Days of the Dead (15 page)

“No wonder they don’t let black men vote,” fumed January after he and Rose were seen out the door by one of Mr. Butler’s slaves. “You couldn’t get
us
to put anyone into office who’d appoint a knothead like that.”

“Nonsense.” Rose drew down the veils that decorated her wide-brimmed straw hat. “There are just as many black imbeciles as white—and that goes for women, too, if civilization ever advances to the point of permitting
us
to express our opinions about who makes the laws.” She climbed into the carriage, even though the house of the British minister was within a few minutes’ walk: Cristobál and Sancho had fallen into step with them the moment they’d emerged from Butler’s door, to keep the beggars at bay.

“Señor, my store in Jalapa was ruined by the fighting. . . .”

“Señor, my family and I once had a hacienda in Cohuila, we were driven off by the taxes. . . .”

“Señor, I am crippled and can no longer support my family. . . .”

“Señor, I have a beautiful sister. . . .”

Maybe the ragged man wrapped in the blanket
had
been a
hacendado
once upon a time. Feeling like the Rich Young Man who was the butt of so many Biblical parables, January tossed a handful of small coins in the direction of the outstretched hands, the stinking bodies, and watched men who should have been tilling fields or minding stores or raising families scrabble for the tinkling metal in the dust.

In New Orleans, nobody begged who wasn’t forced to by physical infirmity or mental degeneration. Mostly if you wanted work you could find it, hauling boxes on the levee or sweeping out a saloon if nothing else.

Here, there was no work. There was no choice for these men to be anything but what they were—the flotsam of decades of war.

Sir Henry Ward and his staff occupied another of the magnificent palaces farther along the Paseo that had been built by some Count or Marquis with money from silver-mines and cattle-ranges the size of German principalities. The Cathedral clock was striking eleven, the bells of every church and convent in that city of churches chiming in like courtiers dutifully laughing at a sovereign’s joke. Such was the press of carriages in the street that it took them nearly fifteen minutes to make the short journey, but January had seen enough of the city’s beggars by then to know that they couldn’t have covered the ground much more quickly by foot.

As Consuela had predicted, the carriage and servants accomplished what good clothing, spotless white kid gloves, and proper English probably wouldn’t have, had January and Rose been unattended and afoot. A well-dressed mestizo servant showed them up to the wide
corredor
that overlooked the immaculate flagstones of the central court. An elderly English footman brought them coffee, and even bowed.

“My dear sir, think nothing of it,” said the British minister when January apologized for interrupting him at his work. “One doesn’t work, here, really—God knows there’s little enough to do, and precious few books to read. I cannot imagine what the local people do to get through the evenings.”

“Well, obviously as a stranger you’re at a distinct disadvantage, sir,” remarked Rose as Sir Henry bowed over her hand. He was a spry, sturdy man with a fair complexion much reddened by sun, dressed as he would have dressed had he been in attendance on his own King at the Court of St. James’s, in strictly formal knee-smalls, striped stockings, a dark-blue long-tailed coat, and a white cravat of the type January hadn’t seen for street-wear since his earliest days in Paris, nearly twenty years ago. “The local people all have each other’s families to gossip about, which are extensive enough that I should imagine it takes up a great deal of their time.”

Sir Henry laughed, invited them to sit—the chairs were tapestried and far finer than those of Mictlán—and sent the servant for
pandolce.
“Most of my colleagues look down their noses at the local delicacies, but personally I find them delicious. What is the point of travel if one doesn’t broaden one’s experience? And I have a wonderful cook.”

January had required no more of Anthony Butler than to introduce himself and make sure that in case of trouble, the American chargé d’affaires would at least remember that such a person as Benjamin January existed. To Sir Henry Ward he explained his case; that he was the friend of a British citizen who had been accused of murder, who was being held more or less under house arrest, and who had asked him—an American—to see to his interests.

