Cuauhtemoc was puzzled. “But yes. When the pochteco go to far lands for trade, it is necessary that they be able to speak to the people. Thus it is that they sponsor schools where young people are taught foreign tongues.”
“Young people, eh? Good. Now, are some of these young people better students of foreign tongues than others? That is, do some of them speak several languages; are some able to pick up a new one much better than most?”
“Why, giant brother, I assume so. I know of some who can make themselves known in four or five different tongues.”
They were passing through the entry to the quarters of the Eagle Clan now.
Don said, “All right. I want you to try to find me six of the best students of foreign languages in the schools. They must be courageous, very intelligent, and take to language quickly.”
“But why?”
“Because we need a spy service.” He twisted his face in irritation. “Especially do I need one, because I’m not long for this world unless I know, from day to day, what our Spanish friends are up to.”
“I do not understand.”
“It isn’t necessary that you do right now. Find me the six and bring them to my quarters. It is most important.” Something else came to Don Fielding. “Look, now that I am a member of the Eagle calpulli, will land be assigned me that I must farm?”
The other looked embarrassed. “But you are a teteuh.”
“Like hell I am! I want to carry my share of the load.”
“It has been decided, in council, that in view of your strange discoveries of the longbow, the use of the litters that roll, and the other things that you have taught us, that you be given priest status and thus need not work in the fields but be supported from the common stores.”
Oh, oh. Here was the class-divided society he had been thinking about in its embryo stages.
So he was still a ward of the government. Now, agnostic as he had always thought himself, he was a priest. How many priests, he wondered, were agnostics?
“Get the lads to my room, blood brother.”
They turned up in surprisingly short order. Two of them he dismissed as too old. He wanted kids. Nobody noticed kids.
The four remaining were from differing clans. So far as he knew, none of them had ever seen him before. At least, not up close. While Cuauhtemoc stood against one wall, fascinated, Don had the four squat on the floor before his stool.
He said, “The teteuhs—though in truth they are not teteuhs—speak a strange tongue. Now listen carefully. Their word for yes is Si. Their word for the opposite is No. Now, repeat that.”
They repeated, their eyes bright.
He shook his head. “No. You must speak with a softer tongue.” He repeated the Spanish affirmative and negative.
He gave them twenty words that night before he dismissed them.
Then he turned to Cuauhtemoc. “See that all four of them are assigned as servants to the Spanish. Instruct them that they are never to reveal that they can understand a single word of what is being spoken. Above all, do not let Malinche know that they understand anything. She is the brain, as well as the tongue, of Cortes. He does not understand Mexico. She does. Within a week, the boys will be proficient enough that they will understand small things they overhear. Within a month, I’ll have them revealing everything that Cortes and his bullyboys discuss among themselves. The Spanish have the arrogance of all conquerors. They speak their own language openly, not believing that those about them understand, since they themselves are too lazy to learn the language of the people they conquer.”
Cuauhtemoc looked at him consideringly. “I do not understand much of what you say. But I have never understood much of what you say, giant brother. I will make the arrangements. And I think it possibly well that I too learn this new tongue.”
“Welcome to the class,” Don said.
After the other had left, Don Fielding had a twinge of conscience. The Indians could use the spies in their coming conflict with the invaders, but he knew that their cause was doomed to failure. In actuality, his big motivation was to keep up with his own fate. When Cortes finally decided to deal with him, and that was only a matter of time, he wanted warning. He could still flee the city and attempt to find refuge with the Tarascans or whomever. At least he might prolong his life for a year or so. Survive, survive!
The Spanish lost no time in getting about their business. They spent the second day of their visit in strengthening their defenses. They blocked up every street entry into the tecpan save one, and for that one they built a heavy door of thick beams. It was, Don Fielding realized, the first wooden door ever seen in Mexico. They requisitioned stores of com and other food far beyond daily needs, obviously building up a reserve. They also requisitioned a large number of huge pots and had their Indian porters fill them with water from the central reservoir in the middle of the plaza. These were evidently stored away as well. In the days that followed they were to add to this food and water over and over again, to the astonishment of the Tenochas who couldn’t understand their motivation.
