Our Lives Are the Rivers

by Jaime Manrique

  One day a letter arrived describing how the general, instead of going directly to Ocaña, would station himself in Bucaramanga, so that his presence at the convention would not be interpreted as coercion on the undecided delegates. I was overjoyed at this news. In Ocaña, where so many of his enemies were gathered, it would be that much easier to kill him.

  NIGHTS AT La Quinta were dreary without him. When the fog submerged the gardens, the chilliness of Bogotá’s altitude set in, like a sickness of the soul. I needed company. I decided to keep entertaining and invited Bolívar’s friends in the city, the British Legion. Pepe París’s daughter, my namesake, Manuelita, who despite her youth had become my only woman friend in Bogotá, came, accompanied by her father. She was the only female who accepted my invitations, although at seventeen she was still a child. The soirees were an excellent way of finding out what was going on outside the walls of La Quinta. Besides that, having the house full of soldiers until late at night made me feel safer. Once I was alone in my bedroom, though, I worried. How could I be sure that some of these soldiers were not spies for Santander and his chums? Or of General Córdoba, for instance, a patriot who was jealous of my place in the Liberator’s affections, and who would have been happy to see me removed from Bolívar’s life.

  Every night I kept a candle burning until dawn broke. One morning I noticed dark shadows under my eyes—I looked haggard, exhausted, aged. That was enough for me. Though I knew the servants would gossip, I asked my girls to sleep in my bedroom, just as we had done when we were children. Most nights we sat on my bed in our sleeping garments with a bottle of aguardiente and gossiped and smoked and laughed until I became exhausted enough to fall asleep.

  As soon as bogotanos found out about the three of us sleeping together, malicious rumors flared up. My most vocal enemy was Monsignor Cuervo, who denounced me from his pulpit during daily mass, accusing me of hosting depraved bacchanals in which my slaves and I performed immoral acts and engaged in “the vice practiced by many women in Lima.” The monsignor was one of the most corrupt members of Bogotá’s clergy, the father of numerous illegitimate children and a usurer who controlled the sale of basic staples to the people.

  Jonotás made him the subject of one of her tableaux vivants. When I was a girl in Catahuango, she had amused me by impersonating and ridiculing the humorless members of my mother’s family. In Lima, she was notorious for her caricatures of the peccadilloes of the society ladies and corrupt politicians. Her antics made James Thorne furious. He demanded that I forbid Jonotás to perform these caricatures. He was afraid they would make enemies for him. I never put her up to it, but clearly I encouraged her by laughing till I cried at her outrageous impersonations. It was one thing when she performed for me in private, or when she acted them out in the kitchen for the other servants. But I had no control over her when she went out in the streets and performed on street corners, or on the steps of a public building, always attracting a crowd and a few coins for her talent.

  I was with guests one night in the game room, where we were playing cards and billiards after dinner, when one of my visitors mentioned that the monsignor’s most recent attack on me had hinted that I had a pact with the devil and held a witches’ coven at La Quinta. Jonotás and Natán were serving drinks and emptying ashtrays as we talked. I never forbade them to converse with my guests—which many criticized me for. They could add to the conversation if they had anything to say. Even so, I was surprised when Jonotás started clapping her hands and asked for a moment of silence.

  “Ladies and gentleman,” she announced, “Natán and I have taken the liberty to prepare an entertainment for you. We hope you will find it amusing. It is about a certain churchman who has been slandering Doña Manuela. We would like to ask for her permission, and your indulgence, to present our little tableau.”

  “Oh, no, no,” I said. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Jonotás.”

  But Pepe París pleaded, “Please, Manuela. This could be amusing. There’s no doubt he deserves whatever it is. And we all need a good laugh.” The rest of the guests applauded in agreement.

  “Fine,” I said, thinking we were among friends so I need not worry about news of Jonotás’s performance getting back to the monsignor.

  “Please continue with your conversation, ladies and gentleman,” Jonotás said. “We need a few minutes to get ready.”

