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chapter 16
The summer rains eventually came to an end, but no sooner had the autumn dry season got started, than foul weather set in. Snow covered the upper slopes of Mount Tancítaro, and down here in Uruapan there was rarely a clear sky. Cold rain either poured or drizzled all day long. A damp wind cut through my clothing as I trudged through the streets with Cuauhtémoc. I held him inside my jacket to share the warmth as gray clouds hid the sun.
The unceasingly bad weather went on for days, then lasted weeks. Sports events and other public events were canceled, crops ruined, roads and bridges washed out.
I'd suspended my field work on the malpaís. It had been easy enough to deal with the daily summer cloudbursts, but this constant rain and dampness made field work miserable. And the cold! I'd never suffered so much from the cold in my life, not even during the notorious Minnesota winters. That was because houses back there were built for it and equipped with furnaces. Here in the tropics the stoves were only for cooking, and most of those weren't inside.
"Usually it's dry and warm at this time of year," Chayo said. We were in Aunt Rosario's shop, huddled next to a small kerosene heater, the only one I'd seen so far in this town. Cuauhtémoc also sat close to the heater, watching Chayo threading a button.
"When did you last see an autumn like this?" I asked.
"Never."
"Never before? Maybe Ragnarøk is approaching," I said with a grin.
"Ragnarøk? Something in Norse tradition?"
"It's the cataclysmic event that brings about the end of the world," I said. "I guess they used to talk about it back in Viking times. It's in the Edda."
"Tell me about it."
"The sun turns black. Animals die. People die. There's drought, famine, war. Even Asgarð comes under attack and cannot withstand it."
"Do you think it'll happen?" she said, looking up from her sewing.
"It's just a myth," I said.
"Is it?" she said. "All around us people are abusing the earth, polluting the land, the water and the sky. Surely this cannot go on for long."
The thought disturbed me. "I don't know," I said. "I had a friend who was majoring in meteorology. His concern had to do with the effects of greenhouse gases and the possibility of climate change. Well, it's something that should be looked into, but I don't think humanity is in any imminent danger."
"Okay," said Chayo, "how does this look?" She laid her needle and thread to the side and held up her completed product. It was a small vest for Cuauhtémoc.
"Here, help me put it on him," she said.
I tried to do as she directed, but without success. The bird squirmed, flapped his wings and then darted off to hide under a cabinet. Perhaps he preferred to endure the cold rather than wear a vest.
"Don't be like that," Chayo said, speaking gently to him. "I made this to keep you warm. Be a good bird and let me try it on you."
The bird looked at her, then came out from his hiding place. She set him on her lap, and he held still as she slipped his wings through the arm holes of the vest and buttoned it up.
Chayo had a way with animals. She'd speak to cows and horses, and even raccoons, and they'd respond as though they wished to please her. I'd seen it before, and it fascinated me to watch. Cuauhtémoc did, of course, adore her, but, even so, I considered it amazing. Most amazing of all was the fact that he never crapped on the floor at her place.
"See! He likes it." Chayo stepped back to admire her work as the bird strutted about in his new vest. It was of blue cloth with three bright red buttons down the front. He looked so handsome that I had to smile.
I returned to Don Pablo's hotel, and went to dinner with my smartly attired chicken. I perched him in his usual place on the backrest of the chair next to me for all to see and admire.
Some grinned and others gaped as they entered the dining room. Probably none of them had ever before seen a bird wearing a dinner jacket.
"Did Chayo make that?" Doña Josefina asked, and the others also commented on it. Someone remarked that in the United States there were even clothing shops for pets, and another person asked if Chayo hadn't lived in the US.
"Yes, she spent some years in California," doña Josefina said, and don Pablo said, "She must've become North Americanized."
Everyone chuckled.
"Speaking of the United States, there's a letter for you," said don Pablo and gave it to me.
It was from MacClayne; it bore a US postage stamp and the return address was San Francisco, California. Without waiting, I opened it and read the opening paragraph:
Olaf,
We have had an enormous amount of rain here in San Francisco. I hate the goddamn rain. Since I was able to crawl I have been crawling south toward the equator where the sun always shines and there is no grey fog, no gloomy mist, no frost, no sleet. No snow. No glum rain. . . . .
"Is it from your friend who's coming to visit you?" Doña Josefina asked.
"Yes, he's looking forward to tropical sunshine."
Everyone laughed.
"When is he due to arrive?" Don Pablo asked.
I quickly read through the rest of the letter. "Next week, according to this."
"I'll reserve a room for him," Don Pablo said.
A couple of rooms were vacant and there was hardly any need to make reservations. It was Don Pablo's way of saying that my friend would be welcome.
"¿Es huerito?" <¿Is he a blond guy?>, Don Pablo asked with his usual good-humored grin, "Like you and Huero Marco?"
"Not any more," I said, "I don't know what color his hair was in years past, but nowadays he's totally gray."
"Does he have blue eyes?" Don Pablo asked.
"That he does," I said.
Doña Josefina assured me that would qualify MacClayne as "huerito."
I told them more about MacClayne, his poetry, his travels to many lands, his having been a war veteran and later a seaman in the merchant marine.
"World War II?" Huero Marco, who was something of a history buff, looked up. "Do you know anything of the battles he might have been in?"
"He hasn't told me a lot about his war experiences," I said. "But I know he was on a ship which was sunk during the battle of Normandy. Later he saw the liberation of Paris. They had quite a celebration afterward. Champagne was flowing in the streets."
"Does he speak Spanish?" everyone wanted to know.
"Some," I said, "But I don't know how much."
Then Carlos asked if my friend knew about the bad weather we were having. I wondered about that myself. In my last letter I had of course told MacClayne about the incessant rain, describing it in great detail, but perhaps he underestimated the severity. Did he really believe that the tropics was a paradise where the sun was always shining? As a sailor he'd been in the tropics numerous times, and he'd certainly been in México before, in Veracruz. But perhaps he'd never seen anything like this storm.
