Grave of Hummingbirds

by Jennifer Skutelsky

  Alberto grabbed his forearm and held on as Finn found his balance. “We don’t have far to go, and you can’t go down by yourself. Trust me. I know these mountains.”

  The cry stilled and seemed to hang in the air, uncertain.

  “Where are we going? How much farther?”

  “Not far. Sit for a moment. Rest.”

  The call started up again, and Finn knew he couldn’t turn away. Only he could hear it, and he might be the only one who would respond. He answered, his mind reaching out and up, catching the cry, letting it resound deep inside him, hurling his own back. I hear you, I’m coming. “I don’t need to rest,” he said. “Let’s move on.”

  Farther up, the trees disappeared. Cold and breathless, Finn almost staggered into Alberto as he stopped and placed a finger on his lips. Now they could both hear voices, the words unclear and some distance away but unmistakably the sounds of men in conversation.

  Alberto thrust Finn back against the face of the mountain. “You make no sound. Nothing. Be quiet and stay by me.” He knelt, then crept forward and lay on his stomach, peering over the edge of the cliff into a wide canyon, where the ground was smooth except for occasional ripples and random, shallow crevices.

  Finn spread his hands against the rock.

  Don’t turn back. The voice was old and frail now, weak with exhaustion. Fear and desperation had made it seem strong.

  Finn crouched and crawled over to Alberto.

  About twenty feet below them, five men skittered over the rock.

  Alberto nodded toward a white horse who stood on slanted, weary hips, head drooping. “That’s Esmeralda,” he whispered.

  Finn recognized the name. This was why the doctor had fought with the governor.

  Esmeralda lifted her back foot so that only the tip of her hoof rested in the dirt. A man approached her and took hold of the rope that hung around her neck.

  Finn could hear him chant. Although the words were unclear, they carried the weight of a ritual, its implications causing him to grab Alberto’s arm and dig into the muscle with his fingers. “What are they going to do?”

  Alberto pulled away. “Be quiet!” he hissed. “Look.”

  The man wrapped a blanket around the horse’s head.

  “It’s forbidden,” Alberto whispered, his face bleak, “to look in the eyes of a dying animal.”

  Men staggered drunkenly across the rocks toward the horse, converging on her rope and hauling her off her feet. Her resistance held for the breadth of a heartbeat, and Finn watched her fall to her knees, then over onto her side. The cry returned, soaring, seeking, and Finn pushed himself up, back onto his knees, prepared to do anything to stop what he saw unfolding.

  I’m here, I won’t let them. To Alberto he said, “We have to stop this. What are they doing to her?”

  Alberto pulled him to the ground. He grabbed a fistful of Finn’s hair and forced his face toward the canyon. “You will see.”

  As she feebly fought the rope, Finn tried to catch her in his heart, but he was slipping, his eyes fogging up and throat closing again. Please, God, please don’t do this.

  “Esmeralda,” Alberto whispered.

  The mare struggled to reach her feet but didn’t make it. She kicked and heaved, but the rope was tenacious, and Finn felt it tighten as seconds became long, slowly strangling minutes.

  He couldn’t watch anymore. He turned and ran, slammed into the cliff and staggered on, ignoring Alberto’s stifled plea to wait.

  Finn ran from Esmeralda, from her voice, which shrank, too slowly, to that of a foal, fading below the grunts and exertions of the men. He ran until his legs folded, and he lay where he landed, cheek scraped and skin stinging, the pain made worse by the salt on his face.

  Something blew on his sweater, and Finn squinted up. As he raised his shoulders, the soft burr of velvet lips sent a breath into his lungs that lifted him to his feet.

  A horse and a woman held him with their eyes before they turned to go. The horse’s mane and tail were silky and long, her hooves dancing on the spot, impatient on the dirt track. The woman appeared as concentrated particles of light, discarded dust sweepings of the sun, retaining here and there the shape of who she had once been—someone with fingers and arms fine as the bones of a leggy water bird. She stood at the horse’s head and lifted a slender arm to tangle her fingers in the animal’s forelock.

  They were leaving Finn on the path, moving away together, even though he reached for them and stumbled to catch up, his heart as agitated as his scrambling feet. They faded from view, and for some time his eyes struggled to find them again, roaming the rearing rock face and clouding sky, until he heard Alberto’s footsteps on the path behind him.

