by Carla Kelly
Diego did not come in for the evening meal until Maria was clearing the table after dinner. He looked more tired than she had ever seen him, and she remembered with a pang the indent of his head on the pillow that morning.
He sat down at the table and spoke briefly to Erlinda as his sister shepherded Luz and Catarina out of the room and down the hall to La Señora’s room. He followed his sisters with his eyes until they were out of sight, then turned around and leaned on the table with both elbows. He sat there in silence, his eyes closed.
Maria brought a bowl of stew and a plate of tortillas. Diego opened his eyes, but did not move. “Maria, I cannot find Cristóbal anywhere. Some say he has gone to Taos, others shrug their shoulders. How ignorant Indians can be when it suits them. And several of my Indian farmers from Tesuque are missing.”
He sat up then, as if impatient with himself, running his hand over his headscarf in the gesture that was familiar to her now. He took off his scarf and put it on the bench beside him. He slammed his hand down on the table, and she jumped.
“I am sorry,” he said immediately. “I have no business coming in here and pouring my troubles on you. I would never tell Erlinda,” he said, looking down at the food. “She worries so much. And yet, sometimes ....”
“Sometimes you have to tell someone, Diego,” she finished, sitting down across from him.
His eyes looked into hers with an eagerness that pleased her and was oddly unsettling at the same time. “You have called me Diego,” he interrupted.
She looked at him, startled, “What?”
“Oh, you call me Señor,” he said, smiling at her, “or Vuestra Merced, if you are upset with me, but mostly you do not call me anything. And now for the second time you have called me by my name.”
She looked down in confusion. “Perhaps I was being presumptuous. ”
“No, no,” he insisted, reaching across the table and taking her hand. “I wish you would do it all the time. ”
Maria withdrew her hand quickly. “I should not.”
Diego picked up his spoon and ate a mouthful of stew. “Maria, you silly girl,” he said, his mouth full.
In spite of her embarrassment, she was pleased to see the exhausted, discouraged look leave his eyes. “But there is another matter,” she began carefully, then the words rushed out. “Surely you do not need to wake up every night I have a nightmare. I know that once I wake up, I always go back to sleep. I do not wish to disturb you. It cannot be fair of me to rob you of sleep.”
Diego put out his hand again to stop the rapid motion of her gesture. “I do not mind, Maria, really I don’t.”
“You cannot mean that,” she contradicted, “especially when you look so tired.”
“I do mean it. It is a small matter. I hear you stirring and mumbling in your sleep. If I rise quickly, go to your room and pat you on the shoulder, you generally go right back to sleep. If I am slower, you are usually sitting up and looking around.” He paused, reaching toward her to brush his fingers briefly across her cheek. “Ay, such a look in your eyes then, Maria chiquita!” He lowered his own gaze as she stared down at her hands. “I wonder what it is you are seeing. And then I have to hold your hands and talk you into lying down. Sometimes we recite the Rosary together. And you remember nothing of this?”
She shook her head. He ate a few more bites, then rolled a tortilla, holding it between his fingers. “One night I came in and you were standing behind the door. Dios mio, what a surprise you gave me!”
“I remember nothing of it.”
“Not even when I picked you up and carried you back to your bed?”' he asked. “When I tried to put you down, you would not let go of my neck.”
“I am sorry,” she whispered, almost overcome by mortification.
He laughed and took both her hands in his as she started to rise. “I did not mind. I sang you some of my Indian lullabies and you went back to sleep. See there, what a nice fellow I am!”
She was silent, unable to move.
“Besides,” he continued, his voice warm, low, “your hair smelled so sweetly of clover and wood smoke. How prettily it curled around your shoulders.” His eyes went to her face. “You should wear it that way in the daytime, instead of braided.”
Never before had he sat still with her long enough for so many words. It pleased and worried her at the same time. Perhaps she should take a light tone. “Long hair would be impractical,” she countered with a smile of her own, “even if it is my only good feature.”
