City of Silver (33 page)

As THE BISHOP prayed, three priests in armor and carrying swords pounded on the door of the Convent of Santa Isabella de los Santos Milagros. When the Abbess and Sor Eustacia were brought to them, a man with a large beak of a nose and a powerful gaze of hate spoke. “By the authority of the Council of the Indies, I arrest you, Maria Santa Hilda, for having knowingly placed the corpse of a suicide in sacred ground. And you, Eustacia, for falsely administering the sacrament of confession. May God have mercy on your souls.”

Maria Santa Hilda stood impassive and repeated the creed to herself to keep her mind blank and her mouth silent while the soldier-priests drew from under their capes two saffron robes. They placed one over her head, the other over Eustacia’s. The stouter of the priests hung a chain around each of their necks.

Monica arrived at an unseemly run. She went and embraced them. “We will save you. We will.” She embraced Maria Santa Hilda a second time. “If they take you to the stake,” she whispered, “confess at the last moment, and they will strangle you and spare you the pain. God will forgive such a small lie.”

Maria Santa Hilda kissed her and whispered in return, “Complete the work you have started. And pray with all your might.”

Flanked by the stern soldier-priests, the Abbess walked through the cold morning, not knowing where they were taking her. There were rumors about a secret prison in DaTriesta’s house.

Bells began to ring all around them, bells that signaled yet another celebration for Nestares. The streets about them were deserted. The citizens were gathered at whatever meaningless event was taking place.

Suddenly they came upon Juana, the maid, walking swiftly toward the convent. The small, sturdy woman did not seem to recognize the two women in the saffron robes.

The Abbess thought to shout for help, as if Juana could know something to save them. But Maria Santa Hilda knew there was very little chance that anyone could save them now. She kept her silence. Despair had begun to leak into her heart.

THE INQUISITION WENT on to hear scores of secret informants, to collect information about many of the King’s subjects, to levy fines, and to make arrests. From Taropalca—a nearby town of Christian Indians—they took Doña Angela Carranza, revered as a mystic. DaTriesta and de la Gasca dubbed her an impostor and dragged her off to prison, where she could consider her ugly dilemma: Should she confess to the sin of heresy and seek absolution before she was burned or insist on her own saintliness and die anyway, but in defiance? In the first case, her detractors would think her saved and her followers would feel she had betrayed them. In the second, her accusers would think her in hell, but her faithful would revere her as a martyr.

In the Convent of Santa Isabella de los Santos Milagros, none of the holy sisters had ever heard of Doña Angela, but Vitallina, who had long put her faith in La Carranza’s mystical powers, trudged around the halls in a pair of the famous Indian woman’s old shoes, convinced they would protect her from those
terrible headaches that had plagued her since her womanly flux had begun to wane.

She shuffled into the infirmary to find Sor Monica bent over some vials.

The scraping of the shoes on the tile floor frazzled the Sister Herbalist’s already overheated nerves. “Must you wear those things? They hardly fit over your toes, they are so small. I told you I would buy you any pair of shoes in the market.”

“I prefer these, thank you, Sister.” Vitallina proceeded to the cauldron over the fire and ladled hot water into a wash bowl. She then, seemingly making as much noise as possible, washed the crockery.

Sor Monica poked at the mysterious substance in the vial in front of her and tried to concentrate. Potosí was a place where, for a price, one could buy anything. Endless shiploads of forbidden wares were unloaded at Rio de Janeiro, Montevideo, and Buenos Aires, made their way up the river system, through the lowland forests and rising highlands, and finally emerged on the high broken tablelands of the Altiplano. Along the way, products of local manufacture were stowed away among the contraband parcels. Eastern Indians were clever at many things, especially poisons.

Vitallina peered over her shoulder. “What is that?”

“Nothing,” Monica said. “I found it when we searched. And I ate some. It is harmless, whatever it is.”

“Why didn’t you show it to me?” The big black woman tried to take the vial from her hand.

