Carlos Fuentes - Terra Nostra

So sooner or later, Señor, my copious wealth will have to pass through the hands of the good nuns of your palace, for Inés, my daughter, will by then have made her personal vow of poverty. As a result, what I am now more than disposed to lend you so that you can pay your debts — at a modicum of interest, twenty percent annually — will not only resolve your present but your future problems as well: my money, thanks to Inesilla, will revert to El Señor’s fortune, as the girl — whom from the chapel I watched leave your bedchamber this night — will again demonstrate her devotion to El Señor, in the same way El Señor demonstrates his devotion to her father in a thousand little ways, for in dealing with El Señor a man will not have to come many times to the well, and anyone who comes to the aid of El Señor must surely receive something more than the ordinary moneylender’s interest, for El Señor can make a gentleman of a flea, and permit me in December to enjoy the pleasures of May, and add honor to riches. You will emerge the winner, Sire, believe me, you will emerge the winner.

Now, if this gentleman can prepare the paper, the pen, the ink, the blotting sand, and seals, we can proceed to an agreement; I am cold, I am sleepy, it has been a very long night and in my long waiting, seated behind the chancel of the nuns, I have dreamed terrible dreams. Forgive my excessive loquacity; let us get on with it; it is getting late, let us get on with it.

El Señor, numb in body and soul, took the pen. But first, narrowing his glassy eyes, he asked: “If I may, I would like to pose a question to this gentleman: If your powers as a merchant and moneylender are so extensive, why do you accept mine?”

The aged moneylender bowed his head. “Unity, Sire, unity. Without a visible head, bodies are wont to be dispersed. Without a supreme power to which to appeal, we would devour each other like wolves. Thank you, Sire.”

That morning Guzmán attended El Señor as he tended his sick falcons, with various ointments, brews, and infusions to ease the complaints of his prostrate master exhausted by ills too long held at bay which suddenly appeared, scourge in hand, and by sleeplessness, love-making, and the increasing horror of his conscience.

“Drink this, Señor”—Guzmán held the potion to his lips—“drink this grama tea that is an admirable remedy against difficulties of the urine and especially against those resulting from ulcers of the bladder, and let me rub your feet with this hot, damp bile of the wildcat, which soothes and assuages the pain of gout.”

“Who opened the skylight, Guzmán? The room is filled with mosquitoes; it is summer, and as the ponds on this plain are dead water, mosquitoes feed there.”

“Do not worry, Señor, I have placed a vessel containing bear’s blood beneath your bed, and all the mosquitoes will gather there and drown.”

“And I, I am drowning…”

“But, Señor, you should be happy; that aged Sevillian moneylender has given us new life, the palace can be completed; you must reward him; besides, he is the father of the novitiate, give him the title, at least, of Comendador; he is old, give him that pleasure before he dies.”

El Señor moaned. “Who is that old man, who is he, really? Is he the Devil, a homunculus come here to humiliate me, to offer me money in exchange for my life; but that is the most horrible sin of simony, does he want my soul in exchange for his money?”

“This is the way of progress, Señor, and the old Sevillian does not exercise a diabolic profession but a liberal one.”

“Liberal? Progress?”

“Progress like that of the sun in its daily course, or of the corpses of your grandfathers to this palace, except that it is now applied to the ascendant road of an entire society; and liberal, Señor, as befits free men who are opposed to servility.”

“But as the sun is born and dies on the horizon, so I conceive that this progress of yours will die of the same causes that engender it; and insofar as liberal is concerned, any serf that attempted to be liberal would run counter to the laws of nature; I do not know these words.”

“The only knowledge is action, Señor.”

“There is hereditary dignity, Guzmán, that cannot be bought or sold.”

“There is the dignity of risk, Señor, one can live with and like either angels or the Devil, one may choose; knowing his limitations, one is free to ascend or descend.”

“No, Guzmán, the only human hierarchy is based upon possession of an immortal soul and its patrimony in the life eternal.”

“No, Señor, there is fate, there is fortune, and there is the virtue which constantly checks that hierarchy and transforms it; man is the glory, the mockery, and the enigma of the world, and the world is an undecipherable enigma either for man’s glory or for his mockery.”

“There is repression, humiliation, and sacrifice, in order to gain eternal life, Guzmán.”

“There is passion, ambition, and desire to gain earthly life, Señor.”

“Wisdom is revealed, Guzmán.”

“Prudence is acquired through trial and error, Sire.”

“The highest ideal is that of the contemplative gentleman meditating upon the Scriptures and the dogma of the Revelation, Guzmán.”

“There are no absolute ideals, Señor, only secular prizes for a life of action.”

“Truths are eternal, Guzmán, and I do not want them to change, I do not want that primary wisdom my family has conserved for centuries to be converted into an object of usury, to be debauched by men like that old man, a man so low he would sell his own daughter, and the multitude like him; I know them, Guzmán, I know their horrifying history, I recall the fate of the Children’s Crusade that set forth to do battle for Christ in the land of the Infidel but instead fell into the hands of Hughes Ferreus and Guillaume Porcus, arms makers of Marseilles, who offered the children free transport to the Holy Land, but actually carried them to the barbarous coasts of Africa, where they sold the innocents as slaves to the Arabs. And will you tell me that I, too, have killed, Guzmán? Yes, but in the name of power and the Faith, or in the name of the power of the Faith, but never for money. And I suspect that he who dedicates his toil to money can be nothing but a falsifying Jew, a convert, a filthy pig, even though he bears the name of a pure Christian; the doctor who mutilated my own mother and almost killed her said his name was Cuevas, and he insisted he was a good and pure Spaniard until they discovered the prayer books and candelabra of Jewry in his house. Are you amazed by the confidence I place in you, Guzmán? Now you shall know: the Spanish nobility is infested with converted Jews, false faithful, and only among the people of your own low estate does one find today the old, uncontaminated Christian bloodlines. Do not tell me now, Guzmán, that you have allied yourself with the enemies of our eternal order…”

“Señor, for God’s sake, everything I do, I do because of intense devotion to your interests…”

“But you believe that my interests can be reconciled with those of that band of merchants and moneylenders, simonists, enemies of the Holy Spirit?”

“They can and they must be, Señor; the new forces are a reality: dominate them or they will dominate you. That is my sincere counsel.”

“No, no, I am right, our line ends here and now, the world may die with us but it will not change, the world is well contained within the limits of this palace, Guzmán; whom are you defending, on whose side are you? tell me.”

“Señor, I repeat, I serve El Señor, I advise him and I warn him that he must make use of the new powers so they do not make use of him: if you honor him with the title of Comendador, the aged moneylender will feel an obligation to honor and obey El Señor; at the same time El Señor can enjoy Doña Inés, and renew his blood, now that the seed is weary of growing in the same field; recognize the bastard and contravene the madness and intrigue of the Queen Mother who offers an idiot heir; and if not her madness, then the restlessness of the workmen who are sheltering a second pretender who arrived yesterday in the company of a page-and-drummer who is actually a woman, although dressed in the customary attire of a man, part of your mother’s train; threat is added to threat, the designs of the women and the designs of the world are being joined, and if El Señor wishes somewhere to encounter the Devil, he may find him in the horrendous coupling of woman and the world.”