* * *
The next afternoon Chayo was planning to go to Los Reyes on an errand. Los Reyes was a not too distant town over on the north-western side of snow-covered Mount Tancítaro. She'd be gone for the evening and would return the next day, so I went to see her off and say goodbye to her.
I entered the tall door of the shop, and found her almost ready to leave. "You haven't been to Los Reyes before. Maybe you'd like to come with me," she said.
We left Cuauhtémoc in the care of her aunt, and headed off down the rainy street to the depot. On the way, we stopped at a small store, just long enough for me to pick up a tooth brush. We arrived as the bus was about to leave. The bus route took us up the hillside overlooking Uruapan, and followed the road past several Indian villages as well as Volcán Paricutín and many older cinder cones, but the rain was splashing down and we couldn't see them very well.
Darkness was falling as we arrived in Los Reyes. We got off the bus, unfolded our umbrellas, and made our way down the street to a restaurant where we had something to eat, then went to a hotel.
It was a recently built place, constructed of concrete. Though it didn't quite have the charm of an old adobe building, it was nevertheless tastefully designed, and in the courtyard was a well-manicured garden with a row of broad-leafed banana palms. No sooner had we entered than a driving rain began, and there was something inherently romantic about being inside this place on this rainy night.
Chayo put her arms around me and said, "This may be our last chance to spend a night together. Let's not waste a minute of it."
* * *
It was as cold and damp as ever, but it hadn't rained all afternoon, and the sky was clearing for the first time in days when MacClayne appeared at don Pablo's boarding house.
Though I hadn't seen him for some time, he was quite as I remembered him. His gray hair was shoulder-length. Had he dyed it, he would've looked considerably younger, but then he wouldn't have been the MacClayne I knew. It seemed to me that he must've been born looking exactly as he did now, fifty years old with long, gray hair.
He was of medium height, lean and physically fit with powerful arms. His face was deeply tanned, although it might soon fade in this sunless world of eternal rain.
"So this is where you live?" He cast his eye about the courtyard admiringly. "It's just as you described it." Then he grinned and asked, "Where's the rooster?"
I glanced around, called to the bird, then looked in my room, but he wasn't there. "He's got to be here somewhere," I said, a little annoyed that he wasn't around when I wanted to show him off. "You'll see plenty of him later, probably more than you want. Anyway. Have you seen the snow?"
"Snow?" MacClayne looked at me blankly for a moment, then, "On the mountain, you mean? Mount Tancítaro--is that how you pronounce it?"
"You've got it perfect," I said, and noted to myself that MacClayne had obviously read my letters closely. "If we're lucky, we just might be able to catch a glimpse."
We climbed a ladder to the base of the water tank above the roof, and from there we could see the mountain. Auspiciously, the clouds had lifted, and the late afternoon sun painted the snow-capped ridge in glowing reds and lavenders. The mountain was presenting itself in all its beauty and dignity for MacClayne to admire.
"Mount Tancítaro is giving you a special welcome," I said, "This is the first time in days that it's been visible."
"Snow in the tropics. That in itself is impressive," said MacClayne, "And I presume the Fabled City lies somewhere at the foot of it, down in the Valley of Infiernillo."
I nodded in silence, impressed with MacClayne's grasp of the local geography. We watched as the clouds slowly closed in again, like a curtain drawn across the stage at the end of a presentation.
As we descended the ladder, the bird strutted out to meet us, displaying his Aztec plumage.
"And this must be Cuauhtémoc."
"It is," I said proudly.
"Truly a regal bird!" pronounced MacClayne. "And I don't say that lightly."
Then I noticed that the bird was hiccuping suspiciously. There were things I'd not told MacClayne in my letters, and the bird's predilection for alcohol was one. I hoped he wouldn't notice. Trying to pretend that nothing was amiss, I bent down and extended my arm to the bird. He tried to hop up, but spun dizzily, fell off and landed splat on his face. I groaned and explained sheepishly, "He was injured rather badly, you know."
"Yes, I read that in your letter. It was a terribly cruel thing they did to him, using him in cockfights. How is he doing?"
"He's had to learn to fly all over again, but, as you see, he survived. Chayo saved him."
"I'm looking forward to meeting this remarkable woman."
MacClayne excused himself to visit the restroom, and I made use of his absence to scold Cuauhtémoc in a low but firm voice. "Just be glad Chayo didn't see you like this! Now I want you to straighten up and act sober tonight. Got that?"
The bird gave me a bleary-eyed look and hiccuped again.
When MacClayne reappeared, the three of us went to the dining room where the others were by now assembled for dinner.
"Ya tenemos tres hueritos," announced don Pablo, and, turning to me, asked if my friend understood that we had three blondies.
I was wondering that myself. I looked at MacClayne.
MacClayne looked at me.
"Hue-ri-tos," I repeated the word slowly; in a letter I had told him that don Pablo called us "hueritos"--blond guys.
MacClayne's face lit up with a broad smile, and he ran his fingers through his gray hair. "¡Si! ¡soy huero!"
Everyone was delighted.
Then he said to the man, "¿Usted es don Pablo?"
Everyone nodded approvingly and confirmed that he was right.
"¿Y doña Josefina?" MacClayne addressed the lady sitting beside don Pablo.
"Mucho gusto en conocerle," she said, obviously pleased that he knew her name.
"El gusto es mío," MacClayne said. Then, glancing towards the end of the table, he saw a blue-eyed fellow, and said, "¿Usted es Marco? ¿Huero Marco?."
Everyone grinned as Huero Marco affirmed that he was again right.
MacClayne then guessed that a fellow who sat with a guitar at his side must be Domingo. Again he was right. And beside Domingo sat a person with a large black mustache whom MacClayne decided must be Carlos--but it was not Carlos, it was Estefan. But by this time MacClayne had identified enough of the company to have favorably impressed everyone.
"¡Nos conoce!" said the proprietor.
