A Ballad of Love and Glory(65)
“The surgeons who tended to me butchered my leg. It has never healed properly. ?Imbéciles!”
As she assessed the wound, Ximena noticed how clumsy the amputation had been. The surgeons hadn’t left enough muscle and skin flap to pad and cover the amputated bone, leaving a few centimeters of it exposed just below the knee joint. He told her it caused him excruciating pain when he walked. The wooden leg couldn’t fit properly, since it rubbed against the protruding bone, and the skin had been stretched so much when it was stitched at the closure that sometimes it broke open, making the stump prone to chronic infection.
“The infection is superficial,” she said. “It hasn’t affected the flesh or bone. You’ll soon be on your way to recovery.”
“?Nunca! Those incompetent surgeons condemned me to a life of pain. They should’ve left me to die instead.” His lower lip stuck out farther, making him look even more like a petulant man-child.
“The general is fortunate to still have his life,” she said, opening the window to allow the fresh air to circulate. “In my time now in this army, I’ve seen half of the soldiers whose limbs were sawed off perish from the operation.”
“It’s an honor to die for one’s country,” he said. “And I would gladly give my life for the motherland. If I had died from my wounds in the battle against the French, I would have had a sublime death with the sweetest taste of glory. To die for Mexico, to go down in history as a martyr!”
She took some supplies from her basket and busied herself with preparing the herbs she needed to make a paste to treat his wound. She could hear her grandmother whispering in her ear—hierba del pollo to staunch the bleeding, gobernadora to discourage infection, calendula to soothe inflammation, florifundia to ease the pain. As she crushed the petals and leaves in her mortar and pestle, Ximena thought about those who’d already perished in this war and how they would never be celebrated as saviors or martyrs. Most who’d given their lives for their country, or who had yet to do so, would be forgotten, as if they never existed. And now this foolish man was speaking of being grateful for a chance at martyrdom.
“Teniente Riley said that you’re a widow. Your husband was killed by the Rangers, was he not?”
She nodded. She didn’t want to talk about Joaquín with this man.
“?Esos Rinches malditos!” he said. “Death and damnation to them!”
The servant returned with the supplies and set them on the table for her before leaving the room. She put malva leaves into the hot water and let them steep before washing his wound. Glancing up, she found him watching her intently. “Tell me, se?ora Ximena—if it isn’t impertinent of me to ask—where in the República do you hail from? I detect a familiar accent in your voice.”
“San Antonio de Béxar.”
“?Una bexare?a? You don’t say. And your family—did they fight with me or against me during the Texan insurrection?”
She looked him in the eye and didn’t hesitate to say, “Against.” Then she held her breath as she waited for his reaction. His eyes, the color of roasted tobacco leaves, revealed nothing. She almost wished he would throw her out of his chambers so she could get away from him.
Finally, he shook his head and shrugged. “It doesn’t matter now, does it? It comforts me to see that you’re on the right side of the war this time.”
She turned back to the table, her body throbbing from the sting of his words. She took her time finishing the paste, mixing some of the hot water into the crushed herbs until it was the right consistency. She remembered so vividly the day Santa Anna and his troops arrived in San Antonio. Many of the townspeople had tried to flee into the country as soon as the rumors reached them that he was on his way to the town. Colonel William Travis and his small force barricaded themselves in the old Alamo mission, including her father who was under the command of Captain Seguín. The wagon her father sent to take her and Nana Hortencia to their ranch fifteen miles from the town was unable to get past the Mexican troops, and so they’d locked themselves up in their house and were forced to witness the siege. Santa Anna hung a red flag from the towers of San Fernando Church—a sign that no quarter would be given, no mercy for the rebels—and she and Nana Hortencia cried for the fate of her father and prayed for his safety. When the Alamo fell, they both rushed out to search for him among the fallen and didn’t find him anywhere. They later learned that he’d left the Alamo one night with Seguín under orders from Travis to bring reinforcements.
Santa Anna, denying the insurgents a Christian burial, incinerated their bodies in pyres. Ximena watched from the terrace of her home as the smoke rose over the buildings. The fire burned for two days, and the stench of burnt flesh permeated the air, lingering permanently in the collective memory of its citizens. A few days later, a letter arrived from her father with news that he was alive and with General Houston’s forces.
The executions in Goliad soon followed. Almost four hundred captives—Texian and Tejano alike—were marched onto a field and shot dead on the orders of the vile man before her. As she observed him lying prostrate in bed, Ximena saw not an invalid or an amputee, but the monster who had committed such atrocious acts of violence from which her homeland had never recovered. Did he have any idea how the destruction he’d wreaked in Texas had incited the Texians’ fury and loathing for all Mexicans? She wished she could shake him and make him see how his mishandling of the Texas Rebellion had set the stage for what was happening now. She turned away from him and placed the rags to soak in the hot water.