Cipriano had found the crucifix six days before when he’d pulled the plaster off the walls. It was lying in the debris, covered with cobwebs and dirt. It wasn’t much longer than his finger and was made of pitted steel. It could have slipped behind the plaster by accident or been placed there by anyone. But it was Rufino he saw squatted down, sliding it into a crack in the plaster for a reason only the old man knew.
Cipriano had rubbed it clean with his fingers. Then he had looped a piece of string around the cross and tied the ends together.
“There,” he said, as he hung it on the edge of the photograph. “Now you have someone to keep you company.” He moved the crucifix so that it hung flat against the picture. “Maybe you guys deserve each other.”
Cipriano had just finished loading the bed of his truck with sheets of curled linoleum and slabs of plaster when Genoveva turned into Rufino’s drive. She was driving so fast that every time she hit a rut Martin would flop around in the passenger seat. A pull of dust hung in the air behind her. Cipriano wiped a run of sweat from his face, tossed his shovel in the back of the pickup and pushed himself up onto the tailgate. Genoveva slowed to a stop a few feet away and shut off the engine.
“Hey,” she said, smiling. “We came to see you.” Her hair was tied back, her face dark and smooth.
“I can see that,” Cipriano said. “You’re going to wreck your car driving so fast.”
“That’s Martin’s fault,” she said as her son leaned across her. “He likes the bumps.”
“Cipriano,” the boy called out, his voice high and piercing, “what are you doing?”
“Martin,” Genoveva said, “don’t yell in my face. You know better.”
“I didn’t,” the boy said. And then he went on as if he’d heard nothing. “What are you doing here, Cipriano?”
“I’m working, what do you think? Go inside and take a look.”
Martin pushed off his mother, threw open the door and came running around the car. “Martin,” Genoveva called out, “you be careful in there.”
“I will,” the boy yelled back, and he disappeared inside the house.
Genoveva opened the door and climbed out. She leaned back against it and folded her arms across her chest. “We can’t stay long,” she said. “I have to get him to little Antonio’s birthday party.” She looked around the yard, at the loose piles of trash, at Rufino’s stained mattress thrown off to one side, at the front of the house with its small window and sagging portal. If anything, the place looked worse than she remembered. Just another old, dark adobe that reeked of neglect. A sad, empty house that stank of Rufino. It was the last place she wanted to be.
“What are you doing here, Cipriano?” she asked, shaking her head.
“You know what I’m doing,” he said. “I told you.” At the far edge of the alfalfa field something was moving through the weeds along the ditch. Cipriano wondered if it was the neighbor’s dog or the coyote he’d seen standing in the middle of Rufino’s field the last few mornings. Whatever it was, it moved up into the scrub oak at the base of the hill and was gone. He looked back at Genoveva.
“I’m fixing my father’s house,” he said.
“No, you’re not,” Genoveva said. “You’ve moved in. And I don’t want you to be here.”
A week before, Cipriano had told her that he’d decided to stay at Rufino’s while working on it. He’d told her when they were lying in bed, and he had spoken so softly that she’d wondered if he was speaking to himself.
At the time, Genoveva had remained still and quiet in the dark. Her face was turned away from him, and outside the bedroom window she could see the stars and the shadows of the mountains. What she could have said to him, she kept to herself. It was later, when she felt him stir and then brush his hand along her leg, that she turned into him quickly. She brought his face down to her breasts and moved his hand below her belly. And then she arched herself back so far that it was as though she was alone. She lay there, her breath shallow, the muscles in her legs straining and her heart so twisted that she realized only later it was twisted with grief.
In the morning, they went their separate ways with barely a word spoken. Genoveva because she thought that Cipriano might find whatever he was looking for if she kept quiet. And Cipriano because he could feel her in the air around him and wanted to be free of it.
“It’s my house now, Genoveva,” Cipriano said. “Rufino left it to me.”
“That doesn’t mean you can just move in without talking to me about it.”
