Maria Concepcion

BY KATHERINE ANNE PORTER

DRAWINGS BY ROSS SANTEE

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ARIA CONCEPCION walked care- swelling life was not a distortion, but , fully, keeping to the middle of the right, inevitable proportions of a the white, dusty road, where the woman. She was entirely contented, maguey thorns and the treacherous calmly filled with a sense of tYe good­ curved spines of organa cactus had ness of life. not gathered so profusely. She would Her small house was half-way up a have enjoyed resting for a moment in shallow hill, under a clump of peru- the dark shade by the roadside, but trees, a wall of organa cactus inclosing she had no time to waste drawing cac­ it on the side nearest the road. Now tus needles from her feet. Juan and she came down into the valley, divided his jefe would be waiting for their food by the narrow spring, and crossed a in the damp trenches of the buried bridge of loose stones near the hut city. where Maria Rosa the bee-keeper lived She carried about a dozen living with her old godmother, Lupe, the fowls slung over her right shoulder, medicine-woman. Maria Concepcion their feet fastened together. Half of had no faith in the charred owl bones, them fell upon the flat of her back, the the singed rabbit fur, the messes and balance dangled uneasily over her ointments sold by Lupe to the ailing breast. They wriggled their benumbed of the village. She was a good Chris­ and swollen legs against her neck, tian, and bought her remedies, bottled, they twisted their stupefied, half- with printed directions that she could blind eyes upward, seeming to peer in­ not read, at the drug-store near the to her face inquiringly. She did not city market, where she went almost see them or think of them. Her left daily with her fowls. But she often arm was a trifle tired with the weight purchased a jar of honey from young of the food basket, and she was hungry Maria Rosa, a pretty, shy child only after her long morning's work. fifteen years old. Under her clean bright-blue cotton Maria Concepcion and her husband, rebozo her straight back outlined Juan Villegas, were each a little past Itself strongly. Instinctive serenity their eighteenth year. She had a softened her black eyes, shaped like good reputation with the neighbors as almonds set far apart, and tilted a bit an energetic, religious woman. It was endwise. She walked with the free, commonly known that if she wished to natural, yet guarded, ease of the prim­ buy a new rebozo for herself or a shirt itive woman carrying an unborn child. for Juan, she could bring out a sack of The shape of her body was easy, the hard silver pesos for the purpose. 224

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED MARIA CONCEPCION 225 She had paid for the license, nearly mound there hung a dusty golden a year ago, the potent bit of stamped shimmer of bees. paper which permits people to be mar­ A light, gay scream of laughter ried in the church. She had given rose from behind the hut; a man's money to the priest before she and short laugh joined in. "Ah, Maria Juan walked together up to the altar Rosa has a novio!" Maria Concepci6n the Monday after Holy Week. It stopped short, smiling, shifted her had been the adventure of the vil­ burden slightly, bending forward to lagers to go, three Sundays one after see more clearly through the hedge another, to hear the banns called by spaces, shading her eyes. the priest for Juan de Dios Villegas Maria Rosa ran, dodging between and Maria Concepci6n Guiterrez. beehives, parting two stunted jasmine- After the wedding she had called her­ bushes as she came, lifting her knees self Maria Concepcion Guiterrez de in swift leaps, looking over her shoul­ Villegas, as though she owned a whole der and laughing in a quivering, ex­ hacienda. cited way. A heavy jar, swung by the She paused on the bridge and dab­ handle to her wrist, knocked against bled her feet in the water, her eyes her thighs as she ran. Her toes resting themselves from the sun-rays pushed up sudden spurts of dust, her in a fixed, dreaming gaze to the far- half-unbraided hair showered around off mountains, deeply blue under their her shoulders in long crinkled wisps. hanging drift of clouds. It came to Juan Villegas ran after her, also her that she would like a fresh crust of laughing strangely, his teeth set, both honey. The delicious aroma of bees, rows gleaming behind the small, soft their slow, thrilling hum poured upon black beard growing sparsely on his her, awakening a pleasant desire for a lips, his chin, leaving his brown cheeks crisp flake of sweetness in her mouth. girl-smooth. When he seized her, he "If I do not eat it now, I shall clenched so hard that her chemise gave mark my child," she thought, peering way and slipped off her shoulder. through the crevices in the thick hedge Frightened, she stopped laughing, of cactus that sheered up nakedly, pushed him away, and stood silent, like prodigious bared knife-blades cast trying to pull up the ripped sleeve with protectingly around the small clear­ one hand. Her pointed chin and ing. The place was so silent that she dark-red mouth moved in an uncer­ doubted if Maria Rosa and Lupe were tain way, as if she wished to laugh at home. again; her long black lashes flickered The leaning jacal of dried rush- with the tiny quick-moving lights in withes and corn-sheaves, bound to tall her half-hidden eyes. saplings thrust into the earth, roofed Maria Concepci6n realized that she with yellowed maguey-leaves flattened had not stirred or breathed for some and overlapping like shingles, sat seconds. Her forehead was cold, and drowsy and fragrant in the warmth of yet boiling water seemed to be pouring noonday. The hives, similarly con­ slowly along her spine. An unac­ structed, were scattered toward the countable pain was in her knees, as back of the clearing, like small mounds though pieces of ice had got into them. of clean vegetable refuse. Over each She was afraid Juan and Maria Rosa

