I didn’t know what to say. Why would I be número uno? I just looked at her in confusion, and she laughed and went sauntering off. A little while later, I saw Tía Isabela taking Edward to see the doctor and have his bandages removed. She didn’t look angry, and she didn’t speak to me at all. I went about my work. I could see Señora Rosario and Inez were still upset about me. They were not as friendly and kept their distance all morning. When the mail was brought into the house, I hurried to see if I had received another letter from Abuela Anabela, but there was none. I had hoped for one. Even a short note in her handwriting would have brought me some comfort.
Later in the afternoon, Edward and Tía Isabela returned. I was dusting in the library. Señora Rosario told me to take out every single book, to dust it and dust around it. There were so many books I would be there for hours, I thought, but I did not complain. I heard Señora Rosario greet Tía Isabela and Edward at the front door. They spoke too softly for me to hear any words. My heart was pounding because I was worrying about Edward’s eyes. What if they were both too damaged? No matter how much he believed in me or cared about me, he wouldn’t be able to help hating me. If I hadn’t come…
The sound of Tía Isabela’s footsteps on the travertine tile stopped my thoughts and brought a trembling to my fingers. I dropped the book I was dusting. When I looked up, she was standing there looking in on me. She turned and closed the library doors. For a moment, she just stood there gazing at me with the oddest smile on her face. It was not one of her cold, sharp smiles that sent shivers down my spine. She looked as if I had done something that pleased her. It reminded me of the rare smile Señora Cuevas would flash on me or any other student who had done something that delighted her. I waited, my own smile of confusion rising into my face.
“How are Edward’s eyes?” I asked. There was no time to struggle with English, and she and I had been speaking Spanish to each other off and on now.
“It’s what the doctor predicted,” she told me. “One eye is about ninety-five percent restored, but the other is too damaged. I’m sure he’ll tell you about it in more detail during one of your very private tête-à-têtes.”
“Our what?”
“Your secret talks,” she said, still holding that smile. She peeled off her hat and undid her hair, shaking her head to let it fall freely. Then she sat on the settee and folded her hands in her lap. “I should have known not to trust you,” she said. “I should have expected it, but you are good. You did such a convincing performance when you first arrived.”
“I do not understand. What performance?”
“Your little show of innocence, of weakness. I should have picked up on you when you flashed that defiance that first day, but you quickly slipped back behind that mask, far enough behind so that I would trust you, eh?”
I shook my head. “I do not understand, Tía Isabela. What mask?”
“It’s okay. I have no one to blame but myself. I should have remembered one of my father’s sayings: ‘La confianza también mata.’ Trust also kills, right, Delia? I haven’t believed in anyone but myself since I left Mexico, and then I go and believe in you, the one person I should have distrusted from the beginning.”
“I have done nothing, Tía Isabela.”
She laughed. “I would have said the same thing. You’re too much like me, Delia.” Her face turned hard, her eyes cold. “It’s of no use to pretend otherwise.” She smiled again. “We are cut from the same cloth, you see.”
“I am not like you,” I said firmly. I could feel my spine harden. “I have lost my mother and my father, and I am far from my home and the people I have known and loved all my life, but you are far more lonely than I will ever be, because you do not have the comfort of your memories.”
Her smile froze and then dissipated. The cold, angry face I had seen that first day returned. “How dare you pity me. You own nothing, not even the clothes on your back. You breathe this air only because I permit it. You’d be groveling in the dust and the grime of that poverty right this moment, if it wasn’t for my generosity. You’re too stupid to know what side your bread is buttered on.”
“What is it you want?” I asked, tired of her rage.
“You go and you betray me, try to drive a wedge between my son and me, and you want to know what I want?”
“I did not try to drive a wedge between you. He came to me and asked for the truth, and I could not lie to him anymore.”
“Oh, you couldn’t lie anymore? You poor thing, troubled by the weight of your deceptions.” Her face hardened again. “When I rewarded you for them, you accepted it all, didn’t you? The clothes, the acceptance as a member of the family so you would be waited on just like the rest of us, so you would enjoy all of this,” she said, gesturing at the house. “You ate at my table. You were driven to and from school in a Rolls. You took Sophia’s gifts. You were starting to accumulate quite a little fortune for an immigrant barely here long enough to grow warts, but warts you’ve grown, right on the tip of that pretty little nose, warts only I can see, but they are there nevertheless.
“Okay,” she said, pulling herself up straighter on the settee, “you’ve won a little battle and caused a rift between my son and myself, but it will pass, and eventually he will be too consumed by his own needs and wants to devote so much time to you.
“To ensure all that, I’ve decided to reward you for your little betrayal. I may not have my attorney do any more than absolutely necessary to defend you. You might be held accountable for your part in this horrible event, you and your Mexican boyfriend. We’ll see. After all,” she said, “those Mexican boys would not have attacked Bradley Whitfield if it were not for you, anyway. He’s dead because of you, and Edward is half-blind because of you.”
She stood up.
“Keep dusting,” she said. “You’re used to filth, and you’ll be visiting it again, I’m sure.”