"¡Sí, nos conoce!" Everyone was laughing. "¡Nos conoce!"
MacClayne glanced at me. "They're saying that I know them?"
"Exactly," I said. "And, as you can see, they're impressed."
"Y usted," said don Pablo to MacClayne. "Usted es marinero."
"Sí, soy marinero."
Cuauhtémoc crowed loudly. He was still tipsy, but fortunately nobody seemed to notice.
MacClayne spoke haltingly, but rolled his R's beautifully. His Scottish brogue came through as charmingly in Spanish as it always had in English. Though, as far as I knew, he hadn't studied anything more than a phrase book, he did well with what he had, and what he lacked in linguistic ability, he made up for in charisma and got as much mileage out of his limited vocabulary as any Scotlander ever had out of his carefully accumulated pennies. And what he communicated was a lot of good feeling.
MacClayne was at his best that evening; presenting the Dr. Jekyll side of his personality, and his arrival was a social success. Even Cuauhtémoc seemed favorably impressed, though I feared it might be that the bird was glad to have someone he somehow recognized as a fellow alcoholic.
At the end of the meal, Domingo took up his guitar and sang several tunes, some of them in English.
MacClayne was starting to look very tired, barely able to keep his eyes open. I knew myself what an intense effort is required to communicate in an unfamiliar language, and he had also probably missed a night's sleep on the way down here.
"I'm going to see Chayo this evening," I said. "If you're up to it, she'd like to meet you, or, if not, then maybe tomorrow."
MacClayne opted for the morrow. Don Pablo and I showed him to his room, which, like mine, had a majestically tall ceiling and thick whitewashed adobe walls. Cuauhtémoc accompanied us in, and, naturally, he crapped on the floor. Perhaps that was the bird's way of saying that he felt comfortable around MacClayne. I cleaned up the mess.
After a tired nod of approval of the room, MacClayne said good night. I bundled up Cuauhtémoc, who had by now sobered up, and set out for El Café Chino. Chayo was already there, and the bird leapt into her arms.
She stroked the bird gently and asked, "Did your friend arrive today?"
"He's resting up from his trip," I said.
"Do the two of you still plan to go to Apatzingán?"
"We didn't get around to talking about it," I said.
Chayo already had her coffee. I ordered a cup for myself, and, after the waitress had gone, I said, "I guess you still feel apprehensive about this excursion to Apatzingán."
"I've thought a lot about it," she said slowly. "And I've decided that it would be wrong for me to discourage you from going there."
"But you would still prefer that I didn't go?"
"Olaf, I'm not saying that."
"You seem to be implying it."
"Olaf, you are not understanding me at all." She sounded slightly irritated. Cuauhtémoc looked up, first at her, then at me and let out a cluck. "Pobrecito," said Chayo turning her attention to the bird and stroking his feathers. For a short while we sat in silence and she took my hand in hers. "It pains me to see you go," she said at last.
"Just for a couple of days?" I said in surprise. Chayo was such a self-sufficient person. I couldn't believe she couldn't do without me for such a short time. "Or is it something else?" I added.
"Something else," she said. "There is something else."
I wondered what she was talking about. Then I thought of the evening at Los Reyes when she'd said that might be our last chance to spend a night together. Somehow it had stuck in my mind in a disturbing sort of way. Had she meant that something was going to separate us? I wanted to ask her, but not here in this crowded café. At that moment my coffee arrived. I took a sip but realized I didn't really want it then. I said, "Can we go and sit by the Huatapera?"
It wasn't raining as we crossed the plaza to the Huatapera, but a puddle of water lay on every flat surface, so rather than sit on the stone fountain as we usually did, we sat on the veranda of the ancient building, under the overhanging roof. We both had warm jackets, but the evening was chilly and we huddled close together. Cuauhtémoc managed to squeeze in between us.
Chayo ran her fingers through my hair. "You're kind and gentle. You're also smart and educated, and you relate to my world so well." She paused. "But what is our future together? We need to think about it."
It was a subject we'd avoided till now by tacit agreement. "I guess you definitely intend to continue to live in this area," I said.
"Yes. I've been in California and also in many parts of México, but this is where I want to spend my life," she said. "I know you like it here in Michoacán, but how would you feel about staying?"
"I want to be with you," I said, "wherever you are."
"And I want you to be with me," she said. "I would like every day for the rest of my life to be like the days we've spent together, and I'd like every night to be like the one in Los Reyes. These weeks and months have been a romance come true, and I truly think that our feelings could last a lifetime. But, for that to be, you would need to establish a life here that was fulfilling to you in every way."
"You mean like finding employment--"
"That would be part of it. Certainly a very important part of it. But still only part of it," she said. "You also have much yet to learn about México. You've only been here for a few months, and I think you need to know this country better before you make your decision."
"I guess you're saying there's a lot that I need to sort out," I said, a bit reluctantly. "Well, I don't know what to say. I'll have to think about it. I suppose during my trip with MacClayne--"
"How long does he plan to be here?"
"Well, our trip to Apatzingán will only take a couple of days. Of course he'll be here in Uruapan longer than that. We plan on a number of one-day trips to places such as Volcán Paricutín."
"Will he be staying for as much as a month?"
"He might," I said, "depending on how things work out. He's not a guy with a busy schedule, full of appointments to keep."
"Okay, so let me suggest something," she said. "You remember some time ago when I mentioned that I needed to make a trip to Chiapas. I expect it might take several weeks."
"I see. You mean you might take that trip right now, while MacClayne is here?"
"Yes, and you can continue to entertain your friend."
"And when you return, we'll get back together again."
"And then we can talk about this some more," she said. "We're considering the possibility of a lifetime commitment. This is not something we should rush into."
"So," I said at last, "I take it you don't object to my going with MacClayne to Apatzingán?"
She shook her head slowly, regretfully I thought. I sensed that she still had huge reservations about my project. I sat in silence as she mulled it over. Finally she seemed to come to a decision.
