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id="heading_id_64">Tyrant at Play</
>
I
Generalito Banderas slotted the metal quoit in the frog’s mouth. Spectacular in rings and necklaces, sitting between the grindstone and the coffeepot, Doña Lupita umpired the game from beneath a striped parasol, encircled by her brightly colored flounces. “Frog!”
II
“Croak! Croak!”
Smarmy and barmy, Nachito looked on from the friends’ enclosure—another of Tyrant’s terrible tasteless jokes. His green grimace churned up the poisonous scorn that still circulated through the crevices of his mind until he launched into an outburst of hypochondriac sarcasm: “Master Veguillas, you’re my partner in the next round. Try to live up to your reputation. Don’t fuck up. You’re shaking like a reed in the breeze! How pale you are, my fine fellow! You need a glass of lemonade. Master V, if you don’t calm down, you’ll ruin your record. And don’t curl your lip at me, Master V! Lemon cordial is just what the doctor orders for souls in crisis. Have a word with that old camp follower and drink a toast with our guests. Bid a cheerful farewell and we’ll all pray for you when you kick the bucket!”
Nacho groaned and staggered and turned white, his ugly visage swollen by tears. “That street nymph was the death of me!”
“Don’t speak in riddles!”
“Generalito, the Holy Souls’ little japes were what did me in! I appeal against my martyrdom! Hope! Give me hope! The rosebush of hope flowers in the most barren of sand dunes! Man cannot live without hope. A bird is full of hope and sings though the branch beneath him breaks, because he knows he has wings. The light of dawn brings hope. My Generalito, all beings wear the green mantle of the Deity! Her voice sings within every soul! The light from her eyes reaches into the darkest dungeon! Consoles the man on death row! Holds out a promise of a reprieve from the Supreme Court!”
Kid Santos extracted the schoolmasterish handkerchief from his frock coat and wiped his skull. “Chop-chop! Such eloquence, Master V! Dr. Sánchez Ocaña must have taught you well in Santa Mónica! Chop-chop!”
Tyrant’s entourage chuckled at his barbed dig.
III
Bowing and scraping, Doña Lupita dispensed a rainbow of refreshment on a sunbeam. Kid Santos alternately sipped lemonade and peered at the old hag: clusters of coral, an insinuating groveling Oriental nuts-and-honey smile. “Chop-chop! Doña Lupita, I’m inclined to believe you’ve got Queen Cleopatra’s nose. A dustup over a few smashed glasses and you’ve succeeded in wreaking havoc in the republic. You’re more scheming than the honorable diplomatic corps. How many of your glasses did Colonel de la Gándara break? Doña Lupita, for less than a boliviano you drove him into the arms of the revolution. The nose of the pharaoh queen couldn’t have done better. Doña Lupita, the debt owed to justice that you’ve involved me in has unraveled a fatal skein of events. It’s the inspiration for Colonel de la Gándara’s rebellion. It has landed Doña Rosa Pintado’s lad inside Santa Mónica. Baby Roach, la Taracena, is appealing against the closing of her flophouse, and we now have a Note from His Catholic Majesty’s minister to answer. Our bonds with the mother country may be broken. And here you are, my dear, entirely unmoved by all these catastrophes! To cap it off, four broken glasses from your side table, a paperweight, a miserable bagatelle—thanks to this I may have to deprive myself of the pleasure of Master V’s froggy songs.”
“Croak! Croak!”
Trying to work his way back into Tyrant’s good graces, Nacho V responded to his scorn by honking and hopping like a frog.
With sour Quakerish sarcasm Tyrant berated him: “Don’t play the buffoon, Master V. These good friends who are about to sentence you won’t be swayed by your batrachian tomfoolery. They are cultured minds who, to say the very least, have seen the parliaments of old Europe in full swing.”
“Juvenal and Jonathan Swift!”
Distinguished whitey stroked his ginger whiskers, his rotund belly and his cheeks grown flabby from uttering flattering words. The old camp follower crossed herself. “I swear by the Holy Virgin, it’s Old Nick that done it!”
“And slotted in one!”
“If the world was that messed up the holy saints would go straight to Hell!”
“A cracking declaration, Doña Lupita. But isn’t your soul even a little bit troubled by having unleashed so much turmoil, so many bolts from the blue?”
“Boss, don’t strike fear into my soul!”
“Doña Lupita, you shudder, don’t you, at the thought of your responsibilities before eternity?”
“I am praying for all I’m worth!”
IV
Tyrant Banderas looked out at the trail. “Chop-chop! Will whoever has the sharpest eyes please let me know whose troops those are that are heading this way. Isn’t the resplendent rider at the head of the pack the renowned Don Roque Cepeda?”
Escorted by four Indian riders, Don Roque stopped at the other side of the fence by the gate. In the light of the setting sun, the horseman’s bronzed temples, golden sombrero, and silvery, sweating colt gave him the aura of a Romanesque saint. Tyrant Banderas adopted Quakerishly measured tones as he embarked on an absurd welcome: “So pleased to see you in this neck of the woods! It was Santos Banderas’s duty to consult with you with regard to a few pressing questions, of course, but my dear Don Roque, why have you put yourself to so much trouble? It was I, yours truly, who was under the obligation to visit you in your abode in order to offer my apologies and those of my entire government. Which is why I dispatched one of my aides to request an audience with you, and here you are, and it is so very kind of you to take this trouble when I, Santos Banderas, should really have been the one to have taken the initiative.”
