Rain of Gold

by Victor Villaseñor

  That evening when Victoriano and Don Benito came under the ramada to eat, Lupe didn’t recognize them at first. They’d both gotten their hair cut short and they were wearing big new hats, brightly colored shirts and new white pants. Why, they looked like men on their way to a great celebration.

  “So you two struck gold, eh?” said one of the young miners, grinning sarcastically at them.

  Don Benito only shook his head, sitting down to eat. “No, not really,” he said. “But we did find a little color in the creek below the town.”

  “How much?” asked another young miner.

  “Hell, it couldn’t be very much,” said a third young miner, “or else he’d be down at the plaza buying music and drinks for everyone like he did last time. Eh, old man, you kept the music going for six months, I’ve been told.”

  “Almost a year,” said Don Benito. “But I’ll tell you this, if I ever strike it big again, I won’t be buying music for fools like you this time.” A hissing rumble went through the ramada. “No, this time I’ll just be right here like I am right now, eating under the ramada of this fine family that has never lost faith in me and has fed me free of charge for over a year.

  “This family is my partner and one day soon, I swear it, I’ll strike it big while you boys can only hope to keep digging gold you don’t even own.”

  Manos roared with laughter. “Well, look who got the horn for a change,” he said, as he dug into his food. “You young ones play with old bulls long enough and you’ll get the horn every time!”

  “You’re damned right,” said Flaco, glancing around and then sneaking a drink from the tequila bottle that he kept hidden under the table. “Here,” he said, passing the bottle to Don Benito, “take a belt!” shaking an upright fist.

  “By all means,” said Don Benito, accepting the bottle. But he, too, glanced around before pushing back his hat and drinking. Doña Guadalupe didn’t allow any alcohol in her home. That was one of the first rules that she had laid down right after her husband had left.

  Then, after dinner, when all the young miners were gone, Manos and Flaco approached Don Benito and Victoriano. The old man and the boy were done eating. They were leisurely drinking a delicious cup of atole together, which was made with warm goat’s milk, raw brown sugar and cornmeal.

  “Congratulations,” said Manos.

  “Thank you,” said Don Benito.

  Victoriano tried to keep his pride intact, but it was difficult.

  Leaning in close to the old man and the boy, Manos whispered, “If you two ever need any powder or tools, just tell us and we’ll get them for you.”

  Don Benito nodded. “Thank you,” he said. “But like I said, we just found a little color in the river, so we have no need of powder or tools.”

  Manos only grinned. “Keep saying that. But Flaco and I know that it’s too early after the rains to get any gold yet.”

  “Old man,” said Flaco, “what Manos is telling you is that the Americans are hungry now that they’re getting their gold out once again, so be careful. And don’t spend your money so wildly.”

  Don Benito put his cup of atole down. Victoriano could see that he was shaken. “Look,” said Don Benito, “I appreciate your concern, but I assure you that my partner and I have found nothing.”

  “Good,” said Manos, “keep saying that. But just in case you ever need a powder man, just say so. I’m getting tired of working for the gringos.”

  “How much do you charge?” asked Victoriano, before he could stop himself.

  Manos grinned. “So it’s that big, eh?” said Manos.

  Don Benito said nothing. He just stared at the heavy cup in his hand: it was a pinched together clay cup with places for the fingers to grip, instead of a handle.

  Manos reached out, plucking a loose thread off of Benito’s new shirt. “Don’t worry,” he said, “it’s safe with us.” And saying this, he and Flaco left.

  “I’m sorry,” said Victoriano, once they were alone.

  “It’s okay,” said the old man.

  “I just wasn’t thinking.”

  “I said it’s okay,” said Don Benito. “I only hope that your little sister can keep quiet when her Colonel returns.”

  Victoriano said nothing more, and Old Man Benito brought out a cigar. “The first time I found gold I couldn’t keep still about it, either. Gold, I swear, robs men of their minds. Believe me, I know. There’s just nothing like it to make the blood boil and the mind go crazy.”

