CHAPTER 27

“YOU HAVE READ THIS, Your Excellency?” Diego produced a recent edition of L’Ère nouvelle, a gazette published in Mexico City in French. This issue contained news of the exploits of Baldemar Peralta, along with certain veiled but unflattering references to the Church. The article did not specifically mention Ángela Peralta or her son, but anyone conversant with events in Mexico City could draw the connection. He held the journal out to Labastida.

The prelate merely glanced at it before tossing the pages into the air. “Yes, yes,” he said. “I have read the article you mean.”

The leaves pulled loose from one another, fluttering away in the wake of the archbishop’s carriage, an English-built landau with a remarkably advanced suspension system. Diego felt as if he were careening through the streets of the capital on the back of an immense cat. His stomach roiled at each elongated twist or turn.

It was a Sunday evening. As was customary at this time of the week, many of the capital’s most distinguished residents were out on the promenade. They paraded back and forth in their carriages along the Paseo de Bucareli. “Ah, look there.” The archbishop’s ruddy, moon-shaped face lit up. He raised his right arm to salute a carriage advancing from the opposite direction. “Why yes. It’s the Marqués de Vivanco. Look, he’s waving at us. How very fine. You know, his carriage is not worth half the value of this one, yet you can see for yourself how proudly he behaves. Do you know his wife, the marquesa?” He scrunched up his face, as if swallowing something rancid.

The marquis and his wife continued to wave gaily as the two carriages floated past one another. Like most of the other vehicles tottering back and forth, these two were open to the air. More than a few of the conveyances bore an elaborate and freshly painted coat of arms on their polished side panels. The newly minted peers of the realm flaunted their status to all, but mainly to each other.

The spectacle made Diego feel ill, but the archbishop was delighted. He waved to them all. The women were in full toilette, their elaborate coiffures bedecked with jewels and secured by mantillas of imported lace to protect the careful arrangement of their hair.

“I take it,” said the archbishop, “that you wish to revisit the subject of the opera singer and her son.”

Diego was about to reply, but Labastida held up a pink and fleshy hand.

“You will forgive me if I begin.”

“Very well.”

In his arch diction, Labastida declared that he had other matters to attend to that were far more urgent than the fate of any individual woman, with or without a son.

“I speak of the reform laws in particular,” he said.

Before Diego could intervene, the prelate resumed his presentation. He said that any lasting agreement between the two sides—the palace and the Church—must await the arrival of Monseñor Meglia, the papal nuncio. In the meantime, he believed it was possible to anticipate the general outlines of an accord. All Church properties stolen by the previous liberal government must be returned. As for the cemeteries, they too must be restored to Church control, along with the registry of births and deaths and the performance of marriage services. All religious holidays were again to be officially observed. The schools were to be operated by the Church once again. Roman Catholicism must once more be declared the official and exclusive religion of the country. All heretical cults were to be banned.

“I see,” said Diego. “But I am not here to discuss relations between Church and state.”

“Nor am I,” said Labastida. “That will be undertaken by Monseñor Meglia. All in good time.”

“In the meantime, I would like to inquire as to the well-being of Ángela Peralta. And her son.”

“I thought as much,” said the archbishop. “Well, since you ask, I can confidently say that both are in excellent health physically and spiritually. The woman in particular is a shimmering model of piety. If only there were more like her.”

“Where are they?”

“They are quite secure.”

“But where?”

The archbishop said that, unfortunately, he was not at liberty to say.

“I see,” said Diego. “You are not concerned that many Mexicans oppose you?”

“Rabble. Extremists. I discount them.”

Labastida turned away, and a gust of wind nearly dislodged the purple skullcap pinned in place at the back of his head. He reached up to keep it from flying off, and immediately a smile lit his large, round face.

“Look there,” he said. He raised his other hand in a magisterial wave. “It is Sánchez Navarro. How delightful to see him.” In a low voice he added, “Poor man. I hear he has offered immense sums in bribes in order to earn a position for his wife at court, so far to no avail.” He grimaced. “The woman’s a peasant, you know—thoroughly ill-bred. Her father was in trade, I believe. Between you and me, I regard their marriage as an abomination. I have it on excellent authority that she was with child at the time of the nuptials. Scandalous.”

He waved again and made a sign of the cross as the carriage swayed past, stirring up thin coils of dust along the rutted breadth of the Paseo de Bucareli. Slowly, dusk settled over Mexico City, and the stream of carretelas and conveyances gradually thinned until the only creatures remaining on the boulevard were the barefoot vendor women, the lepers, the beggars, and the pariah dogs snuffling through the gutters and the dark.

The next morning, Maximiliano announced that he meant to absent himself from Mexico City for a number of weeks in order to become better acquainted with other parts of his realm. He proposed a tour of the Bajío, the lofty, fertile valley that unfolded to the north of the capital. More or less peaceful, the region was said to contain a great deal of historical interest. The emperor tightened the sash of his dressing gown and plucked a biscuit from the silver plate on his desk. He said he expected to be away for the better part of a month.

“But the papal nuncio,” said Diego. “He will certainly arrive during that time.”

Maximiliano frowned, as if he had not thought of this difficulty till now. He bit the biscuit in half. “Hmm. That does pose a dilemma.”

Diego decided it was time to announce his own plans. He, too, would be absent for no little while.

“Absent? Where?”

“Washington, District of Columbia.”

“Whatever for?”

Diego had prepared an answer. To ascertain the fortunes of war in that immense territory, fortunes that would bear directly upon events in Mexico. If the southern states were to prove victorious—or at least if they were able to avoid outright defeat—then it was probable that Maximiliano and the Confederacy could make an alliance that would serve both sides. If, however, the north were to win, then it was difficult to think that Washington would look kindly upon a French military presence in Mexico.

“Your Majesty is undoubtedly aware of the Monroe Doctrine of 1823—”

“Declaring the Americas off limits to interference by European powers. Of course.” Maximiliano brushed a smattering of sugar from his lips. “You know, I am inclined to agree with you. I will provide you with a letter of introduction, of course. And God speed.”

“Thank you. And the papal nuncio?”

The emperor frowned. He reached for a document, seemingly at random, and briefly perused its contents. His face lit up. “I know.” He glanced at Diego. “Why not leave the papal nuncio to Charlotte?”

“To the empress?”

“Yes.” The emperor sat back and smiled. “Why, it’s perfect. They won’t possibly be expecting that. Inconceivable.”

And Diego had to agree. Inconceivable was exactly what it was.

That night, Diego sprawled in his bed, unable to sleep, wondering what species of creature he had become. In a certain light, he was in the same predicament as General Márquez. Both of them were trapped in a contradiction that offered no way out. The Tiger of Tacubaya had a grudge against Baldemar that could be avenged only through murder, but he also owed Baldemar his life, which ought to have made murder unthinkable. Meanwhile, Diego was bound to both Baldemar and the emperor. Baldemar had saved his life, but the emperor had saved Baldemar’s. As a result, he was under an obligation to them both. So far, he’d managed to sustain this contradiction, but how much longer could it hold? Now he was to depart for Washington, supposedly as an emissary of the emperor but with no intention of acting on Maximiliano’s behalf. One day, he was a monarchist, the next day, republican. It was as if the man named Diego Serrano did not really exist at all or as if he existed in multiple versions, like a chameleon—a chameleon that, in this case, had kicked off his bedcovers and kept rolling from side to side in his bed, trying to find a position that was halfway amenable to sleep. But, on this night at least, no such position seemed to exist, and so he kept tossing in his bed, worrying and fretting and doubting himself.

Whoever “himself” was.