by The Power
A voice said: You are the priest, aren't you?
Yes. It was as if they had climbed out of their opposing trenches and met in No Man's Land among the wire to fraternize. He remembered stories of the European war how during the last years men had sometimes met-on an impulse-between the lines. Are you a German? they might have said, with incredulity at the similar face, or: Are you English?
Yes, he said again, and the mule plodded on. Sometimes, instructing children in the old days, he had been asked by some black lozenge-eyed Indian child: What is God like? and he would answer facilely with references to the father and the mother, or perhaps more ambitiously he would include brother and sister and try to give some idea of all loves and relationships combined in an immense and yet personal passion. ... But at the centre of his own faith there always stood the convincing mystery-that we were made in God's image-God was the parent, but He was also the policeman, the criminal, the priest, the maniac, and the judge. Something resembling God dangled from the gibbet or went into odd attitudes before the bullets in a prison yard or contorted itself like a camel in the attitude of sex. He would sit in the confessional and hear the complicated dirty ingenuities which God's image had thought out: and God's image shook now, up and down on the mule's back, with the yellow teeth sticking out over the lower lip; and [95] God's image did its despairing act of rebellion with Maria in the hut among the rats. It must sometimes be a comfort to a soldier that the atrocities on either side were equal: nobody was ever alone. He said: Do you feel better now? Not so cold, eh? Or so hot? and pressed his hand with a kind of driven tenderness upon the shoulders of God's image.
The man didn't answer, as the mule's backbone slid him first to one side, then the other.
It isn't more than two leagues now, the priest said encouragingly-he had to make up his mind. He carried around with him a dearer picture of Carmen than of any other village or town in the state; the long slope of grass which led up from the river to the cemetery on a tiny hill of perhaps twenty feet where his parents were buried. The wall of the burial-ground had fallen in: one or two crosses had been smashed by enthusiasts: an angel had lost one of its stone wings, and what gravestones were left undamaged leant at an acute angle in the long marshy grass. One image of the Mother of God had lost ears and arms and stood like a pagan Venus over the grave of some rich, forgotten timber merchant. It was odd-this fury to deface, because, of course, you could never deface enough. If God had been like a toad, you could have rid the globe of toads, but when God was like yourself, it was no good being content with stone figures-you had to kill yourself among the graves.
He said: Are you strong enough to hold on? He took away his hand. The path divided-one way led to Carmen, the other west. He pushed the mule on, down the Carmen path, flogging at its haunches. He said: You'll be there in two hours, and stood watching the mule go on towards his home with the informer humped over the pommel.
The half-caste tried to sit upright. Where are you going?
You'll be my witness, the priest said. I haven't been in Carmen. But if you mention me-they'll give you food.
Why ... why ...? The half-caste tried to wrench round the mules head, but he hadn't enough strength: it just went on. The priest called out: Remember. I haven't been in Carmen. But where else now could he go? The conviction came to him that there was only one place in the whole state where there was no danger of an innocent man's being taken as a hostage-but he couldn't go there in these clothes. … The half-caste [96] held hard onto the pommel and swivelled his yellow eyes beseechingly: You wouldn't leave me here-alone. But it was more than the half-caste he was leaving behind on the forest track: the mule stood sideways like a barrier, nodding a stupid head, between him and the place where he had been born. He felt like a man without a passport who is turned away from every harbour.
The half-caste was calling after him: Call yourself a Christian. He had somehow managed to get himself upright. He began to shout abuse-a meaningless series of indecent words which petered out in the forest like the weak blows of a hammer. He whispered: If I see you again, you can't blame me. … Of course, he had every reason to be angry: he had lost seven hundred pesos. He shrieked hopelessly: I don't forget a face.
Chapter Two
THE YOUNG men and women walked round and round the plaza in the hot electric night: the men one way, the girls another, never speaking to each other. In the northern sky the lightning flapped. It was like a religious ceremony which had lost all meaning, but at which they still wore their best clothes. Sometimes a group of older women would join in the procession-with a little more excitement and laughter, as if they retained some memory of how things used to go before all the books were lost. A man with a gun on his hip watched from the Treasury steps, and a small withered soldier sat by the prison door with a gun between his knees, and the shadows of the palms pointed at him like a zariba of sabres. Lights were burning in a dentist's window, shining on the swivel chair and the red plush cushions and the glass for rinsing on its little stand and the child's chest-of-drawers full of fittings. Behind the wire-netted windows of the private houses grandmothers swung back and forth in rocking-chairs, among the family [97] photographs-nothing to do, nothing to say, with too many clothes on, sweating a little. This was the capital city of a state.
The man in the shabby drill suit watched it all from a bench. A squad of armed police went by to their quarters, walking out of step, carrying their rifles anyhow. The plaza was lit at each corner by dusters of three globes joined by ugly trailing overhead wires, and a beggar worked his way from seat to seat without success.
He sat down next the man in drill and started a long explanation. There was something confidential, and at the same time threatening in his manner. On every side the streets ran down towards the river and the port and the marshy plain. He said that he had a wife and so many children and that during the last few weeks they had eaten so little-he broke off and fingered the cloth of the other's drill suit. And how much, he said, did this cost?
