Treasure of the World

by Tara Sullivan

  “Dammit!”

  I fish the soggy box out of the water and shove the heels of my hands into my eyes to keep myself from crying. They’re only matches, I tell myself severely. They don’t matter. But they’re also our only box of matches, and though I know I haven’t damaged them permanently, having to wait until they’re dry before I use them means that I won’t be able to have dinner ready by the time Papi and Daniel get home. For some reason, that feels like the biggest tragedy in the world.

  A warm hand settles on my shoulder and I startle.

  “A bit over-the-top to pull God from his busy day to damn a broken match, don’t you think?” Abuelita shushes me, her wrinkled hands smoothing the angry tears off my cheeks. “Now, what’s the matter?”

  “It wasn’t just a match,” I say, holding up the soggy offender. “It was the whole box.”

  “Ah,” says Abuelita, her lined face serious. “Yes, of course. Much more worthy of divine attention.”

  I can’t help it. I smile.

  “Well, it kind of is a big deal if I can’t get dinner cooked because I was too clumsy,” I say. “Papi will be mad if he comes home and there’s no food ready.”

  For a moment Abuelita just looks at me, and I can’t read her expression. We don’t usually talk about Papi and what he does when he’s angry, but she lives in our one-room house with us. She knows what I’m not saying.

  “Well then,” she says, getting up and dusting her hands on her layered skirts, “it’s a good thing there’s more than one way to light a fire.” She disappears into the house and reappears a moment later carrying Papi’s spare acetylene helmet. Running her fingers around the band, she pulls out an almost-empty cigarette lighter.

  “We shouldn’t waste that,” I say automatically.

  “I don’t plan to.”

  Abuelita turns on the acetylene to get the gas flowing, flicks on the lighter in a surprisingly smooth movement, and lights the spigot in the middle of the reflector plate. Then she tucks the lighter back into the band and holds the lit helmet out to me.

  “You want me to light a cook fire with acetylene?” I manage.

  “Why not? You need a fire, don’t you?”

  I shrug miserably, not wanting to take the helmet from her. Papi never lets me touch his mining stuff. When I hesitate for a moment longer, Abuelita sets the helmet gently into my hands.

  “What your father doesn’t know can’t hurt us,” she says.

  Fingers shaking, I hold the flame against the pile of dung. After a minute, the pile catches, the persistent breeze no match for a continuous acetylene-fueled fire. As soon as the fire is well caught, I snap the valve shut to cut off the flow of gas and hand her the helmet.

  “Thank you,” I mumble, placing the pot of water on top of the flames. Abuelita returns the helmet to the house, and I add a handful of diced llama jerky, fresh carrots, and diced chuño to the pot.

  The water has just boiled when a shout from the house snaps me out of my daze.

  “Ana!”

  I jump to my feet at the panic in Abuelita’s voice.

  “Come quickly! They’re back! Daniel is sick!”

  4

  Daniel’s cough is raw and hacking and so intense it bends him around himself and he can’t stand up. It’s why it took the two of them so long to get home: Papi had to carry him.

  Daniel’s fever is back too, raging through him, burning him alive. Being in the mine has triggered his bronchitis, worse than it was before.

  I sit beside him on our pallet of blankets holding a cool, damp cloth to his forehead, trying to bring his temperature down and wiping the blood-flecked spittle off his cheeks. In between his coughing fits, I try to spoon broth into his mouth, but so far he’s vomited up anything he’s managed to get down.

  In the background, Mami yells at Papi that this is why Daniel should never have gone to the mines, that he’s too fragile for that kind of work, that her baby is dying. Papi yells at Mami that she should shut the hell up, that she doesn’t know what she’s talking about, that she’s turning Daniel into a weakling. I’m not surprised when I hear him hit her, which is when Abuelita starts shouting at both of them to stop it.

  I don’t turn around. Instead, my shoulders curve forward protectively, keeping Daniel and myself out of it.

  The fight ends when Papi storms out of the house, shouting that he’ll be damned if he’s going to work alone tomorrow, the price of mineral is too high, and he’ll not have it said that his son’s a cripple.

  When he’s gone, Mami comes over to me.

  “I can sit with Daniel, mi hija,” she says. “Go to sleep: get some rest.”

  But I shake my head.

  “You need it too,” I say. I didn’t take a beating, after all. “Besides, I don’t think I could sleep even if I went to bed. Please let me stay up with him.”

  Mami drops a kiss on each of our foreheads and leaves it at that.

  While my mother and grandmother sleep, I sit, hour after hour, late into the night, and think about all the things I heard over my shoulder. Papi, saying he’s not going to work alone tomorrow. Mami, saying Daniel’s in no shape to walk out the front door, let alone go into the mine.

  The problem is, I believe both of them.

  Even after Daniel falls into a fitful fever sleep, I sit awake, staring around our tiny house, thinking. There has to be a better way, even if it’s not a good choice.

  The price of mineral is high. It should make life easier. It should be a dream come true. Instead, it’s destroying my family.

  Daniel’s right. Dreams are for little kids. What I need now is a plan.