"Olaf," she said, "you are one of the most maddeningly quiet persons I know when it comes to you talking about yourself. Sometimes it almost drives me crazy. But still, partly because of that, because you don't try to control me with conversation, you allow me to be myself. You aren't into proving male dominance. You respect my involvement in my own pursuits. You share but don't insist on being in charge all the time. That, for me, is ideal. I couldn't imagine anyone more right for me than you. But I can't control your destiny. That is up to you."
Rain began to fall and I listened to the sound of scattered droplets splashing in the fountain. After a bit I ventured, "Until very recently you did seem to have a premonition about my going to Apatzingán. Would you care to tell me about it?"
"There are times when such questions should not be asked."
"Why not?"
"Because the answers you get may do you no good. Some things are better left unknown."
"How can it ever be better not to know?" I said.
"Think about it, Olaf. The Aztecs knew an important visitor was coming. They even knew the year--1519. It was foreseen and foretold."
"Quetzalcoatl, you mean. The legend of his return."
"So they thought. They would have been far better off had they known absolutely nothing," Chayo explained. "They knew only just barely enough to disarm themselves. To inspire themselves to inaction." Chayo paused, perhaps to let her point sink in, then said, "Of course, the visitor turned out to be Hernán Cortés, not Quetzalcoatl, not a benefactor, but an unconditional, implacable enemy--that was the information the Aztecs needed and didn't have."
"Why didn't they know?" I asked.
Cuauhtémoc watched Chayo intently, paying careful attention to every word she spoke.
"Even the most insightful of seers cannot see everything they need to see. You've read t he New Testament? Then you must know that Jesus expected the Apocalypse to happen very shortly, within the lifetime of his followers. Jesus was a powerful shaman, he could heal the lame and make the blind see and even raise the dead. He was also a sage, but there were things he could not see, and there were things he saw that were not accurate. Sometimes a key bit of information is withheld, or distorted."
"By whom?" I said.
"It's not always clear where the information comes from. Sometimes it's from our spirit guides, but even their knowledge is limited."
"So why should anyone listen to them, then?"
Cuauhtémoc turned his head to look at me, then back towards Chayo.
"You would do better to turn your question around and ask: 'Why should anyone expect them to inform us?'" she said.
"No? Then how should one properly relate to spirit guides?"
"The spirit guides are in a sense like our teachers, except that they don't generally explain things. Instead, they lead us into situations where we can learn, and our lives are like an exam they are giving us. Think of it this way, a teacher may give a few hints during a quiz, but if he were to reveal all the answers, then it would be no test."
I nodded. It was something I'd have to think over.
"I will say it another way," Chayo added. "You are the actor in the drama which is your life. The spirit guides put you on the stage, but they don't write your script. That is for you to do, because you are the protagonist"
"So we are the authors of our own destiny?" I paused, expecting her to affirm that was so, but she said nothing. "You're shaking your head."
"Yes, I'm shaking my head," she replied.
"But I thought that's what you meant."
"You write your script, but, as your script is enacted, it changes, your very words are altered, the ending you chose becoming something very different from what you had intended."
"Do you mean it becomes what it was meant to be in the very first place?
"No, I simply mean it becomes different, something you hadn't intended, because your intentions weren't adequate enough. I never meant that the ending is preordained."
"So if the ending becomes different from what you intended, how do you cause things to turn out the way you want?"
"Have you ever watched surfers?" she said. I nodded and she continued, "When I was in California I would occasionally go to the beach and watch the surfers. They paddle out onto the water, find a wave in the process of formation, catch it just as the leading edge is about to pass, rise to their feet slightly ahead of the crest, and ride it in."
She paused, then added, "Each wave is unique, just as each situation in our lives is new and different." She was gazing out across the courtyard with a faraway look, watching surfers at a distant beach. "When your life is in sync, you are riding the crest."
I took her hand in mine, and stroked her forearm with my other hand, thinking of the remarkable relationship she had with the world around her, which revealed itself in so many everyday occurrences. She always seemed to know when a thundershower was about to occur, and never got caught in the rain. Or, a bus would arrive at just the instant she stepped out to the curb to catch one. Or, in a store, the last pair of shoes on sale would be just her size. With Chayo such things happened all the time. And of course Cuauhtémoc never crapped on the floor when Chayo was present.
So this was her explanation of it. Like the master surfer, she sensed or perhaps even saw the hollows and the crests. Perhaps that was the essence of being a shamaness.
"So it's not totally out of your hands, like blind luck or fate," I said. "But it does seem rather magical."
"Magical is how people explain something they don't understand."
"Is this something you learned to do? or were you just born with it?"
"Some of both. People learn to surf. It's an art, like learning to paint a picture or write a novel or make pottery or so many other things that require years of apprenticeship."
I wondered if I could learn, but something made me afraid to ask. I didn't want to hear a reply that might be discouraging. Instead, I asked, "So the Aztecs could have defeated Cortés and driven the Spaniards out of México?"
"Isn't that obvious?" she said, "As you yourself said to don Pablo that day, they came very close to it."
"What if the Spaniards came again, in a later expedition under another conquistador."
"They might've been driven off again," said Chayo. "The Aztecs would've been far better equipped to deal with a second attempt at invasion."
"What do you imagine México would have been like today?"
"Think of Japan, a target of both the Spanish and Portuguese in the sixteenth century."
Scattered rain drops were falling again. I thought of an ancient Japanese poem describing an overcast sky like the one above us on this moonless evening. Did the Aztecs write poems about the moon? I wondered. Probably not as much as the Japanese did. Across the plaza an auto horn was beeping impatiently, perhaps a motorist wanting to get home before the rain began in earnest.
I sucked in my breath, let it out, then said. "What about MacClayne?"
"What about him?"
"I don't want to involve him in any risk, at least not without his consent. Is there anything I should warn him about?"
"No. For MacClayne this will be just another journey."
