Bless Me, Ultima(33)

Ultima was very happy too. “This one learns as much in one day as most do in a year,” she smiled. I wondered if she knew about the golden carp.

“We must pray to the Virgin,” my mother said, and although Deborah objected, saying nobody prayed for a grade promotion, my mother gathered us around the Virgin’s altar.

My father arrived home late from work and was hungry. We were still praying and supper was late. He was angry.





Diez


The summer came and burned me brown with its energy, and the llano and the river filled me with their beauty. The story of the golden carp continued to haunt my dreams. I went to Samuel’s house but it was boarded up. A neighbor, an old lady, told me that Samuel and his father had taken a job sheepherding for the rest of the summer. My only other avenue to the golden carp would be Cico, so every day I fished along the river, and watched and waited.

Andrew worked all day so I did not see him much, but it was reassuring at least to have him home. León and Gene hardly ever wrote. Ultima and I worked in the garden every morning, struggling against the llano to rescue good earth in which to plant. We spoke little, but we shared a great deal. In the afternoons I was free to roam along the river or in the blazing hills of the llano.

My father was dejected about his sons leaving, and he drank more than before. And my mother also was unhappy. That was because one of her brothers, my uncle Lucas, was sick. I heard them whispering at night that my uncle had been bewitched, a bruja had put a curse on him. He had been sick all winter, and he had not recovered with the coming of spring. Now he was on his deathbed.

My other uncles had tried everything to cure their youngest brother. But the doctor in town and even the great doctor in Las Vegas had been powerless to cure him. Even the holy priest at El Puerto had been asked to exorcise el encanto, the curse, and he had failed. It was truly the work of a bruja that was slowly killing my uncle!

I heard them say late at night, when they thought I was asleep, that my uncle Lucas had seen a group of witches do their evil dance for el Diablo, and that is why he had been cursed. In the end it was decided to hire the help of a curandera, and they came to Ultima for help.

It was a beautiful morning when the yucca buds were opening and the mocking birds were singing on the hill that my uncle Pedro drove up. I ran to meet him.

“Antonio,” he shook my hand and hugged me, as was the custom.

“Buenos días le de Dios, tío,” I answered. We walked into the house where my mother and Ultima greeted him.

“How is my papá?” she asked and served him coffee. My uncle Pedro had come to seek the help of Ultima and we all knew it, but there was a prescribed ceremony they had to go through.

“He is well, he sends his love,” my uncle said and looked at Ultima.

“And my brother Lucas?”

“Ay,” my uncle shrugged despairingly, “he is worse than when you saw him last. We are at the end of our rope, we do not know what to do—”

“My poor brother Lucas,” my mother cried, “that this should happen to the youngest! He has such skill in his hands, his gift with the care and grafting of trees is unsurpassed.” They both sighed. “Have you consulted a specialist?” she asked.

“Even to the great doctor in Las Vegas we took him, to no avail,” my uncle said.

“Did you go to the priest?” my mother asked.

“The priest came and blessed the house, but you know that priest at El Puerto, he does not want to pit his power against those brujas! He washes his hands of the whole matter.”

My uncle spoke as if he knew the witches who cursed Lucas. And I also wondered, why doesn’t the priest fight against the evil of the brujas. He has the power of God, the Virgin, and all the saints of the Holy Mother Church behind him.

“Is there no one we can turn to!” my mother exclaimed. She and my uncle glanced at Ultima who had remained quiet and listened to their talk. Now she stood up and faced my uncle.

“Ay, Pedro Luna, you are like an old lady who sits and talks and wastes valuable time—”

“You will go,” he smiled triumphantly.

“¡Gracias a Dios!” my mother cried. She ran to Ultima and hugged her.

“I will go with one understanding,” Ultima cautioned. She raised her finger and pointed at both of them. The gaze of her clear eyes held them transfixed. “You must understand that when anybody, bruja or curandera, priest or sinner, tampers with the fate of a man that sometimes a chain of events is set into motion over which no one will have ultimate control. You must be willing to accept this responsibility.”

My uncle looked at my mother. Their immediate concern was to save Lucas from the jaws of death, for that they would accept any responsibility.