“I did talk to you.”
“What we did that night wasn’t talking,” Genoveva said. She glanced over at the house and wondered what Martin was doing in there. She couldn’t hear him, and suddenly she caught sight of her worst dreams, dreams in which her son would become lost in the mountains or in the rocks by the river or in a car being driven away from her. In each one, no matter where she searched, she could never find him until she woke with a sharp gasp, her heart full of despair.
Genoveva pushed off the car and shielded her eyes with her hand. “Martin,” she called out. And just like that, he appeared in the doorway.
“What?” he said. He was holding something in his hand, but with the glare of the sun, she couldn’t quite see what it was.
“What are you doing, hijo?”
The boy shrugged. “Nothing,” he said.
“Then come out here and do nothing.”
“In a minute,” he said, ducking back inside.
She dropped her hand and looked at Cipriano. “Are you sure he’s okay in there?”
“Yes,” Cipriano said.
She leaned back against the car and felt the heat seep through her jeans. She wondered if it would ever rain again or if this would be a summer of drought and burnt fields. “I don’t want to argue with you,” she said. “I don’t like thinking of you over here.”
“It’s just an empty house,” Cipriano said. “It’s not forever.”
For a few seconds, neither of them spoke. The sun was low enough now that the house was in shadows. Genoveva wondered what Rufino would think of all this. And then it occurred to her that maybe none of this was an accident. She could almost picture the old man inside his house making his little plans, planning to be even more trouble when he was dead.
“Are you sure, Cipriano?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said again. “I’ll have most of it done in a couple of days. Then I can get out of here.”
Genoveva smiled slightly and shook her head. “Do you promise me?” she asked.
“I promise you,” Cipriano said, smiling back at her.
“I won’t forget,” she told him, pushing away from the car. “I should go now and get Martin to his party.”
“Why don’t you come inside first,” Cipriano said, jumping down off the tailgate. “You can see what I’ve done.”
“No,” she said, stretching the word out. She wasn’t ready to be in the same room where Rufino had died. “Maybe next time.” She pulled open the car door and sat down on the seat. “When will I see you?”
“I’ll come by Antonio’s later,” Cipriano said. “After I go to the dump.” He turned toward the house and called out for Martin. Inside, the kitchen chair scraped across the floor and then the boy yelled that he was coming. A moment later, he came out with the photograph in his hands.
“Look what I found,” Martin said. He went up to Cipriano and leaned against him, the back of his head resting on Cipriano’s stomach. The boy had wiped the photograph clean. In the daylight, the features of all fourteen men were sharp and clear. Cipriano could see the wrinkles in their uniforms, faded dirt stains on their knees. Genoveva got out of the car and stood beside him.
“Where did you find this?” she asked.
“On the windowsill,” Martin said.
“No, I meant Cipriano. It was his, wasn’t it?”
“Whose?” Martin said.
“Nobody you know,” Cipriano said. “A friend of Rufino’s.”
“I don’t know if he’s one of them or not,” Cipriano said. “I found it in the bag, so I kept it.”
“Can I have it?” Martin asked.
“No,” Genoveva said, taking it from him and giving it to Cipriano. “It belongs here. Now, get in the car or we’ll be late.”
As Genoveva drove away, she caught a glimpse of Cipriano in the rearview mirror. The photograph was hanging down in one hand and he was looking off at his father’s field. His clothes were dirty, his hair matted with dust. Behind him, the house was dark and still.
“Why is Cipriano living here?” Martin asked. He was slouched down in the seat, his feet up flat against the dashboard.
“He’s not, hijo,” she said. “As soon as he’s done, he’ll come back to us.” And she drove away slowly, hoping that was true.
Halfway to the dump, Cipriano turned the truck around and went back the way he had come. A lukewarm beer was tucked between his legs and he dangled one arm out the open window. He drove past Felix’s Café and Tito’s bar and the lumberyard, nodding every time a vehicle passed by. At the south end of the valley, he turned right on the abandoned road that led out to Perdido mesa. He drove in a few hundred yards and then stopped and shut off the engine.
