The Collected Stories of Deborah Eisenberg (47 page)

“I would never dream of calling myself a journalist
at this point
,” I said. “But it’s an easy target, isn’t it? It’s easy to be snobbish about this, just because it doesn’t seem ‘important’ in some superficial way. And who knows, it’s not impossible, that in a few years I could be—well, I could hardly hope for anything like the foreign desk, I suppose. But I won’t be
anywhere
if I’m not reasonably—and, besides, it’s only fair to Zwicker, who, quite frankly, took
pity
on me, no matter what you might think of his half-witted—”

“No, you owe him a lot, Dennis,” Sarah said.

“No, I owe Zwicker a lot. He’s giving me a rather decent salary, he’s given me a job that some people might consider cushy, even prestigious, so the fact is that—”

“No, it’s terrific, Dennis. Look. He sent you to San Francisco, he’s going to send you to London. And we would never in a million years be here if it weren’t for—”

Etc., etc., as I remember. But somewhere around that ridiculous point I slightly crumpled up a bit. Heat, and actually I don’t think either of us is exactly used to the altitude yet, either. And then Sarah was really very sweet for a long, long time. And afterward she seemed quite pleased. But the strange thing about sex (tho. maybe it’s different for a woman) is that if you start off feeling a little bad sometimes, sometimes when it’s over, you can really feel awful.

Thursday

Town at fever pitch today and yesterday. Air sharp and bright—mountains entirely revealed, like a crown tossed around us. Crowds larger, aboil. More people arriving by foot or bus to camp across from the square with their little bundles of possessions, blankets. Flowers furiously blooming.
Alfombras
spread out for the boot. Chilling roll of drums, sepulchral brass, sun flashing in the air like swords. This morning Christ in scarlet robes, rocking down the streets in an ocean of incense; swarms of purple-gowned Jerusalemites. Sweat pouring from the faces of men bearing the
andas.
McGee bobbing in and out of the crowd, snapping pictures.

“Do you see those men in shackles, walking next to the cross?” Dot said. “Those are the thieves. Do you see? The amazing thing is, they use real criminals. Just petty thieves, probably, or poor drunks. But this afternoon, when the procession goes by the square, the whole town will sing an anthem about forgiveness, and one of the thieves will be untied and released into the crowd, just the way they did it in Jerusalem.”

“That’s beautiful,” Sarah said.

“Yes…” Dot said, frowning. “Oh, it’s a lovely holiday. The painted eggs, the mystery of spring, the little candies hidden on the lawn for the children. And here! My goodness. The flowers, the processions…”

Sarah inscrutable; peering out at the procession, working away absently at a ragged nail with her teeth.

“It’s just that they take it all so
literally
,” Dot said. She sighed. “Like this business with the thief. I mean, this is something that happened almost two thousand years ago—do you see what I mean? It’s a
holiday.
But they are so literal-
minded.
You’ll see. On Saturday, Sunday—nothing. No processions, no
alfombras
…They’re not interested in the Resurrection at all, really. Today and tomorrow are the big days. The Crucifixion is the part of it they relate to.” She nodded admonishingly at Sarah. “
Martyrdom.
You see, they pick so at the story—the Crucifixion, the poor, the rich. That sort of thing. The imperial authorities. The soldiers.”

The crowd was jostling around us, Dot serenely accustomed to it—burbling on, unfazed. “We used to go out to the little villages. Santa Catarina and so on. But no more. They’ve taken the wonder right out of it, haven’t they? Of course, they
are
very poor—no one would deny them that. Still, it’s just tempting fate, isn’t it? To glorify it the way they do?

“When Cliff was still with the Department of Agriculture we had a place out by the lake, and we would go to the celebrations there. The people are mostly seasonal labor on the plantations, so, as you might imagine, it’s been a fertile area for guerrilla activity; and now, of course, the people bring politics into simply
everything.