She turned and walked to the doorway, paused after opening it, and looked back at me.
“You’re wrong. I do have the comfort of my memories, the comfort of knowing I have buried them long ago.” She smiled. “They have passed on through the third death.”
“And how will your children treat the memories of you when you die, Tía Isabela?” I replied quickly. “How long will it take for you to pass through the third death?”
Her eyes widened. She flashed her clenched teeth and then walked out, closing the door behind her, the silence that followed crashing down like a curtain made of iron.
I did finish my dusting in the library. It took me hours, but while I worked, I did not cry. When I was finished, I went upstairs slowly. The door to Edward’s room was open wide enough for me to look in as I was passing. I saw him sitting on his bed beside Jesse, who had his arm around his shoulders. They were talking softly, and Edward was looking down, looking as if the weight of the reality of what had happened to him was settling on him. I walked on quickly.
The door to Sophia’s room was open even wider. I could hear her laughter. She was talking to one of her girlfriends on the telephone.
“I just love the way they all trailed after us, pleading for a tidbit of information,” I heard her say.
I went into my room and closed the door. For a long moment, I just stood there looking at everything. This was a wonderful room, a beautiful room, a room in a palace, a dream room for any of my girlfriends back in Mexico. There were many who would do much more to be here. There were many who would think me a fool to have put any of it at risk.
I walked to the windows and looked out onto the large, lavish property. How many times had I been told that the good and the pure of heart might not be rewarded on this earth, but they shouldn’t be sad, for their rewards would be much greater in the life to come? Was it true, or was it just a rationalization, a way to keep the poor and the underprivileged from rebelling, from becoming thieves? Why were the poor and the pure of heart given any life of hardship? How much should they be tested?
Was that what was happ
ening to me? Was I not only Cinderella but Job, whose every earthly blessing was taken away to prove his faith and devotion? How many times had Father Martinez told that story in church? Maybe someday he would tell my story to deliver the same message.
I stood for a while longer and watched the April sun sinking behind the San Bernardino Mountains to the west. Not having been here before, I wasn’t sure what the weather should be like, but I had heard people say that it was much hotter much faster this year. It seemed to be true everywhere, so I imagined it was warmer back in Mexico as well. I thought of the children swimming in the river, floating on old inner tubes, and remembered when I did it, too.
Despite the air conditioning, I had worked up a sweat working in the library. I went to shower and change for dinner. I had no idea what it would be like eating at the table with Tía Isabela, Sophia, and Edward now, but I did not know what else I should do. Of course, I wondered if Tía Isabela would send me back into the kitchen to eat with the servants the moment I appeared.
Not only didn’t she do that, but she acted as if nothing at all was wrong or changed. Jesse was eating with us this evening, too, and it seemed he had cheered up Edward. I felt I was really in a dream now. No one talked about Edward’s eyes. No one mentioned the events that had led to Bradley Whitfield’s death, not even Sophia, who babbled on instead about an upcoming school party. She and Tía Isabela talked about clothes.
Was I going mad? Had I imagined everything that had happened? Was I really there? When the dinner ended and I started to rise to help clear the table, Tía Isabela told me to stop.
“You don’t need to do that,” she said. “Go upstairs and work on your schoolwork. I’ve decided you can and should return to your class tomorrow.”
She didn’t smile when she said it, but she didn’t sound angry at all. I looked at her and at Edward and Sophia, but I saw nothing but agreement. Jesse looked pleased and told me he expected I would be mainstreamed very soon. They were all congratulating me on my further mastering of English. Even Sophia chimed in with, “It’s easier to talk to her now.”
I looked at Tía Isabela. Where was that anger, that hate? Why did she suddenly act so forgiving? Despite all of this, I felt like the male black widow spider, tempted by the female to join her in making a new family of spiders and then stung to death. There was a new web of deceit being spun around me. What had she promised Edward, I wondered, that he was so trusting of her sweet tone and generosity toward me?
After dinner, Sophia rushed off, supposedly to do her homework. Edward was occupied with Jesse, who had brought him schoolwork, too. Tía Isabela went to her office. I had started for the stairway to go up to my room when I heard Inez call to me. She had stepped out of the kitchen and was in the hallway. Surprised, I hurried to her. She looked about for a moment and then pulled me back into the kitchen. There was no one else there.
“Casto wants to talk to you,” she said, practically in a whisper. “He’s waiting outside the door.”
“Casto?”
“Si.”
I went through the rear entrance. For a moment, I saw no one, and then Casto stepped out of the shadows.
“Someone has come to see you,” he said.
“Who?”
“Ignacio Davila.”
“Ignacio! Where is he?” I asked.
“He’s behind the pool house, waiting. You must not be seen with him,” he warned, and then disappeared into the same darkness from which he had emerged.
I hurried across the lawn toward the pool and the pool house, watching for anyone as I walked. When I got to the pool house, I paused, checked again, and went around to the rear. At first, I didn’t see him, and then his silhouette was clear at the corner. He called to me.