Don explained it to Cuauhtemoc.
“They are laying in supplies, in the case you attack them and they have to withstand a siege.”
His new blood brother was shocked. “But we have received them with open arms. We give them all that they require. We give them all that they ask for. My uncle, Motechzoma, refuses to thwart the teteuhs in any manner.” The young Indian took a deep breath and added, “He has become an old woman before them.”
Cuauhtemoc was maturing rapidly these days, Don noted. He laughed considerably less often.
Don looked at him. “How many of your people are talking thus?”
The other held silence for a long moment, then said, “Many. But many others are as fearful of the teteuhs as is he.”
“They have good reason to fear,” Don growled.
Each night, he gave his classes in Spanish to the young linguists and to Cuauhtemoc who sat in on the lessons and proved almost as good a student as the teenagers. Don Fielding was surprised at their aptitude. It went even faster than he had expected. But then, that was always the case. If you speak one language, it is difficult to learn another. But if you have already gone through the experience of learning three or four or even more, then acquiring a new one is comparatively simple. In his own time, such people as the Swiss and Danes, who were raised speaking several languages, had little difficulty in picking up another.
During the day, his charges worked in the tecpan, cleaning up, doing errands, submitting to whatever indignities the Spanish inflicted upon them, and kept to themselves the extent to which they understood the words of the invaders. At night they spent several concentrated hours of drill under Don Fielding.
Largely, he kept to himself and out of the way of the conquistadores. Although Cortes had ruled that he was for the time not to be touched, Don didn’t trust the tempestuous Alvarado, nor his three remaining brothers, for that matter. He suspected that Pedro de Alvarado, and all the rest of the Spanish army as well, had precious little respect for the Tenochas, even the royal family, or for Motechzoma himself, though they believed him to be emperor, or at least king, of all Mexico.
On the second day after their arrival, the Spanish began to case the town.
Their Indian allies they left in the tecpan, having no desire to precipitate any outbreaks between the Tlaxcalans and the Tenochas, hereditary enemies for generations. But in groups never smaller than ten, and fully armed and armored, they explored all aspects of the city, almost touristlike, Don thought grimly.
They went up and down every street, every canal. The horsemen rode up and down each causeway, keen-eyed. Others rode out and completely circumnavigated the lakes, visiting Tetzcuco, Tlacopan, and all the other towns and villages in the valley of Mexico.
Some of them ascended the higher pyramids in both Tenochtitlan and Tlaltelolco, and from Cuauhtemoc Don Fielding learned that some of the soldiers made sketches of the town from these vant
age points.
His new blood brother was mystified at this.
Don sighed and said, “They are making their plans to take over the city. They wish to plan routes of retreat in case of disaster. They wish to map out the vantage points to seize. They want to discover where your…”
“Our,” Cuauhtemoc reminded him.
“Yes… our arsenals are. You see, they are much more advanced in the arts of war than are the Tenochas. They plan thoroughly. They do it well.” Don paused and then added, “And they will win and destroy this city and your… our people.”
Cuauhtemoc said emptily, “This you know, my giant blood brother?”
“I—believe it to be so.”
“Again you foresee the future. You are a magician, but still I am a man and must fight.”
“Yes, of course.”
“What do they do next?”
“They will capture your uncle, the First Speaker, and hold him captive in the tecpan.” Don Fielding was again drawing on his history.
The other’s eyes were wide. “But why?”
Don made a gesture of resignation. “Because they believe that he is the only chief of your confederation. In fact, they believe him to be the chief of all the lands of which you know—or they pretend to believe that. I truly do not know, but so they report back to the Emperor Charles in Spain. They believe that by capturing Motechzoma they have captured the government of Tenochtitlan.” Cuauhtemoc was still staring at him blankly. “But why do they think that?”
