The Children of Sanchez (41 page)

Well, on the way back we were caught in a terrific storm. Did we get wet! The women, the babies, everyone … wet to the bone. We were chilled and hungry and tired when we got back to Mexico City and everyone went right to bed.

The next day I had more strength and vigor and was less backward about going out. I didn’t feel ashamed any more about talking to people about the jail. My friends had a morbid curiosity about it and
asked me a lot of questions. Whether I felt like it or not, I gave them the details, with the intention of influencing them to stop fighting and stealing.

I went back to life with the gang … there was always something going on. During Holy Week, on Holy Saturday, we had fun throwing water and raising Cain. Two or three gangs would get together, so it was fifty to a hundred fellows doing it, instead of just a few. It is a tradition here, but they go too far on that day. Instead of throwing water, a lot of people throw stones at the buses and autos and shop windows. Some of us get mad and it leads to fights, right?

Once, on Holy Saturday, there was a big battle over on the Street of the Miners. Over a hundred people got into a brawl and a jeep with three policemen came along and tried to calm them down. The cops wanted to arrest one of them, but the people here are pretty tough. They don’t scare easily. Well, boom! down came the first bucket of water from a roof and landed on the jeep, see? Well, that was the beginning of the end for the cops because after that the people started throwing oranges, tomatoes and limes. One threw a stone and broke the windshield. The cops chased him and the people turned over the jeep. They blocked the cops and the boy got away.

Four more jeeps came as reinforcements. The cops were sore, damn them, but everybody put on an innocent look, like they were saints with halos. No one had done a thing, so of course there were no arrests.

Another holiday I like to celebrate is the twenty-fourth of June, the day of St. John the Baptist. They open the baths and swimming pools at two in the morning and lots of people go swimming, no matter how cold it is. It’s a matter of tradition. We begin to swim at that hour and it goes on all day long. At the Casa Grande baths, they give us corn gruel,
tamales
, and they throw pears and carnations into the pool. There’s a lot of commotion and the girls look mighty tempting. It’s so crowded that even if you don’t want to, when you swim you’re likely to touch some lady’s breast. Even in the big pools, the same goings-on take place. There are women that go on that day especially to get themselves fingered. They say they like the sport, though the rest of the year they never go swimming. But on June 24, there they are!

Man alive, what I’ve always liked best, what I’ve enjoyed more than anything else, are sports. The happiest moments of my life were when I was swimming, or bicycling or hunting, because, how shall I put it?
I feel that I’m somebody, that I amount to something. I’ve always had the feeling that nobody had any use for me, that nobody paid attention to me. And of course that’s the way it should be, for who am I for anybody to pay attention to?

I’ve had a lot of opportunities to go hunting with my uncle in Veracruz. We’ve hunted jaguar, wild boar, deer. I was once chased by a boar and if it hadn’t been for some big boulders, this little black boy would now be saying his prayers with St. Peter … if I were lucky enough to be up in heaven.

Another time, I was invited by a friend to hunt alligators in Putla. To get to this place you have to walk through the mountains for three days and no one speaks a word of Spanish there, only
Popoloca
. The people there go around covered with nothing but a loin cloth and nobody thinks bad of it. I don’t expect to be believed just because I say so, but it was like that. Those people don’t know what the word fear means. They catch alligators all the time because of the damage they do to the cattle. I didn’t stay long but I was really happy hunting alligators in Putla.

Each time I went off on an adventure, I made sure to get back in time to sign in at the Station House. I signed in regularly for four months … I was still signing in when I was thrown into jail again.

My second time in jail was terrible, and it was all a case of mistaken identity. I was picked up in September, 1951, at about midday, when I was at Chapultepec Castle shooting at birds with a slingshot. I was killing
tórtolas
, for I enjoyed eating them. This time, by bad luck, two guards saw me. I could not say that I wasn’t doing anything wrong, as it is punishable to shoot at the birds. I went up to them and said, “Don’t get me into trouble, because if it is on account of this slingshot, I’ll throw it away.” I had about two
pesos
on me, and I offered them this money, but they didn’t accept it.

