The Doll

We Landed at Colima twenty minutes behind schedule. Two passengers got on, fighting the slipstream as the plane held against the brakes, and took off again in its own dust. The town was still in sight under the left wing when the steward began dispensing Aérovias Azteca's standard flight breakfast. A paper cup of orange juice – warm; powdered coffee – cold; and a sweet roll, roughly the size and shape of a calf's clinker.

A bundle of magazines had been put aboard at Guadalajara. But the same steward – a voluptuary of the type that can't bear to read anything but a virgin periodical – sat on them, releasing only one at a time. Instead of waiting for him to rack up a news weekly, I decided to finish writing a letter. I had been describing a Covarrubias mural, and left it at:

"Actually, it's a large-scale map illustrating the principal attractions in each region. You know —"

Levelling the portable on my knees, I took it up from there:

"Mazatlán, sailfish leaping out of the water, magnificently colored tropical birds; Michoacan, Puebla, churches; Durango, horsemen; San Luis Potosí, wild game – and so on."

The seat next to mine, on the aisle, sagged. "Permisso?" I nodded – or shrugged; it annoyed me slightly that another passenger, with a seat of his own, should leave it to move beside me. He had no excuse for thinking that I was eager for conversation. I wrote on:

"And what do you think Acapulco has to offer? An American-type blonde! A monumental hunk of white meat wrapped in a cellophane bathing suit, with a pair of uptilted fenders, sunglasses ditto, and a face like that which Balzac described as 'that of an infanticide forever hearing her child's last cry.'"

My neighbor fidgeted, prospecting for his cigarettes, then for matches, and finally asked me for a light – as I knew he would. He thanked me, and pointing with the charred match, said, "That appears to be a very fine machine-of-writing. The best, no?"

"It's very serviceable."

"You operate it, if you will permit me to say so, with great skill, señor."

There is no way of being curt without being crude in the Spanish tongue. When a compliment, no matter how feeble, is offered, it is returned, I tried.

"An intelligent man – you, señor – with some practice, can do as well."

"I drive one well enough, but not with such velocity as yourself . . . How much does one of that model cost?"

"A hundred and five dollars, including the case."

"Caray! One thousand three hundred and twelve pesos, fifty centavos . . . a dear price, but, which, I suppose, must be paid to enjoy the newness. A used one, now, would come to —?"

"Anywhere from forty-five dollars up."

"Five hundred and sixty two pesos, fifty centavos. Válgame Dios! Even that is a formidable sum to an humble cura of souls."

A priest. And I had him pegged as a bank clerk. But anybody can make that mistake in Mexico where the law forbids the wearing of canonicals in public. I looked at him properly for the first time. He was short; we sat about the same height. His face was round, a little jowly; skin, light mahogany shading to bronze. I asked him if his parish was in Colima. "I serve God in Uruapan," he said. "My tarjeta —"

His card, well-worn and furry on the edges, fell on my keyboard. "Reverendo Lazaro Fuentes Arce, O. A . . . O. A. —?"

"Orden Augustiniana," he explained. An Augustinian Father. I told him my name; we shook hands and he asked what profesión I followed. I told him.

"As I guessed. A periodistra?"

"My newspaper days are long behind me." I could have stopped there; instead, I elaborated: "And I do not wish them back. I prefer what I am doing – writing what I please." My rationalizing had put him on top; made him my cathechist.

"It brings you a steady income?" he probed.

"You mean like a priest's?" Maybe that would get me from under. "No. But a man can live."

"And live well." He pointed to my typewriter as proof. "What kind of books do you write?"

"I have given up writing books of any kind, Padre."

He looked sad, solicitious, as if he had just discovered some crippling infirmity about me. "But for why, my son?"

"To write books, I am not rich enough – or poor enough."

That seemed to please him. He smiled. "But you write. And if not books, lighter things."

"Shorter – but not always lighter. Little stories – about people. Travel articles – about places and people."

"Then you are going to Acapulco."