“Because that is the way it would be in their own country. If the Emperor Charles was captured, he who accomplished it would have all Spain and all the Holy Roman Empire in his possession.”
“I do not understand.”
“No. I know. But if you think me a magician or not, very shortly the Spanish will take your uncle and hold him in the tecpan as a captive.”
“Very good.”
“What?”
“Of what use is he to the Tenochas? He has become an old woman. He fears the teteuhs. Of what use is a First Speaker who fears the enemy?”
Don looked at him. “You’re learning,” he said. “It probably won’t do you any good, but you’re learning.” Nevertheless, Don Fielding felt it his duty to warn both Motechzoma and the Snake-Woman. After all, they had done him the honor of adopting him into their clan, the greatest honor of which they could conceive. Inside, he was a mass of confusion. He knew what was going to happen, that the Spanish were fated to capture the city, but here he was trying to thwart developments that he knew to be history. Well, he had tried to reason that out before and had come up a cropper.
He walked from his own room to the quarters the Tenocha war chief had taken over for his offices. As usual, there were no sentries, no guard. Such a thing as a bodyguard had undoubtedly never occurred to these people, except possibly on actual campaign or in battle. Perhaps he ought to suggest it.
Motechzoma, in his legless chair, was dictating to several scribes who squatted on the floor and wrote and drew with colored inks on amatl paper. When a message was completed, the large sheets of paper were folded so that they looked something like a book.
The First Speaker looked up at Don’s entrance; neither the Snake-Woman nor any of the other members of the Tlatocan high council were present. He didn’t seem surprised at Don simply walking in on him. Evidently, the government of the Tenochas operated on a very informal basis, Indian-style. Any member of the tribe, certainly any member of this calpulli, was free to confront the Tlacatecuhtli at any time.
Don said, or at least began to say, “I came to warn you that…”
There was a clatter of arms and armor outside and Don Fielding winced. He had miscalculated. The Spanish were acting before he had expected them to. He had thought it would be several more days.
Captain-General Hernando Cortes, in full armor and accompanied by five of his officers, including Alvarado, Sandoval, and Bernal Diaz, came striding into the room, his face in wrath. Behind him came Malinche and Aguilar, and outside, Don Fielding could see a squad of the Spanish footmen armed with pikes and swords.
Motechzoma looked apprehensive.
Malinche said to the secretary-scribes. “The god orders you to leave the room.”
They beat a hasty retreat.
Cortes, still glaring at Motechzoma, rapped to Aguilar, “Tell him.”
Aguilar addressed Malinche in Mayan, a few words. And she turned to Motechzoma.
“The god has been informed that your people have done a great evil.”
She went on to tell the other that the Captain-General had left a garrison under the command of Juan de Escalante at Vera Cruz. When Quauhpopoca, and it wasn’t quite clear to Don if this individual was a Tenocha tribute collector or a local chief, tried to get the Totonacs to pay the same taxes they had before the coming of the Spanish, the Totonacs revolted and asked aid of Escalante, who marched out with his forty soldiers, all he had fit to fight, his two cannon, and two arquebuses. Quauhpopoca had roundly defeated him, chased the Spanish back into Vera Cruz, and accepted the submission of the Totonacs. Juan de Escalante and several others of the Spanish garrison had been killed.
At this point Motechzoma denied that he knew anything of the matter.
Cortes, and Don Fielding had about decided that the rage was an act, thundered, “Give him my command!”
His command turned out to be that Quauhpopoca and his accomplices be turned over to the Spanish and that, meanwhile, Motechzoma be held hostage in the Spanish quarters.
That took some arguing. Cortes now simmered down to the point of saying that the other wouldn’t truly be a prisoner but an honored guest. He could take over any quarters he wished. He was free to conduct his government, and any of his officials could come and go, carrying out his commands. He could bring as big a staff as he wished.