“Oh, no,” he contradicted quickly, “not your only one. I like those silly freckles on your nose. Like cinnamon. Have you never been tempted to count them?”
“Heavens, Señor,” Maria exclaimed, rising from the table.
“Señor, is it?” he asked.
“If someone could hear you, Señor,” she said, “they would think you were crazy.”
He picked up his spoon again. “Possibly. But I meant what I said about your dreams.”
Maria gathered the dishes from the table. He continued after a few minutes of silence, speaking in a voice half to himself. “I know I carry a heavy load, but you are no part of the burden. You serve to lighten it.”
She carried the dishes to the sink, and when she turned back to him, she saw he was staring beyond her, over her shoulder out the open window. Before she could say anything, he leaped to his feet, knocking over the bench, and ran to the open door.
She whirled around. The sky was alive with fire. For one sickening moment she was back in the grove of trees, watching the mission supply caravan burn. She ran to Diego and grabbed him around the waist. “What is it!” she cried.
He shook her off and grabbed the bucket by the door. “The wagon shed!” he shouted. Even as he spoke, the warning bell in the garden beyond the beehives began to clang. Diego was halfway down the path before he turned and shouted to her as she stood transfixed in the doorway. “Don’t let Erlinda or the girls outside!” he called. “Don’t allow the Indian women to leave the house!”
She nodded, her eyes on the flames. She heard Diego pound across the acequia footbridge, following his Mexican servants, who were already running toward the shed.
Erlinda ran into the kitchen, her eyes big with fright, her face as pale as her hair. “Is it Apaches?” she shrieked.
Maria came away from the door and grabbed Erlinda. “No, no! Not that! The wagon shed is on fire. Diego said you were to stay with La Señora and your sisters. He said you were not to leave your mother.” She shook Erlinda, who continued to stare at the stabbing flames. “Do you hear me?”
Erlinda clung to her for a moment, then darted for the door. “I will keep everyone inside,” she said, pausing with her hand on the door. “Oh, Maria, what is happening here?” Then she disappeared in the hall, and Maria heard her speaking softly to Luz and Catarina. Maria thrust her feet into her slippers by the back door, gathered up her skirts with one hand and ran down the garden path. She stopped by the acequia long enough to retrieve the bucket left there by the girls that afternoon. Rather than take the time to cross on the bridge, she waded into the acequia, the water coming only to her knees. She lost one of her shoes in the mud, but did not stop for it.
The smoke was already choking her. She coughed and wiped her eyes, feeling the acrid smoke settling in her throat like a layer of glue. As she ran closer, Maria could see that the shed was already a total loss, and the wagons underneath it. The wooden roof blazed away, the popping of the flames sounding like firecrackers on All Souls’ Eve. The heat drove her back a step, then she hurried forward, her head down.
Diego had already ordered his servants into two lines, one to pass buckets of water to the flames, the other to send the buckets back to the acequia, where they were refilled and passed on again, almost thrown from hand to hand.
Diego and his vaqueros had let the horses out of the stable next to the wagon shed. The animals milled around the corral, whinnying and bumping into each other in their fright. Diego knocked down par
t of the fence to let them out and, their eyes rolling in terror, the horses streaked across the fields.
The flames from the wagon shed were fanning up a hot wind. Maria shaded her eyes with her hand and ran closer, the bucket knocking against her legs. The legacy of drought was all around her as she listened to the parched timbers crackle and watched them burst into flame spontaneously. The play of light on dark held her in dreadful fascination as she stopped to watch.
Diego was forming another fire line, this one for the roof of the stables. He climbed onto the roof as Maria squeezed her way into the line, her eyes on him. He propped his feet against the wooden poles that ran the length of the stables and leaned back against the roof. Several Indians joined him, and they poured water on the dry timbers of the roof, working to stay ahead of the flames on the wagon shed that threatened to jump the gap and fire the stables, too.
The men worked in silence, the only sound the crackling of the flames and the roar of the fire as it billowed upward, carried higher and higher by the fiery drafts of its own creation. The heat nearly knocked Maria down. Sweat rolled off her chin but she could not pause long enough in the fire chain to wipe her face.
