The Hummingbird's Daughter_ A Novel - Luis Alberto Urrea [161]
“Mother,” said the blackened Mexican, “tell him about the caballero.”
“Caballero?” said Aguirre.
“Don Antonio,” the old woman said. “He was a bad one, that boy. Handsome. A Yori, son of a landowner. He lived in Alamos, he said.
“Pues, Don Antonio had been visiting Hermosillo on business. Who knows what—Yoris are always throwing pesos on counters and making demands.” They laughed.
“Now, Don Antonio had a wife—I’ll call her Meche because I can’t remember what the señor said her name was. Meche was younger than Don Antonio, and sly as a cat. Muy viva, esa muchacha. Eh? She married Antonio’s money instead of Antonio. Do you understand?”
Aguirre nodded.
“Good,” she said. “Antonio was no angel, either. Men.” She blew her slack lips out in disgust. “Antonio had women all along the road.” She shrugged. “That’s the way it always was. And I am sure he had women in Hermosillo. That is what everybody at Cabora said. Where was I?”
“Antonio and his wife.”
“Pah! Wife! So Antonio came riding through the countryside, on his way to Alamos. He pulled up at the ranch and said, ‘What is this?’
“‘A pilgrimage,’ we told him.
“‘What kind of pilgrimage?’ he demanded.
“‘A pilgrimage to see Teresa Urrea, the Saint of Cabora!’
“Now, Don Antonio knew Don Tomás—all of those hacendados were cut of the same cloth, you see. As the old men always said, ‘The same cactuses bring forth similar flowers.’” She adjusted her blanket over her knees. “They were alike, those boys. Muchas mujeres. Mil mujeres!”
The woman clicked her tongue and shook her head.
“And Don Antonio, hearing the daughter of Urrea was a saint all of a sudden, laughed in our faces. ‘What!’ he yelled. ‘The daughter of Tomás Urrea, a saint?’ He had been drinking, of course. All those men drink. He was bold. He insulted the pilgrims. He said, ‘Any woman who eats food like me then sits on a toilet like me is no saint!’
“Then the gentleman took his blankets and went to sleep.”
“And then?” said Aguirre.
“Well, then everybody woke up. It was morning.”
“And what did Teresita do?”
“Ay, ay, ay—that was rich, what she did!”
“What was that?”
“Oh well. She came out like every day. First, she prayed in her little chapel. Then she went in the house to eat. Then she came out to us. Like every day.
“On this day, she stood on the porch, and she called out, ‘Don Antonio!’ Everyone turned, looking around. He was saddling his horse. ‘Don Antonio!’ she cried out. He said, ‘Me?’ His face went white. ‘Me?’ he asked.”
The old woman smiled at the memory.
“He went forward. He looked like a little boy in trouble with his teacher, dragging his feet. Everyone was silent, watching him. When he got to her porch, he said, ‘I am Antonio.’
“Teresita said, ‘Señor, I wanted you to know that I eat only fruit and vegetables.’
“They say he flinched as if slapped.
“Then she said, ‘As for the other matter—the bathroom. I have no control over that process.’ He backed away from her, but she said, ‘Another thing, Don Antonio. Your wife is sleeping with your best friend in Alamos. She lies in his arms as we speak. And they plan to surprise you when you return home. Look behind the door, for he will be there with a machete, and he will kill you as you enter.’
“That Don Antonio tore out of there as if devils were pinching his ass!”
The hermanita laughed so hard she started to cough. Her son stepped forward and patted her back.
“You know,” the old woman said, “they say he got home early and caught his friend in the bedroom, and the machete was right beside the bed!”
Aguirre paid them fifteen pesos.
He ran the cautionary tale of Don Antonio on the second page of the Sunday edition. It appeared under a headline he had plagiarized from his own letters to Cabora: DOUBTING THOMAS!
Fifty-three
THE GOVERNOR OF CHIHUAHUA, the licensiado Don Lauro Carrillo, was encamped not three miles from Tomóchic in his Papigochic demesne. His pack mules formed a bucolic remuda downslope, stoically nose-tied to a drooping rope among the ponderosa pines. Six tents yellow as