THE INSURGENCE of
CHAN SANTA CRUZ
BOOK NINE:
BOOK of the JAGUAR PRIEST
CHAPTER
THIRTY NINE
The Tatoob
woke from an entirely satisfactory sleep to find another hot, cloudless day at
hand. Colonel Solis had not passed the night idly, and a meeting with Alvarado
had been arranged. "Tell me of your travels in the capital," the
Governor asked and when Silvestro had finished...
omitting, entirely omitting the treachery of the baleful Teniente,
bumping over a word here and there to allow Solis to maintain the polite
fiction of his troubles with Spanish... Alvarado commended him. "Very
good, General... now I am correct in speaking to you
as an equal, one jefe politico to another."
"At least nearly so," said
Solis. "A few formalities need to be concluded in the capital but, to our
purposes, the matter has been settled, and in a way most satisfactory, I might
add. Silvestro Kaak enjoys,
now, the recognition and protection of Venustiano
Carranza." He crossed his knees then, as if the statement had no
particular meaning.
"Then let us celebrate the
kinship of the state of Yucatan with the Federal territory," Alvarado
said, offering a toast of mineral water. "I've almost forgotten," he
added, "there's a message for you at the telegraph station from the Oficiales of the territory. Its substance, I
understand, appears urgent."
The Governor was busy and his visitors
soon left, proceeding to the telegraph office. Silvestro
took the message spoken of by Alvarado and, in Santa Cruz, by Pedro Yoac, now almost two weeks old. It was cautious, but the Tatoob knew that, what had been mere concerns at the time
of sending must, by now, be realization of the worst expectations of the mazehualob. Wincing at the hesitant request to hold a
ceremony to the Chacs, Silvestro
frowned, hoping that they had had the sense not to wait for his answer. He
began to form a reply and then stopped, a decision having come to him
instantly.
"I have an appointment," he
told Colonel Solis, leaving that officer wondering in the telegraph office as
he hurried out towards the hotel on Frank Miller's card. His searchings took him into the barrio, the oldest and
poorest part of Merida, which neighborhood had changed little in three
centuries. The inventor's lodgings were in a cheap posada and Silvestro wondered, briefly, how a Doctor of Physics could
be reduced to such woeful surroundings but, nevertheless, the urgency of his
situation precluded any sympathies he felt for Miller. If the Yankee was truly
in need, he could be persuaded to let go of the rain-making machinery cheaply.
Miller was waiting
in the patio and leaped at him, fawning with the gratitude of a dog who lurks
behind a butcher's stall, waiting for scraps. "You won't be sorry
that you've come," he said, directing his attention to the mysterious
wooden box, which reposed on a cheap table, watched over by several children
and an old indian in his
hammock. The inventor unfastened the locks, removing from the wooden box a
second box of metal. "It requires electricity," he added, almost as
an afterthought.
"Chan... Santa Cruz del Bravo has a generator. In the territory," Silvestro added, "we are progressive."
"Wonderful," Miller said.
The top of the metal box slid at his touch, revealing two rectangular
protrusions of a metal of a darker shade of gray than the rest of the device.
"Magnets," the inventor said. "Electro-magnets imported from the
Continent, built to the specifications of Mesmer himself and of the German physicists
in famous Instituts of Heidelberg and Köln. Touch
them if you like. Feel their strength."
"Make rain," the Tatoob ordered.
Frank Miller smiled at the simple
expectations of his customer. "I could do just that," he said,
"if I wanted to make a downpour for Merida. The magnetism would
attract clouds to the city and to an area perhaps twenty kilometers in all
directions. I haven't just been sitting or sleeping, you know, I've looked up
your place on the map. If the rain all fell here, the territory would remain dry
and, what's more, you would have lost all hope of magnetizing the skies over
Quintana Roo."
"How is that?" Silvestro wondered.
"Why, because
the rainmaker can only be operated one time. The magnetic powers of the
machine are expended wholly charging the atmosphere, in drawing rainclouds
near. After one use it is expired, useless, finito!"
He nodded to Silvestro with the finality of don del Muerte. "Its influence
lasts for fifteen minutes, but the magnetic forces released cannot be
dissipated, save by the countermagnetic pulses of
storms."
"How long will this take?"