  As she and Natán left the room, a nervous anticipation came over me. Her caricatures could be savage. I lit a cigar and downed a glass of oporto to soothe my nerves. When the ringing of a bell was heard, all of us fell silent. The smell of incense reached us as Natán entered the room dressed as an altar boy, holding a bell in one hand and with the other swinging an incense burner. I giggled nervously. Jonotás, wrapped in purple fabric to denote a high-ranking church official, walked behind her. In her hands she held a wooden cross. Her face was impassive.

  Natán led Jonotás to a chair and helped her sit, then she sat on the carpet at her feet. Jonotás began to speak in mock Latin in sermon-like tones, reading from a Bible she had fished out of her purple tunic. The theme of the sermon was the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah. She began to enumerate the sins—all of a sexual nature—in which the citizens of Bogotá indulged. She pointed at guests in the room and addressed them by the names of known enemies of the Liberator. “You, Julio Zamora, you patronize filthy prostitutes and gave syphilis and ticks to your saintly wife. That is why she gave birth to children with four feet and two heads.” Whenever she mentioned a person’s name, Natán would get up, turn to the audience, beat her breasts, pull her hair with both hands, and bawl, “Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.”

  “In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit,” Jonotás continued, “I condemn you to hell, to thousands of years of burning flames.” Natán threw herself on the floor, thrashing and screaming. Jonotás continued her sermon, calling out the names of other citizens and accusing them of other depravities. After concluding the homily she offered her parishioner communion. Pulling a pewter cup from under her wrap, she motioned to Natán to receive the host. Natán approached on her knees. When she opened her mouth, Jonotás raised her skirts in a quick motion, producing a small crucifix, which she shoved in Natán’s mouth, simulating an act of fellatio. Meanwhile, Jonotás held a rosary, which she started saying aloud, with her eyes shut, her prayers interrupted by her loud moans of pleasure.

  Just as quickly they stopped and, as they ran from the room, sprinkled the guests with “holy water.”

  I had been holding my breath throughout most of the performance. When I turned around to look at the faces of my guests, I saw they were stunned; pale, in fact, as if they could not believe what they had seen. Even for a room full of friends, the satire may have gone too far. Nonetheless, I led off the applause and called back Jonotás and Natán to toast their artistry.

  Monsignor Cuervo stopped making me the target of his sermons. But the atmosphere in Bogotá turned so poisonous for me that I could almost breathe toxic vapors in the air.

  THE BROADSIDES AGAINST me were replaced by newspaper flyers attacking Bolívar. They appeared in El Conductor, a newspaper published by Vicente Azuero, a santanderista. The flyer inserts incited the people to stage an assault on the garrisons where the troops were stationed and to wrest control of the city away from them. These pamphlets declared the time was ripe for an uprising, hinting that in other Colombian cities the troops were ready to rise against the general and defeat his antifederalist ideas. Bolívar was accused of being a “praetorian dictator” who had plans to become emperor before the convention in Ocaña was over. Still other pamphlets stated that the Liberator was near death, and invited the general’s troops to surrender peacefully and swear allegiance to Santander as the new president in return for mercy. Fortunately, I knew from Bolívar’s letters that his health remained stable.

  I missed riding. It had become too dangerous for me to go riding in the savanna, and the idea of going for a ride accompanied
by a regiment was not appealing. Riding was freedom to me. How could I feel free with dozens of armed men following me? Knitting provided a temporary respite from my worries, but I needed fresh air, exercise, to relieve my anxiety. I began to feel trapped in La Quinta. Even its gardens had begun to seem to me like nightmarish labyrinths with no escape.

  THE ARRIVAL OF Colonel Andrés Fergusson from Ocaña provided some contact with the world outside. He rode into La Quinta early one afternoon to meet with the general’s ministers. Their meeting in the library lasted hours. After it was over, I sent word requesting an audience with him.

