by Lily Tuck
Alonzo’s daughters, Mary and Elizabeth, spent most of their mornings playing in a fast-running stream in the woods near the village. Blond and pretty and in their teens, the two girls had such a good time splashing and dunking each other in the water—although neither girl knew how to swim—that, for a while, they forgot the discomfort of the carriage and the home they had to abandon in Asunción. Also, they felt secure. Their mother, Mrs. Taylor, sat not far away on the grassy bank of the stream and watched them. Occasionally, Alonzo sat and watched as well and, out loud, he teased his pretty daughters and compared them to fish.
“A piranha,” Elizabeth, the bolder of the two, replied and made as if to bite her father.
When it began to rain one day—it was the rainy season and often six or seven inches fell in a single day—Mary got out of the water and got dressed while Elizabeth decided to stay in.
“I like the feel of the rain on my head, “Elizabeth told Mary, “and, anyway, I am wet already and I still want to wash my hair.”
When Alonzo saw only his wife and Mary return to the carriage, right away he shouted at them, “You bloody fools. You should not have left her.”
Calling out his daughter’s name—Elizabeth was his favorite—and with his heart pounding, Alonzo ran back into the woods. He found Elizabeth lying on the bank of the stream, she was unconscious. Her blond hair was full of soap lather and there was blood in between her legs. Beside himself, Alonzo looked everywhere for footprints and for evidence of a struggle but he found nothing. Later, when Elizabeth regained consciousness, she was confused and hysterical. She talked about seeing a dog in the water and about seeing a snake as well.
“Mark my word, once the Brazilians take Asunción, we shall be safe,” Charles Washburn told Frederick Masterman. The two men had climbed up on the roof of the American Legation to watch the Brazilian ironclads steam up the river toward the city. Below them, Asunción looked as if it had been deserted for a hundred years. The empty streets glowed in the sunlight and, except for the occasional barking of a stray dog, not a sound was heard.
“Franco is cut off now. He has no supplies; he and his soldiers will starve,” Frederick Masterman said.
“He will have no choice but to capitulate,” Charles Washburn answered. Charles Washburn was not particularly fond of Frederick Masterman but he was grateful to him. Also, he preferred Masterman’s company to that of James Manlove. James Manlove had caused him no end of trouble and had finally been arrested and shot.
“Look,” Frederick Masterman said. He was pointing to Asunción’s only defense, a little fort on a hill opposite the city. A few small field pieces and a 150-pound cannon made from church bells were left—the cannon had been hauled up to the fort. The handful of Paraguayan soldiers who remained were unable to operate it and the small field guns fell short of their targets. “The muzzle is lowered properly but the cannon is set too high,” observed Frederick Masterman.
The two men watched as the Brazilians returned fire. Their shots looked random. One hit the balcony on Franco’s palace, another landed in the empty marketplace and killed a stray dog. After an hour of sporadic firing, the two men could hardly believe their eyes when, as they looked on, the Brazilian ironclads turned around and sailed back down the river.
“Cowards! Come back!” Charles Washburn shook his fists and shouted at them.
“No doubt, the Brazilians will claim a great victory, but what will happen to us now?” Frederick Masterman said.
“You might well ask,” Charles Washburn replied.