"But not for me, you're saying."
"I've told you all I can," she said. A moment later she added, "Oh yes, there is one thing I must tell you. Take Cuauhtémoc with you."
continued in Chapter 17
The unceasingly bad weather went on for days, then lasted weeks. Sports events and other public events were canceled, crops ruined, roads and bridges washed out.
I'd suspended my field work on the malpaís. It had been easy enough to deal with the daily summer cloudbursts, but this constant rain and dampness made field work miserable. And the cold! I'd never suffered so much from the cold in my life, not even during the notorious Minnesota winters. That was because houses back there were built for it and equipped with furnaces. Here in the tropics the stoves were only for cooking, and most of those weren't inside.
"Usually it's dry and warm at this time of year," Chayo said. We were in Aunt Rosario's shop, huddled next to a small kerosene heater, the only one I'd seen so far in this town. Cuauhtémoc also sat close to the heater, watching Chayo threading a button.
"When did you last see an autumn like this?" I asked.
"Never."
"Never before? Maybe Ragnarøk is approaching," I said with a grin.
"Ragnarøk? Something in Norse tradition?"
"It's the cataclysmic event that brings about the end of the world," I said. "I guess they used to talk about it back in Viking times. It's in the Edda."
"Tell me about it."
"The sun turns black. Animals die. People die. There's drought, famine, war. Even Asgarð comes under attack and cannot withstand it."
"Do you think it'll happen?" she said, looking up from her sewing.
"It's just a myth," I said.
"Is it?" she said. "All around us people are abusing the earth, polluting the land, the water and the sky. Surely this cannot go on for long."
The thought disturbed me. "I don't know," I said. "I had a friend who was majoring in meteorology. His concern had to do with the effects of greenhouse gases and the possibility of climate change. Well, it's something that should be looked into, but I don't think humanity is in any imminent danger."
"Okay," said Chayo, "how does this look?" She laid her needle and thread to the side and held up her completed product. It was a small vest for Cuauhtémoc.
"Here, help me put it on him," she said.
I tried to do as she directed, but without success. The bird squirmed, flapped his wings and then darted off to hide under a cabinet. Perhaps he preferred to endure the cold rather than wear a vest.
"Don't be like that," Chayo said, speaking gently to him. "I made this to keep you warm. Be a good bird and let me try it on you."
The bird looked at her, then came out from his hiding place. She set him on her lap, and he held still as she slipped his wings through the arm holes of the vest and buttoned it up.
Chayo had a way with animals. She'd speak to cows and horses, and even raccoons, and they'd respond as though they wished to please her. I'd seen it before, and it fascinated me to watch. Cuauhtémoc did, of course, adore her, but, even so, I considered it amazing. Most amazing of all was the fact that he never crapped on the floor at her place.
"See! He likes it." Chayo stepped back to admire her work as the bird strutted about in his new vest. It was of blue cloth with three bright red buttons down the front. He looked so handsome that I had to smile.
I returned to Don Pablo's hotel, and went to dinner with my smartly attired chicken. I perched him in his usual place on the backrest of the chair next to me for all to see and admire.
Some grinned and others gaped as they entered the dining room. Probably none of them had ever before seen a bird wearing a dinner jacket.
"Did Chayo make that?" Doña Josefina asked, and the others also commented on it. Someone remarked that in the United States there were even clothing shops for pets, and another person asked if Chayo hadn't lived in the US.
"Yes, she spent some years in California," doña Josefina said, and don Pablo said, "She must've become North Americanized."
Everyone chuckled.
"Speaking of the United States, there's a letter for you," said don Pablo and gave it to me.
It was from MacClayne; it bore a US postage stamp and the return address was San Francisco, California. Without waiting, I opened it and read the opening paragraph:
Olaf,
We have had an enormous amount of rain here in San Francisco. I hate the goddamn rain. Since I was able to crawl I have been crawling south toward the equator where the sun always shines and there is no grey fog, no gloomy mist, no frost, no sleet. No snow. No glum rain. . . . .
"Is it from your friend who's coming to visit you?" Doña Josefina asked.
"Yes, he's looking forward to tropical sunshine."
Everyone laughed.
"When is he due to arrive?" Don Pablo asked.
I quickly read through the rest of the letter. "Next week, according to this."
"I'll reserve a room for him," Don Pablo said.
A couple of rooms were vacant and there was hardly any need to make reservations. It was Don Pablo's way of saying that my friend would be welcome.
"¿Es huerito?" <¿Is he a blond guy?>, Don Pablo asked with his usual good-humored grin, "Like you and Huero Marco?"
"Not any more," I said, "I don't know what color his hair was in years past, but nowadays he's totally gray."
"Does he have blue eyes?" Don Pablo asked.
"That he does," I said.
Doña Josefina assured me that would qualify MacClayne as "huerito."
I told them more about MacClayne, his poetry, his travels to many lands, his having been a war veteran and later a seaman in the merchant marine.
"World War II?" Huero Marco, who was something of a history buff, looked up. "Do you know anything of the battles he might have been in?"
"He hasn't told me a lot about his war experiences," I said. "But I know he was on a ship which was sunk during the battle of Normandy. Later he saw the liberation of Paris. They had quite a celebration afterward. Champagne was flowing in the streets."
"Does he speak Spanish?" everyone wanted to know.
"Some," I said, "But I don't know how much."
Then Carlos asked if my friend knew about the bad weather we were having. I wondered about that myself. In my last letter I had of course told MacClayne about the incessant rain, describing it in great detail, but perhaps he underestimated the severity. Did he really believe that the tropics was a paradise where the sun was always shining? As a sailor he'd been in the tropics numerous times, and he'd certainly been in México before, in Veracruz. But perhaps he'd never seen anything like this storm.
* * *
The next afternoon Chayo was planning to go to Los Reyes on an errand. Los Reyes was a not too distant town over on the north-western side of snow-covered Mount Tancítaro. She'd be gone for the evening and would return the next day, so I went to see her off and say goodbye to her.
