Карлос Кастанеда. Второе кольцо силы (engl)
Карлос Кастанеда. Второе кольцо силы (engl)
Carlos Castaneda. The Second Ring of Power
SIMON AND SCHUSTER New York
COPYRIGHT M-) 1977 BY CARLOS CASTANEDA ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INCLUDING
THE RIGHT OF REPRODUCTION IN WHOLE OR IN PART IN ANY FORM PUBLISHED BY SIMON
AND SCHUSTER A DIVISION OF GULF & WESTERN CORPORATION SIMON & SCHUSTER
BUILDING ROCKEFELLER CENTER 1230 AVENUE OF THE AMERICAS NEW YORK, NEW YORK
10020
DESIGNED BY EVE METZ MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA CASTANEDA, CARLOS.
THE SECOND RING OF POWER. 1. YAQUI INDIANSM-^WRELIGION AND MYTHOLOGY. 2.
CASTANEDA, CARLOS 3. HALLUCINOGENIC DRUGS AND RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE. 4.
INDIANS OF MEXICOM-^WRELIGION AND MYTHOLOGY. 1. TITLE.
Carlos Castaneda's extraordinary journey into the world of sorcery has
captivated millions of Americans. In his eagerly awaited new book, he takes
the reader into a sorceric experience so intense, so terrifying, and so
profoundly disturbing that it can only be described as a brilliant assault
on the reason, the dramatic and frightening attack on every preconceived
notion of life that is don Juan's remarkable legacy to his apprentice.
At the center of the book is a new and formidable figure, dona Soledad,
a woman whose powers are turned against Castaneda in a struggle that almost
consumes him. Dona Soledad has been taught by don Juan, transformed by his
teachings from a bent and gray-haired old woman into a sensual, lithe,
deeply sexual figure of awesome and mysterious power, a sorceress whose
mission is to test Castaneda by a series of terrifying tricks. In dona
Soledad, Carlos Castaneda has recorded for the reader a personality as
instantly recognizable as don Juan himself and has illuminated the strengths
and the feelings of a remarkable woman who, despite her sorceric gifts,
expresses some of the deepest and most basic feminine concerns and
ambitions. For dona Soledad, drawn out of the shadows of a defeated and
meaningless life by don Juan, has herself become a warrior, a hunter and "a
stalker of power." Castaneda's combat with her, his gradual realization that
she not only derives her power from don Juan but is fulfilling his plans, is
all a prelude to an astonishing discovery. For Castaneda unfolds for the
reader a sorcerer's family, in which dona Soledad, her "girls," Lidia, Elena
("la Gorda"), Josefina and Rosa, themselves changed and transformed by don
Juan, are part of a small closed society in which the teachings of don Juan
have become a way of life, touching and explaining every aspect of the
world, altering the relationships between them so that they are no longer
mother and children, man and wife, sisters and brothers, friends and
enemies, but disciples, witnesses, accomplices in don Juan's grand design.
Extraordinary as all Castaneda's books have been. The Second Ring of
Power goes far beyond anything he has written before: it is a vision of a
more somber, frightening and compelling world than that of Castaneda's years
of apprenticeshipM-^Wthe world of a full-fledged sorcerer, in which dangers
lie in wait on the journey to impeccability and freedom, and in which the
message of don Juan must be transformed into real life.
Jacket Painting and Design by Robert Giusti (C) 1977 Simon and Schuster
Contents
PREFACE
1 The Transformation of Dona Soledad
Preface
A flat, barren mountaintop on the western slopes of the Sierra Madre in
central Mexico was the setting for my final meeting with don Juan and don
Genaro and their other two apprentices, Pablito and Nestor. The solemnity
and the scope of what took place there left no doubt in my mind that our
apprenticeships had come to their concluding moment, and that I was indeed
seeing don Juan and don Genaro for the last time. Toward the end we all said
good-bye to one another, and then Pablito and I jumped together from the top
of the mountain into an abyss.
Prior to that jump don Juan had presented a fundamental principle for
all that was going to happen to me. According to him, upon jumping into the
abyss I was going to become pure perception and move back and forth between
the two inherent realms of all creation, the tonal and the nagual.
In my jump my perception went through seventeen elastic bounces between
the tonal and the nagual. In my moves into the nagual I perceived my body
disintegrating. I could not think or feel in the coherent, unifying sense
that I ordinarily do, but I somehow thought and felt. In my moves into the
tonal I burst into unity. I was whole. My perception had coherence. I had
visions of order. Their compelling force was so intense, their vividness so
real and their complexity so vast that I have not been capable of explaining
them to my satisfaction. To say that they were visions, vivid dreams or even
hallucinations does not say anything to clarify their nature.
After having examined and analyzed in a most thorough and careful
manner my feelings, perceptions and interpretations of that jump into the
abyss, I had come to the point where I could not rationally believe that it
had actually happened. And yet another part of me held on steadfast to the
feeling that it did happen, that I did jump.
Don Juan and don Genaro are no longer available and their absence has
created in me a most pressing need, the need to make headway in the midst of
apparently insoluble contradictions.
I went back to Mexico to see Pablito and Nestor to seek their help in
resolving my conflicts. But what I encountered on my trip cannot be
described in any other way except as a final assault on my reason, a
concentrated attack designed by don Juan himself. His apprentices, under his
absentee direction, in a most methodical and precise fashion demolished in a
few days the last bastion of my reason. In those few days they revealed to
me one of the two practical aspects of their sorcery, the art of dreaming,
which is the core of the present work.
The art of stalking, the other practical aspect of their sorcery and
also the crowning stone of don Juan's and don Genaro's teachings, was
presented to me during subsequent visits and was by far the most complex
facet of their being in the world as sorcerers.
The Transformation of Dona Soledad
I had a sudden premonition that Pablito and Nestor were not home. My
certainty was so profound that I stopped my car. I was at the place where
the asphalt came to an abrupt end, and I wanted to reconsider whether or not
to continue that day the long and difficult drive on the steep, coarse
gravel road to their hometown in the mountains of central Mexico.
I rolled down the window of my car. It was rather windy and cold. I got
out to stretch my legs. The tension of driving for hours had stiffened my
back and neck. I walked to the edge of the paved road. The ground was wet
from an early shower. Rain was still falling heavily on the slopes of the
mountains to the south, a short distance from where I was. But right in
front of me, toward the east and also toward the north, the sky was clear.
At certain points on the winding road I had been able to see the bluish
peaks of the sierras shining in the sunlight a great distance away.
After a moment's deliberation I decided to turn back and go to the city
because I had had a most peculiar feeling that I was going to find don Juan
in the market. After all, I had always done just that, found him in the
marketplace, since the beginning of my association with him. As a rule, if I
did not find him in Sonora I would drive to central Mexico and go to the
market of that particular city, and sooner or later don Juan would show up.
The longest I had ever waited for him was two days. I was so habituated to
meeting him in that manner that I had the most absolute certainty that I
would find him again, as always.
I waited in the market all afternoon. I walked up and down the aisles
pretending to be looking for something to buy. Then I waited around the
park. At dusk I knew that he was not coming. I had then the clear sensation
that he had been there but had left. I sat down on a park bench where I used
to sit with him and tried to analyze my feelings. Upon arriving in the city
I was elated with the sure knowledge that don Juan was there in the streets.
What I felt was more than the memory of having found him there countless
times before; my body knew that he was looking for me. But then, as I sat on
the bench I had another kind of strange certainty. I knew that he was not
there anymore. He had left and I had missed him.
After a while I discarded my speculations. I thought that I was
beginning to be affected by the place. I was starting to get irrational;
that had always happened to me in the past after a few days in that area.
I went to my hotel room to rest for a few hours and then I went out
again to roam the streets. I did not have the same expectation of finding
don Juan that I had had in the afternoon. I gave up. I went back to my hotel
in order to get a good night's sleep.
Before I headed for the mountains in the morning, I drove up and down
the main streets in my car, but somehow I knew that I was wasting my time.
Don Juan was not there.
It took me all morning to drive to the little town where Pablito and
Nestor lived. I arrived around noon. Don Juan had taught me never to drive
directly into the town so as not to arouse the curiosity of onlookers. Every
time I had been there I had always driven off the road, just before reaching
the town, onto a flat field where youngsters usually played soccer. The dirt
was well packed all the way to a walking trail which was wide enough for a
car and which passed by Pablito's and Nestor's houses in the foothills south
of town. As soon as I got to the edge of the field I found that the walking
trail had been turned into a gravel road.
I deliberated whether to go to Nestor's house or Pablito's. The feeling
that they were not there still persisted. I opted to go to Pablito's; I
reasoned that Nestor lived alone, while Pablito lived with his mother and
his four sisters. If he was not there the women could help me find him. As I
got closer to his house I noticed that the path leading from the road up to
the house had been widened. It looked as if the ground was hard, and since
there was enough space for my car, I drove almost to the front door. A new
porch with a tile roof had been added to the adobe house. There were no dogs
barking but I saw an enormous one sitting calmly behind a fenced area,
alertly observing me. A flock of chickens that had been feeding in front of
the house scattered around, cackling. I turned the motor off and stretched
my arms over my head. My body was stiff.
The house seemed deserted. The thought crossed my mind that perhaps
Pablito and his family had moved away and someone else was living there.
Suddenly the front door opened with a bang and Pablito's mother stepped out
as if someone had pushed her. She stared at me absentmindedly for an
instant. As I got out of my car she seemed to recognize me. A graceful
shiver ran through her body and she ran toward me. I thought that she must
have been napping and that the noise of the car had woken her, and when she
came out to see what was going on she did not know at first who I was. The
incongruous sight of the old woman running toward me made me smile. When she
got closer I had a moment of doubt. Somehow she moved so nimbly that she did
not seem like Pablito's mother at all.
"My goodness what a surprise!" she exclaimed.
"Dona Soledad?" I asked, incredulously.
"Don't you recognize me?" she replied, laughing.
I made some stupid comments about her surprising agility.
"Why do you always see me as a helpless old woman?" she asked, looking
at me with an air of mock challenge.
She bluntly accused me of having nicknamed her "Mrs. Pyramid." I
remembered that I had once said to Nestor that her shape reminded me of a
pyramid. She had a very broad and massive behind and a small pointed head.
The long dresses that she usually wore added to the effect.
"Look at me," she said. "Do I still look like a pyramid?"
She was smiling but her eyes made me feel uncomfortable. I attempted to
defend myself by making a joke but she cut me off and coaxed me to admit
that I was responsible for the nickname. I assured her that I had never
intended it as such and that anyway, at that moment she was so lean that her
shape was the furthest thing from a pyramid.
"What's happened to you, dona Soledad?" I asked. "You're transformed."
"You said it," she replied briskly. "I've been transformed! "
I meant it figuratively. However, upon closer examination I had to
admit that there was no room for a metaphor. She was truly a changed person.
I suddenly had a dry, metallic taste in my mouth. I was afraid.
She placed her fists on her hips and stood with her legs slightly
apart, facing me. She was wearing a light green, gathered skirt and a
whitish blouse. Her skirt was shorter than those she used to wear. I could
not see her hair; she had it tied with a thick band, a turban-like piece of
cloth. She was barefoot and she rhythmically tapped her big feet on the
ground as she smiled with the candor of a young girl. I had never seen
anyone exude as much strength as she did. I noticed a strange gleam in her
eyes, a disturbing gleam but not a frightening one. I thought that perhaps I
had never really examined her appearance carefully. Among other things I
felt guilty for having glossed over many people during my years with don
Juan. The force of his personality had rendered everyone else pale and
unimportant.
I told her that I had never imagined that she could have such a
stupendous vitality, that my carelessness was to blame for not really
knowing her, and that no doubt I would have to meet everyone else all over
again.
She came closer to me. She smiled and put her right hand on the back of
my left arm, grabbing it gently.
"That's for sure," she whispered in my ear.
Her smile froze and her eyes became glazed. She was so close to me that
I felt her breasts rubbing my left shoulder. My discomfort increased as I
tried to convince myself that there was no reason for alarm. I repeated to
myself over and over that I really had never known Pablito's mother, and
that in spite of her odd behavior she was probably being her normal self.
But some frightened part of me knew that those were only bracing thoughts
with no substance at all, because no matter how much I may have glossed over
her person, not only did I remember her very well but I had known her very
well. She represented to me the archetype of a mother; I thought her to be
in her late fifties or even older. Her weak muscles moved her bulky weight
with extreme difficulty. Her hair had a lot of gray in it. She was, as I
remembered her, a sad, somber woman with kind, handsome features, a
dedicated, suffering mother, always in the kitchen, always tired. I also
remembered her to be a very gentle and unselfish woman, and a very timid
one, timid to the point of being thoroughly subservient to anyone who
happened to be around. That was the picture I had of her, reinforced
throughout years of casual contact. That day something was terribly
different. The woman I was confronting did not at all fit the image I had of
Pablito's mother, and yet she was the same person, leaner and stronger,
looking twenty years younger, than the last time I had seen her. I felt a
shiver in my body.