The translating and retranslating went back and forth and, to Don’s understanding, about half of it came through confused.
Finally, Pedro de Alvarado and Sandoval drew their swords. “Skewer him if he protests,” Alvarado growled.
Although this wasn’t translated, the meaning was obvious and Motechzoma paled. Some war chief, Don thought. If the other had shouted, a thousand Indians would have come on the run.
But Motechzoma was demoralized beyond all ability to rise to the occasion. His shoulders slumped in defeat and he made a motion of acceptance. These, after all, were gods.
The Captain-General, his face elated, snapped, “Make arrangements for his litter, Dona Marina!”
Malinche turned and left. She was evidently picking up Spanish rapidly.
Cortes turned to Don who had remained quiet through all this. His eyes narrowed, “And I think you had better come along as well, Don Fielding.”
Chapter Fifteen
All right. He had just inwardly criticized his adoptive uncle for lack of backbone. Put up or shut up, Don Fielding.
But he knew full well he would never even get his gun out before the swords of Alvarado and Sandoval pierced him through. He was helpless. Hang on to life! Something might come up.
The litter arrived and Motechzoma, who had given in completely, mounted it. The Spanish gathered around tightly, desperately, and the march to the tecpan began.
As they progressed through the courtyards of the buildings of the Eagle clan, various of the First Speaker’s kin looked up in surprise, but no one raised a hand, or even a shout. They must have thought, Don realized, that this was but one more visit of the Tlacatecuhtli to the inscrutable teteuhs, who were so full of surprises.
The same applied to the great square which they crossed quickly and without incident.
In the tecpan, the whole invading host was standing to arms, Spanish and Indian allies alike. The men at the artillery had smoldering lengths of rope in hand. The crossbowmen had their bows cocked, quarrels in their grooves. The musketeers stood at vantage points, arquebuses at the ready. In the center of the main courtyard, the horsemen, armed with lances, wer
e mounted and ready to go.
They had expected trouble, Don could see. It must have been an unbelievable relief for it to have come off so easily. They were probably dumbfounded. Could anyone imagine Emperor Charles the Fifth being captured so easily?
Cortes snapped orders that “His Majesty” be given any quarters he desired and anything else that he wished, short of leaving the building. The dejected pseudomonarch was led off by a fawning Sandoval and a properly respectful Malinche.
The Captain-General turned to Don Fielding and eyed him speculatively. Don held his peace. It was the other’s ball.
Cortes said, “My faith, I should execute you and have done with it. But there are some aspects about you that mystify me. None of your story holds together. So we will postpone your fate until I have time to dig further into your impossible tale. Bernal!”
Bernal Diaz stepped up. “Yes, my Captain-General.”
“He is your responsibility. This palace is free to him. However, he is never to leave it save in your company. And he is not to leave the city under any circumstances. Otherwise, since he claims to be a gentleman, we will accept his parole if he gives it. Well, Don Fielding?”
Don sighed and said, “I give my parole. So long as you are here in command, I won’t leave the… the palace without Captain Diaz and will not leave the city without your permission.”
Pedro de Alvarado growled, “You are going to give this murdering dog permission to roam at will?”
Cortes said, “For the time, Pedro. Curb your temper. We have much to do. Come, let us examine the defenses. I trust no one save myself in such matters.”
Cortes and his officers went off, and Bernal Diaz looked at Don Fielding in amusement.
“Well, my tall friend, what brought you to this?”
Don snorted. “As though you didn’t know.”
“Believe me, on my faith, I don’t! Only that you were the death of one of our people, Gomez de Alvarado. Personally, I never thought highly of Gomez; nevertheless, he was a countryman and part of the army.”
“He entered the room in Cempoala in which I was sleeping and attempted to put me to the sword, as the expression goes.”
The Other Time Page 16
