincerely your, General Obregon."
"Now, can I cut his tongue out?" asked the still enraged little Captain.
"Yes!" answered Zapata. "Cut his lying tongue out! But don't kill him!"
Did Carranza and Obregon think him so ignorant! A Convention of National Delegates! It was probably composed of alcoholics they picked up in the streets and alleys of Mexico City!
Priorities! Priorities to land and liberty! What the devil were they talking about! That's what the Revolution had been all about! That's what it was all about!
"What do I do with it?" asked the little Captain, the bloody tongue in his left hand.
"Place it in the red envelope," replied Zapata, "and give it to the messenger when he comes to."
When the messenger regained consciousness he was placed on top of his horse. And with the red envelope tied to his mouth, he heard Zapata fuming behind him. "Tell Obregon and Carranza that the same thing awaits them!"
But Carranza was a man who did not need to be told what awaited him. He was a man of imagination, if somewhat pessimistic.
Tired and disgusted, Carranza, el Senor Presidente, received the message sent to him by General Obregon.
He took a long, deep breath. He loved the smell of the sea, here in Veracruz. Still, he missed his home in Coahuila. Sometimes he wished he had never left his rancho, despising his present involvement in the politics of this troubled land.
He hated the present chaos; the senseless, hopeless misunderstanding existing among former friends; the complete disagreements as to what the nation's goals should be. He hated this chaos with passionate conviction.
Certainly there should be labor and social legislation and the abolishment of peonage. Many people had sacrificed their lives for that, too.
And Mexico should certainly have more controls pertaining to the exploitation of its natural resources. Mexico, after all, did belong to the Mexican people and the benefits of its wealth should go to them, and not to the Americans or the English or the French.
But what Zapata and Villa and others did not wish to understand was that all these changes required great spans of time. No, to them it was an easy matter; a proclamation was all they offered and to them the problem was solved. Fools! Ignorant fools is what they were!
And what did they do when their proclamations were not accepted ? More war! More revolution! More destruction!
No! A nation seeking international respect could not afford to behave in such a foolish and irresponsible manner.
Changes must come but they must come about through a system of law and order. True, such changes require a great deal of time, but they are more stable and secure, too.
He read part of the message and smiled. It was a step in the right direction. Perhaps, there was still hope.
A convention of delegates representing the various Mexican states had refused to recognize the claims of Eulatio Gutierrez to be President of Mexico.
Yes, perhaps Mexico was beginning to regain its sanity. Someday, perhaps soon, Mexico would stand free and proud among the world's communities.
He yawned; very, very tired. It had been a long, long time since he, and Madero, and Zapata, and Villa, and Obregon, and many others had overthrown the thirty-five year dictatorship of Don Porfirio Diaz.
"The Mexico of Don Porfirio Diaz already has the respect of the world" Carranza heard a far away voice inside his brain. "Why do you dislike his regime so much ? " The voice had belonged to his father, a wealthy landowner from Coahuila. "If anything he has made us richer. And look what he has done for the nation. You may not remember because you were very young then. But before Diaz was elected president every other man was a bandit and nobody was safe. But he has given us internal order now for more than three decades. And under his regime, rail lines have been extended, harbors have been built, communication lines have been built, water systems have been improved, drainage and canal projects have been completed, and thousands of public buildings have been constructed, and now petroleum is being exploited!"
"Yes," Carranza would argue with his father, "but look how he has done it. By borrowing foreign capital, that's how."
"Ay, mi hijo, mi hijo," his father would say in a condescending manner, "My son, don't be stupid. On a national level it is not a dishonor to borrow money. On the contrary, foreign investors only lend their money to nations whom they consider honorable and willing and able to pay back."
"Maybe so, maybe so," Carranza would answer his father, "but you must admit that the man has become an absolute dictator."
"So what," the old man had said, smiling suspiciously, "unless you want to become President."
"No, no," he had objected faintly, "I just want to be Governor of Coahuila but I don't think Diaz will approve my election this time."
"Why not?" his father had asked. "He has approved your election as a Congressman in Mexico City. Why won't he approve of you now?"
"Well," he hesitated and decided not to answer. The old man had an awful temper and a bad heart. But the truth was that everyone knew that the presidential elections of 1910 had been rigged, and when Madero challenged the balloting he had backed Madero's challenge in Congress!
No, Don Porfirio Diaz had not approved his becoming Governor. And instead of waiting and possibly facing further persecution, he joined the Madero movement.
After Madero became president he assumed the office of Governor of Coahuila. But when Madero was so cowardly assassinated by Huerta, he knew the conservative elements behind Huerta would soon attempt to destroy him. It had been either he or them. And so he had destroyed Huerta. But now that he was President, Zapata and Villa were trying to break his back.
Yes, he had always dreamed of being President and now that he was, he must try and do the right things. But God, oh God, it was difficult enough to know what was right, with everyone pulling at him from a different direction. But this civil war had him emotionally exhausted.
Well, first things first, he thought to himself and finished reading the message sent to him by General Obregon. He was shocked, then he felt furious and again he went into shock.
Of all times for this to happen, why now? When total victory had been so near, why didn't Obregon put up a better defense for Mexico City?
Carranza was beside himself; his eyes were wild, almost in a trance.
His fingers played with a pen and out of desperation broke it in half. What did Obregon expect in reply? Hadn't he known how important it had been to hold Mexico City, especially now!
He looked at the messenger standing before him and shook his head. No. He still couldn't believe it. He read the message again.
"Have retreated from Mexico City. Will see you soon and will explain in person."
"But we must hold Mexico City." he pleaded, his begging wild eyes fixed on the messenger. "We must!"
"Mi senor Presidente," replied the messenger nervously. "It's too late. We have already retreated ! "
"Yes, of course," whispered Carranza, taking hold of himself.
Something must be done and fast. Mexico City must be regained, and the sooner the better.
He glanced at the papers scattered on top of the desk. From everywhere! From America, from South America; good, solid news! But what good would they do now? Certainly no good to him, or Obregon, nor to Mexico.
Tears flowed down his cheeks and he slammed the desk with the palm of his right hand. According to all the information laying on his desk, and God, now how he wished it were false, a number of the South American countries together with the American government would soon agree to recognize that Mexican government which showed the greatest success in maintaining law and order. And God Almighty, this was of supreme importance: whoever controlled the capital city would be recognized as the established government.
"What does General Obregon need to regain control of the Capital?" whispered Carranza, his voice an anguished cry.
"Weapons, mi Presidente," the messenger answered. He, of course did not know what his General was planning to do. "Weapons of all kinds and sizes! We need more men of course. But if we could get more weapons, we would have no problem in recruiting more men."
"Weapons," said Carranza. "Weapons, yes, of course." That had always been the main problem.
Weapons! That was the tricky solution to the whole problem. Whoever was recognized as the established government would enjoy the sympathy of the various governments to the south and more important the Americans to the north. And sympathy translated into reality meant weapons; weapons to crush rebellions, to protect foreign property, to enforce law and order, to create good will among the foreign communities of the world.
And that was the only way to proceed in a world which was like a den of hungry wolves; by creating good will and not antagonism.
"Mi Presidente," the messenger interrupted the silence, concerned about the President's visible paleness. "Is everything all right? I mean do you feel well?"
Carranza shuddered. Terror! Horror! Disaster ! In a moment's vision he saw all of Mexico burned to the ground!
If Zapata, Villa, and their bunch took the reins of control what would they do ? God, what wouldn't they do!
Well-meaning men, yes! But ignorant, God they were utterly, hopelessly ignorant! They knew nothing, nothing, but nothing of world politics!
They would take control and wait but for enough time to accumulate all the weapons being offered by foreigners. They would crush the opposition.
And then, dear God, then they would bring instant destruction to Mexico!
Yes! He saw it all too clearly. They would divide all of Mexico among the peasants and then proceed by confiscating all foreign property!
And what would the foreigners then do ? God, oh God! In a month's time, foreign troops would have trampled Mexico to death!
"Mi Presidente," insisted the messenger. "Are you feeling ill?"
"Huh?" Carranza was perspiring heavily even though the room atmosphere was cool and fresh. "No," he said. "I'm all right.
"Tell General Obregon to hold on," he ordered, lips trembling, muscles visibly twitching. "Retreat no further! I will immediately get in touch with influential people in America, France, and England. Then we will see."
"Will that be all, mi Presidente?"
"Yes," said Carranza. "I am afraid so."
CHAPTER FOUR
Many hours before Emiliano Zapata was to order the mobilization of his troops, a very unique and bizarre experience was being shared by two quite different people. One, the boy Vargas was drowning in his own hate. The other one, the woman Patricia, was desperately searching for herself in an act of love.
Humming a soft melody, she tenderly ran her hand through his coarse, black hair.
Pablo was having a nightmare, cold chills running up and down his spine, his body trembling.
"Have to kill him!" he mumbled over and over. "Have to kill him."
Next to her naked body Patricia could feel his long, slender body shaking. She pressed her body closer to him, to give him comfort, to give him warmth.
She could feel the warmth of his maleness, of his potency. And she failed to understand what had happened.
Studying his smooth face and clean-cut features, she decided she really liked him.
But this one really hated! She knew what hate did to people. She herself had lived through it. But this one! This boy was really consumed by it!
Maybe that was the reason why he had failed to make love to her. Somehow she felt responsible. But what had she done wrong?
He had followed her down the hill, to the bottom of a small ravine. They had talked a while. She knew this was going to be his first experience, and she was determined to make it a very special occasion for him.
When she had sensed that he was fully relaxed, she had unbuttoned his shirt and pants, taking pains not to over-excite him. It was hard on a man, to control himself. And she wanted him to enjoy her fully, to appreciate her completely.
Wishing to soothe him she had whispered softly and calmly, suggesting other things, other scenes: slowly she had helped him undress.
Pablo had wanted to help her undress but she had declined. "There will be other times," she had whispered gently.
But he had persisted and with fumbling hands helped her undress, accidentally rubbing his genitals against her warm, soft flesh. .Her fear came true. He had ejected prematurely.
She had smiled, concealing her disappointment, but still determined. "You are young." she had whispered, loving the sheepish expression on his face. "You are young. You are strong. And it's a long night."
They had been sitting on top of a big, gray boulder. And while she whispered sweet, dear words beside his ear, occasionally biting it, she skillfully and lovingly manipulated his genitals.
When she had felt he was capable again, she had made her way down the boulder and stretched out flat on the cool, rough ground.
He had followed her and stood above her, looking at her complete nakedness for the first time. That's when it happened.
He had stood there, numb, like a man paralyzed. And then he had started to scream, kneeling next to her, his hands covering his eyes.
"No! Please, oh please, leave her alone!" he screamed over and over. "Dear God! Please help her. Don't let him do this!"
Since then he had been hysterical, in some sort of trance, like a man possessed.
Tears slowly formed inside her brown eyes and with no great urgency rolled down her high cheek-boned face.
In many respects he reminded her of her brother. The last time she saw her brother alive he, too, had been in a trance. Before he was hanged by the people he, too, had been hysterical. Hysterical, not with fear, but with remorse.
But it had happened so long ago, that night, that terrible night. She could still see her father, dead on the floor with a hatchet deeply buried in his forehead.
Sheer terror in her heart, Patricia quickly moved her horror-stricken eyes from the bloody pulp of a face on the floor to her mother and brother.
Immediately she knew what had happened. Her father had come home, drunk as usual.
"God, I didn't mean to kill him," uttered Juan, her brother, badly frightened, his whole body trembling.
"I didn't mean to kill him," he said over and over, an expression of utter disbelief on his tormented face.
Her mother was bleeding through her nose and mouth and ears. Her face was blank and she kept mumbling to herself, looking at the dead body.
"He was beating me again," she whispered to herself. "He was beating me again when your brother came in."
By now half of the people of the village were out there, around the hut. A woman came in to investigate what all the screaming had been about. She saw the body with the diabolical ax stuck in his face and she let out a murderous scream.
More people came in until no more could fit in the small hut, and when they realized what had happened they began a horrible chant.
"He killed his father," they accused in one voice as if they were one man. "He killed his own father, his own flesh and blood!"
And in a murdering rage the crowd forced the frightened, crying boy outside and they shoved and pushed him until he was trapped against a tree.
They brought a strong rope and a sturdy-looking stallion and nobody paid any attention to the crying mother.
"He's a good boy," the unheeded mother screamed. "He has always been a good boy. He was only trying to protect me."
But the crowd of peasant farmers and angry women would have none of it. And they proceeded by forcing the boy up onto the black stallion, first having secured a tight knot around his neck.
Patricia felt paralyzed, unbelieving, a spectator to a horrible drama.
She saw her mother run forward, towards the black stallion; at the same time, a peasant whipped the rump of the horse.
And then it was dead quiet, as if nothing had happened. They all stood there, fascinated, their eyes wide open.
Her brother was swinging, back and forth, like a huge pendulum. His neck had snapped and his mouth was open and his tongue was hanging out, like a red tie.
Her mother had been crushed to the ground by the running stallion. Her chest had caved in and a great deal of blood was gushing out her mouth and nose.
She felt her body being lifted by her legs and she was running from that horrid scene, running from those murderous, hateful people.
And she ran until she could run no more, until her legs gave out under her and her lungs were hurting for air. She fell to the ground and mercifully slept.
She woke when the sun was high in the sky. Hungry and thirsty and not knowing where she was, except that she was under the Morelos sky, not caring where she was heading; she continued her journey.
Very late in the afternoon she approached a great procession of men and women. Upon talking with some of them, she found out this procession of people was Emiliano Zapata's army, on its way to Mexico City.
Because she was hungry and thirsty, because she had no other place to go, she joined the rebel forces of a country at war with itself.
The Zapata army expected its women followers to provide aid and comfort to its soldiers. It was kindly suggested to her that she choose a man of her liking.
And on the second day she chose Mario Rodriguez, a fine, kind man who was killed during the assault of Mexico City.
She then chose to become Gustavo Morales' woman. He was a drunk, disorderly man. Basically a good man, his life was distorted by bitterness and hate.
Gustavo maltreated her often, at times even hurting her physically and for no apparent reason.
But she remained loyal to him and even felt love for him. He reminded her a great deal of her father.
She had understood her father. True. He had often beaten his family. But her father had been a desperate man, a man who hated his way of life and who could find no way out of it. All his life he had been a peon, a peon who had always worked the land of Don Ramirez, a peon who would always work the land of Don Ramirez.
He had never appreciated the revolution. "They are too powerful," he had always said. "We are too poor; we cannot win."
And so like Gustavo her father had released his bitterness on those nearest him. But she understood Gustavo and gladly took care of his needs.
But then Gustavo was shot personally by General Zapata for deliberately disobeying a military order. Zapata had strict orders against the plundering and looting of their fellow peasants.
Near the city of Toluca a peasant woman complained to Zapata that her cow had been stolen, that her hungry children missed the warm milk.
Zapata, El Caudillo, leader of the common people, was outraged and ordered the guilty party to be found.
Several people had seen Gustavo take the cow and he was brought before Zapata. El Caudillo asked that the cow be returned to its owner.
Gustavo replied the cow could not be returned, that it had been killed.
Zapata wanted to know if he had been hungry or had he given the meat to someone who had been hungry.