  He blew out, catching his breath, then he picked up his hat. “Come on, partner, let’s go take a little stroll down to the plaza, buy another cigar and look around.”

  Quickly, Victoriano picked up his new hat. “Just let me run in and tell my mother that I’m going,” he said.

  “Of course,” said Don Benito.

  Inside, Victoriano found his mother with his sisters and Socorro going over the material that they’d bought to make dresses.

  “Mama,” he said, “can I go back down to the plaza with Don Benito?”

  “Twice in one day?” said Doña Guadalupe, smiling happily. “Sure, go with God, mi hijito.”

  Victoriano kissed his mother, then he was off. Lupe watched after her brother, feeling so glad that he wasn’t angry with her anymore.

  The sun was going down toward the towering cliffs when Victoriano and Don Benito came out of Don Manuel’s store. Don Benito had bought another cigar and a stick of hard candy for Victoriano. Walking side by side, they crossed the plaza and said good evening to the soldiers that the Colonel had left behind. The old man smoked his cigar and the young boy sucked his stick of candy. They bought two big beautiful hand-woven handkerchiefs from an Indian woman and tied them about their necks. They were men of leisure, strolling peacefully. They decided to go down by the springs below the town.

  The rainy season had ended. The creek was subsiding rapidly and the foliage was growing back in profusion along the banks. The flocks of parrots had returned to the box canyon by the thousands and were nesting in the tall trees. The wildflowers were blooming in abundance, filling the canyon with fragrance. This was the time of year that the deer had their young, the birds mated, and the canyon filled with insects and butterflies by the millions. It was the season of life.

  “Smell the air,” said Don Benito as they went along. “I swear that the world has grown more beautiful and I’ve gotten twenty years younger since we struck gold. That first time I found gold I was too young to appreciate anything. I was only going on twenty and went crazy with gold fever. I couldn’t stop talking. I had to tell everyone! And every night I sang to the heavens, I couldn’t even sleep, I was making so many plans of buying land! Haciendas! Whole villages!

  “Oh, I was a king, I tell you! Nothing was beyond my grasp! I was immortal!” He laughed, putting his arm around his young partner. They were now down by the small ponds below the plaza and there were hundreds of tiny frogs along the edge of the water. Victoriano watched the little frogs jumping about.

  Don Benito puffed on his cigar and they continued down the pathway through the tall, thick, new foliage. It was getting late and the sun was painting the sky with colors of pink and rose and lavender above the towering walls.

  Coming around a large boulder surrounded by great ferns, Don Benito suddenly saw Lydia, Don Manuel’s oldest daughter. She was dressed in white lace, running down an open meadow just beyond the creek, and her long, chestnut hair was flying in the wind. She was with two other girls and they were laughing, turning, whirling, as they came down the meadow carpeted with wildflowers, chasing after an enormous swarm of butterflies, flashing orange and silver in the going sunlight.

  Don Benito stood there, rooted to the ground, when the lightning bolt of God’s miracle of love came down from the heavens, hitting him between the eyes.

  And there she was, his queen, his truelove, whom he’d been dreaming of for as long as he could remember. And she was laughing, dancing over the meadows of flowers as she came into the cloud of
butterflies with her long hair flowing, golden in the bright sunlight.

  Gasping, mouth open, Don Benito watched Lydia go whirling, flying into the tapestry of butterflies, and he saw the delicate white flesh of the underside of his queen’s arms.

  Lunging from out of the ferns, Don Benito grasped Lydia in his arms. Startled, she looked at him, not recognizing the old man at first. But then, when she did, she yelled, struggling to get away, but he held her fast in his powerful arms, powerful from having moved rock all his life.

  “He’s crazy, Lydia!” screamed the girls. “Get away from the fool!”

  “Crazy in love, yes!” he shouted. “But I’m no fool! I’m rich, Lydia! Marry me and I’ll have slippers made of gold for you so your feet will never touch the dirt of the world again!”

  “Rich?” she asked.

  “Yes,” he said, still holding her close, “ask your father, he’ll tell you! This is our fate, and you are my queen! And we will have a house in Mexico City, another in Paris and a third one here in La Lluvia de Oro, if you wish.”