  The woman’s voice stayed with him long after she and the horse had vanished. See, Finn. Esmeralda. I have her. Go now. Go to Gregory.

  FOURTEEN

  Gregory stepped outside and crossed the cobblestone path toward the paddock where Tomás and Coco grazed. The horses whinnied and came over. He ran his hands along their necks and teased the soft skin beneath Coco’s jaw. He breathed horse, warm and rich, alive with the gently held spirits of river and soil, grass and mountain air. Moments later, the animals stilled and grew alert, gazing toward the logging road.

  Two young men walked toward the house—together, yet not. Alberto stayed a number of steps ahead of the boy Gregory had met at the village, whose mother’s striking resemblance to Nita had appeared rude, a liberty, an imposition.

  Alberto turned back twice. Each time he did so, the other boy stopped, too, and once, he pointed, his rigid arm conveying a warning. Keep going. Then he did speak, in a voice that crackled with fury. “Stay away from me.”

  Gregory nudged Tomás aside and hurried toward them. They were sullen as he approached. Blood rimmed one of Alberto’s nostrils and spotted the cleft in his upper lip.

  Forgetting his own injuries, dismayed at the traces of violence on the boy’s face, Gregory said to him in Pájaron, “What happened, Alberto?”

  “He hit me. For nothing. He’s dangerous.”

  “What’s he saying?” The young man was too angry to acknowledge Gregory with a greeting.

  Gregory studied the storm in his eyes. “He says you’re dangerous.”

  “I’m dangerous? I’m dangerous?”

  “You are dangerous,” Alberto shouted in English. “And crazy.”

  The boy leaped toward Alberto and was upon him before Gregory could step between them.

  “Ahhhhh,” Alberto yelled. “Get him off me.”

  Gregory took hold of the boy’s arm and yanked him to his feet. “That’s enough. What’s the matter with you?”

  The young man shook. The palms of his hands and his cheek were scratched, and his face was red. His bottom lip quivered until he bit it. “Ask him.”

  Gregory said, “I’m asking you.” He clamped a hand on the boy’s shoulder and turned him away from Alberto. “I’m sorry, I don’t remember your name.”

  His eyes cleared slowly. “Finn,” he said. “Finn Lawson.”

  “Finn. I’m Gregory Vásquez Moreno. You calm down now, all right? I’ll have no more of this, you understand?”

  A slow nod. Tears filled his nut-colored eyes—the man at odds with the boy. Holding Finn in his gaze, Gregory said in Pájaron, “What have you done, Alberto?”

  “I’ve done nothing! He—”

  “You took him up to the canyon, didn’t you?”

  Alberto was silent.

  “You made him watch something, didn’t you? You made him watch Esmeralda?” In English, his voice soft, Gregory said, “Come inside, Finn. Come.”

  He seated them at opposite ends of the long wooden table in the kitchen and prepared a bowl of warm water and antiseptic.

  “I’m also injured. My face is very painful,” Alberto said and glared at Finn. “He made my nose bleed, and he nearly broke all the teeth in my head.”

  Finn stared down at his swollen palms, turned them, and studied the bro
ken skin over his knuckles.

  “You’re not a fighter, I think,” Gregory said. He placed the bowl in front of Finn, wrung the water out of a napkin, and handed it to him. “Use this on your hands.” Bits of gravel were embedded in the skin, and brown streaks were ingrained like skid marks.

  Gregory returned to the sink and poured hot water into another bowl. “Did he break any?”

  “Any what?” Alberto said.

  “Any teeth? You said he nearly broke all of them.”

  “He almost did.”

  Gregory picked up another cloth. “Excuse us, Finn. I must talk to Alberto. Stay here. I’ll be a moment, and then we’ll have something to drink. Maybe eat, too.” He gestured for Alberto to follow him, and together they left the room.

  In the study, Gregory said, “Why did you do it?”

  “Because he needs to see.”

  Gregory sighed. “Why? What difference will it make? Journalists have seen. Photographers have recorded it.”

  Surly, Alberto shrugged.

  Gregory nodded. “Nothing. They’ll do what you’ve just done. Shrug.”