Gustavo replied in the negative and was shot dead on the spot.
Gustavo's brother, Manuel, then asked Patricia if she would be his woman. She agreed. Manuel was a good and brave man, who often had interfered when his brother had been in a hitting mood.
Manuel wanted to marry her and she, of course, was flattered by his proposal. He was a kind man, not a difficult man to love forever. So at the first opportunity they rode to a nearby village and asked the parish priest to marry them.
The priest was delighted, of course, provided they confessed their sins first.
He was shocked. As a man he could understand. But as a priest it was his duty not to marry people of such loose morals, certainly he would never bestow such a noble sacrament on a woman who was no better than a common prostitute. And the circumstances made absolutely no difference at all. They could understand his difficult position, he was sure. Marriage was a gift of God, a gift meant to be earned by goodness. They could understand, couldn't they?
Not understanding at all, they rode away, unmarried, but determined to live together in any case.
They were good to each other, caring for each other, becoming deeply involved with one another.
But it could not last forever. They had always known that. They had never talked about it. But death was like air, it was always there.
She had buried him this morning. And while she was digging the grave, she had cried, knowing after he was buried he would be no more.
And yet here she still was, feeling weary, rather tired, but still breathing among the living. And, God forgive her, she was full of feeling and wanted nothing more than to keep on living.
She pressed her body still closer to the boy, loving his warmth, bathing in his vitality.
Pablo stirred and mumbled. "The priest. Damn the priest, too!"
The priest the boy was damning to all the dimensions of hell was, of course, none other than the good Father Perez. And at this very minute the good father was in Mexico City facing a very angry Bishop Gutierrez.
Bishop Gutierrez was quite dissatisfied and in the last twenty minutes he had repeated his admonitions several times.
"No, Father Perez," he said to the priest standing humbly before him. "The Church disapproves strongly, very strongly, your behavior in this case.
"Surely you must understand," he continued, completely demolishing the visibly trembling priest. "Times are changing. And we, all of us in the Church, must change."
"But your Excellency," complained the poor priest, who refused to accept the responsibility for the death of the peasant Vargas, and much less, for the rape and death of the peasant's wife. "But your Excellency, all I did was to cooperate with Don Rivera."
"Yes, yes!" replied the Bishop. "It was once quite acceptable to cooperate with the landlords. But this you must understand. This is a luxury the Church can no longer afford.
"Don't you understand?" he went on angrily. "If we keep on cooperating with the landlords, the people themselves will throw us out of Mexico. Even now, the government wants to confiscate all the lands owned by the Church."
The parish priest was quite scared but determined to defend himself. "But your Excellency," he objected.
Losing what little patience he had, the Bishop decided to be blunt. "Look!" he said, smashing his fist against his desk. "Once it was within the interests of the Church to support the peonage system. But now it is not. Surely you can understand that, Father Perez!"
Father Perez resented this whole business. He had been suddenly recalled from his parish of fifteen years. No sooner had he arrived in Mexico City and he was blamed for the tragedy of the Vargas family.
What had he done? God, what had he done!
He had just followed normal procedure. And for that he was being treated like a criminal now.
The Vargas peasant had been an atheist. Hadn't he refused to allow his son to attend Sunday school, where the boy would have learned the doctrine of God?
What had he done? Hadn't he reported the incident, as required by procedure, to the peasant's landlord. He failed to see how all this was connected with the death and rape which followed. How was he to blame for all this?
"But your Excellency," he insisted again.
The limits of the Bishop's patience were long overdrawn, and his face turned purple with rage. "Look! We are giving you another parish in the state of Sonora, and all we want you to remember is this. Your job is to preach the word of God and nothing else.
"Now, go with God," said the enraged Bishop, extending his right hand towards the priest.
"So be it," whispered Father Perez, kissing the Bishop's ring.
When the good priest had left, Bishop Gutierrez got on his knees and prayed. It was clear that in the years to come the Church would pay dearly for its long and immoral collaboration with the Diaz regime. He prayed that the Church be forgiven for its part in this unholy wedding, but somewhere along his prayer he also justified the Church for its part in this most unspeakable of unions.
It had been a matter of sheer survival, had it not? Before the regime of Don Porfirio Diaz, during the days of La Reforma, the liberals under the presidency of Juan Alvarez had literally oppressed the Church through legislation. These laws abrogated the binding power of monastic vows in the civil courts, decreed the expropriation of all the Church lands, and forbade the clergy to be recompensed for their spiritual ministrations.
Now, all these laws remained in the statute books; and from this point of view, the Church regarded the situation as being far from satisfactory. But the government of Don Porfirio never made an effort to enforce these laws, and this live-and-let-live policy was such an improvement over conditions of an earlier period that the Church became a strong supporter of the Diaz regime.
It would probably never be clear whether God could forgive the Church for its unholy trespasses; and in the years to come, the Mexican government would have to compromise with its attitude against the Church just like it would have to compromise with everything else.
But the boy Vargas; no, not he, he would nevei; compromise. He hated Padre Perez and as far as he was concerned, Padre Perez was the Church.
And all this hate plus a myriad of confusing emotions had come to him.
It had come. It had come like the sea, engulfing him, drowning him, robbing him of his sense, leaving him in a fever of terror...
They had worked the land, he and his father, his beautiful father. All day under the hot, bright sun. All day with their backs bent, their calloused hands touching a loved land, a mistress, a woman who had never been theirs; bathed in the salty sweat of their brown bodies, they caressed the land.
"Pablo," the older man would say. "This religion business is a tool of the rich man. Don't ever believe any of it. If you ever do, the rich man will have stolen your manliness."
"Believe if you must." His weathered face would become very serious then. "Believe in something bigger than yourself, if you must, but let the rich man and his religion go to hell."
They would walk back to their small hut, their bodies aching, their bodies overheated by the now dying sun. From far away Pablo could see his mother waving at them.
Rice, beans and tortillas. This was their supper. And it would be served, hot and ready to be eaten.
His mother would say, "Let us thank God for this food He has given us this day."
"Humph!" his father would grunt. "You should thank me for growing it."
But then, his father, his beautiful father, would repeat the prayer anyway.
"We thank you dear God," his mother would whisper, her hands reverently clasped together. "For this food You have generously given us on this day."
His father would repeat word for word and then add some of his own. "And if You would only get rid of all the Don Riveras," his voice would rise and he would wink at Pablo. "We would all be eating much better. Amen."
While his mother complained, they would eat hungrily, starved from being in the fields all day long.
"How do you expect the boy to have any respect," she would say angrily., "Even Don Rivera ordered you to send Pablo to church, to learn the ways of God."
"I already work his land and harvest the crops and am slave to nearly all his wishes," his father replied bitterly. "But I won't have my son learning all that lying crap Father Perez wants to teach him."
"Mario!" She was shocked. "They will punish you. God will punish you!"
How right she had been. That same evening the troops came riding out of the night. The soldiers, the ugly man, arrogant animals, had stormed into their small world.
Pablo could see the strained face of his father lit against the full moon. "What do you want?" his father screamed, boldly facing the intruders at the gateway of his world. "We have no money! We have nothing you want!"
"You impudent peasant," replied the ugly man with the harelip. "We want you!"
Two of the soldiers grabbed his father and secured each of his arms tightly while the ugly man dismounted his black stallion and slowly untied a whip secured to his saddle.
Calmly he took aim and Pablo heard the whip crack twice. Two direct hits aimed at each one of his father's eyes.
"That's for being a disobedient peon." grinned the ugly man, rolling his whip, strolling easily towards his horse.
Painfully enraged, Pablo's father struggled himself loose and blindly charged in the direction of the ugly man's voice, knocking him off balance.
One of the soldiers, who but seconds before had been one of the men holding his father, grabbed a pitchfork that was leaning against the hut and charged at the blind man.
The two middle prongs plunged deeply into his father's forehead. Bones cracked and Pablo heard an awful scream, that moved him like nothing ever had.
Pablo came running out of the hut, his muscles and senses concentrated on the ugly man, and sprang at him. Landing on top of the man's shoulders, the other soldiers found it humorous. And while they laughed, the ugly man tried to dump Pablo off his shoulders.
"Leave him alone," Pablo's mother came out of the hut weeping. "He's only a boy. Leave him alone, please."
They all grew quiet and even the ugly man stopped bucking. And while their attention was held by the weeping woman ; Pablo leaned over towards the black stallion and drew out a knife that had been tied to the saddle and he brought the knife down, hard over the ugly man's face.
Immediately two of the soldiers forced the boy off the wounded man's back and held him down on the ground.
The ugly man looked at Pablo, his eyes a cloud of fury. Pablo spat in his face.
"No!" said the ugly man. "I will not kill you, not just yet," He glanced at Pablo's mother and grinned.
"Take the woman into the hut," he shouted. "And him, too."
Two of the men stripped his mother, tearing her clothes off, touching her here, squeezing her there, and all the time making obscene jokes.
They tied her to the bed while they secured him to a wooden chair that faced the right side of the bed. His mother had shut her eyes tightly and would not look at him.
They wouldn't dare, he kept thinking. Not his mother! They wouldn't do that to his mother!
"All right," screamed the ugly man. "Out, all of you, get out!" His eyes were gleaming with lust.
Pablo looked at the man, climbing out of his uniform, his face still bleeding. He looked at his mother, naked, tied down, helpless.
His mother. It was his mother, lying there, flat on her back, her legs spread wide open.
"No," he pleaded. "Please, oh, please, leave her alone."
"Shut up!" ordered the ugly man, now completely naked. "You might learn something." He climbed into bed, between her legs, and
"Dear God! Please help her!" Pablo screamed over and over. "Don't let him do this!"
It had come. This vision had come like the sea, engulfing his senses, robbing him of his potency.
His mother. It was his mother, lying there, flat on her back, her legs spread out wide open.
"Damn the priest!" he mumbled. "Damn the priest, too!"
"Please," the woman Patricia pleaded from the depths of her soul, "Don't torture yourself any more, please."
How kind she was! How gentle! This woman, this stranger!
The palm and each of the fingers of her hand felt warm and delicate. How wonderful the caress of this woman's hand!
Yes. Beautiful and meaningful it was, her hand tenderly touching his chest and stomach in an ever endless circle.
Don't be ashamed, her hand pleaded. Don't feel embarrassed. You have your reasons and I have mine. But they make no difference at all. You see this is our private world, ours alone to do as we will. Oh, please, please help me and will with me. Oh, don't you see! Only kindness is important, only love is supreme. Will with me, oh, please, will with me this one reason, and only then will we live. Yes, only then, for one brief moment, the will to live will become a lovely one.
How gentle, this woman! How beautiful this stranger!
"Are you all right now?" she asked tenderly, rubbing her lips on his chest.
"I think so." Pablo lied, thinking of his mother, afraid of what he felt.
This woman, who was this woman at his side? For an instant she had become his mother. A woman waiting, her legs wide open. His mother. Waiting for whom ? Her son ? Oh, God! No! No! His mother waiting for him to come into her!
"No!" he whimpered. "It's not true. I feel terrible."
"I know," she whispered, understanding his guilt, sensing his awful distress.
The moon was concealed by some dark, huge cloud. And in the utter darkness they could see nothing, not even each other. They could only feel their naked bodies.
"Do me a favor?" she asked, hoping her sudden inspiration would work.
"Sure," he answered, feeling miserable, unsure of himself.
"Repeat my name, over and over and over," she pleaded, hoping he would do as she asked.
"And think of a big, white cloud," she added. "A huge cloud floating in the air. Think of that, and nothing else."
"Patricia," he began, "Patricia, Patricia..." and in his mind, he formed a huge, white cloud-floating, floating, floating...
"Nice," she encouraged him. "That's really nice." And with her lips she caressed his chest, slowly down his stomach, lingering down his genitals. And upward again.
"Yes, yes," she repeated after him. "It's me, Patricia. And I want you! I want you!"
Patricia! Patricia! How gentle, this woman! How beautiful this stranger!
Slowly she lifted herself on him and gently, ever so gently eased herself down his genitals, engulfing his swollen organ.
"No, no!" she moaned. "Not yet. Don't move. Make it last."
Patricia! Patricia! How soft, how warm it was down there! A warm sponge; a world of feathers and cotton; a living, growing, squeezing organism.
Hugging him, pressing hard against him, she nibbled on his ear. "Please," she begged. "Suck my breasts! Suck me!"
Raising his back, straining every muscle, every nerve tense in him; he placed an urgent responsive, erect nipple between his teeth; his tongue playing with it, tantalizing it, sucking on it.
She became bigger than life, this woman, this stranger! Moaning and biting, squeezing and pulling and pushing, her buttocks rotating, the sound of her breathing overpowering.
"Come!" she moaned, her nails savagely cutting into his back. "Come with me! Now! Ohh, now! Now! Ohh...! "
He was pounding in her! His organ went wild, out of control; it was straining, pounding, yearning to go in deeper and deeper and...
Wonderful! Wonderful, this woman! Wonderful this stranger!
Lovely! The will to kindness, the will to love, the will to live; for a moment, they had become one! A lovely wondrous thing!
Exhausted, she fell to his side. And together they slept, unaware of the military summons.
The drums were beating, the will to war was raising its ugly head, the land was still thirsty for more blood.
But together they slept. The boy and the woman. The gentle woman and the boy filled with hate.
The drums were beating. Darkness still covered the land, its western horizon not yet welcoming the warm rays of the sun.
"Wake up Pablo," he heard a soft kind of voice from far away. "Wake up!"
Already! But it seems like I just fell asleep, he thought. And already it's time to go to the fields! Papa! Papa, why weren't you born rich!
"Pablo," the feminine voice insisted. "Wake up, Pablo! They are gone. We have been left behind."
Gone? Who's gone? Papa! Has he gone? Without me ?
No! Mama, tell him to wait. Make him wait. Mama! He needs me. It's hard work in the fields. Hard work! Hard work! It'll kill him, Mama! Mama make him wait!
"Mama!" he woke with the words in his mouth. "What happened?" he asked with the words in his mouth. "What happened?" he asked startled. "Where am I?"
The burning sun was well on its course towards midpoint in the slightly clouded sky.
"You were having a nightmare," Patricia said kindly, petting his hair.
He sat up and rested his head against his knees. "Yes," he whispered. "I remember."
She was rubbing his back, her bronze colored body shining under the sun.
"Only," he explained. "It wasn't a nightmare. I was home again. And it was morning," he continued, turning his head to look at Patricia. "Like any other morning."
He smiled. "Papa used to tell me I should have been born a rich man's son."
He shook his head. "I never could get up early in the morning."
He felt his body relax as Patricia rubbed the back of his neck.
"They are gone," she said after a while. She stood up and dressed. Pablo looked at her shyly, embarrassed because he was blushing.
"They can't have gone too far," she said smiling, teasing him with her eyes. "It shouldn't be very hard to catch up with them."
She was lovely, the slight breeze blowing tenderly through her long, black hair.
My woman, he thought. No! She's too much. It must be a dream, a mistake, an illusion.
Had she really said, "I am your woman now." A sense of awe came over him.
Yes! She was his woman, his warmth, his comfort! How lovely and kind she was!
"Thank you," he said, blushing, looking into her eyes. Her eyes sparkled with life and her face was gentle.
