by Carla Kelly
She took the damp towel from him, and began scrubbing his back. When she finished, she put her arms around him, savoring the warmth of his bare skin. She closed her eyes, thinking how short their time together might be. Diego pulled her against his chest, his voice soft.
“Wife, we have each other. No matter what happens we have tonight.”
He picked her up and carried her to the pallet. As he took the pins out of her hair, it tumbled down, covering her shoulders. He sat back on his heels and looked at her. “Someday when I have the time, I am going to kiss every strand. But I haven’t time right now, Maria.”
She held out her arms to him and he came to her, pulling her down beside him on the narrow pallet. Even in his hurry he was gentle. He helped her out of her dress, running his hands over her ribs and laughing.
“Are you hungry, Maria?” he asked, his head on her breasts.
“Starving,” she replied. “My stomach is rumbling. Cannot you hear it?”
“No, your heart is beating too loud, heart of my heart. But now, Maria chiquita, it is time you were a wife, my wife.”
He kissed her, his fingers cradling her head from the hard pallet. There on the dirt floor behind the chapel he took her slowly, carefully and honestly. The fears that she could not get close enough to him were gone now. Maria accepted Diego willingly, joyfully as husband, lover and friend, her own earthly Trinity.
They lay together later, arms and legs entwined, Diego idly running his fingers across her stomach. “Maria, perhaps we are not as decrepit as we thought.”
“Apparently not,” she murmured, drowsy.
“Oh, love, do not go to sleep yet, not yet. I realize that what I have done is highly irregular. If things had been different, I would have come to your hacienda with a whole chest of beautiful clothing and a wedding dress.” He paused and lifted her brown serge dress with one bare toe as she giggled. “And after the wedding you would have paraded around in the different dresses for the wedding guests. I could have puffed up my consequence at your display of my wealth.”
She kissed him and his hands were gentle on her body. “Diego, how you run on.” She twined her fingers in the hair on his chest and pulled it.
“Ay! I am awake!”
“Well then, tell me, husband ....” She paused. The word sounded so alien and yet so natural on her lips. “Husband, what of your meeting with the governor in the chapel? You never would say, and now I insist.”
“What a shrew you are!”Maria’s hands slid to his waist and she rested her head on his chest.
The sound of his heartbeat, slower now, was making her eyes close. “Tell me, husband.”
“I like the way that sounds, wife. And am I a good husband?”
She kissed his chest. “You do not feed me, I have no clothes, but I cannot recall a time when I have been more content. But tell me what I ask.”
He rubbed her arms and yawned. “His fearless Excellency would have us venture forth tomorrow for one last sortie. Those are his words. You know I do not talk like that. So we shall.”
He wrapped his arms around her bare shoulders. “We cannot stay here. The acequia is cut and food is running out. We will starve to death, one by one, until there is no one to resist. But Otermin seems to think that if we give them one grand show, they will allow us to march out.” His voice grew harsh as he continued. “I’ll be damned if I will stand by and watch you and my sisters starve to death!”
“Let me ask again,” said Maria, inching closer to the warmth of her husband, “Do you mean that you are going to march out of here tomorrow and attack?”
“Yes. Mad, isn’t it? I vow we all thought so, sitting there in the chapel, listening to our wise leader. But no one came up with anything better, so there you are.”
She leaned her head on his arm and he kissed her. “Maria, Maria, skinny, beautiful Maria with the black eye,” he said. ,
“At least I do not have any teeth gone.”
“It is only one. I’ll never miss it.” He pulled her closer. “As I see it, wife, we have two choices at the moment. We can either go to sleep or make love.”
“That’s no choice,” Maria replied, her fingers smoothing the tangle she had made of her husband’s hair.
“Bravo, wife,” he murmured, his mouth finding hers again.