She moved a couple of steps in front of me and faced me.
"Let me look at you," she said. "The Nagual told us that you're a
devil."
I remembered then that all of them, Pablito, his mother, his sisters
and Nestor, had always seemed unwilling to voice don Juan's name and called
him "the Nagual," a usage which I myself adopted when talking with them.
She daringly put her hands on my shoulders, something she had never
done before. My body tensed. I really did not know what to say. There was a
long pause that allowed me to take stock of myself. Her appearance and
behavior had frightened me to the point that I had forgotten to ask about
Pablito and Nestor.
"Tell me, where is Pablito?" I asked her with a sudden wave of
apprehension.
"Oh, he's gone to the mountains," she responded in a noncommittal tone
and moved away from me.
"And where is Nestor?"
She rolled her eyes as if to show her indifference.
"They are together in the mountains," she said in the same tone.
I felt genuinely relieved and told her that I had known without the
shadow of a doubt that they were all right.
She glanced at me and smiled. A wave of happiness and ebullience came
upon me and I embraced her. She boldly returned the embrace and held me;
that act was so outlandish that it took my breath away. Her body was rigid.
I sensed an extraordinary strength in her. My heart began to pound. I gently
tried to push her away as I asked her if Nestor was still seeing don Genaro
and don Juan. During our farewell meeting don Juan had expressed doubts that
Nestor was ready to finish his apprenticeship.
"Genaro has left forever," she said letting go of me.
She fretted nervously with the edge of her blouse.
"How about don Juan?"
"The Nagual is gone too," she said, puckering her lips.
"Where did they go?"
"You mean you don't know?"
I told her that both of them had said good-bye to me two years before,
and that all I knew was that they were leaving at that time. I had not
really dared to speculate where they had gone. They had never told me their
whereabouts in the past, and I had come to accept the fact that if they
wanted to disappear from my life all they had to do was to refuse to see me.
"They're not around, that's for sure," she said, frowning, "And they
won't be coming back, that's also for sure."
Her voice was extremely unemotional. I began to feel annoyed with her.
I wanted to leave.
"But you're here," she said, changing her frown into a smile. "You must
wait for Pablito and Nestor. They've been dying to see you."
She held my arm firmly and pulled me away from my car. Compared to the
way she had been in the past, her boldness was astounding.
"But first, let me show you my friend," she said and forcibly led me to
the side of the house.
There was a fenced area, like a small corral. A huge male dog was
there. The first thing that attracted my attention was his healthy,
lustrous, yellowish-brown fur. He did not seem to be a mean dog. He was not
chained and the fence was not high enough to hold him. The dog remained
impassive as we got closer to him, not even wagging his tail. Dona Soledad
pointed to a good-sized cage in the back. A coyote was curled up inside.
"That's my friend," she said. "The dog is not. He belongs to my girls."
The dog looked at me and yawned. I liked him. I had a nonsensical
feeling of kinship with him.
"Come, let's go into the house," she said, pulling me by the arm.
I hesitated. Some part of me was utterly alarmed and wanted to get out
of there quickly, and yet another part of me would not have left for the
world.
"You're not afraid of me, are you?" she asked in an accusing tone.
"I most certainly am!" I exclaimed.
She giggled, and in a most comforting tone she declared that she was a
clumsy, primitive woman who was very awkward with words, and that she hardly
knew how to treat people. She looked straight into my eyes and said that don
Juan had commissioned her to help me, because he worried about me.
"He told us that you're not serious and go around causing a lot of
trouble to innocent people," she said.
Up to that point her assertions had been coherent to me, but I could
not conceive don Juan saying those things about me.
We went inside the house. I wanted to sit down on the bench, where
Pablito and I usually sat. She stopped me.
"This is not the place for you and me," she said. "Let's go to my
room."
"I'd rather sit here," I said firmly. "I know this spot and I feel
comfortable on it."
She clicked her lips in disapproval. She acted like a disappointed
child. She contracted her upper lip until it looked like the flat beak of a
duck.
"There is something terribly wrong here," I said. "I think I am going
to leave if you don't tell me what's going on."
She became very flustered and argued that her trouble was not knowing
how to talk to me. I confronted her with her unmistakable transformation and
demanded that she tell me what had happened. I had to know how such a change
had come about.
"If I tell you, will you stay?" she asked in a child's voice.
"I'll have to."
"In that case I'll tell you everything. But it has to be in my room."
I had a moment of panic. I made a supreme effort to calm myself and we
walked into her room. She lived in the back, where Pablito had built a
bedroom for her. I had once been in the room while it was being built and
also after it was finished, just before she moved in. The room looked as
empty as I had seen it before, except that there was a bed in the very
center of it and two unobtrusive chests of drawers by the door. The
whitewash of the walls had faded into a very soothing yellowish white. The
wood of the ceiling had also weathered. Looking at the smooth, clean walls I
had the impression they were scrubbed daily with a sponge. The room looked
more like a monastic cell, very frugal and ascetic. There were no ornaments
of any sort. The windows had thick, removable wood panels reinforced with an
iron bar. There were no chairs or anything to sit on.
Dona Soledad took my writing pad away from me, held it to her bosom and
then sat down on her bed, which was made up of two thick mattresses with no
box springs. She indicated that I should sit down next to her.
"You and I are the same," she said as she handed me my notebook.
"I beg your pardon?"
"You and I are the same," she repeated without looking at me.
I could not figure out what she meant. She stared at me, as if waiting
for a response.
"Just what is that supposed to mean, dona Soledad?" I asked.
My question seemed to baffle her. Obviously she expected me to know
what she meant. She laughed at first, but then, when I insisted that I did
not understand, she got angry. She sat up straight and accused me of being
dishonest with her. Her eyes flared with rage; her mouth contracted in a
very ugly gesture of wrath that made her look extremely old.
I honestly was at a loss and felt that no matter what I said it would
be wrong. She also seemed to be in the same predicament. Her mouth moved to
say something but her lips only quivered. At last she muttered that it was
not impeccable to act the way I did at such a serious moment. She turned her
back to me.
"Look at me, dona Soledad!" I said forcefully. "I'm not mystifying you
in any sense. You must know something that I know nothing about."
"You talk too much," she snapped angrily. "The Nagual told me never to
let you talk. You twist everything."
She jumped to her feet and stomped on the floor, like a spoiled child.
I became aware at that moment that the room had a different floor. I
remembered it to be a dirt floor, made from the dark soil of the area. The
new floor was reddish pink. I momentarily put off a confrontation with her
and walked around the room. I could not imagine how I could have missed
noticing the floor when I first entered. It was magnificent. At first I
thought that it was red clay that had been laid like cement, when it was
soft and moist, but then I saw that there were no cracks in it. Clay would
have dried, curled up, cracked, and clumps would have formed. I bent down
and gently ran my fingers over it. It was as hard as bricks. The clay had
been fired. I became aware then that the floor was made of very large flat
slabs of clay put together over a bed of soft clay that served as a matrix.
The slabs made a most intricate and fascinating design, but a thoroughly
unobtrusive one, unless one paid deliberate attention to it. The skill with
which the slabs had been placed in position indicated to me a very
well-conceived plan. I wanted to know how such big slabs had been fired
without being warped. I turned around to ask dona Soledad. I quickly
desisted. She would not have known what I was talking about. I paced over
the floor again. The clay was a bit rough, almost like sandstone. It made a
perfect slide-proof surface.
"Did Pablito put down this floor?" I asked.
She did not answer.
"It's a superb piece of work," I said. "You should be very proud of
him."
I had no doubt that Pablito had done it. No one else could have had the
imagination and the capacity to conceive of it. I figured that he must have
made it during the time I had been away. But on second thought I realized
that I had never entered dona Soledad's room since it had been built, six or
seven years before.
"Pablito! Pablito! Bah!" she exclaimed in an angry, raspy voice. "What
makes you think he's the only one who can make things?"
We exchanged a long, sustained look, and all of a sudden I knew that it
was she who had made the floor, and that don Juan had put her up to it.
We stood quietly, looking at each other for some time. I felt it would
have been thoroughly superfluous to ask if I was correct.
"I made it myself," she finally said in a dry tone. "The Nagual told me
how."
Her statements made me feel euphoric. I practically lifted her up in an
embrace. I twirled her around. All I could think to do was to bombard her
with questions. I wanted to know how she had made the slabs, what the
designs represented, where she got the clay. But she did not share my
exhilaration. She remained quiet and impassive, looking at me askance from
time to time.
I paced on the floor again. The bed had been placed at the very
epicenter of some converging lines. The clay slabs had been cut in sharp
angles to create converging motifs that seemed to radiate out from under the
bed.
"I have no words to tell you how impressed I am," I said.
"Words! Who needs words?" she said cuttingly.
I had a flash of insight. My reason had been betraying me. There was
only one possible way of explaining her magnificent metamorphosis; don Juan
must have made her his apprentice. How else could an old woman like dona
Soledad turn into such a weird, powerful being? That should have been
obvious to me from the moment I laid eyes on her, but my set of expectations
about her had not included that possibility.
I deduced that whatever don Juan had done to her must have taken place
during the two years I had not seen her, although two years seemed hardly
any time at all for such a superb alteration.
"I think I know now what happened to you," I said in a casual and
cheerful tone. "Something has cleared up in my mind right now."
"Oh, is that so?" she said, thoroughly uninterested.
"The Nagual is teaching you to be a sorceress, isn't that true?"
She glared at me defiantly. I felt that I had said the worst possible
thing. There was an expression of true contempt on her face. She was not
going to tell me anything.
"What a bastard you are!" she exclaimed suddenly, shaking with rage.
I thought that her anger was unjustified. I sat down on one end of the
bed while she nervously tapped on the floor with her heel. Then she sat down
on the other end, without looking at me.
"What exactly do you want me to do?" I asked in a firm and intimidating
tone.
"I told you already! " she said in a yell. "You and I are the same."
I asked her to explain her meaning and not to assume for one instant
that I knew anything. Those statements angered her even more. She stood up
abruptly and dropped her skirt to the ground.
"This is what I mean!" she yelled, caressing her pubic area.
My mouth opened involuntarily. I became aware that I was staring at her
like an idiot.
"You and I are one here!" she said.
I was dumbfounded. Dona Soledad, the old Indian woman, mother of my
friend Pablito, was actually half-naked a few feet away from me, showing me
her genitals. I stared at her, incapable of formulating any thoughts. The
only thing I knew was that her body was not the body of an old woman. She
had beautifully muscular thighs, dark and hairless. The bone structure of
her hips was broad, but there was no fat on them.
She must have noticed my scrutiny and flung herself on the bed.
"You know what to do," she said, pointing to her pubis. "We are one
here."
She uncovered her robust breasts.
"Dona Soledad, I implore you!" I exclaimed. "What's come over you?
You're Pablito's mother."
"No, I'm not! " she snapped. "I'm no one's mother."
She sat up and looked at me with fierce eyes.
"I am just like you, a piece of the Nagual," she said. "We're made to
mix."
She opened her legs and I jumped away.
"Wait a minute, dona Soledad," I said. "Let's talk for i while."
I had a moment of wild fear, and a sudden crazy thought occurred to me.
Would it be possible, I asked myself, that don Juan was hiding somewhere
around there laughing his head off?
"Don Juan!" I bellowed.
My yell was so loud and profound that dona Soledad jumped off her bed
and covered herself hurriedly with her skirt. I saw her putting it on as I
bellowed again.
"Don Juan!"
I ran through the house bellowing don Juan's name until my throat was
sore. Dona Soledad, in the meantime, had run outside the house and was
standing by my car, looking puzzled at me.
I walked over to her and asked her if don Juan had told her to do all
that. She nodded affirmatively. I asked if he was around. She said no.
"Tell me everything," I said.
She told me that she was merely following don Juan's orders. He had
commanded her to change her being into a warrior's in order to help me. She
declared that she had been waiting for years to fulfill that promise.
"I'm very strong now," she said softly. "Just for you. But you disliked
me in my room, didn't you?"
I found myself explaining that I did not dislike her, that what counted
were my feelings for Pablito; then I realized that I did not have the
vaguest idea of what I was saying.
Dona Soledad seemed to understand my embarrassing position and said
that our mishap had to be forgotten.
"You must be famished," she said vivaciously. "I'll make you some
food."
