The Hacienda(34)

He let out his breath with a hoarse curse, then those long legs stretched out, and he rose to his feet. “If you wish to stay, I must ask that you not tell the other priests . . . anything,” he said sharply. “Especially Padre Vicente. Do you understand?”

“Padre Vicente?” I repeated. The demand—for it was clear from his tone it was a demand, albeit couched in polite language—caught me off guard. “I could tell him anything and he wouldn’t believe me.” I could honestly picture myself declaring the sky is blue to his overfed, red-cheeked face, only to see his eyes widen, his jowls tremble as he reached for a pen to write to my husband to control his hysterical wife.

Andrés looked down at me, somber and unamused. Then his attention flitted to the door. Whatever he had heard, it was enough to tip the scales of his silent debate. He patted his trousers pocket as if searching for something then drew out a piece of charcoal.

Rolling the charcoal between forefinger and thumb, he turned away from me and began to count his paces from the first copal censer to the one before the door. “Siete, ocho, nueve . . .” He crouched, made a mark on the floor, and straightened. He counted again. Crouched, marked, rose. His steps were measured, mathematical, as he sketched a circle of precise markings into the floor around where I sat. Then he picked up a censer and retraced his steps, pacing the circumference of the circle, his stride measured and controlled, murmuring under his breath.

It took me several moments to realize he was not speaking castellano at all. The language was silky, sinuous as the copal that curled around him in thick plumes. I had heard it many times since coming to San Isidro, spoken among the tlachiqueros and their families.

Candlelight danced on the high points of Andrés’s face like sunlight on water; incantations wove through the smoke with the lazy grace of a water snake.

He is a witch.

The thought rang in my mind clear as the toll of a church bell.

I shook my head to dismiss it. No. That was impossible. Padre Andrés was a priest.

He finished the incantation, crouched on the ground, and began drawing more geometric shapes. Finally, he set the charcoal down and retrieved a small object from somewhere in the black fabric of his habit.

A sharp pocketknife glinted wickedly in the candlelight as he flicked it open and pricked his thumb with its tip.

I gasped.

A large bead of blood bloomed beneath the knife’s point. Without missing a beat, Andrés lowered his hand to the floor and smeared the blood through one of the geometric shapes. Then he pocketed the knife and drew out a handkerchief to staunch the blood.

He lifted his eyes to mine, his expression defiant. As if he were daring me to speak the words that he knew were on the tip of my tongue.

“You’re a witch,” I breathed.

He nodded. Once, solemnly.

“But you’re a priest.”

“Yes.”

He stood, cocking his head to the side as he evaluated the markings he had made on the floor. Then his eyes flicked back to my face. If he had been waiting for an exclamation of fear or any other sort of reaction from me, he received none. I was struck dumb.

You’ve never met a priest like him before.

“What are you thinking?” he challenged.

“I find it odd that a witch would become a priest,” I said flatly.

This answer surprised a bark of laughter from him, its texture low and throaty. “Is there any vocation more natural for a man who hears devils?”

Hairs lifted on the back of my neck. I should be afraid of him. I should be. People were meant to be afraid of witches.

But a quiet as soft as dawn fell within the circle. The air felt lighter, calmer. The flames of the candles drank it greedily and danced high, reaching for and illuminating the witch’s throat as he turned his head and narrowed his eyes at the door.

“But the Inquisition . . .” I began.

“I feared it, yes. But it has left México.” Andrés made a soft, dismissive noise. Though the tension in his shoulders had not relaxed, his movements resumed their natural, languid pace as he adjusted the position of the copal censers. “I don’t know if inquisitors even sought people like me,” he said thoughtfully. “Their purpose was to destroy political rivals. Control people who stepped out of line, like mystics and heretics. They never found me.”

He picked up the charcoal and moved to another part of the circle to resume sketching. His intent, I now saw, was to make a thick band of marks around us.

Like the glyphs on the inside of the kitchen doorway.

“Is Ana Luisa a witch?”

“You’re thinking of the kitchen. No.” He never looked up from his work. The wax surrounding the wick of the candle nearest to me had liquefied, and a thick droplet of it rolled lazily down the candle’s side. There was a judgmental note on his voice, and a harsh one, as he continued. “She knows these are meant to have power. She also knows that she isn’t capable of doing it correctly. It was dangerous. She should have known better.”

“Why?” I asked.

The stroke of his charcoal slowed; paused. Perhaps he caught himself speaking too much. Perhaps he realized fear had loosened his tongue and created an intimacy between us that should not be there, that I was not to be trusted with this information, for he raised his head sharply. “You won’t tell anyone. You can’t,” he said. “Swear you won’t.”