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—rebozo spun tight as a cinnamon roll, on her head, heavy water jug balanced upon it, riding her skull as if she were a donkey —

—fat bullets, cold as lizards, cold and greasy, cold and sliding on their grease into the receivers of rifles, and hands, dark hands, working the levers —

—laundry, stretched on river stones, foam moving down, down, down the river, white islands of foam, going down —

—maize dough in a ball, slapped by women’s hands, taking shape, disk of the sun, flesh of the sun —

—down —

—cottonwood fluff going

down —

—Huila, walking

through trees —

down —

—the Hummingbird, though she had no memory of seeing the Hummingbird, she knew who it was. “Mother,” she whispered, as the Hummingbird watched rain above a churning sea, coming

down.

In the dream, she traveled far.

Nine

HUILA HAD SAT ON A ROCK, and she had used a small knife to peel an orange: the peel had curled out and fallen to the ground in one endless piece, and Huila had spoken. Your mother, child, was the prettiest girl on the ranch. She could make birds land on her fingers. It’s true. And they called her Hummingbird, Semalú, and she spoke the mother tongue but learned Yori when the troubles came and her own family was scattered. Your grandmother and grandfather were good people. Poor people. Your grandmother was funny, and she had the gift come down from her own mother. What gift? The only gift there is, child. The birthing and working of the plants. That gift. Your grandfather was Catholic, and your grandmother followed the old ways. She was Mayo, and her own mother was Yaqui. Your grandfather was Tehueco, and the soldiers put him in a tree before you came.

Your father? Ah, your father. You’re too young now to hear the story. But find Huila later, when you can hear what Huila has to say, and I will tell you about your father. Do you hope he is a prince, child? A king? I will tell you this much—your father is not a bad man. Just silly. You will soon learn that almost all men are silly. Even the priests are silly. But your father is a kind man, and he has many acceptable traits, and he even owns many wonderful things that someday you might have.

And he is very, very handsome.

Teresita lay awake, leaning against the redolent flank of the she-pig. The old sow’s vast heart thumped deep inside her, like the relentless tock of the grandfather clock she had seen in the main house. It seemed like weeks ago. The old pig, on her side, lazily offered her fourteen nipples to this small human shoat, and she drowsed happily, feeling the warmth of the child against her gut and her sides. One foot stirred slightly in her sleep as she dreamed of finding a broken door in the great storeroom larder across the road, and it sped up as in her dream she discovered sweet potatoes and gobbled them while her hundreds of lost piglets regrouped around her.

Teresita had tried to call up the sleep glow to stop her bruises from aching, but it was no use. Clumps of mosquitoes landed on her legs, but she didn’t even feel them feeding on her. The heavy air above her choked off the celestial light, but slow throbs of lightning pulsed red and gold far to the west, over the invisible sea. And the moon was up there, parted and orange, and a lone star burned near the curve of lunar glow. Teresita lay back against the sow and tried to see ghosts—the old women said you could see them out of the corners of your eyes—but concluded the flittering shadows above her were only bats.

“Hey!”

She looked around in the dark.

“Oye, tú!”

She looked over the pig.

“Who is it?”

“Me.”

“Who?”

“Me!”

He stood up. It was the skinny boy from the horse trough with the ridiculous big hat.

“Me!” he said. “Buenaventura!”

In spite of the stiffness in her back and legs, and the ache of her beaten body, she giggled.

“What kind of name is Good Luck?” she said.

“It’s my name,” he said.

He stood among weeds and small bushes, and his hat was glowing grayly in the moonlight.