"There's a lot that you haven't explained to me," I said. "I'll be
frank with you, I wouldn't stay here for anything in the world. You frighten
me."
"You are obligated to accept my hospitality, if it is only for a cup of
coffee," she said unruffled. "Come, let's forget what happened."
She made a gesture of going into the house. At that moment I heard a
deep growl. The dog was standing, looking at us, as if he understood what
was being said.
Dona Soledad fixed a most frightening gaze on me. Then she softened it
and smiled.
"Don't let my eyes bother you," she said. "The truth is that I am old.
Lately I've been getting dizzy. I think I need glasses."
She broke into a laugh and clowned, looking through cupped fingers as
if they were glasses.
"An old Indian woman with glasses! That'll be a laugh," she said
giggling.
I made up my mind then to be rude and get out of there, without any
explanation. But before I drove away I wanted to leave some things for
Pablito and his sisters. I opened the trunk of the car to get the gifts I
had brought for them. I leaned way into it to reach first for the two
packages that were lodged against the wall of the back seat, behind the
spare tire. I got hold of one and was about to grab the other when I felt a
soft, furry hand on the nape of my neck. I shrieked involuntarily and hit my
head on the open lid. I turned to look. The pressure of the furry hand did
not let me turn completely, but I was able to catch a fleeting glimpse of a
silvery arm or paw hovering over my neck. I wriggled in panic and pushed
myself away from the trunk and fell down on my seat with the package still
in my hand. My whole body shook, the muscles of my legs contracted and I
found myself leaping up and running away.
"I didn't mean to frighten you," dona Soledad said apologetically, as I
watched her from ten feet away.
She showed me the palms of her hands in a gesture of surrender, as if
assuring me that what I had felt was not her hand.
"What did you do to me?" I asked, trying to sound calm and detached.
She seemed to be either thoroughly embarrassed or baffled. She muttered
something and shook her head as though she could not say it, or did not know
what I was talking about.
"Come on, dona Soledad," I said, coming closer to her, "don't play
tricks on me."
She seemed about to weep. I wanted to comfort her, but some part of me
resisted. After a moment's pause I told her what I had felt and seen.
"That's just terrible!" She said in a shrieking voice.
In a very childlike gesture she covered her face with her right
forearm. I thought she was crying. I came over to her and tried to put my
arm around her shoulders. I could not bring myself to do it.
"Come now, dona Soledad," I said, "let's forget all this and let me
give you these packages before I leave."
I stepped in front of her to face her. I could see her black, shining
eyes and part of her face behind her arm. She was not crying. She was
smiling.
I jumped back. Her smile terrified me. Both of us stood motionless for
a long time. She kept her face covered but I could see her eyes watching me.
As I stood there almost paralyzed with fear I felt utterly despondent.
I had fallen into a bottomless pit. Dona Soledad was a witch. My body knew
it, and yet I could not really believe it. What I wanted to believe was that
dona Soledad had gone mad and was being kept in the house instead of an
asylum.
I did not dare move or take my eyes away from her. We must have stayed
in that position for five or six minutes. She had kept her arm raised and
yet motionless. She was standing at the rear of the car, almost leaning
against the left fender. The lid of the trunk was still open. I thought of
making a dash for the right door. The keys were in the ignition.
I relaxed a bit in order to gain the momentum to run. She seemed to
notice my change of position immediately. Her arm moved down, revealing her
whole face. Her teeth were clenched. Her eyes were fixed on mine. They
looked hard and mean. Suddenly she lurched toward me. She stomped with her
right foot, like a fencer, and reached out with clawed hands to grab me by
my waist as she let out the most chilling shriek.
My body jumped back out of her reach. I ran for the car, but with
inconceivable agility she rolled to my feet and made me trip over her. I
fell facedown and she grabbed me by the left foot. I contracted my right
leg, and I would have kicked her in the face with the sole of my shoe had
she not let go of me and rolled back. I jumped to my feet and tried to open
the door of the car. It was locked. I threw myself over the hood to reach
the other side but somehow dona Soledad got there before I did. I tried to
roll back over the hood, but midway I felt a sharp pain in my right calf.
She had grabbed me by the leg. I could not kick her with my left foot; she
had pinned down both of my legs against the hood. She pulled me toward her
and I fell on top of her. We wrestled on the ground. Her strength was
magnificent and her shrieks were terrifying. I could hardly move under the
gigantic pressure of her body. It was not a matter of weight but rather
tension, and she had it. Suddenly I heard a growl and the enormous dog
jumped on her back and shoved her away from me. I stood up. I wanted to get
into the car, but the woman and the dog were fighting by the door. The only
retreat was to go inside the house. I made it in one or two seconds. I did
not turn to look at them but rushed inside and closed the door behind me,
securing it with the iron bar that was behind it. I ran to the back and did
the same with the other door.
From inside I could hear the furious growling of the dog and the
woman's inhuman shrieks. Then suddenly the dog's barking and growling turned
into whining and howling as if he were in pain, or as if something were
frightening him. I felt a jolt in the pit of my stomach. My ears began to
buzz. I realized that I was trapped inside the house. I had a fit of sheer
terror. I was revolted at my stupidity in running into the house. The
woman's attack had confused me so intensely that I had lost all sense of
strategy and had behaved as if I were running away from an ordinary opponent
who could be shut out by simply closing a door. I heard someone come to the
door and lean against it, trying to force it open. Then there were loud
knocks and banging on it.
"Open the door," dona Soledad said in a hard voice. "That goddamned dog
has mauled me."
I deliberated whether or not to let her in. What came to my mind was
the memory of a confrontation I had had years before with a sorceress, who
had, according to don Juan, adopted his shape in order to fool me and
deliver a deadly blow. Obviously dona Soledad was not as I had known her,
but I had reasons to doubt that she was a sorceress. The time element played
a decisive role in my conviction. Pablito, Nestor and I had been involved
with don Juan and don Genaro for years and we were not sorcerers at all; how
could dona Soledad be one? No matter how much she had changed she could not
improvise something that would take a lifetime to accomplish.
"Why did you attack me?" I asked, speaking loudly so as to be heard
through the thick door.
She answered that the Nagual had told her not to let me go. I asked her
why.
She did not answer; instead she banged on the door furiously and I
banged back even harder. We went on hitting the door for a few minutes. She
stopped and started begging me to open it. I had a surge of nervous energy.
I knew that if I opened the door I might have a chance to flee. I moved the
iron bar from the door. She staggered in. Her blouse was torn. The band that
held her hair had fallen off and her long hair was all over her face.
"Look what that son of a bitch dog did to me!" she yelled. "Look!
Look!"
I took a deep breath. She seemed to be somewhat dazed. She sat down on
a bench and began to take off her tattered blouse. I seized that moment to
run out of the house and make a dash for the car. With a speed that was born
only out of fear, I got inside, shut the door, automatically turned on the
motor and put the car in reverse. I stepped on the gas and turned my head to
look back through the rear window. As I turned I felt a hot breath on my
face; I heard a horrendous growl and saw in a flash the demoniacal eyes of
the dog. He was standing on the back seat. I saw his horrible teeth almost
in my eyes. I ducked my head. His teeth grabbed my hair. I must have curled
my whole body on the seat, and in doing so I let my foot off the clutch. The
jerk of the car made the beast lose his balance. I opened the door and
scrambled out. The head of the dog jutted out through the door. I heard his
enormous teeth click as his jaws closed tight, missing my heels by a few
inches. The car began to roll back and I made another dash for the house. I
stopped before I had reached the door.
Dona Soledad was standing there. She had tied her hair up again. She
had thrown a shawl over her shoulders. She stared at me for a moment and
then began to laugh, very softly at first as if her wounds hurt her, and
then loudly. She pointed a finger at me and held her stomach as she
convulsed with laughter. She bent over and stretched, seemingly to catch her
breath. She was naked above the waist. I could see her breasts, shaking with
the convulsions of her laughter.
I felt that all was lost. I looked back toward the car. It had come to
a stop after rolling four or five feet; the door had closed again, sealing
the dog inside. I could see and hear the enormous beast biting the back of
the front seat and pawing the windows.
A most peculiar decision faced me at that moment. I did not know who
scared me the most, dona Soledad or the dog. After a moment's thought I
decided that the dog was just a stupid beast.
I ran back to the car and climbed up on the roof. The noise enraged the
dog. I heard him ripping the upholstery. Lying on the roof I managed to open
the driver's door. My idea was to open both doors and then slide from the
roof into the car, through one of them, after the dog had gone out the other
one. I leaned over to open the right door. I had forgotten that it was
locked. At that moment the dog's head came out through the opened door. I
had an attack of blind panic at the idea that the dog was going to jump out
of the car and onto the roof.
In less than a second I had leaped to the ground and found myself
standing at the door of the house.
Dona Soledad was bracing herself in the doorway. Laughter came out of
her in spurts that seemed almost painful.
The dog had remained inside the car, still frothing with rage.
Apparently he was too large and could not squeeze his bulky frame over the
front seat. I went to the car and gently closed the door again. I began to
look for a stick long enough to release the safety lock on the right-hand
door.
I searched in the area in front of the house. There was not a single
piece of wood lying around. Dona Soledad, in the meantime, had gone inside.
I assessed my situation. I had no other alternative but to ask her help.
With great trepidation, I crossed the threshold, looking in every direction
in case she might have been hiding behind the door, waiting for me.
"Dona Soledad!" I yelled out.
"What the hell do you want?" she yelled back from her room.
"Would you please go out and get your dog out of my car?" I said.
"Are you kidding?" she replied. "That's not my dog. I've told you
already, he belongs to my girls."
"Where are your girls?" I asked.
"They are in the mountains," she replied.
She came out of her room and faced me.
"Do you want to see what that goddamned dog did to me?" she asked in a
dry tone. "Look!"
She unwrapped her shawl and showed me her naked back.
I found no visible tooth marks on her back; there were only a few long,
superficial scratches she might have gotten by rubbing against the hard
ground. For all that matter, she could have scratched herself when she
attacked me.
"You have nothing there," I said.
"Come and look in the light," she said and went over by the door.
She insisted that I look carefully for the gashes of the dog's teeth. I
felt stupid. I had a heavy sensation around my eyes, especially on my brow.
I went outside instead. The dog had not moved and began to bark as soon as I
came out the door.
I cursed myself. There was no one to blame but me. I had walked into
that trap like a fool. I resolved right then to walk to town. But my wallet,
my papers, everything I had was in my briefcase on the floor of the car,
right under the dog's feet. I had an attack of despair. It was useless to
walk to town. I did not have enough money in my pockets even to buy a cup of
coffee. Besides, I did not know a soul in town. I had no other alternative
but to get the dog out of the car.
"What kind of food does that dog eat?" I yelled from the door.
"Why don't you try your leg?" dona Soledad yelled back from her room,
and cackled.
I looked for some cooked food in the house. The pots were empty. There
was nothing else for me to do but to confront her again. My despair had
turned into rage. I stormed into her room ready for a fight to the death.
She was lying on her bed, covered with her shawl.
"Please forgive me for having done all those things to you," she said
bluntly, looking at the ceiling.
Her boldness stopped my rage.
"You must understand my position," she went on. "I couldn't let you
go."
She laughed softly, and in a clear, calm and very pleasing voice said
that she was guilty of being greedy and clumsy, that she had nearly
succeeded in scaring me away with her antics, but that the situation had
suddenly changed. She paused and sat up in her bed, covering her breasts
with her shawl, then added that a strange confidence had descended into her
body. She looked up at the ceiling and moved her arms in a weird, rhythmical
flow, like a windmill.
"There is no way for you to leave now," she said.
She scrutinized me without laughing. My internal rage had subsided but
my despair was more acute than ever. I honestly knew that in matters of
sheer strength I was no match for her or the dog.
She said that our appointment had been set up years in advance, and
that neither of us had enough power to hurry it, or break it.
"Don't knock yourself out trying to leave," she said. "That's as
useless as my trying to keep you here. Something besides your will will
release you from here, and something besides my will will keep you here."
Somehow her confidence had not only mellowed her, but had given her a
great command over words. Her statements were compelling and crystal clear.
Don Juan had always said that I was a trusting soul when it came to words.
As she talked I found myself thinking that she was not really as threatening
as I thought. She no longer projected the feeling of having a chip on her
shoulder. My reason was almost at ease but another part of me was not. All
the muscles of my body were like tense wires, and yet I had to admit to
myself that although she scared me out of my wits I found her most
appealing. She watched me.
"I'll show you how useless it is to try to leave," she said, jumping
out of bed. "I'm going to help you. What do you need?"