  I don’t go to bed until I have one.

  * * *

  Usually I sleep deeply and silently, but tonight when I fall asleep, a dream is waiting for me.

  In it, I’m standing barefoot on the rutted rock path that leads into the mountain, and the arched entrance to the mines looms dark in front of me. The cold from the mountain stabs up through my heels and the wind whips over the ridge and raises goose bumps on my arms and calves. I’m amazed at how real it feels because I know it’s a dream. Standing there, cold seeping up through me, wind whistling over me, I stare into the maw of the mountain and, in the way of dreams, I feel the Mountain That Eats Men inhaling and exhaling. When it sighs, the smell of dust and death washes over me and I cannot imagine that anything could be worse, until the next moment when the wind pulls around me and whistles into the black cavern and I realize the mountain is breathing me in.

  I stand there, unable to move, as the mountain heaves beneath me, learning my smell.

  * * *

  I wake bathed in sweat and feeling more exhausted than when I fell asleep. Shaking my head to clear it, I roll out of bed. The small amount of warmth I managed to put into the alpaca-wool blankets overnight is instantly gone and my sweat chills me even more as I struggle into my shoes. As cold as it is to be awake, I’m glad to leave sleep behind.

  Everyone else is still asleep—even Papi, who must have come home at some point—as I pull my thick black hair into two braids and wind them in a tight, bobby-pinned crown on top of my head. I layer on a shirt and my least-favorite sweater and pull on jeans and my heaviest pair of socks. Before anyone else wakes up, I take what I need from the house and hide it outside.

  “That’s a different style for you,” comments Abuelita when she joins me while I make the morning tea. She tries to pull me into quiet conversation, but I’m having trouble shaking off my dream from last night and stay quiet. It’s almost like I can feel the slow rise and fall of the mountain under my feet even though I’m awake. Besides, of everyone, I think I’m about to upset Abuelita the most and that hurts my heart.

  Through the open door I hear the unmistakable sounds of Papi waking up, and I know that I have to move now.

  “Here.” I hand her a cup of tea. “C
ould you take this in to Daniel, please? I’ll follow in a sec with the rest of it.”

  Abuelita takes the cup and heads into the house. As soon as she’s gone, I unwrap the bundle I hid around the corner of the wall. In it are Daniel’s coveralls, belt, boots, and acetylene headlamp.

  Battling a hollow, gnawing feeling in my chest, I pull them on.

  Beneath me, the mountain sighs.

  * * *

  The fight I cause with my appearance is, in some ways, more epic than the fight last night. Even Daniel props himself up on his elbows and shakes his head at me. Mami is shouting things that are so scattered and unconnected to each other that they don’t make any sense and Abuelita has gone pale and is trying to pull the uniform off me by force. Papi, for once, is sitting quietly on his stool, watching all of us fight. When he finally speaks, everyone in the room freezes.

  “And what,” he says to me coldly, “do you think you’re doing in your brother’s clothes?”

  Abuelita and Mami step away, leaving me alone to face the coming storm.

  I swallow and force out the words I practiced.

  “You said you needed to bring a kid with you to work today. Mami said that Daniel is too sick to go. You’re both right, so I’m going instead of him.”

  Papi’s face darkens like a building thundercloud.

  “Do you think being a miner is a joke, girl?”

  I shake my head and the helmet I’ve wedged over my coiled braids jostles.

  “No, sir. But I’m older than Daniel and right now I’m stronger than he is. Whatever he was able to do, I know I’ll be able to do.” I play my best card. “He can’t work with a fever and there’s no point wasting days when the price of mineral is so high.”

  Papi rubs a thick hand over the lower half of his face, considering.

  This is enough uncertainty that Abuelita loses it. She turns on me. “Have you not listened to a word I’ve said?” she shrieks. “La Pachamama does not allow girls into the mountain. It’s ill luck!”

  “But, Abuelita,” I try to soothe her, “the tourists do it all the time. The Americans and Europeans, when they come to visit the mountain, they ask for tours of the mine and everyone lets them in, no problem. Nothing happens when those women go into the mountain. Why should something happen if I help out, just until Daniel is better?”

  Abuelita is furious, but instead of answering me, she turns and yells at Papi. “No, Mauricio, absolutely not! This is ridiculous! You can’t let your daughter go into that hell hole.”

  I can see at once that she has made a big mistake. Papi’s face, which had lightened in amusement to see me being yelled at by my grandmother, twists into rage at being scolded.

  “Quiet!” he roars at her. “I’ll not be told what I can and can’t do under my own roof!”

  Abuelita stretches her thin neck and squawks at him, angry as a wet chicken. “I’m your mother!”

  “And I’m no longer a boy and you’d do well to remember it.” He’s on his feet now. “I am the man of this house! What I say goes.”

