Black Dog(68)

“Crosses?”

“Yes, to make into, you know…” She didn’t know the words for what she wanted to say. “Aggressive protection” was about as close as she could come. She wasn’t sure there were English words for what she meant. “Mamá taught me to make, well, these things. Aparatos. Tools, I guess. Things to call light, to catch and trap shadows, you know? So they can anchor the mandala. You know about that?”

“No,” said the sheriff. “But that sounds fine.”

Natividad was surprised. What in the world had Dimilioc’s own Pure women done to protect people, if not made the same kinds of aparatos Mamá had shown her? She said, “Well, what I want is big wooden crosses to anchor the mandala. Wrapped with silver. You probably have crosses like that left over from the war?”

“Oh, yes.”

“OK,” said Natividad. “Good. Four crosses. The biggest you have. As tall as I am, if you have any that big. We’ll put them at the compass directions. As exactly as possible, so somebody should figure out where on the circle they should go. The crosses can be plain, but Mamá… Mamá always said it’s better if they have writing on them. ‘Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil’ – things like that, you know? And your priest should renew the blessings on them, that’ll help almost as much as the silver.”

“Crosses, we’ve got,” repeated the sheriff. He nodded. “A plan for where to put your circle and four big crosses.” He smiled at her. “What else?”

“…I think that’s all.” Natividad rubbed her face. Had she missed anything obvious? If Mamá was here… She wasn’t. She never would be, never again, never… Natividad was on her own. She turned her face away, squeezed her eyes shut, and thought fiercely about mandalas.





8



Lewis was very small. It seemed even smaller than Natividad remembered from their brief pause on the way to Dimilioc, but then they had been too tired and anxious to explore. She looked around as they drove through it now. This town was much more prosperous-looking than Hualahuises, but not very much larger than Potosi. If there were even a hundred families here, that would surprise Natividad.

There was a tiny brick post office, and an even smaller police station, which looked like somebody’s house and not like a government building at all. She and her brothers had eaten sandwiches at that little place adjacent to the post office. It was a small, shabby diner, only half a dozen tables covered with cheap faded cloths that might once have been yellow, centered with narrow vases holding plastic flowers. But the sandwiches had been good. Also on the main street were a few shops, one with farm equipment and one with coats and sweaters and shoes, old books and children’s toys and little statues in its window, really toda clase de cosas. There was a little grocery store, and a bar that Natividad thought might also be a restaurant. Everything else in sight was a private home, those big American houses, with a lot of space around each as though Americans wanted to pretend they didn’t have neighbors.

Nearly all the buildings were made of wood, but at the far end of the street, in the center of an open town square, reared a great stone church, far bigger than was reasonable for a town this size. Except, of course, that Lewis was right in Dimilioc’s backyard. No wonder the people who had founded the town here had wanted a big church. A proper Catholic church, too, which was good. Its bell tower was easily the tallest thing in the whole town, and the glass of its windows sparkled blue and red and gold even in the dull light that filtered past the clouds.

Natividad immediately felt happier, more at home, especially because when she experimentally turned her head to glance at it sideways, she saw that the whole church was immersed in soft light as though illuminated by the glow of the full moon, even though it was daylight and nublado. Overcast. She smiled – then lost the smile, thinking about the Pure woman who must have wrapped those layers of protection around the church. She would be dead now, whoever she had been. The war between black dogs and the blood kin had been terrible for the Pure.

Sheriff Pearson drove straight past the police station and tucked his big vehicle by the curb in front of the church. It took up enough space for two ordinary cars. He turned off the engine. Immediately the silence of the town seemed to fold itself around them. Natividad realized that she had seen only a few other cars moving on the road, and no one on foot. Was that the snow? Or was everyone so afraid?

Then someone opened the church door and people flooded out into the town square, young men with shotguns and in their midst a priest, the white collar at his throat a reassurance in any time of trouble. At first it seemed like a crowd, though when Natividad sorted them out, she saw that besides the priest, there were really only three men.