The Other Time

by Mack Reynolds

He was working, these days, sixteen hours a day from dawn until dark. He would have worked later still, but the only type of illumination was torch and that was inadequate for paperwork. Possibly the petroleum would end that. How did you make a lamp? Hell, the Greeks had solved that one!

  More of the Spanish were coming over to him daily as they saw the advantages of collaboration. They were opportunists to a man, Don decided grimly. He had given his collaborators a superior diet, better quarters, and had even allowed them women. When they had been in command of the city, many of the soldiers had acquired Aztec mistresses. Some of them had even had their girls baptized and married them. Don now encouraged these to return. The noncollaborators were not allowed this privilege.

  His clothes were really rags now. At long last he took them to the quarters where the seamstresses worked to be duplicated as best they could. He introduced them to the concept of the button-hole and button.

  And then he ran into Malinche. She was evidently as clever with a needle as the next woman.

  The city by this time was an armed camp. Most men of military age carried arms and participated in daily drill.

  Malinche said, her head high again, “And you alone in all Tenochtitlan wear clothes like these, carry no shield or weapons, in a time when the city prepares to fight for its very existence?”

  He sighed and said, “Yes, I alone, Malinche.”

  “When the time comes, even women will fight. We will stand on the rooftops and throw large stones on the invaders. Where will you be then, Don Fielding?”

  He looked at her in sour amusement. “Out of the way of the fighting, if possible,” he told her levelly.

  He had come to peace with himself on the subject. Let war be fought by such as Cuauhtemoc whose profession it was. If Mexico was to be dragged by the scruff of the neck from a Neolithic culture into the sixteenth century, Don was not expendable. At least he—unique in the world of 1519—had been vaccinated for smallpox!

  Assistance came from an unexpected source when the pochteca expedition returned from Tarascan country with the copper and other metals. The trading mission had met with all-out success, and the several hundred porters who had gone along were weighted down with copper and smaller amounts of other metals, including gold, silver, and even a little lead.

  Botello Puerto de Plata, the supposed astrologer of the Spanish army, had listed himself as a soothsayer as his former occupation when Don Fielding had taken roll call.

  However, when Don called on the blacksmiths and the miners to look at his collection of metals and tell him if they recognized tin, the dark-visaged Botello came along.

  He pointed at some of the ingots. “That isn’t silver. It’s tin.”

  Don looked at him. “How do you know?”

  “When I was a boy, I was apprenticed to an alchemist.”

  “An alchemist! For how long?” If there was anything Don needed it was a chemist—no matter how primitive a chemist.

  “For but two years. He blew himself up. But at least I know the metals. He was attempting to produce gold from the baser ones.”

  Don turned back to his blacksmiths. “I assume that none of you know how to make bronze from copper and tin. You’ll have to experiment at the proportions. As soon as you come up with a suitable hard product, we will begin the manufacture of bronze spear and arrowheads. We will send you more metalworkers and you can train them, scores of them. Train them in shifts. At this time they need to learn to make nothing save spear and arrowheads.”

  Don turned back to the subchief who had captained the expedition to Tarasca. “As soon as some of the other trade groups have returned from the south, acquire more of the things the Tarascans desire and return to trade for more of this tin.”

  “Its name is amochitl,” the pochteca said. “And there are other areas where it is found, particularly near Taxco, to the south.”

  Don turned to one of his secretary-scribes. “Get a list of all tribes that mine amochitl. Send expeditions to acquire all we can, as well as all the copper. Promise anything; barter anything for it; urge the people to intensify their attempts to get both of these.” He added under his breath, “We’ve just left the Stone Age and entered the Bronze Age; Iron, coming up.”

  From time to time messengers came in with news of the Spanish. Don had been right. New ships appeared, one or two at a time, once a small fleet of three. The Captain-General was acquiring his reinforcements and new supplies. And then the word came that Martin Lopez, the shipwright, was constructing brigantines in the Tlaxcan river. Don Fielding had expected that but was dismayed that it was getting under way so soon. He couldn’t remember from his former reading how long it had been between the Cortes retreat to Tlaxcala and his return, but he had thought he had more time than this.