One of them said, “Listen, he looks like the one we have been looking for.” I didn’t give this any importance, but since I was in the army, I know the tricks they use to throw people off. They said to me, “Come with us.” One of them had his gun in my back and the other his bayonet in his hand. This made me very mad … especially when they pull a gun on me … maybe it is from fear … I wanted to throw myself on them in rage, but I said, “I’ll go, but because I want to.”

If I had known what was waiting for me, what it was going to cost
me, I wouldn’t have gone. But I thought it would be easy. When we arrived before the superintendent, he said to me, “So, my friend, we see each other once more. Don’t you remember the time you ran away from me?”

I said, “You’ve got me mixed up with someone else.”

“Don’t you remember?” he said. “And you sure are like a deer. Tie him up.” A soldier brought a rope and they tied my wrists.

“Take him to the tower.” The tower was in the Castle itself, and they tied me to a railing of a spiral staircase. They tied the rope around my body and then passed it under my knees, so that I couldn’t walk. I was very mad, but the guards just laughed—they were real brave with a lone, tied-up man.

They accused me of having been the author of many robberies; of stealing hoses, wire, lamps, and many other things. They wanted to make me say I was guilty, and asked me a thousand times for the things that were missing … how I had gotten them out, where I had sold them, endless questions which always got the same negative answer. The same soldier who tied me, put the rope around my neck and pulled it hard, supporting himself against the railing. All I could manage to say was, “You son of a …” and I lost consciousness but did not fall. My head just dropped over to one side.

At nine o’clock at night I was still tied up like any ordinary criminal and swearing a blue streak at everybody. One of the guards said to me, “Say, pal, they are really giving you the business. I don’t think they put special guards even on the worst criminals.” I asked him to loosen the rope around my hands a little. He said, “Well, I will but I shouldn’t do it.” I think that the guard himself realized his error.

He asked me if I was hungry, and sent out for some
tortas
and coffee. I thought, “At least they are going to untie me while I eat my food.” But no, the soldier fed me, that’s how I ate my
tortas
.

The patrol arrived a little later. They untied me and took me to the office. I said, “
Ay, chirrión
, it’s a good thing you guys got here. They’ve made me take a lot of punishment and I don’t even know why.”

“That’s a lie,” said the guard.

“How can it be a lie if I just got through untying him and his hands and wrists are all marked and numb?” the patrolman answered.

The police patrol took me in the paddy wagon to Station No. 6, where they drew up the charges against me, without asking me any questions, understand? They just banged away at the typewriter and I have no idea what they wrote, and when they finished they wanted to
make me sign the document. According to them it was supposed to be my statement, but actually I hadn’t opened my mouth except to give them personal data, my name, where I was born, my father’s name and stuff like that.

I asked them to let me read what I was going to sign and they wouldn’t. And so I didn’t want to sign, because I know if you’re going to sign something you have to read it first. They said: “Sign, you son-of-a-whore, or we’re going to give you a warming over.”

“Well, do anything you want with me, but first let me see what I’m going to sign.” That was the end of that, and they put me in the
separo
.

The
separo
is what they call a room, about four meters by six, where the toilet is. Of course you can’t even call it a toilet, it’s just a dung-heap. A prisoner came up to me. He was one of those fellows they appoint as head man because he’s the most cocky with his fists or a knife, understand? the toughest fellow. He came up to me and said, “What’s the matter with you? What are you sore about?” I tell him, “Nothing, they claim I robbed some things.” He says, “Look, you, don’t be a boob; here you talk and talk straight; here you’re up against straight ‘
brosa
.’ ”

He was talking
caló
to me, see?—a special dialect of the underworld. I had learned
caló a
long time back, and so as not to appear queer I started answering him in
caló
because that was the right thing to do. If I had answered him in ordinary Spanish it would have turned out worse for me. Well, he said, “Here you talk ‘
derecho
,’ you’re among pure ‘
brosa
’ and nobody ‘
se chivea
.’ ” This is a home for the innocent because none of us have done anything wrong; however, we’re all here.

