Saving the World (38 page)

“Where will you be?” the mate spoke almost instantly. If he waited, he might find himself ambushed by shyness and incapacity.

I don't know why it was that suddenly I knew what I would do. I was infected with America. There was an open, unfinished feel to these territories that invigorated me. The air seemed to have more air, the sky more sky. Every place we visited, there was talk of new ideas, the rights of human beings. The poor, the powerless, the enslaved were rising up and demanding their rights—in the back rooms and kitchen of our house in Puerto Rico, in the parlor chatter after the dances in Caracas, in Havana, and now in this port city. My boys stood a better chance here, peninsulares, with every advantage. Why, Spain was full of destitute souls seeking a new life on these very shores. “We will accompany Don Francisco to Mexico City. The viceroy will take charge of the boys there, as I understand it.”

“And you, where will you be?” the mate asked again, his voice surer now.

“Wherever you hear the boys might be.” In that general vicinity, he'd be likely to find me.

For days following, I thought, surely, I had imagined his proposal. After all, I had a penchant for constructing scenes to console myself and my young charges. Could it be possible that I was being courted, a none-too-young woman of thirty-six, scarred by smallpox, and thinned by the exigencies of our journey? So many years wasted in thinking I did not deserve such love! I remembered the prayer for orphans we had read daily at
chapel in La Coruña:
We are saved not because we are worthy; we are saved because we are loved.

We parted company before the ship had left port, for our director was in a great hurry to reach Mexico City. The lieutenant—the name now stuck—accompanied us several days out of town before returning to honor his contract. Our last moments, we were surrounded by boys, by mule drivers, by Don Francisco and my colleagues. But for once, the modest man lifted his gaze and I held him with my eyes.
We will soon be together.

N
EW
S
PAIN
—
TRIUMPHANT ENTRY INTO
M
EXICO
C
ITY
? Do not expect a grand encounter between the fair-skinned Conquistador Cortés and the goldclad Aztec emperor Montezuma.

A viceroy in his nightshirt shakes his fists in a temper; his wife descends the stairs in a robe of rich satin, her hair undressed, her face a struggle between politeness and suspicion, as nineteen little youngsters wail their claims upon her husband. A woman quiets them. The palace guards look worriedly upon the scene.

We entered the city at night, having waited in the outskirts all day for the viceroy to receive us. When it seemed our welcome would not come, Don Francisco led us down the wide avenues. There were forty of us, all told, including ten soldiers from the regiment who had carried the vaccine from Veracruz.

I could not help but admire the many grand houses we passed, their windows lit up, displaying that enviable warmth of a home seen from the outside at night. This was as large a city as La Coruña, grander, richer. At the palace gate, we were stopped by guards, who were advised to inform the viceroy that His Royal Highness's expedition had arrived.

It was ten at night. The guards looked unsure.

But our director was not to be deterred. We were to be announced immediately. Somehow—perhaps it was the six soldiers accompanying us that gave our group an official air—our director convinced the head guard not only to summon the viceroy but to let us wait for his audience
inside
the palace.

Viceroy Iturrigaray descended from upstairs having been informed that the king's sons were at his door and would not leave. “How there, sir?” he confronted our director. This was most unprecedented, that he should be importuned at this time of night in his private residence.

“And this is very unprecedented,” our director returned the indignation, “that a
royal
expedition should not be met with due ceremony. I sent word this morning,” Don Francisco added. “We have brought the precious vaccine to New Spain.”

The viceroy's smile was smug. “You might have spared yourself the trouble, sir. I myself brought the vaccine to these dominions months ago.”

From upstairs came a soft voice. How rare a woman's voice had become to my ears! “Love? Who is it?”

“No one of importance,” he called back, twisting the knife in the wound of our director's pride.

The children had commenced whining that they were hungry, that they were tired.

“These are your charges, señor. We shall leave them here for you to see to. Meanwhile, we, members of His Majesty's expedition, shall sleep on the streets.”