“And the priests can be just as bad. There was one, just about ten years ago, in the village across the lake from us. An American, if you please. Who should have known better. It’s a terrible story, really. It makes me
sick
to tell it—I’m sorry the whole thing came up. You see, it was what he allowed them to do, some of these people in his parish. He let them dress up the figures of the saints—the figures of Christ, even—as Indians.” Dot nodded as she looked from Sarah to me. “Well, not just
Indians
—actually as guerrillas, do you see? With the little masks and so forth? And they did it right in that great big church of theirs, which is practically the only real building in that town. Father Tobin thought he could get away with it, I suppose, because he was American. But he might have stopped to think how he was endangering his parishioners. What sort of priest is that, I ask you? His parishioners were disappearing by the score.”

The pavement swiped briefly up at me, and I reached out to steady myself against Dot’s arm. “No hat?” Dot said. She gave me a penetrating look, and steered us through the crowd to a shady spot. “Reckless creature. Anyhow, it made us just as mad as anything. But of course I’m not Catholic myself, so to my mind the whole
thing
is a bit—there, look! Executioners!”

Group filed by dressed in black, black conical hats, but faces eerily covered by flaps of white fabric with holes cut out for the eyes. Saw a Pontius Pilate—pointed him out to Sarah: “Do you see the sign he’s carrying? It says, ‘I wash my hands of the blood of this innocent man.’”

“This is just the sort of thing I mean,” Dot said.

“What’s what sort of thing?” Sarah said. But Dot was gazing out with dis pleasure.

Felt unaccountably nervous—started chattering at Sarah: “Well, it’s complex, isn’t it? Because the thing is that the local people said to Pilate, ‘Look. You’ve got to get rid of this fellow Jesus. He’s got this whole mob of crazy hillbillies behind him, and they’re saying his claims supersede the claims of Rome.’ And
Pilate
said, ‘Well, I don’t happen to think Jesus is guilty of anything, but I can’t stop you from doing whatever you want to him, can I? Because I can’t intervene in local affairs.’ So who knows who was using who? After all, you could say that it was very much in Pilate’s interest, as well as the interest of the local authorities, that Jesus be killed, because, after all, Jesus was certainly fomenting unrest in Pilate’s province.”

Sarah turned to me. “So you mean the guy with the sign—”

“Well,
no
,” I said. “I’m just trying to point out various ironies of the situation…And it’s interesting to remember that that’s where those phrases come from. You know: ‘I wash my hands of it.’ ‘My hands are clean.’ And so on. They come from the Bible.”

“As do so many,” Dot said vaguely. “Oh, there he is—” She waved as McGee appeared from the crowd, coughing from incense. “I thought we were going to have to send out the Romans! Did you get some good ones?”

“Indeed I did,” McGee said. “Ought to have some beauties.”

“Clifford left the lens cap on last year,” Dot explained. “By the way,” Sarah said to her. “What happened to the priest?”

“Excuse me?” Dot said.

“The priest in the village near the lake,” Sarah said.

“Well,” Dot said. “Do you mean—I mean, no one knows, exactly, do they? That is, they came in a van, as usual. But the windows were smoked glass, of course, and they weren’t wearing uniforms. The van slid up behind him, they say. Just the way those vans do. I’m afraid they got him just outside the church.” Dot shook her head. “You can still see the bullet holes. And it took quite some time to scrub down the wall and the street, we were told…Well. But no one recognized them. No one knows who they were.”

Friday

Last night, after all the wooden shutters were closed and the town was quiet, Sarah and I went out. Above the encircling mountains the sky was bright with stars; down on the ground the night was pouring back and forth, glistening over the cobblestones and churches. Sarah and I walked around for a bit, then sat down in the square next to a pale-trunked palm.