I entered the tall door of the shop, and found her almost ready to leave. "You haven't been to Los Reyes before. Maybe you'd like to come with me," she said.
We left Cuauhtémoc in the care of her aunt, and headed off down the rainy street to the depot. On the way, we stopped at a small store, just long enough for me to pick up a tooth brush. We arrived as the bus was about to leave. The bus route took us up the hillside overlooking Uruapan, and followed the road past several Indian villages as well as Volcán Paricutín and many older cinder cones, but the rain was splashing down and we couldn't see them very well.
Darkness was falling as we arrived in Los Reyes. We got off the bus, unfolded our umbrellas, and made our way down the street to a restaurant where we had something to eat, then went to a hotel.
It was a recently built place, constructed of concrete. Though it didn't quite have the charm of an old adobe building, it was nevertheless tastefully designed, and in the courtyard was a well-manicured garden with a row of broad-leafed banana palms. No sooner had we entered than a driving rain began, and there was something inherently romantic about being inside this place on this rainy night.
Chayo put her arms around me and said, "This may be our last chance to spend a night together. Let's not waste a minute of it."
* * *
It was as cold and damp as ever, but it hadn't rained all afternoon, and the sky was clearing for the first time in days when MacClayne appeared at don Pablo's boarding house.
Though I hadn't seen him for some time, he was quite as I remembered him. His gray hair was shoulder-length. Had he dyed it, he would've looked considerably younger, but then he wouldn't have been the MacClayne I knew. It seemed to me that he must've been born looking exactly as he did now, fifty years old with long, gray hair.
He was of medium height, lean and physically fit with powerful arms. His face was deeply tanned, although it might soon fade in this sunless world of eternal rain.
"So this is where you live?" He cast his eye about the courtyard admiringly. "It's just as you described it." Then he grinned and asked, "Where's the rooster?"
I glanced around, called to the bird, then looked in my room, but he wasn't there. "He's got to be here somewhere," I said, a little annoyed that he wasn't around when I wanted to show him off. "You'll see plenty of him later, probably more than you want. Anyway. Have you seen the snow?"
"Snow?" MacClayne looked at me blankly for a moment, then, "On the mountain, you mean? Mount Tancítaro--is that how you pronounce it?"
"You've got it perfect," I said, and noted to myself that MacClayne had obviously read my letters closely. "If we're lucky, we just might be able to catch a glimpse."
We climbed a ladder to the base of the water tank above the roof, and from there we could see the mountain. Auspiciously, the clouds had lifted, and the late afternoon sun painted the snow-capped ridge in glowing reds and lavenders. The mountain was presenting itself in all its beauty and dignity for MacClayne to admire.
"Mount Tancítaro is giving you a special welcome," I said, "This is the first time in days that it's been visible."
"Snow in the tropics. That in itself is impressive," said MacClayne, "And I presume the Fabled City lies somewhere at the foot of it, down in the Valley of Infiernillo."
I nodded in silence, impressed with MacClayne's grasp of the local geography. We watched as the clouds slowly closed in again, like a curtain drawn across the stage at the end of a presentation.
As we descended the ladder, the bird strutted out to meet us, displaying his Aztec plumage.
"And this must be Cuauhtémoc."
"It is," I said proudly.
"Truly a regal bird!" pronounced MacClayne. "And I don't say that lightly."
Then I noticed that the bird was hiccuping suspiciously. There were things I'd not told MacClayne in my letters, and the bird's predilection for alcohol was one. I hoped he wouldn't notice. Trying to pretend that nothing was amiss, I bent down and extended my arm to the bird. He tried to hop up, but spun dizzily, fell off and landed splat on his face. I groaned and explained sheepishly, "He was injured rather badly, you know."
"Yes, I read that in your letter. It was a terribly cruel thing they did to him, using him in cockfights. How is he doing?"
"He's had to learn to fly all over again, but, as you see, he survived. Chayo saved him."
"I'm looking forward to meeting this remarkable woman."
MacClayne excused himself to visit the restroom, and I made use of his absence to scold Cuauhtémoc in a low but firm voice. "Just be glad Chayo didn't see you like this! Now I want you to straighten up and act sober tonight. Got that?"
The bird gave me a bleary-eyed look and hiccuped again.
When MacClayne reappeared, the three of us went to the dining room where the others were by now assembled for dinner.
"Ya tenemos tres hueritos," announced don Pablo, and, turning to me, asked if my friend understood that we had three blondies.
I was wondering that myself. I looked at MacClayne.
MacClayne looked at me.
"Hue-ri-tos," I repeated the word slowly; in a letter I had told him that don Pablo called us "hueritos"--blond guys.
MacClayne's face lit up with a broad smile, and he ran his fingers through his gray hair. "¡Si! ¡soy huero!"
Everyone was delighted.
Then he said to the man, "¿Usted es don Pablo?"
Everyone nodded approvingly and confirmed that he was right.
"¿Y doña Josefina?" MacClayne addressed the lady sitting beside don Pablo.
"Mucho gusto en conocerle," she said, obviously pleased that he knew her name.
"El gusto es mío," MacClayne said. Then, glancing towards the end of the table, he saw a blue-eyed fellow, and said, "¿Usted es Marco? ¿Huero Marco?."
Everyone grinned as Huero Marco affirmed that he was again right.
MacClayne then guessed that a fellow who sat with a guitar at his side must be Domingo. Again he was right. And beside Domingo sat a person with a large black mustache whom MacClayne decided must be Carlos--but it was not Carlos, it was Estefan. But by this time MacClayne had identified enough of the company to have favorably impressed everyone.
"¡Nos conoce!" said the proprietor.
"¡Sí, nos conoce!" Everyone was laughing. "¡Nos conoce!"
MacClayne glanced at me. "They're saying that I know them?"
"Exactly," I said. "And, as you can see, they're impressed."
