THE INSURGENCE of CHAN SANTA CRUZ

BOOK SIX: THE FIRST of the BOOKS of CHANGE

CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR

When the first column of light appeared on the church wall, to mark a new day in Santa Cruz del Bravo, Octaviano Solis, who had trusted its appearance to deliver him from the terrible thirst of his tomb, fell into despair. The prisoners, both men and women... from the humblest prostitute or pickpocket to the bandit chief Matochino... had, similarly, lost all hope, placing their heads in their hands to await the coming of don del Muerte.

This golden cord of sunlight which, in its departure on the previous evening, had resembled the vanishing ladder of hope being drawn out of reach, now took on the semblance of a hangman's noose descending towards one and all. The songs with which they had battled the night had faded with the dawn, and many of the prisoners had lain down to die even as General Rivera entered the capital... not even the cries and shots outside could revive that music.

There were always cries and shots in Santa Cruz del Bravo.

"My time has come," the dying bandit Sandoval Padilla groaned when the light appeared. "I shall mount that ladder of light, whether it leads to Heaven or another place, and you shall do what I have commanded." He crossed himself weakly, then expired; one of the many crossties of the railroad set down in Quintana Roo and, by circumstance, one of the last.

Solis and Matochino sat facing each other while the color faded from the dead man's cheeks. The heavy breathing and coughing of the sick and the dying reverberated off the walls of the church like hundreds of balls set in play within an Indian court of stone. The teeth of one of Lo Matochino's women rattled and he spat in her mouth, she licked this hungrily, rocking from side to side and drawing her knees up into a ball, sobbing without words, then smearing the tears with thirsty fingers which she sucked upon, greedily..

"Here is my knife," Matochino said. "Use it for me, I cannot. When I was a boy, the fathers said that, before Cortes brought Jesucristo to this Mexico, our people drank the blood and ate the flesh of human beings. Not as symbols, as the priests tried pointing out, not in the form of bread and wine but as the flesh itself... at first only that of enemy kings but, after a time, anyone, living or dead. Now symbols distinguish ourselves, the civilized, from that which we condemn as savagery and though I have given everything... my soul, my sweat, my freedom... to the sinful life I have led, I cannot make a complaint. It should be a matter of no consequence for me to slit the throat of a dead man the way I have slit the throats of so many of the living, but I cannot. I cannot go back to the drinking of blood... it is where I've made my stand. Take this knife, Colonel, you must do this thing for me that will keep us both alive."

"No," Solis answered, "I cannot either. I will wait and hope, but does there come a time when hoping is no more? Those who have nothing must make their own time, so I shall make this arrangement with you and with the lords of death."

He nodded towards the wall. "What that light has reached the floor," said Solis, measuring a distance of some eight meters, "I shall surrender myself to don del Muerte but, if he does not choose me, I shall do as Sandoval has asked. It may be that he has already too many treasures to harvest one more, and it also may be that this place has been so cursed that even don del Muerte fears to tarry... for it was only by great will, by a heroic effort that Sandoval achieved death. Yes, when the light reaches the floor I shall cut and drink blood and you shall do the same."

The golden noose crept downwards slowly towards the floor, gaining brilliance as it did and holding the fascination of the hundreds still alive. In the great temple of the Cruzob, the only sound was the buzzing of flies and, occasionally, a shouting from outside the walls, indicative of some commotion.

"Give me the knife," said Solis when perhaps two hours had gone by, and the beam was less than a meter from the ground. Its light drew the eyes of the prisoners towards it, bulging like those of toads, some closed as if to ward off the impending degradation. The words between the Colonel and Matochino had been overheard and carried to the furthest corner, men who still could raise a hand were opening knives, sharpening sticks or, for a few, the edges of their military decorations, fumbling for the sharp little flints which served to make fire.

"Padilla was a liar who never killed a man," said Lo Matochino, "for he would know that when a living throat is cut, blood comes out in great streams and is lost if one is not waiting. But the blood of dead men lies in their veins like a stagnant stream - it rots, as does the flesh. So do not tarry long at the doing of this thing, it must be time."

Solis held the dead man's head in his lap and stared at the wall, waiting in mute acceptance for either a miracle or the inevitable. Finally the light reached the end of the wall, trembling as it crossed over onto the gray expanse of mud. Bending towards Padilla, he cut savagely into the bandit's neck but there was no answering spurt of blood, not even a line of crimson. As Matochino predicted, the heart no longer pumped and Padilla's blood had flowed downwards, collecting in the veins of his feet which dangled over the edge of the altar.

"Help me with this," Solis said and, with an oath, Matochino hoisted the corpse up by its ankles which new position caused them to lighten in color. The flesh about the wound grew darker but still the blood merely dripped and, abandoning his knife and his principles, Solis plunged his teeth and tongue into the crevice. The tepid blood had already begun to clot, but Solis drew it out in strings and, when he withdrew his teeth to wring every essence of fluid from the clotted blood, Matochino took his turn... then, as those dying on Matochino's altar stirred at the sensation of serum, the Colonel drank again. Down and down he pressed his face, striking the hidden moisture which trickled through his parched lips like some dark electricity of such potency he never even heard the similar sighs and cries of the feeding prisoners, nor the banging upon the door.

A brilliant white enveloped him and, at first, Octaviano Solis deduced that this was death, that his body had deserted his spirit at the shock of receiving the criminal's blood. Pulling his face up from Padilla's neck, the light surrounding him was so bright he could not see and he put a hand before his eyes, raising his bloody snout towards the source of its brilliance, anticipating its judgment.

"Madre de Dios!" cried General Rivera, standing in the doorway of the cathedral. The liberating party had been first stricken by a great wind of odors... of corpses and their excretions, blood and despairing sweat, causing them to tuck their chins into their chests and close their eyes. And when this first gust had passed they had looked into this heart of the apocalypse... these figures keening and cowering and ravaging the torn bodies of the dead... and the General, being a devout Christian, had centered his gaze on the altar where a man clothed in the remnants of the uniform of a Federal officer was raising his chin, dripping with gore, from the dead man on whom he was feeding... opening his lips in the vampire's salutation.

The General covered his ears so that no trace of these rejoicings would scar his soul. "What is this thing," he murmured to Colonel Rodriguez, "that we have set loose upon the world?"

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