Toward dawn Maria slept, an uneasy slumber filled with dreams. She and Diego’s sisters were running slowly across the plaza, stumbling over the bodies of the Gutierrez family, while Cristóbal, swollen to enormous size, chased them. With nightmare snail’s crawl she reached the palace gates and banged on them until her knuckles bled, but the governor would only smile and wave. She banged harder.
Maria sat up, sweating and shivering at the same time. The room was still dark and cold. Diego was asleep, his hands relaxed. Still the banging continued. She shook Diego awake.
He woke up quickly, groping for his clothes. “It must be Father Farfán, Maria. Pull on your dress.”
She slipped into her clothing as her husband pulled on his breeches and shirt. He hurried to the door and leaned against it. “Father?” he asked in a soft voice.
The key turned in the lock, and the priest came in. “It is time, my children. The men are in the chapel for Mass. Father Asturiano is celebrating it this time, and I am hearing confession. It is your turn now, Diego. Maria, say goodbye and go back to Señora Castellano.”
“No,” she said.
“You cannot come with me, Maria,” Diego said gently, “not this time.” He enveloped her in a strong embrace, then pointed her toward the door. “I will see you and my sisters before I go.”
She left the room without a backward glance. The passageway was still shrouded in gloom, so she stepped carefully, then opened the door to the chapel.
She stood in the doorway and counted the soldiers and landowners. Seventy-eight men. Seventy-eight against all those Indians. She stood rooted to the spot, finally beyond tears.
Some of the men slept, leaning against each other, while others sat staring into the distance, looking at the foreign territory that she and her loved ones would always carry with them now. A few talked quietly among themselves, fathers and sons trying to say whatever it was fathers and sons would say at a moment like that. Their dirty, smoke-painted faces were serious, but she could see no fear, only a certain calmness that held more courage than brave words. They were desperate men, cornered men, men who would fight.
Diego came down the passageway behind her. He put his arm around her waist and walked her to the door of the chapel. She let him pull her along, her eyes going back to the men on the benches, then to her husband’s face. He looked as they did, and she was glad.
He paused at the chapel door. Maria hugged him and made the sign of the cross on his forehead. “Go with God, my husband,” she whispered.
“And you,” he answered.
She patted his good arm and left the church swiftly, almost running. The courtyard was silent in the early dawn, the children exhausted by the terrors of the night. Smoke hung heavy and choking over the ground. Here and there younger children still slept, but the women were awake, staring without seeing.
She looked at the still mask of tragedy on each face, the calm acceptance of what the day would bring, and knew without consulting a mirror that she wore the same expression. Their sorrows were hers, finally. She had as much to lose as they. She watched the women of the upper colony and knew that she belonged in this hard place. The river kingdom in its death struggle had finally taken hold of her.
She walked across the silent, stinking plaza and sat down next to Señora Castellano. The woman pulled Maria close. “He is too old, my Reynaldo,” said the woman, stroking Maria’s hair. “And my sons too young.”
Maria was silent, thinking of Diego’s love. They had their night. Now it was morning.
The men came out of the chapel. Governor Otermin stood at their head, a slender figure in his rags and dented helmet. Diego came toward her. He carried a sword, turning it over and over, tes
ting the weight and heft of it.
Maria walked with him to the fortress gates. Other women joined their men. They were by nature a restrained and reticent people, unused to showing affection in public, but everywhere there were kisses and embraces, final words, last hurried instructions, as the colonists tried to express in a few seconds what they had waited a lifetime to say.
“Take care of my sisters,” Diego said, then looked at the ground. “If it should come to that, do not let yourselves be captured. If you should survive and I should not ...” He stopped, his voice full of unshed tears. “Dios, querida, this is a cruel thing!”
It was the closest he had come to a protest in all the days of their trial. He touched her cheek. “Then we will meet in heaven, for we are in Purgatory now.”
She hugged him to her, then forced herself to walk away.
“I love you,” he called after her. It was something no Spanish man ever said lightly, or even out loud. She turned and kissed her hand to him, amazed at her brazenness. They gazed at each other another moment, and then he was gone in the crowd around the gate.