She observed me with a gleam in her eyes. Her small white teeth gave
her smile a devilish touch. Her chubby face was strangely smooth and fairly
free of wrinkles. Two deep lines running from the sides of her nose to the
corners of her mouth gave her face the appearance of maturity, but not age.
In standing up from the bed she casually let her shawl fall straight down,
uncovering her full breasts. She did not bother to cover herself. Instead
she swelled up her chest and lifted her breasts.
"Oh, you've noticed, eh?" she said, and rocked her body from side to
side as if pleased with herself. "I always keep my hair tied behind my head.
The Nagual told me to do so. The pull makes my face younger."
I had been sure that she was going to talk about her breasts. Her shift
was a surprise to me.
"I don't mean that the pull on my hair is going to make me look
younger," she went on with a charming smile. "The pull on my hair makes me
younger."
"How is that possible?" I asked.
She answered me with a question. She wanted to know if I had correctly
understood don Juan when he said that anything was possible if one wants it
with unbending intent. I was after a more precise explanation. I wanted to
know what else she did besides tying her hair, in order to look so young.
She said that she lay in her bed and emptied herself of any thoughts and
feelings and then let the lines of her floor pull her wrinkles away. I
pressed her for more details: any feelings, sensations, perceptions that she
had experienced while lying on her bed. She insisted that she felt nothing,
that she did not know how the lines in her floor worked, and that she only
knew not to let her thoughts interfere.
She placed her hands on my chest and shoved me very gently. It seemed
to be a gesture to show that she had had enough of my questions. We walked
outside, through the back door. I told her that I needed a long stick. She
went directly to a pile of firewood, but there were no long sticks. I asked
her if she could get me a couple of nails in order to join together two
pieces of firewood. We looked unsuccessfully all over the house for nails.
As a final resort I had to dislodge the longest stick I could find in the
chicken coop that Pablito had built in the back. The stick, although it was
a bit flimsy, seemed suited for my purpose.
Dona Soledad had not smiled or joked during our search. She seemed to
be utterly absorbed in her task of helping me. Her concentration was so
intense that I had the feeling she was wishing me to succeed.
I walked to my car, armed with the long stick and a shorter one from
the pile of firewood. Dona Soledad stood by the front door.
I began to tease the dog with the short stick in my right hand and at
the same time I tried to release the safety lock with the long one in my
other hand. The dog nearly bit my right hand and made me drop the short
stick. The rage and power of the enormous beast were so immense that I
nearly lost the long one too. The dog was about to bite it in two when dona
Soledad came to my aid; pounding on the back window she drew the dog's
attention and he let go of it.
Encouraged by her distracting maneuver I dove, headfirst, and slid
across the length of the front seat and managed to release the safety lock.
I tried to pull back immediately, but the dog charged toward me with all his
might and actually thrust his massive shoulders and front paws over the
front seat, before I had time to back out. I felt his paws on my shoulder. I
cringed. I knew that he was going to maul me. The dog lowered his head to go
in for the kill, but instead of biting me he hit the steering wheel. I
scurried out and in one move climbed over the hood and onto the roof. I had
goose bumps all over my body.
I opened the right-hand door. I asked dona Soledad to hand me the long
stick and with it I pushed the lever to release the backrest from its
straight position. I conceived that if I teased the dog he would ram it
forward, allowing himself room to get out of the car. But he did not move.
He bit furiously on the stick instead.
At that moment dona Soledad jumped onto the roof and lay next to me.
She wanted to help me tease the dog. I told her that she could not stay on
the roof because when the dog came out I was going to get in the car and
drive away. I thanked her for her help and said that she should go back in
the house. She shrugged her shoulders, jumped down and went back to the
door. I pushed down the release again and with my cap I teased the dog. I
snapped it around his eyes, in front of his muzzle. The dog's fury was
beyond anything I had seen but he would not leave the seat. Finally his
massive jaws jerked the stick out of my grip. I climbed down to retrieve it
from underneath the car. Suddenly I heard dona Soledad screaming.
"Watch out! He's getting out! "
I glanced up at the car. The dog was squeezing himself over the seat.
He had gotten his hind paws caught in the steering wheel; except for that,
he was almost out.
I dashed to the house and got inside just in time to avoid being run
down by that animal. His momentum was so powerful that he rammed against the
door.
As she secured the door with its iron bar dona Soledad said in a
cackling voice, "I told you it was useless."
She cleared her throat and turned to look at me.
"Can you tie the dog with a rope?" I asked.
I was sure that she would give me a meaningless answer, but to my
amazement she said that we should try everything, even luring the dog into
the house and trapping him there.
Her idea appealed to me. I carefully opened the front door. The dog was
no longer there. I ventured out a bit more. There was no sight of him. My
hope was that the dog had gone back to his corral. I was going to wait
another instant before I made a dash for my car, when I heard a deep growl
and saw the massive head of the beast inside my car. He had crawled back
onto the front seat.
Dona Soledad was right; it was useless to try. A wave of sadness
enveloped me. Somehow I knew my end was near. In a fit of sheer desperation
I told dona Soledad that I was going to get a knife from the kitchen and
kill the dog, or be killed by him, and I would have done that had it not
been that there was not a single metal object in the entire house.
"Didn't the Nagual teach you to accept your fate?" dona Soledad asked
as she trailed behind me. "That one out there is no ordinary dog. That dog
has power. He is a warrior. He will do what he has to do. Even kill you."
I had a moment of uncontrollable frustration and grabbed her by the
shoulders and growled. She did not seem surprised or affected by my sudden
outburst. She turned her back to me and dropped her shawl to the floor. Her
back was very strong and beautiful. I had an irrepressible urge to hit her,
but I ran my hand across her shoulders instead. Her skin was soft and
smooth. Her arms and shoulders were muscular without being big. She seemed
to have a minimal layer of fat that rounded off her muscles and gave her
upper body the appearance of smoothness, and yet when I pushed on any part
of it with the tips of my fingers I could feel the hardness of unseen
muscles below the smooth surface. I did not want to look at her breasts.
She walked to a roofed, open area in back of the house that served as a
kitchen. I followed her. She sat down on a bench and calmly washed her feet
in a pail. While she was putting on her sandals, I went with great
trepidation into a new outhouse that had been built in the back. She was
standing by the door when I came out.
"You like to talk," she said casually, leading me into her room. "There
is no hurry. Now we can talk forever."
She picked up my writing pad from the top of her chest of drawers,
where she must have placed it herself, and handed it to me with exaggerated
care. Then she pulled up her bedspread and folded it neatly and put it on
top of the same chest of drawers. I noticed then that the two chests were
the color of the walls, yellowish white, and the bed without the spread was
pinkish red, more or less the color of the floor. The bedspread, on the
other hand, was dark brown, like the wood of the ceiling and the wood panels
of the windows.
"Let's talk," she said, sitting comfortably on the bed after taking off
her sandals.
She placed her knees against her naked breasts. She looked like a young
girl. Her aggressive and commandeering manner had subdued and changed into
charm. At that moment she was the antithesis of what she had been earlier. I
had to laugh at the way she was urging me to write. She reminded me of don
Juan.
"Now we have time," she said. "The wind has changed. Didn't you notice
it?"
I had. She said that the new direction of the wind was her own
beneficial direction and thus the wind had turned into her helper.
"What do you know about the wind, dona Soledad?" I asked as I calmly
sat down on the foot of her bed.
"Only what the Nagual taught me," she said. "Each one of us, women that
is, has a peculiar direction, a particular wind. Men don't. I am the north
wind; when it blows I am different. The Nagual said that a warrior can use
her particular wind for whatever she wants. I used it to trim my body and
remake it. Look at me! I am the north wind. Feel me when I come through the
window."
There was a strong wind blowing through the window, which was
strategically placed to face the north.
"Why do you think men don't have a wind?" I asked.
She thought for a moment and then replied that the Nagual had never
mentioned why.
"You wanted to know who made this floor," she said, wrapping her
blanket around her shoulders. "I made it myself. It took me four years to
put it down. Now this floor is like myself."
As she spoke I noticed that the converging lines in the floor were
oriented to originate from the north. The room, however, was not perfectly
aligned with the cardinal points; thus her bed was at odd angles with the
walls and so were the lines in the clay slabs.
"Why did you make the floor red, dona Soledad?"
"That's my color. I am red, like red dirt. I got the red clay in the
mountains around here. The Nagual told me where to look and he also helped
me carry it, and so did everyone else. They all helped me."
"How did you fire the clay?"
"The Nagual made me dig a pit. We filled it with firewood and then
stacked up the clay slabs with flat pieces of rock in between them. I closed
the pit with a lid of dirt and wire and set the wood on fire. It burned for
days."
"How did you keep the slabs from warping?"
"I didn't. The wind did that, the north wind that blew while the fire
was on. The Nagual showed me how to dig the pit so it would face the north
and the north wind. He also made me leave four holes for the north wind to
blow into the pit. Then he made me leave one hole in the center of the lid
to let the smoke out. The wind made the wood burn for days; after the pit
was cold again I opened it and began to polish and even out the slabs. It
took me over a year to make enough slabs to finish my floor."
"How did you figure out the design?"
"The wind taught me that. When I made my floor the Nagual had already
taught me not to resist the wind. He had showed me how to give in to my wind
and let it guide me. It took him a long time to do that, years and years. I
was a very difficult, silly old woman at first; he told me that himself and
he was right. But I learned very fast. Perhaps because I'm old and no longer
have anything to lose. In the beginning, what made it even more difficult
for me was the fear I had. The mere presence of the Nagual made me stutter
and faint. The Nagual had the same effect on everyone else. It was his fate
to be so fearsome."
She stopped talking and stared at me.
"The Nagual is not human," she said.
"What makes you say that?"
"The Nagual is a devil from who knows what time."
Her statements chilled me. I felt my heart pounding. She certainly
could not have found a better audience. I was intrigued to no end. I begged
her to explain what she meant by that.
"His touch changed people," she said. "You know that. He changed your
body. In your case, you didn't even know that he was doing that. But he got
into your old body. He put something in it. He did the same with me. He left
something in me and that something took over. Only a devil can do that. Now
I am the north wind and I fear nothing, and no one. But before he changed me
I was a weak, ugly old woman who would faint at the mere mention of his
name. Pablito, of course, was no help to me because he feared the Nagual
more than death itself.
"One day the Nagual and Genaro came to the house when I was alone. I
heard them by the door, like prowling jaguars. I crossed myself; to me they
were two demons, but I came out to see what I could do for them. They were
hungry and I gladly fixed food for them. I had some thick bowls made out of
gourd and I gave each man a bowl of soup. The Nagual didn't seem to
appreciate the food; he didn't want to eat food prepared by such a weak
woman and pretended to be clumsy and knocked the bowl off the table with a
sweep of his arm. But the bowl, instead of turning over and spilling all
over the floor, slid with the force of the Nagual's blow and fell on my
foot, without spilling a drop. The bowl actually landed on my foot and
stayed there until I bent over and picked it up. I set it up on the table in
front of him and told him that even though I was a weak woman and had always
feared him, my food had good feelings.
"From that very moment the Nagual changed toward me. The fact that the
bowl of soup fell on my foot and didn't spill proved to him that power had
pointed me out to him. I didn't know that at the time and I thought that he
changed toward me because he felt ashamed of having refused my food. I
thought nothing of his change. I still was petrified and couldn't even look
him in the eye. But he began to take more and more notice of me. He even
brought me gifts: a shawl, a dress, a comb and other things. That made me
feel terrible. I was ashamed because I thought that he was a man looking for
a woman. The Nagual had young girls, what would he want with an old woman
like me? At first I didn't want to wear or even consider looking at his
gifts, but Pablito prevailed on me and I began to wear them. I also began to
be even more afraid of him and didn't want to be alone with him. I knew that
he was a devilish man. I knew what he had done to his woman."
I felt compelled to interrupt her. I told her that I had never known of
a woman in don Juan's life.
"You know who I mean," she said.
"Believe me, dona Soledad, I don't."
"Don't give me that. You know that I'm talking about la Gorda."
The only "la Gorda" I knew of was Pablito's sister, an enormously fat
girl nicknamed Gorda, Fatso. I had had the feeling, although no one ever
talked about it, that she was not really dona Soledad's daughter. I did not
want to press her for any more information. I suddenly remembered that the
fat girl had disappeared from the house and nobody could or dared to tell me
what had happened to her.
"One day I was alone in the front of the house," dona Soledad went on.
"I was combing my hair in the sun with the comb that the Nagual had given
me; I didn't realize that he had arrived and was standing behind me. All of
a sudden I felt his hands grabbing me by the chin. I heard him say very
softly that I shouldn't move because my neck might break. He twisted my head
to the left. Not all the way but a bit. I became very frightened and
screamed and tried to wriggle out of his grip, but he held my head firmly
for a long, long time.