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED 226 THE CENTURY MAGAZINE would feel her eyes fixed upon them, restored unchanged. But it was all and find her there, unable to move. gone. And now here was a worse But they did not pass beyond the in- thing. This was something that could closure, or even glance toward the gap not happen. But it was true. Maria in the wall opening upon the road. Rosa, that sinful girl, shameless! Juan lifted one of Maria Rosa's She heard herself saying a harsh, half-bound braids and slapped her true word about Maria Rosa, saying it neck with it, playfully. She smiled aloud as if she expected some one to with soft, expectant shyness. To­ answer, "Yes, you are right." At this gether they moved back through the moment the gray, untidy head of hives of honey-comb. Juan flourished Givens appeared over the edges of the his wide hat back and forth, walking newest trench he had caused to be dug very proudly. Maria Rosa balanced in his field of excavations. The long, her jar on one hip, and swung her long, deep crevasses, in which a man might full petticoats with every step. stand without being seen, lay criss­ Maria Concepci6n came out of the crossed like orderly gashes of a giant heavy darkness which seemed to en­ scalpel. Nearly all the men of the wrap her head and bind her at the small community were employed by throat, and found herself walking on­ Givens in this work of uncovering the ward, keeping the road by instinct, lost city of their ancestors. They feeling her way delicately, her ears worked all the year through and pros­ strumming as if all Maria Rosa's bees pered, digging all day for those small had hived in them. Her careful sense clay heads and bits of pottery for of duty kept her moving toward the which there was no use on earth, they buried city where Juan's chief, the being all broken and covered with American archaeologist, was taking his earth. They themselves could make midday rest, waiting for his dinner. better ones, perfectly stout and new. Juan and Maria Rosa! She burned But the unearthly delight of the jefe all over now, as if a layer of those tiny in finding these things was an endless fig-cactus bristles, as insidious and puzzle. He would fairly roar for joy petty-cruel as spun glass, had crawled at times, waving a shattered pot or a under her skin. She wished to sit human rib-bone above his head, shout­ ing for his photographer to come and down quietly and wait for her death make a picture of this! without finishing what she had set out to do, remembering no more those two Now he emerged, and his young strange people, Juan and Maria Rosa, enthusiast's eyes welcomed Maria laughing and kissing in the sweet- Concepcion from his old-man face, smelling sunshine. Once, years be­ covered with hard wrinkles, burned to fore, when she was a young girl, she the color of red earth under the count­ had returned from market to find her less suns of his explorer's life. jacal burned to a pile of ash and her "I hope you 've brought me a nice few pesos gone. An incredibly lost fat one." He selected a fowl from the and empty feeling had possessed her; bunch dangling nearest him as Maria she had kept moving about the place, Concepci6n, wordless, leaned over the unbelieving, somehow expecting it all trench. "Dress it for me, there 's a to take shape again before her eyes. good girl. I '11 broil it."

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED Maria Concepcion

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED 228 THE CENTURY MAGAZINE Maria Concepcion took the fowl by shot, for his varied and highly imagi­ the head, and silently, swiftly drew native misdemeanors. the knife across the throat, twisting "I am never a minute too soon," he oflf the head with the casual firmness would say indulgently. "Well, why one might use with the top of a beet. not? He is a good worker. He never "Dios, woman, but you have val­ intentionally did harm in his life." or!" said Givens, watching her. "I After Juan was married, he used to can't do that. It makes me creep." twit him, with exactly the right shade "My home country is Guadalajara," of condescension, on his many in­ answered Maria Concepcion, without fidelities to Maria Concepcion. He bravado. "There we have valor for was fond of saying, "She '11 discover everything." you yet, young demon!" which She stood and regarded Givens con­ would please Juan immensely. descendingly, that diverting white Maria Concepcion did not think of man who had no woman to cook for telling Juan she had found him out, him, and, moreover, appeared not to but she kept saying to herself, "If I feel any loss of dignity in preparing had been a young girl like Maria Rosa, his own food. He knelt now, eyes and a man had caught hold of me so, I squinted tightly, nose wrinkled, try­ would have broken my jar over his ing to avoid the smoke, turning the head." Her anger was all against roasting fowl busily on a stick. Juan's Maria Rosa because she had not done jefe, therefore to be humored, to be this. placated. Less than a week after this the two "The tortillas are fresh and hot, culprits went away to war, Juan as a Senor," she murmured. "By per­ conimon soldier, Maria Rosa as his mission, I will now go to market." soldadera. She bowed her neck under "Yes, yes, run along; bring me an­ a heavy and onerous yoke of duties: other to-morrow." Givens turned his she carried the blankets and the cook­ head to look at her again. Her grand ing-pots, she slept on stones or dry manner reminded him of royalty in branches, she marched ahead of the exile. He noticed her unnatural pale­ troops, with the battalion of experi­ ness. "The sun is too hot, eh?" he enced women of war, in search of pro­ asked. visions. She ate with them what was "Si, Senor. Pardon me, but Juan left after the men had eaten. After will be here soon?" battles she went out on the field with "He should be, the scamp. Leave the others to salvage clothing and his food. The others will eat it." guns and ammunition from the slain She moved away; the blue of her before they should begin to spoil in rebozo became a dancing spot in the the heat. heat vibrations that appeared to rise This was the life the little bee-keeper from the gray-red soil. Givens con­ found at the end of her runaway jour­ sidered her exceptionally intelligent. ney. There was no particular scandal He liked to tell stories of Juan's es­ in the village. People shrugged. It capades also, of how often he had was far better for every one that they saved him, within the last five years, were gone. There was a popular from going to jail, or even from being belief among her neighbors that Maria