She leaned over to him and softly kissed his forehead. "You look lost." She laughed, her hair tickling his bare shoulders. "Do I make you feel uncomfortable?"
"Oh, no!" he replied truthfully. "It's just that I've never known a woman before."
He couldn't stop his face from blushing. "I mean," he added nervously, "not the way I knew you last night."
"Is that why you were thanking me?" she asked, her tender face shining devilishly.
"I don't know," he answered, remembering last night.
"No," he said a few seconds later. "You were very gentle with me. Thank you."
"Aha," she said laughing. "I remind you of your mother."
"Shut up!" he screamed impulsively, not blushing now, but his face very angry, very tense.
"What?" she asked, surprised, drawing back from him.
Stupid! What's wrong with me, he thought. She doesn't know! She was teasing, nothing else.
"I am sorry," he said, his face melting as suddenly as it had become furious. "But you see," he started to explain. "My mother was..."
"No," she interrupted. "Please don't explain. Some things are better left unsaid."
"You really think so?" he asked, terribly sorry he had hurt her feelings.
"I know so," she replied, petting his hand. "Now come on. Get dressed while I go look for my burro.
"You must be starving," she called back, climbing out of the ravine, and making her way up the hill. "After all, you're still a growing boy! Just still a growing boy!"
"Go on!" he called back, laughing.
Wonderful! She was really wonderful! And he felt fantastically wonderful!
Land and woman! Woman and land! They are both one and the same, his father had often said. Both are the sources of life: both are the source of growth: and both affect man in the same way. He must love them both to make them produce. Love is what makes a man a farmer of both, a husband to each one of them.
"I want to be a farmer," he sang as he dressed. "Yes, I do. I want to be a husband, that the fruit may grow."
But why farm the land? Why husband the woman? Why become a slave to each one?
"Ahh, muchacho," his father would reply. "Because the joy of living is in them. The land satisfies your hunger and the woman satisfies your lust and her fruit satisfies your wish for immortality."
"I want a woman," he kept on singing, thoughts flashing through his mind. "I need the land."
But what about God? Yes, what about God, Papa? What does He satisfy?
"God," the old man would reply. "Why, God satisfies the rich man. The rich man needs to become richer. And so they must make the poor become poorer. But without God the rich man wouldn't have a chance."
What about the vultures, Papa? When your land is threatened: when your woman is in danger; when the vultures attack, Papa, what does a man do?
"Kill!" the old man had answered. "You must kill, boy! You must kill!"
"And so it shall be done," he kept on singing, suddenly interrupted by a sharp, deep crackling sound. A rifle shot! Immediately followed by a scream. A woman's scream!
With a great outburst of energy, Pablo jumped up and landed on his feet, already running up the ravine and up the hill.
He reached the top and far below he saw a group of uniformed soldiers, about thirty of them, riding away in the opposite direction away from him.
Patricia! They shot Patricia, he thought! Bastards ! dirty bastards! Dirty, filthy bastards! They killed Patricia!
He ran, stumbled, fell and rolled down the hill: and getting up, he ran some more, about forty yards away from the hill.
The burro! They shot her donkey. The animal was bleeding profusely from its head.
Patricia! Where was Patricia?
* * *
Up ahead Sergeant Lopez was enraged. He held the woman Patricia in front of him, tightly, angrily.
What tricks were they playing and why? Captain Contreras must have known. And the Colonel? Certainly the Colonel had known it all the time.
It wasn't bad enough he had counted some five hundred rebels before dawn. No, now it appeared there were even more.
But how many more? And where were they? Where were they going? How long had they been in this area?
Clenching his tobacco-stained teeth, his words hardly audible, the sound of running horses overbearing; he whispered in the woman's ear. "How many of you are there and where are the others ? "
Patricia couldn't answer, the heavy dust was suffocating her and the man's muscular arms were crushing her ribs.
"You will talk," Sergeant Lopez whispered. "I promise you that."
They rode up to the garrison, which but two days before had been held by some one thousand government troops. It was deserted now, except for a small dog that came running out barking.
"What now?" asked the Corporal, reaching inside his shirt for a handkerchief. He cleaned the mixture of dust and sweat from his tired face. A few vultures circled high above the silent garrison.
Inside the garrison a few of the buildings were burned to the ground. And scattered all over the grounds were dead corpses, some in uniform and others not. Some of the bodies appeared to be incredibly swollen. One body in particular was so badly decomposed that its openings were emitting a yellowish liquid substance. The stench was sickening.
"Tie the woman to the flagpole," ordered Sergeant Lopez, tying a handkerchief around his mouth and nose. "We don't have a moment to lose."
"Quickly," he howled to the others. "Help me to build a fire."
Everything they could find: rags, paper, pieces of wood; they threw it all in a big heap and made a fire with it.
Patricia, her eyes wide with fear, looked on as Sergeant Lopez held a long knife over the fire, impatiently glancing at her now and then.
"You're foolish," he told her several times. "You're making me waste all this time! And in the end you will talk anyway!"
"But I don't know anything," Patricia answered truthfully, her voice quivering with fright.
"You won't lie when your eyes are being burned out," he frowned, attempting to determine whether the blade was hot enough.
"I don't know!" she screamed frantically, the blade was beginning to glow a little. "I don't know!"
"Your last opportunity!" he declared, bringing the very hot blade out of the fire to about eight inches from her eyes. "How many of you are there and where have the others gone?"
"I don't know!" she screamed, crying, already sensing the glowing heat emanating from the terrifying weapon. "There were many of us. I don't know how many. And I swear by God I don't know where they are!"
"You're lying!" he screamed angrily, bringing the knife still closer. "This is your last chance!" he added, wondering if all the time she had been telling the truth.
The terrible heat, now but three inches from her, forced her eyelids to clamp shut tightly.
"Honest!" she cried, the color red overpowering her frantic brain. "Please believe me. I don't know anything."
Sergeant Lopez was about to pull the knife away, convinced she was telling the truth, when suddenly he felt a sharp, pointed sensation in the left side of his back immediately thereafter spreading to his chest and heard a sharp crack before losing consciousness forever.
For a moment Patricia felt the sharp edge of the burning knife cutting at her eyebrows, heard the sizzling sound of burning hair; and then the terrible pain against her eyelids overpowered her brain into instant blackness.
The Corporal followed the shot with an outburst from his rifle.
High on top of the garrison's wall the bullet sped by Pablo's head; like an angry wind it passed by grazing him slightly; shocking him into unconsciousness, losing his balance, he fell to the outer side of the garrison.
"What now?" asked the Corporal, leaning over, feeling the Sergeant's pulse.
There was no answer. It was up to the Corporal ; he was in command now.
He thought in silence. He remembered the great force of rebels they had fortunately spotted sometime before dawn, the hundreds of still recent campfires which they had seen just a little while ago, and the dead garrison with its countless corpses.
"It's every man for himself," he finally decided. "We are too few to engage a bigger enemy. And we are too many to hide effectively."
"Each man go his own way," he said mounting his horse. "And do it fast. The rebels probably have us surrounded."
They dispersed. And over the endless hours the clouds above concentrated into blackness and lightning zigzagged across the skies.
The sound of thunder frightened Patricia still more. It was dark! Everything was black! An immense shadow, a sea of nothingness, had engulfed her. And the deep, sharp, resonant sounds: were trying to break in, to smash the barrier of blackness, to strike her dead!
"God!" she whimpered. "Dear God, please, please help me!! "
Why? Oh, why had they done this to her: She had known nothing. Nothing!
She was blind. Blind? Yes. And forever and ever and ever. Blind!
"What am I going to do now!" she screamed, twisting her body frantically, the rope cutting deeper into her flesh. "What am I going to do! I am blind! Blind! Blind!"
Wouldn't anyone help? Didn't anyone care? Was there no one here? Where was everyone? Had everyone disappeared?
There was no one. No one to care for her; nobody to give her comfort.
"I want to die," she cried, the salty tears irritating her already burned skin. "Dear God, help me to die."
There, in the external darkness, trapped by a blackness of her own, she cried herself into unconsciousness. And even the rain, which came down in an outburst, would not wake her.
But the rain, wet and cold and falling hard, did wake Pablo.
Seconds, minutes, hours passed and he could not move. The earth was moving, spinning: and it had him pinned to the ground. His every muscle could feel the force of the earth, trying to swallow him, to drag him under. The earth was like a woman and her womb was reaching out, calling him, screaming for him.
Finally it let go of him. And he managed to stand on his feet. Leaning against the adobe wall, he wiped the mud of blood and dirt from his face. The bullet had grazed his left temple and it burned.
His left arm hung loosely, like a lifeless rag, absolutely out of control. He looked up the straight wall; five, six times his height. It had been a nasty fall.
A scream still lingered in his mind. A short painful scream. A death scream.
Patricia? Oh, no...! No! No! He shot the man and he fell forward. The knife? The man had a knife. He had shot him and then the scream. A woman's scream. And then nothing.
As he fell the man had plunged the knife into Patricia!
She was dead! "Patricia!" he screamed, crying, falling slowly to the ground.
Jesus! Jesus! Jesus! Why her? Why? She had harmed no one. "God damn you," he mombled over and over, his good hand pounding the earth. "God damn you!"
Warm, gentle Patricia was dead. His mother and father were dead. And the God damn earth was wet and breathing.
He got back on his feet and started to walk away. He didn't want to see her cold dead body. He wanted to remember her the way he had known her: warm, kind, and gentle: and life screaming, sprouting, enveloping from within her.
He was not long in his journey before the memory of the ugly man again flowed through his veins, and his heart ached with fury while his mind demanded revenge. Someday, someplace. The ugly man would die a thousand deaths.
CHAPTER FIVE
The ugly man had made love to the Colonel's widow four times. As he rested by her side, Marina's body trembled in convulsions and she would not look at him.
She wept and she remembered and she wept some more. She had crossed the ocean. She had traveled from one continent to another.
She laughed hysterically.
"Don't be afraid, my daughter," her father had told her when she was leaving the city of Granada to the port of Malaga. "Sanchez is a good man and he will take care of you."
But how could he know that Sanchez was a good man, she had argued. They hadn't seen each other since Sanchez was sixteen years old.
"The family of Sanchez," her father said sternly, "was one of the best families in Granada, so Sanchez is a good and honorable man."
Her father had not been mistaken. Sanchez had been very good to her. Oh, not everything had been perfect. He had been much older than she and he had always wanted sex. But all in all he had always been very kind and gentle to her.
After her arrival in Veracruz the Colonel had made their future relationship clear. "Ever since my wife died," he had explained, "I have been a very lonely man. And a very old man as you can well see. Oh, I know, I know that the young don't think very much of the old traditions."
She had been thinking just that. How could she marry a man old enough to be her grandfather?
"But be realistic," he had said, "I don't have many years left, maybe five or ten at the most. And then, my dear, you will be free and modestly wealthy. My family has a few holdings here and there. And you will receive my pension from the Army."
She wasn't convinced. She was only eighteen and he was over sixty!
"Besides," he added, "it is your father's wish."
Yes. It was the custom. The father arranged the marriage.
"Surely," he had said in amazement, "you don't wish to break your father's heart.
"Think of it," he continued, "what will your father think of you? And what, may I ask, will become of you? Surely you don't think your father will receive you with open arms, not after you so impudently disobey him?"
No. She had not disobeyed her father. She had crossed the ocean. She had lain in bed with an old man. All this she had done just so that this animal, this savage could ravage her now!
She could not stop weeping.
Weep! Weep and weep some more! Is that all the dumb bitches ever do?
"Why are you crying?" Contreras snapped. "This is probably the best screwing you ever had!"
"How could you know?" she wept. "You are nothing but an animal!"
"An animal." He laughed, the touch of his hand appreciating the contour of her breast. "Aren't we all?"
"He wasn't," she replied disgusted, trying to move his hand away.
He roared. "You didn't know the old bastard too well, did you? Anyway, why did you ever marry the old goat? He was old enough to be your grandfather."
"He was a good husband," she replied hotly. "He and my father grew up together in Spain..."
"Good husband!" he interrupted. "What did the old goat do, screw you with his forefinger!"
She swung her right hand at him, with all her might behind it. But he moved faster than she, and her hand slammed against the warm ground. Immediately he was on top of her.
"Please," she begged, crying, her eyes shut tight, afraid to look at him. "Please, not again!"
"Why not?" he moaned, rubbing on her ear, kissing her neck, biting her breasts.
"You're the best I ever had," he groaned, running his wet tongue down her stomach, below her navel. He kissed her vagina and ran his tongue in and out. It was wet and salty and it stank like the sea.
She started to buck and was crying hard but in his insane passion he thought she was moaning and he failed to note that she was reaching for his rifle.
He felt something cold and hard poking him in his left shoulder but it did not bring him back to his senses until he felt something burning pass through his shoulder.
Completely startled he jumped up as she was screaming, "I hope I killed you, pig! I hope you are dead!"
With lightning speed he grabbed the rifle from her and swung it down like a club; the terrific impact smashing her head.
He fell to the ground exhausted, feeling numb, his shoulder hurting.
Dazed he looked at the creamy, white body with its long well-formed legs. She had been the most beautiful woman he had ever known.
Idiot! Moron! Did you have to kill her! Did you have to smash her face in!
She would have killed me, he thought a long while after. The bullet had passed clean through his shoulder. It wasn't bleeding badly but the blood was coming out steadily.
He searched for his shirt and took a few cigarettes and crushed them, rubbing the tobacco on his shoulder.
The shot! It was probably heard for miles around. He had to get out of here and in a hurry!
Hold it! Just think a minute now! Quit acting like a panicky old woman. If anyone is searching you would easily be found out there. This is a good place to hide, it is well-hidden by the hill and the heavy underbrush.
He looked up at the descending sun. It would be dark soon; in an hour, hour and a half at most.
Yes, it would be best to wait until it was dark. Then he would go.
Go? Yes, but where? Where would the safest place be? He would have to toy with the problem.
Jesus, he was tired! If he could sleep for an hour or two, he would be all right. Better concentrate on that first.
Hell with the shoulder! Think of something nice, something pleasant, anything that will help you sleep.
Something nice? Can't think of anything pleasant. Cut it out! Think of nothing then. Think of blackness and nothing else.
Slowly he dozed off. But his instincts were working, calculating, planning.
Why not go where the rebels had come from! Since the rebels were there no longer, that would be the safest place of all.
Yes, he would do that. He would seek safety in the lion's den. He would flee to the Amado garrison.
The pain woke him up. The shoulder had stopped bleeding and the pain wasn't great but it was steady like a toothache.
The sky was dark, without stars and with no moon. Flashes of lightning streaked throughout the eastern horizon. The smell of rain was in the air.
Luck is on my side, he thought. The darkness would conceal him; the rain might keep the rebels from roaming the outdoors.
He stretched his arms, trying to unwind his muscles, his right hand touched the body of the dead woman.
An animal, she had called him. A pig. Yes, he thought, I suppose I have become an animal. But what had she known!
Once he had been a priest. Would she have ever believed that?
No. It was hard even for him to believe it. But it was true. A long time ago, he had been a priest.
"Following family tradition," his father had told him, "you can be either a lawyer or a priest.
