by K C Norrie
Before the next full moon, the village worked together to fix up an abandoned abode for Gerro. They surprised him with it one morning after church services.
"For everything you have done for us," they told him.
The gesture touched Gerro deeply. He had made no secret that he was on his way to the ocean, yet the village provided him with a home accepting him as one of their own. It was only one room, but it held a proper bed, a kitchen table, and a stove for cooking. Everyone contributed something of his or her own possessions. Father Muniz came in carrying a yellow cat.
"Her name is Sabrina. Be sure to tell her all about the ocean before you go," Father Muniz instructed dryly.
And so, Gerro stayed on.
Chapter 2
Years passed.
Marita was now a grandmother several times over. Nico, the first and oldest was seven years old. His sister Rita followed with two more after her. Juan and Christina had two of their own, with another on the way.
The entire village knew how to prepare the tea and syrup and the state of their health was excellent. Perhaps Gerro arrived as an answer to their prayers when the village seemed at its bleakest.
****
The mine continued to decline.
The mine owner Emilio Cardiaz arrived one day announcing that the mine was not producing enough silver.
"I will close and sell it as and as soon as I find a buyer."
The announcement greatly upset the villagers. For many, what little they earned from the mine was their only way to feed their families. What would happen to them once the mine closed?
Senor Cardiaz offered to sell the mine to the workers. They were agreeable but no one could afford to pay the price he asked. Emilio knew the workers were poor and offered them a payment arrangement. They would continue to work at the mine without pay until they produced enough silver to pay his asking price.
Once paid, the mine, the equipment, and any future profits, would be theirs alone to divide.
The villagers cheered. Riches gleamed in their eyes. They saw nothing wrong with the offer. The only opposer was Gerro, and he was vehement.
"The mine is no longer safe. Please reconsider. I don't know how I know this. But I know. The mine is not safe!"
No one listened.
Henori worked in the mine with three of his sons. He calculated that his family would own more shares than anyone else once they paid back the owner. He became angry with Gerro.
"You are not one of us," he told him. "You have no say."
The workers signed the contract. They believed they could earn the silver and buy the deed to the mine in mere weeks. They celebrated. They marched each morning to work with determination and passion. They came home each night with dreams of a rosy future.
On the tenth working day Gerro stood in front of the mine entrance and told everyone to go back home.
"The mine is not safe today. Come back tomorrow," he said to the men approaching the entrance.
They laughed at him. He was a small man, and they walked right past him down into the mine. Henori laughed the loudest. "Go home little man. Have some tea."
Near lunchtime the ground trembled beneath the village. A tiny earthquake rattled cups and saucers on shelves as it shook across the ground. As one, everyone thought of the mine and rushed out of their homes and businesses. They were too late. Not half a minute passed before the alarm horn sounded, filling the air with its wail.
Three long blasts that chilled every heart in the village. The mine had caved in.
****
Marita, Fresca, and Christina alongside the children, arrived at the scene with everyone else, their eyes fixed on the mine's entrance. There was hope. Men were coming out.
"Juan!"
Marita and Christina recognized Juan as he stepped into view.
"Juan!"
Christina ran ahead to throw her arms around him, as Marita and Fresca scanned the faces in the distance for Kenro. Marita couldn't find him, but the growing crowd made it hard to see.
As they approached, they heard murmurings of miners trapped. Marita's heart paled at the words, as she could not find Kenro.
"Where's papa?" asked Nico.
"We are still looking."
She had to show a bravery she did not feel for little Nico, Rita and the rest.
They reached the mine's entrance, roped off and teeming with workers. Their expressions told a story of fear. Faces and clothing were coated with dust from the mine. Marita caught sight of Henori pacing and muttering near the entrance, no doubt worried about his sons.
They caught up to Juan and Christina, and Juan explained that Kenro hadn't made it out.
"He is trapped with others. They are still counting heads."
