The Rebellion of the Hanged Read online

  Funeral establishments are open day and night, because the climate demands that a corpse be interred within twelve hours, and sometimes sooner. So Cándido easily found one open. The cheapest coffin was a rectangular wooden case badly painted black. The artisan who had made it received a laughable wage, and he satisfied himself with a few brush-strokes, leaving the natural color of the wood showing through in many places and the bottom not even daubed.

  “This coffin costs four pesos,” said the employee.

  “Good. I’ll take it.”

  “But I’m afraid it’s very small for your wife,” the salesman continued, seeing that Cándido had enough money to buy one costing more.

  One of the Indians measured the body and the wooden case with his arms and declared: “The coffin is big enough, Cándido.”

  The businessman felt that he was going to lose the opportunity of making a more advantageous sale. Slapping Cándido’s back affectionately, he said: “Listen, fellow, you can’t bury the mother of your children in a coffin as ugly as that. What would the holy Virgin think when she saw her in it? She is quite capable of not letting her enter heaven, and I don’t believe that you’re ready to leave your wife hanging around the gates of paradise in the company of sinners, bandits, and assassins. This box you want to buy is intended for corpses of unknown people found on the roads. Look at this other coffin, how pretty it is. You’re not obliged to buy it, but at least look at it. Don’t you believe that your wife would rest better in it? And I assure you that when the most holy Virgin sees this lovely box, she’ll go up to your wife and take her by the hand to lead her into paradise herself. That’s sure, because she’ll see immediately that the deceased is not a lost sinner but a good Christian who was baptized. I suppose that your wife was baptized?”

  “Yes, my chief, when she was a child.”

  “Then you can’t bury her in that common coffin. The other box is well made, beautifully painted black outside and white inside; it’s lined with lace paper, fine Chinese paper.”

  “How much does it cost?” asked Cándido.

  “Twenty pesos, fellow.”

  The Indian looked at him in consternation. Whereupon the salesman immediately abandoned his commercial tone and said to him in a voice full of compassion: “It’s hard, my friend, to lose one’s wife. I know that better than anybody, because I’ve been widowed twice, and as I’m being considerate of you, I’ll let you have the coffin for only seventeen pesos. At that price I make nothing. I swear by the most holy Virgin that it cost me sixteen pesos and fifty centavos.”

  They began to bargain, and when at last the Indian could lay the body of Marcelina in the bottom of the coffin, it was because he had paid out thirteen pesos. He still had to buy blessed candles and the aguardiente needed if his friends were not to leave with dry throats.

  2

  From the day on which his wife had fallen sick until a week after her death, Cándido lived in a kind of daze. His thought had stopped, his sensibility had become blunted.

  To buy the pretty coffin, the wax candles, and the five liters of aguardiente so as to be able to refresh his friends and those who came to offer condolences, Cándido had depleted his sash without thinking one single moment of the way he had obtained the money, not to mention the consequences that the possession and dwindling of such a sum would have for him. Even if he had not had a single centavo in his pocket, he would have found the means to bury his wife decently. At the worst, his friends and other Indians would have helped him to roll Marcelina up in two sleeping-mats and to fell a tree and hack from it some boards to make a box. Cándido had begun to spend without keeping account from the precise moment at which the doctor had insisted on the payment of the ten pesos, with the threat of retaining Marcelina’s corpse if he did not pay up. Vain threat, because the doctor would not have been able to keep the body more than ten hours, at the end of which he would have been obliged to let the town take care of the burial. But Cándido had not hesitated to reduce his store of pesos. The idea of leaving Marcelina’s body in the doctor’s house, of returning to his home and appearing before his two little boys without having brought their mother, dead or alive, horrified him. Afterwards, as if seized by giddiness, he had continued his reckless spending.