"And frankly," the old man had added, an expression of disgust showing on his face, always failing to understand how he had ever produced a freak. "Your appearance is too repugnant, too offensive to the senses. A lawyer earns his bread by working with people of delicate sense. You would starve."
The old man had shaken his head. "Even as a priest you won't have much of a future, certainly the Church would never make you a bishop. No, I am afraid you are destined to be a lowly priest all your life, to work with the morons of society, to keep them within the true faith. I am sorry, boy, it's a hard life."
"Yes, it's a hard life." He laughed petting the dead woman's cold thigh.
The more he thought about it the more he laughed. His future as a priest had certainly been short and happy.
Yes, there had been happy days. Happy ? Suddenly he slapped the woman's thigh.' Happy? Goddamn, he thought, the pain must be making me delirious.
No! No! God damn it no! That's when it had really started, his insane passion for a woman's flesh.
He had been twenty-five, recently ordained, and a virgin.
Even now he was curious. What had finally done it? Hadn't he for years been a good boy, an honorable youth? What had made his mind snap, driving his senses into a whirlpool of madness ?
Oh, hell! You are ignorant, Contreras, a complete idiot to be sure. Must there be a theory, an explanation for everything?
He became hysterical, laughing like a madman. Damn it to hell, he thought. Twenty-five and a virgin. And I ask for theories!
The woman and her damned confessions, he suddenly remembered. That's what had finally done it. He had been a good boy, a fine man, and a great masturbator. By God, he had even grown a fine pair of calluses on his right hand!
Then the adulterous, hot-blooded bitch came into his life. Had she deliberately enlivened his imagination, driving him into such a frenzy that he actually felt like he had a boil in his balls? Damn it to hell! As if his imagination had needed any more stimulation!
"Oh, padre," she had confessed to him," I know it's wrong. I know it. But I can't help myself. My husband is so dull, Padre. So dull. And he hasn't touched me in months. Oh, Father, I am so ashamed. But I am a young woman and-and T need a man."
"You don't love this other man then?" he had asked her.
She wept and stuttered. "Nnno. Oh Padre, I am terrible, I really am!"
"Well," he told her kindly, "we are all human. You must pray two hundred Ave Marias and ask God for forgiveness. And above all, you must never do it again. You won't, will you?"
She had remained quiet for a long time. "Oh, I don't know," she finally said, "I need a man, don't you understand!"
"When a man touches me," she said dreamily, "I feel like I exist, I become alive, I feel like a woman. Do you understand, Padre? I need a man's hands all over my body. I need them! Do you understand! Otherwise I am dead, I am nothing! Do you see, Padre? Do you?"
"Any-any man-will do?" he asked her, his blood already boiling.
She hesitated. "Yes," she screamed. "Yes, any man! I don't care, I don't care! I just want to know I am alive. I must feel like a woman! I must!"
That had done it. His mind snapped. He had to have the woman. He had to!
He took his cassock off and ran out of the confessional and slipped his shorts down. Naked he stood next to the curtain that concealed the adulterous woman.
"You may come out," he had whispered panting like an exhausted dog.
Startled, the young woman slid the curtain open and seeing the naked priest she jumped from her knees and started running down the aisle.
He took a few steps and caught up with her and when she resisted him he raped her right there and then in the presence of at least five other women who had been waiting their turn to go to confession.
He was, of course, immediately recalled to Mexico City. And after being reprimanded he was given one more chance.
"We don't particularly approve certain lines of behavior," the Bishop had informed him. "But we tolerate them if done with discretion. Now, if certain females don't desire your attention, leave them alone."
The second time he was interviewed by the Bishop, the Bishop was less kind. "Father Contreras, we have overlooked a number of your shortcomings, but this time you have gone too far. Whoever gave you the authority to teach people that as individuals they are entitled to some dignity? Yes, it's true that as souls they have certain rights, but in heaven, Father Contreras, not on earth. Are you trying to instigate discontent, Father? It was one thing for you to try to impose your affection on an unwilling woman, but we won't tolerate trouble of this sort."
Hell with it, he thought. If you are going to be a bastard, at least be sincere. But he had tried to be a good priest. And for it, he had been excommunicated.
It made no difference any more. Only the young tried to be the conscience of the world. For the mature only the real needs of existence were of any importance.
And this was his pain, his agony, his failure. All his life he had needed affection, to be wanted.
But the devil with that, too. Right now he needed to get away from here, as far and as fast as possible.
He moved quickly and surely as it started to rain and the sound of thunder was in his ears. He remembered the whore who had kicked him in the groin, and he wondered if the rebels had torn her insides yet.
The rebel forces had in fact already taken over the Colonel's former garrison and the rebel commander was rather perplexed about the whole situation.
"And there was no one else?" asked Captain Reyes, one of Zapata's most competent officers.
The shadows inside the adobe room were long, the light from the one candle being very dim.
"No," replied Sergeant Serrano, the pupils of his eyes enlarging like a cat's. "Only three prostitutes. Nobody else was in the garrison."
"What do you think, Sergeant?" The Captain was soaking his feet in a pail of warm water. "You should try it, too," he told the Sergeant. "Your feet stink."
"It's unusual, sir." he answered embarrassed. "It could be a trap."
"Yes," Captain Reyes agreed, his hands busy scratching his toes inside the water. "It could be one hell of a big trap! And I suppose the three whores don't know a thing?"
"No, sir," replied Serrano, fighting a sudden desire to scratch his own toes. "They still insist there were only some thirty people in the whole garrison."
"And they don't even know what happened to them!" Reyes snapped angrily. "If we ever win this damn war it'll be a miracle! Our decisions can be as good as the information behind them. And our information stinks! There was supposed to be a whole division here! Now where in the hell is it?"
"I don't know, sir," Serrano answered apprehensively.
"You don't know ! " the Captain's face turned red as a tomato's. "You are in charge of our spy system, aren't you?"
"Yes sir! But we can't be expected to know every little change that comes along."
"Little change!" Captain Reyes mimicked, completely exasperated. "Get out! Out! Out! Before I drown you!"
"Wait, you idiot! What about that shot you claim you heard this afternoon? You sent out two men to investigate. Have they returned yet?"
"No sir, they have not." Serrano's lips trembled slightly, the rest of his face was indifferent.
Captain Reyes took his feet out one at a time and dried each one meticulously. "One is as good as one's feet," he commented.
He put on a pair of huarachis and slapped his knees. "Well," he said, "we can't afford to be trapped. I am dispatching half our troops back to the Amada garrison. They will leave at dawn-break."
The ugly man would have given anything to know this bit of information. But there was no way he could know, and he was proceeding with his plan.
He found the animals where he had tied them. He took the belongings of the Colonel and his wife and hid them in the heavy underbrush.
He took some sugar from his saddlebag and fed a small amount to each animal. And while he chewed on a big piece of jerky he let the other two animals loose.
He would go around the garrison, around the immediate danger and then proceed to safety, to the Amada garrison.
He began to saddle his horse and an uneasy feeling came over him. His skillful eyes searched the big trees around him. He spotted something unusual, a shadow out of place, a something that didn't quite belong there.
He dived for the ground, hitting it hard, and he felt his wound open as he rolled his body mightily.
"Hold it, hombre," an unfamiliar voice ordered from on high among the trees, "or you're dead!"
With the speed of a natural-born warrior, with the skilled hands of a trained hunter, Contreras slipped a knife out from within his boot and in the same motion threw the knife at the shadow he had seen.
There was a thud followed by a groan and then the sound of twigs breaking and leaves being disturbed and another thud.
His senses became magnified; his eyes, his ears, his nose spanned the immediate surroundings ; over and over his eyes scanned each tree. The thunder, the rain, the darkness; his own pain hindered his judgment. He stood up slowly and walked towards the dead man. His knife had gone through the Adam's apple.
"Don't move!" came another voice from behind him. In quick succession two shots rang out and he heard a sharp, whistling sound pass by each ear. "Just so you know you don't have a chance," the voice said.
"Turn around," the voice ordered. "But slowly, very slowly. Or you're dead!"
The man stepped out from behind a tree and approached Contreras, watching for the slightest move, the slightest excuse to kill him.
"Jesus! You're an ugly bastard," the man said, looking at Contreras for the first time.
Contreras' facial muscles twitched and he looked as though he were going to charge the man.
"Get your horse and move ahead of me." The man moved cautiously to the side. "And be careful," he warned. "Very careful. You are of more value alive. But I would love to kill you."
Contreras obeyed and moved slowly ahead of the man. Now and then the man would say, "Turn left," or "Go right."
They approached two horses and the man ordered Contreras to lie on the ground while he mounted one of the horses.
"All right," the man said. "Mount your horse. And whatever you do, don't forget I'm holding a rifle pointed directly behind your neck."
What to do? Was his luck running out? No! There was something, always something, one could do. Wait! For the moment, he would wait. But he would have to strike fast and soon, before they rode out of the forest.
He didn't have much going for him, though. Only the thunder and the rain and his fear. It would have to do.
He would wait until two or three simultaneous cracks of thunder broke the tension. Two or three loud cracks would dull the man's mind for an instant or two. He hoped.
One, two; he counted. One! One! One, two! One, two, three! No, too late. Try it, on the next one.
He dove for the neck of the horse, throwing his body to the right side, kicking the horse's side with his left leg, his right leg going under the horse's belly.
A bullet whistled by his head, grazing the horse's ear. "Run you bastard!" he screamed at the horse. "Run!"
He got ahead of the rebel some twenty-five feet before the man got his horse on the run. He turned his head around and saw the man gaining ground on him.
Another bullet flew by and hit the horse in the back of the neck. As the horse stumbled to the ground Contreras heaved himself away from the falling body with all his might. He fell hard on the ground, the wind knocked out of him, his lungs hurting for air. His fingers searched the ground frantically for a rock, a stick, anything.
A rock! He grasped it tightly, his only chance, a string between life and death. The man was almost on top of him, rifle aimed, death in his heart.
He swung his arm and felt the rock leave his hand. A terrific impact reversed the motion of his hand and slammed him backwards to the ground. A bullet had gone through his hand!
The rock hit the man on the left temple and the upper part of his body fell limply on the horse's neck.
Contreras lay there, his left shoulder and right hand burning and bleeding, his throat and nose making desperate sounds, his lungs straining for all the air they could inhale, the cramps in his chest minimizing all other pain.
Must move! There may be more of them! An animal! Must find a horse! Must! Come on, move! Move!
Gritting his teeth, he stood on shaky legs.
He took a step and another and fell. Again he tried, only to see the ground coming up to him.
Blood! Must stop the bleeding! What to use ? No more tobacco. Mud! Use the mud! Use it! Hurry!
With his good hand, he scraped the wet ground. The wet earth eased the burning; it even felt good, it was so cool.
Thank God for the rain and thunder. I owe my miserable life to both, he thought.
He shrugged his shoulder. Even a worm fights for life. Noble worm, noble Contreras; the will to survive is divine.
His legs were wobbly but he had a strong heart, and the dizziness was leaving him.
The Colonel's horse. He must find it. Couldn't have gone very far. Even the donkey would do, if he could find it.
He walked around in circles, stopping to rest every few minutes. And then he heard a human sound, a groan.
It was the rebel! The same man who had tried to kill him.
The horse was grazing, its neck stooping way down. The rebel was unconscious; the upper part of his body hanging, leading on the animal's neck, the blood flowing down to his head.
Must not scare the horse. No sudden movements, nothing that will alarm the animal.
He approached the animal softly, slowly; and spoke to it gently. The horse kept on feeding, undisturbed.
"What shall I do with him?" he asked the horse. "Should I kill him?
"No," he whispered to himself. "I have a much better idea, if I can find a knife."
He dismounted the rebel as gently as he could and searched him for a knife. He didn't have one.
What could he use? What would cut the rebel's face? A rock! A sharp rock! Yes, but it would take too much time to find one that was sharp enough. What else could he use?
Of course! The belt buckle or rather the pin of the buckle! He unfastened his belt and proceeded to butcher the rebel's clean-cut face. He cut two huge circles on either cheek. The unconscious man groaned and moaned.
"Have fun, ugly man," he whispered, wiping the blood from the pin. "Have fun."
He mounted the horse and as he looked down on the rebel, he sincerely felt sorry for him.
Contreras rode slow and he rode all night and when he finally approached the Amada garrison it was still dark. And the darkness was terrible and silent.
Suddenly there came a painful moan.
He hit the ground and lay still and heard. It was like a cry from hell, terrible and urgent.
His nostrils were filtering a stink that was rotten and insufferable. This garrison was like a living, stinking cemetery.
Perhaps stopping here had been a mistake. If the rebels out there didn't kill him, the damn stink of the dead would. But his need to rest had become all important.
Soon it would be dawn and he would be able to see distinctly. Dead bodies were all he could make out immediately about him.
The dead were of no concern, however. He concentrated on the diretion from which came the devilish moan. It seemed to be coming from the middle of the fortress.
He zigzagged his way; slowly, around dead bodies, crawling close to the wet earth.
His face was distorted; every movement, the slightest motion bringing flowing currents of pain.
The mud had stopped the bleeding. Yes. But his hand was swollen, and if he didn't burn the wound soon the infection would spread.
The shoulder wound wasn't bad. It hurt. But it didn't appear to be infected. Still, it would be wise to burn that wound, too, and since it was much nearer to the heart than the other wound he would burn that one first.
He laughed. Damn earth! It would save your life in one way and kill you by another!
He was near the flagpole now, and he could hear a desperate whisper.
"Dear God!" he heard the agonizing chant. "Dear God! Please help me!"
He stood fascinated, then slowly approached the source of the entrancing sound.
Strange! One always pleaded for God, even cried for Him. Sufficient proof that one always desired for there to be a God. He had always believed so.
Odd! There was never a reply from God, not one way or the other. Did this mean that while man believed in God, God did not believe in man?
Oh, to hell with it! What a time to be making such moronic distinctions!
What was wrong with the woman? Was she blind! Yes! Yes, of course.
Her eyes were fixed on him. But it was a blind stare. And now he could see her eyes had been burned!
"Dear God," she whispered. "Please help me. Please."
Poor wretch! She might as well be dead. What good was she blind? Shame, too, she was a beautiful woman.
He hesitated a moment and then brought his hand up, level against the woman's neck. He was going to strangle the poor wretch!
He took a step forward and felt something under his boot. A dead body! Disgusted he looked down.
Sergeant Lopez! What in the devil's name was he doing there! He bent down and took his pulse. Sergeant Lopez was as dead as a stone.
"Is someone there?" asked the girl frantically. "Help me please! In the name of God, please help me!"
Contreras said nothing. He stood up and brought his hands forward. Again she cried out, more desperate in tone this time. "I need help! Please, I need someone! I need someone! In the name of heaven, please answer me!"
There was no reply and she cried in hopeless abandon.
I need help! I need someone! Contreras put his hands down. How well he knew those words! Hadn't he uttered those same words a million times!
"It's all right," he said, somewhat disconcerted. "It's all right now."
"Oh, thank you God!" she moaned, her head drooping. "Thank you."
He untied her from the pole and carried her inside one of the adobe buildings. He laid her badly bruised body on the dirt floor.
"Mil gracias," she uttered gratefully. "A thousand thanks."