8 January 1868
Ma chère Princesse,
I cannot express how disappointed I was on my return from Humaitá not to find a letter from you. News from you is like a ray of sunshine especially as, presently, it is the rainy season here and everything in this country is wet, wet, wet—even the clothes in my closet are damp and covered with mold. However there is no point in my complaining, especially since there are more important matters to consider. Franco has had to move his headquarters several times in the last few months and I have moved with him—no easy matter as I have had to leave the children (all but the oldest, Pancho, who will not leave his father’s side) behind in Asunción with their nurse. No doubt you would be surprised if you could have seen me! You might not have recognized me! I wear the same gray wool riding cloak, the same muddy boots, and my hair is done up in a single braid. Sometimes several weeks go by before I put on a dress or have a proper bath! As for my hands—I can’t begin to describe how rough and callused they look from riding and being outdoors all day. I hope I am not distressing you but life on the front is—
Ella stopped writing. She reread her letter and tore it up. She found it hard to concentrate but she began again:
Ma chère Princesse,
Alas, I was hoping to have news of you on my recent return to the capital and I was particularly eager to hear how you succeeded with your portrait of Monsieur Mérimée. I envy you your talent and I can well understand the peace and satisfaction that the practice of art brings you. Likewise, I too find great solace in playing the piano and the moment my fingers touch the keys I forget the ordinary cares and burdens of life. And now the thought of you, dear friend, surrounded as you surely must be (despite Monsieur le Comte’s frequent absences, which you mention in your last letter) by friends and relatives, including your nephew whom I know has always been more like a son to you, fills me with happiness. As for my own sons, they too fill me with joy and—
Again, Ella tore up the letter.
At dusk one evening, Franco crossed the Paraguay one more time—this time, his canoe nearly overturned when it bumped into the bleached corpse of a crocodile floating down the river. (For a moment, Franco mistook it for the corpse of a woman, the pale stomach, the white breasts.) He established his new headquarters four miles inland on the banks of the Tebicuary River at the village of San Fernando. High on a hill, San Fernando was situated on dry ground that was covered with a thick flowering foxtail called aguaráruguai, which bent and waved in the wind and, from afar, looked like the sea. Except for an occasional palm tree, there were no trees. The country around San Fernando was marshland, flat and wet and uninhabitable; a high road that lay under water most of the year ran along the marshes to Asunción.
Lieutenant-Major Thompson supervised the construction of workshops and lathes to repair the guns; the engineers in his employ had to improvise and both design and make the machines for rifling. He was also in charge of building an arsenal to manufacture gunpowder—there was plenty of iron pyrite in Paraguay—and he put some of the women who had offered to take up arms for Paraguay to work producing saltpeter from urine and decomposed animal substances. The women did not like Lieutenant-Major Thompson—he was humorless and severe and he did not let them sing or laugh while they worked. Whenever he came by to inspect their progress, Carmencita Chaves, one of the women producing saltpeter, made faces and stuck out her tongue at him behind his back. One time, he turned around and caught her with her tongue sticking out at him and without a word he grabbed her so hard by the hair that a handful of it came out. Next time, Lieutenant-Major Thompson told Carmencita Chaves, he would cut out her tongue. He put the rest of the women, Isabella Carreras, Dolores Bérges, Maria Incarnacion Rodriguez, Pancho’s favorite Juliana Mañuela Sanchez, Maria Fernandez and Juaña Pura Mendoza, to work stamping percussion caps out of copper.
Before leaving Obispo Cue, Ella told her children that they were each allowed to bring one toy. Enrique, who was nearly ten, wanted to bring his front-pedaled Michaux velocipede—although his feet did not quite yet reach the pedals, Enrique liked to sit on the velocipede and pretend he was riding it—but the velocipede was made of iron and weighed fifty pounds and Ella would not allow it and, instead, he brought three sets of lead British soldiers (his favorites: the Lancers, the Household Cavalry and the Light Dragoons); Federico, who was eight, brought a board game his mother had given him called Wanderers in the Wilderness; Carlos Honorio took his
Noah’s ark, which was carved in the shape of a box set in a boat, with the roof serving as a lid in which 150 pairs of animals as well as Noah and his wife, their three sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, and their wives, had fit originally, but Noah’s wife, Shem, Ham and the sons’ three wives, along with many of the animals, were missing (for this, Carlos Honorio blamed Leopoldo); and Leopoldo, aged five, could not decide between a hobbyhorse, with a real mane and leather reins, and a humming top, so that in the end Ella let him bring both.
Ella and her family left Asunción on board the Salto. Without lights and under cover of night, the ship took them down river safely, past the Brazilian ironclads as far as Villa Franca. There, little remained of the once pretty village of thatch-roofed houses built on a wide lawn that sloped all the way to the river. Ella could see nothing but burned-out, shelled façades, wrecked gardens and torn-up trees; the lawn sloping down to the river was littered with pieces of charred wood, broken carts, wheels, bones, a horse’s skull had been stuck to a pole. In the village, only the telegraph posts made from hardwood stood intact.