  Although scrupulously honest, at this time he would have spent even funds entrusted to him by someone else, his grief being enough to prevent him from telling good from bad, just from unjust. During the three weeks after the death of his wife it never occurred to him for a moment that his expenditures would decide his destiny. The money was of no use in the village, for the land produced enough to prevent death from hunger. But it was necessary to buy three suckling pigs. These little animals are as necessary for the subsistence of the Indian peasants as cows are for Dakota or Minnesota farmers. Unfortunately, Cándido, in trying to dig a stone from the earth, had broken his machete so close to the handle that what remained of the blade was useless. He made his calculations: a new machete would cost him three pesos. As for the little pigs, he could find them at four reales each, provided he took the trouble to look for the smallest ones in the market at Jovel. Altogether he needed four and a half pesos.

  On the market day he made up his mind and got together the sum required. Like all the Indians of his tribe, he had the habit of wrapping his money in a rag and burying it in the earth floor of his hut. When they need to take out a few centavos, they disinter the cache, extract the coins, and bury the cloth again, but in a different spot, usually under the hearth. Cándido dug in the floor, took out his bundle—and could not restrain a cry of surprise at finding before his eyes twenty-six pesos.

  In the preceding few days he had been emerging little by little from his torpor. Work in the field, urgent because of the approaching rains, and looking after his two children had brought him back to reality. As the clarity of his thoughts had vanished when he took his wife to Jovel, all that had happened afterward, including his negotiations with the doctor and the druggist, seemed to him like a nightmare, and he remembered only the eighteen pesos he had saved earlier. His stupefaction did not last more than a minute. Suddenly he remembered the reason for his wealth, the amounts he had disbursed, and that he not only had lost his wife, but had pawned his freedom forever. He had turned himself into property, into the slave of Don Gabriel, who would send him to the lumber camps, uprooting him from the soil in which Marcelina rested.

  He was struck with the idea of running away with his two little boys, but two considerations held him back: one of his fellow Indians was his guarantor, and if Cándido broke his promise, his friend would have to take his place. He could not do such a thing. Furthermore, if he fled, he would also be separating himself from the land that was flesh of his flesh. There was nothing to do, then, but wait for the day when the soldiers would come looking for him to force him to go to the mahogany camps. The faint hope struck him that perhaps Don Gabriel might have forgotten him. That was possible, seeing that Don Gabriel had not sent him the two hundred pesos, to which the doctor had no right whatever. And in that case Don Gabriel himself had not fulfilled his part of the agreement.

  On the following day Cándido, without even waiting for the sun to rise, set out on the trail with his two children. He carried a great bundle of corn on his back. The older boy was doubled under the weight of a bale of fodder, and the little one carried a sack of wool. Cándido intended to sell his products in town and, with what he could get for them, buy salt, sugar, and a piece of sheeting. As a precaution he was taking five pesos with him.

  He completed his deals quickly, obtaining as usual a ridiculously small sum. Then he bought the little pigs and put them in a sack, which he slung over his shoulder. The little animals squealed and struck him with their feet, which pleased Cándido, who knew that such vigorous behavior was a sign of good health and that they would be easy to raise. Then he turned his steps toward the hardware shop called El Globo to buy a new machete. He left his sack outside the door and told the children to wa
tch it. He went into the store with as much timidity and embarrassment as if, instead of being a customer with money who was gong to bring profit to the merchant, he was a shameful beggar, to be received with kicks.

  He had scarcely entered the shop when he heard someone calling him. “Ah, see here, fellow, I was just looking for you.”

  Cándido raised his eyes and saw Don Gabriel, the labor contractor, the trickster.