Pedero, the mine supervisor, was speaking to the crowd from behind the rope.
"... a second rumble caused another collapse. Men are still trapped behind a pile of debris. We must brace the supports before we can remove the rubble. We need volunteers to help... "
Pedero began to recite a list of items needed; ways for people to help.
Marita saw Gerro push his way through the crowd. He came to stand beside her, his eyes and ears intent on Pedero. Marita reached for his hand.
"... food, water, the red tea, shovels, wheelbarrows. Someone must send word to Dr. Santos. There is no doubt, that there will be men who cannot walk out on their own. We will need pallets to carry them out... "
Suddenly Henori caught sight of Gerro and shouted, pointing his finger, drowning out the voice of Pedero.
"It was you! What did you do?"
Marita looked to Gerro.
"I did nothing. I tried to warn you away." Gerro implored.
"It's true," interceded Juan just as loudly. "He guarded the entrance this morning and told us the mine was not safe. No one listened."
"But how did he know the mine was not safe unless he did something to it?" shouted Henori.
Men began to shush and calm him. They shook their heads at Gerro. No one agreed with Henori.
He raged on, ignoring those who tried to calm him.
"You are jealous, because we did not share the silver with you. You cursed the mine. Two of my sons are trapped in there. I think you are evil. I wish you had never come!"
Then he spat and turned his back. Gerro shrunk into himself. Marita patted his back.
"Henori is an angry man. He has no call to say such things to you. But you knew and tried to warn them? How did you know?"
Gerro looked at Marita. She saw tears.
"They told me. The people on the mountain after the storm. Before I even knew there was a mine they said, ‘You cannot stop the mine disaster.' I still tried. I had to. Why did no one listen?"
Of the sixty men who entered the mine that morning, forty-seven walked out. Thirteen men were trapped inside the mine.
****
Chapter 3
It was light. Then it was dusk and then it was dark.
During the light, they were too busy to think. Marita and others returned to their houses to prepare food and transport needed items to the rescue site.
Through all the daylight, Gerro and the women kept the red tea flowing. The children served cups to the workingmen as they dug.
At dusk, Dr. Santos arrived from Sao Cachito, the only village in the area with a doctor. He marveled over the flavor of the red tea. Marita helped light the thousand lanterns brought from the village. They glowed magically in the dimming light as they braced for the night. All the while, wheelbarrows brought out debris, and Kenro and the others remained trapped.
Dusk became a rich dark. Night creatures sang and lived their lives unseen as sounds of digging, hammering, and subdued shouts of men continued from within the mine. Marita sat alone on a stool, sipping tea, a shadow among the thousand flickering lanterns. She imagined a piece of night sky had dropped down to comfort them with stars.
It was early morning, still dark, when they reached the collapse.
Th
roughout the day and night, the villagers had put together enough makeshift pallets cushioned with blankets to carry the rescued men to safety.
Only two of the men were able to walk on their own. The rest were carried out on the pallets, the dark hiding their wounds and injuries from those who loved them. Some groaned with pain, while others lay dazed or unconscious, possibly dead. All were coated with dust and soil from the mine.
Dr. Santos checked the vitals of each man that lay in the line of pallets. Cries erupted when he pronounced the first two dead. Both were young men leaving wives and children behind.
One man's leg was bent in an odd angle. He was barely conscience. Dr. Santo enlisted the help of the man's son to hold him tight while he set the leg straight. Afterward he administered whisky to help with the shock. On and on he went down the line administering aid as best as he could, with the severity of their injuries unknown. Dr. Santos could only ask them where it hurt. While he stitched a laceration on one man's head, he had no way to tell whether the skull was fractured. He had to assume that it was, and bandaged the head accordingly. The man might still die.
Marita sobbed beside Fresca. Kenro was one of the unconscious. Half of his chest looked caved in and his breath was raspy, chilling her heart.
Father Muniz followed behind Dr. Santos, giving blessings or last rites.