  The Aztec chiefs were flabbergasted at the news. They couldn’t imagine what the Spanish had in mind. How could they possibly get the small ships over the mountains to the lake near Tetzcuco? However, Don knew the story. The Spanish would first build the brigantines, then dismantle them and haul them all the way on the backs of the porters. Then they’d assemble them in the lake near Tetzcuco.

  That brought something else to mind. The still was now in operating order. Don had the Indians bring large amounts of pulque, their drink fermented from maguey. He stood and watched as the veteran vintner ran the first batch through. Tequila had been born.

  But Don Fielding wasn’t, at least at this point, particularly interested in introducing distilled potables to the Aztecs, or even to the Spanish, who could probably handle it better. He had his distiller run it through again and again until he got as close to pure alcohol as he could get.

  Then he went to his glassblower and had him blow several narrow-necked bottles of about a quart capacity. The glass was crude in appearance, and not transparent, but useable. When these were completed, he filled two of them with the alcohol and stoppered them with rags.

  He summoned Cuitlahuac and some of his chiefs and assembled them in the great square. One of the smaller structures was of wood, a minor temple to some forest god.

  The Aztecs were mystified. Don took out his matches, lit the rag, which protruded slightly from one of the bottle necks, and quickly heaved the alcohol bottle at the wooden structure. He kept his fingers crossed that it would work, especially this first time. It would be a hell of an anticlimax if he had to make two tries.

  It worked. The bottle splattered up against the wooden wall, the alcohol splashed every which way and immediately took fire—colorless shimmering heat waves that ignited the wood.

  Don threw his second bottle with equivalent results. The building was ablaze. He turned to the Aztec chiefs who were staring, bug-eyed.

  “What…what is it?” Cuitlahuac blurted. “Magic of the gods, that you have water that burns?”

  “It’s the first Molotov cocktail,” Don said in satisfaction. “And the Spanish have some surprises coming when they bring those tar-caulked brigantines down here. But no, it isn’t magic. It is a new weapon which I will show your people how to make. We need more young men to learn to make glass and to distill pulque.” He thought about it. Perhaps kerosene or gasoline would be better, if he could only figure out how to distill them. What was fractional distillation? He knew the words, but that was about all. If he only had time!

  By now, all of the Spanish had been seduced from their patriotism, such as it was. Only Padre Diaz and the page, Orteguilla, held out, and neither of them was of the slightest importance. Even Sandoval grudgingly succumbed, gave his parole, and volunteered to help train the Indian warriors to ride. The first class of horsemen had already graduated and a new group was being rushed through the course.

  An idea came to Don Fielding and he discussed it with Cuitlahuac and Cuauhtemoc. One of their spies from the coast had reported that a ship had brought in ten new horses for the Cortes forces and that they had immediately been marched inland. It was bad news; the Spanish cavalry was building up again from the low point it had h
it during the debacle of the causeways.

  They had the boys who had learned horsemanship brought before them. They were the youthful cream of the Aztec host and Don Fielding’s heart sank at what he was going to have to propose.

  He said, “Fifty of you will go to Tlaxcala. You will move only at night. Each day you will hide so that the whole distance you will not be seen. This is of the utmost importance. Our spies have brought us sketches of the quarters where the Spanish army is housed, including the stables of the horses. The Spanish have grown careless, since they now trust the Tlaxcalans completely and feel that we, the enemy, are far away. Just before dawn you will creep up upon the sentries. There will probably be only a few; they’ll be sleepy and not alert at that time of the morning. Half of you will rush them. The others will fling yourselves on the horses, not taking time to saddle them, and dash off. If possible, stampede those that cannot be taken.”

  They were watching and listening stolidly. On the face of it, most of them were being sent to their deaths.