Diego called from the roof, his voice strained and loud, ordering the Indians to take poles and knock down the walls of the wagon shed. The walls were adobe, but the wooden-framed windows burst into flame from the heat of the burning roof and the wagons inside. Indians rushed forward with long poles, poking and prodding at the walls.
Diego climbed higher on the stable roof until he was straddling the peak. The Indians followed him, inching along, as they dumped bucket after bucket of water on the timbers.
And then she saw Cristóbal climbing to the roof, moving slowly toward Diego. He had appeared suddenly out of the dark.
Cristóbal edged slowly along the roof. He paused behind Diego and touched him on the shoulder. Diego glanced back, motionless, waiting, for a long moment. Then he handed Cristóbal the empty bucket. After another pause, Cristóbal took it, passing it back along the line. Maria sighed and turned her attention once more to the man next to her, who was shouting at her to speed up.
The workers were soon able to force out enough adobe bricks to bring the wagon shed roof down. It fell on the blazing wagons with a whoosh that sent a cascade of flames and sparks soaring even higher into the darkness. A shower of flaming wood spread onto the stable roof, but the wood was soaked through and it did not ignite, except in isolated patches, where the men hurried to beat out the sparks with their bare hands.
Maria’s hands were blistered by the rough leather straps of the buckets slapped from hand to hand. Her back ached from bending forward to receive the full buckets, but she stayed in the fire line until the wagon shed was a smoldering heap of coals.
An hour later, the men climbed off the stable roof, coming down slowly and awkwardly like old men. Diego and Cristóbal were last. They leaned against the adobe wall of the stable, their faces blackened by smoke. Diego took the last bucket handed to him and drank out of it, coughing and spitting out the water. He handed it to his brother.
The Indians put down their buckets and gathered around the ruined shed. No one said anything as the men watched the red embers flickering in the ashes. Maria set down her bucket and wiped her face with her sleeve. Her throat was raw and hot and her eyes ached. She rubbed them, then walked slowly toward the stable.
Diego and Cristóbal were sitting on the ground, leaning against the wall. Diego looked up at her and coughed. “I thought I told you to stay with Erlinda.”
She shook her head. “No, Señor, you told me to tell Erlinda to stay with your mother. ”
The words stuck in her throat, and she coughed until her eyes watered. Diego got slowly to his feet and handed her the bucket. She drank from it. The water was the only coolness in the whole wagon yard.
“Maria,” Diego said carefully. She waited for his anger to explode. “Maria, you are a mess,” he said softly.
She looked at him. His face was as black as his hair. His homespun shirt was burned through in several places, and even the leather of his breeches bore holes from the sparks. There was an angry red streak on his cheek. On impulse, she reached out and touched it. “Erlinda has some salve for that,” she said.
“Later,” he said. “I have to round up the horses. ”
“I will do that, brother,” spoke up Cristóbal. He had been silent, watching them standing close together. “With a few of your Indians.” Diego stared at him hard, but he continued. “I can have them back by morning.”
Diego turned from Maria. “I suppose it is the least you can do, my brother.”
The brothers faced each other. Cristóbal put out his hand, but Diego shook it off.
“I saw the flames from Tesuque,” said Cristóbal.
Diego was silent.
“But you do not believe me,” Cristóbal continued.
“Why should I, Cristóbal?” Diego asked. “Why should I believe a man who hates me and all I stand for?”
Cristóbal said, “Why would I start such a fire, Diego?”
“Perhaps someone told you to,” said Diego, his voice old and tired. “I wonder if you have a mind of your own anymore.”
Cristóbal lashed his hand across Diego’s face, slamming him against the stable. Diego’s eyes rolled back in his head as he slid down the wall.
“Don’t touch him, Maria,” Cristóbal shouted as Maria darted forward. “If he gets up again, I will kill him.”
She stopped where she was, her eyes on Cristóbal.
He did not see her. “He is like all the rest, my own brother! He will not take the word of an Indian. Not even an Indian he calls brother.”
