THE INSURGENCE of CHAN SANTA CRUZ

BOOK FOUR: THE BOOK of SCIENCE

CHAPTER FIFTY FOUR

Ana Osorio was a woman of perhaps even less account than those gazers in Molina's garden, but she had welcomed President Diaz as a personal liberator. Her usual residence was Villahermosa in the state of Tabasco, but when Don Porfirio had come to Campeche she had followed him for a few days of revelry and then boarded the train... second class... to Merida. There, she found that the hotelkeepers had multiplied their rates by three, five, some even ten times, but Ana's mind was as sharp as her tongue and she was not long in finding way around the problem; a Lebanese coffee importer who made her the offer of the use of his warehouse after closing hours for a small consideration. Since the arrival of the President she had entertained as lavishly as any of Yucatan's old families, although the squirming of the sacks of beans that were her bed was a distraction to a few of her more sober clients, as were the many weevils who had made nests among these beans. But some... the clients, not the bugs... found that, in fact, the aroma of the fresh coffee was so stimulating that they were moved to stay for a second helping, even a third.

Ana had come to the little alley beside the gate to the Molina home because she had assumed, correctly, that a few of the guests would be so honored and overwhelmed to be in the presence of the President that they could not wait for the night to end and to return to the arms of their wives and mistresses, but must find release at once. For a peso, the soldiers who patrolled the alley allowed Ana and a few others of her kind the use of its darkened corners and, further, kept the place free of pick-pockets and journalists and other unsavory types who had also been drawn to the usual places where whores and politicians congregate.

Still, the suddenness with which the man appeared had caused her to lose her voice, if only for a moment, before she could recover and ask if he desired company. The night concealed his face, but his form was athletic, his clothes good... an officer's uniform... certainly this was a gentlemen of some sort who could afford to be choosy. Only when he lit a cigarette, briefly allowing the flame to illuminate his features, did she have the impression of something birdlike in the quick movement of his hooded eyes and the appearance of a beak, rather than a nose. But the shadows were treacherous and a commercial agent from Progreso she had serviced half an hour previously had left her a full half-liter of cognac in addition to paying twice what she asked.

"We can do it here or, if you prefer, there is a place where we are certain to be alone. But it is a few blocks away, and I would need just a little more." She named a price and the dark man nodded, taking possession of her by wrapping one arm around her shoulder. "That even feels like a wing," she thought, but the sentiment was ridiculous; she nodded to the corporal at the far end of the alley and he tipped his rifle back, the dark man from Molina's ball lowered his head against her breast and so could not be identified while Ana, again, thought of feathers nuzzling her, sensing also the presence of the sharp, horned beak. "I've been working too long without a rest," she also told herself, vowing that when the President departed tomorrow, she would amuse herself at the seashore for a few days before, returning to Tabasco.

"Do you have a name?" she asked the dark man, who was guiding her with a deceptive speed and unerring accuracy towards the coffee warehouse, though she did not recall whether or not she had told him of their destination. She must have! The client did not answer, but drew something from his coat that glittered briefly beneath a street-lantern and traced a line with his finger from her ear down past her chin to the top of her breast. Of course it was a finger... and his arm around her, and perhaps a necklace or a ring as an enticement for the special favours she conferred upon a fortunate few. On such a night why shouldn't strangers lavish diamonds upon her? How foolish she was to think of wings, instead of rings!

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