You'd be surprised how little.
Suddenly as a clock struck nine-thirty all the lights went out. The beggar said: It's enough to make a man desperate. He looked this way and that as the parade drifted away down-hill. The man in drill got up, and the other got up too, tagging after him towards the edge of the plaza: his flat bare feet went slap, slap on the pavement. He said: A few pesos wouldn't make any difference to you. ...
Ah, if you knew what a difference they would make.
The beggar was put out. He said: A man like me sometimes feels that he would do anything for a few pesos. Now that the lights were out all over town, they stood intimately in the shadow. He said: Can you blame me?
No, no. It would be the last thing I would do.
Everything he said seemed to feed the beggar's irritation. Sometimes, the beggar said, I feel as if I could kill …
That, of course, would be very wrong.
Would it be wrong if I got a man by the throat ...?
Well, a starving man has got the right to save himself, certainly.
The beggar watched with rage, while the other talked on as if he were considering a point of academic interest. In my case, of course, it would hardly be worth the risk. I possess [98] exactly fifteen pesos seventy-five centavos in the world. I haven't eaten myself for forty-eight hours.
Mother of God, the beggar said, you're as hard as a stone. Haven't you a heart?
The man in the drill suit suddenly giggled. The other said: You're lying. Why haven't you eaten-if you've got fifteen pesos?
You see, I want to spend them on drink.
What sort of drink?
The kind of drink a stranger doesn't know how to get in a place like this.
You mean spirits?
Yes-and wine.
The beggar came very close: his leg touched the leg of the other man: he put a hand upon the others sleeve. They might have been great friends or even brothers standing intimately together in the
dark: even the lights in the houses were going out now, and the taxis which during the day waited half-way down the hill for fares who never seemed to come were already dispersing-a tail-lamp winked and went out past the police barracks. The beggar said: Man, this is your lucky day. How much would you pay me ...?
For some drink?
For an introduction to someone who could let you have a little brandy-real fine Vera Cruz brandy?
With a throat like mine, the man in drill explained, it's wine I really want.
Pulque or maguey-he's got everything.
Wine?
Quince wine?
I'd give everything I've got, the other swore solemnly and exactly, -except the centavos, that's to say-for some real genuine grape wine. Somewhere down the hill by the river a drum was beating: one, two, one, two: and the sound of marching feet kept a rough time-the soldiers-or the police-were going home to bed.
How much? the beggar repeated impatiently.
Well, I would give you the fifteen pesos and you would get the wine for what you cared to spend.
[99] You come with me.
They began to go down the hill: at the corner where one street ran up past the chemist's shop towards the barracks and another ran down to the hotel, the quay, the warehouse of the United Banana Company, the man in drill stopped. The police were marching up, rifles slung at ease. Wait a moment. Among them walked a half-caste with two fang-like teeth jutting out over his lip. The man in drill standing in the shadow watched him go by: once the mestizo turned his head and their eyes met. Then the police went by, up into the plaza. Let's go. Quickly.
The beggar said: They won't interfere with us. They're after bigger game.
What was that man doing with them, do you think?
Who knows? A hostage perhaps.
If he had been a hostage, they would have tied his hands, wouldn't they?
How do I know? He had the grudging independence you find in countries where it is the right of a poor man to beg. He said: Do you want the spirits or don't you?
I want wine.
I can't say he'll have this or that. You must take what comes.
He led the way down towards the river. He said: I don't even know if he's in town. The beetles were flocking out and covering the pavements: they popped under the feet like puffballs, and a sour green smell came up from the river. The white bust of a general glimmered in a tiny public garden, all hot paving and dust, and an electric dynamo throbbed on the ground-floor of the only hotel. Wide wooden stairs crawling with beetles ran up to the first floor. I've done my best, the beggar said; a man can't do more.
On the first floor a man dressed in formal dark trousers and a white skin-tight vest came out of a bedroom with a towel over his shoulder. He had a little grey aristocratic beard and he wore braces as well as a belt. Somewhere in the distance a pipe gurgled, and the beetles detonated against a bare globe. The beggar started talking earnestly, and once as he talked the light went off altogether and then flickered unsatisfactorily on again. The head of the stairs was littered with wicker rocking-chairs, [100] and on a big slate were chalked the names of the guests-three only far twenty rooms.
The beggar turned back to his companion. The gentleman, he said, is not in. The manager says so. Shall we wait for him?
Time to me is of no account.
They went into a big bare bedroom with a tiled floor. The little black iron bedstead was like something somebody has left behind by accident when moving out. They sat down on it side by side and waited, and the beetles came popping in through the gaps in the mosquito wire. He is a very important man, the beggar said. He is the cousin of the Governor-he can get anything for you, anything at all. But, of course, you must be introduced by someone he trusts.
And he trusts you?
I worked for him once. He added frankly: He has to trust me.
Does the Governor know?
Of course not. The Governor is a hard man.