Was terribly aware how quickly it would be over, sitting with her there in the fragrant night. Thought of her ten years hence: a dinner party, high over some sparkling city, Sarah in a wonderful little dress, more beautiful, even, than now. Gazing out the window, next to someone—a colleague, an admirer…

Could feel the future forming in embryo—the sort of longing that sleeps watchfully in one’s body through time and separation. Could imagine so clearly—Sarah at this future party, confiding to this admirer: Her first involvement with a mature man, her introduction to so much that was new…No, she and I won’t have meant
nothing
to each other…

The shine of her hair like a little light around her as she absorbed the night, breathing it into her memory for that moment in the future. Raised her hand and stroked it, spreading out the fingers; kissed her palm. Asked what she was thinking.

“I’m thinking, Thank God we’re rid of the McGees for once.” She laughed.

I looked down at her hand.

“What’s the matter, Dennis?” she said.

Said I was sorry about the McGees. Sorrow, in fact, had fallen over me like a gentle net. “They really are idiots.”

“Well, they’re not
idiots
,” Sarah said.

I looked at her. “That was
your
word,” I said.

“Yes? Well, I was wrong, then,” Sarah said. “Wasn’t I.”

Across from us the people in the shelter of the porticoed municipal building slept, cradling the town in the mesh of their breathing.

“‘Tainted,’”
Sarah said. “I mean,
Jesus.
”

Noticed that the people in front of the municipal building were stirring, rousing themselves in a dreamlike way, rolling back the blanket of sleep, sitting up—first one or two, then several more, shaking others gently by the shoulder until, soon, they were all awake, getting to their feet, smoothing out their rumpled clothing.

In moments they were in the square with us, talking in low, eager voices. Some were speaking Spanish, some were speaking languages I’d never heard. Were paying no attention to us at all; leaned over the basin of the fountain to splash themselves or their babies with water, or to reach up with tin cups for its less polluted streams.

But then—as unexpectedly as they’d appeared in the square, they filed out again. Absolutely weird. Sarah and I paused a moment, then followed. Soon we were in a part of town we’d never seen before. Lanterns swaying from stone arches, heavy shutters swinging open as we passed by—behind them women in black staring out at us from candlelit rooms or patios.

Crowd led us to a churchyard dense with people, tiny stands selling food, wooden toys, shiny whirling things. No tourists, no wealthy Ladinos, none of the Europeans who keep houses here in town. All the people ragged and thin—surroundings incredibly festive, but their faces, as they milled about, were serious. Abstracted.

The sky was scattered with stars, balloons, plumes of incense. Above a long flight of wide, shallow steps a scrolled church (such delicate adornments! carved fruit, carved vines) floated like a dove, pale pink in the moonlight. Candles alight everywhere, flickering, converging into a flickering river at the huge, open church doors.

Tantalizing aromas: food frying in vats or simmering in huge kettles or roasting on sticks over fires. Sarah pulling me from one culinary spectacle to another in an agony of cupidity. “Look, Dennis—can you believe it? There’s real food in this country!”

“Don’t even think of it,” I said.

“Please,” she said. People were eating patiently, without greed, as though they were preparing themselves for something. Men were so thin it was hard not to watch them as they ate—so frail. Several had what looked like a band of hair shaved from the top of their heads—worn away from hauling loads by a strap, I suppose. Sarah hovered longingly by a woman frying huge disks of tortilla, then using them to scoop up a bright, chunky sauce. “I can’t stand it!”

“Out of the question,” I said. At our feet a flock of tiny children chewed solemnly at the dirty treat. “Do you imagine I’d let you do something like that to yourself? But listen. The minute we get home I’m taking you to the Red Fox Inn for a decent meal.”

“Do you promise?” Sarah said as the crowd carried us with them into the floating church. Was just making me swear it, but then she gasped and took my arm.

We were at the front of the crowd—the entire floor between us and the altar was a picture, a picture carpet, made of flower petals, like the
alfombras
, but vast: Jesus, all of flowers, white-robed on a mountaintop with waves of power radiating from his raised hands. And beneath him, pouring out toward us, becoming us, a flower multitude—the poor, the mourning, the meek, the hungry, the pure in heart, the persecuted…