When the Owl Cries Part 50

Gravely concerned for Lucienne, he lit his pipe and stepped to the fireplace. Perhaps the clock needed winding: yes, he wound it carefully, as if for the last time.

Someone was coming up the steps.

"Don Raul?"

"Manuel."

"I went to see Calvo."

"How is he?"

"He's all right."

"We must get Angelina's things packed tomorrow."

"I'm ready to help you."

"Thank you for getting Vicente back to Colima safely. That's an accomplishment these days."

"Let's make the rounds together," said Manuel.

"It's no world for Angelina," Raul said. "We must get her to Guadalajara."

"Have you heard from Palma Sola?"

"Not a word."

"Esteban has gone there again."

"I don't like the silence," Raul exclaimed.

"Shall I ride to Colima?"

"Wait till tomorrow. After breakfast we must work at the packing.

Have the carriage in front of the house. Let's do everything to get Angelina off. Organize her guards, six or eight men. If we can get to Colima tomorrow, I'll see about Lucienne."

It seemed to Raul, as he helped load the carriage in the morning, that he might fall asleep as he worked. He had slept little. Even the rain did not revive him, a warm, pleasant rain, slanting in long, insistent lines. He had pa.s.sed most of the night on the sofa in the living room.

The clock had said: Tighten that strap; put that valise on top; go see about Angelina.

Someone spoke.

"Yes," said Raul, strapping a valise.

"I just came from Palma Sola."

"Yes," said Raul, looking at a rain-streaked, mustached face, with a scar over one eye.

"Dona Lucienne is all right and the hacienda has not been bothered.

Federicka and some of her people are with Dona Lucienne."

The rain was a benediction after that: such a great weight had been lifted. He went into the house with a lighter step.

"We're ready now, Angelina," he called presently.

Tears trickled down Fernando's face as Angelina said goodbye; he could not see her; it was goodbye to a voice, to a memory.... After she had gone--he listened carefully to her footsteps, the banging of carriage doors, clatter of horses--he struggled to sit up: If I can sit up, I can still help Petaca. Petaca needs me, with people leaving, Raul away, Manuel ... I must help out.

In his gray world, he puttered with his nervous hands and tugged at his sheet but he could not sit up. Calling weakly to Chavela, he begged a cigarette; she had to put it in his mouth, take it out, put it back; she was still afraid of him, afraid of his closeness to death now. She shuffled uneasily by his bed, sat down, got up.

Raul and Angelina tried to make themselves comfortable, with a valise between them. The luggage on top rolled and thumped. Angelina clutched her mother's jewel case in her lap, a box covered with pink leather.

"Raul, I don't see how I can make it. The rain has made the road so much rougher."

"It is worse on such a bad day. But the train's running again."

"Won't all my luggage get soaked?"

"The tarpaulin's new," he said. "Try to rest against the cushions."

"There's no room. Will I ever get there?"

"I'll take off my poncho. That will make more room."

Rain drummed all the way and the road became a mire in places. They had to pull off to bypa.s.s a wagon and the carriage sank to the hubs.

Manuel put his cowboy escort to work, but it was a difficult job, with one of the whippletrees splintered. Angelina sat on a valise under her umbrella, a shawl around her, hating the rain and mud.

Colima's streets and houses were a glad sight, but at the railway station they learned from the telegraph operator that the rails had been ripped up by rebels, somewhere miles along the line.

"It will be days before a train can get through," he explained, wanting to be sympathetic.

Raul slipped some money into his hands.

"Keep me informed," he said. "I'll be in touch with you."

He took Angelina to Federicka's, but she could not shake her pessimism; she felt defeated, fated to die at Petaca; she complained of a sick stomach; her head ached. When Federicka urged her to remain in Colima she consented, sullen, ready to go to bed, unwilling to say goodbye to Raul. She shut herself in her room, telling herself: I'll stay here till the train runs.

Raul learned every inch of Colima's time-gnawed station before the train ran again: the scaled walls, the stink of urine, the fruit peels on the floor, peasants sleeping among c.o.c.kroaches.... Vicente sometimes waited with him, disgusted, a boy in school clothes. Raul was usually hatless, in tight gray trousers and a snow-white pocketed jacket-shirt.

Vicente chewed sugar cane. "It's going to be bad in Guadalajara," he said.

"It may be bad here."

"I don't like the Colegio Frances."

"But you can't stay at Petaca, as it is."

They spoke angrily:

"Mama's getting sicker."