  Like all the white townspeople, Don Gabriel spent the day now in one shop, now in another, chatting with the tradesmen and looking for familiar faces. Between one stop and the next he went to the saloon to quench his thirst and commune with his friends. It was clear that his political opinions were of considerable importance. When he had refreshed himself the way he liked, he returned to his occupations and thus passed the day. Then he had a good excuse for returning to the saloon, and on this visit he was not satisfied with a modest little drink, but needed at least a dozen. Then he went out for a stroll through the plaza until time for the evening meal. As supper could not be enjoyed without a reasonable quantity of liquid, he had to make another call at the bar. The work of real gentlemen, indispensable for the progress of civilization, is intermittent. They know how to alternate serious matters with pleasant pastimes, while they have work done by those who are not gentlemen—and, indeed, they could not live at all without this arrangement.

  It had been during one of those very brief periods of activity, generally lasting only a few minutes, that he had been able to trick Cándido, tying him up in the knots of a contract whose terms he was recalling during another of those periods. The business of strolling around the shops and letting the hours pass uselessly did not turn out as unproductive as might have been supposed, seeing that if Don Gabriel had not been (apparently) idling away his time in the hardware shop, he would not have met Cándido and would not have been able to take up this important matter with him.

  “Listen, fellow, don’t forget that the group leaves for the lumber camps Monday and that you’ll be going along.”

  “But, my patron, I didn’t use the money—my wife died before the doctor arrived.”

  “The two hundred pesos are at your disposal. You can ask the druggist for them whenever you like.”

  To be sure, the money was not in the drugstore or anywhere else, but Don Gabriel thought that if Cándido claimed the money, of which he now had no need, there would always be time to deposit it or to cover up the whole matter by fine words.

  But Cándido resisted, saying weakly: “No, my chief. Because I haven’t taken the money there is no contract for the lumber camps.”

  “You took fifty pesos—yes or no?”

  “Yes, but I can return them.”

  For a moment Don Gabriel was disconcerted. He was afraid he might lose his man. Yet he became calm almost immediately at the thought that it was impossible for the Indian to have those fifty pesos, seeing that he had paid the doctor and bought the coffin. Also, Don Gabriel was sure that Cándido could never have saved that much.

  “Do you think I’m going to pay attention to your stupidities? Even if you were to give me back the fifty pesos, you would not be free from your obligations. You’ve signed the contract before witnesses and you also received an advance payment before witnesses. Even if you’d taken only three pesos, it would be the same thing. You can’t duck your obligation. Do you want me to take you to the police station for them to tell you which of us is right?”

  Cándido did not reply, and a fear struck Don Gabriel.

  “Oh, no—so that’s it! You intend to try to clear out… .”

  Immediately Cándido understood what was happening. He rushed to the door and doubtless would have succeeded in getting away had it not been for his children, whom he could not abandon in the town. He shouted to them to follow him, but by then Don Gabriel had seized each one of them by an arm, and in a stentorian voice was shouting: “Police! Police! This way!”

  The Municipal Palace was just on the other side of the plaza. The fourth door led to the police station, where a few policemen were always waiting for orders. In response to Don Gabriel’s shouts, three of them ran up with clubs in hand.

  “What’s happening, Don Gabriel? Have these boys stolen something from you?”

  “Take this pair of lousy brats into the station and lock them up. I’m going to speak to the chief right now.”

  “Right you are, Don Gabriel, at your orders,” the policemen replied servilely, grabbing the children, who were screaming with fear: “Papa! Papa!”

  In spite of the load hindering him, Cándido had been able to cover a good distance. He was almost across the plaza, thinking that his children would follow him, for he knew they were quick-witted and accustomed to chasing rabbits and iguanas. But on hearing them scream, he turned and saw them being taken to the Municipal Palace. There was nothing to do but go back. When he neared the station door the policemen let go of the children, who immediately rushed toward him and held onto his knees, begging for protection. A man seated at a table was looking profoundly bored, staring out toward the plaza, doubtless because he had nothing better to do.

  “Stay here, fellow! Wait until Don Gabriel comes. He seems to have something against you.”

  Along the walls of the portico there were two large wooden benches on which offenders sat resignedly to wait until they were called. In the big building were housed not only the municipal services but also the town council, the police, the civil judge, the criminal judge, the federal and local authorities, and the tax offices—and there was still room in the patio for the jail cells.