  “But la Pachamama—”

  “Damn the Pachamama and the devil and all the saints too while you’re at it!” he bellows. “No one quotes hocus-pocus to control me!” He looks me up and down, and I try not to flinch under his glare. “The mines are no place for a girl,” he starts, and I wilt, thinking I’ve lost. But then Papi goes on. “However, her brother is too sick to work right now, and she makes a good point that this is not a time when there is a day to waste. The price for zinc is higher than it’s been in ten years. Tin is on a rebound too. I’m not going to waste this opportunity because Daniel has a sniffle. Until the boy’s back on his feet, Ana will take his place.” When Mami starts to talk again, he holds up a hand to stop her and points at Daniel. “If you don’t like it, focus on making him better.”

  He slams his helmet on his head and stomps out the door.

  “Ana! Come!”

  I glance an apology at Mami and Abuelita. Mami is shaking and Abuelita won’t meet my eyes. Daniel looks shocked, but he’s still wrapped in blankets and propped on pillows. He’ll get a chance to heal. I know I’ve done the right thing.

  Without a word to any of them, I follow Papi.

  * * *

  Papi doesn’t talk to me as we walk the long road to the big mine entrance on the other side of the mountain where he works. The Cerro Rico has hundreds of mine entrances, some huge, some no bigger than the little manhole near my house. I sometimes think about all the tunnels snaking their way through the rock and wonder how the whole thing, hollowed out from the inside, doesn’t fall down around us.

  The big mine is a long way from home, nearly two hours of walking, and we’re not lucky enough to meet up with any trucks going our direction, only trucks coming down the mountain. We stand aside and let them pass. It’s downhill for the first hour until we get to the intersection with my school. I give it a wistful glance, then follow Papi up the road leading away from it for the last forty-five minutes of steep uphill walking.

  Finally, we round a last blind curve and the El Rosario mine stands before us. The cleared area in front of the main tunnel is a hive of activity—the tromp of heavy boots competing with the whump-whirr of the air compressor machine and the rattle of an electric jackhammer.

  I feel deeply that I don’t belong here. Sure, I’ve come to the mine before, once or twice, when Papi forgot his lunch sack. But every other time I’ve come here as Ana, Mauricio Águilar Agudo’s daughter, who was doing a nice, daughterly deed. People smiled at me and patted my head.

  But now I’m not running an errand, not wearing a skirt. Instead, I’m in a dusty miner’s suit, cinched tight at the waist. There are mud-caked boots on my feet, and my braids are wound around my head so that the helmet doesn’t wobble. The acetylene tank is strapped uncomfortably to my right hip and a spike jabs into my left. Over my shoulder, in Daniel’s bag, are a simple lunch, a few handfuls of coca leaves, and the small plastic water bottle I carried with me when I left home. No one is smiling at me now.

  “Well,” says Papi, cracking his knuckles one by one and looking around him, “now you just need to convince César to let you stay. Don’t make me regret bringing you.” He sets off at a brisk walk across the lot.

  I swallow. I didn’t realize I would have to have this fight with more than just Mami and Abuelita.

  Heart hammering in my throat, I force my feet to follow Papi as we walk toward the chaos of the mine entrance. Men strain, their feet slipping in the gray sludge as they struggle to keep huge wheeled metal bins of rock fragments on their narrow tracks. I scrabble sideways to get out of their way and bump into a column of workers lighting each other’s acetylene lamps. The glow from the open flame on their helmets shadows their faces even in daylight.

  “Sorry,” I mumble, and hurry away.

  I hug the rock face, scuttling to catch up to Papi, who is standing in front of a tin-roofed hut off to the left of the gaping archway. Just as I get there, a man comes out. I pull up short to avoid smashing into him and recognize César Jansasoy Herrera.

  “Don César,” I squeak. I hate how high and girlish my voice sounds, but I can’t help it, so I don’t try again. César is a huge slab of a man: his shoulders are wide, his face is wide, his knuckles are wide. He’s the kind of strong you can see coming ten meters away, not the ropy, sneaky strong that Papi is, that surprises you when you’re not expecting it.

  About to walk past, César does a double take when he hears me and peeks under the brim of the helmet at my face.

  “Ana?” he asks, shocked.

  I nod and glance at Papi, but he just waves a hand for me to go on. “Daniel is sick today. We were hoping you’d let me take my brother’s place, just until he gets better . . .”

  “Ana . . .” he starts, holding up his hands in front of him in apology, but Papi claps César on the shoulder.
Even though he’s shorter and slimmer than César, Papi moves with an intensity that tends to make people do things his way. Steering César away from me and other listening ears, Papi leans in and starts talking to César in a low, focused voice. I can’t hear their words, but it doesn’t take hearing to see César shaking his head back and forth. This is not good. I can’t imagine how angry Papi will be with me if this doesn’t work out. Not only will he have to go home this evening and have his mother’s way be the way things are, but his work buddies will have watched him fail to convince his boss. None of that will go well for us. I break into a cold sweat under my awkward gear. This idea is all my fault. I have to make it work.

  Without any more thought than that, I run over and grab César’s hand in mine.

  César startles and tries to pull away, but I hold on tight.

  “Please, Don César,” I beg. “It’s not for long—a couple of days only, maybe a week! Let me try to work here for just today. If you think I can’t do the job, then you can tell me to go and I’ll leave. Let me try. Please.”