He looked up from the list. "Tell me, are you competent at reading the Aztec and Maya books of word-pictures, Juan Británico?"
"I was well taught," I said. "It would be immodest of me to say how well I learned."
"Perhaps you could be of help to me. I am attempting to translate into Spanish what few native books are left in this land. Almost all of them were purged—burned—as being iniquitous and demonic and inimical to the true faith. I manage fairly well with those books whose word-pictures were drawn by speakers of Náhuatl, but some were done by scribes who spoke other languages. Do you think you might be able to help me fathom those?"
"I could try."
"Good. Then I shall ask His Excellency for permission to pay you a stipend. It will not be lavish, but you will be spared the feeling that you are a disgraceful drone, living on charity." After another exchange with the fat priest Ignacio, he said to me, "I have registered you for only two classes, for now. The one I teach in basic Spanish and the one in Christian instruction taught by Father Diego. Any other classes can wait. In the meantime, you will spend your free hours at the Cathedral, helping me with those native books—what we call the códices."
"I shall be pleased," I said. "And I am greatly obliged to you, Cuatl Alonso."
"Let us go upstairs now. Your other classmates should already be seated on their benches and waiting for me."
They were, and I was abashed to find that I was the only grown man among some twenty boys and four or five girls. I felt as my cousin Yeyac must have felt, years ago, back in Aztlan's lower schools, when he had to commence his education with so many classmates who were mere infants. I do not believe there was a single male in the room old enough to wear the máxtlatl under his mantle, and the few girls appeared even younger. Another thing immediately noticeable was the range of skin coloration among us. None of the children was Spanish-white, of course. Most of them were of the same complexion as myself, but a good number were much paler of hue, and two or three were much darker. I realized that the lighter-skinned ones must be the offspring of couplings between Spaniards and us "indios." But whence came those very dark ones? Obviously one of the parents of each had been of my people... but the other parent?
I asked no questions right then. I dutifully sat down on one of the benches set in rows and—while those youngsters craned and leaned around to gawk at this hulking adult in their midst—waited for the first lesson to begin. Alonso stood behind a table at the front of the room, and I must say that I admired his clever approach to the teaching of us.
"We will start," he said in Náhuatl, "by practicing the open soundsof the Spanish language—ah, ay, ee, oh, oo. They are the same sounds as in these words of your tongue. Listen. Acáli... tene... ixtlil... pochotl... calpúli."
The words he had uttered were recognizable by even the youngest in the class, since they meant "canoe," "mother," "black," "ceiba tree" and "family."
He continued, "You will hear the very same sounds again in these Spanish words. Listen. Acáli... banca.Tene... dente.Ixtlil... piso.Pochotl... polvo.Calpúli... muro."
He led us in repeating those ten words again and again, stressing the sameness of the "open sounds." Only then—not to confuse us—did he demonstrate what the Spanish words stood for.
"Banca," he said, and reached down to pat one of the front-row benches. "Dente," and he pointed to one of his own teeth. "Piso," and he pointed to and stamped his foot on the floor. "Polvo," and he swept his hand across the table, raising a puff of dust. "Muro," and he pointed to the wall behind him.
Then he made us repeat those Spanish words again and again, and join him in pointing to the things meant. Banca,"bench." Dente,"tooth." Piso,"floor." Polvo,"dust." Muro,"wall." Now he returned to our own tongue, saying:
"Very good, class. Now—which of you bright students can tell me five other Náhuatl words that contain those sounds of ah, ay, ee, oh, oo?"
When nobody, including myself, volunteered to do so, Alonso motioned for a small girl on a front bench to stand up. She did, and began timidly, "Acáli... tene..."
"No, no, no," said our teacher, wagging his finger. "Those are the same words I gave you. There are many, many others. Who can speak five of them for us?"
The students, including myself, all sat silent and glanced shyly sideways at each other. So Alonso pointed at me.
"Juan Británico, you are older and I know you have a good store of words in your head. Tell us five of them that contain those various open sounds."
I had already been meditating on this and—I do not know why—a certain five had come into my mind. So now, as mischievously as a schoolboy half my age, I grinned and spoke them:
"Maátitl... ahuilnéma... tipíli... chitóli... tepúli."
A few of the younger children looked blank, but most of the older ones recognized at least some of the words, and gasped with horror or giggled behind their hands, because those were words that any teacher—especially a Christian one teaching in a church school—would not often hear or care to hear.
Glowering at me, Alonso snapped, "Very comical, you impudent babalicón.Go and stand in that corner with your face to the wall. Stay there, and be ashamed of yourself, until class is dismissed."
I did not know what a babalicón was, but I could hazard a guess. So I stood in the corner, feeling that I had been rightfully chastised, and regretting having spoken so to a man who had been kind to me. Anyway, the whole of that day's lesson was given over to repeating, again and again, innocuouswords containing those open sounds. I had already mastered the sounds, and memorized those five Spanish words, so I did not miss much by being ostracized and ignored. Also, after the class, Alonso said to me:
"It wasa rude and unseemly and infantile thing you did, Juan. And I had to be strict with you as a caution to the others. But I must confide that your wicked caprice did relax the stiffness of those children. Most of them were tense and nervous at this commencement of a new experience. They and I will get along more easily and familiarly from now on. So I forgive your deviltry. This time."
I said, and meant it, that there would not be any more such times. Then Alonso led me along the hall to the room where my next class was assembling. This was where I would be subjected to my first instruction in Christianity, and I was pleased to see that here I was not the oldest pupil. My classmates ranged in age from adolescents to mature adults. There were no children, and only a few females, and among these students there was none of that disturbing diversity of skin color displayed by the youngsters in the other room. However, this was not a class where beginners were being taught the very simplest rudiments of their subject. It had clearly been going on for some time, maybe months, before I joined it. Therefore I was plunged into what, for me, were depths that defied my comprehension.
On that, my first day, the teacher-priest was expounding on the Christian concept of trinity.Padre Diego was bald of hair, not shaven just on the crown of his head, and was pleased when addressed as Tete, our people's fond diminutive of "father." He was very nearly as fluent in Náhuatl as was the notarius Alonso, so I understood everything he said,but not what the words and phrases meant.For example, the word trinityin our tongue is yeyíntetl, and it denotes a group of three, or three things in company, or three entities acting together, or a set of three somethings—such as the three points of a triangle or the three-lobed leaf of certain plants. But Tete Diego kept urging us listeners to adore what is plainly a group of four.