She was thanking him, the ugly man! Was he dreaming! A woman; a real flesh and blood woman, thanking him!
No! It was not a dream. The poor wretch was blind as a bat!
She smiled. "I thought I would die," she said. "I wanted to die."
"Don't talk now," he said petting her head gently. "I'll get some water to clean your wounds."
"Have you ever felt like that?" she asked, her face twitching from the pain. "Like you want to die, really wanted to die."
"Yes," he said, confused. "Many times. Now don't talk any more and conserve your strength."
He went out and found a well on the west side of the garrison. He came back with a pail of water.
She was crying. "I am blind." She was whimpering. "I am blind."
He put the pail down and knelt by her side. "Listen," he said, feeling a little annoyed. "There are worse things that could happen. You have to believe that."
"I am sorry," she whispered, her body trembling-"But I'm frightened. What am I going to do? I am blind! Don't you understand!"
She started to scream, shaking frantically. "Don't you understand! Who will take care of me! Who!"
"Stop it!" he shouted, shaking her by her shoulders. "Stop it! I'll take care of you!"
"But why?" she asked unbelievingly, crying her heart out. "Why would you want to take care of me! Why would anyone want to care for a blind woman!"
"Never mind," he screamed angrily. "Believe me, that's all! Now look," he ordered her.
"Take control of yourself! I'm going to build a fire and heat some water."
He went out and searched all the other buildings for all the paper and wood he could accumulate.
And as the sun was coming out he built the fire and placed the tin pail on top of two pieces of wood. He waited until the water was boiling.
"Did you really mean what you said?" she asked when she heard him come in. "Will you really take care of me?"
"Yes," he said. He was very tired. "If you let me, I'll take care of you. Now," he went on, putting the pail down. "I don't want you to be frightened, but I want you to undress. I'll be able to clean your wounds better that way. The rope cut badly into your flesh."
He felt a surge of desire pass through him as he watched her undress.
Forget it! Let it pass from the mind! There's no time! No time at all! If he waited any longer, he would have to cut off his own hand!
He tore a piece of cloth from her dress and soaked it in the boiling water.
Very gently, very tenderly he cleansed her body wounds. He was sweating. She was a beautiful woman.
"Put your dress on," he ordered, "before I cleanse your face."
When he got through cleaning the area around her eyes he fell to the floor exhausted.
"What's wrong?" she asked, frightened again.
"Nothing!" he replied after a long moment, trying desperately to regain some energy.
"I'm wounded," he finally said. "If you hear me screaming, don't be frightened. I have an infection and I'm going to burn it out. It will burn like hell but I'll be all right."
"Is there anything I can do to help?" she asked, frightened, concerned.
"Yes," he replied, getting up. "Be a good girl and get all the rest you can."
"You won't leave me here alone?" she asked trembling a little.
"No," he said smiling. "I won't leave you."
He walked awhile among the rotting stinking bodies, then picked up a bayonet.
Sitting down by the fire, he placed the bayonet in the middle of the blazing flame.
She was a good-looking woman, that girl. He could take her to Sonora. His father had left him a good, sizable piece of land there.
He could learn to farm the land. Why not? He had learned to be a soldier.
Yes! It would be nice. He needed someone; he had always needed someone. And here she was and she needed him!
Yes, but she was blind! What good was a blind person! She would be useless!
Hold it, stupid! Now just wait and think! Does she need her eyes to make love? No! Does she need her eyes to have children ? No!!
And if she could see, would she want him? No!
He smiled and turned the bayonet around. Well then! She was exactly what he had been looking for!
Yes! By God, he would take her there! Who knows, he might even become a decent man once again! He had been a decent man once, before the despair of his desolation had driven him into a degenerate.
Yes! A woman he definitely needed; he needed the companionship she could offer; and God, oh God, their children could make a complete man out of him!
The bayonet was ready. Jesus! It would hurt like the devil!
He grabbed the bayonet with his right, swollen hand and with great difficulty, closed his fingers around the handle.
He closed his eyes, tightly and quickly brought the hot blade against his left shoulder. Count to ten!
He screamed and screamed but did not let up on the bayonet.
"Jesus! Jesus!" he mumbled lifting the bayonet. "Sometimes it's hell to be alive!" He was crying and with his left hand he wiped the tears away.
"Are you all right?" a feminine voice called out. "Please answer me, are you all right."
I feel like hell, he thought. "There's nothing you can do," he called out. "Don't be frightened."
"What's your name anyway?" he asked a little later, struggling against the dizziness.
"Patricia," she replied, "Patricia Diaz. And you?"
"Patricia." He pronounced the name slowly. "It's a beautiful name, Patricia. I like it!"
He grabbed the bayonet with his left hand this time. "My name is Pancho." he said, gripping the burning blade with his swolled hand!
"Pancho Contreras!" he screamed.
Hold on! Another second! And another! And still one more!
He let go of the blade, and with a great roar coming deep from within his lungs, the bayonet flew away from his left hand.
"Pancho!" she screamed. "Are you all right? Pancho!"
There was no reply. He had fainted. She was scared.
Was the man Pancho dead ? Had he run away, leaving her here?
"Pancho." she quivered. "Pancho, where are you?"
Nothing. The dark silence was frightening, horrifying.
The screaming still echoed in her ears. Why had the man screamed so terribly?
She was alone! God, she was alone and she couldn't see!
She had to find her way out of here, find out what had happened.
Leaning against the adobe wall she got her maltreated, hurting body upright and with her hands against the solid, cold, rough surface she took a step at a time.
When she reached the first corner, her head bumped against the wall.
God! What was she going to do! She was blind! Blind! Blind!
"Mother of God!" she cried. "Help me! Help me!"
She dropped to the floor, weeping. She was useless! Helpless!
What would she do ? What could she do! She couldn't even find her way out of a room!
"Pancho!" she wailed. "Answer me! Where are you? Are you hurt? Are you dead?"
It was dark. It was so terribly dark! If she could only see, if only she could see a little!
She rested her head between her two small hands. And she sobbed.
The man had left! He had gone and left her here to die!
And why not, she thought. What was she to him ? Why would any man want to be burdened with her?
She had nothing to offer. She was blind and useless! She was nothing! Good for nothing!
"Kill me, God!" she cried. "Please kill me!"
Contreras could not hear the woman screaming. He was in another world, and all he knew was that he was burning and burning, and burning.
There was a blurred shadow of intense heat before his half-opened eyes.
The noon sun was a burning inferno hanging over a humid sky.
Contreras rolled over, away from the sun god and moaned.
Jesus! The pain had been unbearable! His body felt numb, except his shoulder and hand. The two wounds were very much alive, two very raw spots.
He groaned and groaned. The sound of his agony helped him to bear it.
"Madre mia!" he uttered once every so often. "Madre mia, damn you, damn you, for having given me birth!"
Little by little, curse by curse, groan by groan, the agonizing pain flowed out, not all of it, but enough so his mind started functioning again.
Contreras! Contreras! You cowardly scum! Stop feeling sorry for yourself!
Be bigger than yourself! Much bigger! You're not dead yet!
Get up! On your feet! Come on! Feel the blood go round, feel it flow through your miserable veins! You know you're alive!
He raised himself to his knees first, and slowly worked his way up on a pair of wobbly legs.
He felt weak and dizzy and tne world before him was alternating in black and gray.
He took a few steps, up the wooden sidewalk and rested against the adobe wall.
The bodies of the dead spread the length and the width of the rectangular court.
The dead! Soon he would be dead, if he did nothing but stay there.
Where would he go from here? Where?
He remembered the blind woman. What was her name? Patricia.
Patricia. He liked the name. She was a good-looking woman, too. The image of her naked body came to him.
Ah, Contreras! You ugly bastard! Here you are almost dead and you think of naked females !
He smiled. Why not? Here they were alone, with nobody to bother them but the dead.
He moved back a few steps, leaning against the wall and found the doorway.
The woman was sleeping, her body resting against the right corner of the room.
He looked at the woman for some time. Had he dreamed it or had it really happened?
Was this woman, this beautiful woman willing to go with him!
He brought his fingers up to his harelip and ran them up his scar.
No. He had not dreamed it. The woman was blind and frightened to death.
In any case she could be his. Why rape her then? Why not be nice and decent to her?
Yes. It was in his interest to behave decently. She would be his. It would just take longer that's all.
He walked up to her and knelt beside her. "Patricia," he whispered as gently as he knew how. "Patricia, wake up."
Startled she groped around with her hands, touching his left hand.
"Are you all right?" she asked, surprised. "Are you all right?"
"Yes, I feel fine now," he said, studying her face closely. "Have you been crying again?"
"I, I thought you had left me here, alone," she stuttered.
"I was out cold, like a stone," he said angrily.
"I'm sorry," she mumbled. "I didn't know what to think. The darkness is so strange and frightening."
"Anyway," he whispered, holding her right hand. "It doesn't make any difference. Do you still want to go with me?"
"Yes! Oh, yes," she replied. "Don't leave me alone! Please!"
He hesitated a moment still looking down at the burned face.
"I have some land," he explained seriously. "On a place which is many hundreds of miles from here, in the state of Sonora. Have you ever heard of it?"
"No," she replied shaking her head.
"It borders the United States of America," he added.
"The United States," she asked. "What's that?"
"It's a nation like Mexico," he explained. "Anyway, my lands are near a small town called
Bacuachi. It's an ancient town, so old I guess nobody really knows how old it is.
"I want to go back there," he went on with enthusiasm growing in his tone. "I want to go there and make the land grow!"
He hesitated again. "Would you like to go there with me?"
"If you want me," she said, not quite believing. "Yes, I would like to go with you."
His jet black pupils lit up like two very finely polished stones.
"Good!" he exclaimed, giving her hand a soft squeeze. "We will go to Bacuachi then!"
Letting go of her hand, he said, "You must be hungry."
"I don't know." She laughed nervously. "I've been so scared and hurting."
"I have some dried meat we can eat," he said. "And then we must rest. We can start our journey after it's dark."
"After it's dark?" she asked, her nose twitching a little. "Do you think the Pelones might be out there?"
"The Pelones?" He hesitated. She didn't know he was a federal soldier!
"No. I don't think they are anywhere near here. But why not play it safe." He hesitated. "Now, don't you worry about anything." I'll be back in a few minutes."
He went out and walked across the court of the dead and found his horse where he had tied him before dawn.
Should he tell her? Should she know he was a Pelon?
He walked the very tired-looking horse to the stables and took off the saddle. Poor animal! It started to eat the alfalfa which covered the ground.
No! There was no need for her to know. Perhaps he might tell her later when she knew him better and felt more comfortable with him. If he told her now it would only frighten her.
He took two bundles of dried meat from the saddlebag and walked out of the stables.
No, what he needed now was a plan. Bacuachi was a fine idea but it was a long way off. And it was the rebels who held the immediate area. He looked down at some of the dead bodies. The rebels must have been in a hurry to not even bury their own people.
A sudden thought struck him. Why not change uniforms with a dead rebel! If federal troops caught up with him he could always establish his identity. But if the rebels caught him, how would they ever know he wasn't one of them?
He searched around and found a big cadaver of about his own size and traded his torn uniform for a pair of what had once been white pants and a white shirt.
The pants and shirt were now brownish with dirt and mud.
The boots! He hated to trade the pair of black leather boots for the cadaver's huarachis.
Off with them, Contreras, you greedy bastard ! It may be either the boots or your life!
He took off his boots and hesitated a moment before making the exchange.
Yes. Everything would work out fine. Nobody in Bacuachi knew he had become a professional soldier. He would have to offer no explanations. The people there didn't even know he had become a priest. No. The last time he had been in Bacuachi was in his youth, the day he had left for Mexico City to study at the University. It had been long ago, nearly seventeen years had passed by since.
He stood in the huarachis feeling sort of naked. He would get used to them. One could get used to everything except, maybe, not eating.
What about the army! He and the army had been together now for some seven years. Would they inquire about him, make trouble?
No. They would just assume he had been killed with all the others and let it go at that.
The meat in his hand, he headed for the adobe room where Patricia waited for him.
Yes, everything would work itself out and things would be fine.
Patricia was sitting, leaning against the corner. "Is that you, Pancho?" she asked, bringing the upper part of her body forward.
"Yes," he answered, gently placing a bundle of meat in her hand.
They chewed hungrily on the meat for a few minutes. He was watching her closely all this time.
It would be nice. It was something he had wanted all his life.
She would always be there, someone to talk seriously to, someone to take care of; a woman, a person, a being who would accept him; a woman who would share his life.
He might in time learn to love her. And if he were gentle and kind to her, she might learn to love him. It could happen.
He would make it happen! By God, he would!
"Pancho!" she spoke suddenly. "What's that noise?"
"What noise?" he stopped chewing.
"Listen," she said, her face startled, frightened.
He pressed his ear close to the ground. Horses! Hundreds of horses!
"Oh, God," she squirmed. "Pelones! They must be coming here!"
Pelones! No. They were rebels! The woman could not know. She didn't know what he knew.
He hesitated a few moments.
He would have to trust her.
He would tell her who he really was. His survival depended on it.
And if she betrayed him?
He would kill her! Yes, he would kill her, if it was the last thing he ever did!
He moved next to her. And with his good hand, he held hers, ever so gently.
"Patricia," he said in a calm, slow voice. "Listen carefully, I am Captain Contreras of the Federal Army."
Her hands jerked a little, the rest of her remained still.
"I meant everything," he said. "I want you to go with me to the land of my birth."
He pressed her hands lightly and kissed her right cheek.
"Those horses, those people," he explained. "They are not Pelones. They are rebels."
"I am one of them," she whispered nervously.
"I thought you were," he said. "That's why you can save my life, if you want."
She said nothing. Her nose was twitching again.
He observed her closely and continued.
"I discarded my uniform but if they get the chance to talk too much with me, they might suspect the truth. You can save me by telling them I was a prisoner of the Pelones who blinded you, that the two of us were left for dead. Tell them I'm too wounded to talk to them, that I need to rest."
The horses were approaching the gates and they could now hear the sound of voices.
"Will you do it?" he asked.
She didn't answer.
He moved away from her and lay flat on the floor and pretended to be asleep. If she betrayed him, he would kill her! She was confused.
The deep voice; the rough, gentle hands; the man in the room with her. Who was he? He had saved her!
He had cleansed her wounds and fed her!
No. It was impossible. He could not have been one of those mean, bestial people!
But he was a Pelon! He had said so himself. Her enemy! He was her enemy!
Leaning against the corner of the adobe room, she pushed herself upward.
He had given her comfort!
The laughter of men, the curses of soldiers, the neighing of horses were there; only the earth walls were between them.
"Help!" she screamed. "Help!"
She was blind!
She was useless! What would become of her ?
He had promised her a home!
"Madre mia!" uttered the first rebel to come in the room. "What have we here ? "
"Zapatistas!" she replied, a hand against each wall, a blind stare in the direction of the rebel's voice.
"I am blind," she said, bowing her head. "And he's terribly wounded. Help us. In the name of God, help us."
The first rebel walked in and was followed by others. He turned Contreras around and a long whistle escaped his dry lips.
"What happened?" he asked, taking his straw sombrero off.