  Victoriano came running up, and seeing Don Benito with the mayor’s oldest daughter, he dropped his candy. It was that time of year when the butterflies robbed mortal men of their senses.

  “Don Benito,” said Lydia, using the word “Don” as she’d never used toward it him before, “if you’re lying and causing me embarrassment, I swear I’ll have my father shoot you! But, if what you say is true, and you are rich, then you must present yourself to my father like a king!” And she said “king” with such authority that it echoed out over the clearing filled with butterflies and dazzling wildflowers, all the way to the towering mighty cliffs.

  Victoriano turned, and ran as fast as he could.

  Doña Guadalupe and her daughters had just finished the dishes and were laying out the material when Victoriano came running under the ramada. They could see in Victoriano’s eyes that something terrible had happened.

  “What is it?” asked his mother.

  “Don Benito just told Lydia about our gold.”

  “So what?” said Carlota.

  “So what?” repeated Victoriano angrily. “Don’t you see? The whole town will know by tomorrow, and the Americans will come and take our gold from us!”

  “Oh, Mama, Mama!” screeched Carlota. “Don’t let them do it! I still need new shoes!”

  Everyone burst out laughing.

  “All right, mi hijita,” said Doña Guadalupe, “I won’t let the Americans take the gold before you get your shoes.” Then she turned to her son. “Now go on, tell me everything, but keep your voice down. Socorro is in the next room sleeping, and I don’t want us disturbing her.”

  The sun had just gone down behind the towering walls when Don Benito came whistling up the hill.

  “Don Benito,” said Victoriano, standing in one of the long dull shadows of the dimming light, “my mother wishes to speak to you.”

  “Why, of course,” said the old man cheerfully. He was so much in love, his feet had not touched the ground.

  “All right,” said Doña Guadalupe when she saw her son come up with the old man, “leave us alone, Victoriano. Don Benito and I have some business to discuss alone.”

  Victoriano didn’t like it, but he did as he was told. Going into the ramada, he passed by his sisters who were working on their dresses.

  “What did Mama tell him?” asked Carlota.

  “They’re just getting started,” he said, going out the backside of the lean-to.

  Lupe and her sisters stopped their work and glanced at each other, then Sophia giggled with mischief and went out the back of the lean-to, following her brother. Lupe and Carlota quickly followed. María was the last one to quit her work and go. She was seeing a boy and she wanted to finish her dress so she could wear it on their next walk together. But her curiosity was even greater.

  Outside, Lupe tried to climb up on the backside of the boulder after her two sisters, but she was too small. With one hand, María came up behind her and lifted Lupe up on the boulder. Quickly, Lupe crowded in close to Sophia and Carlota. Victoriano was already perched on the high point of the rounded boulder like an eagle, looking down at their mother and Don Benito. The big mother goat came to the edge of her pen, looking down on the young people on top of the rock below her.

  “I tell you,” Old Man Benito was saying, “your son came to me just in time. That’s all I needed, a little extra muscle. And now, we’re rich!”

  “Please, keep your voice down,” said Doña Guadalupe, smoothing the apron out on her lap.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” he said.

  Looking at him, Doña Guadalupe felt such an anger rising up inside her that she knew she would scream if she didn’t calm herself.

  “Don Benito, was it not our agreement that we would tell no one of our find?”

  He stared at her. “So Victoriano told you, eh?”

  “He’s my son; it was his duty.”

  Quickly, the old man got to his feet. “Look,” he said, “I’m a man, and I know what I do!”

  She took a big breath. “No one said you aren’t,” said Doña Guadalupe. “But we are partners, and we do have a deal.”

  Quickly, Don Benito picked up his hat to go. “I will listen to this no more,” he said. “You’re a woman, after all, Doña Guadalupe. And so you just don’t know the ways of this world. Don’t you see? I couldn’t wait. I need to dig up the gold right now so I can present myself to Lydia’s father like a king!”

