“They’ll have to believe I’m a shark or something,” Raulito said. “This is Oahu. Doesn’t Vicente live on the island of Hawaii?”
“What other choice do you have?” Carlito picked up his spoon.
Because Soraida pitied him, she spooned extra rice and beans onto Raulito’s plate.
“Ay, mijo, think it over. Your life could get so much worse because that’s how life is. Trabajo y tristeza,” Soraida said.
“Don’t trust anybody you meet, especially Americans,” Carlito said.
“Never.” Raulito tossed back the anisette. “I hope I don’t ever have to speak to one.”
“Don’t worry about that.” Carlito poured more. “They won’t waste a civil word on a Puerto Rican.”
Soraida wrapped rice and beans in a shiny green tí leaf. She cried, being one of those women who believed the worst would happen.
Raulito tucked the food in his knapsack, along with a tin can to fill with water from streams; the edges had been smoothed out to save his lips. He heard guitar music and the rasp of a fork against a güiro. The Saturday night party had started. Another night of music and dance and comida criolla to help his compatriots forget that they cried out in their dreams for their island and for their mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters and the coquís that had lulled them to sleep. Another night to remember only that they had come from Puerto Rico and that they were Puerto Ricans and would die Puerto Ricans, wherever they might be.
Carlito had a memory for routes and he’d drawn dots and dashes on a scrap of brown paper the plantation store used to wrap parcels.
“This here is the road we sometimes take to cut cane, and you follow the road to here.” His finger hovered above a big black dot. “From here, you’ll have to walk a long time. Could be a day, I’m not sure. I remember when we arrived, the wagon rode by a stream . . . follow it and you’ll get to the harbor. Then you’ll have to get on a boat . . .”
At the end of the dots and dashes was Vicente.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
PROMISES
When Lourdes screamed in her sleep, Valentina went to her, brushing the little girl’s hair from her face, making soothing sounds.
“Mami, am I going to die like Javiercito and Manuelito?”
Valentina looked down at her daughter’s frightened eyes, which she could see in the streaks of moonlight coming in through the cracks in the wattle wall.
“Shhh, Lulu, no.” Valentina kissed her daughter’s forehead.
“But they died. And Sonia died.”
“I know.”
“And Tío Raulito.”
Valentina shook her head. “No, not Tío Raulito. He is alive and well.”
She didn’t know if it was true, but how she hoped that it was.
“But Abuela Angelina and Tía Inés?”
“Yes.”
“Why did they die?”
Valentina took a deep breath.
“I don’t know.”
Lourdes whispered, “I miss Javiercito.”
“I know.”
“And Tío Raulito.”
“Me, too.”
“I’m afraid, Mami.”
“Nothing bad will happen to you, Lulu,” Valentina said. “I promise.”
Lourdes nodded; she closed her eyes to sleep.
•
A notice written in Spanish had been posted at the plantation store. This Saturday was a special day, as an interpreter was being brought in to hear the Puerto Ricans’ grievances. There was a rumor that the interpreter was a Spaniard. A few of them swore that they would refuse to speak to any Spaniard. The Spaniards had never treated the Puerto Ricans right, they all agreed. Look how, after Hurricane San Ciriaco, the Spanish hacienda owners had kept most of the money for themselves and had made the Puerto Ricans work for what? A piece of bread? A shirt? A pair of pants? Vicente said that the interpreter wouldn’t be a Spaniard because the Americans hated the Spanish. Didn’t they remember that the American army had encouraged the bands of tiznados, who had smeared charcoal on their faces to hide their identities when they robbed and beat up the Spaniards? The partidas had the run of Utuado and Adjuntas, too, remember?
The Puerto Ricans had a lot to complain about—that there wasn’t a school for their children as they were promised; that they lived in shacks instead of decent houses as promised; that they were at the bottom of the hill, breathing in foul garbage and human waste; that foodstuffs were double the prices of those in Puerto Rico. Somebody said that they should appoint a man to speak for them, someone who had once owned a farm and knew how to talk to businessmen, like Ramírez or Vega. How about it, Ramírez? Ramírez said that he didn’t have schooling like Vicente Vega, better Vega. How about it, Vicente?
“What do you think, Valentina?” Vicente looked at his wife.
Ramírez and the man next to him exchanged glances. What kind of man needed his wife’s permission?
“Ask about the school,” Valentina said. “And Raulito, and Sonia’s husband.”
People called out to Vicente: Ask why the doctor gives out blue pills for everything, and why he sends us back out to the fields when we’re sick. Tell how the plantation police drag us out of bed as if we were slaves from olden times. Tell about the shotguns in our backs. Tell about how the luna raises his whip to us as if we were slaves. And what is this about the docking of pay when we take a minute to piss in the fields, or when we cut less sugarcane because of bad weather? Demand that we be paid cash money! As we were promised! Demand the increase we were promised! We’ve been here a year already! We should have gotten a pay increase! But all we got was a balance due at the plantation store! Remind them that we are to get a bonus in the third year. And would the translator take letters to mothers, fathers, and the newspapers on the island? They weren’t sure that the letters they mailed had arrived since they never received responses. Would—could—tell—tell.
The Inside Men, the manager Mr. White and the interpreter, sat outside the plantation manager’s office; the guards with their shotguns stood on either side. The Puerto Ricans gathered in front of the table.
“¡Vicente Vega, a la orden!” Vicente was proud that Valentina stood beside him, watching him be the spokesperson. “I have been elected to speak for all of us Puerto Ricans.”
The interpreter said he was Mr. Donald Jackson and that he worked for the Hawaiian Sugar Planters’ Association. He’d learned his Spanish in the Philippines and Cuba during the Spanish-American War. Please excuse his mistakes, Mr. Jackson said, in that way that made it evident he thought he’d conquered the language.
“The Spanish-American War?”
“You know . . . la guerra . . . why you belong to the United States.”
“Ah, you mean the Americans’ war against Spain.”
“No speak fast,” Mr. Jackson said. “Don’t understand fast talking.”
Vicente exchanged a look with Valentina.
“Señor, we’re expected to work in the pouring rain like beasts. The police disrespect us. They kick open our doors and enter where our wives and children are sleeping.” Vicente paused after every few words.