Gerro followed the priest, spooning the yellow syrup into the mouths of the wounded, conscious or not.
By the time the doctor noticed Gerro, his examinations of the men were nearly complete. He saw no harm in the letting the little man dispense the tonic, or whatever it was, into each victim's mouth, so he said nothing.
Dr. Santos detected no heartbeat in the last man he examined and pronounced him dead like the others. The dead man was one of Henori's sons. Three deaths so far. How many more before the day was through?
He organized the villagers to carry the men away from the mine site to the big hall in the village. It was still dark. Marita walked closely alongside Fresca, holding Nico with one hand and a sleeping baby Suzanna over her shoulder with the other. Nico proudly held a lantern lighting their small steps, a single star of light amid the thousand others. She glanced up into the night sky and wondered what the stars could see. By the time they arrived the sun was rising.
Once inside the hall, Dr. Santos could do little else but administer comfort. He expected more deaths before the morning was through.
Marita looked around the hall remembering the celebration all those years ago with the red tea after the big storm. A happier time. She kneeled beside Kenro, as Fresca, clutched his hand. Fresca's tears dripped onto his arm. In the morning's light, Marita thought the injury didn't look so bad, and his breathing seemed steadier and more normal. She felt a slight hope. She bent her head and prayed.
There was a shout.
"He's breathing!"
Marita looked up and smiled. It was Henori. He was standing beside his son Marco. Dr. Santos had pronounced Marco dead.
"He's breathing!" Henori repeated.
Marita gasped. There was no doubt he was breathing. She heard rasps coming from his throat, but the rest made no sense. Marco bared fangs and his eyes looked white. Was he trying to bite his father?
Suddenly the others thought to be dead, sat up straight, shedding the blankets draped across their faces to the floor; their eyes too wide and their teeth too long. Sounds gurgled from their throats as they struggled upright.
Screams filled the room. Then there was too much blood as the dead Marco struck his father Henori in the neck with fangs killing him instantly.
Pedero raised a pistol and shot Marco through his chest up close. Gore exploded everywhere, but while the wound in Marco's chest gaped open; it did not stop him. Instead, he turned toward Pedero and took a step. Marcos's head exploded as Dr. Santos shot Marco from behind.
They turned as one shooting the two other dead men through their heads, before they could get entirely to their feet. Both dead went back down, still and lifeless.
Terror gripped the villagers. Children hid their faces. Words would not come. Marita found herself shaking when Kenro's eyes opened. Both Marita and Fresca screamed as Pedero and Dr. Santos aimed guns.
Fresca yelled "No!" and threw herself across Kenro's head. "He is okay! He is just waking up!"
It was true. Kenro blinked his eyes and smiled before he slipped back into sleep
****
Dr. Santos, as terrified as the villagers, willed himself to stay calm and re-examine the injured men. He was astonished by the difference.
All down the line, the remaining men showed signs of recovery. What was in the bottle that the little man spooned out to them? Had it been the cause of the dead men rising up?
He looked around at the carnage. Men, women and children, witnesses to this horror were frightened and shocked.
Father Muniz got their attention. "Everything is okay now. Everyone is all right. The dead are once again at peace. Perhaps we have witnessed a miracle. The Bible is full of them. Let us pray." And he led them in prayer.
Dr. Santos put them to work.
He organized the people, telling them to return to their homes with their loved ones, making sure they carried the injured men all the way home, on the stretchers that got them there.
"You will be more comfortable in your own homes. None of the injured are to walk on their own until I say!" he shouted. They appeared okay now, but he wasn't sure if that would last.
"I will find you and come around to see how you are doing," he assured them all.
Next, he directed some older boys to gather enough wood to prepare a great bonfire in the big space behind the hall. Father Muniz, Pedero and a few other men remained with him, and together they scrubbed the blood and gore from the hall. When the boys came back from piling up the wood, he sent them back out to gather the grieving families of the deceased so they could say a proper goodbye.