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED MARIA CONCEPCION 229 Concepcion was not so mild as she "Keep your prayers to yourself, seemed. Lupe, or offer them for others who When she learned about her man need them. I will ask God for what and that shameless girl she did not I want in this world." weep. Later, when the baby was "And will you get it, you think, born, and died within four days, she Maria Concepcion?" asked Lupe, tit­ did not weep. "She is mere stone," tering cruelly, and smelling the mix­ said old Lupe, who had offered all her ture clinging to the wooden spoon. charms for the preservation of the "Did you pray for what you have little life, and had been rebuffed with now?" a ferocity that appalled her. Afterward every one noticed that If Maria Concepcion had not gone Maria Concepcion went more often to so regularly to church, lighting candles church, and less to the village to talk before the saints and receiving holy with the other women as they sat communion at the altar every month, along the curb, eating fruit apd nurs­ there might have been talk of her ing their infants, at the end of the being devil-possessed, her face was so market-day. changed and bhnd-looking. But this "After all, she is wrong to take us was impossible when, after all, she had for her enemies," said grave old Sole- been married by the priest. It must dad, who always thought such things be, they reasoned, that she was being out. "All women have these troubles. punished for her pride. They decided Well, we should suffer together." this was the true reason: she was al­ But Maria Concepcion lived alone. together too proud. She was thin, as if something was During the two years that Juan and gnawing her away inside, her eyes were Maria Rosa were gone Maria Con­ sunken, and she spoke no more than cepcion sold her fowls and looked was necessary. She worked harder after her house, and her sack of hard than ever, and her butchering knife pesos grew. Lupe had no talent for was scarcely ever out of her hand. bees, and the hives did not prosper. Juan and Maria Rosa, tired of mili­ She used to see Maria Concepcion in tary life, came home one day without the market or at chiirch, and afterward asking permission of any authority she always said that no one could tell whatever. The field of war had un­ by looking that she was a woman who rolled itself, a long scroll of vexations, had such a heavy grief. until the end had frayed out within "I pray God everything goes well twenty miles of Juan's village. So he with Maria Concepcion from this and his soldadera, now as lean as a wolf, out," she would say, "for she has had and burdened with a child daily ex­ her share of trouble." pected, set out with no ostentation and When some idle person repeated walked home. this to the deserted woman, she went They arrived one morning about down to Lupe's house and stood within daybreak. Juan was picked up on the clearing, and called to the medi­ sight by a group of military poHce cine-woman, who sat in her doorway from the small cuartel on the edge of stirring a jar of fresh snake's grease town, who told him with impersonal and rabbit blood, a cure for sores: cheerfulness that he would add one to

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED 230 THE CENTURY MAGAZINE a group of ten waiting to be shot next embroidered with silver thread, hung morning as deserters. over one eyebrow, secured at the back Maria Rosa, screaming, and falling by a cord of silver dripping with co­ on her face in the road, was taken balt-blue tassels. His shirt was of a under the armpits by two guards and checkerboard pattern in green and helped briskly to her own jacal, now black, his white cotton trousers were sadly run down. She was received bound by a belt of yellow leather with professional calm by Lupe, who tooled in red. His feet were bare, the hastily set about the business obvi­ beautifully arched and muscled feet of ously in hand. the Indian, with long, flexible toes. Limping with foot weariness, a He removed his cigarette from the layer of dust concealing his fine new corner of his full-lipped, wide mouth. clothes, got mysteriously from some­ He removed the splendid hat. His where, Juan appeared before the cap­ black hair, pressed damply to his fore­ tain of. the cuartel. The captain head, sprang up suddenly in a cloudy recognized him as the chief digger for thatch on his crown. his good friend Givens. He des­ "You young devil," said Givens, a patched a note in haste to that kindly trifle shaken, "some day I shall be and eccentric person. five minutes too late!" Shortly afterward, Givens showed Juan bowed to the oflicer, who ap­ up at the cuartel, and Juan was deliv­ peared to be gazing at a vacuum. He ered to him, with the urgent request swung his arm wide in a free circle up- that nothing be made public about so soaring toward the prison window, humane and sensible an operation on where forlorn heads poked over the the part of military authority. window-sill, hot eyes following the Juan walked out of the rather stif­ lucky departing one. Two or three of ling atmosphere of the drumhead them flipped a hand in response, with court, a definite air of swagger about a gallant effort to imitate his own him. His hat, incredibly huge and casual and heady manner.