  Lupe and her brother and sisters had to cover their mouths so they wouldn’t giggle aloud.

  “All right,” said Doña Guadalupe, seeing how insane he was. “So you love her and you couldn’t wait. But tell me, just how do you expect to present yourself like a king once you get the gold?”

  Don Benito rolled his eyes to the heavens. “Woman,” he said sarcastically, “why, I’ll buy myself a suit and shirt and tie. I’ll get boots, instead of these huaraches, and I’ll dress myself like a gentleman.” He smiled, glowing, trembling, feeling on fire he was so proud and sure and confident. He absolutely could not understand how anyone could even doubt him. He was rich, after all.

  Doña Guadalupe took pity on him. She’d been in this canyon long enough to see what the migration of butterflies did to people every season. She smoothed out her apron once again. She’d have to go easy so she wouldn’t offend the gold-crazy, love-crazy old man.

  “All right,” she said, trying to keep calm, “that’s all very good indeed, Don Benito. But now, you tell me, how exactly do you expect to get this suit and tie with our gold? No one up here in this whole region sells a suit or tie.”

  Don Benito stared at her. “You’re right, Doña Guadalupe,” he said, his lower lip beginning to tremble. “I guess I’ll have to go to Mexico City. And then, while I’m there, I’ll have them make slippers of gold for her feet, too.”

  “And so who will attend to the mine while you’re gone?” she asked.

  The rage that flashed into the old man’s eyes took Doña Guadalupe by surprise. Why, it looked like he was going to strike her.

  “Doña Guadalupe, you’ve gone too far!” he said. “You’re my partner, yes, but you’ve forgotten your place as a woman! Good night!”

  But she was on her feet. “Wait!” she said. “I fed you! I’ve seen you through sickness! We can’t afford to lose what we’ve found!”

  He stopped, his whole body trembling. “Doña Guadalupe,” he said, “you’ve provoked me beyond all reason! I will listen to you no longer! Tomorrow I shall blow out that hole we covered and take out enough gold to prove myself, and that’s that!”

  “And the Americans,” she asked, “wouldn’t they hear the explosion and come running to see what’s happened?”

  His eyes twisted, but he held his ground. “All right,” he said, “so I won’t use powder then, but I will dig it out by hand.”

  “Oh, please,” she said, “wait a few weeks and, I tell you what, if you cooperate with me, then my daughter
s and I will help you, and we’ll make the clothes for you.”

  His eyes widened. “You’ll help me, then, to present myself like a king?” he asked.

  She nodded. “Yes,” she said.

  “Oh, Doña Guadalupe, you are a hard woman,” he said. “But, yes, I’ll agree to this, but only for a few weeks. Then I’ll be out of money, and I’ll need more gold.”

  The grey-haired old woman glanced up toward the towering walls of rock, thanking God.

  And up on the boulder, Lupe and her brother and sisters could see it was over, so they quietly slid off the backside of the boulder. They didn’t want their mother to know that they’d been listening. They rushed back inside to continue working on their dresses. But then, when their mother came in, the first thing she said was, “And children, the next time you decide to hide on top of the boulder to listen to one of my conversations, lock up the goat first. She was right behind you the whole time, showing me where you were.”

  Lupe and her sisters and brother all burst out laughing. Doña Guadalupe joined them, and the little lean-to was filled with their happy sounds.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  And so the box canyon filled with the fragrance of wildflowers and the sound of newborn parrots. Love was in the air, choking the very atmosphere.

  The moon was full and the coyotes were howling and the dogs of the village were barking. Doña Guadalupe decided that she couldn’t deliver Socorro’s baby alone. The full moon was the most powerful time of the month, and strange things happened to women in labor during this time. Doña Guadalupe sent Lupe and Victoriano for the midwife while she and her three daughters heated water and prepared for the birth. Lupe and her brother ran up the pathway to the main road and then out the mouth of the canyon into the bright moonlight.

  The midwife’s name was Angelina. She and her husband lived just outside of the canyon on a little ranchería. They had their home in a small hole nested up against the mountain.