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IV · Conquistador

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  Section four of Conquistador. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are
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  in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox
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  dot org. Read by Claire. Conquistador by Catherine Fullerton Gerald four. Don
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  Pablo Gutierrez swung out of the saddle and drew a long, hot sigh.
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  He had been far afield all day, among shifting herds and wild young vaccaros.
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  He had ridden himself to weariness, and his clothes seemed stuck to him.
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  But before he went to bathe and change, he stopped at Don Fernando's
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  door. How goes it? Vicente? The old man sighed, he has
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  had Don Miguel with him for an hour. I think that means the end.
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  Don Pablo's brow clouded. Don Fernando wasted ordinarily little of his chaplain's time.
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  Shall I dine as usual or stay with him? Vicente? I think
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  you would prefer you to sit in his place first, then come to him.
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  Pablo Gutieras nodded and walked to his great chamber in the tower, which
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  he had always kept the end. As he washed and dressed, his grave
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  dark face grew graver no one who loved Don Fernando could wish him longer life,
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  but the burden lay heavy on his adopted son. His role These last
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  two years had not been hard for Wharton Cameron had loved his uncle at sight,
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  and week by week had come to love him more. He had let
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  himself go Spanish, sinking the other strain out of sight, easier too,
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  than he had expected. For Saint Ulalia had been a magical sound in his
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  ears ever since. He could remember all he had known in youth of piety,
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  all he had known of romance had flowed into his mind from the tales
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  of the Hacienda, the saga of the Gutieras, the legend of the first
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  conquisadore woman, talk from his mother and old Neez. But held how close,
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  how deep in his heart, It had all begun when he was a
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  child in stature and the sight of the Hacienda, and Don Fernando had reiterated
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  an unchallengeable claim something that first night had stepped out of the Mexican shadows to
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  lay a hand on him, and never had touched. Had pressure seemed so
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  familiar. Don Fernando had encountered, probably to his own surprise, no difficulty
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  with his air Wharton, Cameron stripped himself of his name and his citizenship as
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  easily as he abandoned his khaki. All that, in truth, had been
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  done before. At the moment when he turned suddenly to meet Juan's machete and
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  had shot Juan dead. Even as he himself reeled under the impact of that
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  hate driven knife, he saw only the finish of the peculiar gesture. For
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  Wan had meant to plant the machete in his back between the shoulder blades against
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  which he had been worn by Don Fernando, But then shoot rang in his
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  ears, and he shot before the knife sank in. In that terrific moment,
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  he knew all that Don Fernando, waiting in Enguish, had revealed to
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  Old Vicente, understood the ordeal which had been prepared, saw himself submitting he
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  had killed Juan, and straightway returned home. Never for one instant had he
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  regretted killing Juan. He had no shutters over that corpse. But by killing
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  him he had accepted Santa Yulailia forever. The Cameron in him did not whimper.