Surely, he was not serious! My face must have betrayed my fear and disbelief. The children, who always took their cue from me, commenced sobbing.

Before too long, the mistress of the house made her way downstairs. She seemed quite shocked to find nineteen children in her parlor, all claiming to be her husband's charges. “How so?” she questioned the viceroy, who by now was in quite a temper at the uproar brought to his door at this ungodly hour by an arrogant doctor!

Finally, a servant was sent to fetch one of the city councilors to escort us to the residence that was to house us during our stay. “I must advise you that owing to the fact that we had not heard of your impending arrival, the repairs to the building have not been completed,” the viceroy warned. And with that, he gathered his robes around him, his wife by the arm, and left the room.

We waited until the councilor had arrived with many apologies. He
corroborated the viceroy's claim. No word had been received about our arrival today. No doubt the courier whom Don Francisco had commissioned to deliver our missive had dropped it off at the wrong office. Probably, our director's letter was slowly making its way up the hierarchy.

We loaded the children back into their carriages and wended our way back down the streets we had come. We traveled some distance. The noise of our caravan brought people to their doors to see what army was afoot, what trouble was brewing. Soon, I could tell by the bumpy, narrowed streets and the foul smell in the air that we had entered the poorer environs of the city. In the morning we would find ourselves surrounded by little shacks and shanties and by several tanning factories; it was their refuse that gave the air that sordid, raw smell.

We broke into that locked house—the city councilor could not find his key—only to discover, as the viceroy had warned, that the place was under repair, full of dust and tools, and completely unfurnished. We slept upon the hard floors, the boys and I, too tired to care. But all night, Don Francisco's footsteps paced the halls, waiting for morning in order to call again on the viceroy and lodge a formal complaint in the king's name.

I thought of going out there and urging him to get some rest. But I was beyond trying to save our director from his worst enemy, himself.

N
EW
S
PAIN
—
DEPARTURE FROM
M
EXICO
C
ITY
: Who can bear to look upon these youngsters and not weep for their terror, not feel their pitiful sorrow?

What is it they want, these frightened children, clinging to that sad woman, who turns her face away to hide her tears? They are at the door of a dark and damp building that dares to call itself the
Royal
Hospicio. See, on the other side of the door, the young denizens of the place, sitting down at long tables to bowls of greasy soup thickened with cornmeal. See their tricks, the hair pullings and furtive punches, the small cruelties of the abused who become abusers. See how the newcomers plead with the woman not to abandon them here.

We spent a little over a month in the capital, and I had to amend my judgment of our director. He had an even bigger enemy than himself—the viceroy. At every turn, Viceroy Iturrigaray impeded the progress of our expedition. He had stolen the glory of introducing the vaccine to his viceroyalty
himself, but our director's presence qualified the achievement by raising questions.

Was the vaccine his doctors had propagated indeed potent?

Was wholesale vaccination the best way to proceed?

Was a system of juntas being instituted that could safeguard the territory against future smallpox epidemics?

I am sure the viceroy felt as if he had triumphed in a battle only to have the enemy he believed he had slaughtered rise up to interrogate him.

Don Francisco paid with his own funds to print up broadsides announcing his vaccination sessions. But no carriers came forward, only the orphans from the Royal Hospicio and two dozen Indian babies wrenched from their panicked mothers—a horrid scene I will never forget. When several of the orphans died soon after being vaccinated, the viceroy set up a commission of doctors to investigate our director's methods.

Finally, Don Francisco admitted defeat and decided to head for Puebla and outlying villages. Before leaving, he petitioned the viceroy to pay us our salaries and to arrange for the transport of the expedition to the Philippines.

“We must leave as soon as possible for Manila,” our director insisted. “I have already written you several missives on this matter, sir. May I remind you, that you are ignoring not my humble person, but your king!”