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED MARIA CONCEPCION 231 He kept up this insufferable pan­ and say, 'Silence, thou simpleton!' and tomime until they rounded the first she weeps. She is just a girl with sheltering clump of fig-cactus. Then whom I do as I please. You know he seized Givens's hand, and his eyes how she used to keep those clean little blazed adoration and gratitude. bees in their hives? She always "With all my life, all my life, I thank smelt of their honey. I swear it. I thee!" he said. "It is nothing to be would not harm Maria Concepcion shot, mijefe,—certainly you know I was because I am married to her in the not afraid,-^but to be shot in a drove church; but also, mi jefe, I will not of deserters, against a cold wall, by leave Maria Rosa, because she pleases order of that—" me more than any other woman." Glittering epithets tumbled over "Let me tell you, Juan, Maria Con­ one another like explosions of a rocket. cepcion will some day take your head All the scandalous analogies from the off with that sharp knife she uses on animal and vegetable worlds were ap­ the fowls. Then you will remember plied in a vivid, unique, and personal what I have said." way to the life, loves, and family his­ Juan's expression was the proper tory of the harmless young officer who blend of sentimental triumph and had just set him free. But Juan melancholy. It was pleasant to think cared nothing for this; his gratitude of himself in the r61e of romantic hero to his jefe excluded all other possible to two such desirable women. His obligations. present situation was ineffably perfect. "What will Maria Concepcion say He had just escaped from the threat of to all this?" asked Givens. "You a disagreeable end. His clothes were are very informal, Juan, for a man who new and handsome. He was on his was married in the church." way to work and civihan life with his Juan put on his hat. patient jefe. He was little more than "Oh, Maria Concepcion! That 's twenty years old. Life tasted good, nothing! Look you, mi jefe, to be for a certainty. He fairly smacked married in the church is a great mis­ his lips on its savor. fortune to a man. After that he is not The early sunshine, the light, clear himself any more. How can that air, full of the good smell of ripening woman complain when I do not drink, cactus-figs, peaches, and melons, of not even on days of fiesta, more than a pungent pepper-berries dangling in glass of pulque? I do not beat her; bright red clusters on the peru-trees, never, never. We were always at the very smell of his cigarette, shook peace. I say to her, 'Come here,' and him with a merry ecstasy of good-will she comes straight. I say, 'Go there,' for all life, whatever it was. and she goes quickly. Yet sometimes "Seiior,"—he addressed his friend I looked at her and thought, 'Now I handsomely, as one man to another,— am married to that woman in the "women are good things, but not at church,' and I felt a sinking inside, as this moment. By your permission, if something were lying heavy on my I will now go to the village and eat. stomach. With Maria Rosa it is all To-morrow morning very early I will different. She is not silent; she talks. come to the buried city and work. When she talks too much, I slap her Let us forget Maria Concepcion and

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED 232 THE CENTURY MAGAZINE Maria Rosa. Each one in her place. Maria Concepcion, seeing that Juan I will manage them when the time was quiet, began automatically to comes." bind the legs of her fowls. It was News of Juan's adventure soon got market-day, and she would be late. abroad, and Juan found many friends Her movements were quick and about him during the morning. They rigid, like a doll jerked about on frankly commended his leaving the strings. She fumbled and tangled the army. Por Dios! a man could do no bits of cord in her haste, and set off better thing than that! The new across the plowed, heavy fields instead hero ate a great deal and drank a little, of taking the accustomed road. She the occasion being better than a feast- ran grotesquely, in uneven, jolting day. It was almost noon before he leaps between furrows, a crazy panic returned to visit Maria Rosa. in her head, in her stumbling legs. He found her sitting on a straw mat, She seemed not to know her directions. rubbing oil on her three-hour-old son. Now and then she would stop and Before this felicitous vision Juan's look about, tr3dng to place herself, emotions so twisted him that he re­ then proceed a few steps. turned to the village and invited every At once, with an inner quivering, man in the "Death and Resurrection" she came to her senses completely, pulqueria to drink with him. recognized the thing that troubled her Having thus taken leave of his so terribly, was certain of what she balance, he found himself unaccount­ wanted. She sat down quietly under ably back in his own house after his a sheltering thorny bush and gave her­ long absence, attempting to beat self over to her long and devouring Maria Concepcion by way of rees- sorrow; flinched and shuddered away tabUshing himself in his legal house­ for the first time from that pain in the hold. heart that pressed and pressed in­ Maria Concepcion, knowing what tolerably, until she wished to tear out had happened in the withe hut of her the heart with her hands to be eased enemy, knowing all the events of that of it. The thing which had for so unhappy day, refused to be beaten by long squeezed her whole body into a Juan drunk when Juan sober had tight, dumb knot of suffering suddenly never thought of such a thing. She broke with painful and shocking vio­ did not scream; she stood her ground lence. She jerked with the involun­ and resisted; she even struck at him. tary recoil of one who receives a blow, Juan, amazed, only half compre­ and the tears poured from her eyes as hending his own actions, stepped back if the wounds of her whole life were and gazed at her questioningly through shedding their salt ichor. Drawing a leisurely whirling film which seemed her rebozo over her head, she bowed to have lodged behind his eyes. Cer­ her forehead on her arms, folded upon tainly here was a strange thing. He her updrawn knees, and wept. had not intended to touch her. Oh, After a great while she sat up, well, no harm done. He gave up, throwing the rebozo off her face, and turned away. Sleep was better. He leaned against the clustered saplings lay down amiably in a shadowed cor­ of the bush, arms relaxed at her sides, ner and floated away dreamlessly. her face still, her eyes swollen, the lids