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  It withdrew, as if his Cameron blood literally turned back from the heart
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  to hoard itself in a private vein until its time should come. He was
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  all gutieras he stirred to the old man beside him, as though he had
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  been, in truth his son, not a voice in all the hacienda,
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  since Wan's was stilled so much as whispered him Americano, though women's lips whispered
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  him a monk. He thought and dreamed these days in Spanish, And if
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  you had asked Wharton Cameron if he was a gentleman, Pablo Gutierres would have
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  told you that he was a caballero. Don Pablo donned white clothes for the
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  evening meal, like any young Mexican dandy. Don Fernando, who never wore
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  European garb, encouraged his air to be more modern. All day Pablo wore
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  the clothes of the vocero, of softest leather and most richly embroidered. But
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  it night he did as any young Gutierres might have done, aping the ways
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  of the foreigner. The clothes were made by a tailor in Chihuahua, and
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  Pablo saw nothing odd in their cut, nor did he feel it strange now
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  to have a knife in his belt at all times. The wide sash at
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  present concealed all but the top of the hilt. Pablo Gutierrez took his uncle's
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  place and ate and drank with a brooding eye on his dependence. Not a
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  man, woman, or child there who did not know that he had killed
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  Juan, But it is to be feared that they took it as an added
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  recommendation of Don Pablo. Juan's mother had died long since no one else,
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  it was safe to say, had ever loved one. Had Juan got in
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  his knife work three seconds earlier, Don Fernando might have learned to love him
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  at Heaven's bidding. But an ordeal is final, and the Haciendado had never
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  Mentionedjuan since Wharton Cameron made his first report of the incident. Heaven had sent
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  Don Fernando a son as authentic to his mind as the clever sulky brat with
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  whom the little wild cat Benita had long ago endowed him. Pablo Gutiera stood
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  on firm ground. To night, however, was to show Don Pablo another
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  ordeal, more complex even than that earlier one, when two had been sent
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  into the wilderness together in order that only one might return for use and want
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  are strange and potent things. And Pablo Gutiera's heir to Santa Ulalalia, had
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  come to love his adopted father profoundly. Therefore he was that night to no
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  grief and loneliness, and the pain of giving what he did not wish to
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  give, because he wished to give it. He shouldered his way gently into
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  the room where his uncle lay, and sat down beside the bed. Don
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  Miguel had disappeared. He thought he had seen a cassock slipping past him in
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  the dusky patio. There was a prick of light in the chapel window.
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  My father, said Pablo, and could say no more. Here before his
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  eyes was very great weakness, and probably some pain. My son came the
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  reply, then silence, while Don Fernando gathered for for further speech. I
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  have confessed and received the body of Christ. The young man nodded. One
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  or two things remained to be said. If I had had five years more,
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  nothing would be left to say. Everything would have been settled. But
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  I have been stricken aforetime. And before I give Santa Eulalia into your keeping,
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  as by tomorrow I shall have done, I wish to know a little
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  more explicitly about Santa Ulilia's future. By law, the hacienda is yours in
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  a few hours. But to a caballero there are rights above the law.
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  There is no right you could claim that I should not instantly grant. There
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  is no room for distrust or even caution between us. No, Don Fernando
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  closed his eyes. Presently, he spoke again, quickly and shortly, as
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  if breath came hard. Your religion and your wife. Don Pablo gently released
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  the other's hand, which he had been holding in his own. He folded
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  his arms. Let us take the wife first, he said quietly. Some
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  day you will lie as I am lying to what manner of man? Then?
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  Will you be speaking as I am speaking now to you? You mean
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  who will be my son's mother? Yes, for you have no mistress as
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  far as I know, And in any case I would not wish you a
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  life like mine. My wife was childless. It seemed that Juan would have
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  to have Santa Eulalia until God and Hernando Luca sent you to me. I
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  should have had a boy all Spanish, Pablo, I do not regret what
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  I have had, But you know how men are never so sure of another
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  as of themselves. I do not care to marry. Perhaps Heaven will send
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  me a son from Afar, as it sent you one. But the dying
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  man was fretfully logical, No, because you are kinless. You have no
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  sister to bequeath you a son. True, Pablo Gutieras brooded for a time
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  over his own deep affairs. He should have known that this would come,
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  he should have thought, but he had left it to the easy future.
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  His mistake, My uncle, What shall I say to marry a Spanish woman?
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  I must leave the hacienda and twang a guitar beneath the barred window.
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  In Chihuahua or Mexico, cattle or cattle on either side the rio grande.
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  A caballero is a caballero still, but women. Then I begin to see
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  that I am not at all Gutieras, and it troubles me, I,
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  who, for both our sakes, wish to be all Gutieras. Save about
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  women. I believe before God I am. Had you ever loved before you
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  came to me? I called it love? And she she may be married
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  or dead. Don Fernando, we were boy and girl American fashioned. Do
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  not try to wrench me back. But a man cannot die childless and leave
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  a Santa u Lalie forlorn better one of these girls about the place only for
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  the sake of the hacienda. Do not marry her. Legitimize your son rather
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  before you die. And yet, Pablo, that is not the best way.
