Mexico (82 page)

"How much, senora?" When the keeper of the stall gave a price less than a dollar in American money, Clay said: "I'll take it," and since it was not customary in the plaza for such a purchase to be wrapped, he continued his stroll with the big doll under his arm.

He had gone only a short distance when he heard his name, and turning around he found himself face-to-face with Senora Echeverria and her daughter. In that moment Alicia understood why my grandfather had bought this doll, and she gave Jubal a comforting smile as if to say: I was impressed with you, also. Jubal, realizing that he had betrayed his secret infatuation, felt blood rushing to his face and tried to hide his doll in his arms, but Alicia laid her hand gently on his arm and said: "It's a handsome doll, Senor Clay, and it does look like me when I was her age," and she looked at her daughter, who smiled at the American.

The next months at the Mineral were depressing. Work did not move ahead as planned, production lagged and repairs were not made after Jubal had identified weak spots. Also, he was agitated by the presence of the China Poblana in his quarters and mortified that he had revealed his secret to Alicia. The doll became a self-inflicted wound reminding him that he had lost an important part of any decent life: partnership with a person of the opposite sex.

Clay felt that his spirits might be lifted if he could at least improve the situation at the mine, and it occurred to him that if he could get two trained mechanics he could fix everything required. He remembered the group of Confederate exiles in the churchyard in Mexico City, and consulting with the Palafoxes, he promised them: "If one of you will go to that little church in the capital--it'll be easy to find--and bring me two good American mechanics ..."

"Why don't you go?" they asked, and he found himself riding to Queretaro and taking the train to Mexico City, but when he located the church where the Confederates had once assembled, he found them gone. Locals he interrogated told him that the Americans now congregated in a series of cantinas, and when he visited those bars he learned that the good workers had found jobs right away, while the others were still waiting for money from the Southern states and still getting drunk each night.

"Where could I find two good mechanics?" Clay asked, and the prospect of steady work was so inviting to the more responsible of the Confederates that several who'd held good jobs in the Old South wanted Clay to consider them. He picked two men, one from South Carolina and the other from Alabama, whom he felt he could trust, and his taking them to Toledo began the influx of Confederate expatriates that clustered about the Mineral. The two men Jubal hired proved excellent workmen, who in time married local women and raised children who spoke, acted and looked like average Mexicans. Such families, in turn, attracted other Confederates until the area contained numerous veterans, all of whom considered Jubal Clay their informal leader and spokesman since he had been a colonel in America and a foreman in Mexico.

When the families were settled, the men, none of whom had American wives, used to meet occasionally to talk about their activities during the war. Some had been at Gettysburg, others at the devastation of Antietam, but all found grim satisfaction in hearing what Colonel Clay had done in those incredible minutes at Cold Harbor or in the burning of Chambersburg, for as one of the men who had ridden with Jeb Stuart on his impetuous raids said: "Sometimes we won."

These men were disgusted when in 1869 they heard that General Grant had been installed as president because it reminded them that he had always been destined to win. But one Confederate--they never called themselves ex-Confederates, for they would consider themselves to be on active duty till they died--a man with a theological background, consoled his companions: "It proves to me that God really is a Confederate." When a man slow to catch on asked: "What do you mean?" the theologian said: "God is finally punishing the North. Giving them Grant for a president. He'll ruin the country the way he wasted his army."

Gradually this cadre of loyalists surrendered the dream that they might one day return to take up arms against the North, but some vowed that if Canada ever decided to march south, they would flock back to help. Jubal's Southern patriotism flagged somewhat when a newcomer brought shocking news: "General Early has left Canada, accepted a presidential pardon and is now serving as front man for a group of gamblers in New Orleans." Refusing to believe this of his former leader, Clay kept making inquiries till he learned from a reliable source: "Yes, the two generals, Beauregard and Early, are working for a gang of gamblers in Louisiana, but it ain't as bad as it sounds. They been appointed by the state to see the lottery is kept honest. Couldn't find two better guarantees than names like Beauregard and Early."