A fire had burned here once. The piñon and juniper that had come back were small and spindly and mixed in with charred stumps and stunted sagebrush. They grew for just a little farther on before tapering off. Beyond them was the valley that ran all the way to the base of the mesa. By now the sun had set and the sky was soft and streaked with red. The slopes of the mesa were dark, the canyons shadowed. Cipriano took a cigarette out of the glove compartment and lit it. He swung open the truck door and leaned back on the seat, smoking.
The road he was on hadn’t been used in years. It was grown over with sage, the ruts on each side deep. In places it was scarred with elk tracks and beer bottles had been broken against rocks. If Rufino’s story was true, he and Nemecio would have run this way to get home. Cipriano tried to picture it in his mind. Two boys running all that distance in the dark, one of them hauling a rifle and a sack of dead rabbits, the other dragging a heavy canvas bag. It would have been late when they finally got home, bruised and scratched from falling. Late enough that both their parents would have found out. And then, whatever had happened out on that mesa would have spread through the village until everyone had heard the story.
Cipriano finished off his beer and threw the can on the floor. He lit another cigarette and sat watching the evening grow darker.
“No,” he said out loud, his foot resting between the frame of the truck and the open door. “There’s no way that happened.”
Cipriano was on his way to meet Genoveva and Martin when he decided to pick up a six-pack of beer to bring to Antonio’s party. The door to Tito’s bar was propped open and the lot in front was empty. He pulled up close to the building and got out. Lights were on in all the houses, and down the hill came Ermina Gonzales’s voice calling for her son. From where Cipriano stood, he could see almost all of the village. He was suddenly aware of just how closed in and small it was. Even blind, he might be able to walk from where he was to his Tia Lupita’s house. All he would need to do was cross the road and find the ditch that ran along the fence line. It would take him through field after field until finally it would bring him to the house where he had been raised.
I’ll do that with Martin someday, he thought. Just the two of us. It would be like walking a map of this village. He turned and headed toward the bar, toward the odor of beer and smoke.
Nemecio was thinking about going home and forgetting about this day when Cipriano walked through the open door. The old man was sitting by himself at the far end of the bar, six empty bottles and a couple of shot glasses pushed off to the side. At the sight of Cipriano, he hissed out a breath and looked down at the surface of the bar. The varnished wood was ringed with moisture and burns from cigarettes. He ran his finger through the water and carefully traced the outline of a stick figure. Beside it, he drew another. Beneath the two, he ran a line and angled it upward as if they were standing on a slope. And above all that, he made a circle for the sun.
Nemecio raised his head, squinted his eyes and looked at what he had drawn. He thought that the two boys he had made out of water looked awkward and foolish perched on such a steep incline.
“Cuidado, hijos,” Nemecio mumbled. He shook his head, finished what was left of his beer and then wiped the water away with the flat of his hand. “Mira,” he said. “That wasn’t so hard.”
Nemecio had spent the afternoon walking the shoulder of the road on the north side of the village. At least he had until Gilfredo Vigil had driven up and told him the news. When he’d heard what Gilfredo had to say, he’d headed straight to Tito’s and drunk one beer after another. Other than aching legs and a sore back, all he had to show for his work was a bag half full of cans, a woman’s shoe, a pair of scissors and a toy tractor. He would make a few dollars from the cans, but not enough to pay for his beer. The rest he would throw behind the house with all the other junk he’d collected over the years. Forgetting now about going home, he reached in his pocket and dug out a handful of change. Then he called for Tito to bring him another beer.
“I’ll buy your beer, Nemecio,” Cipriano said, sitting down beside him. “Bring me one, too, Tito.”
Nemecio glanced up at Cipriano. The old man’s eyes were damp and bloodshot, the corners of his mouth wet with saliva. “Thank you, Cipriano,” he said, nodding his head.