  Don took a deep breath and exhaled. He said, “Some of you will die. Possibly all of you will. However, you must realize that even if we succeed in stealing two horses, it means two more for us, two less for them. So important are the horses in the battles to come that it might mean the difference between defeat and victory. Now, then: We want fifty volunteers.”

  Cuauhtemoc said, “But these are Tenochas. All wish to participate.”

  “We need only fifty. A larger number is too clumsy. Those who wish to go, raise a hand.”

  All hands went up.

  “As I told you,” Cuauhtemoc laughed.

  Don said, “Only fifty go, and those, perhaps, have the best chance to survive since one moon from now we will again make the same attempt, and by then, of course, the Spanish will be more alert.”

  Don Fielding looked at his blood brother. “I will leave the details to you.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  The smallpox hit the following day.

  And Cuitlahuac, the First Speaker, was among the very first. He had been complaining of fever and aching for three days; now he was prostrated and an eruption broke out all over his body.

  Don Fielding held a doctorate, but most certainly not in medicine. He knew no more about medicine than to prescribe aspirin for a headache, but he knew this must be the virulent disease. Vaccine? He hadn’t the vaguest idea of how to prepare smallpox vaccine and he knew precious well that neither did any of the Spanish physicians. The Europeans were largely, though not completely, immune, since they had been subjected to it for centuries. For the Aztecs, it was unadulterated death.

  He could think of nothing save isolation. The people must not be allowed to nurse one another.

  He bit out his ruthless commands to the Snake-Woman.

  All who showed even the first symptoms must be driven from the city. All. Even the First Speaker. They must go up into the mountains and none be allowed near them save only those who also had the disease. Porters could be sent up to them with food, but these must not get to within a thousand meters.

  Cuauhtemoc said dismally, “Then there is no hope?”

  “Very little, for those who have it. Some will recover. They will then be safe and never contract the disease again. They can nurse the sick, and eventually, they can return to the city.”

  “What else do you know of this dread sickness, giant brother?”

  “Nothing,” Don said miserably.

  They had the medicine men continually checking every house in Tenochtitlan. At the first sign of symptoms, the victims were sent up into the hills. Perhaps a thousand in all. Don knew that many of them were probably not infected and were being sent to where they would be. But there was nothing for it. Men, women, and children were sent off wholesale. To their deaths, most of them, he knew.

  Cuitlahuac died up in the mountains.

  By this time, all of the valley tribes had been brought into the Aztec Republic. They couldn’t have done otherwise if they had wished, but none of them wished. For the first time in almost two centuries, they were free of the domination of the former confederation, free to participate in the type of comparative affluence of the Tenochas. Their senators and clan representatives flooded into the capital. Quickly enlisted, too, were such nearby cities as Toluca, some forty miles to the west.

  And then they began to arrive in a flood as the pochteca traders hit the towns, over three hundred in all, that had formerly suffered under the confederation’s campaigns. Don had no illusions. They were joining up, at this stage of the game, either in fear of the new Aztec Republic or in relief by the fact that there was to be no more tribute and no more demand for victims for the former sacrifices.

  The first Congress was held. Hesitantly, confusedly, but held. And Cuauhtemoc was elected First Speaker.

  Then it came back to Don Fielding. The name of his blood brother was variously spelled in the twentieth century—Guatemoc, Guatemozin, and even Cuauhtemoctzin. History had the youthful war chief as the last of the Aztec “emperors.”

  We’ll see about that, Don decided grimly. Given his plans, there would be a good many First Speakers in the future history of Mexico.

  The five-thousand-man phalanx had reached a degree of training that was going to have to do. Cholula and Huexotzingo had both refused to join the republic. In fact, they had united in a confederacy of their own and let it be known that they supported the Spanish and were ready to ally themselves further with the Tlaxcalans. Don needed that iron ore—and the sooner, the better. He had put his Spanish miners to work on the coal seam in the mountains with a sizable contingent of Aztecs, but now that mine was well under way. The Europeans could leave it in the hands of their Indian apprentices. Apprentices learned much faster than slaves.