"I know you," one of the rebels interrupted. "You're Patricia, aren't you? The woman of Manuel Morales."
"I was," she answered, much of the tension leaving her. "Manuel was killed two days ago."
"Who's he?" asked the same rebel, pointing at Pancho. "I never seen him before."
Pancho groaned and moaned. "Kill the Pelones!" he uttered. "Kill the Pelones!"
"Poor man," said Patricia. "He's been having terrible dreams."
The rebels laughed and one of them said.
"Good, I hope he kills them all."
"He was a prisoner of the Pelones," Patricia said, easing herself slowly down to a sitting position. "There were about thirty of them. And they passed through here a day ago. They captured me and they brought us here. When we wouldn't give them any information they tortured me and shot him. And then they left, leaving us for dead."
She brought her knees up and rested her head on top of them.
Pablo! What had happened to him? Had he been killed by the Pelones?
"Have any of you seen a young man named Pablo Vargas?" she asked.
No. The rebels shook their heads.
"We were left behind," she explained. "When I was captured, he was waiting for me."
"Did this man burn his own wounds?" asked the rebel who had first entered the room.
"Yes," she said. "His wounds were catching infection."
The rebel whistled. "It takes a lot of man to do that."
An elderly man came in and inspected Pancho's wounds and then turned to her.
"There's nothing we can do for him, except to let him rest," he said.
"And the only thing I can do for you," he told her, watching the terribly burned face, "is to apply some lard over the burned area. It may help you from getting a very painful blister. All right," he said to the others. "All of you, out. Let them rest. They'll be all right."
Pablo!
Pablo Vargas!
That was the boy he should have killed.
Damn those soldiers of his! If only they hadn't been stone drunk. He should have known.
Oh, hell! The boy had escaped. And now he was around here somewhere.
He opened his eyes gradually. They were alone. Patricia was resting peacefully near the right corner of the room and he looked at her for a long time.
How much did she know? Had the boy told her anything?
He listened to the laughter and curses. They were picking the dead up and carrying them out of the garrison.
His hand was hurting him quite a bit now and he started to shake it.
He was being stupid. Even the boy didn't know a great deal.
"Patricia," he whispered. "You awake?"
There was no answer. She was breathing softly, now and then turning her body to either side.
Hell, he was being an old woman. How could she know anything when the boy didn't! And even if he had described him to her, how could she ever know. She was blind.
His tired eyes wandered over the ceiling and down the wall opposite him.
An old, faded painting of the Baby Jesus hung there.
He looked at the painting a long time and sighed. "Your Old Man sure made a hell of a mess when He built this earth of His."
Patricia grunted in her sleep as she rolled over, her face against the corner.
The noise from the court had subsided, only an occasional outburst of laughter broke the dull, late afternoon air.
Well, he would know what to do about the boy. But he hoped they would meet under better circumstances.
"Patricia," he tried again. "You awake?"
She grunted and with no further reply she remained as still and as quiet as a statue.
He stared at her back, appreciating the contour of her buttocks.
A very warm feeling originating from the pit of his stomach soon spread throughout his body.
She had not betrayed him!
She was a woman and she was a person. And for the first time in his life he had not been betrayed by either one.
His forehead started to feel very heavy and this heaviness worked its way downward, leaving his eyes barely open. Drowsiness seized his brain and everything became shadowy and then completely dark.
Suddenly he was startled by loud, hysterical screaming.
"The Revolution is over! The Revolution is over!"
It was pitch black in the room and he was painfully working his way up to his feet when a jubilant voice broke in from the doorway. "Wake up!" the voice said. "Wake up! Did you hear the messenger! Did you hear the news! Mexico City is ours! The Revolution is over! We can go home now! We can all go home!"
"Did you hear that?" Patricia asked.
"Yes," he said finding his way in the darkness. He sat down beside her.
They listened for a while. The songs were happy and light. The screams and laughter flowed with an unbelievable reality.
"How long will the trip take us?" Patricia finally asked.
"About a month," he said, resting his head against the wall.
There was a pause and then she said, "I'll be good to you, Pancho, I promise."
"I know you will," he said, and he leaned over and kissed her forehead very gently.
CHAPTER SIX
Once again, for the fourth time in less than four years, the peasant mind thought of the Revolution as coming to the end of the beginning.
To the peasant, Mexico City was the government. Whoever controlled Mexico City was the government.
Emiliano Zapata was now the government, and he was desperately trying to hand it over to someone else.
He was sad and tired and he did not want to be President.
Who would he be fooling? If he was a General it was because he believed deeply that his people's wrongs should be righted. If he ordered a thousand men to die, he needed no education to do so. All he needed was conviction and a strong heart. And when he communicated with his men, he barked directions mixed with obscenities. What did he know of good manners and of speaking so refined as to offend no one?
Besides-he really did feel more comfortable around horses. The only beautiful memories he had of his boyhood and early manhood were centered around horses. He had been happy as a stableman. But then the Army of Don Porfirio Diaz had forced him to join its ranks. And his rebellion had started.
No, his job was done. Mexico City was under his control. He had kicked Obregon out of the Capitol.
"Are you sure that thing works?" Zapata asked the telegraph operator.
"Si, mi General." The young man waved his hand requesting a moment's silence. A message was coming in.
Yes. His job was done. And he hoped this was for the last time. The burden of war was too heavy. All his being was yearning to break chains, to be free as the wind.
He looked out the glass window. A young couple walked by, the woman holding a small baby in her arms. His weary eyes followed them until they disappeared around the corner.
Lucky people! The world belongs to them.
I have a wife, too, he thought. Poor woman! Poor wife! Some bargain she had received. She was married but to a name. How she must wish for flesh, blood, and bones to share her bed!
The operator turned to Zapata. "General Villa wants to know if you still refuse the Presidency."
Not only was Villa a bandit, he was crazy too! "No! I don't want to be President! I don't want to be anything! I have a wife! I want to go home!"
The young man's eyes opened wide in disbelief. He turned around and started tapping on the key.
"Ask him, why not him?" ordered Zapata. "He would be a good president."
The door to the telegraph office opened and a small bell rang. The heavy-bearded captain came in and approached Zapata.
"You were right, General," the small, powerfully built man said. "The so-called delegates who refused to recognize Gutierrez, they were nothing but Obregon's puppets."
Zapata frowned. "Carranza and Obregon want power so badly they can taste it."
"If you have no other duties for me, I think I'll go to bed. I could sleep for a week."
"No, go ahead, Captain," Zapata said. "There's nothing to do now but wait."
"Gracias, mi General," yawned the small soldier and walked out.
The operator was writing furiously on a piece of paper. It was hard to believe. Could words really travel hundreds of miles? And in such a short time! All he could hear was a tic-tac sound.
The operator stopped writing and turned to Zapata. "General Villa says that old habits are hard to break. His one big love had been to steal from the government. What joy would there be in stealing from his own government?"
"Does he suggest anybody?" Zapata asked anxiously, his hands gripping the rail that divided the room in two.
"Yes," the operator said. "He wants to know what you think of General Roque Gonzalez Garza? Would he be agreeable to you?"
Zapata walked back and forth across the small office.
God! He wanted to go home so badly the pit of his stomach ached.
But could Garza be trusted? Would he serve the cause of the Revolution? Or would the power go to his head?
How does one know! How can one ever possibly know? A man never reveals his true colors until he feels the devil's temptation!
Garza was a good man. He believed in the cause. But even the mountains could change overnight!
He thought of the couple he had seen a few minutes before.
His own wife was young and beautiful. How long would a woman wait to realize her womanhood? How long?
He thought of the many people he had seen die, of the many people he had killed himself. How long can a man live with death and still be a man? How long?
He remembered the illusions and the disillusions, the dreams and the shortcomings, the ideals and the realities.
No! His job was done. He had done a soldier's job. Let others now carry the burden. This was a politician's job. Let them carry the weight. Let them play with the mud of life. Let them shape that mud into the kind of statue the people want.
Garza had fought with the people, for the people. He was as good a man as any, if he didn't change.
"I agree!" Zapata finally said. "When can I expect him?"
The operator relayed the message and waited pencil in hand.
But God help him! If Garza ever betrayed the Revolution, God help him!
Ah! It would be nice to live a man's life again. No more hate! No more shooting! No more death!
Only he and his wife and their love, and the land! Yes! It would be nice!
The operator wrote down the reply. It was short and to the point.
"General Garza will be in Mexico City in a few days, a week at the most."
While these arrangements were being made, General Obregon was going ahead with his campaign, but not without a great deal of difficulty. Once he reached Veracruz he had explained his campaign to Carranza. But Carranza was raving mad. "You have caused us a political disaster," he accused Obregon. "You should have consulted with me," he went on and on, "before abandoning the capitol to those ravaging dogs."
But Obregon was resolute. He was very much in doubt that any foreign government would ever recognize a government composed of ignorant peasants-and especially so, if the intent of that government was immediate confiscation of all foreign property.
Why, the American government had even refused to recognize the Huerta regime, and Huerta had been backed by all the conservative elements who wished to preserve the economic gains made by Don Porfirio Diaz.
"Yes, yes," answered Carranza, "but the only reason why Huerta wasn't ever recognized was because of his offensive personality and because of the cowardly way in which he assassinated Madero."
The argument between the two men went on. Carranza wanted Obregon to attack Mexico City immediately. Obregon would not comply. Mexico City did not interest him. The destruction of the rebel armies was what was important.
Even if Carranza's fears were to come true, he reasoned, the foreign governments would not pass recognition for several months to come. And by that time his own campaign would have been completed.
"As long as we control the modern harbors of Tampico and Veracruz," he assured Carranza, "I foresee no real dangers. With these two harbors under our wings we can receive weapons and supplies. And that's your job. We need more weapons and supplies."
Carranza was not at all convinced that Obregon's way was the right way, but he did know that Obregon commanded the loyalty of almost every officer in the army. He decided to let Obregon have his way.
But he made a mental notation to get rid of Obregon sometime in the near future.
In the days to come, weapons were accumulated and more men were recruited. Long months of planning and preparation came to an end, and Obregon launched his attack on the central regions of Mexico. In a few weeks Obregon was the master of central Mexico. But not everything had gone well. Pancho Villa had escaped with a few men to the Chihuahua mountains.
And Carranza had grown bitter and impatient. Time was running out and Obregon had neglected to take Mexico City.
The two men were again in conference and Obregon was in a good mood. Taking Mexico City now would be child's play.
Carranza, however, was in anything but a good mood. "This time," he said in a deadly serious voice, "we must completely crush the opposition."
"I quite agree," said General Obregon, seated across the desk from Carranza.
"Of course," said Obregon, "it will be no problem to run Garza out of Mexico City. He only has a few hundred peasants protecting the city."
"Yes," Carranza agreed, looking up at the ceiling, thoughtfully. "The problem as always will be Villa and Zapata."
Obregon inhaled deeply from his cigar. "Well," he said. "I don't know about Villa. But there is only one thing that will stop Zapata. And that is his own death."
"Do you suggest assassination?" asked Carranza looking closely at Obregon.
Obregon shrugged his shoulders. "I am not suggesting anything," he said. "All I know is that as soon as we run Garza out of the capital, Zapata will come down from his mountains and organize another peasant army. And then it will happen all over again."
"I know," said Carranza, tapping the desk with his fingers. "I know."
"Villa," continued Obregon. "I don't know about him. But I always felt he was a bandit above and beyond all else. Perhaps we could buy him off, so to speak. We could offer him money, a ranch, anything of value, just so he minds his own business."
"I think you are right." Carranza stood up. "Time has run out. We simply don't have any more time to deal with ignorant fanatics. We must destroy them, one way or the other."
Obregon also stood up and extended his right arm across the desk. "Well," he said, shaking hands with Carranza. "I'll leave the nasty little details to you. I'll see you in Mexico City. It should be ours in two days."
Carranza looked after Obregon suspiciously. The man was too damn smart for his own good. Somehow he must assassinate him, too.
Had Carranza known what Obregon had been thinking lately, he would have been more than suspicious.
As far as Obregon was concerned, Carranza was a man who was confused about what he really wanted. Carranza would have liked to think of himself as a man who wanted only what was best for Mexico. Obregon could believe this, but in its proper perspective. He had no doubt that Carranza loved Mexico. But he felt that Carranza was primarily interested in the power of being President.
And this worried Obregon. He, too, wanted to be President. He was willing to wait until Carranza served his six year term. But what if Carranza did not keep his promise? He had been elected on the platform of no reelection.
No, if he had assessed the man correctly, Carranza would attempt to find a way not to relinquish the presidency. He would have to keep a very careful eye on Carranza.
And why did he want to be president? Did he, too, want to become another Porfirio Diaz and rule the country for several decades ?
Yes and no. He was no fool. If the country was in a mood to tolerate another Porfirio Diaz, he would love to become another Diaz-though he would do things much differently than Diaz ever did. But Mexico was far from being in the mood of ever tolerating another dictator. So the next best thing was to be president for a decent term of time. Being president, number one, was one of the highest glories a man could achieve. What man, in his right mind, would walk away from it?
Yes, he wanted to be president. But he was also a businessman, and for the compensation of being president he would give Mexico's problems the best of his abilities. It was a fair trade in any businessman's language.
CHAPTER SEVEN
When Pablo left Patricia, thinking she was dead, he headed straight for Mexico City. It was a new and altogether different world from the one he knew.
The strangeness, the fascination of the metropolis made him forget the ugly man but for a few days.
He saw and heard and experienced things he never, not even in his wildest dreams, had imagined could exist. For hours at a time he would stare at those odd-looking, mechanical self-running things called automobiles. How could they move if nothing was pushing and nobody was pulling? He wondered about the huge, massive buildings he saw everywhere. What held them up; why didn't they crumble? The plumbing mystified him. Water flowing in through the walls, water draining down the floors. Mother of God, what sort of magic was this? The markets with their hundreds of different foods entranced him. Where did it all come from, how could people buy these different foods? Money, he was told. Money will buy you anything you want.
Money? What was money? Why it was just a piece of paper. "You mean," he asked a street vendor, "all I need is paper and I can really get anything I want."
The street vendor roared with laughter. "Si muchacho, si," he said amiably, producing a peso out of his pocket. "All you need is this kind of paper."
Pablo was really perplexed. Not everything in the city had been beautiful and awe-inspiring. He had also seen people starving in the streets like wild dogs without a dime. Why didn't these people just gather all the paper they could find and then go to the markets? Were they just lazy and indifferent about their own hunger?
No. No. No. The vendor was shocked. "Only the government can produce this paper," he tried to explain. "You just don't find it in the streets."
Pablo was also introduced to very ancient joys of the flesh. One day a bartender gave him a marijuana cigarette to smoke. It was wild. No, it was even better than that. It was a dream like no dream he had ever had. His mind somehow became disattached from his body. It was a universe all of its own.
It was frightening. "And sometimes it can drive you insane," the bartender said.
"You're full of shit." A customer started an argument with the bartender. I've been smoking it for ten years and it's the only thing that keeps me sane."
The bartender ignored the troublemaker and recounted the story of a man who had been smoking it for years.