Monica pulled it away. “I did not want to.” She meant her words to sound commanding, but they seemed to come from the mouth of a disobedient child.

Vitallina kicked off her silly shoes and ran barefoot out of the room.

Monica sighed. Now her assistant had gone off in a huff and
left her to puzzle out this mystery alone while the Inquisitors marched the Abbess away. Maria Santa Hilda could spend years in prison. Even if she was acquitted, the Tribunal would not necessarily release her immediately. She could die of some disease while living in such conditions in this dreadful climate. Monica whispered a prayer for the Abbess’s and Eustacia’s protection.

She could not give up the idea that this mysterious substance had something to do with the deaths of those girls. The two flails lay on the counter beside the vial. It also seemed clear to her that Hippolyta had taken Inez’s flail and used it to punish herself. Was that just an act of self-mortification offered for the repose of her friend’s soul? Or was it an act of penance for the sin of murder?

Monica held her head in her hands. Try as she might, she could not accept that Hippolyta had killed Inez. If that child had committed such a sin, then perhaps this substance had nothing to do with the deaths. It belonged to Juana. And what could Juana, so beloved of the young girls, have to do with any of this?

Monica racked her brain to remember some piece of gossip Vitallina had been blabbering. Something about Juana having given her brother the money to pay instead of taking his place in the mine. They called it making an Indian in silver. Monica ordinarily ignored convent gossip, but Juana’s problem had interested her. The sturdy, dependable maid was a good sort, and the dangers of the mine were legendary. People said that Indian women maimed their male babies so they would not have to serve in the mine. And because the smallpox plagues had killed so many natives, fewer and fewer men came to work. The ones who did were forced to labor harder and harder. Padre Junipero said the
azogueros
sometimes made the workers stay underground for two days at a time, even sleep there. Cutting rock with bars weighing thirty pounds, crawling along like snakes, burdened
with ore, they sweated blood. They were whipped and lashed. The King had sworn to protect the Indians. There were judges specially appointed to hear their suits, but still they suffered miserably.

Vitallina appeared at the door, carrying the cat.

“What was it, Vitallina, that you told me about Juana’s brother?”

“That Juana had given him money to buy his way out of service, but that a card trickster cheated him out of it.”

“I want you to—”

Vitallina turned and took the cat to the counter against the wall. She held the struggling animal in one hand, spilled the gummy substance from the vial onto the counter, poked the point of a knife into it, and thrust the knife into the cat’s paw. Its limbs went immediately stiff; it made one small, desperate gasp and died.

Monica gasped, too. At the suddenness. She gripped her arms across her chest. One hand went to her throat. “But—What—”

“It is called curare. The Indians along the great Brazilian river make it. For hunting.”

The hand on Monica’s throat tightened. “But I ate some.”

“It does not kill that way. Only on the tip of a knife or a dart.”

Monica stared at the flails. Those barbs. “Come with me. We must find Juana.”

“Most of the maids are in the choir for a service.”

Monica scooped the poison back into the vial and took it with her. They hurried across the rear cloister and up the narrow stairs. Monica pulled her veil over her face as she reached the top. Unlike the old thick-walled churches with their single narrow nave and octagonal altars, this new church was in the form of a cross, with a dome over the altar. The convent choir overlooked one of the arms of the cross. The heavily decorated dome soared gold and gorgeous above them. The great stone
arches echoed with a “Dies Irae” being sung for Hippolyta by her father’s Indians. The girl’s funeral was to take place the following morning.

The maids of the convent chanted with them. One, no more than a child, sobbed softly as she tried to sing. Monica touched her shoulder as she scanned their bowed heads.

Juana was not there.

They found her in the maids’ dormitory, spinning vicuña yarn with a drop spindle. Piles of wool, pale yellowish brown, gray, black, lay on the floor near her feet.