"Y usted," said don Pablo to MacClayne. "Usted es marinero."
"Sí, soy marinero."
Cuauhtémoc crowed loudly. He was still tipsy, but fortunately nobody seemed to notice.
MacClayne spoke haltingly, but rolled his R's beautifully. His Scottish brogue came through as charmingly in Spanish as it always had in English. Though, as far as I knew, he hadn't studied anything more than a phrase book, he did well with what he had, and what he lacked in linguistic ability, he made up for in charisma and got as much mileage out of his limited vocabulary as any Scotlander ever had out of his carefully accumulated pennies. And what he communicated was a lot of good feeling.
MacClayne was at his best that evening; presenting the Dr. Jekyll side of his personality, and his arrival was a social success. Even Cuauhtémoc seemed favorably impressed, though I feared it might be that the bird was glad to have someone he somehow recognized as a fellow alcoholic.
At the end of the meal, Domingo took up his guitar and sang several tunes, some of them in English.
MacClayne was starting to look very tired, barely able to keep his eyes open. I knew myself what an intense effort is required to communicate in an unfamiliar language, and he had also probably missed a night's sleep on the way down here.
"I'm going to see Chayo this evening," I said. "If you're up to it, she'd like to meet you, or, if not, then maybe tomorrow."
MacClayne opted for the morrow. Don Pablo and I showed him to his room, which, like mine, had a majestically tall ceiling and thick whitewashed adobe walls. Cuauhtémoc accompanied us in, and, naturally, he crapped on the floor. Perhaps that was the bird's way of saying that he felt comfortable around MacClayne. I cleaned up the mess.
After a tired nod of approval of the room, MacClayne said good night. I bundled up Cuauhtémoc, who had by now sobered up, and set out for El Café Chino. Chayo was already there, and the bird leapt into her arms.
She stroked the bird gently and asked, "Did your friend arrive today?"
"He's resting up from his trip," I said.
"Do the two of you still plan to go to Apatzingán?"
"We didn't get around to talking about it," I said.
Chayo already had her coffee. I ordered a cup for myself, and, after the waitress had gone, I said, "I guess you still feel apprehensive about this excursion to Apatzingán."
"I've thought a lot about it," she said slowly. "And I've decided that it would be wrong for me to discourage you from going there."
"But you would still prefer that I didn't go?"
"Olaf, I'm not saying that."
"You seem to be implying it."
"Olaf, you are not understanding me at all." She sounded slightly irritated. Cuauhtémoc looked up, first at her, then at me and let out a cluck. "Pobrecito," said Chayo turning her attention to the bird and stroking his feathers. For a short while we sat in silence and she took my hand in hers. "It pains me to see you go," she said at last.
"Just for a couple of days?" I said in surprise. Chayo was such a self-sufficient person. I couldn't believe she couldn't do without me for such a short time. "Or is it something else?" I added.
"Something else," she said. "There is something else."
I wondered what she was talking about. Then I thought of the evening at Los Reyes when she'd said that might be our last chance to spend a night together. Somehow it had stuck in my mind in a disturbing sort of way. Had she meant that something was going to separate us? I wanted to ask her, but not here in this crowded café. At that moment my coffee arrived. I took a sip but realized I didn't really want it then. I said, "Can we go and sit by the Huatapera?"
It wasn't raining as we crossed the plaza to the Huatapera, but a puddle of water lay on every flat surface, so rather than sit on the stone fountain as we usually did, we sat on the veranda of the ancient building, under the overhanging roof. We both had warm jackets, but the evening was chilly and we huddled close together. Cuauhtémoc managed to squeeze in between us.
Chayo ran her fingers through my hair. "You're kind and gentle. You're also smart and educated, and you relate to my world so well." She paused. "But what is our future together? We need to think about it."
It was a subject we'd avoided till now by tacit agreement. "I guess you definitely intend to continue to live in this area," I said.
"Yes. I've been in California and also in many parts of México, but this is where I want to spend my life," she said. "I know you like it here in Michoacán, but how would you feel about staying?"
"I want to be with you," I said, "wherever you are."
"And I want you to be with me," she said. "I would like every day for the rest of my life to be like the days we've spent together, and I'd like every night to be like the one in Los Reyes. These weeks and months have been a romance come true, and I truly think that our feelings could last a lifetime. But, for that to be, you would need to establish a life here that was fulfilling to you in every way."
"You mean like finding employment--"
"That would be part of it. Certainly a very important part of it. But still only part of it," she said. "You also have much yet to learn about México. You've only been here for a few months, and I think you need to know this country better before you make your decision."
"I guess you're saying there's a lot that I need to sort out," I said, a bit reluctantly. "Well, I don't know what to say. I'll have to think about it. I suppose during my trip with MacClayne--"
"How long does he plan to be here?"
"Well, our trip to Apatzingán will only take a couple of days. Of course he'll be here in Uruapan longer than that. We plan on a number of one-day trips to places such as Volcán Paricutín."
"Will he be staying for as much as a month?"
"He might," I said, "depending on how things work out. He's not a guy with a busy schedule, full of appointments to keep."
"Okay, so let me suggest something," she said. "You remember some time ago when I mentioned that I needed to make a trip to Chiapas. I expect it might take several weeks."
"I see. You mean you might take that trip right now, while MacClayne is here?"
"Yes, and you can continue to entertain your friend."
"And when you return, we'll get back together again."
"And then we can talk about this some more," she said. "We're considering the possibility of a lifetime commitment. This is not something we should rush into."
"So," I said at last, "I take it you don't object to my going with MacClayne to Apatzingán?"
She shook her head slowly, regretfully I thought. I sensed that she still had huge reservations about my project. I sat in silence as she mulled it over. Finally she seemed to come to a decision.