****
"You must hold the ceremony outdoors," explained Dr. Santos. "We have to burn them; we cannot put them in the ground. You will forever know they are there. I don't think they will turn back to dust as they should."
Father Muniz agreed as he stared at the gruesome images before him. The men dragged the four bodies outside and placed them beside the woodpile.
"Do we have to burn Henori?" someone asked. "He did nothing wrong."
"We can't take that chance," replied Dr. Santos. He left the men to ponder his answer on their own.
****
It was a formal funeral despite the circumstances. All twelve hundred, or so, of Jai` Doro's population attended. The injured men arrived along with everyone else. Dr. Santos raised his eyebrows at their miraculous recoveries. Men with grave injuries earlier now appeared healthy and whole.
Father Muniz performed his most reverent ceremony. The bonfire was lit. The bodies were added one by one as the people bowed their heads and prayed for their loved one's safe passage into heaven.
Later Dr. Santos visited the homes of the injured mine workers and listened to them praise the benefits of the syrup they had been using for the last several years. He knew they would not give it up.
He gave explicit instructions to Father Muniz and the village leaders before he left them to return to Sao Cachito.
"It is my belief that even the best medicines can have dangerous side effects. Here's what you need to do…"
He took a bottle of the syrup with him when he went back to Sao Cachito. He administered it to his ill patients, and it made them well.
He planned to return to Jai` Doro for more but was killed when he was thrown from his horse on his way to help someone else.
Dr. Raul Santos left the world mourned by many.
****
The mine reopened. The people decided that it must, as they strived to put ordinary routine back into their daily lives. After some weeks of repair, they discovered that the collapse opened a new vein of silver. They paid the rest of their debt to Emilio Cardiaz an
d took control of the mine.
Chapter 4
Jorge Amarez age 83 passed away in his sleep one night. His wife Kyra discovered his body when he did not wake up for breakfast. She had tears in her eyes when she left her house to find Father Muniz and gather her grown children.
Father Muniz walked back to the house with Kyra, but when they opened the bedroom door, Jorge was not there.
A confused and upset Kyra Amarez shook in panic. "No, no, no," she kept repeating. The priest tried to calm her when a scream pierced the air from outside. They both hurried outside toward the scream.
There was Jorge. He wasn't dead after all. Jorge was walking toward their neighbor Jesse Ruiz who lived close by. It was Jesse's wife who was screaming.
"Why is she screaming?" thought Kyra. Something seemed wrong. Jorge didn't walk that way. He shuffled along as if his feet were too heavy.
"Jorge!" shouted Kyra running toward him. "Jorge!" Jorge turned to Kyra. His eyes were not Jorge's eyes. The irises had faded nearly colorless. When he opened his mouth, his teeth had grown too big for his mouth. Fangs!
For tearing flesh from the bones. Kyra wondered where the thought came from. Suddenly, she was frightened of the man who had been her husband for sixty-five years. She screamed. Before Jorge could bite into his wife's neck his head exploded as Jesse pulled the trigger of his hunting rifle.
****
Father's Muniz helped the family burn Jorge's body where it lay.
They were caught unprepared. Fraught with grief and burdened with the horror, they struggled to gather the materials for a fire and rushed to start the flame, catching the surrounding grass on fire. Eventually they prevailed, and once again, Father Muniz performed a ceremony for a man raised from death. They burned the corpse to ashes, and the soul of a good man returned to heaven.
No one talked about it, but it was on everyone's mind as they readied themselves for the next death.
When Manuel Guana died from a choking accident, everyone was ready. Mourning for his loss would have to come later. Father Muniz gave last rites and the family quickly washed and dressed him. They carried his body to the churchyard where a proper funeral pyre waited. They didn't light it right away. They were still unsure. They waited and prayed. Father Muniz prayed with them.