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  Had I lived, I would have taken my old bones to Mecca and
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  found you a senorita. One you would have had to love the cameroon as
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  well as the gutieras the air of the gutieras bent forward and resting his elbows
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  on his knees, sank his chin in his hands. I am a man
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  like other men, Don Fernando. It is no harder for me than for
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  another to make love to a pretty girl. Or I may yet go to
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  Mexico and be a town blood, offering Santa you Lalilia to a bride.
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  But there is that in me which would prefer to take a wife in another
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  fashion. It is very hard, even though time presses, I cannot make
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  a promise in the dark. If I die childless, Don Fernando, to
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  whom shall Santa you l Lilia go? They are distant kin in Spain,
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  you will find the papers. They have already been acquainted with the fact of
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  your adoption. But oh, eho, mio, get me a son,
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  for I have loved you greatly. Pablo. No, he turned his head
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  on the pillow. Make no promise, for I have known love. Pablo
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  Gutierra, who saw Don Fernando growing weaker each moment, realize the relentlessness of
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  the hour. No time, we say, and reluctantly wait for another occasion.
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  But no time when there is no morrow is another matter. He had
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  ere this felt the cleaning pressure of Santa u Lalalia's arms upon him, had
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  laid his head happily upon her breast. Now he filled her nails in his
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  flesh, sharp as the point of Juan's machete. He flung his head back
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  and spoke in an agony from a constricted throat, harshly, though low,
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  I will get a son unless Heaven rewards my efforts only with daughters. But
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  do not press me as to the mother of my children. I can make
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  no undertaking. I have never been able to love any of these girls who
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  are brave at Fiesta's and make eyes at the young master. Forgive me,
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  Pablo came the whisper, it is Santa u Lalia stronger than either of us.
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  Who would rule Santa u Lalia must be conquistador. I know, I
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  know Pablo his own mastery regained, tried to soothe him, and mother church
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  went on. Don Fernando, his breath catching and failing. I should have
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  asked you all this before, but I thought there was time and it would
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  come gently of itself. I am no priest ridden superstitious fellow. I think
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  no less of you for not practicing your mother's faith assiduously. Yet, unless
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  religion is maintained, the Peans run after politics and go distraught with windy modern
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  notions. Without religion, the hacienda would not hold three months. So I
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  have held up Don Miguel's hands, and that to keep the hacienda safe,
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  the Hassandado must do. I have no religion in the dogmatic sense. Don
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  Pablo replied quietly. I was baptized into the church, I made my first
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  communion, and a few others. Since I came to manhood, I have
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  had nothing to do with it, but you will return. It is only
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  a few gestures, the gestures every Gutierres has always made. While I was
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  here, it past that no one ever saw you take sacrament. For all
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  they knew you confessed and communicated in private. But they must see their master
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  at Easter, at God's table, see him with their own eyes, and
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  follow in his train. Look, Pablo, every caballero believes in God.
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  Every caballero believes in God. Pablo repeated quietly. Well, then the rest
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  is simple. Don Miguel, who has never split hairs with me, will
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  not split hairs with you. Agutiera's is always a son of the church.
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  When you believe in God, everything else follows. I can have no hesitation
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  in asking you for Santa You Lalia's sake, to forsake the lax ways of
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  youth, not leave my poor indians. Masterless Pablo Gutieras was silent, Have
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  you ever had absolution for killing? Wand came the voice from the shadows?
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  Never a strange wind from the north rang in Don Pablo's ears. But he
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  clapped a hand over the thin far voice of the ancient convenanter. That was
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  not well. Child. The young man bit his lip, No, it
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  was not well. He laid his hand on his uncle's forehead. All shall
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  be done as you command. I do not command I, but tell you,
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  as father to son, I understand. He understood only that he greatly
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  loved Don Fernando, and that Santa Yu Lalayla was a coat he must wear.
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  All else blurred in the immediacy of that sense. Then prompt as a
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  man's shadow, Don Miguel entered the room. An Indian boy dressed as an
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  acolyte accompanied him, none too soon, for an hour later Don Fernando lay
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  unconscious. End of Section four.