“The only ship out to Manila is the galleon that leaves in January,” the viceroy countered. He had troops and friars ahead of us to send. He was not sure that the January galleon would have room enough for forty or so men and children.

“Very well, then, sir,” Don Francisco countered. “We shall stay in New Spain vaccinating until you have provided us passage to our next destination, as the proclamation orders you to do. May I remind you, too, that this will be at your expense.”

The proclamation stated that point clearly. The viceroy had no further recourse. I think that was when he decided that he must rid himself of this annoying expedition and its irritating director the sooner the better. Passage was arranged on the next Manila galleon. Too bad that January was still five months away!

During those months, our director asked me to continue with the
expedition on its journey through the provinces. My little boys were to be entrusted to the Royal Hospicio. Even so, I did not want to leave the environs of Mexico City until I could be sure the boys would be well taken care of. But I had yet to be paid. Viceroy Iturrigaray was in charge of the treasury funds in New Spain. Needless to say, he was not forthcoming.

But it was not just necessity that compelled me to continue with our expedition. We were now half the number we had been upon setting out from La Coruña. And New Spain, as I soon discovered, was a huge place. I could not desert our director now when he was most in need of my help.

Before we left the capital city, I said good-bye to the boys at the Royal Hospicio. It was a depressing place, especially the lower floor reserved for boys. The girls had the lighter, airier accommodations upstairs. But these were to be temporary quarters only, the viceroy had assured me. The boys would soon be placed in families. They were penisulares, the king's charges, there should be no problem.

“I will be back very, very soon!” I promised them. “I am just finishing my work here with Don Francisco.”

“No!” They had already spent several weeks in the Royal Hospicio. Even the orlop deck of the
María Pita
on a stormy night was better than this horrid place among strangers. My boys clung to me and would not let go.

“Listen,” I gathered them around me, my heart in my throat. “Remember those stories I told you?”

They nodded, sniffling, bottom lips quivering.

“They can come true. I will help you. But you must put in your part. You must be good, leave off swearing, do as your teachers tell you.”

I held them with my gaze, and they seem tranquilized. But I knew their faith would last as long as I was by them.

I slipped away as they were eating their supper, busy with their bowls, guarding their fare from the bigger boys. But once outside the door, I wept so mightily that Don Ángel grew concerned. Don Francisco was summoned, but I refused the sedative he prepared. I wanted to feel the full measure of my culpability and despair. Later in the provinces I would hear the story of La Llorona, a crazed mother who drowned her children in the river to avenge their father's abandonment. No sooner had she realized
what she had done, she repented and was condemned to spend eternity weeping for them.

“It is one of their superstitions,” the finer ladies of those towns would say, embarrassed by the crude beliefs of their Indian maids. But I knew that it was no invention of theirs. Even after I had run out of tears, I could hear her cries in my ears. Nothing would stop her sorrow, except the knowledge that her children—and were they not all our children?—had been spared.

N
EW
S
PAIN
—P
UEBLA DE LOS
Á
NGELES
, Q
UERÉTARO
, C
ELAYA
, G
UANAJUATO
, L
EÓN
, Z
ACATECAS
, D
URANGO
, F
RESNILLO
, S
OMBRERETE
: These must be sketches for a larger work, studies of misery discarded as being too miserable or later used for the murals of a church, our Lord healing the sick; our Lord turning the water of tears into the wine of laughter; our Lord dispensing loaves to the numberless, hungry poor.

But this is not Our Lord with his long, sad face and his head aglow. This man is older, his gray hair tied back with a dirty ribbon, his shirtsleeves rolled up. He is ministering to the long lines of Indians and Creoles who have come to this village clinic to receive the smallpox salvation their king has sent them.

Beside him, weak and thin, a not very alluring Magdalene, a woman assists him, her hands a blur as if to suggest the many tasks she is performing. She seems intent on her ministry, as how can she not be? Behold the masses that will be saved future suffering! But there are tears in her eyes, a puddle at her feet.