Page 25 of The Hacienda
He would listen.
“I know this sounds shocking, but someone died in this house, Padre Vicente,” I said, the authority in my voice echoing through the narrow hall. “Someone died and was buried in a wall. Covered with bricks. I know because I found a body. This house is diseased because of it. There are... there is a spirit. A malevolent one...”
“That is quite enough, Doña Beatriz,” Padre Vicente snapped, his brows now drawn close together.
My cheeks flushed hot. I don’t quite know what I expected, but I certainly should not have expected it to go well. Perhaps it was because Idescribed the house asdiseased. Perhaps it was because I had no proof of this body I claimed to have found buried in the walls of the house.
“I will do what I came to do. That is all.” He turned on his heel and stalked toward the front hall, muttering prayers of blessing and sprinkling holy water on this wall and that. That wasn’t what I wanted.
“This house needs an exorcism, Padre,” I said, following him toward the front door. “I beg you.”
“I said, that is enough, Doña Beatriz.” Padre Vicente gave me a sharp look that indicated how obvious it was to him that something on San Isidro’s property needed an exorcism, and it wasn’t the house. “Do not give me further reason to believe you mock me with Satan’s tongue.”
My breath caught. I trod on dangerous ground.We must bear this with dignity, Mamá often said—the well-worn habit of fear bade me be silent. I should have held my tongue. But the cold of the north wing sank its claws deep into marrow. I could not shake it. I would never be free of it. I needed help. I needed someone—anyone—tolisten.
“Please,” I repeated softly, and caught Padre Andrés’s forearm as he trailed behind Padre Vicente.
The young man paused, his eyes falling to my hand on his arm. I dropped it as if I had been burned—laying hands on a priest was not something a woman like Rodolfo Solórzano’s wife should do. Something no sane woman would do.
Yet I had.
For there was a curl of fear in the way Padre Andrés held his shoulders, a bent to his posture that told me he felt there was a predator nearby. That he was ready to spring away, because he, too, felt there was something breathing down his neck.
He raised his gaze to mine.
He believed me.
“Padre Andrés, my work here is done,” Padre Vicente called. He was already in the garden.
“No, please,” I breathed. The holy water and begrudging blessings were not enough. I couldn’t face another night like the previous. I would lose my mind, or—
“Andrés, boy!” That was the cross bark of a superior who would not tolerate being disobeyed.
“Come to Mass often, Doña Beatriz,” Padre Andrés said. His voice was low, sonorous—low enough that Padre Vicente could not overhear him in the garden. “The sacraments remind us we are not alone.”
Then he dipped his head and stepped into the light. I watched his dark silhouette, slender as a young oak, as he crossed the courtyard in Padre Vicente’s wake.
There was a lilt of invitation in that final phrase, in the urgent shade of his eyes.
Come to the church, it said.I will helpyou.
10
THE NEXT LETTER Ireceived from Rodolfo opened with the same piloncillo-sweet well-wishes as the first, but quickly dovetailed into harsh scolding.
Evidently, Padre Vicente had found it prudent to report my troubling behavior to my husband. And he had either embellished my state or truly believed I had taken leave of my senses.
I stood in my study as I read, my back to the wall. Two sleepless nights had passed since the visit from the priests. No matter where I was, no matter where I hid, it was as if the houseknewwhere I was. Cold swept through the halls like flash floods through arroyos, gluttonous from rain, sweeping me away.
That morning, as I uncurled the stiffness in my back and watched the lilting smudges of bats returning outside my bedroom window, I wondered if I should try sleeping outside. Far from the house rather than in its belly.But the idea of being so exposed, of having no wall to put my back to, no door to shut if those eyes...
Gooseflesh crawled over my skin.
No more of this foolishness, Rodolfo wrote.I know you must be lonely—as I am without you by my side. But if you feel unwell in the country, come back to the capital. Do not draw the attention of the Church like this again.
Perhaps it was not embarrassment that caused Rodolfo to write. The Inquisition had released its bloody fervor and was abolished several years ago, but its suspicions were still firmly in place. We had never discussed it, for what newlywed politician would divulge anticlerical views to his pretty little wife? But I suspected he did not hold the institution of the Church in high regard, much less trust them.
Rodolfo’s message was plain: if San Isidro does not agree with you, come to the capital.