  Evening had fallen by the time Andresito Fergusson came into the room where I was knitting with Natán and Jonotás. I immediately put my knitting down and ran to embrace him, then motioned to my girls to leave us alone.

  “Colonel, tell me the truth about the general’s health,” I said, looking straight into his clear blue eyes.

  He took a chair and held my gaze. “Coronela, the general’s health is the same as it was when he left Bogotá. He asked me to tell you he hopes to return soon. He worries for your safety.” Andresito paused. “How are you doing, mi coronela? Is there anything I can do to make your situation better?”

  Over whiskeys I told him about the broadsides attacking me and how they had been replaced by the inflammatory pamphlets against the general printed by Vicente Azuero.

  “We have to stop the man,” Andresito said, his face reddening with anger. “Give me your blessing, Coronela, and I’ll put a bullet through his heart.”

  “No, Andresito,” I said, “don’t take rash action you will later regret. You are too valuable to the general and me to ask you to do something so foolish. I do agree with you that we need to send a strong message to Azuero. Let me try a plan of my own first. If it doesn’t work, then I will ask for your help.”

  We drank late into the evening. Andresito described the atmosphere in Bucaramanga, and gave me the details of what was happening in Ocaña. He considered it a good sign that José María Castillo, a loyal supporter of Bolívar, had been elected president of the convention. I was happy to have a true friend back in Bogotá.

  The next day I instructed Alejandro, a Venezuelan lancer, a gigantic black man who had fought with the general in many campaigns, to find Vincente Azuero, give him a sound beating, and order him to stop publishing the scurrilous pamphlets at once. I was somewhat alarmed later when Alejandro reported to me that, consumed by his fury, he had broken the fingers of Azuero’s right hand.

  “Don’t worry about it, Coronela,” he tried to reassure me, “he was lucky I didn’t cut off his fingers to feed the dogs.”

  BECAUSE NOTHING ESCAPED Jonotás’s espionage network, I heard right away that General Córdoba had let it be known he was appalled by what he considered my act of censorship against a free press. Apparently, he was planning ways to discipline me.

  I was pondering whether to write to General Bolívar denouncing Córdoba’s treasonous conduct, when news arrived in Bogotá that one of Santander’s men, Admiral Padilla, had launched a rebellion in Cartagena.

  Padilla, a mulatto who had fought heroically during the Wars of Independence and later turned against the Liberator, had a reputation for brutality and bloodthirstiness. This revolt could signal to Bolívar’s enemies that the time had come to rise in arms against him. I desperately wanted to join the general in Bucaramanga, to be by his side at this moment. However, staying in La Quinta meant I could continue gathering valuable intelligence for the general about what was being plotted in Bogotá. My situation was more difficult than ever: I had to fear harm not only from Bolívar’s enemies, but now from his friends as well. I could take care of the latter, but the former, led by Córdoba, were too many and too powerful for me to do anything about them.

  I wrote to Bolívar:

  Sir:

  In my last letter to you I said nothing about the events in Cartagena to spare you disagreeable news. Now I congratulate you because the traitors failed. Santander is responsible for this, as if all he had done before was not enough reason for us to shoot him. May God look favorably upon the death of the evil Santander and Padilla. It will be a great day for Colombia when these vile men die. This is the most humane solution: may ten men die in order to save millions.

  If this letter fell into the hands of my enemies, it would be my ruin. Yet I was certain that the only advantage we had at this point was the element of surprise—to strike before our enemies did.

  ASTONISHING NEWS REACHED us: Gran Colombia still lived! Bolívar had ordered his delegates to walk out of the convention, dissolving it for lack of a quorum. Santander and his followers had lost this round. Bolívar would be returning to Bogotá soon, and I could stop looking over my shoulder every second of the day.

  I longed to see the general, to hear his voice, be held in his arms again. Without him by my side, living with him the daily turmoils of the nation, the relentless assaults on his dream of unity, life was reduced to the banality of political intrigues, and cold, lonely nights.