"No. To Morelia. I have never been there, and I hear it is a beautiful city. And the people —"

"I know Morelia. I was ordained there. And the people are like all others, made of flesh and imbued with the Spirit; in hot haste to sin, and creeping like worms to atonement." His tone was without anger. He still looked like a bank clerk during a coffee-break; relaxed, but with the figures in his head. "Inform me, if you please, these stories which you write; where are they published in revistas? . . . magazines – thank you. Which ones?"

"Any of a dozen or more, of general interest."

"How long does it take you to compose a story?"

"His curiosity, somehow, did not appear idle, and his interest in the details of my trade was, I admit, not unflattering. I explained that once the content, the substance, is formed in the mind, the actual work of writing can take from several days to as long as weeks. "Sometimes it just sings along – it seems to write itself; and you see that only two hours have passed."

"Like that —" he nodded toward the typewriter, "when I interrupted you."(concluded overleaf)

"Not at all, Padre. What I am writing there is a letter to the States, practically finished."

"That is how you dispatch your writings to the magazines – by mail," he said, "and they send the money to whereever you are. Is that the procedure?"

"No, Padre. The procedure is more elaborate than that. I send what I write to my agent – my literary representative." The designation appeared to puzzle him. I clarified it. "My apoderado . . . Yes, he has the power to deal for me with the magazines – and the skill. He has the judgement to decide to which magazines my work is to be submitted; or to none, if it's not good enough."

"Of that you need not be afraid, my son. I can see —"

By what could he see? By my portable from which he couldn't take his eyes? "Thank you, Padre, but your compliment is undeserved," I began. "As a matter of fact, Padre, this letter is to my agent. I am still trying to find the words to apologize for the last two stories I sent him."

"Then I shall tell you a good one."

Snared! That's what you get for lying to a priest! "You are very kind, Padre, but I have one in preparation."

"But the one I shall tell you is, as you explained, entirely formed & mdash; complete – whole. It requires only the writing . . . it will sing along – like a Te Deum . . . Are you a Christian?"

"Yes, but —"

"By that I mean a Catholic, naturally."

"Yes, Padre, but you see —" I struggled for an out: " – my ties to the Church have not been as —"

"I understand, my son. A man in your occupation, given to – you understand the sense in which I use the term – profane writing."

"Yes, unfortunately, I seem to be able to write only about – what did you call them, father? – people who fly to evil and crawl to repentance."

"In hot haste to sin, and creeping like worms to atonement," he corrected. "But now, my son, you shall write about saintly people. As only you can." Another dab of butter.

"I'm sorry, Padre. But you can't sermonize at people any more; not in these days. Take my word for it; people don't want to read moral tales. They'll go to church for their devotions, but when they open a magazine they want to smile – to be edified, also – but mainly to smile."

"Claro! The story that I will tell you, and which you will write, will do just that! Man! A stone would have rejoiced to hear His Eminence, the head of our Order, relate it to my class of seminarians. Why, some of the young priests —"

I saw an escape hatch. "One moment, Padre– is this one of those stories —"

He flicked my arm, grinned widely and bobbing his head rapidly, said, "Ah! Don't tell me you know it – the one about the Reverend Mother and the nuns . . . Sister Prudencia, and how —"

"No, señor cura! Do you think I would lend myself to relating anything disrespectful to our faith?"

"Would I, a priest, trust anybody but a man like yourself to treat this story with all the reverence due to the holy women involved? . . . Listen: It happened in the golden times of that noble and most devout chief-of-state Don Porfiro Díaz —" He was off; the lid fell; I was trapped.

" – that there flourished, in Puebla, an edifice occupied by saintly women who had dedicated themselves to poverty, chastity and good works in nomine Deo Optimo Maximo. This convent was under the guidance of the Most Reverend Mother Inocencia de la Cruz; and very aptly was she named – as you will see presently.