From there they continued the journey on land. Lurching and bumping along the road, the carriage taking Ella and the children to San Fernando was so loaded down that it got mired in the mud several times and everyone had to get out. They also often had to stop and wait for the other, slower carriage, which Doña Iñes shared with the servants and the rest of the luggage, to catch up. The bumping and lurching motion made Leopoldo fall asleep and made Carlos Honorio sick to his stomach and the carriage had to stop several more times so he could vomit in the bushes by the side of the road. Federico had spread out Wanderers in the Wilderness on his knees and he and Enrique, who was sitting across from him, were trying to play the game. Each time they hit a pothole or a rut in the road, one of the wooden markers fell to the carriage floor and each time, too, that Enrique picked up his marker, Federico accused him of not putting it back in the proper place on the board and of cheating.
“Stupid! It was right here.” Enrique pointed to site 22. “Right where the boa is swallowing the jaguar.”
“Don’t call me stupid. You were over here, where the cayman is eating the Negro!” Federico insisted.
“Hush, children,” Ella said. “Stop quarreling. You’re giving me a headache.”
“Here!” Federico hissed.
“No, here!” Enrique hissed back as, with one swift motion of his hand, he overturned the board and sent both their wooden markers to the floor.
Leopoldo, who had been asleep in Rosaria’s lap, woke up and started to cry.
Excerpts from Charles Washburn’s journal:
Tuesday, February 25: Silence through the day; I sent Basilio to buy meat and vegetables. Toward evening I took a ride through the streets and met scarcely anybody, the city appearing to be deserted. Hester has now been sick a week.
Wednesday, February 26: Another day of silence, and we know nothing of what has happened since day before yesterday. The child continues sick.
Thursday, February 27: The little one very bad, and the mother has not slept a moment during the whole night. ’Tis said Madam Lynch and the children went on board the Salto at twelve o’clock last night….
Monday, March 2: Basilio went to get a passport, but after waiting two hours, without being able to obtain it, returned. From the looks of the people, it seems as if matters were going very badly below.
Tuesday, March 3: At 7 A.M. went to the Ministerio to complain of the treatment of Basilio…. There is nothing new from below. Silence only. The ironclads are a little above Humaitá, doing nothing to prevent the guayans from crossing the river. What fools are the Brazilians!
Wednesday, March 4: The weather continues oppressive, with nothing to break the monotony. The days seem very long, but thank God! we are now all in good health.
Benigno Lopez, Franco’s brother, had a premonition. The night before he was arrested he dreamt that he was being chased down a long, dark corridor. He never got a look at who was chasing him but whoever it was he knew for certain was intent on harming him, and as he ran, the corridor kept getting narrower and narrower so that Benigno had a harder and harder time fitting himself through it, and just before he awoke, he got stuck in the corridor and whoever was chasing him—Benigno felt a blast of hot breath on his neck—caught up with him.
Minister of the Treasury Saturnino Bedoya had no such premonition. Outside the capital at his quinta, he was having dinner with his wife, Rafaela, and sister-in-law, Inocencia, and, as was his custom, he was trying to eat his food and ignore the two women who were talking their usual nonsense, when, unannounced, the chief of police walked into the dining room.
“Have you eaten?” was the first thing Saturnino said to him. He had seen Matias Sanabria just a few days ago, he had played whist with him. Happy for the unexpected company, Saturnino even made a move to make room for Matias Sanabria to sit next to him at the table. “The roast is not so bad tonight and is not overcooked as is the case—” he started to say when, right behind Matias Sanabria, Saturnino saw several policemen. Their swords were drawn.
