THE INSURGENCE of
CHAN SANTA CRUZ
BOOK SEVEN:
CUAHTENOTL EPACT
CHAPTER SIX
Some
hours after midnight, the angle of the trail leveled out, and he ducked between
those crossed, fallen pines. Ahead of him, there was actually a slight descent
into a sort of bowl of great expanse, with mountains rising to all sides and
even... to the east, by the Major's reckoning... a pale glint of silver that
must be the very railroad tracks ascending up, up... and over the Sierras into
Puebla State, with Orizaba beyond and below, and Veracruz beyond and beneath
even that.
The
plain of the bowl of Cuahtenotl was littered with
ghastly shapes in the wan moonlight that reminded José only of the strange
headstones and mausoleums of the many cemeteries of New Orleans in America,
where he had gone as a student, with gaily-aspected
others, to drink and rendezvous with ladies of compromised virtue who
frequented the stalls of don del Muerte.
There
were no ladies visible in Cuahtenotl, virtuous or
not... nobody at all... nothing to drink, either, but the rainwater collecting
in the hollows of his slouch hat.
And... bless the pretentious ancianos of
San Sebastien... no dogs!
José
crouched and ran hurriedly across a plain of sawgrass to a group of huts that,
even by the decomposed moonlight, could not have been home to anyone for a good
many years. One of these had a part of a roof, and even a long sheet of tin by
the door that José dragged across the threshold and set against two of the
walls. Then, he crawled behind this... hoping that any intruder would stop to
ponder at the sight of such obstacle and, in doing so, make some noise which
would awaken him so he might have recourse to his Webley, which he had removed
from his bag and placed under his head... a useful, if uncomfortable pillow.
It was
not the counsel of eagles... but at least it was something. And José shook the
rain from his coat and fell into a deep, exhausted sleep... and dreams of
Cortes and Malinche waving to those lining the
streets of Merida who had come to do homage to Porfirio
Diaz. And, now, Malinche and Diaz... not to mention
Cortes, also, were...
Gone!
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