Читать книгу Great River - Paul Horgan - Страница 26

5.

Destiny and the Future

In midsummer of 1540 the Pueblo World of the river had the news of what was happening at the rocky towns to the west, in the deserts, where Zuñi people lived. New men had come, in shining garments, with tremendous animals on whose backs they rode. It seemed that these animals, with their great teeth in their long bony heads, ate people. There was a battle at the town of Hawikuh, where before the town the Indians made a line of sacred meal on the ground which they told the newcomers not to cross. One of the strangers advanced and made a long statement with a one-handed gesture to his brow, his breast, and each shoulder. More came up behind him. The Zuñis sounded their war horn, and were ready, with leather shields and bows, arrows, lances and maces. The women and the little ones and the old ones were sent many hours before to the hills beyond the town. The war captain gave the signal and arrows flew. Then came the men with the high animals, and gave war, making loud sudden noises with flashes of fire and smoke, and thrusting with hard knives as long as a leg. The Zuñis broke and ran to their town, the invaders followed, and a hot fight brought the surrender of the town in a little while. The new men broke into the food stores and ate like starving dogs. They made peace, and treated everyone kindly, though they had killed twenty Zuñis in the battle. Their chief was a grand lord who had been hurt in the fight, wearing a helmet of gold. He now recovered, and remained with his men at Hawikuh. Various chiefs from other pueblos went to see him, bringing him gifts of turkeys, animal skins and food. To them he gave marvellous little things never before seen, some to be worn, either as ornaments, like the flashing beads, or on the head, like the red caps, others to be played with, like the little bells. He made much of a sign to be given with fingers, crossed one over another, squarely, or fixed in wooden pieces. It was the mark by which they did everything. They could always be recognized by it.

Nobody knew who the newcomers were, with their light coloring, their immense animals, and their frightful noises. They brought with them a great amount of things they needed, and they sat down and put their legs one over the other as though to stay.

Long ago this world had heard of a white lord who would come to rule them. He would come from the south, as these men had come. Was this he?

There were people always moving on the long trails that went from the western deserts to the eastern plains. The news came along steadily.

One day in August of that summer the old chief of the pueblo of Pecos,^• that stood at the gateway to the plains to the east of the river, came to the river pueblos on a journey. With him he brought a few of his people, including a young chief who wore long mustaches. He had heard of what had happened to the Zuñis, and he was going to see for himself. Word had travelled that the new man at Hawikuh would be glad to see chiefs from the country. The newcomers at Hawikuh were strange people, and bold men, and should be met and examined. Travelling by the pueblos on the river, the chief from Pecos and his party crossed over to the west and made their way in the August heat over the desert to the town where the amazing thing had happened.

When he arrived with his party at Hawikuh, he was without delay taken to see the commander of the invasion, whose name was given as General Don Francisco Vásquez de Coronado. The travellers identified themselves. The old chief of the pueblo of Pecos, because of his position, was at once called Cacique, and the young chief, because of his long mustaches, was called Bigotes. Friendly greetings were exchanged and gifts—on the one hand little glass dishes, and pearl beads, and little bells; on the other, dressed animal skins, and leather shields, and headdresses.

Bigotes spoke for the callers. He was a tall, handsomely made young man, a person of authority. He said they had come in response to the General’s invitation to the people of this land to meet him as friends. He put his hands on himself and then toward the General. If the other soldiers and the General wished to come to his own land—he pointed to the east—then they would be welcomed, and in the air he made designs to enlarge his meaning.

^• Pecos was then called Ciqúique.

The General was touched, and showed his gratitude. He was himself a tall and handsome young man, with dark gold hair, mustaches and beard, and blue eyes. He gave himself a fine bearing and was beautifully dressed, with leather, velvet, brocade and linen. He indicated that he would know more of the lands from which Bigotes and his friends came.

There to the east, told Bigotes with word and hand, lay the plains, so wide, so flat, so far, where the cattle were, with great bodies, little hooves, heads lowered, short curled horns, and beards, thus, from the chin.

The General knew of those before, from the reports of Núñez Cabeza de Vaca. One by one the pieces of the map fell into place. He wondered if the hides that had come as gifts might be from such cattle? But the hair on them was so matted and snarled that it was impossible to picture from them the appearance of those plains cows.

Bigotes could show them. He took one of his men and turned him so that all could see his nakedness. There on his body was a painted picture of one of the cows. On his breathing skin they could see how the cattle were.

The General and his men were delighted. The interview continued, with descriptions of the trails to the east, towns to see, one on a vast high rock, a river with more towns, and then mountains, with the plains beyond. The General for his part explained who he was, for whom he came here, his purpose in the land, the power of the Emperor, and the will of God, whose Son to save the world died on the Cross: thus: cross.

Now it was clear that there was much to see and the General wanted to ask one of his first captains to go to see it. He presented Captain Hernando de Alvarado, commander of the artillery. Captain de Alvarado, with twenty soldiers, and the chaplain Fray Juan Padilla, was to accompany the Indian visitors on their return to their homelands, and take up to eighty days if necessary to make a proper reconnaissance of the territory to the east.

Bigotes and Cacique found that this could be arranged, and at once proposed to accompany Alvarado as his guides and to sponsor him in friendship among the people they would meet and whose towns they must pass as they went, toward the land of the cattle.

So it was settled. The General had already sent other expeditions to the west and the northwest, who would report back to Hawikuh which he now called Granada, both because it somewhat resembled the town in Spain, and also to honor the Viceroy, who came from the old Granada. Captain de Alvarado now with his little force of sixteen cavalry, four dismounted crossbowmen and a chaplain, along with the Indian party would be able to furnish much information. The General would remain at Granada until he received all reports from his scouting forces in the field. Then, in a position to move wisely, he would decide where to take the bulk of the army, which awaited his word in the Sonora Valley to the south, and establish its winter quarters.

The General saw Alvarado and his company off to the east on Sunday, August 29, 1540, which was the feast day of the beheaded St. John. The unknown lay vastly all about him to the west, the north and the east. His health was restored to him after the wounds he had suffered in the battle for Hawikuh, when because of his gilded armor and his place of command in the vanguard of his troops he had been the chief target of the Indian defenders. Storming the walls among his men, he had suffered piercing arrows and a rain of heavy stones thrown down from the parapets. Alvarado and another captain, García de Cárdenas, had saved his life and borne him away unconscious, and for the duration of the battle they had thought he must die.

But now the town was at peace, the Indians made paintings for him on hides, showing the animals of the region, that he could send to the Viceroy, and he worked on his reports, and awaited news from his field forces.

Not too many years before an odd thing had happened in Salamanca, his home in Spain. It was the kind of thing to which thought now and then returned. It seemed that in his young days he had a friend who was an adept in mathematics and other sciences. One day they had a conversation in which destiny and the future came up. The mathematician looked at him and told him that he was destined in the future to find himself in faraway lands.

Faraway?

Yes, and furthermore, that he would become a man of high position and much power.

Position? Power?

Yes, but alas, he was to suffer a fall from which he would never recover.

A fall?

The mathematician told him no more; but already at Granada in the Indian wastes of the most remote northerly marches of the Indies of the Ocean Sea, the General of the Army Francisco Vásquez de Coronado was undertaking new kingdoms for the Crown. Was the prophecy two-thirds fulfilled?