Maria stood watching him. Cristóbal took her arm, his touch gentle. She raised her face to his face.
“Come with me, Maria. It will not be safe here soon. And do not ask me how I know. Just come with me. Perhaps—perhaps I can protect you.” He was holding her with both hands now, his fingers warm on her arm.
Maria looked down at Diego, who was beginning to stir, then back to Cristóbal. “I cannot,” she said.
“Maria, you are the only particle of goodness in this cruel place. Come with me.”
She tried to move away, but he held her. She leaned forward then, resting her head against Cristóbal’s chest like a tired child, and he encircled her with his arms. “Cristóbal, I cannot leave Diego, not after all he has done for me.” She did not add, “And I cannot go with you.” She loved Cristóbal, as a friend, a brother, a Masferrer, but not as a lover.
Cristóbal released Maria and turned to his brother. “I will find your horses,” Cristóbal spat out. “Let it be the last deed I do for you, the last time I am ever your Indian.” He turned to leave the wagon yard as silently as he had come, but paused, looking back at his brother. “You are a curious man, Diego mio,” he said, his tone almost conversational. “You cannot believe a gesture of honor in someone who is not Spanish.”
With a curse, he walked back and jerked Diego to his feet, peering close into his eyes for a moment, then letting him go with a grunt. “You will soon,” he said. With a nod to Maria, he left the wagon yard. After a look at Diego, several Indians followed him.
With a slow shake of his head, Diego staggered to the fence and leaned against it. Maria joined him. Feeling someone’s eyes on her, she turned to see Cristóbal still watching. She raised her hand in farewell, and he was gone.
In silence she turned back to Diego. “You need to put cool water on that, Señor.” She touched his bruised scalp gently.
For a brief moment while her hand was searching through his hair, he leaned against her shoulder with his eyes closed. Then he straightened, putting his fingers to his head. “Say nothing of this to Erlinda. She would only worry more.”
They stood close together, their shoulders touching. “Does it matter that she worries?” murmured Maria. “Why can you not share your troubles?”
His only answer was to turn away from
her and start toward the burned wagon shed. Maria remained by the fence as he walked around the still-smoking shed, idly kicking dirt and mud onto the embers. He went around the building twice, then walked back to Maria, his hands shoved deep in his pockets.
“Pues, bueno,” he said, as they started slowly back toward the hacienda. “The harvest will be difficult this year.” In an almost unconscious gesture he put his arm around her shoulder, hugging her to him as they walked. She hesitated a moment, thinking of everything her mother had ever taught her, then put her arm around his waist, hooking her thumb into his sword belt.
Halfway to the hacienda he stopped, standing still to cough until Maria thought he would turn himself inside out. “Ay, that smoke,” he finally gasped. “I feel as dirty on the inside as I do on the outside.” He felt the back of his head again and swore.
They started walking again, slowly, almost leisurely, as if this were the end of an evening stroll out beyond the acequia. “But do you know the worst part of this fire, Maria?” he asked suddenly.
“What, Señor?”
“We really cannot leave this place now. The wagons are all burned, and the only way out is on horseback—if Cristóbal finds the horses. Do you think he will?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he gave his word,” she burst out. She faced Diego, compelling him to stop. “And I do not believe Cristóbal lies.”
Anger rose, then died in his eyes. He looked at the ground. “Do you love him, Maria?”
She could not have heard him right.
“Do you?” he asked again, still looking at the ground.
Her feelings were too complex for an answer. There were many kinds of love. There was also the prospect of her spinsterhood, since she had no dowry. “I was not raised to answer such a forward question.”
“And I was not raised to ask it,” he said sharply, looking at her. A slight smile, a caressing smile, crossed his face. “But I am asking.”
Before she could answer, the kitchen door banged open, and Erlinda and her sisters ran down the garden path. They crossed the footbridge, the little ones flinging themselves at Diego as he stood facing Maria. Erlinda stood watching them, a thoughtful expression replacing the fear on her face.