  Don Fielding suggested the attack be undertaken and the new First Speaker mobilized. Don wanted to go along, on the off-chance that he’d note some improvements that could be made in the new method of war, but for once his blood brother refused.

  “The enemy is numerous and there might be disaster. It is a new method of warfare for us. You cannot be risked. If I go down to black death, a new First Speaker can be elected. But if you die, we cannot elect a new Quetzalcoatl.”

  “Once again, I am not Quetzalcoatl.”

  Cuauhtemoc looked at him in amusement. “Yes, you are, though perhaps you know it not. But even if you were not, you are just as good. You are the hope of all Mexico and must come to no harm.”

  As the army marched out, Don stood on the rooftop of the Eagle clan buildings and watched. It made a brave display. The ranks of the phalanx were quite orderly and straight. The auxiliary warriors who followed in their thousands were almost universally armed with the new longbows and crossbows. There were some twenty armed with the Spanish arquebuses. That reminded him. He wondered if any of the Spanish musketeers or cannoneers knew how to make gunpowder. He’d have to find out; their supply was short. They had captured quite a bit when they took the four brigantines, but the rest in the possession of Cortes had largely been fired in the fighting. Some of what remained had fallen into the lake from the causeways and had been ruined.

  A voice from beside him said archly, “You do not go?”

  He looked at her.

  Malinche said scornfully, “Every able-bodied man in Tenochtitlan marches on Cholula except you.”

  “That is correct,” he said. “Actually, I did want to go, to observe, but Cuauhtemoc, the First Speaker, would not let me.”

  She laughed scornfully at that and turned and left. He looked after her. As ever, her figure was desirable even under the sacklike dress. Don Fielding had the normal amount of sex drive, and he had not known a woman since his arrival in this other time.

  Sandoval made his play while the army was gone. Indian-fashion, every able-bodied man was a member of the Aztec host and in a war the whole town participated. Don was going to have to change that, he knew. He couldn’t let all his activities grind to a halt every time
the organization went into combat. He was going to have to organize a large standing army.

  Of the thirty-three horses, twenty-five went with the army, Indian warriors proudly on their backs, carrying European lances and European swords. The other eight horses remained for one reason or the other, including the fact that several were mares heavy with colt. Sandoval and two of the other gentleman cavalrymen rounded up four of the horses, the four in best shape, and rode them into the city and to the Eagle quarters. They had managed to acquire swords.

  Somehow, too, they had found out where Malinche was quartered, perhaps by questioning one of the women married to a Spaniard. They marched in, bare swords in hand, seized her, gagged her, bound her hands behind her back, and then headed for the quarters occupied by Don Fielding.

  Don, for once, was alone. His entourage was all off on the road to Cholula. He sat on his stool, going over paperwork. There was plenty of it. He was going to have to figure out some method of shoving more of it off on someone else’s shoulders.

  De Leon held Malinche, who was staring wide-eyed and trying to struggle, while Sandoval and Olid bounded into the room.

  “Prepare to die!” the slight swordsman shrilled.

  Don Fielding knocked his stool over backward and retreated to the far side of the room. Breathing deeply, he assessed the situation. It was obvious. The three wished to kill him and to smuggle the invaluable Malinche back to the forces of Cortes.

  He tried to keep his voice calm. “You gentlemen all gave your parole and swore to it on the Bible of your religion.”

  Sandoval laughed softly, even as he began to shuffle forward, his sword extended. “The good Padre Diaz absolved us of that oath and has given us indulgence for all that we do.”

  Don Fielding brought forth the Beretta. He didn’t want to shoot any of these men. He needed them, and it would set a bad precedent with the other Spanish.

  He aimed the gun at the other and said, “I warn you that this is a gun. You wear no armor. Come any closer and I fire. Release the girl immediately and return to your quarters.”