Confronted with a murderer, Monica could not speak. Her racing mind stumbled. She held up the vial with the poison wad at the bottom.

The arm with the spindle dropped to Juana’s side. Her eyes glanced toward the box under her bed. Recognition dawned in her bright, black eyes. Vitallina’s powerful hands closed on her shoulders.

“We know,” Monica said simply. “Tell me how this came to be.”

“There is a snake,” Juana said, “a huge black snake in the mountain. It has a flat head and fiery eyes, and it causes the earth to shake and cave in.”

It was as if Juana had started to speak a language Monica did not understand. She pulled Vitallina’s arms away and backed Juana into the corner. “What are you talking about? What does this have to do with those poor dead girls?”

Juana sank to the floor and sobbed, “Pachamama, now the Spanish will kill me.”

“You can have sanctuary here,” Vitallina murmured consolingly. “Just tell us what you know. Help us help the Abbess.”

The anguish fled from Juana’s face. “Sanctuary. Will you grant me sanctuary?”

“Yes,” Monica said. The Abbess would say yes. She was sure of that. “Tell me. Tell me quickly what you have done.”

“I put the poison on the flail.”

“But why? Why would you kill those girls?”

Juana stared at them for a long time, but she did not answer.

“Tell me, and I will do anything I can to save your life.” Monica was not sure she could keep such a promise or that she really wanted to. This woman had murdered Inez and Hippolyta. Monica had to extract the information she needed.

Juana stammered and finally said, “I killed Inez because of what she did to Sor Eustacia.”

“What do you mean?” Monica demanded.

Vitallina put out her hand. “The maids have all known that Inez seduced Eustacia. The maids know everything.”

Monica’s mouth gaped. Her hand rose as if to slap Juana but stopped in midair.

Juana cowered. “She ruined the life of the kindest sister in the convent. I put the poison on the flail because I knew she would use it and kill herself. She loved the flail. She was evil.”

“Did you punish Hippolyta, too?” Monica asked. “Why did she have to die?”

“I did not mean for her to die,” the Indian woman said. “I did not know she would take Inez’s flail and use it on herself.”

“Do not leave this room,” Monica said. “I will be back. Vitallina, stay here and make sure she does not leave. But first, I must speak to you in the corridor.”

When they were out of earshot of the maid, Monica asked, “Do you believe that she did this?”

“Oh yes,” Vitallina said. “I believe that she meant to kill Inez, but I do not believe her reason.”

“Neither do I.”

PADRE JUNIPERO STOOD in the reception parlor of the monastery of San Augustín, gazing up at the statue by Gaspar de la Cueva of Christ bound to the column. It seemed sculpted by angelic rather than human hands—the kind of statue that might perform miracles. Perform one for me, he prayed to it. Help me save the Abbess.

Fray Vincente entered the room and embraced him. “I have seen the Abbess. She has been taken by the Tribunal.”

“I know. It is the gossip on every street corner.”

“She asked for me to go and confess her, but instead she gave me messages. She told me to tell you to go to the Alcalde and to—”

“I cannot,” Junipero said. “The Alcalde’s friends are trying to kill me.”

Vincente’s eyes clouded over.

“I must speak to the actor Sebastian,” Junipero said.

The portly man frowned. “I am sorry, my friend, but he is not here.”

“Not here? You let him go?” Vincente had the soul of a saint and the intelligence of a wood-and-gesso statue.

“He told me you were finished with him. He was truthful about his origins. Why would he lie about that?”

“Do you know where he went?”

“He promised that if I did not denounce him to the Inquisition, he would leave Potosí and go east to Brazil. But I doubt he has left yet. He was going to try to find a smuggler to travel with.”

Junipero’s fingers went to his lips. “I have to see him before he leaves. I must hurry. But listen. I have an idea what the Abbess suspects. You must go to find Gemita de la Morada and tell her that I said she may be in danger. Tell her to go to the house of Tovar. I will find her there.” He turned to the door immediately.