No matter how hard he worked at the Mineral, Jubal could not lessen his infatuation with Alicia, but history now removed her from his presence. Major Echeverria had associated himself with the rising fortunes of Porfirio Diaz, whom the Palafox men had supported for years, and who showed promise of correcting the excesses perpetrated by the Indian president, Benito Juarez. Now Diaz was about to make his move to stabilize the nation, and Echeverria went with him, taking his wife and family to Mexico City.

But as Alicia left Toledo she did a somewhat surprising thing: when she looked at the China Poblana dress that four generations of girls in her family had treasured, she impulsively wrapped it and attached a hastily penned note: "Senor Clay, you are a dear, loyal man whom we all appreciate. I pray that you will find yourself a good wife and much happiness. This dress is a remembrance. Alicia Palafox Echeverria." Handing the package to one of the family's Indian servants, she said: "Take this to the Mineral and leave it in the room of Senor Clay," and she went off to the capital.

When my grandfather returned to his quarters, he told his family later: "I wondered what this gift could be, because the note was inside. When I opened it and saw the colorful dress I was still confused. But then I read the letter." He never told his family what he had made of Alicia's strange gesture, but I at least know what he did, because I still retain proof. He went to an Indian wood-carver and asked him to make a sturdy doll, the size of an eight-year-old girl. When it was delivered he dressed it in the China Poblana dress, and the doll stayed with him till he died. My father, John Clay, then kept it, and I have it in my apartment in New York.

Alicia's prayer, which Grandfather interpreted as a command that he find himself a wife, arrived at a time when he, too, had begun to think about this, for his Confederate friends who had married Mexican girls were constant proof that even when the Rebel was Protestant and his bride Catholic, a strong union could result. And just at this time, circumstances developed that required him to see more and more of Maria de la Caridad. No longer a teenager--she was now twenty-four--she had tired of climbing the perilous steps more often than was absolutely necessary and she had taken to sleeping now and then in the lowest cavern, down with the donkeys and the Indian men who elected to remain there permanently. One such man, Elpidio, who had not seen sunlight in years, explained when she asked why he never climbed up: "If the priest sends me here and if Senor Clay makes me work so hard, they have taken the sun from me and I don't give a damn when I die."

This bitter lament so distressed her that the following night she took Elpidio's complaint to Senor Clay, and as he listened to her report of how the Indian men lived in that bottom cavern he began to question the slave-owning mentality he had brought with him from Virginia. For some weeks he did nothing about it, contenting himself with visiting the caverns each day and inspecting the tragic conditions in which the brown
-
skinned men labored. But one evening as he was about to climb the appallingly inadequate stairway, he felt invisible hands clutching at his throat, and at each step upward the strangulation became more real, until he halted in the topmost cavern, one abandoned more than a century before. Here he formed the self-incriminating judgment: On the day we send them into this mine, we condemn them to death! It was a moment fraught with overwhelming guilt.

The next morning he told the Palafoxes: "There are engines now that can haul a cage up out of the mine loaded with ore and lower it back down with men. to work the ore. We mus
t u
se those, no matter the cost." They agreed, and were pleased when he added: "And they have a new wire rope in place of the bulky manila hemp."

Immediately Clay drew the specifications for a cage capable of negotiating the diameter of the existing shaft, and where the stone sides were close together he appointed workmen to cut away protruding stone. In this way he created one of the first humane mines in Mexico. During this hectic time when the engine was being installed and the diameter widened he saw a good deal of Caridad, who helped by supervising the traffic on the stairs that were soon to be abandoned. He found her extremely quick in comprehending his orders and helpful in explaining Indian traditions and preferences to the other Confederates, so that by the time the new system was installed he and Caridad had achieved such rapport in working together that she became in effect his assistant.

When the conversion was completed and the new engine from England, appropriately called a donkey, was bringing ore above ground and taking workers down, he arranged two celebrations: a fancy one in the House of Tile attended by local officials, friends of the Palafoxes and a mariachi orchestra; and a much quieter get-together of the Confederates, including any living in the area, whether they worked at the Mineral or not. Jubal, aware that many Mexican wives would be present, invited Caridad to attend--he wanted to show his gratitude for the help she had given.