Otermin stationed a guard at every third rifleport, then gave the signal for the gate to be opened. With a shout of “For God and Spain!” that roared from every throat, the remaining defenders rushed into the sleeping plaza, swords drawn, lances ready.
The noise of swiftly joined battle was deafening. The women in the fortress shrieked and ran back to their screaming children. Maria picked up her skirts and climbed the ladder to one of the vacant rifleports. She could see nothing but smoke from the arquebuses. At the next rifleport the guard fired, paused to reload, then fired again into the crowd of swirling Indian and New Mexican bodies. Maria reached for his arquebus. “If you can find another one,” she shouted over the noise of the battle, “I can reload this one while you fire the other.”
Without a word, he handed her the heavy firing piece and raised another one to the tripod. Awkwardly at first, she swabbed the barrel, rammed down another charge and ball, and handed the weapon back. The soldier, an elderly man, paused long enough to grin at her, his white teeth a contrast to his black face.
She stood at the rifleport all day. The August day was hot, but such a pall of smoke hung over Santa Fe that she could look directly at the dull copper ball that was the sun. The fighting spread through the villa as the remaining houses burned. Men returned to the gates bearing their wounded to be tended by women and priests. As soon as their wounds were bound, the men who could still walk hurried back to the fight.
Maria saw Diego once and called to him. He waved and blew her a kiss, then was gone again.
“Your husband?” It was the only thing the rifleman had said all day.
She nodded and took the gun he handed her, reloading it quickly and expertly, then giving it back. The muzzle was hot and her hands burned at the touch, but she did not stop. Her whole body ached, but she was bound up with Diego and his venture in the plaza. She leaned against the fortress wall and doggedly reloaded arquebuses. Other women joined her at other rifleports, and they all worked silently, swiftly, their faces filthy, their clothing sooty and burned in spots from the fire of the weapons.
In the middle of the afternoon, someone in the noisy courtyard gave a great shout. Maria whirled around quickly, fearful of Indians in their midst. Through the smoke and the haze, she saw water flowing in the acequia again. It was muddy and sluggish at first, but it was water. Soon young children came to the gun holes with drinks for everyone. Maria didn’t wait for the sediment to sink to the bottom of the cup. She drank her portion in two swallows, spitting some of the water on her burning hands.
In late afternoon, Otermin’s brave venture was over. One moment there was the noise of battle, then silence.
The quiet hummed in Maria’s ears. The rifleman motioned for her to stop reloading. She rested the arquebus against the ledge and moved to the soldier for a glimpse out of his portal. She sucked in her breath at the sight, then turned away to lean against the wall, her eyes wide and staring.
The plaza was filled with bodies. Maria sat down in a heap by the rifleport and put her head between her knees, clenching her fists and holding them tight against her body to keep her hands from shaking. I could walk from one side of the plaza to the other and never touch ground, she thought.
Her empty stomach churned and she put her hand to her mouth. The rifleman slumped down next to her and took her hand. They sat together, companions in misery, until the gates swung open.
Slowly, one by one, the soldiers and rancheros returned from their day’s work. Maria let go of the rifleman’s hand and crawled to the edge of the platform, too tired to stand. From her vantage point, she watched the men return.
Governor Otermin was carried in by two men. He was still alive, but he bled from several wounds. She didn’t see a man coming through the gates who was not wounded. They were silent and grim as they had been in the chapel that morning. Most of the men barely cleared the gates before they collapsed against each other, their exhaustion complete.
Maria climbed down the ladder, her legs unsteady. The smell of blood and death in the plaza was overpowering, and she blinked back the tears she had been too busy to shed all day. Señora Castellano ran past to her husband, who sprawled on the ground, leaning against one of his young sons. Both were wounded, but they looked up when she put her arms around them, saying their names over and over in her own litany of devotion.