“Look, man, I really didn’t steal a thing.”

“O.K., that’s the end of that. And now how about shelling out for a candle?”

So I tell him, “Sure thing, man.”

You see, there’s a custom that when you’re locked up you have to give a
peso
or few
centavos
, according to your means, to buy a candle for the Virgin. Because they always have a little altar made by the prisoners themselves, some of them hardened criminals and others serving their first rap. In the Penitentiary, there is a special cell converted into a little church, with an altar and candles burning day and night. A priest comes once a week to say Mass. One of the prisoners is given the job of taking care of the Virgin’s altar.

Then this guy, the head man, says, “Out with your wallet!”

“All I have is twenty
centavos
.”

“Let’s see,” he said to his lieutenant. “Put him on the scale,” which means they searched me from head to foot. I hated this and protested but there was nothing I could do. They just took the twenty
centavos
and didn’t bother me any more.

The food in Station No. 6 is terrible. They give you coffee with what they call milk, but it’s just colored water and there’s nobody to dish it out. Each one serves himself from the big milk jug. The first one to dip in gets clean coffee, while the last fellow gets it after everybody’s hand has been in it, full of dirt and everything, see? because some of them don’t have a cup to dip with, so they stick in a pop bottle with their hands.

I had to do some fighting in there for the simple reason that, although we all slept on the floor, one on top of the other, still one fellow or another would have a spot he preferred, see? his own special place. And the Lord help anyone who lies down there without asking his permission, because they always chose the best places, the ones that aren’t close to the toilet. Somebody will have to sleep sitting right on the toilet bowl.

I didn’t think I could sleep a wink, because the smell is foul, something you can’t stand. Well, you can stand it but God only knows how you suffer. And the man is lucky who has the luxury of having a bed made of newspapers, or the superluxury of a sheet of cardboard to He on. So it happened I went and sat down next to one of those special places that belonged to one of the toughest guys there and he gave me a kick and said, “Hey, you, ‘
voto
,’ scram.”

So I tell him, “What makes you think I’m going to scram?”

“Oh no? Well you scram or we’re going to cook up a ‘
sopa de chuladas
.’ ” I stood up and we began to fight with our fists. They all began to holler and make a racket, and the trusty, the guy that asked me for money for a candle, says, “Quiet, ‘
brosa
’ otherwise you’re going to get a ‘
berga
.’ ” He meant that if we didn’t calm down, he was going to step in and somebody would get his face smashed. Well, then someone said, “Let them fight it out in a fair fight. All right, so everybody shut up,” and they calmed down, and we went on socking each other.

To make a long story short, I can’t say I won or lost, because the trusty stopped the fight, saying, “Look, this boy showed he’s a straight shooter and has guts, so if anyone tries to take him on, they’re going
to take me on too.” Well, nobody bothered me any more, right? So I said to myself, “Fine, that’s over, I’ve had a rough time, but nobody’s going to bother me any more.”

But how wrong I was! They bothered me again, but this time it wasn’t the prisoners, it was the prison officials. I spent six days incommunicado in Police Station No. 6, here in Mexico City, in the Federal District; and, just the words Station No. 6 mean torture, understand, it’s brutal punishment that very few can take. They took it out on me for six days, three beatings a day, see? a beating for breakfast, another one for dinner and another for supper, and for dessert, another beating in the middle of the night.

The reason they did this was to make me tell where I sold the things they claimed I’d stolen from Chapultepec Castle. It was not true, understand? But the police here use these methods to make anybody confess he’s guilty. Not somebody who
is
guilty, but anybody they want to make confess. Because they really give you a tough beating, see? They hit me very hard in the stomach and that’s why I believe I’ve had a delicate stomach ever since.

The first time it happened, there was a banging on the cell door: “Roberto Sánchez Vélez, step up front!” It was my tough luck to be thrown in with the top criminals in the city, and they all knew what happens when you get called out this way. You get warmed over, that’s the expression in
caló
, and even the prison officials use it. It means you’re going to get beat up. So nobody says anything; they just look at you and wait to hear you screaming.