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED MARIA CONCEPCI6N 233 closed and heavy. She sat there in ly, calling to him. Then he saw her deadly silence and immobility, the clearly. tears still forming steadily under the "For Dios!" thought Juan, frozen lashes, as if poured from an inex­ with amazement, "here I am facing my haustible, secret, slow-moving river. death!" for the long knife she wore She seemed to be crying in her sleep. habitually at her belt was in her hand. From time to time she would Hft the But instead, she threw it away, clear corner of her rebozo to wipe her face from her, and got down on her knees, dry; and silently the tears would run crawling toward him as he had seen again, streaking her face, drenching her crawl toward the shrine at Guada­ the front of her chemise. She had lupe many times. Never had she that complete and horrifying realiza­ knelt before him! He watched her tion of calamity which is not a thing approach with superstitious horror. of the mind, but a physical experience Falling forward upon her face, she as sharp and certain as the bite of kissed his feet. She huddled upon his thorns. All her being was a dark, knees, lips moving urgently in a thrill­ confused memory of an endless loss, ing whisper. Her words became of grief burning in the heart by night, clear, and Juan understood them all. of deadly baffled anger eating at her For a second he coujd not speak. by day, until her feet were as heavy as He sat immovable. Then he took her if she were mired in the muddy roads head between both his hands, and during the time of rains. supported her somewhat in this way, Juan awakened slowly, with long saying swiftly, anxiously reassuring, yawns and grumblings, alternated almost in a babble: with short relapses into sleep full of "Oh, thou poor creature! Oh, thou visions and clamorous noises. A blur dear woman! Oh, my Maria Con­ of orange hght seared his eyeballs cepcion, unfortunate! Listen! do not when he tried to unseal his lids. fear! Hear me! I will hide thee There came from somewhere a rapid away, I, thy own man, will protect confusion of words, a low voice weep­ thee! Quiet! Not a sound!" ing without tears, speaking awful Trying to collect himself, he held meaningless phrases over and over. and soothed her as they sat together He began to hsten. He strained and in the new darkness. Maria Con­ tugged at the leash of his stupor, he cepcion bent over, face almost upon sweated to grasp those words which his knees, her feet folded under her, should have fearful meanings, yet seeking security of him. For the first somehow he could not comprehend time in his careless, utterly unafraid them. Then he came awake with existence Juan was aware of danger. frightening suddenness, sitting up, This was danger. Maria Concepcion eyes straining at the long, lashing would be dragged away between two streak of gilded light piercing the gendarmes, with him helpless and un­ corn-husk walls from the level, dis­ armed, to spend her days in Belem appearing sun. Prison, maybe. Danger! The night Maria Concepcion stood in the door­ was peopled with tangible menaces. way, looming colossally tall to his He stood up, dragging the woman to shocked eyes. She was talking quick­ her feet with him. She was silent now.

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED 234 THE CENTURY MAGAZINE perfectly rigid, holding to him with legged near her, he stared at her as at resistless strength, her hands frozen on a creature unknown to him, who be­ his arms. wildered him utterly, for whom there "Get me the knife," he told her in a was no possible explanation. She whisper. She obeyed, her feet slip­ did not turn her head, but kept an ping along the hard earth floor, her oblivious silence and stillness, save shoulders straight, her arms stiffened for the movement of her strong hands downward. He hghted a candle. Ma­ fanning the blaze which cast sparks ria Concepcion held the knife out to and small jets of white smoke, flaring him. It was stained and dark even to and dying rhythmically with the mo­ the end of the handle, a thick stain tion of the fan, lighting her face and with a Adscous gleam. leaving it in darkness by turns. He frowned at her harshly, noting "Tu mujer,"—Juan's voice barely the same stains on her chemise and disturbed the silence,—"hsten now hands. to me carefully, and answer my ques­ "Take off thy clothes and wash thy tions as I ask them, and later, when hands," he ordered. He washed the the gendarmes come here for us, thou knife carefully, and threw the water shalt have nothing to fear. But there wide of the doorway. She watched will be something to settle between us him, and did likewise with the bowl afterward." where she had bathed. She turned her head slowly at this. "Light thy brasero and cook food The light from the fire cast small red for me," he told her in the same per- sparks into the corners of her eyes; a