"When he let go of my chin, I fainted. I don't remember what happened
then. When I woke up I was lying on the ground, right here where I'm sitting
now. The Nagual was gone. I was so ashamed that I didn't want to see anyone,
especially la Gorda. For a long time I even thought that the Nagual had
never twisted my neck and I had had a nightmare."
She stopped. I waited for an explanation of what had happened. She
seemed distracted, pensive perhaps.
"What exactly happened, dona Soledad?" I asked, incapable of containing
myself. "Did he do something to you?"
"Yes. He twisted my neck in order to change the direction of my eyes,"
she said and laughed loudly at my look of surprise.
"I mean, did he. . . ?"
"Yes. He changed my direction," she went on, oblivious to my probes.
"He did that to you and to all the others."
"That's true. He did that to me. But why do you think he did that?"
"He had to. That is the most important thing to do."
She was referring to a peculiar act that don Juan had deemed absolutely
necessary. I had never talked about it with anyone. In fact, I had almost
forgotten about it. At the beginning of my apprenticeship, he once built two
small fires in the mountains of northern Mexico. They were perhaps twenty
feet apart. He made me stand another twenty feet away from them, holding my
body, especially my head, in a most relaxed and natural position. He then
made me face one fire, and coming from behind me, he twisted my neck to the
left, and aligned my eyes, but not my shoulders, with the other fire. He
held my head in that position for hours, until the fire was extinguished.
The new direction was the southeast, or rather he had aligned the second
fire in a southeasterly direction. I had understood the whole affair as one
of don Juan's inscrutable peculiarities, one of his nonsensical rites.
"The Nagual said that all of us throughout our lives develop one
direction to look," she went on. "That becomes the direction of the eyes of
the spirit. Through the years that direction becomes overused, and weak and
unpleasant, and since we are bound to that particular direction we become
weak and unpleasant ourselves. The day the Nagual twisted my neck and held
it until I fainted out of fear, he gave me a new direction."
"What direction did he give you?"
"Why do you ask that?" she said with unnecessary force. "Do you think
that perhaps the Nagual gave me a different direction?"
"I can tell you the direction that he gave me," I said.
"Never mind," she snapped. "He told me that himself."
She seemed agitated. She changed position and lay on her stomach. My
back hurt from writing. I asked her if I could sit on her floor and use the
bed as a table. She stood up and handed me the folded bedspread to use as a
cushion.
"What else did the Nagual do to you?" I asked.
"After changing my direction the Nagual really began to talk to me
about power," she said, lying down again. "He mentioned things in a casual
way at first, because he didn't know exactly what to do with me. One day he
took me for a short walking trip in the sierras. Then another day he took me
on a bus to his homeland in the desert. Little by little I became accustomed
to going away with him."
"Did he ever give you power plants?"
"He gave me Mescalito, once when we were in the desert. But since I was
an empty woman Mescalito refused me. I had a horrid encounter with him. It
was then that the Nagual knew that he ought to acquaint me with the wind
instead. That was, of course, after he got an omen. He had said, over and
over that day, that although he was a sorcerer that had learned to see, if
he didn't get an omen he had no way of knowing which way to go. He had
already waited for days for a certain indication about me. But power didn't
want to give it. In desperation, I suppose, he introduced me to his guaje,
and I saw Mescalito."
I interrupted her. Her use of the word "guaje," gourd, was confusing to
me. Examined in the context of what she was telling me, the word had no
meaning. I thought that perhaps she was speaking metaphorically, or that
gourd was a euphemism.
"What is a guaje, dona Soledad?"
There was a look of surprise in her eyes. She paused before answering.
"Mescalito is the Nagual's guaje," she finally said.
Her answer was even more confusing. I felt mortified by the fact that
she really seemed concerned with making sense to me. When I asked her to
explain further, she insisted that I knew everything myself. That was don
Juan's favorite stratagem to foil my probes. I said to her that don Juan had
told me that Mescalito was a deity, or force contained in the peyote
buttons. To say that Mescalito was his gourd made absolutely no sense.
"The Nagual can acquaint you with anything through his gourd," she said
after a pause. "That is the key to his power. Anyone can give you peyote,
but only a sorcerer, through his gourd, can acquaint you with Mescalito."
She stopped talking and fixed her eyes on me. Her look was ferocious.
"Why do you have to make me repeat what you already know?" she asked in
an angry tone.
I was completely taken aback by her sudden shift. A moment before she
had been almost sweet.
"Never mind my changes of mood," she said, smiling again. "I'm the
north wind. I'm very impatient. All my life I never dared to speak my mind.
Now I fear no one. I say what I feel. To meet with me you have to be
strong."
She slid closer to me on her stomach.
"Well, the Nagual acquainted me with the Mescalito that came out of his
gourd," she went on. "But he couldn't guess what would happen to me. He
expected something like your own meeting or Eligio's meeting with Mescalito.
In both cases he was at a loss and let his gourd decide what to do next. In
both cases his gourd helped him. With me it was different; Mescalito told
him never to bring me around. The Nagual and I left that place in a great
hurry. We went north instead of coming home. We took a bus to go to
Mexicali, but we got out in the middle of the desert. It was very late. The
sun was setting behind the mountains. The Nagual wanted to cross the road
and go south on foot. We were waiting for some speeding cars to go by, when
suddenly he tapped my shoulder and pointed toward the road ahead of us. I
saw a spiral of dust. A gust of wind was raising dust on the side of the
road. We watched it move toward us. The Nagual ran across the road and the
wind enveloped me. It actually made me spin very gently and then it
vanished. That was the omen the Nagual was waiting for. From then on we went
to the mountains or the desert for the purpose of seeking the wind. The wind
didn't like me at first, because I was my old self. So the Nagual endeavored
to change me. He first made me build this room and this floor. Then he made
me wear new clothes and sleep on a mattress instead of a straw mat. He made
me wear shoes, and have drawers full of clothes. He forced me to walk
hundreds of miles and taught me to be quiet. I learned very fast. He also
made me do strange things for no reason at all.
"One day, while we were in the mountains of his homeland, I listened to
the wind for the first time. It came directly to my womb. I was lying on top
of a flat rock and the wind twirled around me. I had already seen it that
day whirling around the bushes, but this time it came over me and stopped.
It felt like a bird that had landed on my stomach. The Nagual had made me
take off all my clothes; I was stark naked but I was not cold because the
wind was warming me up."
"Were you afraid, dona Soledad?"
"Afraid? I was petrified. The wind was alive; it licked me from my head
to my toes. And then it got inside my whole body. I was like a balloon, and
the wind came out of my ears and my mouth and other parts I don't want to
mention. I thought I was going to die, and I would've run away had it not
been that the Nagual held me to the rock. He spoke to me in my ear and
calmed me down. I lay quietly and let the wind do whatever it wanted with
me. It was then that it told me what to do."
"What to do with what?"
"With my life, my things, my room, my feelings. It was not clear at
first. I thought it was me thinking. The Nagual said that all of us do that.
When we are quiet, though, we realize that it is something else telling us
things."
"Did you hear a voice?"
"No. The wind moves inside the body of a woman. The Nagual says that
that is so because women have wombs. Once it's inside the womb the wind
simply picks you up and tells you to do things. The more quiet and relaxed
the woman is the better the results. You may say that all of a sudden the
woman finds herself doing things that she had no idea how to do.
"From that day on the wind came to me all the time. It spoke to me in
my womb and told me everything I wanted to know. The Nagual saw from the
beginning that I was the north wind. Other winds never spoke to me like
that, although I had learned to distinguish them."
"How many kinds of winds are there?"
"There are four winds, like there are four directions. That's, of
course, for sorcerers and for whatever sorcerers do. Four is a power number
for them. The first wind is the breeze, the morning. It brings hope and
brightness; it is the herald of the day. It comes and goes and gets into
everything. Sometimes it is mild and unnoticeable; other times it is nagging
and bothersome.
"Another wind is the hard wind, either hot or cold or both. A midday
wind. Blasting full of energy but also full of blindness. It breaks through
doors and brings down walls. A sorcerer must be terribly strong to tackle
the hard wind.
"Then there is the cold wind of the afternoon. Sad and trying. A wind
that would never leave you in peace. It will chill you and make you cry. The
Nagual said that there is such depth to it, though, that it is more than
worthwhile to seek it.
"And at last there is the hot wind. It warms and protects and envelops
everything. It is a night wind for sorcerers. Its power goes together with
the darkness.
"Those are the four winds. They are also associated with the four
directions. The breeze is the east. The cold wind is the west. The hot one
is the south. The hard wind is the north.
"The four winds also have personalities. The breeze is gay and sleek
and shifty. The cold wind is moody and melancholy and always pensive. The
hot wind is happy and abandoned and bouncy. The hard wind is energetic and
commandeering and impatient.
"The Nagual told me that the four winds are women. That is why female
warriors seek them. Winds and women are alike. That is also the reason why
women are better than men. I would say that women learn faster if they cling
to their specific wind."
"How can a woman know what her specific wind is?"
"If the woman quiets down and is not talking to herself, her wind will
pick her up, just like that."
She made a gesture of grabbing.
"Does she have to lie naked?"
"That helps. Especially if she is shy. I was a fat old woman. I had
never taken off my clothes in my life. I slept in them and when I took a
bath I always had my slip on. For me to show my fat body to the wind was
like dying. The Nagual knew that and played it for all it was worth. He knew
of the friendship of women and the wind, but he introduced me to Mescalito
because he was baffled by me.
"After turning my head that first terrible day, the Nagual found
himself with me on his hands. He told me that he had no idea what to do with
me. But one thing was for sure, he didn't want a fat old woman snooping
around his world. The Nagual said that he felt about me the way he felt
about you. Baffled. Both of us shouldn't be here. You're not an Indian and
I'm an old cow. We are both useless if you come right down to it. And look
at us. Something must have happened.
"A woman, of course, is much more supple than a man. A woman changes
very easily with the power of a sorcerer. Especially with the power of a
sorcerer like the Nagual. A male apprentice, according to the Nagual, is
extremely difficult. For example, you yourself haven't changed as much as la
Gorda, and she started her apprenticeship way after you did. A woman is
softer and more gentle, and above all a woman is like a gourd; she receives.
But somehow a man commands more power. The Nagual never agreed with that,
though. He believed that women are unequaled, tops. He also believed that I
felt men were better only because I am an empty woman. He must be right. I
have been empty for so long that I can't remember what it feels like to be
complete. The Nagual said that if I ever become complete I will change my
feelings about it. But if he was right his Gorda would have done as well as
Eligio, and as you know, she hasn't."
I could not follow the flow of her narrative because of her unstated
assumption that I knew what she was referring to. In this case I had no idea
what Eligio or la Gorda had done.
"In what way was la Gorda different from Eligio?" I asked.
She looked at me for a moment as if measuring something in me. Then she
sat up with her knees against her chest.
"The Nagual told me everything," she said briskly. "The Nagual had no
secrets from me. Eligio was the best; that's why he is not in the world now.
He didn't return. In fact he was so good that he didn't have to jump from a
precipice when his apprenticeship was over. He was like Genaro; one day
while he was working in the field something came to him and took him away.
He knew how to let go."
I felt like asking her if I had really jumped into the abyss. I
deliberated for a moment before going ahead with my question. After all I
had come to see Pablito and Nestor to clarify that point. Any information I
could get on the topic from anyone involved in don Juan's world was indeed a
bonus tome.
She laughed at my question, as I had anticipated.
"You mean you don't know what you yourself did?" she asked.
"It's too farfetched to be real," I said.
"That is the Nagual's world for sure. Not a thing in it is real. He
himself told me not to believe anything. But still the male apprentices have
to jump. Unless they are truly magnificent, like Eligio.
"The Nagual took us, me and la Gorda, to that mountain and made us look
down to the bottom of it. There he showed us the kind of flying Nagual he
was. But only la Gorda could follow him. She also wanted to jump into the
abyss. The Nagual told her that that was useless. He said female warriors
have to do things more painful and more difficult than that. He also told us
that the jump was only for the four of you. And that is what happened, the
four of you jumped."
She had said that the four of us had jumped, but I only knew of Pablito
and myself having done that. In light of her statements I figured that don
Juan and don Genaro must have followed us. That did not seem odd to me; it
was rather pleasing and touching.
"What are you talking about?" she asked after I had voiced my thoughts.
"I meant you and the three apprentices of Genaro. You, Pablito and Nestor
jumped on the same day."
"Who is the other apprentice of don Genaro? I know only Pablito and
Nestor?"
"You mean that you didn't know that Benigno was Genaro's apprentice?"