Don Roque dismounted and Tyrant hugged him warmly. They had a long, confidential exchange on the friars’ lookout bench, opposite the becalmed equatorial sea where the sun blazed a path as it flamed down through the western sky. “Chop-chop! So pleased to see you.”
“Mr. President, sir, I didn’t want to join the campaign without first speaking to you. It is a question of courtesy and of my attachment to the republic. Mr. President, sir, your aide, my former colleague, Lauro Méndez, secretary for Foreign Affairs, came to visit me. Our conversation spurred me to take action, and I expect you, Mr. President, sir, are aware of the outcome.”
“The honorable secretary acted incorrectly if he failed to inform you that he was acting under my instructions. Transparency is the name of my game. Don Roque, my friend, our independence as a nation is in danger, under siege from ambitious foreign powers. The honorable diplomatic corps—a thieves’ den of colonial interests—is shooting us in the back with the slanderous Note it is cabling everywhere. Malign agencies are being deployed by these foreign diplomats to defame the Republic of Santa Fe. The Yankees and Europeans are equally greedy for our rubber, mines, and oil. True patriots must look ahead to a time of deepest anguish. We may even face military intervention, and that’s why I wanted this audience with you. I want to propose a truce. Chop-chop!”
“A truce?”
“A truce until the international issues are resolved. You can set the conditions. I will begin by offering an amnesty to all political prisoners who didn’t take up arms.”
Don Roque muttered, “Amnesty is the correct policy and one that I fully support. Many, however, were unjustly accused of conspiracy.”
“Everybody will be amnestied.”
“And will the election really be free? What about the secret police? Will they refrain from harassing the opposition parties and the voters?”
“The election will be free and the law will be observed. What more can I say? I want peace for the country. I am offering you peace. Santos Banderas is not the vulgar power-hungry monster that dissidents like to caricature. I only want what is best for the republic. The happiest day in my life will be the day I, like Cincinnatus, can return to my farm in the outback. In a word, you and your friends will recover your freedom and the full exercise of your civil rights. As a loyal patriot, however, you must strive to return the revolution to the paths of legality. But if the people cast their ballots for you, I will be the first to respect their sovereign will. I admire your humanitarian ideals, Don Roque. I feel bitter that I am unable to share your optimism. Therein lies my tragedy as a ruler! You, a Creole from one of the best Creole families, dismiss Creole interests. While I, a plain Indian, lack any faith in the virtues and abilities of my race. You stand before me like a man who has seen the light; your touching faith in the destiny of indigenous peoples reminds me of Bartolomé de las Casas. You wish to scatter the shades that three hundred years of colonial rule has cast around the Indian soul. How admirable! There is nothing Santos Banderas would like more. Don Roque, after present circumstances have been successfully dealt with, defeat me, annihilate me, demonstrate the slumbering potential of my race through a victory that I will be the first to celebrate. Your victory will be a permanent victory for the Indians. From that day forth, they will hold sway over the destiny of our nation. Don Roque, go propagandize as freely as you like, work your miracle within the law, and, believe me, I will be the first to celebrate. Don Roque, I thank you for listening. Now will you please state any objections, as frankly as you wish. I don’t want you to give me your word now and then find you are unable to keep to it. Consult the leading lights among your allies. Offer them an olive branch from Santos Banderas.”
Don Roque gave him a look of such serenely ingenuous sincerity that it was impossible to miss his qualms. “A truce!”
“A truce. A hallowed union. Don Roque, let us defend the independence of the fatherland.”
Tyrant Banderas waved his arms pathetically. He could hear his cronies in the twilit garden mocking and teasing Master Veguillas.
V
Don Roque cantered off into the distance waving his handkerchief. From behind the gate, Kid Santos waved his top hat in return. Horse and rider were soon hidden in fields of tall maize, though the arm and handkerchief continued to wave, “Chop-chop! A pigeon!”
The mummy went on joking and grimacing and drooling poison. He looked at the old camp follower who, seated between the coffeepot and the grindstone and encircled by her flounces, was telling her rosary beads, horrified at the prospect of a night of holy terror. She stood up at a sign from Tyrant. “Generalito, the world’s tangled ways may lead the holiest of men to the cauldrons of Hell.”
“My dear, you really should amputate that Cleopatra’s nose of yours.”
“If that would really sort out this world, I’d go snub-nosed tonight.”
“A skirmish over four glasses on your table opened a door for Lucifer to step in. Consider our now disgraced melodious friend, charged with treachery! He’ll probably be sentenced to death!”
“And was the smashing of my glassware really to blame?”
“Future historians will have to figure that one out. Master Veguillas, bid goodbye to this old camp follower. Forgive her. Show your generosity of spirit. Put your cloak on, and astonish these jokers with your magnanimity.”
“Juvenal and Jonathan Swift!”
The mummy grinned sourly in whitey’s direction. “Illustrious Don Celestino, it’s up to you to get me some mileage out of this. Neither Juvenal nor Jonathan Swift: Santos Banderas. The wonder of these southern shores. Chop-chop!”