THE INSURGENCE of CHAN SANTA CRUZ

BOOK NINE: BOOK of the JAGUAR PRIEST

CHAPTER TEN

"How can you say that it is no difficult matter to drive a motor car?" Clarencio protested. It was nine Monday morning, only an hour before they were to present themselves at the Governor's office, where Alvarado's driver would be ready to convey them to Progreso. The Tatoob had explained his plan, but this last aspect of it had been that which disturbed Clarencio Pec.

"The principle of the fotingo is not much different from that of the railroad engine," Silvestro said, "and, when Bravo was Governor, there were a few times when it was necessary to move chicle quickly, and I had use of the Decauville. There is one pedal to go forward, one to stop. Of course you do not steer a train, as you must steer a motorcar, but there is a wheel and you merely point it in the direction which you wish to travel. And if someone is slow getting out of your way, use the horn!"

Alvarado's driver was that same thin Lieutenant whose baleful stare forewarned the Tatoob not to expect the Governor's "scientific socialism" to differ, in many respects, from the scientific sympathies of past Governors. He greeted Clarencio with few words, saying nothing of the arrangement for return of the ticket in the Tatoob's presence... a fact which only confirmed the intent of Alvarado's instruction... and motioned Pec to sit down beside him, where he was afforded the opportunity to see how the gears and pedals were operated. Silvestro had the back seat to himself. The fotingo was of the sort whose roof could be lowered and, once on the open road, Alvarado's Teniente accelerated to a speed of twenty kilometers per hour... a velocity of such dimension that the straw hat of the Tatoob flew from his head or, to be more precise, it lingered in the air, fearful of journeying onwards, while the motorcar and the head beneath outran it. Alvarado's driver braked to a halt, Clarencio dashed back road to receive the hat and Silvestro's hand dropped to his machete for the road was empty and the time propitious for treachery. But the driver made no hostile move; in fact, he offered the Tatoob a scarf to tie the hat under Silvestro's chin, as if the Jefe of the sublevados suffered from a toothache.

"Gracias," the Tatoob replied in hesitant Spanish, bobbing his head like an idiot boy.

"He really doesn't speak much Spanish, does he?" the driver contemplated.

"Only a few obscenities," Clarencio allowed, for to have expressed ignorance of such would not be believable.

The journey was of four hours' duration, for many kilometers lay between them and the port and the road was poorly maintained beyond the city. When they disembarked at an empty crossroads, there was a salty tang to the air, a smell Silvestro recognized as that near Vigia Chico... although sharper, for here there lay only scrubland and a few henequen estanciónes between them and the sea and not the monte with its varied, deep odors. From Alvarado's words, Silvestro had expected a port city, smaller than Merida, certainly, but larger than Vigia Chico... with ships tied up, warehouses and sailors' haunts. He whispered something and the Lieutenant noted his puzzlement.

"Tell him," he said to Clarencio, "that the docks and city are still at some distance, and that we will drive to this place after we enjoy the fine lunch prepared for us. I am not so barbarous not to offer a man his last meal... of course you needn't repeat that!"

Clarencio repeated those words he had been ordered to the Tatoob, suspecting that the Teniente had at least a fair command of Mayan. This man now turned to the left, maneuvering the motorcar barely faster than a man could walk, its tires crunching upon the rocks blown into the road, which had degenerated to little more than a trail between the scrub and, to the north, some sand dunes. Silvestro now recognized another smell, a tantalizing but faint hint of the presence of don del Muerte. As the fotingo climbed a tiny hill and Alvarado's driver braked it to a stop, the engine backfired in protest and a pair of zopilotes arose out of a small copse of thorny bushes to their right.

The driver leaped from his seat. His face was almost solicitous, but his pistol was in his belt. He motioned to Clarencio.

"Have him get out," he ordered. "That little grove down there, that's where we'll do it. It's one of the Governor's favorite places to dispose of enemies. Make him think that we're going to eat and... you know..." He turned to Silvestro and pantomimed a man putting something in his mouth, then unzipping his trousers, smiling. The Tatoob nodded stupidly, reaching for the door and pretended not to understand how to open it until the Teniente with a most unsolicitous grunt, pulled it open so abruptly that Silvestro nearly tumbled into the dirt. But the driver then removed a covered straw basket from the trunk, smiled again and extended a pointing hand.

There was a small path, well littered with stones, and the Lieutenant gestured for Clarencio to lead, Silvestro to follow between them and, carrying the basket for lunch, he brought up the rear. The path bottomed out some twenty meters east and three meters below the road... there was nothing beneath them but baked earth in which, at one time, henequen had been cultivated. A few brown spikes grew wild here and there, affording cover for rats and snakes, and the aroma of death from the trees was sharper. Silvestro knew that a move was to be made but did not turn. He hoped only that Alvarado's deception was a simple one, that he merely wanted to place his own influence in the territory rather than butchering the mazehualob indiscriminately as Bravo had done... in the beginning.

The face of Venancio Pec flitted past the copse. Clarencio was a distant cousin of that treacherous Jefe; what loyalty did he really owe to Silvestro, who was born to the mazehualob but, after all, an outsider, a Yucatecan...

The Lieutenant, allowing the Oficiales to put a few meters between them, slipped his hand into the basket and removed a shotgun of the sort that campesinos used to hunt deer... or rid themselves of trespassers. "Stop there," he said. "Stop him!" he ordered Clarencio Pec.

"Take the tickets from him." Alvarado's driver had dropped the basket, training his shotgun upon the men in a way such that he could shoot Clarencio too, or appear to. The young Oficiale said nothing, but removed the tickets and, besides, the Tatoob's purse.

"Is that silver?" the driver asked. Greedy now, he had let Clarencio step some distance from the Tatoob. "A bonus. You can have half of it."

"Only let me be the one who kills this man!" Clarencio now said. "It is traditional that only the son or the murderer of a Jefe will be recognized by the sublevados as his successor. That is what our Commander desires, isn't it?"

"Why so it is!" The Teniente's smile was at its widest, his teeth bared like a single row of kernels of white corn. Wedging the shotgun in the crook of his right arm between shoulder and elbow, he drew his pistol, left handed, handing its barrel to Clarencio. "To the Jefe of Santa Cruz del Bravo," he said.

"From the Governor of Chan Santa Cruz," Clarencio replied, firing a single shot into the Lieutenant's heart.

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