  Policemen awaiting orders were sitting on one of the benches at the entrance. Cándido remained standing for a short while in the hall. Nobody seemed to pay the least attention to him. Then he went into the patio and sat down in a corner. He could not think of escaping with the police covering the entrance. A quarter of an hour had passed when Don Gabriel, in no hurry, strolled in and asked the drowsy clerk: “Is Don Alejo in?”

  Don Alejo was the chief of police.

  “No, not just now, Don Gabriel. He went out to have an aperitif with the deputy. But he won’t be long.”

  “Good. Then I’ll come back. Until then!”

  “At your service,” said the clerk, bowing.

  Don Gabriel went out of the room and slowly lighted a cigarette. He glanced around the patio and deigned to notice the presence of Cándido huddled in his corner.

  “Get this into your head, fellow: neither you nor anybody else is going to slip through my hands. When I’ve caught a fish, I hold onto it tight.”

  He held out his cigarette case to the policemen. Each of them took a cigarette and thanked him courteously.

  Before going out Don Gabriel added: “Keep a sharp eye on that Indian, boys.”

  “Don’t worry, Don Gabriel, he won’t get away.”

  Cándido pulled toward him the sack in which he had the pigs, and patted the little creatures, which squealed and tried to get out. “Quiet, quiet!” he said. To the children he added: “They’re full of life. They’ll grow to be big pigs.”

  “Yes, papa,” replied the children, “they’re beautiful little pigs.”

  Cándido took five centavos from his sash.

  “Here,” said he, holding out the money to the older boy, “take this and go to the corner of the market. Buy a measure of corn for them to eat. They’re hungry.”

  Angelito obeyed. He returned a few minutes later with his shirttail full of corn. Although Indians’ money has exactly the same value as that of the townspeople, they are never given a piece of paper or a bag in which to wrap their purchases. What end would such generosity serve? They can just as well keep their things in their hats, in their shirttails, or in the folds of their sarapes. The Indians could not expect any attention from shopkeepers even when without sales to the Indian peasants commerce would be ruined and the tradesmen would have to shut their doors: the Indians who came into Jovel each week or fortnight to do their buying and selling
numbered twenty or twenty-five thousand—that is, twice as many as the population of the town, for which they provided a livelihood.

  The suckling pigs ate the corn voraciously, to the great satisfaction of Cándido and his boys. Meanwhile the commandant had returned. He paid no attention to the Indians huddled in the corner of the patio. The patio was full of them constantly. They came to settle some matter with the authorities or simply to rest or to wait for friends whom they had agreed to join there for the trip to their homes.

  A few minutes later Don Gabriel reappeared.

  “How are you, Don Alejo?”

  “As usual, Don Gabriel.”

  “Don Alejo, out there in the patio is an Indian whom I’d like you to lock up for me until Monday. I’ll pay you for his keep.”

  “On what grounds, Don Gabriel? You know that you must make a formal charge. Without that I can’t lock up anybody, because it all has to be entered in the record… .”

  “Breach of contract, Don Alejo, or rather, attempted breach of contract.”

  “Good. How did it happen?” The commandant gave an order: “One man—here!”

  One of the policemen sprang toward the door, saluted in military fashion, and said: “At your orders, chief.”

  “Bring in that fellow of Don Gabriel’s.”

  The policeman returned to the door and in the same imperious tone used by the commandant shouted: “Hi! You! Come this way, and hurry if you don’t want me to come get you!”

  Cándido stood up, put the pigs in the sack, closed it, put it over his shoulder, and followed the policeman.

  “What have you got in that sack, fellow?” asked the commandant.

  “Some little pigs that I want to fatten up, my chief.”

  “Right. You can keep them with you in the patio.”

  The commandant turned toward the two heavily laden boys, who were trying to hide behind their father’s knees.