Cipriano had seen Nemecio walking the road a couple of times since Rufino’s rosary. Each time, he had nearly pulled over to talk. But he had driven on by, leaving the old man alone. Now that Nemecio was sitting just a few feet away, Cipriano wasn’t sure what to say, so he pulled a cigarette out of his shirt pocket and lit it, blowing the smoke out over the bar.
“Nemecio,” he said at last, “I wanted to tell you I’m sorry for what happened at the rosary. I shouldn’t have said what I did.”
The old man grunted and raised a hand. “Don’t worry about it, Cipriano,” he said.
“You were Rufino’s old friend. He didn’t have too many of those.”
“No,” Nemecio said gruffly. “He didn’t have no friends at all.”
Tito finally came over and passed them each a beer. “Cómo está, Cipriano?” he said without looking up. He was a heavyset man who moved about slowly. His face was gray and mottled, and the skin pulled down beneath his eyes from decades of sitting inside his bar.
“Bien, Tito,” Cipriano said, taking a drink. “How are you doing?”
Tito shrugged and began to wipe up the mess in front of Nemecio with a rag. “I’m doing just like I was yesterday,” he said. He cleared the empty bottles away and dumped them in a plastic bucket. “So what’s this I hear,” he said, “about you and some black girl?”
Cipriano leaned his body back, not sure he’d heard right. “What are you talking about?”
“I saw her walking out on the road earlier,” Tito went on, looking at him now. “I heard you wrote her a letter telling her to come here. You told her that her grandfather once lived here and that you knew what happened to him. Why would you do that, Cipriano?”
“Eee,” Nemecio said, shaking his head. “Leave him alone, Tito. It’s not his doing. It’s all Rufino’s fault.”
“How could Rufino write a letter, jodido?” Tito said. “He’s dead.”
“What’s Rufino’s fault?” Cipriano asked them both. He was lost in this conversation. With all the talk, no one was saying anything that made any sense.
Nemeci
o turned his head and looked at Cipriano. “I never took nothing,” he said, a slur in his voice. His eyes drifted away toward the open door as if someone was standing outside watching. “I want you to know that,” he said. “I never took nothing from that man.”
Cipriano suddenly felt as though he’d been gone for a long time, that while he’d been sitting in his pickup looking at Perdido mesa one thing after another had happened in the village. He picked up his beer and took a long drink. “Tell me about this girl,” he said.
Nemecio grunted again and then pushed his beer away and slid off the stool. He reached down and picked up his garbage bag. The empty cans rattled inside. “I don’t know nothing about her,” he said. “And I don’t want to. It doesn’t matter anyway. It’s you she’s looking for, Cipriano. Not me.”
Obie Poole
Back in the summer of 1929 we was playing ball up north in Iowa when a boy got struck by lightning. It struck him high up on his shoulder and come scorching out his feet. For a second that boy just stood there as if hed been spiked to the ground. Then he got flung backward through the air. When he came down he didnt make a noise but curled up into a little ball like something shameful had just happened to him.
He was a sandy haired white boy playing center field against us. My memory is that he and his teammates were from a small church school nearby. I dont remember how he hit against us or how he played the outfield or if you could take that extra base off his arm. What I do remember is he was a tall skinny boy out there in center. And what I remember most is how he died.
The field we was playing on sat in flat lands outside of town. By the late innings the sky had gone so black with clouds that they was twisted with green. Even though the air was hot and dead still there was a scent of something cool running through it like cold spots in lake water.
It happened in that quiet time between innings. Their pitcher was out on the mound throwing in easy to his catcher. The infielders were taking soft tosses from first. And out in center that poor boy was playing catch with his left fielder. As for me I was sitting in the dugout in between Madewell and Hightop. Madewell he was dozing off with his legs stretched out and his arms folded. And Hightop was going on as usual about nothing in particular.
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