emptory tone. He took her garments yellow phosphorescence glimmered be­ and went out. When he returned, hind the dark iris. she was wearing an old soiled dress, "For me it is all settled, Juanito and was fanning the fire in the char­ mio," she answered, without fear, in coal-burner. Seating himself cross- a tone so tender, so grave, so heavy

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED MARIA CONCEPCION 235 with sorrow, that Juan felt his vitals "Pass, friends!" Juan cried cheer­ contract. He wished to weep openly fully. not as a man, but as a very small They stood in the doorway, simple, child. He could not fathom this cautious gendarmes from the village, woman, or the mysterious fortunes of partly Indian themselves, personally life grown so instantly tangled where known to all the inhabitants. They all had seemed so gay and simple. He flashed their lanterns almost apologet­ felt, too, that she had become unique ically upon the pleasant, harmless scene and invaluable, a woman without an of a man eating supper with his wife. equal in a million women, and he could "Pardon, Brother," said the leader. not tell why. He drew an enormous "Some one has killed the woman sigh that rattled in his chest. Maria Rosa, and we must ask ques­ "Si, si, it is all settled. I shall not tions of all her neighbors and friends." go away again. We shall stay here He paused, and added with an at­ together, you and I, forever." tempt at severity, "Naturally!" In whispers he questioned her, and "Naturally," agreed Juan. "I was she answered whispering, and he in­ a good friend of Maria Rosa. I regret structed her over and over until she her bad fortune." had her lesson by heart. The pro­ They all went away together, the found blackness of the night en­ men walking in a group, Maria Con­ croached upon them, flowing over the cepcion following a trifle to one side, a narrow threshold, invading their few steps in the rear, but near Juan. hearts. It brought with it sighs and This was the custom. There was no murmurs, the pad of ghostly feet in thought of changing it even for such the near-by road, the sharp staccato an important occasion. whimper of wind through the cactus- The two points of candle-Kght at leaves. All these famiHar cadences Maria Rosa's head fluttered uneasily; were now invested with sinister ter­ the shadows shifted and dodged on the rors; a dread, formless and uncon­ stained, darkened walls. To Maria trollable, possessed them both. Concepcion everything in the smother­ "Light another candle," said Juan, ing, inclosing room shared an evil aloud, suddenly, in too resolute, in too restlessness. The watchful faces of hard a tone. "Let us eat now." those called as witnesses, those familiar They sat facing each other and ate faces of old friends, were made alien by from the same dish, after their old that look of speculation in the eyes. habit. Neither tasted what they ate. The ridges of the rose-colored silk With food half-way to his mouth, rebozo thrown over the body varied Juan listened. The sound of voices continually, as though the thing it grew, spread, widened at the turn of covered was not perfectly in repose. the road, along the organa wall. A Her eyes swerved over the body from spray of lantern-light filtered through the candle-tips at the head to the feet, the hedge, a single voice slashed the jutting up thinly, the small, scarred blackness, literally ripped the fragile soles protruding, freshly washed, a layer of stillness which hovered above mass of crooked, half-healed wounds, the hut. thorn-pricks and cuts of sharp stones. "Juan Villegas!" Her gaze went back to the candle-