"Like many of us," the bartender began, "the man was a coward. He couldn't face reality any longer. His wife died, leaving him with ten children. Soon after that his two elder girls became prostitutes. One of his sons became a thief and murderer. And he, himself, was completely fed up working for a shoemaker who made him work for fourteen hours a day, seven days a week. So he started smoking marijuana and chewing peyote. He was a changed man; he was even a happy man. For years and years he smoked it. Then one night he came in here and drank a bottle of mescal and smoked three whole sticks of marijuana. Very calm and composed, he suddenly got up and produced a long sharp knife. He walked up to the bar, unbuttoned his pants, took his penis out and held it against the bar. He chopped his penis off and held it high in the air. And while he bled to death he screamed over and over. "I don't need it anymore! I am a god! I am a god."
As the days went by and the novelty of the city wore off, Pablo was once again confronted by his own ugly reality. The ugly bastard had to die. He had to find him and kill him. He had to!
Over the next several months, while Obregon and his troops were raising hell and death all over central Mexico, Pablo worked patiently and meticulously under a plan which would find him the ugly man.
But as Villa and his troops abandoned city after city until only Mexico City remained under rebel troops, Pablo became frantic. He was fast running out of time. And if he didn't find the ugly man now, he might never find him.
As he walked into a bar facing the city's main fortress, he was very much aware that today might be the very last chance he had of ever catching up with the ugly devil.
"Buenos alias, Pablo," the bartender said. "What will it be today?"
"Aqua con tequila," said Pablo, cleaning the sweat and dirt of the late afternoon sun off his triangular shaped face.
"How does it look out there?" the bartender asked, placing a glass of water on the bar and serving a shot of tequila in a separate glass.
"Bad," Pablo said, "real bad. Carranza's army is all over around Mexico City."
"That bad, huh."
Pablo swallowed the tequila and for a moment enjoyed the burning sensation down his throat.
"Yeah," he said, drinking the water. "It's that bad."
"I'm not surprised," said the bartender. "In the last few years I've seen armies come and go like the seasons of the year.
"Another shot?" he asked, holding the bottle up.
"No, gracias," Pablo said, tucking the handkerchief inside his shirt. "I have to meet Carlos at the Main Cuartel."
"You still trying, huh?" The bartender slammed the cork back into the bottle and put it away on the top shelf.
"Wouldn't you ? " Pablo snapped, walking out of the cantina.
He crossed the unusually wide street and approached the two men guarding the entrance to the fort.
"Your friend Carlos is not here," the smaller of the two guards told Pablo.
"I'll wait," Pablo said, leaning against the very massive wall.
"Haven't you gone through all the records?" the other guard asked, spitting tobacco juice.
Pablo looked at the man. "No," he said. "We still have two rooms of files to go through."
Both guards whistled. "But what if the file you are looking for," the smaller of the two men asked, "was one of the many files that were burned?"
Pablo looked at the ground. "I don't know," he said.
The two men looked at each other and smiled and shook their heads.
It was hopeless! He knew it was impossible. But he had to try.
If only he knew the name of the ugly bastard! Then he could find him, somewhere.
He wanted to kill that man! He wanted to kill that man more than he wanted anything else!
But he knew nothing about the man! Nothing! Except that he was ugly.
Well, somewhere inside the fort, among the thousands and thousands of files, he would find a man described as being ugly because of a monstrous harelip.
And then, yes, then he would know the man's name!
Pablo walked towards the guard who was chewing tobacco. "Compadre," he said, "if Carlos gets here, tell him to wait for me. I am going to the plaza to see if he is still there."
As he walked away a terrible thought occurred to him. What if the ugly bastard was already dead! What if he had already been killed?
He walked eastward three blocks and approached the small plazita where Carlos did business.
God no, he thought. I have to kill him myself! I have to!
Carlos was still there. He was busy writing a letter for an old woman who was dictating to him.
He finished the letter and charged the woman one peso. "Ah, Pablo, my boy," he said. "I'm sorry I am late. But business is good, very good."
His brown eyes sparkled. "And to think the Revolution wants people to learn to read and write! Why they will starve me! That's what the Revolution will do for me!"
He slapped his knees. "Well, let's see if we can find that devil of yours today. "You have a peso for me?"
Pablo reached deep in his pants pocket and produced one peso.
Carlos grabbed it greedily. "Let's see," he said, slapping Pablo's back. "That makes forty-five pesos you have given me in three months. The next hour is yours to command."
As they approached the fort the ground started to shake and rumble. And black smoke and dust were everywhere.
While Pablo stood there, full of awe, and his mouth open, Carlos ran down the street.
The fort was being attacked by artillery fire. The whole establishment was being crushed, burned to the ground.
God, no! No! No! Now he would never find the ugly bastard!
As men and horses raced back and forth, Pablo cried.
All the files! All the documents were burning ! And there was nothing he could do. Nothing.
The bombardment continued through the night and before dawn General Garza had given up all hope of holding the capitol. His defenses around the city were nearly crushed, but he gathered what forces he could and he led them to the north of the city. From there he spearheaded his troops through the enemy lines and they broke through but with considerable losses. For the next several weeks they rode hell and leather through the enemy-held territory. They traveled through five states until they reached the Chihuahua mountains.
Most of the troops never made it. When they broke through, there were some two hundred of them. Only ten rode into the mountains, and they were more dead than alive.
Pablo was one of the few who had lived through the long and devilish journey, but he really didn't give a damn one way or the other any more. He had given up all hope now. He would never find the ugly bastard, the thought of whom still boiled through his veins.
He wished he had marijuana or peyote now. The mescal he was drinking wasn't half doing its job. He wanted to get so drunk that his mind would jump out of his body and whirl on and on and on into oblivion.
He hated his consciousness, his awareness. It oppressed him. It was like chains. And he wanted to break them. He wanted to be free, to drown in nothingness, to jump in a black deep hole with no bottom to it.
But all he had was this damn mescal and it wasn't doing what he wanted. Just the same it was better than nothing, and he drank it down like a man dying of thirst.
Even in the dark, Pablo could sense the old man's eyes on him.
"What's wrong, old man?" he asked, his voice drunk, his tone slurred.
The old man shook his head, scratched his white beard and continued to drink his coffee.
Pablo placed the half-empty bottle of mescal to his lips and sucked a long long shot from it.
"So young," whispered the old man. "So young. And so drunk."
"Mind your business," Pablo snarled. "What the hell do you know about anything!"
"Nothing," said the old man quietly, pity in his eyes. "But you won't find a solution in the bottle."
"Leave me alone, you old bastard!" Pablo cried. "Go on! Go bother someone else!"
The old man stood up quietly, picked his saddle up, and walked softly away to another campfire.
Pablo put the bottle to his mouth again and swallowed another hard drink.
"The old man is right," said a voice from across the fire. "Why don't you get some sleep."
A hysterical sound escaped his lips. It sounded like laughter, except it wasn't. It was the sobs of a madman.
Sleep! God, yes! He wanted to sleep! He needed to sleep!
But he couldn't. He could not sleep. Every-time he closed his eyes he dreamed.
"I can't sleep," he cried, throwing the bottle into the fire. "I won't sleep! I won't!"
"Hey, muchacho," the same voice from across the fire said. "Take it easy. You have a long life ahead of you."
"I won't sleep," he cried in a drunken furor. "I won't! I won't!"
But he was too drunk. He was too tired. He had fought off sleep and now sleep was winning, creeping in, dominating him. And he fell flat on his back. And he slept. And he dreamed.
It was always the same. It started as a beautiful dream. And it always ended as a nightmare.
It was a woman, beautiful and naked. She would wait for him, legs spread out, buttocks moving up and down.
He would crawl up to her and going slowly into her he would see her face. It was Patricia. He would bring his lips down on hers and a wild gyration of movement would follow.
Going off in her, giving her everything that was in him, he would again look at her face.
It was not Patricia.
It was his mother, an expression of hopeless ecstasy on her wild-looking face!
He woke, sweat running down his tortured wrought face.
He slapped his face a couple of times, killing a moth that had persisted on landing on his nose.
It was still dark. A weird silence had settled over the entire camp. Now and then a loud snore would break the dead feeling of the night.
About a hundred yards away he could see two men against a fire still burning strong. One of the men was Persident Garza. The other one, he thought, must be General Villa.
He looked at the two men for a while. Villa was walking back and forth, at times moving his arms wildly, while Garza just sat still, his back stooped.
Pablo inhaled deeply a few times and then gazed at the dying fire.
Suddenly he broke down crying. He could have killed the ugly bastard! He had had his chance! Why hadn't he? Why?
Oh, God, how well he remembered! For ten, twenty seconds, the ugly bastard had been at his mercy. His mother had been screaming and then she had stopped; and all this time, the ugly bastard had been outside the hut.
And so had he. He had been hiding behind a tree, a huge rock in his hand.
It could have been so easy. He could have crushed the ugly bastard's head with the rock.
Why hadn't he? Why? Why?
He knew.
His eyes did not flicker. He gazed up at the open black sky.
It was an empty stare.
And tears rolled down his young, old face.
He knew why.
He had enjoyed it. The whole act had fascinated him. He had fought, yes, but not against the act. Only against his enjoyment of it.
And he had been defeated.
The fascination had finally paralyzed him, so that he could not throw the rock.
His fingers dug deeply into the earth.
"God damn you," he mumbled. "God damn you."
A hundred yards away Pancho Villa was also cursing.
God damn the Gringos, thought Pancho Villa, God damn them all!
He was going to pay them in full! By God, he was going to teach them to mind their own business!
It was difficult to see, even by the campfire, but Pancho Villa was blushing. He was embarrassed.
Garza was gazing at the fire, drinking coffee from a tin cup. Since his arrival an hour before, he hadn't said a word.
Garza had traveled hundreds of miles, but he didn't appear tired any more.
He conveyed anger-a furious, savage silent anger.
Villa had promised him weapons-hundreds upon hundreds of weapons to defend the capitol.
Garza poured the remaining coffee into the ground and looked up directly at Villa. "Why?" he asked simply. "Why?"
Villa faced the angry eyes and held them. "I had weapons coming in," he said calmly. "I had them coming in from the north."
Villa's eyes lit up with a fury that had no match. "But the Gringos placed an embargo on all arms and munitions! That's why I couldn't keep my promise."
Garza remained silent.
"How many men did you bring with you?" Villa asked, serving himself a cup of coffee.
Garza gazed into the fire. "Only what I came in with," he murmured. "The rest were cut to pieces. About two hundred of us broke through the encirclement."
"And the rest of your army was slaughtered?" Villa asked surprised.
"Yes," Garza said "Carranza's army was well-equipped, American weapons for the most part."
"Damn Gringos!" said Villa. "They are going to pay, compadre!"
"How?" asked Garza looking up at him.
"We are going to steal every damn Gringo company in this part of Mexico! And then, compadre," Villa's face lit up with enthusiasm. "We are going to use their filthy money to buy weapons, preferably from them. And then, compadre, with their own weapons we are going to hit them! We are going to hit those damn Gringos at least once!
"And they will always remember, compadre. They should never have messed with Villa!"
"What's your plan?" asked Garza, unimpressed.
Villa walked back and forth, unable to contain his vast energy. "Very briefly, compadre, we'll divide our forces into three groups. The main group stays here in Chihuahua. The second group crosses into Sonora, and the third group rides into Coahuila and Monterrey.
"In every town there's some Gringo who shouldn't be there, fleecing our people. Once we have borrowed what's ours by national right, we'll meet back here. Then we will attack either El Paso but probably Columbia. It will be easier to escape from Columbia than it would be from El Paso."
Garza expressed concern. "What about the American Army, General?"
Villa doubled up in laughter. And then he was deadly serious. "Do you think, General Garza, that anyone of their schoolboy generals is capable of finding me?"
Garza shook his head, for he was talking to the master guerrilla of them all.
Villa had been defeated not only by Obregon but also once by Huerta. Both times, however, he had escaped their grips. He was a soldier, but not in the conventional sense of being a soldier. His way was the way of the guerrilla; his tactics always the tactics of a bandit.
And that's what he was, this Pancho Villa. A bandit. He had been a bandido all his adult life and half of his youth. Not by choice by any means, but a bandido he was because he had been forced into being one.
He had been a peon like almost every male in Mexico was a peon. One fine day when Pancho Villa was not Pancho Villa but still Doroteo Arango, the son of his patron, the landlord, decided he was going to seduce Doroteo's sister. This he did, except that when Doroteo's sister didn't want to be seduced she was raped. Doroteo was a proud youth and when he learned that his sister had been violated he killed the son of the patron.
Now such things were just not done, at least, not to the patrones and their families. Doroteo immediately fled from the state of Durango to the Chihuahua mountains. And once there he joined a band of bandidos led by a man named Pancho Villa.
Doroteo learned the profession well; so well, in fact, that one day he decided there was room for only one caudillo. He killed Pancho Villa and because he was sentimental in an odd sort of way he assumed the name of the man who had taught him his trade.
Over the years he grew to be one great big thorn in Don Porfirio Diaz' side. The Rurales, a specal branch of law enforcement, could never catch up with him. He always gave the army a run for its money. So Diaz finally put a price on his head in the hope that some poor peon might shoot him for the money.
But Villa had foreseen years before that Diaz might do just such a thing, and to protect himself against being assassinated by some poor peon he had been sharing his loot with the peasants.
Over the years the word got around that he was a sort of Robin Hood, stealing from the rich to give to the poor. And far from killing him, the peasants loved him and protected him from the Rurales and the regular army.
For more than ten years before the Revolution, Pancho Villa terrorized the landowners of Chihuahua and Durango. And the people loved him for it. Who was it, they sang in secret, who made the patrones walk with their behinds between their legs ? Who was it, they praised, that made the patrones' ladies cross their legs at the mere mention of his name?
Yes, Pancho Villa was made a hero by an oppressed people. And though he was really no hero, he was nevertheless influenced by the love and praise of the people. When he offered his services to Madero he was not unaware that as a revolutionary leader he stood a good chance to mak a fortune. But he believed that the people's secret desires were legitimate. It was not just that so few should own all the land and wealth of Mexico.
Whatever Pancho Villa really was, he was ruthless, calculating, and vengeful. And his plan to attack the Americans had a double purpose. He would teach the meddling Gringos a lesson, and conceivably he might bring Carranza down on his knees. The Gringos, he had no doubt, would send an army to pursue him. This would embarrass the Carranza government, and Carranza would be forced to attack the Gringo invaders.
After this the possibilities were too unpredictable, but it would have served his dual purpose. He would have taught both the Gringos and Carranza that it did not pay to tangle with Pancho Villa.
CHAPTER EIGHT
As the year of 1915 approached its bloody end, Pancho Contreras-unsuspecting that the breathing, bleeding earth was already crying urgently for his flesh and soul-drove a wagon-load of red chile into the town of Bacuachi.
Had he known that a group of Villistas were in town, he might have turned back. Maybe not. It is impossible to predict. He was different now, this ugly man.
He wasn't really ugly any more. Oh, a hideous scar still marked his monstrous harelipped face.
But inside-inside he was beautiful. It was amazing what a woman's compassion and a woman's willing body had done to him. Even his animalistc face softened into something more human.
Everything he looked upon, whether old memories or familiar things, he now saw with a different perspective.