  “He didn’t shrug.”

  “No,” Gregory said. “He’s hurt and upset.”

  “I don’t care. He’s a spoiled child. He knows nothing of poverty, and maybe he should learn. Suffering is something other people must do. Peasants like me.”

  “And you want him to know poverty. And suffering.”

  “Why not? He can take a little piece of it back to his fancy house and his American school.”

  Gregory shook his head. “This young man is not like others.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I don’t.” Gregory wrung out the cloth. “I sense it. Come, let me see your face.”

  Alberto stepped into the light. He didn’t flinch as Gregory tested his nose for a break and lifted his upper lip to check the tear.

  Gregory gently held the warm, damp cloth against the abrasions and cleaned the skin. “You’re a good boy, Alberto. Look farther than your nose.”

  Eyes on the floor, Alberto said, “I’m not a boy anymore.” He took the cloth and held it against his mouth.

  Gregory’s hands dropped to his sides. “No, I know. You’re a man. You’ve been a man for some time.”

  “You said you would buy her.”

  “I did say that. I tried.”

  For a while, silence hung between them.

  Alberto’s accusation burned in his eyes. “I have to go. I don’t think he’ll come back to Colibrí with me.”

  “No, probably not. Don’t worry, I’ll see he gets home. Where’s his mother?”

  “She’s there.”

  “You’ve seen her?”

  Alberto nodded, but a faraway expression crossed his face, as though part of him had already left the house.

  “Is it just me? Did she remind you of Nita?”

  Alberto touched his fingers to his swollen lip and grimaced before he quietly said, “Yes.”

  “Does she know where her son is?”

  Alberto nodded. About to say something, he changed his mind and left.

  The front door closed quietly behind him, and Gregory returned to the kitchen.

  Finn sat in Gregory’s kitchen, catching the aromas of garlic and wood, food and antiseptic. Rough terra-cotta pots lined the window, softened by lilacs and shaded greens of rosemary, sage, and mint.

  Looking into the bowl of antiseptic, Finn drifted to a vision of Sophie, who peered up at him and asked him to watch the food while she took a bath. Gregory followed her out of the room. Needled, Finn touched the surface, and the liquid snatched away its message, rippling back to the inscrutable dullness of diluted milk.

  He listened to the sound of birdcalls converging outside in a courtyard at the back of the house.

  Hours had passed since he’d started up the mountain with Alberto. His face and hands still stung but not as much, and a swelling sensation had brought with it a dull throb that was easier to tolerate. He didn’t want to wait for Gregory and Alberto while they discussed him in another part of the house, so he pushed out of his chair and headed through the back door. If it was rude to wander uninvited around a stranger’s property, well, it was ruder still to leave a guest alone while they decided what to do with him.

  Finn stepped out onto stone slabs laid in a spiral that led to a large oyster shell filled with water, plants, and fish. Poised in its center, a cement woman stood at least a head taller than he. Her face tipped toward her shoulder, but her eyes were not shy. He believed they would follow him. She was full of afternoon shadows, and her hands cupped something Finn had to stretch forward to see: an egg with a deep crack running down its center. She almost smiled, perhaps because her toes were underwater and the fish that swam at her feet kissed them from time to time. When he touched her, he found the stone surprisingly warm in the shaded courtyard.

  Finn left her, turning to make sure that she continued to watch him. What he would do to have a woman look at him like that, as though she knew all about him, as though she teased him, as though he were the only man she saw.

  He couldn’t begin to name the birds he discovered in the aviaries. Their colors dazzled, but Finn’s attention slipped away from them when he spotted the barn.

  Need you so. Cannot find you, through the dark. Think, perhaps, I am dying. Want to feel the sky again and you beside me. It was a voice spun from the air between him and the barn, but the words were not meant for him. They rode on the back of a deeper, stronger cry, one that hauled Finn’s eyes upward.

  Far above him, a black shape swooped and circled. Where, where are you? You can find me, yes you can. Look up, look up.

  As clearly as Finn heard two voices, strong and weak, they couldn’t hear each other. One seemed muted, as though trapped in the barn, while the other rang clear above the craggy peaks. Finn stood, caught between the pair, unable to patch them together. For moments, the bird he could see drifted, expecting an answer from him. Finn tried hard to listen and understand.