“I cannot say that I am an American citizen,” said January quietly, “because I am not, exactly. New Orleans is my home, but I have the right neither to vote nor to bear arms nor to hold any public office, nor even to publicly smoke a cigar. I have thought of myself all of my life as a Frenchman, but when I lived in France I was spoken of as an American. And to further complicate matters, I was born under the flag of the King of Spain. And all because my father was an African who through no doing of his own was kidnapped and enslaved. All I ask from you is your leave—your tacit support—in helping my friend, who is unjustly accused of a crime he did not commit.”

“Your friend’s—er—lady-friend explained the situation to me back in early September, when this happened.” Sir Henry folded his hands, gloved in pearl-gray kid, upon his knee. “Had he been formally arrested and charged, of course, I would have been obliged to intervene, but he was not.”

“If he is,” January reminded him, “he may not be able to communicate with you before he is tried—maybe before he is executed. A letter to Capitán Ylario to the effect that you wish to be officially notified before any steps are taken would go far toward assuring that justice actually is done.”

“I shall write one,” agreed Ward with a brisk nod. “Though from what I have seen of the corruption at all levels of the courts these days, I’m not sure what good it will do if this Capitán Ylario is determined to make an example of Sefton. However, I am not a policeman, nor do I have armed constables on the embassy staff. And by all accounts there doesn’t seem to be much doubt that Mr. Sefton committed this murder.”

“I appreciate your willingness to write,” said January. “It may be of great help. In fact, I think there is room for doubt that Mr. Sefton killed his host’s son.”

“Is there?” Sir Henry raised his brows. “Madame Montero did not seem to think so, and she should—er—know.” He glanced apologetically at Rose, as if asking forgiveness for speaking of activities that human beings had been engaging in since the dawn of time. “The mere fact that Mr. Sefton did not trouble to present himself here—made no effort to establish credentials of any kind with the representatives of his homeland upon his arrival in Mexico—causes me to doubt his motives and his character. According to Madame Montero, he is a man of . . . irregular habits, a drunkard, and an opium-taker. A vile weakness.” Genuine anger suddenly envenomed his voice. “A trade that is a disgrace to my own nation, and makes me blush when England boasts of her righteousness and good will.”

“But weakness does not necessarily make of him a killer,” replied January gently. “Or exempt him from the right to justice.”

“No,” agreed Ward, and rang a bell on the corner of the coffee-tray. The elderly English butler—like Sir Henry, stifling in knee-breeches and a high white stock—brought a small portable desk from the study, complete with pen, ink, paper, sand, and sealing-wax, and the minister thought for a moment, then wrote a short paragraph in a strong and beautiful hand. “No, you’re quite right. . . . And it would not be at all proper for the King to abandon even the guilty to the sovereignty of another nation. Is there anything else that I can do?”

“Only write me a letter of introduction and recommendation,” said January. “I’ll certainly need it to get in to speak with the Prussian minister in my efforts to locate the dead man’s valet, who not only brought his master tea minutes before Sefton brought him brandy, but who, I have reason to believe, subsequently lied about the time of his death.”

“Indeed?” The minister again raised his sun-bleached brows, his interest clearly piqued. “Could one put poison in tea without impairing the flavor? Coffee I could understand, particularly as they make it here, but tea . . .”

“I don’t know,” said January. “It’s one of the things I propose to find out.”

As they descended the tiled staircase to the velvety shade of the courtyard below, it crossed January’s mind to wonder whether Hannibal had simply neglected to introduce himself to the minister upon his arrival—which would be very like Hannibal—or whether, in fact, his friend had deliberately stayed away from a man who might recognize him from his former life.

In the three years he’d known him, Hannibal had spoken of being up at Oxford, of aunts and cousins who were members of England’s social elite; of the family gamekeepers and coachmen and of the countryside in the north-west of Ireland, where so many English landowners had holdings. His manners were as polished as his Latin, and even in the extremities of his illness, half-delirious in one of the back-sheds or whorehouse attics where he mooched a living, he was unfailingly polite and unwilling to give trouble. Yet he had never spoken of what had separated him from his family, or how he had found his way—a penniless consumptive with a hundred-guinea Italian violin—to New Orleans to eke a threadbare living among the black musicians of the town.