The highlight of the Confederates' party was a report from a Baptist clergyman from Alabama who was quietly proselytizing for Protestantism among the devout Catholic Indians: "Wonderful news from the North," he said. "Their President Grant is proving to be the most corrupt, stupid and inadequate leader they've ever had. A thieving ass." After the cheering, a man from an important family in North Carolina asked with mock grief: "Why didn't he show those attributes when he was fighting us?"

Jubal saw how easily the Mexican wives fitted into the gathering, speaking freely, making jokes, teasing their voluble husbands. One wife who had become proficient in English said: "When I listen to you muchachos I find it difficult to remember that you lost the war." Her husband snapped: "But we took care of you paisanos in 1848," and everyone cheered.

As the party ended, Caridad took Jubal aside and said bitterly in her broken English: "Always the same. You give big party for Palafoxes, mariachi band. You give one for Americans, lots of beer. But nobody do nothing for Indians--we do all the work. You saw it," she stormed. "You not ashamed?"

He was ashamed, but as a Virginia planter he was astounded that a woman who was virtually a slave with a different skin color should have talked to him so bluntly and on a subject so out of line with customary practice. Of course, on his plantation when a job was well done he might have given the slaves a side of beef, and maybe Zephania would have helped her cooks bake some pecan pies, but no slave would ever have demanded any of this--least of all a woman. But the idea was so clearly right that he was humbled. He clasped her hand and said: "You're right in what you say. I need your help." And then he added: "And I need you, too," to which she whispered: "Yes, you do."

At first they did not get married. Quietly she moved into his quarters and cleaned the place. In the following days each of his two main Confederate workmen, accosting him separately, said: "You'll never regret it," and the two wives told Caridad with considerable firmness: "Learn English."

Their marriage took place in one of the cathedral's ornate chapels, not in the outdoor chapel, where the Indians had attended rites during the rule of the first Palafox bishops, and in due course they had a son, who would become my father. In naming him John, Jubal said: "I've always hated my name, that Old Testament stuff. And I think the names Mexicans give their boy babies are worse: Hilario, Alipio, Candido. I want the simplest name there is. Sam would be good, but the women would call him Samuel. Maybe John. It's biblical too, but people forget that," and John it was.

When Jubal was older he received a surprising letter from the Cold Harbor post office. It was from Grace Clay Shallcross and said that to her delight, her husband, an important lawyer with government connections thanks to his having been an aide to General Grant, had saved his salary, taken her back to the land she owned at Newfields and built there a replica, no, an improved version, of the old plantation house. The letter ended: "Your spirit dominates the place, Father, the same fields, the same crops, many of the same Negroes but working for wages now. Please come home and help us enjoy it."

Caridad, who could now read English easily, appreciated the grave threat this letter was to her and did not protest when he burned it without taking down the new address, nor would his son, John, ever visit the place, nor John's son, myself.

The act of Jubal's that had the most lasting effect on Toledo--for in time the silver mine petered out and all he achieved there was lost--was something he did in the 1890s, when he was an old man. While attending the spring fiesta in the plaza it occurred to him that this affair could be made much grander, so he hurried to the Palafox mansion and he and the Palafox men, all very old, made ambitious plans for the next fiesta: "We could have a Tournament of Flowers, for all the poets of the region. There'd be dancers from Oaxaca in their colorful costumes. We could build thirty stalls, all the same size, and store them from year to year." They gave full rein to their imagination, because they knew they would not see many more fiestas. The main innovative idea came from Don Alipio: "My Palafox bulls have become the best in Mexico, no contest. The city wants to make our plaza bigger. We'll help them. And to make the fiesta real, we'll have three grand bullfights, Friday, Saturday, Sunday." Jubal said: "We'll give a hundred-peso prize to the best mariachi band." The men liked the idea, but the Palafoxes who handled funds asked: "Where will we get the hundred pesos?" and Jubal said: "From me. Do you know what my name means in the Bible? The father of all who play the harp and flute." One of the men pointed out: "No harps or flutes in a mariachi band," and Jubal retorted: 'Those trumpets make up for them."