Their hands and feet manacled, Benigno Lopez and Saturnino Bedoya were taken to San Fernando in an open cart. It rained every day during the three-day journey and both men got soaked through to the bone. Benigno’s too long hair fell into his eyes and he could not brush it back, worse, after one particularly violent lurch of the cart he lost his balance and fell onto his stomach where he lay for the rest of the day unable to move, his head in an inch of water. Next to him, Saturnino had not been able to convey his sudden urgent need in time—no doubt the fault of the undercooked roast—and had defecated into his breeches and although the rain had partly washed away the shit, he could smell it still. Each evening, when their shackles were removed so they could eat, Benigno and Saturnino’s arms and wrists were so swollen and stiff, they could barely lift the spoons with the food to their lips. The two men were forbidden to speak but since each one blamed the other for his predicament, they mouthed insults at each other: Puerco! Perro! One time when, after another particular violent lurch of the cart, Saturnino was thrown against Benigno and the guard was not looking, Saturnino leaned over and bit Benigno’s earlobe off.
“Perro!” Benigno screamed at Saturnino.
“Puerco!” the guard screamed, beating Benigno.
Two carts followed after Benigno and Saturnino’s; the horses pulling them were straining. The carts were filled with Saturnino and Benigno’s so-called household gold and silver.
Instead of going to Luque, Dr. Eberhardt had stayed in Asunción. He was old and he had enough dried beef, sugar, chipa and yerba to last him for a few days. His principal concern, however, was not food for himself but food for the parrots. Already several of the parrots had died of malnutrition: a friendly red-spectacled Amazon; two talkative white-bellied parrots, two yellow-collared macaws and four green-winged macaws—two of the green-winged macaws Dr. Eberhardt had seen born in the aviary—also at least half a dozen parakeets; and every day, filled with apprehension at the prospect of more deaths in the aviary, Dr. Eberhardt walked over to Inocencia’s house. The house was shut tight—before leaving, Inocencia had given Dr. Eberhardt the key—and completely deserted, but the moment Dr. Eberhardt unlocked the heavy front door (the aviary was located in the back of the house in the patio) and the parrots heard him, they began to scream and squawk. In spite of his worries, Dr. Eberhardt smiled.
Tea? Profesor, tea?
The day the Brazilian ironclads had sailed up the Paraguay River and fired their guns at Asunción, Dr. Eberhardt, in his excitement, forgot and left the aviary door open. In the front hall, when he returned the next day—fortunately, all the windows of the house were shuttered and shut—he found several parrots perched on top of the marble statue of the woman being bitten by a serpent: a scarlet macaw was perched on her knee, a yellow-naped Amazon on her breast, a blue-fronted parrot on her flung-back head. Several blue-and-yellow macaws hung from the silk curtains (curta
ins that had once belonged to Baron de Villa Maria and that Inocencia had not made into dresses) and they had ripped the fabric with their sharp claws; a scarlet macaw and a red-and-green macaw were each perched on a mahogany carved pineapple that decorated the headboard of Inocencia’s large bed and the parrots were adding their own haphazard carvings. They had also shat on the embroidered monogrammed linen sheets and pillowcases; a couple of parakeets were playing and splashing in the leftover water inside the porcelain basins and commodes; Dr. Eberhardt’s favorite hyacinth macaw had gotten inside the larder and his blue feathers—what was left of them—were covered in white flour; from the dining room Dr. Eberhardt heard laughter—like the sound of a raucous dinner party—there he found a single parrot, the little mean green one who used to sit on his head, swinging upside down from an ornate Venetian chandelier, shaking the delicate glass teardrops and mimicking peals of laughter each time one broke off and shattered on the floor.
Collecting all the parrot food he could find—a handful of palm nuts, a cup of sunflower seeds, some peanuts and pine nuts, a few chilies, half a cup of boiled maize, a bunch of berries—Dr. Eberhardt carefully distributed it in the metal trays inside the aviary; he also replenished the water dishes. Then, going back inside Inocencia’s big house, he went through each room, opening wide all the windows and shutters wide, and when he was certain that no window or shutter was left closed, Dr. Eberhardt walked back to the aviary and sat at the table the way he always did. He put his head in his hands and wept.