The second of November,
thought January as the carriage inched its way through the wide Paseo, around the traffic circles with their stone benches and fountains and back to the narrower confines, the higher buildings, of the Calle San Francisco, and thus toward Consuela’s flat again. In the market-places he could already see among the ant-larva tamales and mango fritters the sweet breads baked with the shape of bones upon their sugared surfaces, the little skulls of sugar decorated with flowers among the camote and spiced peanuts. Marigolds—the flowers of the dead—had begun to appear among the poppies and roses of the flower-sellers, huge gaudy basketfuls of them, to decorate the altars that would be raised in every home.

The Days of the Dead were coming, as certain as the slow waning of the sun. Ten days’ grace at the outside, and less than that if Santa Anna left town, or Don Prospero grew bored with Hannibal. . . .

Or went mad again.

The recollection of the smell of blood in the darkness returned to him, and of Casimiro’s frightened eyes. January reached into his coat and touched the letter of introduction, with its official crimson seal of lion and unicorn, and wondered how much information that seal would buy him.

And he still hadn’t the faintest idea of where to begin.

ELEVEN

“My box at the Teatro Principal is not in the fashionable tiers,” explained Consuela, emerging from her room gorgeously decked in indigo satin thick with gold. “Not down with the wives of the grandees—or the lady-friends of those who now make up Santa Anna’s government.”

Color was fading from the square of sky visible above the town house’s high walls. Down in the courtyard, candles had been lit on the rough tables, and the voices of Señora Garcia’s first customers of the evening rose, along with the smells of tamales, stewed pork, pulque, and cigarettos. From the street came the wailing voice of the charcoal-man, and the higher-pitched song of an Indian offering to trade fruits for outworn household goods.

“But you’ll find no shortage of company,” Consuela went on. “And many of the men who will come up there to play cards tonight—if the croaking of that crow they have singing the lead doesn’t put everyone off their game—will be Fernando’s fellow officers.” As she spoke, she tonged chunks of dark muscavado sugar into two of the three small coffee-cups that Lita had brought out onto the
corredor
while January waited for the women to get ready: Rose was still in Consuela’s room. After taking
comida,
Rose and January had slept, with every intention of going to the house of the Prussian minister to present January’s newly-acquired credentials in the pre-twilight cool.

But waking with Rose lying curved against him in the straw-smelling gloom of their room was not conducive to any inclination on January’s part to spring out of bed and institute expeditions anywhere, no matter how desperate Hannibal’s situation. By the time he and Rose finally did get up, bathed, and had consumed a leisurely cup of cocoa on the gallery, the courtyard was deep in shadow and it was time to get ready for the opera, which, Consuela assured them, was where everyone who was anyone in Mexico City was to be found. Even on nights like tonight when she did not sing, she attended. “For what else does one do?”

“You won’t run into trouble for inviting us to share your box?” he asked. In New Orleans he and Rose would not have been permitted into the section of the theater where whites sat.

Consuela paused, a cup of coffee in either hand. “Of course there will be raised eyebrows,” she replied. “And if you did not have money it would be a much different matter. But you do have money . . . and you will lose it at cards to them, lose a great deal, and men always talk over cards. And then again, much of how you are treated in this country depends on how others see you being treated. There are so many mestizos here who have paid to have the records altered to say they are white, and so many bastards who have paid to have themselves declared legitimate, that no one points fingers so much as they used to. No one really knows anymore who has what blood in their veins.”

“I think in my case,” said January with a wry expression, “there won’t be much trouble hazarding a guess.”

“No—but then, you are not trying to establish yourself in society. No one has to worry about you appearing at their house or proposing marriage to their daughter. All you want is for them to talk for an evening. And I assure you, they will talk.”

She rustled away to her room again; January heard Rose’s voice as the door was opened for her, and their mingling laughter and that of their maids as it was closed. He settled back with his own coffee, a little regretful that he could not be part of the group in the bedroom. He knew many men who were impatient with—and contemptuous of—the froufrou of women as they got themselves ready for the opera or the theater or a ball. Having been married for ten years to a dressmaker, he had been initiated into the intricate codes that women use, the color and cut of their clothing, the fashion of arranging hair and flowers and jewelry, the secret language that says all manner of things:
I’m beautiful
or
I’m spoken for
or
I’m more important than any woman in this room
or
I’ll lie with you if you give me money.
He found the bustle and flutter of women both fascinating and erotic.