Maria rested by the wall close to the gate, watching the men straggle in. She looked for Diego, but could not find him among the soldiers limping in, dragging their weapons behind them. Some of the men dangled scalps from their belts, and one soldier carried an Indian’s head, his fingers clenched in the long black hair. Maria shuddered and turned her face away as he passed, leaving a trail of dark blood.
“Where is Diego?” It was Catarina, tugging Luz after her.
Numbly, Maria walked back to their corner of the portal with her sisters. She accepted the bowl of water and scrap of towel from them and wiped the gunsmoke off her face and neck.
“Your hair is black like mine, Maria,” said Luz, wrinkling her nose, “and you smell funny.”
“It is just the gunpowder, chiquita,” she said, digging the soot out of her ears.
Luz watched her, then put her hand to Maria’s cheek. “Can we find Diego?” she asked.
“I will go look. You two stay here with the Castellanos and I ... I will bring him back.”
“But if he does not come?” Luz asked anxiously, searching Maria’s face for reassurance.
“I will find him, Luz,” said Maria. She hesitated and looked down at the familiar face turned up to hers. “But if ... if I cannot find him, Luz, you have me. I will never leave you and Catarina.”
“I know that,” said Luz.
She kissed both girls and walked slowly toward the gate. More men had come in and were being led away by wives and children. Father Farfán rose from a wounded man he was tending and put his hand on her shoulder.
“He is not here?” the priest asked.
She shook her head. “I cannot see him. Oh, Father, do you think ...”
“No,” he interrupted firmly, “I do not. He will come.”
She stood by the gate and looked out over the hazy plaza, thinking of her long watch along the Taos road that endless day before the massacre. The wait was long then, but nothing compared to this wait, this final wait.
Maria saw her husband just as the sun was going down. He and two other Spaniards were walking slowly, painfully, across the plaza, supporting each other. With a little cry of delight, she ran toward him, raising her skirt to keep the blood off the hem.
She stood before him in silence. He said nothing, but watched her, taking her into himself with his eyes as if she were water to drink, food to eat, a pillow to rest on. She touched his face and then his arm. He was not a dream. He had come back to her alive.
“Here, Maria, put your arm around this man.”
; She did as he said, hooking the fingers of her other hand possessively in Diego’s belt.
“Here, here, woman!” he said, “I am not going anywhere!”
She could not trust herself to speak, or even to look at him. The four of them crossed the plaza and entered the governor’s courtyard as the sun went down and night settled on the ruined villa.
The wounded men were quickly led away by their families. Diego took Maria in his arms and they stood close together by the gates. No words passed between them. She hugged her husband to her, knowing that there was nothing more in the world that she would ever need or want. It was enough to be with him.
After several long minutes of silence, she felt a lump against her back. Diego was carrying something that she had not noticed before, and it was digging into her. She tried to pull away from his embrace. “What is that?” she asked.
He didn’t let go of her. Wincing, he brought his arm around in front of her. “Look what I have for you, my heart.”
She took the small object from him and turned it over in her hands while she stood in the circle of his arms. It was her San Francisco. She stared at it, unbelieving.
The arms were both missing and someone had made a hole through the body and strung the figure on a rawhide thong. The image was still covered with pink gypsum, a memorial to the struggle of the brothers in the saintmaker’s workshop. She ran her finger down the fold of San Francisco’s robe, remembering again that wonderful afternoon when she had found the saint in the wood.
“Diego,” she whispered, still unbelieving, “Diego mio, you didn’t go back there!”
“No, no. Many of the Pueblos were wearing figures like this, or bits and pieces from the churches—vestments, sashes. I don’t know why. For luck? For vengeance? I recognized our San Francisco, but I had to track that Indian almost to the hills to get it back for you.”
He chuckled and drew her close again, the saint between them. “He didn’t want to die anymore than I did, so we fought rather cautiously. Took a while.”
“I can always clean it off and put on new arms,” she said, closing her eyes as he kissed her ears, her neck.