"No, I didn't."
"He was Genaro's oldest apprentice. He jumped before you did and he
jumped by himself."
Benigno was one of five Indian youths I had once found while roaming in
the Sonoran Desert with don Juan. They were in search of power objects. Don
Juan told me that all of them were apprentices of sorcery. I struck up a
peculiar friendship with Benigno in the few times I had seen him after that
day. He was from southern Mexico. I liked him very much. For some unknown
reason he seemed to delight himself by creating a tantalizing mystery about
his personal life. I could never find out who he was or what he did. Every
time I talked to him he baffled me with the disarming candor with which he
evaded my probes. Once don Juan volunteered some information about Benigno
and said that he was very fortunate in having found a teacher and a
benefactor. I took don Juan's statements as a casual remark that meant
nothing. Dona Soledad had clarified a ten-year-old mystery for me.
"Why do you think don Juan never told me anything about Benigno?"
"Who knows? He must've had a reason. The Nagual never did anything
thoughtlessly."
I had to prop my aching back against her bed before resuming writing.
"Whatever happened to Benigno?"
"He's doing fine. He's perhaps better off than anyone else. You'll see
him. He's with Pablito and Nestor. Right now they're inseparable. Genaro's
brand is on them. The same thing happened to the girls; they're inseparable
because the Nagual's brand is on them."
I had to interrupt her again and ask her to explain what girls she was
talking about.
"My girls," she said.
"Your daughters? I mean Pablito's sisters?"
"They are not Pablito's sisters. They are the Nagual's apprentices."
Her disclosure shocked me. Ever since I had met Pablito, years before,
I had been led to believe that the four girls who lived in his house were
his sisters. Don Juan himself had told me so. I had a sudden relapse of the
feeling of despair I had experienced all afternoon. Dona Soledad was not to
be trusted; she was engineering something. I was sure that don Juan could
not under any conditions have misled me so grossly.
Dona Soledad examined me with overt curiosity.
"The wind just told me that you don't believe what I'm telling you,"
she said, and laughed.
"The wind is right," I said dryly.
"The girls that you've seen over the years are the Nagual's. They were
his apprentices. Now that the Nagual is gone they are the Nagual himself.
But they are also my girls. Mine!"
"You mean that you're not Pablito's mother and they are really your
daughters?"
"I mean that they are mine. The Nagual gave them to me for safekeeping.
You are always wrong because you rely on words to explain everything. Since
I am Pablito's mother and you heard that they were my girls, you figured out
that they must be brother and sisters. The girls are my true babies.
Pablito, although he's the child that came out of my womb, is my mortal
enemy."
My reaction to her statements was a mixture of revulsion and anger. I
thought that she was not only an aberrated woman, but a dangerous one.
Somehow, part of me had known that since the moment I had arrived.
She watched me for a long time. To avoid looking at her I sat down on
the bedspread again.
"The Nagual warned me about your weirdness," she said suddenly, "but I
couldn't understand what he meant. Now I know. He told me to be careful and
not to anger you because you're violent. I'm sorry I was not as careful as I
should've been. He also said that as long as you can write you could go to
hell itself and not even feel it. I haven't bothered you about that. Then he
told me that you're suspicious because words entangle you. I haven't
bothered you there, either. I've been talking my head off, trying not to
entangle you."
There was a silent accusation in her tone. I felt somehow embarrassed
at being annoyed with her.
"What you're telling me is very hard to believe," I said. "Either you
or don Juan has lied to me terribly."
"Neither of us has lied. You understand only what you want to. The
Nagual said that that is a condition of your emptiness.
"The girls are the Nagual's children, just like you and Eligio are his
children. He made six children, four women and two men. Genaro made three
men. There are nine altogether. One of them, Eligio, already made it, so now
it is up to the eight of you to try."
"Where did Eligio go?"
"He went to join the Nagual and Genaro."
"And where did the Nagual and Genaro go?"
"You know where they went. You're just kidding me, aren't you?"
"But that's the point, dona Soledad. I'm not kidding you."
"Then I will tell you. I can't deny you anything. The Nagual and Genaro
went back to the same place they came from, to the other world. When their
time was up they simply stepped out into the darkness out there, and since
they did not want to come back, the darkness of the night swallowed them up"
I felt it was useless to probe her any further. I was ready to change
the subject, but she spoke first.
"You caught a glimpse of the other world when you jumped," she went on.
"But maybe the jump has confused you. Too bad. There is nothing that anyone
can do about it. It is your fate to be a man. Women are better than men in
that sense. They don't have to jump into an abyss. Women have their own
ways. They have their own abyss. Women menstruate. The Nagual told me that
that was the door for them. During their period they become something else.
I know that that was the time when he taught my girls. It was too late for
me; I'm too old so I really don't know what that door looks like. But the
Nagual insisted that the girls pay attention to everything that happens to
them during that time. He would take them during those days into the
mountains and stay with them there until they would see the crack between
the worlds.
"The Nagual, since he had no qualms or fear about doing anything,
pushed them without mercy so they could find out for themselves that there
is a crack in women, a crack that they disguise very well. During their
period, no matter how well-made the disguise is, it falls away and women are
bare. The Nagual pushed my girls until they were half-dead to open that
crack. They did it. He made them do it, but it took them years."
"How did they become apprentices?"
"Lidia was his first apprentice. He found her one morning when he had
stopped at a disheveled hut in the mountains. The Nagual told me that there
was no one in sight and yet there had been omens calling him to that house
since early morning. The breeze had bothered him terribly. He said that he
couldn't even open his eyes every time he tried to walk away from that area.
So when he found the house he knew that something was there. He looked under
a pile of straw and twigs and found a girl. She was very ill. She could
hardly talk, but still she told him that she didn't need anyone to help her.
She was going to keep on sleeping there and if she didn't wake up anymore no
one would lose a thing. The Nagual liked her spirit and talked to her in her
language. He told her that he was going to cure her and take care of her
until she was strong again. She refused. She was an Indian who had known
only hardships and pain. She told the Nagual that she had already taken all
the medicine that her parents had given her and nothing helped.
"The more she talked the more the Nagual understood that the omen had
pointed her out to him in a most peculiar way. The omen was more like a
command.
"The Nagual picked the girl up and put her on his shoulders, like a
child, and brought her to Genaro's place. Genaro made medicine for her. She
couldn't open her eyes anymore. The lids were stuck together. They were
swollen and had a yellowish crud on them. They were festering. The Nagual
tended her until she was well. He hired me to look after her and cook her
meals. I helped her to get well with my food. She is my first baby. When she
was well, and that took nearly a year, the Nagual wanted to return her to
her parents, but the girl refused to go and went with him instead.
"A short time after he had found Lidia, while she was still sick and in
my care, the Nagual found you. You were brought to him by a man he had never
seen before in his life. The Nagual saw that the man's death was hovering
above his head, and he found it very odd that the man would point you out to
him at such a time. You made the Nagual laugh and right away the Nagual set
a test for you. He didn't take you, he told you to come and find him. He has
tested you ever since like he has tested no one else. He said that that was
your path.
"For three years he had only two apprentices, Lidia and you. Then one
day while he was visiting his friend Vicente, a curer from the north, some
people brought in a crazy girl, a girl who did nothing else but cry. The
people took the Nagual for Vicente and placed the girl in his hands. The
Nagual told me that the girl ran to him and clung to him as if she knew him.
The Nagual told her parents that they had to leave her with him. They were
worried about the cost but the Nagual assured them that it would be free. I
suppose that the girl was such a pain in the ass to them that they didn't
mind getting rid of her.
"The Nagual brought her to me. That was hell! She was truly crazy. That
was Josefina. It took the Nagual years to cure her. But even to this day
she's crazier than a bat. She was, of course, crazy about the Nagual and
there was a terrible fight between Lidia and Josefina. They hated each
other. But I liked them both. But the Nagual, when he saw that they couldn't
get along, became very firm with them. As you know the Nagual can't get mad
at anyone. So he scared them half to death. One day Lidia got mad and left.
She had decided to find herself a young husband. On the road she found a
tiny chicken. It had just been hatched and was lost in the middle of the
road. Lidia picked it up, and since she was in a deserted area with no
houses around, she figured that the chicken belonged to no one. She put it
inside her blouse, in between her breasts to keep it warm. Lidia told me
that she ran and in doing so the little chicken began to move to her side.
She tried to bring him back to the front but she couldn't catch him. The
chicken ran very fast around her sides and her back, inside her blouse. The
chicken's feet tickled her at first and then they drove her crazy. When she
realized that she couldn't get him out, she came back to me, screaming out
of her mind, and told me to get the damn thing out of her blouse. I
undressed her but that was to no avail. There was no chicken at all, and yet
she still felt its feet on her skin going around and around.
"The Nagual came over then and told her that only when she let go of
her old self would the chicken stop running. Lidia was crazy for three days
and three nights. The Nagual told me to tie her up. I fed her and cleaned
her and gave her water. On the fourth day she became very peaceful and calm.
I untied her and she put on her clothes and when she was dressed again, as
she had been the day she ran away, the little chicken came out. She took him
in her hand and petted and thanked him and returned him to the place where
she had found him. I walked with her part of the way.
"From that time on Lidia never bothered anyone. She accepted her fate.
The Nagual is her fate; without him she would have been dead. So what was
the point of trying to refuse or mold things which can only be accepted?
"Josefina went off next. She was already afraid of what happened to
Lidia but she soon forgot about it. One Sunday afternoon, when she was
coming back to the house, a dry leaf got stuck in the threads of her shawl.
Her shawl was loosely woven. She tried to pick out the small leaf, but she
was afraid of ruining her shawl. So when she came into the house she
immediately tried to loosen it, but there was no way, it was stuck.
Josefina, in a fit of anger, clutched the shawl and the leaf and crumbled it
inside her hand. She figured that small pieces would be easier to pick out.
I heard a maddening scream and Josefina fell to the ground. I ran to her and
found that she couldn't open her hand. The leaf had cut her hand to shreds
as if it were pieces of a razor blade. Lidia and I helped her and nursed her
for seven days. Josefina was more stubborn than anyone else. She nearly
died. At the end she managed to open her hand, but only after she had in her
own mind resolved to drop her old ways. She still gets pains in her body
from time to time, especially in her hand, due to the ugly disposition that
still returns to her. The Nagual told both of them that they shouldn't count
on their victory because it's a lifetime struggle that each of us wages
against our old selves.
"Lidia and Josefina never fought again. I don't think they like each
other, but they certainly get along. I love those two the most. They have
been with me all these years. I know that they love me too."
"What about the other two girls? Where do they fit?"
"A year later Elena came; she is la Gorda. She was by far in the worst
condition you could imagine. She weighed two hundred and twenty pounds. She
was a desperate woman. Pablito had given her shelter in his shop. She did
laundry and ironing to support herself. The Nagual came one night to get
Pablito and found the fat girl working while a circle of moths flew over her
head. He said that the moths had made a perfect circle for him to watch. He
saw that the woman was near the end of her life, yet the moths must have had
all the confidence in the world, in order for them to give him such an omen.
The Nagual acted fast and took her with him.
"She did fine for a while, but the bad habits that she had learned were
too deep and she couldn't give them up. So one day the Nagual sent for the
wind to help her. It was a matter of helping her or finishing her off. The
wind began to blow on her until it drove her out of the house; she was alone
that day and no one saw what was happening. The wind pushed her over hills
and into ravines until she fell into a ditch, a hole in the ground like a
grave. The wind kept her there for days. When the Nagual finally found her
she had managed to stop the wind, but she was too weak to walk."
"How did the girls manage to stop whatever was acting upon them?"
"Well, in the first place what was acting upon them was the gourd that
the Nagual carried tied to his belt."
"And what is in the gourd?"
"The allies that the Nagual carries with him. He said that the ally is
funneled through his gourd. Don't ask me any more because I know nothing
more about the ally. All I can tell you is that the Nagual commands two
allies and makes them help him. In the case of my girls the ally backed down
when they were ready to change. For them, of course, it was a case of either
change or death. But that's the case with all of us, one way or another. And
la Gorda changed more than anyone else. She was empty, in fact more empty
than I, but she worked her spirit until she became power itself. I don't
like her. I'm afraid of her. She knows me. She gets inside me and my
feelings and that bothers me. But no one can do anything to her because she
never lets her guard down. She doesn't hate me, but she thinks I am an evil
woman. She may be right. I think that she knows me too well, and I'm not as
impeccable as I want to be; but the Nagual told me not to worry about my
feelings toward her. She is like Eligio; the world no longer touches her."
"What did the Nagual do to her that was so special?"