  He turned his attention to the barn. The doctor wouldn’t mind if he explored. It wasn’t as if he were peering into cupboards or the forbidden wing of a Gothic mansion. Perhaps it was just a barn, and even though its doors were closed, no one could object to his discovery of a pig or cow.

  But it was quiet and still and dark. Finn left the door open to let in the fading light, and gradually the dim interior took shape. He heard a noise, a rustling, not of rats. Of something bigger. It got up and fell and tried again, and fell again.

  Finn swiftly closed the door and turned to face the stooped and silent figure of a lopsided bird. One four-foot wing stretched across the floor, a crippling cape too heavy to drag about. The darkness was still thin enough to show Finn the bird’s long and slender neck, now stretched, now tucked, now arched, now scraping the floor, as the bird fought for balance.

  It was frightened of him. Finn, who never struggled for words when it came to animals, couldn’t find them now. He stood motionless, unsure of its gender and clueless as to how he should speak to it.

  At last, it settled into a position that it could hold. They looked at each other for seconds or minutes, and slowly a connection formed across the empty space between them.

  The kitchen door was open, but Gregory saw no sign of Finn in the courtyard.

  The barn. Surely not? The young man wouldn’t have ventured into the barn.

  Gregory would need the lamp, he’d need to see . . . but what would he find? . . . she’d inflict damage on an unwary boy . . . where was the lamp? . . . and the young man might hurt her if she frightened him . . . where was the godforsaken lamp, he must have left it in the kitchen . . . no . . . why could he never find anything when he needed it?

  There. Someone had placed it behind the axe and the firewood.

  Perhaps he was mistaken and Finn had returned to his mother.

  Gregory opened the barn door and for a moment stood, immobile, able to distinguish only shapes. He was afraid
to speak, afraid to show his fear, unwilling to alarm the condor.

  “Finn?” he murmured into the shadows.

  “Yes?” The response came after a pause.

  “Where are you? Where’s the bird?” Gregory fumbled for words. “Finn, are you there? Why are you hiding in the dark? Are you hurt? Has she hurt you?”

  The lamp oozed a yellow glow across the accessible areas of the barn: the garden tools, bridles, saddles, sacks of feed for the horses and birds; Finn and the condor together, not apart as he had hoped. Jesus.

  “No, she hasn’t hurt me. Why would she?”

  Gregory had no answer. A magical boy sat cross-legged on the floor, a boy from far away, who rested his hand on a condor’s wing and held his head inches away from her beak.

  Gregory closed his eyes and calmed his cluttered thoughts. About to step toward them, he changed his mind and, to avoid disrupting the intimate connection they shared, walked out of the barn.

  Looking up at the shrinking sun, he saw a second condor begin a descent into the canyon.

  FIFTEEN

  After Finn had gone off with Alberto, Sophie went inside to check on the governor, but he’d left the café and probably wouldn’t be back for a few hours. With an irony not lost on her, she hoped he didn’t need to see a doctor.

  She sat back down outside with a fresh cup of coffee, needing to feel the sun on her face. She was warmly dressed but shivery and tired. Her life revolved around Finn, and since he’d begun to pull away, forgotten impulses had emerged, along with a sense of the younger Sophie stirring and awakening. She’d abandoned that self and her dreams of a grand love and settled in every aspect of her life for less than she’d yearned for.

  The doctor had shaken her. Sophie had followed Rufo’s gaze as it rested on the man and immediately sensed an alert hostility rise in the governor. She’d seen the shock on Gregory’s face when she turned to him. He’d stood alone and very still, staring at her as though she had injured or offended him in some way, as though he couldn’t bear the sight of her but couldn’t look away. As he’d headed toward their table, she had tried to read his lean, weathered face and found it taut with sorrow. Filled with the need to sleep, and eat, and forget. His bones were too prominent, the angular slopes of his face shadowed. Palpable tension set him apart and rippled outward. People moved out of his way. When he’d stood over her, she’d felt as though his darkness might swallow her up. She had found no softness in him until she looked into his eyes—eyes that, beneath a tumble of thick black curls, were the color of dark chocolate, too rich to ever be cold or empty. Passion, intense and pitiless, consumed him.