Down in the courtyard, Señora Garcia the coffee-seller’s wife chatted and laughed with the men who came in for supper, single men mostly or groups of male friends, muleteers with their faded shirts and dark-tanned faces, water-sellers who carefully set down their huge clay jugs,
cargadors
and lard-vendors and men who sold lottery-tickets. By the way they greeted the big woman, January understood that Señora Garcia was more than the source of a medio’s worth of tortillas and beans every night: she was wife and sister and chum to men who were essentially alone. Most of them had only a single room in some barrio hut, without even a bed, much less a place to cook; many had to share such a room, and the muleteers didn’t even have that.

Their voices ascended from the torch-sprinkled gloom of the court, friendly and at peace, mulling over the chaff of the day with people they saw in this place every night or nearly every night.
Good luck on the journey to Puebla tomorrow. Did your cousin have her child yet? Those Army men, they nearly got me today. I had to run around an alley and hide in a load of hay. . . .
Laughter. Someone playing a guitar.

“Tortillas de cuaaajaadaaaa . . .”
wailed a vendor from the street.

Lamplight splashed through an open door, and January heard Zama’s loud, free laugh, and two women came along the
corredor. . . .

January had to look twice at the taller, resplendent in a gown of black satin, masked with a small domino such as adventurous ladies sometimes donned for assignations, flashing with diamonds, voluptuously curved and nothing like . . .

“Rose?”

Behind the mask the familiar gray-green eyes sparkled, the carmine lips curled in a smile. “Alas, no, M’sieu. Rose will not be with us this evening. Since the company tonight will be so raffish—and men will talk more freely in front of a single woman whom they feel will not disapprove of anything they say—Consuela thought that perhaps Rose’s place should be taken by me, her evil twin sister, Elena.”

“Oh, did she indeed?” January got to his feet and stared in startled bemusement at the woman before him, seeing where Consuela’s theatrical experience had altered figure and face and hair and bosom into something that would never have been associated with the gawky and reserved New Orleans schoolmistress. He supposed he should act like a normal husband and thunder words to the effect that no wife of his was going out in public like that—evil twin sister be damned—but he was far too entranced. Besides, it was an excellent idea.

The perfume she wore was unfamiliar, vanilla and musk, and it went to his head like liquor with visions of crushing her to him, biting the silky dust-colored flesh of her shoulders. . . . “And are you—like your virtuous sister—also so short-sighted that you cannot see your hand in front of your face?”

“Alas, I am, M’sieu. But my mother
—our
mother, my virtuous sister’s and mine—did not believe any man would ever wed a girl who wore spectacles. So up until I was fourteen I became very good at identifying people by shape, and by voice, and by the way they moved, and never knew there was another way to be.”

She tucked a dark, oiled curl back into a coiffure much augmented with false locks and braided into the exotic loops and twists considered fashionable and topped off with an enormously tall tortoiseshell comb. Sprays of white jasmine made the darkened chevelure seem darker still. “My mother was a plaçée, remember, M’sieu, and attempted to raise me—and my virtuous sister, who loves you very much—to follow in her path. I think I will not have too much trouble tonight.”

“Not while you’re at the theater you won’t,” said January somberly. “But the moment we are alone,
Mademoiselle,
I warn you: you may tell your virtuous and loving sister that her virtuous and loving husband proposes to take revenge upon her for her trickery by giving her evil twin sister the punishment for which she is so shamelessly begging.”

“Oh, M’sieu.” “Elena” lowered her mascarae’d eyelashes breathlessly and unfurled her fan. “I can hardly wait.”

They were joined for the carriage ride to the Teatro Principal—which had had several other names depending on the political regime—by a sleek young gentleman whom Consuela introduced as Don Tulio de Avila y Merced, “Formerly the son of the Marquis de Merced,” Consuela assured them, who was now making his money as a genteel gambler, his family silver-mines having been utterly ruined as a result of the years of war. “He knows everyone in town, and is related to everyone. . . .”