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED 236 THE CENTURY MAGAZINE flare, to Juan's eyes warning her, to Seiior," retorted Lupe. "This noise the gendarnaes talking anmong thena- was something else." selves. Her eyes would not be con­ But she was at a loss to describe it trolled. exactly. Immediately, there was a With a leap that shook her her gaze slight rattle of pebbles rolling and settled upon the face of Maria Rosa. slipping under feet; then she knew Instantly, her blood ran smoothly some one had been there and was again: there was nothing to fear. running away. Even the restless hght could not give "Why did you wait so long before a look of life to that fixed countenance. going to see?" She was dead. Maria Concepcion "I am old and hard in the joints," felt her muscles give way softly; her said Lupe; "I cannot run after people. heart began beating without effort. I walked as fast as I could to the She knew no more rancor against that organa hedge, for it is only by this way pitiable thing, lying indifferently on that any one can enter. There was its new mat under the fine silk rebozo. no one in the road, Seiior, no one. The mouth drooped sharply at the Three cows, with a dog driving them; comers in a grimace of weeping ar­ nothing else. When I got to Maria rested half-way. The brows were Rosa, she was lying all tangled up, strangely distressed; the dead could and from her neck to her middle she not cast off some dark, final obsession was full of knife-holes. It was a of terror. It was all finished. Maria sight to move the Blessed Image Him­ Rosa had eaten too much honey and self! Her mouth and eyes were—" had had too much love. Now she "Never mind. Who came oftenest must sit in hell, crsdng over her sins to her house? Who were her ene­ and her hard death forever and ever. mies?" Old Lupe's cackling voice arose. The old face congealed, closed. She had spent the morning helping Her spongy skin drew into a network Maria Rosa. The child had spat of secretive wrinkles. She turned blood the moment it was bom, a bad withdrawn and expressionless eyes sign. She thought then that bad upon the gendarmes. luck would come to the house. Well, "I am an old woman; I do not see about sunset she was in the yard at well; I cannot hurry on my feet. I the back of the house grinding toma­ did not see any one leave the clearing." toes and pepper. She had left mother "You did not hear splashing in the and babe asleep. She heard a strange spring near the bridge?" noise in the house, a choking and "No, Seiior." smothered calling, like some one in the "Why, then, do our dogs follow a nightmare. Well, such a thing is only scent there and lose it?" natural. But there followed a light, "Solo Dios sabe, Seiior. I am an quick, thudding sound — old wo—" "Like the blows of a fist?" inter­ "How did the footfalls sound?" rupted the officer. broke in the officer, hastily. "No, not at all like such a thing." "Like the tread of an evil spirit!" "How do you know?" intoned Lupe in a swelling oracular "I am acquainted with that sound. tone startling to the listeners. The

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Indians stirred among themselves, "Local" yapped the gendarme in a watchfully. To them the medicine- shrill voice. "Take her away some­ woman was an incalculable force. body! Juan Villegas, tell me—" They half expected her to pronounce Juan told him eversrthing he knew, a charm that would produce the evil patiently, several times over. He had spirit among them at once. returned to his wife that day. She The gendarme's politeness began to had gone to market as usual. He had wear thin. helped her prepare her fowls. She "No, poor fool; I mean, were they had returned about mid-afternoon, heavy or light? The footsteps of a they had talked, she had cooked, they man or of a woman? Was the person had eaten. Nothing was amiss. shod or barefoot?" Then the gendarmes came. That A glance at the listening circle as­ was all. Yes, Maria Rosa had gone sured Lupe of their thrilled attention. away with him, but there had been no She enjoyed the prominence, the bad blood on this account between menacing importance, of her situation. him and his wife or Maria Rosa. What she had not seen she could not Everybody knew that his wife was a describe, thank God! No one could quiet woman. harm her because her knees were stiff Maria Concepcion heard her own and she could not run even to seize a voice answering without a break. It murderer. As for knowing the dif­ was true at first she was troubled ference between footfalls, shod or bare, when her husband went away, but man or woman, nay, even as between after that she had not cared. It was devil and human, who ever heard of the way of men, she believed. Well, such madness? he had come home, thank God! She "My ears are not eyes, Seiior," she had gone to market, but had returned ended grandly; "but upon my heart I early, because now she had her man swear those footsteps fell as the tread to cook for. That was all. of the spirit of evil!" Other voices followed. A toothless

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PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED 238 THE CENTURY MAGAZINE old man said, "But she is a wonaan of The gendarmes gave up. Nobody good repute among us, and Maria Rosa could be accused; there was not a was not." A smiling young mother, shred of true evidence. Well, then, Anita, baby at breast, said: "But if no good night to everybody. Many par­ one thinks so, how can you accuse dons for having intruded. Good her? Should not a woman's own health! husband know best where she was at Maria Concepcion, carrying the all times?" Another: "Maria Rosa child, followed Juan from the clearing. had a strange life, apart from us. The hut was left with its lighted How do we know who may have candles and a group of old women who wished her evil?" would sit up all night, drinking coffee Maria Concepcion suddenly felt and smoking and relating pious tales herself guarded, surrounded, upborne of horror. by her faithful friends. They were Juan's exaltation had burned down. all about her, speaking for her, defend­ There was not an ember of excitement ing her, refusing to admit ill of her. left in him. He was tired; the high The forces of life were ranged in­ sense of adventure was faded, Ma­ vincibly with her against the van­ ria Rosa was vanished, to come no quished dead. Maria Rosa had for­ more forever. Their days of march­ feited her share in their loyalty. ing, of eating, of fighting, of making What did they really believe? How love, were all over. To-morrow he much had old Lupe seen? She looked would go back to dull and endless from one to the other of the circling labor, he would descend into the faces. Their eyes gave back reas­ trenches of the buried city as Maria surance, understanding, a secret and Rosa would go into her grave. He mighty sympathy. felt his veins fill up with bitterness, The gendarmes were at a loss. with black and unendurable melan­ They, too, felt that sheltering wall cast choly. 0 Dios! what strange fortunes impenetrably around the woman they overtake a man! had meant to accuse of murder. They Well, there was no way out of it. watched her closely. They ques­ For the moment he craved to forget tioned several people over again. in sleep. He found himself so drowsy There was no prying open the locked he could hardly guide his feet. The doors of their defenses. occasional light touch of the wonaan at A small bundle lying against the his elbow was unreal, as ghostly as the wall at the head of the body squirmed brushing of a leaf against his face. like an eel. A wail, a mere sliver Having secured her safety, compelled of sound, issued. Maria Concepci6n by an instinct he could not in the least took the almost forgotten son of Ma­ comprehend, he forgot her. There ria Rosa in her arms. survived in him only a vast blind hurt "He is mine," she said clearly; "I like a covered wound. will take him with me." He entered the jacal, and, without No one assented in words, but she waiting to light a candle, threw off his felt an approving nod, a bare breath clothing, sitting just within the door. of friendly agreement, run around the He moved with lagging, half-awake tight, hot room. hands, seeking to strip his outwearied

