Mexico (89 page)

Hispanic custom being what it is, the producers of such an entertainment faced a difficult decision: "Do we give it at eight in the evening before the public eats dinner at eleven? Or do we give it at one in the morning, after the spectators have eaten?" The Altomec poet had wisely decided on the latter, since he realized that his audience would be excited after the ending of the bullfight and would be so engaged in festivities that they would not want to sit still to hear his performance. It would start at one.

This delay gave me time to watch evening shadows come creeping over the plaza, and it was as if each degree of gathering darkness brought out its own accompaniment of mariachi bands, for one by one they appeared in various quarters of the plaza and the surrounding streets, until they seemed like a gathering of chattering birds, each singing its own song.

As their music grew, I found deep pleasure in just sitting there and watching events in the plaza and on the Terrace. When the Widow Palafox bustled past checking that tables were properly set for the evening meal, I thought: How reassuring it is to see the continuity of ordinary behavior, and as if to demonstrate the truth of this comment, Don Eduardo stopped by to spread lies about his six bulls for the morrow: "Precious, Don Norman, I assure you, if the matadors are equal to the task of making them conform." For the last twenty Ixmiq festivals he had been saying that about his bulls, even when he knew that at best they were only marginal. But as I started to laugh at this fraudulent spiel I remembered how many times in past decades some Palafox bull whom the experts had dismissed as marginal had come storming into an arena and torn the place apart. It did not pay ever to laugh at Don Eduardo--or his bulls.

Sitting momentarily at my table he surprised me by asking: "Norman, do you ever miss Magdalena?"

Since he was referring to one of his nieces, a fine Palafox girl to whom I'd been married for five years, I felt I must speak well of her, but doing so was not difficult because she had been a good wife: "When I'm in the States I almost feel as if I'd never known her. But here in Toledo--looking at the plaza where we courted--my heart could break with longing."

He sighed, for he too remembered Magdalena, one of the best Palafox women of her generation, but now an exile in Madrid: "You should seriously consider, Norman, flying to Madrid and bringing her back to Toledo. And while you're about it, why not bring yourself back?" Since there was nothing I could say, he shrugged, rose and continued his wandering among the tables.

When the two Oklahoma women came onto the Terrace for dinner, I invited them to join me and I quickly saw that young Penny was still grieving over the loss of her matador, for her red eyes showed that she had been weeping. But such regrets ended when Le
o
n Ledesma came up from the plaza, halted dramatically as he drew his cape around him, and studied the scene as if deciding whether it would be worth his while to mingle with us. His mind was made up by Mrs. Evans, who called: "Senor Critic, what did you write about today's performances?"

"Do you really want to hear?" he asked as he joined us, and without waiting for an answer, for it was obvious that he wanted to show off, he said: "Of the divine Conchita I wrote: 'She bade farewell to Toledo and our hearts with the wonderful grace she has always had, and we wept as she departed.' "

"But what did you say of her performance?" Mrs. Evans asked, and he snapped: "A real critic never bothers with rejoneadors, male or female. I indicated that I loved her, didn't I?"

"And Calesero?"

"A man of honor. A distinguished citizen of Aguascalientes, one of my favorite cities, and a man who can be very good with the cape, but not too good with the kill. Of such men whom I hold in esteem I have two code words, detalles, details, and pinceladas, delicate brushstrokes. To see Calesero give three of his wonderful passes to a real bull is better than watching some clown have good luck with a compliant one."

"And Pepe Luis Vasquez? I felt respect for that young man."

"And so you should. He's one of those honest workmen who brings basic credit to the art of bullfighting. Always dependable. With him you're sure to see honorable effort, and when he gets a good animal, he wins ears because the heart of the audience is with him. In respecting him, Senora Evans, you become a true aficionada. But what do you suppose I wrote about our newcomer, Don Fermin?"

"Did he pay you?"

"Adequately. My words read better in Spanish. More poetic, more resonant," and he proceeded to read his commentary on Fermin with such dramatic force that she had to stop him: "My Spanish isn't good enough. I don't understand a word you're saying."

"With what I write sometimes it's better that way," he said and folded the paper. "What I said was that this young man has a future as promising as Armillita's or Gaona's at a similar age." When I gasped, for these were two of Mexico's greatest, he snapped peevishly: "I didn't say he was as great. Only that he had a chance to be."

"And if he doesn't pay you next time?" Mrs. Evans asked
,
and he replied: "Then I say: 'Despite the great promise he showed at Toledo, it's now clear that he's a zero, has not fulfilled his potential, no class at all.' "

Mrs. Evans, enjoying the preposterous exhibitionism of this sardonic man, asked: "Will you be coming with us to the pageant tonight?" and he dismissed her with a sneer: "I loathe amateur theatrics." He delivered the Spanish word for loathe in four long-drawn-out syllables, aborrezco, but then he bowed to the two women and said: "However, to accompany you would be so pleasant that I shall be here to escort you." And he too wandered off.

During the leisurely meal electric lights throughout the plaza were turned off, and in the momentary darkness men ran with flaming brands to light a multitude of torches, devices constructed of some kind of long-burning wick drawing from a reservoir of oil contained in a can. To see these torches emerge like a host of fireflies on a summer night was a return to childhood innocence. The plaza suddenly became so enchanting that whatever might happen at the pageant would be touched with magic.

It was now toward one in the morning, and I watched the crowd beginning to drift toward the improvised stands facing the cathedral where a built-up wooden stage merged easily with the entry steps to the church. This enabled the eight pillars to be used as part of the scene, and the great doors to be opened and closed as the action required. Thus the entire church would be part of the presentation.