"It fell that one day, some pilgrims on their way to the sacred grotto of Chalma, having been refreshed at the nunnery, and thankful, presented the nuns with a little pig. A pig, do I say? It was a cherub! A suckling – a lechon – at the rosy peak of its delicacy. Take a suckling like that, señor, stuff it with a forcemeat of its own tripes, green plums, pounded brains and pine nuts, and you have a dish fit for the table of an archbishop. However, none of the good sisters could bring themselves to take this amiable little swine, the color of lotus buds, and cut its throat. So, it became a pet. They gave it a name – La Muñeca – The Doll. The nuns built for it a little sty, and fed it, literally with their own hands. And in time – all too soon – The Doll grew up. She had become, to the dismay of her guardians, a cochina grandota. In your English that would be —?"

"A great, big, roaring sow."

"Thank you. Still they loved her; she was still their Muñeca, though it saddened them at times to see her grow coarser of hide and bristle. But Mother Inocencia, who knew more of this world than did the younger nuns, counted the twelve botones on the sow's belly, and rejoiced that the Order would have, in God's time, a litter of little pigs. They thought of names for them (there could be only one Muñeca) and they waited.

"Weeks passed. The convent sow grew leaner and uglier in disposition; and often she complained in the night. But no tiny pigs did she yield up. Then, on a day when His Grace, the Bishop of Cholula, came to confess them, Mother Inocencia remarked about the stubbornness of The Doll. His Grace smiled, though he pitied the unworldliness of the nuns. He told them that their sow must be coupled with a boar for the increment that they wished, and rode off on his fine mule.

"Now, Mother Inocencia learned that there was a boar in the herd of a peasant, some two kilometers distant, and resolved, since that was the custom, to bring her Doll there. Needless to say, it was not seemly for a godly woman, the Superior of a convent, to drag a leashed pig two kilometers along a highway. So, with the help of Sor Prudencia, a robust novice, Mother Inocencia lifted the animal into a handbarrow and brought her, in state, so to speak, to the headquarters of the boar. And the two beasts, after a manner, rushed into each other's arms. You may be assured that the Reverend Mother and Sister Prudencia averted their faces while the boar conducted himself with the convent sow, as Nature ordained. . . . Or, how would you put that in the English?"

"You put it well enough, Padre."

"We must be careful not to offend. Now then, came morning. They looked in the sty. La Muñeca was at peace, luxuriating in her wallow. But there were no sucklings! So, that afternoon again, the sow was put into the barrow and delivered to the boar. And he, though he had ministered earlier to his own household, acquitted himself as diligently as on the previous day.

"You may be sure that Mother Inocencia's disappointment was profound when she saw no young the following morning, either. But dauntless, she and Sor Prudencia conveyed the obstinate sow once more to her cavalier, and home again to the convent.

"On the fourth day, neither were there any little pigs, nor – to the horror of all – was The Doll anywhere to be found. They looked among the stalks of maize and in the bean patch. They searched the barranca where wild berries grew."

The plane banked sharply. The no-smoking and seat-belt signs were on – must have been on for some time. Ahead, that irregular, dun blob against a cluster of gray-green hummocks, was Uruapan. Flaps and landing gear were down, and we were angled for the approach. I nudged the padre.

"I will finish," he said. ". . . The search went on. Again in the corn, and among the melons. They called, they coaxed and wheedled. Then, as they were beginning to despair. Sor Prudencia cried out that she had found their sow, and called the others to see. Where? There! There was The Doll, perched comfortably in the hand cart – and waiting."

The wheels bit, and some passengers were up before the plane rolled to a stop. The steward brought over and handed Padre Lazaro a small black satchel.

Standing above me, he seemed taller in the tilted aisle. He gave me his hand. "It has been an agreeable hour, my son. Now, good bye."

"Adios, Padre."

At the door he called down, "Don't lose my card."

"No."

Another fifty minutes to Morelia. Not enough time. I went back to my letter.

"There are many Canterburys in this country, and right now I feel like Chaucer, when ye olde boie himselfe leapt to his quill on hearing a moral tale. I'm sending you one tomorrow, about 3,000 words. Calling it The Doll. – And, please, an urgent favor: Will you have somebody in the office pick up a good used portable typewriter, charge it to me, and send it to: Padre Lazaro Fuestes A., Iglesia de San Marcos, Uruapan, Edo. de Mich., Mexico."