  Even before leaving Bucaramanga, the general’s first action was to vacate the position of vice-president, thus demoting Santander. The newspapers announced that the scoundrel had been named Ambassador to the United States, which meant he would leave Colombia soon and be too far away to represent an immediate danger to the general.

  My elation at these events was dampened considerably when I received a rather formal letter from the general saying that for reasons he could not explain on paper he would not be returning to live in La Quinta; he would take up residence in San Carlos Presidential Palace. I was well past the point where I would interpret this as a sign that the general did not want me by his side. I no longer needed reassurances of his love for me, even though a rumor had reached my ears that the general was planning to crown himself king of Colombia upon his return to Bogotá, and that to solidify his position he would marry a princess from one of the European monarchies. It was said that el Libertador would never again be my lover, making of me what Napoleon had made of Josephine.

  I refused to believe a word of this rumor. It was meant to harm me, I was convinced. If it was true, I would have to hear it from Bolívar’s lips. No matter what, I would remain the general’s most loyal subject, friend, and lover. I would rather continue as the general’s mistress, the second woman in his life, than go back to Lima and Thorne.

  23

  Natán

  Manuela and all of Bolívar’s followers applauded his decision to declare himself Dictator of Gran Colombia. Nothing good could come of it, I thought. If he wanted to win the trust and affection of Colombians, it seemed the wrong way to go about it. It’s possible Bolívar was so drunk with the total arrogance of absolute power that he thought he did not need the people’s love in order to rule them.

  To prepare the people for the news, Colonel Herrán, the governor of Bogotá, came up with the foolish idea of parading Bolívar’s portrait through the streets of the city. From a corner, I watched members of the Municipal Council carrying the portrait. Gold ribbons were attached to the four corners of the painting, and other members of the council held the ribbons as they walked the streets, praising Bolívar and shouting his accomplishments, as if he were a god. No crowds followed the procession to acclaim the image of the general. There were even some people who heckled the portrait as it went by.

  This procession was Herrán’s first step in preparation for the formal announcement of the general assuming extraordinary powers. The next day, the colonel, accompanied by at least a thousand soldiers, held a public meeting at the Customs House. I was there, too, at the request of Manuela, who had sent me and Jonotás to bring back a full report. Colonel Herrán announced at that meeting that General Bolívar, to protect Colombia from chaos, had been persuaded by illustrious patriots to assume the dictatorship of Gran Colombia. Herrán took the opportunity to announce that the mandate of the representatives elected by bogotanos the year before had been revoked. To silence the oppos
ition, he added that Bolívar was reluctant to accept the dictatorship and the resolution approved by the Council of Ministers, who had pleaded with the Liberator to accept it in order to maintain unity.

  This resolution became known as the Act of Bogotá. If the procession of the portrait had been received without enthusiasm, the new resolution was like a slap on the faces of bogotanos. People congregated in small crowds in the public spaces of the city, and it was obvious that some sort of popular resistance was being planned. Herrán wasted no time ordering Bolívar’s garrisons out on the streets to make clear to the populace that the military was ready to do whatever it took to enforce the resolution.

  Simón Bolívar, Dictator of Gran Colombia, reached Bogotá on June 24. The victory parade felt more like a funeral procession, as the people locked themselves in their homes when the troops entered the city. Bogotanos were unhappy to see Bolívar again. They knew that whenever the Liberator showed up in the city, war was not far behind.

  The night before Bolívar addressed the people in his new role as dictator, he sent for Manuela. Jonotás and I accompanied her to the palace. We stood outside the closed door of the general’s bedroom, from where we heard Manuela vehemently reminding Bolívar of the importance of his words the following day, imploring him to change the tone of the speech, to make the people of Bogotá the true saviors of Gran Colombia. “You have an opportunity right now to win their affection and their trust,” Manuela had shouted. “If you want to continue ruling, you need them as your allies.” After much loud arguing, Santana was sent for. It was well past midnight, when a new draft, one that had more popular appeal, was completed.