"He taught her things he never taught anyone else. He never pampered
her or anything like that. He trusted her. She knows everything about
everybody. The Nagual also told me everything except things about her. Maybe
that's why I don't like her. The Nagual told her to be my jailer. Wherever I
go I find her. She knows whatever I do. Right now, for instance, I wouldn't
be surprised if she shows up."
"Do you think she would?"
"I doubt it. Tonight, the wind is with me."
"What is she supposed to do? Does she have a special task?"
"I've told you enough about her. I'm afraid that if I keep on talking
about her she will notice me from wherever she is, and I don't want that to
happen."
"Tell me, then, about the others."
"Some years after he found la Gorda, the Nagual found Eligio. He told
me that he had gone with you to his homeland. Eligio came to see you because
he was curious about you. The Nagual didn't notice him. He had known him
since he was a kid. But one morning, as the Nagual walked to the house where
you were waiting for him, he bumped into Eligio on the road. They walked
together for a short distance and then a dried piece of cholla got stuck on
the tip of Eligio's left shoe. He tried to kick it loose but its thorns were
like nails; they had gone deep into the sole of the shoe. The Nagual said
that Eligio pointed up to the sky with his finger and shook his foot and the
cholla came off like a bullet and went up into the air. Eligio thought it
was a big joke and laughed, but the Nagual knew that he had power, although
Eligio himself didn't even suspect it. That is why, with no trouble at all,
he became the perfect, impeccable warrior.
"It was my good fortune that I got to know him. The Nagual thought that
both of us were alike in one thing. Once we hook onto something we don't let
go of it. The good fortune of knowing Eligio was a fortune that I shared
with no one else, not even with la Gorda. She met Eligio but didn't really
get to know him, just like yourself. The Nagual knew from the beginning that
Eligio was exceptional and he isolated him. He knew that you and the girls
were on one side of the coin and Eligio was by himself on the other side.
The Nagual and Genaro were indeed very fortunate to have found him.
"I first met him when the Nagual brought him over to my house. Eligio
didn't get along with my girls. They hated him and feared him too. But he
was thoroughly indifferent. The world didn't touch him. The Nagual didn't
want you, in particular, to have much to do with Eligio. The Nagual said
that you are the kind of sorcerer one should stay away from. He said that
your touch doesn't soothe, it spoils instead. He told me that your spirit
takes prisoners. He was somehow revolted by you and at the same time he
liked you. He said that you were crazier than Josefina when he found you and
that you still are."
It was an unsettling feeling to hear someone else telling me what don
Juan thought of me. At first I tried to disregard what dona Soledad was
saying, but then I felt utterly stupid and out of place trying to protect my
ego.
"He bothered with you," she went on, "because he was commanded by power
to do so. And he, being the impeccable warrior he was, yielded to his master
and gladly did what power told him to do with you."
There was a pause. I was aching to ask her more about don Juan's
feelings about me. I asked her to tell me about her other girl instead.
"A month after he found Eligio, the Nagual found Rosa," she said. "Rosa
was the last one. Once he found her he knew that his number was complete."
"How did he find her?"
"He had gone to see Benigno in his homeland. He was approaching the
house when Rosa came out from the thick bushes on the side of the road,
chasing a pig that had gotten loose and was running away. The pig ran too
fast for Rosa. She bumped into the Nagual and couldn't catch up with the
pig. She then turned against the Nagual and began to yell at him. He made a
gesture to grab her and she was ready to fight him. She insulted him and
dared him to lay a hand on her. The Nagual liked her spirit immediately but
there was no omen. The Nagual said that he waited a moment before walking
away, and then the pig came running back and stood beside him. That was the
omen. Rosa put a rope around the pig. The Nagual asked her point-blank if
she was happy in her job. She said no. She was a live-in servant. The Nagual
asked her if she would go with him and she said that if it was what she
thought it was for, the answer was no. The Nagual said it was for work and
she wanted to know how much he would pay. He gave her a figure and then she
asked what kind of work it was. The Nagual said that it was to work with him
in the tobacco fields of Veracruz. She told him then that she had been
testing him; if he would have said he wanted her to work as a maid, she
would have known that he was a liar, because he looked like someone who had
never had a home in his life.
The Nagual was delighted with her and told her that if she wanted to
get out of the trap she was in she should come to Benigno's house before
noon. He also told her that he would wait no longer than twelve; if she came
she had to be prepared for a difficult life and plenty of work. She asked
him how far was the place of the tobacco fields. The Nagual said three days'
ride in a bus. Rosa said that if it was that far she would certainly be
ready to go as soon as she got the pig back in his pen. And she did just
that. She came here and everyone liked her. She was never mean or
bothersome; the Nagual didn't have to force her or trick her into anything.
She doesn't like me at all, and yet she takes care of me better than anyone
else. I trust her, and yet I don't like her at all, and when I leave I will
miss her the most. Can you beat that?"
I saw a flicker of sadness in her eyes. I could not sustain my
distrust. She wiped her eyes with a casual movement of her hand.
There was a natural break in the conversation at that point. It was
getting dark by then and writing was very difficult; besides I had to go to
the bathroom. She insisted that I use the outhouse before she did as the
Nagual himself would have done.
Afterward she brought two round tubs the size of a child's bathtub,
filled them half-full with warm water and added some green leaves after
mashing them thoroughly with her hands. She told me in an authoritative tone
to wash myself in one of the tubs while she did the same in the other. The
water had an almost perfumed smell. It caused a ticklish sensation. It felt
like a mild menthol on my face and arms.
We went back to her room. She put my writing gear, which I had left on
her bed, on top of one of her chests of drawers. The windows were open and
there was still light. It must have been close to seven.
Dona Soledad lay on her back. She was smiling at me. I thought that she
was the picture of warmth. But at the same time and in spite of her smile,
her eyes gave out a feeling of ruthlessness and unbending force.
I asked her how long she had been with don Juan as his woman or
apprentice. She made fun of my cautiousness in labeling her. Her answer was
seven years. She reminded me then that I had not seen her for five. I had
been convinced up to that point that I had seen her two years before. I
tried to remember the last time, but I could not.
She told me to lie down next to her. I knelt on the bed, by her side.
In a very soft voice she asked me if I was afraid. I said no, which was the
truth. There in her room, at that moment, I was being confronted by an old
response of mine, which had manifested itself countless times, a mixture of
curiosity and suicidal indifference.
Almost in a whisper she said that she had to be impeccable with me and
tell me that our meeting was crucial for both of us. She said that the
Nagual had given her direct and detailed orders of what to do. As she talked
I could not help laughing at her tremendous effort to sound like don Juan. I
listened to her statements and could predict what she would say next.
Suddenly she sat up. Her face was a few inches from mine. I could see
her white teeth shining in the semidarkness of the room. She put her arms
around me in an embrace and pulled me on top of her.
My mind was very clear, and yet something was leading me deeper and
deeper into a sort of morass. I was experiencing myself as something I had
no conception of. Suddenly I knew that I had, somehow, been feeling her
feelings all along. She was the strange one. She had mesmerized me with
words. She was a cold, old woman. And her designs were not those of youth
and vigor, in spite of her vitality and strength. I knew then that don Juan
had not turned her head in the same direction as mine. That thought would
have been ridiculous in any other context; nonetheless, at that moment I
took it as a true insight. A feeling of alarm swept through my body. I
wanted to get out of her bed. But there seemed to be an extraordinary force
around me that kept me fixed, incapable of moving away. I was paralyzed.
She must have felt my realization. All of a sudden she pulled the band
that tied her hair and in one swift movement she wrapped it around my neck.
I felt the tension of the band on my skin, but somehow it did not seem real.
Don Juan had always said to me that our great enemy is the fact that we
never believe what is happening to us. At the moment dona Soledad was
wrapping the cloth like a noose around my throat, I knew what he meant. But
even after I had had that intellectual reflection, my body did not react. I
remained flaccid, almost indifferent to what seemed to be my death.
I felt the exertion of her arms and shoulders as she tightened the band
around my neck. She was choking me with great force and expertise. I began
to gasp. Her eyes stared at me with a maddening glare. I knew then that she
intended to kill me.
Don Juan had said that when we finally realize what is going on it is
usually too late to turn back. He contended that it is always the intellect
that fools us, because it receives the message first, but rather than giving
it credence and acting on it immediately, it dallies with it instead.
I heard then, or perhaps I felt, a snapping sound at the base of my
neck, right behind my windpipe. I knew that she had cracked my neck. My ears
buzzed and then they tingled. I experienced an exceptional clarity of
hearing. I thought that I must be dying. I loathed my incapacity to do
anything to defend myself. I could not even move a muscle to kick her. I was
unable to breathe anymore. My body shivered, and suddenly I stood up and was
free, out of her deadly grip. I looked down on the bed. I seemed to be
looking down from the ceiling. I saw my body, motionless and limp on top of
hers. I saw horror in her eyes. I wanted her to let go of the noose. I had a
fit of wrath for having been so stupid and hit her smack on the forehead
with my fist. She shrieked and held her head and then passed out, but before
she did I caught a fleeting glimpse of a phantasmagoric scene. I saw dona
Soledad being hurled out of the bed by the force of my blow. I saw her
running toward the wall and huddling up against it like a frightened child.
The next impression I had was of having a terrible difficulty in
breathing. My neck hurt. My throat seemed to have dried up so intensely that
I could not swallow. It took me a long time to gather enough strength to get
up. I then examined dona Soledad. She was lying unconscious on the bed. She
had an enormous red lump on her forehead. I got some water and splashed it
on her face, the way don Juan had always done with me. When she regained
consciousness I made her walk, holding her by the armpits. She was soaked in
perspiration. I applied towels with cold water on her forehead. She threw
up, and I was almost sure she had a brain concussion. She was shivering. I
tried to pile clothes and blankets over her for warmth but she took off all
her clothes and turned her body to face the wind. She asked me to leave her
alone and said that if the wind changed direction, it would be a sign that
she was going to get well. She held my hand in a sort of brief handshake and
told me that it was fate that had pitted us against each other.
"I think one of us was supposed to die tonight," she said.
"Don't be silly. You're not finished yet," I said and really meant it.
Something made me feel confident that she was all right. I went
outside, picked up a stick and walked to my car. The dog growled. He was
still curled up on the seat. I told him to get out. He meekly jumped out.
There was something different about him. I saw his enormous shape trotting
away in the semidarkness. He went to his corral.
I was free. I sat in the car for a moment to deliberate. No, I was not
free. Something was pulling me back into the house. I had unfinished
business there. I was no longer afraid of dona Soledad. In fact, an
extraordinary indifference had taken possession of me. I felt that she had
given me, deliberately or unconsciously, a supremely important lesson. Under
the horrendous pressure of her attempt to kill me, I had actually acted upon
her from a level that would have been inconceivable under normal
circumstances. I had nearly been strangled; something in that confounded
room of hers had rendered me helpless and yet I had extricated myself. I
could not imagine what had happened. Perhaps it was as don Juan had always
maintained, that all of us have an extra potential, something which is there
but rarely gets to be used. I had actually hit dona Soledad from a phantom
position.
I took my flashlight from the car, went back into the house, lit all
the kerosene lanterns I could find and sat down at the table in the front
room to write. Working relaxed me.
Toward dawn dona Soledad stumbled out of her room. She could hardly
keep her balance. She was completely naked. She became ill and collapsed by
the door. I gave her some water and tried to cover her with a blanket. She
refused it. I became concerned with the possibility of her losing body heat.
She muttered that she had to be naked if she expected the wind to cure her.
She made a plaster of mashed leaves, applied it to her forehead and fixed it
in place with her turban. She wrapped a blanket around her body and came to
the table where I was writing and sat down facing me. Her eyes were red. She
looked truly sick.
"There is something I must tell you," she said in a weak voice. "The
Nagual set me up to wait for you; I had to wait even if it took twenty
years. He gave me instructions on how to entice you and steal your power. He
knew that sooner or later you had to come to see Pablito and Nestor, so he
told me to use that opportunity to bewitch you and take everything you have.
The Nagual said that if I lived an impeccable life my power would bring you
here when there would be no one else in the house. My power did that. Today
you came when everybody was gone. My impeccable life had helped me. All that
was left for me to do was to take your power and then kill you."
"But why would you want to do such a horrible thing?"
"Because I need your power for my own journey. The Nagual had to set it
up that way. You had to be the one; after all, I really don't know you. You
mean nothing to me. So why shouldn't I take something I need so desperately
from someone who doesn't count at all? Those were the Nagual's very words."
"Why would the Nagual want to hurt me? You yourself said that he
worried about me."
