When the Owl Cries Part 23

"I, I filled her grave ... took care of the others ... have almost finished."

They glanced at one another, the glance of brothers, the glance of men who had seen a great deal of life and death. Raul's hand felt for Manuel's arm and gripped it with grat.i.tude and affection.

9

Donato Farias:

1 bandana 0.25 2- kil. tobacco 2.30 cig. papers 0.70 shoes 3.50 2- met. cloth 2.25 (for trousers) 6 kil. beans 1.80 4 kil. sugar 1.20 salt 0.62 dried chili 0.10 ------ 12.72

Farias had purchased these items during the last month.

Each week he earned twelve pesos but received nothing in cash. His total indebtedness at the _tienda de raya_ amounted to 1,291.68 pesos. Raul, perched on a three-legged stool at the desk in the _tienda de raya_, mumbled Farias' name and x'd his account; then signed and dated the sheet. Flipping to the S pages, he canceled Salvador's account, which totaled over fifteen hundred pesos. Esperito, his father's bookkeeper, had faked entries and Raul spotted them with half an eye; the corroded bra.s.s pen between his fingers, he felt Esperito's pocked face over his shoulder, objecting. Let the ghost object: Esperito had been packed off to Guadalajara, to another job of pencil chewing and peso bickering.

Raul wiped the nib of the pen on the desk blotter, pleased that he had control and could be generous. Deliberately tapping the tobacco into his pipe bowl, liking the aroma, he smoked a while, hacienda noises coming in through the open windows. Sun streaked the freckled Petaca map, with its residence, ponds, villages, roads and mountains. His father had tacked it up. A colored print of Porfirio Diaz (as a young man) dangled over the stained flattop desk. A Mosler safe, with New England autumn landscape on its door, squatted under a heap of account books, cattle magazines, boxes of nails, screws and bolts, its casters in dust, sand and pigeon feathers.

All other s.p.a.ce in the room was shelved with supplies, soap, boxes of nails and hinges, bundles of machetes, bolts of cloth, cans of tobacco and oil, packages of tobacco and cigarette papers, tins of coffee and gunpowder, the thousand and one things needed at an hacienda. A thousand times a week Petacan men and women talked of the _tienda de raya_ and cursed its prices. The same words were heard at a thousand haciendas. The _tienda_ was the core of the peasants'

lives, for there they bought their servitude, since no _hacendado_ permitted purchases anywhere else. The _tienda_ was everyman's ball and chain. Sons inherited their father's indebtedness. If a man fled, the rurales had a way of picking him up with uncanny rapidity.

In the corner, the shelving was broken by a gla.s.s gun case: Winchesters and Remingtons stood in a row. Revolvers and pistols, holstered and unholstered, crowded the rack, with boxes of sh.e.l.ls neatly stacked behind them. The guns and sh.e.l.ls were the only neatly arranged things in the store.

Everything else had been put down carelessly, was dusty and tangled with cobwebs.

Raul fiddled with the counterfeit coins a forgotten _mayordomo_ had nailed across the rim of his desk: the five-peso silver piece turned rustily on its nail; the ten-peso coin had a big nick out of the side; he remembered the copper two-centavo coin was like one he had had as a boy; quite a bit of counterfeit money had found its way to the hacienda during the nineties.

Wind puffed through the open room.

Feeling relaxed, he got up, shut the door and walked toward his father's room. His wound had stiffened, as he sat at the desk, and he pumped his arm as he walked, appreciating the fit of his new red leather boots. His jeans and gray shirt, carefully tailored, were also new. Scratches from the palmera marred his cheek and he picked the scab as he paused in his father's open doorway.

"h.e.l.lo," he said.

His father grunted.

"I'd like to talk to you," said Raul.

"I can't very well stop you," said Fernando. "Come in," he added peevishly.

"I see you've had breakfast," Raul said.

Chavela was removing dishes and silver and placed them on her Tarascan tray. A stupid grin on her face, she worked awkwardly. Amused, Raul watched her, knowing how clever she could be in the kitchen, supervising others. When she had gone he pulled a chair up to the bed. Through the grilled window, the sun spread over the carvings on the ugly wardrobe. Fernando smoked a fresh cigarette and asked:

"Did Farias tell you that our rock fences had been deliberately pulled down along the del Valle line? Or did he keep that information to himself?"

His voice quavered; propped on his pillows, one arm under the sheet, his hair uncombed, his face unshaven, he filled Raul with pity and disgust.

"I've talked with Farias. I plan to visit Santa Cruz. I'll talk with Senor Oc."

"You'll find him a trickster."

"I've never met him. He's your enemy, not mine."

"You imply...." The old man's voice climbed; he wanted the peace of his own folly.

"I came to talk to you about this." Raul tapped his shoulder where a bandage bulged under his shirt. He thought it would be easy to say, but the words choked in his throat.

"Don't accuse me of attempting to a.s.sa.s.sinate you!" Fernando screamed.

"I'm leaving for Colima in an hour or so. I'll have a talk with the police. I'll have Pedro picked up and jailed," Raul said, forcing himself to keep calm.

"Who'll be your overseer?"

"Salvador."

"Salvador, the oxcart maker! Jesus, use your head!"

"I like honest men."

With tense fingers, Raul emptied and filled his pipe; his eyes took in the smooth, familiar bowl and stem. Neither man spoke and the chatter of servants crossed the room; a child called: "Run, Lupe, run."

"You may as well get it into your head that I didn't send Pedro after you."

"You sent him after Farias."

"I wanted to involve those Jesuits. I hate those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds.

I wanted to work up a little trouble ... we've always had difficulties with the del Valle people." He sounded extremely tired; a flip of his fingers sent his cigarette somersaulting across the tiles.

Raul saw himself in his father's mirror; he shut his eyes and bit his pipe stem.... In Guadalajara, his father had said: "I sometimes see him...."

"You think in terms of morals," Fernando went on. "We don't live in a moral age. Do you believe Diaz is a moral president? Surely, at your age, Raul, you're not that blind!

You're not moral yourself--if we come to that. I've never been moral but you, well, you seem to feel you're G.o.d himself!"

Raul wished he could forget the decayed face, the glaring eyes.

"I don't like what you've said."

Fernando chortled.

"You and your Lucienne don't like a lot of things, I gather.

She hides in her flowers and you hide in her lap."

Raul jabbed his pipestem at Fernando. "You hired Pedro; he's been your private a.s.sa.s.sin; get rid of him."

Fernando's lips collapsed. His eyes slapped shut. House noises filled the room.

"Let me say this," said Raul, pipe in both hands, eyes on the smoke that trailed from its bowl. "Maybe I'm as corrupt as you say. But I happen to love Lucienne, if that makes any difference. I've been promiscuous.... We've all played with hacienda girls. But you have played with lives. You've let people starve for a whim. You've had them kicked and whipped and killed. You've stopped our school. You let Esperito fake entries in the account books. That's corruption."

"You should be able to name things," growled Fernando, his hands under the sheet, the sheet under his chin. "I'm sure you learned everything when you were in Europe, all the pros and cons."