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED MARIA CONCEPCI6N 239 body of its heavy finery. "With a long stealthy moon crept slantwise to the groaning sigh of relief he fell straight shelter of the mountains. She felt back on the floor, almost instantly soft and warm all over; she dreamed asleep, his arms flung up and out in that the newly born child was her own, the simple attitude of exhaustion. and she was resting deliciously. Maria Concepcion, a small clay jar Maria Concepcion could hear Juan's in her hand, approached the gentle breathing. The sound vapored from little mother goat tethered to a sapling, the low doorway, calmly; the house which gave and yielded as she pulled seemed to be resting after a burden­ at the rope's-end after the farthest some day. She breathed, too, very reaches of grass about her. The kid, slowly and quietly, each inspiration tied up a few yards away, rose bleat­ saturating her with repose. The ing, its feathery fleeceshiverin g in the child's fight, faint breath was a mere fresh wind. Sitting on her heels, shadowy moth of sound flitting in the holding his tether, she allowed him to silver air. The night, the earth under suckle a few moments. Afterward— her, seemed to swell and recede to­ all her movements very deliberate gether with a vast, unhurried, benign and even—she drew a supply of milk breathing. She drooped and closed for the child. her eyes, feeling the slow rise and fall She sat against the wall of her house, within her own body. She did not near the doorway. The child, fed and know what it was, but it eased her aU asleep, was cradled in the hollow of through. Even as she was falfing her crossed legs. The silence over­ asleep, head bowed over the child, she filled the world, the skies floweddow n was stiU aware of a strange, wakeful evenly to the rim of the valley, the happiness.

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED The Stevenson Myth

BY GEORGE S. HELLMAN DRAWINGS BY PAUL ROCHE

HE zest of discovery and the en­ novels, and, most important of all, T joyment of research in the field of well over one hundred poems. unknown writings of great authors are Professor W. P. Trent of Columbia delights familiar to the lover and stu­ University had been asked by that dent of such papers. Let them imag­ ardent Stevensonian, the late F. S. ine the thrill I experienced when, in Peabody of Chicago, for his opinion looking over the Stevenson material concerning some unpubKshed material offered a few years ago at auction sale that formed a part of Mr. Peabody's in New York, there came the realiza­ notable Stevenson collection. Pro­ tion that score after score of the manu­ fessor Trent and I were at that time scripts therein included had never been associated on the publication com­ printed. To acquire these without mittee of the Authors Club, and at one having the dealers recognize the as­ of our meetings there was occasion to tounding nature of many insufficiently mention the Stevenson papers that I described items led me, after having had acquired. Professor Trent be­ marked the catalogs, to refrain from came greatly interested, and asked me attending the various sessions of the whether I would study Mr. Peabody's auction; adopting, instead, the policy manuscripts in connection with the of doing my buying the next morning. others. The upshot of the entire mat­ I would then make a round of the book­ ter was that at the invitation of the sellers and offer a fifty per cent, ad­ Bibliophile Society, whereof Professor vance over the prices fetched the Trent was vice-president, Mr. Pea- preceding day, on the condition that body one of the most interested mem­ I should be left alone with their Ste­ bers, and H. H. Harper of Boston the venson purchases to make my own se­ directing spirit, the editing of all this lections. In this way, save for those unpublished material was undertaken items which were bought on order and by me. It led to the issue of two which private collectors would not re­ volumes of Stevenson's poetry in 1916, linquish, almost all of the unpublished and later two more volumes of hitherto Stevenson material was corralled with­ unknown Stevenson material were out having aroused competitive bid­ brought forth by the Bibliophile So­ ding by various dealers who knew my ciety under the joint editorship of Pro­ special predilections in the field of un­ fessor Trent, Mr. Harper, and myself. published material. In this collection were family letters, unpublished es­ Thus these four Stevenson volumes says, stories, portions of plays and came to make their appearance in print. But when the first two vol-

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