"Olaf," she said, "you are one of the most maddeningly quiet persons I know when it comes to you talking about yourself. Sometimes it almost drives me crazy. But still, partly because of that, because you don't try to control me with conversation, you allow me to be myself. You aren't into proving male dominance. You respect my involvement in my own pursuits. You share but don't insist on being in charge all the time. That, for me, is ideal. I couldn't imagine anyone more right for me than you. But I can't control your destiny. That is up to you."
Rain began to fall and I listened to the sound of scattered droplets splashing in the fountain. After a bit I ventured, "Until very recently you did seem to have a premonition about my going to Apatzingán. Would you care to tell me about it?"
"There are times when such questions should not be asked."
"Why not?"
"Because the answers you get may do you no good. Some things are better left unknown."
"How can it ever be better not to know?" I said.
"Think about it, Olaf. The Aztecs knew an important visitor was coming. They even knew the year--1519. It was foreseen and foretold."
"Quetzalcoatl, you mean. The legend of his return."
"So they thought. They would have been far better off had they known absolutely nothing," Chayo explained. "They knew only just barely enough to disarm themselves. To inspire themselves to inaction." Chayo paused, perhaps to let her point sink in, then said, "Of course, the visitor turned out to be Hernán Cortés, not Quetzalcoatl, not a benefactor, but an unconditional, implacable enemy--that was the information the Aztecs needed and didn't have."
"Why didn't they know?" I asked.
Cuauhtémoc watched Chayo intently, paying careful attention to every word she spoke.
"Even the most insightful of seers cannot see everything they need to see. You've read t he New Testament? Then you must know that Jesus expected the Apocalypse to happen very shortly, within the lifetime of his followers. Jesus was a powerful shaman, he could heal the lame and make the blind see and even raise the dead. He was also a sage, but there were things he could not see, and there were things he saw that were not accurate. Sometimes a key bit of information is withheld, or distorted."
"By whom?" I said.
"It's not always clear where the information comes from. Sometimes it's from our spirit guides, but even their knowledge is limited."
"So why should anyone listen to them, then?"
Cuauhtémoc turned his head to look at me, then back towards Chayo.
"You would do better to turn your question around and ask: 'Why should anyone expect them to inform us?'" she said.
"No? Then how should one properly relate to spirit guides?"
"The spirit guides are in a sense like our teachers, except that they don't generally explain things. Instead, they lead us into situations where we can learn, and our lives are like an exam they are giving us. Think of it this way, a teacher may give a few hints during a quiz, but if he were to reveal all the answers, then it would be no test."
I nodded. It was something I'd have to think over.
"I will say it another way," Chayo added. "You are the actor in the drama which is your life. The spirit guides put you on the stage, but they don't write your script. That is for you to do, because you are the protagonist"
"So we are the authors of our own destiny?" I paused, expecting her to affirm that was so, but she said nothing. "You're shaking your head."
"Yes, I'm shaking my head," she replied.
"But I thought that's what you meant."
"You write your script, but, as your script is enacted, it changes, your very words are altered, the ending you chose becoming something very different from what you had intended."
"Do you mean it becomes what it was meant to be in the very first place?
"No, I simply mean it becomes different, something you hadn't intended, because your intentions weren't adequate enough. I never meant that the ending is preordained."
"So if the ending becomes different from what you intended, how do you cause things to turn out the way you want?"
"Have you ever watched surfers?" she said. I nodded and she continued, "When I was in California I would occasionally go to the beach and watch the surfers. They paddle out onto the water, find a wave in the process of formation, catch it just as the leading edge is about to pass, rise to their feet slightly ahead of the crest, and ride it in."
She paused, then added, "Each wave is unique, just as each situation in our lives is new and different." She was gazing out across the courtyard with a faraway look, watching surfers at a distant beach. "When your life is in sync, you are riding the crest."
I took her hand in mine, and stroked her forearm with my other hand, thinking of the remarkable relationship she had with the world around her, which revealed itself in so many everyday occurrences. She always seemed to know when a thundershower was about to occur, and never got caught in the rain. Or, a bus would arrive at just the instant she stepped out to the curb to catch one. Or, in a store, the last pair of shoes on sale would be just her size. With Chayo such things happened all the time. And of course Cuauhtémoc never crapped on the floor when Chayo was present.
So this was her explanation of it. Like the master surfer, she sensed or perhaps even saw the hollows and the crests. Perhaps that was the essence of being a shamaness.
"So it's not totally out of your hands, like blind luck or fate," I said. "But it does seem rather magical."
"Magical is how people explain something they don't understand."
"Is this something you learned to do? or were you just born with it?"
"Some of both. People learn to surf. It's an art, like learning to paint a picture or write a novel or make pottery or so many other things that require years of apprenticeship."
I wondered if I could learn, but something made me afraid to ask. I didn't want to hear a reply that might be discouraging. Instead, I asked, "So the Aztecs could have defeated Cortés and driven the Spaniards out of México?"
"Isn't that obvious?" she said, "As you yourself said to don Pablo that day, they came very close to it."
"What if the Spaniards came again, in a later expedition under another conquistador."
"They might've been driven off again," said Chayo. "The Aztecs would've been far better equipped to deal with a second attempt at invasion."
"What do you imagine México would have been like today?"
"Think of Japan, a target of both the Spanish and Portuguese in the sixteenth century."
Scattered rain drops were falling again. I thought of an ancient Japanese poem describing an overcast sky like the one above us on this moonless evening. Did the Aztecs write poems about the moon? I wondered. Probably not as much as the Japanese did. Across the plaza an auto horn was beeping impatiently, perhaps a motorist wanting to get home before the rain began in earnest.
I sucked in my breath, let it out, then said. "What about MacClayne?"
"What about him?"
"I don't want to involve him in any risk, at least not without his consent. Is there anything I should warn him about?"
"No. For MacClayne this will be just another journey."
"But not for me, you're saying."
"I've told you all I can," she said. A moment later she added, "Oh yes, there is one thing I must tell you. Take Cuauhtémoc with you."
continued in Chapter 17
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