THE INSURGENCE of CHAN SANTA CRUZ

BOOK FIVE: THE BOOK of STONE

CHAPTER THIRTY THREE

The discreet odor of corruption that had greeted the Major’s arrival was more pronounced now, and he made his way to Bravo's door. "General," he called. "General!" There was no reply and the door was barred against his entry. Muttering oaths, he clawed his way up a lemon tree that bordered the office, halting only to observe what seemed a deer's shank... already decaying, covered with flies and suspended from a branch by good Yucatecan sisal! The tree was barely tall enough to reach the second floor and two branches sagged and broke beneath his feet. Leaves and lemons, shook loose, rained down upon the plaza. An angry jay thrashed from its perch and departed with a shrieking to turn the heads of those unfortunate enough to be outside in this hottest hour of the day towards the ridiculous spectacle.

José dangled from the lemon tree, glaring into the General's second floor window. Bravo's quarters were deserted but half a dozen eggs nestled among the bedclothes. He leaned forward to rap at the glass and the tree began to shake, loosing more lemons. "General!" he called again, but there was no reply other than that of shouts and laugher from below and the whistling of a fresh wind that brought more of the ripe scent to his nose.

"General?" José cried out once more but the figure approaching from the shadows of the plaza was Miguel Chankik. He scuttled back towards the trunk. "Do you have an explanation for this? Where is General Bravo?"

"Stop swinging from trees like a monkey and I'll tell you." José edged downwards and jumped, falling heavily on his side and raising a puff of dust. Those who were watching him stopped laughing as soon as they recognized the ill-tempered Major of Akbal, and pretended to have destinations to hurry towards. "The General is being purified," Chankik said, when all had passed. "He is not here. He's gone to the monte alone."

"Alone?" José exclaimed. "That's madness! What if something were to happen to him? The monte is no place, even for a younger man."

"I am hardly a young man," Chankik pointed out, "and I go to the monte when I please."

"Well of course you do," José responded. "You're an indian!"

"Does the tiger ask after one's parentage or the viper or chicle fly? The sun, the bad water, the falling tree? And especially," the old sorcerer continued with a hint of a smile, "you don't think the General has cause to fear from the Cruzob, do you?"

A fresh breeze brought another pungent whiff of rotting flesh to José's nostrils. "Well, I suppose the General has enough experience to survive whatever meeting he's arranged. Still, it leaves us somewhat at a disadvantage." He wrinkled his nose again. "Didn't you say that his return would be soon? Or rather, that the General's purification, as you call it, has a fixed duration?"

"He will be back in nine days. Unless, of course, he is not." Chankik gave a weak smile. "This is the second."

"Eight more days? And what about this, this..." He could not complete the sentence for a wind had passed again. Every tree in Santa Cruz del Bravo was, it seemed, garnished with cut-up gobbets of beast or fowl... and these teemed with insect life, also, not a few opportunistic black birds.

"These? These are the General's offerings, placed here by his order, which must also remain here as his atonement."

"They stink," José protested. "And in nine days,” he pointed to a pair of large birds stepping cautiously around the plaza, “every corner of Santa Cruz del Bravo will stink and every zopilote south of Valladolid will have taken up residence here!"

"They are only hungry," Chankik said. "They have not had so much of the fortune that you Mexicans provided years ago. Can they be blamed?"

RETURN to HOMEPAGE – “THE INSURGENCE of CHAN SANTA CRUZ”

RETURN to GENERISIS HOMEPAGE