"Depending on
how far the clouds must travel, sometimes the same day... but, more often, two
or three, up to a week. Volcanic eruptions may affect this, any large
disturbance. The full moon, as well. But I have built nine such machines and
not one has ever failed. And if there were some error in design, you could
return it to me in Ohio and its price would be refunded entirely. So you're not
risking even one penny."
"And what then is the price?"
Silvestro asked.
The inventor scratched his bony chin.
"For the Governor of Yucatan, a wealthy, populous state, I was prepared to
ask and, but for the ignorance of Alvarado's guard, would certainly have
received, five hundred American dollars. But since he has treated me
unconscionably... even if without knowing so... and since there are not so many
people in Quintana Roo as in Yucatan, shall we say...
three hundred fifty?"
The Tatoob
took a step backwards, blinking. He had expected rainmaking to be an expensive
science but this figure was beyond his means. "There is not one of the mazehualob... the men of Quintana Roo,
whatever their village... for ten in Yucatan." He shook his head. "I
shall give you one hundred dollars in pounds, sterling," said Silvestro, naming the price had had fixed as his final
offer, twice that he had been prepared to declare at the beginning.
"I understand your position.
But," said Miller, "I, too, have expenses." He fell silent
abruptly and, in the uncanny heat and silence of midday, Silvestro
heard a tiny clicking of shutters, the sighs of an unseen watcher from the
windows of the posada. "Very well, fifty pounds," the inventor
blurted out.
He owes money for his lodgings, the Tatoob deduced, resolved to put a rapid end to bargaining.
"I'm not a bandit," said the Tatoob,
"I can only offer what I have." And he took six of the five pound
notes from Mexico out of his pocket and lay these on the table where they were
not disturbed by so much as a breeze. From his other pocket he added, to the
pile, three pound notes, two American dollars and twenty, thirty, finally
thirty seven Constitutionalist pesos and removed the leather pouch around his
neck. Gently he shook it and coins rolled across the table; gold and silver,
even five and ten cent pieces.
"I have my fare to Peto and the hotel bill to pay," he said, retrieving
one of the gold coins and most of the silver. At the mention of his hotel bill,
the shutters to their left clicked and the inventor's eyes darted wildly. The
value of the coins was perhaps fifty pesos, maybe even sixty... for who could
tell whether or not that the great mass of copper may have still concealed a
little silver. Miller calculated the value of the pile to be somewhat more than
one hundred fifty dollars, American, finally shaking his head in resignation.
"Well, that is all I can afford.
If you were to come to Santa Cruz del Bravo with me,
and thence to Belize" said the Tatoob, "I would
give you, besides this, another hundred dollars upon the arrival of the rain
which you have promised. You must understand that you would have to pay your
own expenses in any such instance."
The American gave the appearance of
thought but shook his head. "I would miss the steamer back to New
Orleans," he said. "No, I cannot come with you. Throw in that watch
of Carranza's and it's yours."
Silvestro
frowned and the shutters rattled again. He worked the gold ring from his finger
and shook it off atop the coins. "That is all," he said. "If
Alvarado is willing to pay more, God bless him."
"Take it," shrieked Miller,
more to the unseen face behind the shutters than to Silvestro.
He removed his hat and began scooping coins into it. "You'll need to take
that in a taxi," he said, generously leaving a few coppers on the table.
The shutters clicked, the old man in the hammock sighed and smiled. Frank
Miller scribbled some English words and numbers on another card. "This is
your guarantee," he said. "If there is something wrong, notify me at this address and I will refund all... all your
money... but you won't have to, it works perfectly. At least all eight before
it did! Look, this is the switch that turns it on." And he returned the
metal rainmaker to its wooden container. "Connect this terminal to your
generator with copper wire. Be careful, it's heavy but delicate."
Within the hour, Silvestro
was to appreciate the latter warning, for there were no fotingos
to be found in Merida's barrio. The Tatoob was, hence,
obliged to carry the device ten blocks to a streetcar route, struggling under
the sun. His breath fell short, sweat poured from his
brow.
"I am growing old," he
realized. All the Generals and Jefes were old men,
such as Ignacio Bravo. Was that his fate? The streetcar arrived and the Tatoob saw his reflection in one of the dusty windows, a
disheveled, wild-eyed old man. He tugged the rainmaking machine aboard and
shoved his way to a seat, earning angry glares.
"If I had worn my uniform, they'd
move the hell out of my way," he thought, but then remembered that he had
not worn it lest the inventor have thought him a wealthy man. Life was full of
such distasteful compromises.
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