Conquistadora - Esmeralda Santiago [85]
When blancos talked about what was happening across the ocean, they usually ended up trying to ascertain how those events might affect Puerto Rico. Siña Damita heard señores venting their frustrations with the Spanish government’s laws. Hacendados and merchants complained that the fees, duties, and taxes they paid were sent to the Spanish treasury, leaving no money for public works on the island. Thousands of soldiers, she’d heard, waited in vain for guns, ammunition, horses, and salaries that never arrived.
One night, Siña Damita was attending the death vigil of an hacendado. As she crossed from the bedroom to the outhouse, she heard one of the sons telling the other that after planting, harvesting, processing, and transporting sugar, their father owed fees, taxes, customs, and export duties amounting to 117 percent of his income that year.
“Our government is strangling us slowly,” the younger son said.
“And not a single official is a native Puerto Rican,” the older one continued. “All those jobs are reserved for españoles who couldn’t care less about the future of this island.”
“So long as we’re a colony, we’ll suffer these indignities. It’s intolerable. Things must change.”
Siña Damita knew that she could make money if she reported that conversation to the authorities. It was against the law to criticize the government, to talk openly about independence. But she also knew that independence for Puerto Rico would mean the abolition of slavery. It had happened in every other former Spanish colony.
It was unusual to hear young people talking like the hacendado’s sons. Something told her that the climate was changing. Maybe these young criollos returning from their travels in Europe and in the United States were seeing things differently from their conservative parents. It could only be good news for the slaves. Siña Damita wasn’t going to say anything that might silence those kinds of conversations in any home in the land.
As the 1848 zafra wound down, Siña Damita could spend more time with her husband and sons. Severo wrote a pass so that Lucho, Jorge, Poldo; their wives, Coral and Elí; their children; and Artemio could spend Sunday afternoons in Damita’s bohío once they finished their chores. A few times they arrived to an empty cabin, because she’d been called away. Lucho and their sons repaired and improved the cottage while the women cooked whatever she’d left for them.
One Sunday afternoon Siña Damita rode up when it was almost time for the family to start the walk back to the hacienda. She was bone-tired from a long vigil in Guares, and when she reached her bohío, she was as breathless as her wheezing mule.
“The town is upside down,” she said. “Slaves on another island killed the masters and burned the estates.”
“What island? How close?” Jorge asked.
“Martinca, something like that … I don’t know. Ay, nena, some water.” Coral went to the barrel while Lucho helped Damita to sit on the threshold. “Gracias, hija.” She drained the cup.
“Take a minute, Mamá,” Jorge said. “We’re not leaving until you tell us.”
Siña Damita took a few deep breaths, but she was too excited. “This little boat sail with blanco families. It was miracle they not drowned. There was men, women, and kids. When they come to shore, one woman got on knees to kiss the sand! They didn’t speak one word of Spanish, but don Tibó translated. Ay! More water, hija!”
“Don Tibó? The Frenchman who owns the cantina?”
“Yes,” Siña Damita said. “He said that the French government