“Ignacio, where have you been?”
“A friend of my father’s has kept me safe,” he said.
“I am sorry you are in so much trouble. It’s all my fault.”
“No, no. It is not your fault. You were the victim.”
“What happened? Why did you hurt him so badly?”
“It wasn’t meant to be that way. He put up a big fight, and Vicente put his head down like a bull and charged at him just when he backed up in front of the window. I thought Vicente would go through the window, too, but he didn’t. We didn’t wait around after that. The girl was screaming.”
“You didn’t know how badly he was hurt?”
“We ran off. No one stopped to look. Later, when we heard, we separated. My father was very angry at me. I think he would have turned me into the police if it wasn’t for my mother. He got his friend to hide me, and I learned the others were caught. I was afraid for you, but I couldn’t come here.”
“Why did you come here now? Is it not as dangerous?”
“Yes, but I wanted to say good-bye, Delia. I can’t stay here any longer. No one will believe it was not meant to be that terrible. I’ll be sent to prison. My father believes this, too.”
“Where are you going?”
“Back to Mexico. My father has given me the money I was saving for a car, and I’m using it to pay a coyote to take me across.”
“Back to Mexico?”
“Sí, Delia. I have come to tell you I am not unhappy I met you and…”
“I must go with you,” I said quickly.
“What?”
“Back to Mexico. If you can cross over, you must take me back, too.”
“No, no, it is not a crossing for you to make. I must be smuggled through Tucson. From there, I will cross through the desert with my coyote to Sasabe, Mexico. It’s miles and miles of walking, and with this unexpected heat…”
“I will go,” I said.
“It’s too dangerous.”
“You are going. You are taking this chance.”
“Yes, but I have no choice. Even my family wants me to go back.”
“I have no choice, either,” I said.
“How can you have no choice? You are Señora Dallas’s niece. Look where you live.”
“She is not fighting for me, defending me. She will let the police believe I sent you to do this thing. She wants to see me in trouble.”
“Why?”
“It’s a long story, Ignacio. I do not wish to stay here any longer, and they won’t let me just return to my grandmother. Not now, not with all of this going on.”
“I don’t have the money to pay for you, Delia.”
“What if you did?”
“Delia, it is very dangerous. It’s not only the hardship of crossing the desert, so many miles, there are other dangers to face.”
“I want to go home, Ignacio.”
“I did not mean to come here to get you to go,” he said, shaking his head.
“No, but you have come, and we must believe a higher power made you come.”
“Where will you get this money?”
“Remember that bracelet?” I asked.
“Sí. Where is it?” he asked, looking at my naked wrist.
“Don’t worry. I will bring it. Surely, it’s enough.”
“Yes, it might be enough,” he said. “I can’t promise you. My father’s friend is making this arrangement. He might not do it if you are with me.”
“Tell him he’d better, or else,” I said. There was enough light for me to see him smile.
“Since when did you become so tough, Delia Yebarra?”
“Since I came to America, to a harder life,” I said, and he laughed.
“Harder life? What harder life? This is the promised land.”
“The promise was not made to me,” I said, and he smiled again.
“Okay. Here is what you must do, and I warn you, if you are late, I won’t be able to wait for you.”
“I won’t be late,” I said.
He told me how far I should take the bus.
“When you get off, you will walk to Sixth Street. You will go to the first corner and turn right. When you get to the third house on the left, you will see a broken chain-link fence. Go t
hrough the opening in the fence, and go to the house behind that house. I will be there. We will not wait for nightfall. We are going in a van to Tucson and then in a car with the coyote. The driver of the van has been paid. He will want more when he knows you’ve come, but I have that much more. It’s the coyote in Tucson who will take us through the Buenos Aires wildlife reserve. He will have to agree to take your bracelet. I’m sure he will.”
“Okay. Gracias, Ignacio.”
“But how will you get to the bus? Your aunt has you driven back and forth to school, right?”
“I’ll find a way. You wait for me. I’ll be there,” I said.
“If you don’t come, I’ll understand. I would like you to come. I would like you to be with me, Delia, but the good part of me wishes you would not,” he said.
He leaned forward to kiss me, and then he slipped back into the shadows. Like a shadow, he disappeared in the thicker darkness.
Maybe I’m still in a dream, I thought, but if I am, I do not want to wake up until I am standing in my family’s front door and looking at my wonderful Grandmother Anabela.
21
Dangerous Journey
I did not come to be a thief in the night, I told myself as I walked over the grounds and back to the main house, planning to steal back the bracelet Sophia had given me and taken away. I did not come to cause my cousin to become blind in one eye or another young man to die. The trouble I had found was begun years ago in Mexico, when my aunt sought revenge and defied her father. My father had dared to choose my mother over her, and she would hate every part of her past, hate as far back as she could go, rejecting her heritage, her language, and her people. I was running away not only to return to the only family I had left, but I was running away from her words, her terrible words comparing me to her. If I remained here, I was afraid I would become as spoiled as Sophia and maybe more like my aunt than I had ever dreamed I could be.