He had hated his mother before. She had rejected him so completely that soon after he was born she had entrusted his care to a maid. And his father, of course, had been no better. All Pancho had to do was look at his old man and he would get a whipping for it. He had shocked his parents so badly that they had simply refused to have any more children.
Somehow though he couldn't hate them anymore, not that they still weren't worthy of hate. He just didn't have anything inside him with which to hate. It seemed as though he had been washed, rinsed, and then put out under the sun to be cleansed. He had visited their graves not long ago; and while he had not been able to cry for them he had at least not cursed them.
He drove on into the old town, and he was familiar with every street and every building and he felt good. He felt at home.
He went on about his business and sold his crop of red chile. And as the day moved on he decided to get a haircut.
The barber worked slowly, cutting hair for a few seconds and spending long minutes chasing a persistent burro that insisted on being inside the small shop.
As the barber whistled a nameless but happy tune the burro walked in again and made himself comfortable smelling the barber's behind.
"Burro desgraciado," he said, laughing. "You must be on my wife's side."
Contreras laughed. "How's that?"
The barber pushed the chair around. "Well, it's like this, Senor Contreras," he explained, covering his behind with both hands. "She keeps telling me I should bathe more often. But I insist as my father always said, that bathing is bad for the system.
"No, no, it's really true," he said, looking into Contreras' doubtful eyes. "Every time you take a bath you wash away a little bit of yourself. Why in no time at all you could wash all of yourself away.
"My father, Senor Contreras, he got to be over a hundred years old. And before he died, the devil bless his soul, he told me his secret.
"Do you want to know the secret of his long life?" the barber asked, looking into Contreras' smiling eyes. "Well, I'll tell you. He never took a bath, not once in his long life. He used to clean his body once a month, but with alcohol.
"Senor," the barber laughed, placing his arms around the donkey's neck and dragging the burro out of the shop. "My father was never clean, but he was preserved."
He dragged the burro across the narrow street where two small boys were playing and gave them ten centavos each in exchange for taking the burro away from the vicinity.
"You know, senor," he said when he came back inside, "that burro reminds me of the Revolution."
"Oh?"
The barber moved his head both ways, very secretively. "Si-si senor," he whispered, "the whole thing is dumb like a burro."
Pancho leaned back in the chair and made himself comfortable while the barber searched for his scissors among a pile of instruments.
"I mean the way it started," he continued, "it was a real burro thing. Do you know how it all started?"
"I've heard different versions," Pancho answered.
"Well-this the real burro, senor. And you tell me if it isn't a real burro. The way I heard it, it seems an American magazine sent a man by the name of James Creelman to Mexico City to interview Don Porfirio Diaz. I think this was back in 1908.
"Anyway, Don Porfirio became burro careless during the interview and said that when his present term expired that he would not serve again. He also added that he would welcome an opposition party in the republic.
"When Madero read this burro statement that had been made in a burro mood by an old man who was really so old as to be burro senile, he made this burro thing ride him all the way to the Capitol. Not that it did him any good either. It didn't take Huerta long to take the burro away.
"Well," he asked Pancho, "wasn't it a real burro thing? I mean, what difference will it really make once the burro is killed. Senor, the poor man was born to be fucked, no matter how many burros come and go."
Pancho laughed.
"And speaking of Huerta," the barber asked, "Have you read the papers lately."
"What's he done now?"
"Well," he said, "it seems he found his way into the United States and he was buying weapons and recruiting an army. The American authorities arrested him in Newman, New Mexico and jailed him in Fort Bliss, Texas. He hasn't got a chance now, senor. Those damn Texans will hate him to death. They don't like Mexicans, you know. Ever since that bastard Santa Anna gave them Texas they can't stand the sight of any Mexican.
"But if Mexico ever becomes a powerful nation. No. No, Senor Contreras, don't laugh. Miracles still do happen, you know. And don't forget, senor, that while those damn Gringos were still running with their asses bare against the wind, our ancestors were a powerful empire.
"Anyway, senor Contreras, a Mexican is like an elephant. He never, never forgets. And God knows those Gringos have stolen our elephant blind. One way or the other they crooked us out of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.
"Well-for now, we can kill them with words, eh, senor?"
"You read a great deal," commented Pancho.
"Si," the barber agreed. "Now I read just so people know that I can read. But I went through a great deal of trouble to learn how because I wanted to know what was going on in the world. You know what I found out?
"If you want the truth of anything your read, senor Contreras, you must imagine the complete opposite of what you read and then you have the truth."
Pancho couldn't stop laughing.
"You're a happy man," Contreras said to the barber after the man had resumed cutting his hair.
"Si, senor," the barber agreed. "And why not? Since the Villistas have been in town, business has been very good."
"What are they doing here, anyway?" Contreras asked.
"It's hard to say, senor," the barber replied. "The only thing they have done so far is to ask questions."
"Oh, what questions?"
"Gringos, senor. They are looking for Gringos, any Gringo."
"Why?"
"Well, Senor, they don't really want the Gringos. It's their money they want."
He finished cutting and dusted the loose hair off of Contreras' face with a small brush made of chicken feathers.
"Anyway," the barber said, "they found out there's a lot of Gringos living in Cananea. So I imagine they'll be going there very soon."
Contreras produced a roll of bills from his pocket and gave the barber one peso.
"How's the milpa coming along, Senor ? " the barber asked, putting the peso inside an old cigar box.
"Good," Contreras replied, "very good. I just sold my first crop of red chile."
"Well, I guess that makes you a farmer, Senor," the barber said, taking off his apron. "Only, don't become like the other farmers around here. Can you imagine, they try to cut their own hair, the cheap bastards."
Pancho laughed. "No," he said, "I'll see you in another three months or so."
He was happy.
For the first time in his life, he was a happy man. And as he walked down the narrow street, Contreras swung his arms wide and proud and free.
Jesus! He felt good! The first crop of chile had sold well. He had taken care of that chile the way a woman takes care of her child.
He placed his hand next to his pants pocket and felt the bulge of bills there, nearly a thousand pesos.
It was worth it, all the work and sweat to make the damn earth give a little chile! Yes sir, it was worth it.
He approached the corner and was about to turn left when he noticed a group of five men coming up the street. The ammunition belts hanging diagonally across their chests marked them as Villistas.
Pancho turned right, away from the approaching group.
No sir. He didn't want trouble. He didn't need trouble any more.
Everything he had ever wanted, he now had. And that's the way he was going to keep it.
He whistled as he walked. And he enjoyed the peaceful feeling within himself.
He looked back and saw that the street was now empty, so he turned back. He walked some three and a half blocks and entered the Bacuachi General Store.
"Linda senora," he said to the elderly clerk, "I want the most beautiful dress in your store for the most beautiful woman in the world."
"Ahh, senor Contreras," the woman said, clapping her hands. "I have just what you want. A dress imported all the way from Paris."
He followed the short, plump woman to the back room and waited while she opened a big, white box and unfolded a red dress out of it.
"But, senora," he objected, "that dress is two times bigger than my woman."
"So?" the woman smiled. "That's no problem. Make her pregnant. Besides," she added, "this is the only dress I have in the whole store."
"All right," he said. "I'll take it then." Well, if Patricia wasn't pregnant, nobody could accuse him of not trying. He had squirted more sperm into that woman than the clouds pour water on this earth.
"Will that be all?" the woman asked.
"Huh, oh, no, here is a list of provisions you can fill for me."
But it was no problem. If they couldn't have children of their own, they could always adopt an orphan or two.
What the hell? If there was one thing the bloody revolution was producing, it was lots of orphans.
It sure bothered Patricia though. Getting pregnant had become an obsession with her.
He smiled.
Life was one hell of a joke at times. Lately he was forced into the situation of having to make love to Patricia in the morning, at noon, and at night.
"Pancho," she would say, "I have to get pregnant. You have given me so much. The least I can do is give you a son."
He knew what was bothering her. And he would tell her, "Don't feel the way you do. I need you. Believe me, I need you. I need you like the air I breathe."
And she would cry, "But if I could give you a son then I wouldn't feel so helpless."
Helpless! What the hell, she got around the house all right. She could do the chores around the house as well as any other woman could.
Well, he would just have to keep on trying to make her realize how badly he really needed her. She was indispensable to him. In time she would come to know it. He would make her see it.
"Senor Contreras," the woman clerk called out, "that will come to two hundred and twenty-three pesos."
He paid the woman and carried the merchandise out in a wooden crate. His wagon was parked about half a block way.
He placed the medium-sized crate in the back and lazily climbed onto the driver's seat. Whistling, feeling peaceful and content, he drove the horses through the narrow streets.
He drove by the church, the school, and residential homes. And then at the outskirts of the small town he passed the cantina.
Pancho glanced at a wild-looking man who was just coming out. His hair was long, as long as a woman's hair. A very light black beard covered his face.
For a fraction of a second Pancho's eyes were riveted on the young man's eyes. They were bitter, cold eyes.
He drove by the cantina. He knew that young man, from somewhere, from some place. But where ?
Pancho looked back. The young man was still looking after him.
Something. There was something familiar about him.
Well, if he couldn't remember, it couldn't have been of any importance.
* * *
The ugly man!
Before his drunken eyes had passed the devil. Some place, some time. The place was here, the time was now!
"Kill!" the beat of the heart pounded.
"Kill!" the air of the lungs breathed.
"Kill!" the impulses of the brain commanded.
And the young body obeyed. He ran two blocks, maybe three, he didn't know. He reached the stables.
"My horse, old man." He gasped for air. "Hurry!"
The calm old man responded patiently. "He's eating. Besides-my son is just fitting him with the shoes you ordered."
"Then lend me one," Pablo regained his breath. "Or rent me one."
"Seguro," the old man smiled, "but I have to know where you are going."
"Visiting," he whispered.
"Where?"
"Well, perhaps you can help me," Pablo answered. "I was drinking at the cantina with a fellow who lives around this region. And he invited me to stay with him a few days. But I was very drunk, you understand, and now I don't remember what the fellow's name is nor the place where he told me he lives.
"But perhaps you know the man. He's a very, well, you understand, a very ugly man. He has a harelip and a circular scar covers his right cheek."
"Oh, si," the old man replied. "There's no mistaking him. His name is Pancho, Pancho Contreras."
"Yes, yes that's his name!" Pablo smiled. "It's coming back to me. And he lives where?"
The old man spat out a mouthful of tobacco juice.
"You know where the cantina is," he said. "Well, you follow that road for about four kilometers until you come to a side road that breaks in from the left. You follow that side road for about a kilometer and a half. That's where he lives."
He had wasted enough time.
"All right, all right," he said. "May I have a horse now."
"Oh, si," the old man replied, walking up to a black stallion. "I am kind of surprised though. I mean, that he invited you to his place. That man has always kept to himself."
The old man lifted an old, worn-out, faded-looking saddle and placed it on the horse's back.
"I guess he must have changed some," he said, fastening the belt under the horse's belly. "He was gone for years and years. Didn't come back until six or seven months ago. Ugly as hell that boy is, but somehow he managed to get himself a real handsome looking woman. Yeah, I guess he must have changed some."
"All right, all right, old man, cut the silly talk. How much do I owe you?"
"Five pesos now and five when you bring the horse back.
Pablo mounted the black stallion and with impatient hate gave chase to the man who had for so long now tortured his mind and body.
So the ugly bastard has a woman, he kept thinking.
Good!
He had raped his mother. He would rape his woman. It was as simple as that. And then he would kill him a hundred times over!
"God," he prayed, "Let him die slowly, oh, so slowly."
The night was bright, the moon was full, and the distant stars twinkled over the silent night.
Behind a group of trees, some thirty yards away from the small adobe house, Pablo observed and waited.
He had waited a long time. He could wait a while more.
He smiled. The right time was here. He took his shirt off and with both hands in front of him, he ran towards the house.
The woman had come out of the house and she was now standing below the clothes line.
Patricia heard the sudden, approaching noise and was in the process of turning when Pablo reached her.
He placed the extended shirt over her head, swinging his right fist down on the back of her neck. He tied the sleeves of the shirt a-round the woman's neck.
Good! The woman had not made a sound.
He reached for the gun tucked between his belly and his pants.
He moved quickly, silently, to the front door. The ugly man wasn't in the kitchen.
From the entrance he could see that three other rooms connected with the kitchen. But he could see there was light coming from only one of the rooms. The other two were dark.
He went in as quietly as he could and his back leaning against the wall he peeked into the lighted room.
He was there! He was in bed, reading a book.
Pablo moved and boldly he stood in the doorway screaming, "Don't make a move, you ugly bastard!"
With the speed of lightning Pancho let go of the book, hitting Pablo in the face.
At the same time Pablo fired once and heard a groan.
"Oh, no," he whispered regaining his balance, "I killed him. Oh, God, and I didn't even make him suffer!"
Crying, cursing himself, he took the ugly man's pulse.
He was alive!
The devil's heart was still beating.
The bullet had found its mark in his chest, about two inches above the heart.
Pablo tucked his gun between his belly and pants and grabbed the ugly man by the shoulders.
He dragged him through the house, all the way outside, to one of the clothesline poles. He went back into the kitchen and came out with a knife.
He cut one of the ropes between the two poles and with it he tied the ugly man to the pole.
Slapping the devil's face several times he screamed, "Wake up, you bastard!"
When the ugly man finally opened his eyes, Pablo demanded, "Do you know who I am?"
Pancho said nothing, his drowsy eyes showing no recognition. He was dying fast.
"You raped my mother," Pablo cried, slapping him hard across the face. "You remember me, don't you. You made me watch!
"And now do you know what I am going to do?" he said slowly, dragging the body of the unconscious woman before Pancho. "I am going to rape your woman!"
He pulled the woman's dress up, above her waist. And he tore her panties off.
He unbuttoned his pants and moved between the woman's legs; rubbing and rubbing.
God damn it! He couldn't do it!
He was willing. God, he was willing!
But his penis just hung there, limp!
Pancho was pulling against the pole with all his remaining strength, a blind stare in his eyes.
"Don't do this to her!" he pleaded just once.
"I can't do it!" Pablo finally said. "God damn it, I can't do it.
"You think it's funny," he said, standing up buttoning his pants. "I promise you this. I am going to tear your woman to pieces. Remember the way you and your men tore my mother to pieces!"
Pablo ran to the barn and came out with two horses. And he cut the remaining rope between the clothesline poles.
"Wake up, you bastard," he screamed, kicking Pancho in the face.
He brought the two horses together by throwing the rope around their necks and making a knot between the two. He cut the remaining rope.
He lifted the woman up and placed her between the two horses, one leg resting on each horse, her buttocks hanging between the two beasts.
He tied each leg securely but independently onto each beast.
Pancho looked on sheer terror in his nearly dead face. "No." he whispered, "No!"
"That's right," Pablo rejoiced, cutting the rope holding the two animals together. "Enjoy it, you ugly bastard, enjoy it!"
He walked behind the two animals, and brought his hands up, each hand coming down hard on each animal.
The animals sprung forward, parallel to one another for about ten feet.
And then they broke apart, tearing the woman in two.
"No!" with his last breath, Pancho pulled on the pole, breaking it. He fell flat on his face, dead.
The other end of the pole came down on Pablo knocking him unconscious.
Peace! At last, he thought from somewhere deep in his insides, I can have peace!