“Isn’t that so, Aunt Trudis?” smiled the young man at Doña Gertrudis, who shared the carriage with them in affronted silence; she turned her face coldly aside. When they reached the Teatro, he and January immediately got up a game of vingt-et-un at a small table at the back of Consuela’s box; it was all they needed to draw every one of her visitors into acceptance of January’s presence, and into conversation over cards.

As in nearly every theater January had attended—or played at—in Italy and France, virtually no one paid attention to anything that transpired on-stage. A pity, since
Fidelio
was one of January’s favorite operas, but it couldn’t be helped. The theater itself, formerly splendid, was filthily shabby, and the corridor outside the cloakrooms had to be smelled to be believed; from what he could see of the production, the costumes seemed to have been chosen at random from what was on hand, Leonore bedecked in trunk-hose and doublet vaguely reminiscent of the Renaissance, while the evil Pizarro pranced about in Roman armor. But every box was filled, and long before the first strains of the overture sounded, Consuela was playing hostess to a steady stream of brightly-uniformed officers, to men in short jackets of embroidered velvet who’d made fortunes selling useless horses or cardboard boots to the Army of Operations, and suspiciously wealthy government officials and their even-wealthier hangers-on.

The company reminded January forcibly of the riffraff nobility who’d clambered to prominence in Paris in Napoleon’s bloody footprints thirty years previously, with their talk of contracts and favors and special privileges to do things like broker food-purchases to the soldiers (with a little cut for themselves, naturally) or lend out at interest the money allotted them for gunpowder, ammunition, and food.

An experienced hostess, Consuela had brought her own candles, candleholders, brandy, and her butler, Sebastian, and Sancho to serve it. As predicted, Don Tulio’s presence at the table with January acted as an introduction to men who would ordinarily not have sat down with a black man. The gold and silver mingled with the red and black of the pips, all glittering in the candle-light on the polished marquetry tabletop, drew the men’s attention like honey. They saw January being treated as a man of wealth by a man they knew, with whom they had played cards before.

And as Consuela had predicted, they talked.

They talked of parties they had been to, and horse-racing, cock-fighting, dogs—none of those brilliantly-uniformed officers ever seemed to have actually drilled troops in his life. Young Major Cuchero, one of Santa Anna’s aides who’d been at Mictlán three days before, got a big laugh by describing how he’d gotten his prize fighting-cock drunk before a match so it would be cut to pieces by one of Santa Anna’s, thus endearing the Major to the President’s heart and getting him a promotion to console him. Another officer named Lajazar mentioned seeing the President with a new little game-pullet. . . .

“You mean poor Fernando’s bride?”

“She’s had a narrow escape. You remember the time he bought an evening with La Perfecta, and then beat her so she couldn’t work for weeks?”

“Sounds like Fernando,” remarked January, lighting a cigar that would have gotten him jailed in New Orleans. “I knew him in Berlin—or met him, anyway, I’m sure he wouldn’t remember the likes of me. Was he going to be married, then? That doesn’t sound like him.”

“If you knew anything much about him,” laughed Cuchero good-naturedly, “you’d know how
much
that doesn’t sound like him.”

“Personally,” said Lajazar’s mistress, a flashily-dressed girl with a jeweled comb a foot tall in her Indian-black hair, “it’s not Fernando I’d have worried about if I were Natividad, but Werther.” She drew a long breath of smoke, holding her cigarette with a tiny gold clip to avoid staining her fingers with the nicotine. “I wouldn’t have put it past him to put Spanish fly in her rouge.”

“What became of Werther, anyway?” asked January. “Does anyone know?”

“Walking the streets, I should imagine,” said a portly man who’d recently bought the right to tax every
pulqueria
in the city. “There’s the woman who’d know . . .” And he nodded at Consuela, who had been playing ombre with Don Rafael and, January noticed, had quietly made enough to run her household on for several months.

Consuela shrugged. “My brother paid him, and his chef, and his grooms out of his own money, not Don Prospero’s,” she said, something January had already ascertained from Don Fernando’s ledger. “He did not like the servants of this country any more than he liked the food, he said.”