The Widow Palafox came through warning her patrons: "Better start for the cathedral or you'll miss the opening," whereupon Ledesma returned to our table, extended his right arm to Mrs. Evans, his left to Penny, and started the procession through the plaza. Don Eduardo and I trailed behind, arriving at the cathedral just in time to take the seats that had been reserved for us, with Don Eduardo, Ledesma and Penny in the front row, Mrs. Evans and me off to one side in the second. I was not unhappy about this arrangement, for it allowed me an opportunity before the play started to speak about Penny, in whom my interest had grown.

"She seems an admirable girl," I said. "Perhaps a bit raw about the edges, but--"

"Tulsa-raw. When it matures you can get a very powerful person."

"Has she that possibility?"

For some moments she pondered this, then said: 'The way she's handled her father recently makes me think so. She's been more mature than I could have been," and she told me how the confrontation had developed. "Ed came home one day while Penny was still in school. Needing a tool he could not find, he suspected it might be in her room. When he got there he didn't find it, but he did see on the wall a big four-color poster of the kind high school kids enjoy. This one showed a fifteen-year-old red-headed nymphet barely clothed, and the caption:

Sure, blondes have more fun, But redheads have it more often.

"He left it there, but when she came home he asked: 'Does that mean what I think it means?' and she said: 'Sure, if you have a dirty mind.' Again he said nothing, but the next day when she returned from school the poster was missing.

"She was outraged: 'I thought we had an agreement you wouldn't trespass on my room,' and he said quietly: 'That's not the kind of sign to be looking at just before you go to sleep.' She had the sense to surrender: 'You might be right, Dad,' and the flash point was avoided.

"But a few days later she told him: 'When the Haggards and Mrs. Evans go down to Mexico next month, I'm going along.'

" 'Not without my permission.'

" 'I'm going, Dad. Don't let's make a big deal of it.'

" 'Why in hell would you want to go to Mexico?'

" 'Because last Sunday's paper said that the Festival of Ixmiq in the little town of Toledo was a highlight of the season.'

" 'Why would you bother with a Mexican festival? It's a backward country to begin with.'

" 'Because they have bullfights, and I'd like to meet a matador.'

"At this poor Ed exploded, called me in as Penny's unofficial guardian and asked, with both of us sitting there: 'Elsie, what's gotten into this child? She wants to drive to Mexico with you to see if she can meet a matador,' and I said: 'When I was her age I was burning to meet John Barrymore.' An
d t
hen I added: 'Ed, the obligation of a child is not to make his or her parents happy.'

" 'That's a hell of a rule. What is her obligation?'

" 'To develop into a mature woman, with character. To be herself.' It was hard to do, but I told Ed that I thought if my son had had more personal gumption he might be alive today. But when my husband died, poor Peter felt he had to remain home and look after me. I told him: 'Ed. If you want to keep her, let her go. Unless you want her to grow up to be one more oil heiress making a damn fool of herself in New York and Paris.' "

"How did he take that?" I asked, and she said: "He kissed me and said: 'Off we go to Mexico, if I can take it.' Obviously, as you saw, he couldn't. He fled." She chuckled: "So there beside Senor Ledesma we have a young lady who is developing a very strong character. Mexico's been good for her--and for me, too. I needed it as much as she did."

At this point the mariachis ended their overture with a blare of trumpets, after which the one-armed Altomec poet, dressed in the flimsy clothing of a peon, came out from the cathedral, walked down the steps and took center stage, where he declaimed:

"This is the House of God Built by the Bishops Palafox. Here is where the laws of God Were promulgated.

Here we worshiped for four hundred years
,
Here we were baptized.

Here we were married

Here we paid our tithes

It was a holy place."

Suddenly, from inside the cathedral came three separate groups of three men each dressed in simple black robes and wailing antiphonally, first one group then another:

PRIESTS: We are the three of Toledo.

Now from the front rows of the audience came the heavy voices of two dozen men and women in the peon costume representing the people not only of Toledo but of all Mexico. Their combined voices had great authority:

ALL THE We are three priests of Toledo.

PRIESTS:

PEOPLE: May their souls rest in peace.

FIRST PRIEST: We served God and the people of Mexico, as we were instructed.

PEOPLE: May their souls rest in peace.

SECOND We brought mercy to the people, we PRIEST: brought justice.

PEOPLE: These three good men instructed us, they baptized us. And at the hour of death they sped us into the arms of God.

THIRD PRIEST: We are the three who were assassinated against these walls.

At this each group went to a part of the fa?ade at which the executions of 1914 had taken place, as the mariachi musicians played mournful notes:

PEOPLE: May their souls rest in peace, may these good men find eternal peace.

While the priests remained in their positions against the wall, the music became martial, the marching songs I had sung with my grandmother during the Revolution, "Adfelita" and "Jesusita en Chihuahua," while from behind the cathedral came a large group of soldiers in tattered uniforms:

SOLDIERS: We are the brave soldiers who saved the city of Toledo.

PEOPLE: May they be awarded medals.

SOLDIERS: For eleven bitter years we fought to save Mexico, and our wives knew us not, our sons were not born.

PEOPLE: Across the barren fields they fought, on the outskirts of the city they skirmished, and they died as they were commanded.

SOLDIERS: But we are also the ones who burned Toledo, who destroyed the cathedral in which we march tonight.

PEOPLE: May their souls rest in peace, the peace they never knew.

SOLDIERS: We are the firing squad that murdered the priests here against the wall, as we were commanded.

PEOPLE: Merciful God, forgive them.

Eight of the soldiers now detached themselves from the body, raised their rifles, and formed a firing squad to murder the priests. An officer took charge, raised his sword as we awaited the volley, then dropped it ... in silence. And although there was no explosion of gunfire, the priests fell. I think we were pleased that we had been spared the sound of real bullets; it was only make-believe.