"What I've done to you tonight has nothing to do with what he feels for
you or myself. This is only between the two of us. There have been no
witnesses to what took place today between the two of us, because both of us
are part of the Nagual himself. But you in particular have received and kept
something of him that I don't have, something that I need desperately, the
special power that he gave you. The Nagual said that he had given something
to each of his six children. I can't reach Eligio. I can't take it from my
girls, so that leaves you as my prey. I made the power the Nagual gave me
grow, and in growing it changed my body. You made your power grow too. I
wanted that power from you and for that I had to kill you. The Nagual said
that even if you didn't die, you would fall under my spell and become my
prisoner for life if I wanted it so. Either way, your power was going to be
mine."
"But how could my death benefit you?"
"Not your death but your power. I did it because I need a boost;
without it I will have a hellish time on my journey. I don't have enough
guts. That's why I dislike la Gorda. She's young and has plenty of guts. I'm
old and have second thoughts and doubts. If you want to know the truth, the
real struggle is between Pablito and myself. He is my mortal enemy, not you.
The Nagual said that your power could make my journey easier and help me get
what I need."
"How on earth can Pablito be your enemy?"
"When the Nagual changed me, he knew what would eventually happen.
First of all, he set me up so my eyes would face the north, and although you
and my girls are the same, I am the opposite of you people. I go in a
different direction. Pablito, Nestor and Benigno are with you; the direction
of their eyes is the same as yours. All of you will go together toward
Yucatan.
"Pablito is my enemy not because his eyes were set in the opposite
direction, but because he is my son. This is what I had to tell you, even
though you don't know what I am talking about. I have to enter into the
other world. Where the Nagual is now. Where Genaro and Eligio are now. Even
if I have to destroy Pablito to do that."
"What are you saying, dona Soledad? You're crazy! "
"No, I am not. There is nothing more important for us living beings
than to enter into that world. I will tell you that for me that is true. To
get to that world I live the way the Nagual taught me. Without the hope of
that world I am nothing, nothing. I was a fat old cow. Now that hope gives
me a guide, a direction, and even if I can't take your power, I still have
my purpose."
She rested her head on the table, using her arms as a pillow. The force
of her statements had numbed me. I had not understood what exactly she had
meant, but I could almost empathize with her plea, although it was the
strangest thing I had yet heard from her that night. Her purpose was a
warrior's purpose, in don Juan's style and terminology. I never knew,
however, that one had to destroy people in order to fulfill it.
She lifted up her head and looked at me with half-closed eyelids.
"At the beginning everything worked fine for me today," she said. "I
was a bit scared when you drove up. I had waited years for that moment. The
Nagual told me that you like women. He said you are an easy prey for them,
so I played you for a quick finish. I figured that you would go for it. The
Nagual had taught me how I should grab you at the moment when you are the
weakest. I was leading you to that moment with my body. But you became
suspicious. I was too clumsy. I had taken you to my room, as the Nagual told
me to do, so the lines of my floor would entrap you and make you helpless.
But you fooled my floor by liking it and by watching its lines intently. It
had no power as long as your eyes were on its lines. Your body knew what to
do. Then you scared my floor, yelling the way you did. Sudden noises like
that are deadly, especially the voice of a sorcerer. The power of my floor
died out like a flame. I knew it, but you didn't.
"You were about to leave then so I had to stop you. The Nagual had
shown me how to use my hand to grab you. I tried to do that, but my power
was low. My floor was scared. Your eyes had numbed its lines. No one else
has ever laid eyes on them. So I failed in my attempt to grab your neck. You
got out of my grip before I had time to squeeze you. I knew then that you
were slipping away and I tried one final attack. I used the key the Nagual
said would affect you the most, fright. I frightened you with my shrieks and
that gave me enough power to subdue you. I thought I had you, but my stupid
dog got excited. He's stupid and knocked me off of you when I had you almost
under my spell. As I see it now, perhaps my dog was not so stupid after all.
Maybe he noticed your double and charged against it but knocked me over
instead."
"You said he wasn't your dog."
"I lied. He was my trump card. The Nagual taught me that I should
always have a trump card, an unsuspected trick. Somehow, I knew that I might
need my dog. When I took you to see my friend, it was really him; the coyote
is my girls' friend. I wanted my dog to sniff you. When you ran into the
house I had to be rough with him. I pushed him inside your car, making him
yell with pain. He's too big and could hardly fit over the seat. I told him
right then to maul you to shreds. I knew that if you had been badly bitten
by my dog you would have been helpless and I could have finished you off
without any trouble. You escaped again, but you couldn't leave the house. I
knew then that I had to be patient and wait for the darkness. Then the wind
changed direction and I was sure of my success.
"The Nagual had told me that he knew without a doubt that you would
like me as a woman. It was a matter of waiting for the right moment. The
Nagual said that you would kill yourself once you realized I had stolen your
power. But in case I failed to steal it, or in case you didn't kill
yourself, or in case I didn't want to keep you alive as my prisoner, I
should then use my headband to choke you to death. He even showed me the
place where I had to throw your carcass: a bottomless pit, a crack in the
mountains, not too far from here, where goats always disappear. The Nagual
never mentioned your awesome side, though. I've told you that one of us was
supposed to die tonight. I didn't know it was going to be me. The Nagual
gave me the feeling that I would win. How cruel of him not to tell me
everything about you."
"Think of me, dona Soledad. I knew even less than you did."
"It's not the same. The Nagual prepared me for years for this. I knew
every detail. You were in my bag. The Nagual even showed me the leaves I
should always keep fresh and handy to make you numb. I put them in the tub
as if they were for fragrance. You didn't notice that I used another kind of
leaf for my tub. You fell for everything I had prepared for you. And yet
your awesome side won in the end."
"What do you mean my awesome side?"
"The one that hit me and will kill me tonight. Your horrendous double
that came out to finish me. I will never forget it and if I live, which I
doubt, I will never be the same."
"Did it look like me?"
"It was you, of course, but not as you look now. I can't really say
what it looked like. When I want to think about it I get dizzy."
I told her about my fleeting perception that she had left her body with
the impact of my blow. I intended to prod her with the account. It seemed to
me that the reason behind the whole event had been to force us to draw from
sources that are ordinarily barred to us. I had positively given her a
dreadful blow; I had caused profound damage to her body, and yet I could not
have done it myself. I did feel I had hit her with my left fist, the
enormous red lump on her forehead attested to that, yet I had no swelling in
my knuckles or the slightest pain or discomfort in them. A blow of that
magnitude could even have broken my hand.
Upon hearing my description of how I had seen her huddling against the
wall, she became thoroughly desperate. I asked her if she had had any
inkling of what I had seen, such as a sensation of leaving her body, or a
fleeting perception of the room.
"I know now that I am doomed," she said. "Very few survive a touch of
the double. If my soul has left already I won't survive. I'll get weaker and
weaker until I die."
Her eyes had a wild glare. She raised herself and seemed to be on the
verge of striking me, but she slumped back.
"You've taken my soul," she said. "You must have it in your pouch now.
Why did you have to tell me, though?"
I swore to her that I had had no intentions of hurting her, that I had
acted in whatever form only in self-defense and therefore I bore no malice
toward her.
"If you don't have my soul in your pouch, it's even worse," she said.
"It must be roaming aimlessly around. I will never get it back, then."
Dona Soledad seemed to be void of energy. Her voice became weaker. I
wanted her to go and lie down. She refused to leave the table.
"The Nagual said that if I failed completely I should then give you his
message," she said. "He told me to tell you that he had replaced your body a
long time ago. You are himself now."
"What did he mean by that?"
"He's a sorcerer. He entered into your old body and replaced its
luminosity. Now you shine like the Nagual himself. You're not your father's
son anymore. You are the Nagual himself."
Dona Soledad stood up. She was groggy. She appeared to want to say
something else but had trouble vocalizing. She walked to her room. I helped
her to the door; she did not want me to enter. She dropped the blanket that
covered her and lay down on her bed. She asked in a very soft voice if I
would go to a hill a short distance away and watch from there to see if the
wind was coming. She added in a most casual manner that I should take her
dog with me. Somehow her request did not sound right. I said that I would
climb up on the roof and look from there. She turned her back to me and said
that the least I could do for her was to take her dog to the hill so that he
could lure the wind. I became very irritated with her. Her room in the
darkness gave out a most eerie feeling. I went into the kitchen and got two
lanterns and brought them back with me. At the sight of the light she
screamed hysterically. I let out a yell myself but for a different reason.
When the light hit the room I saw the floor curled up, like a cocoon, around
her bed. My perception was so fleeting that the next instant I could have
sworn that the shadow of the wire protective masks of the lanterns had
created that ghastly scene. My phantom perception made me furious. I shook
her by the shoulders. She wept like a child and promised not to try any more
of her tricks. I placed the lanterns on the chest of drawers and she fell
asleep instantly.
By midmorning the wind had changed. I felt a strong gust coming through
the north window. Around noon dona Soledad came out again. She seemed a bit
wobbly. The redness in her eyes had disappeared and the swelling of her
forehead had diminished; there was hardly any visible lump.
I felt that it was time for me to leave. I told her that although I had
written down the message that she had given me from don Juan, it did not
clarify anything.
"You're not your father's son anymore. You are now the Nagual himself,"
she said.
There was something truly incongruous about me. A few hours before I
had been helpless and dona Soledad had actually tried to kill me; but at
that moment, when she was speaking to me, I had forgotten the horror of that
event. And yet, there was another part of me that could spend days mulling
over meaningless confrontations with people concerning my personality or my
work. That part seemed to be the real me, the me that I had known all my
life. The me, however, who had gone through a bout with death that night,
and then forgotten about it, was not real. It was me and yet it was not. In
the light of such incongruities don Juan's claims seemed to be less
farfetched, but still unacceptable.
Dona Soledad seemed absentminded. She smiled peacefully.
"Oh, they are here!" she said suddenly. "How fortunate for me. My girls
are here. Now they'll take care of me."
She seemed to have had a turn for the worse. She looked as strong as
ever, but her behavior was more disassociated. My fears mounted. I did not
know whether to leave her there or take her to a hospital in the city,
several hundred miles away.
All of a sudden she jumped up like a little child and ran out the front
door and down the driveway toward the main road. Her dog ran after her. I
hurriedly got in my car in order to catch up with her. I had to drive down
the path in reverse since there was no space to turn around. As I approached
the road I saw through the back window that dona Soledad was surrounded by
four young women.
The Little Sisters
Dona Soledad seemed to be explaining something to the four women who
surrounded her. She moved her arms in dramatic gestures and held her head in
her hands. It was obvious she was telling them about me. I drove up the
driveway to where I had been parked before. I intended to wait for them
there. I deliberated whether to remain in the car or to sit casually on the
left fender. I opted to stand by the car door, ready to jump in and drive
away if something like the events of the previous day were going to be
repeated.
I was very tired. I had not slept a wink for over twenty-four hours. My
plan was to disclose to the young women as much as I could about the
incident with dona Soledad, so they could take the necessary steps to aid
her, and then I would leave. Their presence had brought about a definite
change. Everything seemed to be charged with new vigor and energy. I felt
the change when I saw dona Soledad surrounded by them.
Dona Soledad's revelation that they were don Juan's apprentices had
given them such a tantalizing appeal that I could hardly wait to meet them.
I wondered if they were like dona Soledad. She had said that they were like
myself and that we were going in the same direction. That could be easily
interpreted in a positive sense. I wanted to believe that more than anything
else.
Don Juan used to call them "las hermanitas," the little sisters, a most
befitting name at least for the two I had met, Lidia and Rosa, two wispy,
pixie-like, charming young women. I figured that they must have been in
their early twenties when I had first met them, although Pablito and Nestor
always refused to talk about their ages. The other two, Josefina and Elena,
were a total mystery to me. I used to hear their names being mentioned from
time to time, always in some unfavorable context. I had deduced from passing
remarks made by don Juan that they were somehow freakish, one was crazy and
the other obese; thus they were kept in isolation. Once I bumped into
Josefina as I walked into the house with don Juan. He introduced me to her,
but she covered her face and ran away before I had time to greet her.
Another time I caught Elena washing clothes. She was enormous. I thought
that she must be suffering from a glandular disorder. I said hello to her
but she did not turn around. I never saw her face.
After the buildup that dona Soledad had given them with her disclosure,
I felt driven to talk with the mysterious "hermanitas," and at the same time
I was almost afraid of them.
I casually looked down the driveway, bracing myself to meet all of them
at once. The driveway was deserted. There was no one approaching, and only a
minute before they had been no more than thirty yards from the house. I
climbed up on the roof of the car to look. There was no one coming, not even
the dog. I panicked. I slid down and was about to jump in the car and drive
away when I heard someone say, "Hey, look who's here."
I quickly turned around to face two girls w