American Chica_ Two Worlds, One Childhood - Marie Arana [96]
“I think I’m about the same in both,” I said.
“Sir,” he said.
“What?”
“I think I am the same in both, sir.”
I repeated the phrase after him. I had never heard anyone in the United States of America talk like that. I wanted to fall on the floor and squeal, his words were striking me as so idiotic. But there was nothing amusing about the man.
“Here,” he said. “Read to me from this book.” He shoved a brown volume across the table, pinched two fingers, and then plucked a white shirt cuff out of his jacket sleeve.
I turned the book in my hands. Indians of the Great Plains, the cover announced. I opened it. “What part would you like me to read?” I asked.
“Any page,” he said. “Pick one.” He sat back and crossed his hands behind his head.
I flipped through, looking at pictures. Somewhere near the middle, there was one labeled Medicine man with a rattle, or words to that effect. The witch doctor was peeking out of a tepee, holding an artifact. In the foreground, an Indian brave in a loinflap ran down to a river with his hair spread behind him like wings. The text was interesting enough, something like this: After the last steaming and sweating ceremony, the Indian plunged into water during the summer, or into a snowbank in winter. Thus purified, he was ready to make an offering to the Great Spirit or seek a sign from the Great Beyond.
I stared at the words and considered my situation. I could read this aloud and be waved into the English stream. It was clearly as simple as that. Or I could play possum, as Grandpa Doc liked to say. Put one over on the prig.
I snapped the book shut and set it down on the table. “I can’t read this,” I said, and looked up.
“You’re not even going to try?”
I shook my head. “Too hard.”
“Well, read this, then,” he said, and slid another book at me. It was thin and bright as a candied wafer.
I picked it up, leafed through. Then I smoothed it flat on the table in front of me. “Jane … puh-plays … wi-i-ith the … ball.”
“I see,” he said, after some pages of this. “I thought as much. That will do.” He scribbled a long commentary into my file.
I was put into Señora Arellano’s class and, for what seemed a very long time, my parents were none the wiser. I toted my children’s illustrated Historia del Perú, memorizing the whole litany of Inca rulers until I could recite their Quechua names with all the rattletybang of gunfire.
And Margarita Martinez paid attention to me.
THERE IS A STORY they tell in Cajamarca about four sons from an honorable family that knew the value of honesty, the pleasures of hard work, and the worth of a job well done. The first son set out to build houses. The second became a general in the army. The third founded a bank. The fourth went east and made hats. Time passed, and the hatmaker fell in love with a green-eyed woman. He asked her father for her hand. But, as fate would have it, her father rejected him. It wasn’t only that the commerce of straw hats wasn’t grand enough. The suitor’s skin wasn’t fair enough, his eyes not clear enough, his language not elegant enough, and, to seal the rejection: Of all his brothers, he was told, he had the least clout.
The hatmaker wouldn’t take no for an answer. He was intent on winning the green-eyed lady. First, he took stock of his situation. There was nothing he could do about his shade of skin, the brilliance of his eyes, nor the cleverness of his tongue, but he certainly could do something about his clout in the world. He swindled a mansion out of his first brother; he killed the general and took over his men; he kidnapped the banker and created an empire. And when he was done, the green-eyed woman was his.
So what is the moral of this story? The answer out of Cajamarca is: Do what you can. You can’t change skin, can’t fix tongues, can’t brighten eyes, but power is for the taking. Steal it, lie for it, kill if you have to. You can win the girl with the interesting eyes.
Looking back, I understand what was happening—though I certainly didn’t understand it at the time. Mother had made a bargain