Every now and then the water-pipes swallowed noisily. And why should he trust me?
Oh, anyone can tell a drinker. You'll have to come back for more. It's good stuff he sells. Better give me the fifteen pesos. He counted them carefully twice. He said: I'll get you a bottle of the best Vera Cruz brandy. You see if I don't. The light went off, and they sat on in the dark: the bed creaked as one of them shifted.
I don't want brandy, a voice said. At least not very much.
What do you want then? I told you-wine.
Wine's expensive.
Never mind that. Wine or nothing.
Quince wine?
No, no. French wine.
Sometimes he has California wine.
That would do.
Of course himself-he gets it for nothing. From the customs.
The dynamo began throbbing again below and the light came dimly on. The door opened and the manager beckoned the [101] beggar; a long conversation began. The man in the drill suit leant back on the bed: his chin was cut in several places where he had been shaving too closely: his face was hollow and ill-it gave the impression that he had once been plump and round-faced but had caved in. He had the appearance of a business man who had fallen on hard times.
The beggar came back. He said: The gentleman's busy, but he'll be back soon. The manager sent a boy to look for him.
Where is he?
He can't be interrupted. He's playing billiards with the Chief of Police. He came back to the bed, squashing two beetles under his naked feet. He said: This is a fine hotel. Where do you stay? You're a stranger, aren't you?
Oh, I'm just passing through.
This gentleman is very influential. It would be a good thing to offer him a drink. After all, you won't want to take it all away with you. You may as well drink here as anywhere else.
I should like to keep a little-to take home.
It's all one. I say that home is where there is a chair and a glass.
All the same- Then the light went out again, and on the horizon the lightning bellied out like a curtain. The sound of thunder came through the mosquito-net from very far away like the noise you hear from the other end of a town when the Sunday bull-fight is on.
The beggar said confidentially: What's your trade?
Oh, I pick up what I can-where I can.
They sat in silence together listening to the sound of feet on the wooden stairs. The door opened, but they could see nothing. A voice swore resignedly and asked: Who's there? Then a match was struck and showed a large blue jaw and went out. The dynamo churned away and the light went on again. The stranger said wearily: Oh, it's you.
It's me.
He was a small man with a too large pasty face and he was dressed in a tight grey suit. A revolver bulged under his waistcoat. He said: I've got nothing for you. Nothing.
The beggar padded across the room and began to talk earnestly in a very low voice: once he gently squeezed with his bare toes the other's polished shoe. The man sighed and blew [102] out his cheeks and watched the bed closely as if he feared they had designs on it. He said sharply to the one in the drill suit: So you want some Vera Cruz brandy, do you? It's against the law.
Not brandy. I don't want brandy.
Isn't beer good enough for you?
He came fussily and authoritatively into the middle of the room, his shoes squeaking on the tiles-the Governor's cousin. I could have you arrested, he threatened.
The man in the drill suit cringed formally. He said: Of course, your Excellency ...
Do you think I've got nothing better to do than slake the thirst of every beggar who chooses ...
I would never have troubled you if this man had not …
The Governors cousin spat on the tiles.
But if your Excellency would rather that I went away …
He said sharply: I'm not a hard man. I always try to oblige my fellows ... when it's in my power and does no harm. I have a position, you understand. These drinks come to me quite legally.
Of course.
&
nbsp; And I have to charge what they cost me.
Of course.
Otherwise I'd be a ruined man. He walked delicately to the bed as if his shoes were cramping him and began to unmake it. Are you a talker? he asked over his shoulder.
I know how to keep a secret.
I don't !t mind you telling-the right people. There was a large rent in the mattress: he pulled out a handful of straw and put in his fingers again. The man in drill gazed out with false indifference at the public garden, the dark mud-banks, and the masts of sailing-ships: the lightning flapped behind them, and the thunder came nearer.
There, said the Governor's cousin, I can spare you that. It's good stuff.
It wasn't really brandy I wanted.
You must take what comes.
Then I think I'd rather have my fifteen pesos back.
The Governor's cousin exclaimed sharply: Fifteen pesos! [103] The beggar began rapidly to explain that the gentleman wanted to buy a little wine as well as brandy: they began to argue fiercely by the bed in low voices about prices. The Governor's cousin said: Wine's very difficult to get. I can let you have two bottles of brandy.
One of brandy and one of ...
It's the best Vera Cruz brandy.
But I am a wine drinker ... you don't know how I long for wine. …
Wine costs me a great deal of money. How much more can you pay?
I have only seventy-five centavos left in the world.
I could let you have a bottle of tequila.
No, no.
Another fifty centavos then ... It will be a large bottle. He began to scrabble in the mattress again, pulling out straw. The beggar winked at the man in drill and made the motions of drawing a cork and filling a glass.
There, the Governor's cousin said, take it or leave it.
Oh, I will take it.
The Governors cousin suddenly lost his surliness. He rubbed his hands and said: A stuffy night. The rains are going to be early this year, I think.
Perhaps your Excellency would honour me by taking a glass of brandy to toast our business.
