They did not touch on the subject again for years, not until that Friday, December 30, 1966 when Chivo turned up at the doctor’s invitation, opening his arms and declaring that the only redeeming feature of old age is that one ages alongside one’s friends.
“As our mayor points out,” the doctor said, “the business with Chepita Santacruz must have taken place during Bolívar’s initial entry into Pasto, on the eighth of June, 1822.
“Sañudo states: ‘He entered the city at five in the afternoon, entered the city surrounded by royalist troops who had formed up in his honour, proceeded to the parish church where the bishop and clerics were waiting to lead him, as Bolívar had arranged, in the manner of a royal tribute, under a canopy, up to the altar where the “Te Deum” was sung. The same day the surrender was ratified and Bolívar issued a proclamation full of promises to the people of Pasto.’”
It was after this proclamation that the Liberator was invited over to drink chocolate, as was the tradition, by one of the most powerful men in Pasto: Joaquín Santacruz himself, Belencito’s ancestor, who had very good reasons for making a fuss over Bolívar and ingratiating himself, at least for the duration of his stay in Pasto. The gold coins Santacruz kept in his house were famous, buried in a secret corner — under his bed, as was the tradition — and Bolívar’s aide-de-camp had already informed him, as he had the rest of Pasto’s merchants, that a contribution towards the cause of freedom would be required, as was Bolívar’s tradition. But Santacruz did not fear so much for his property as for the fate of his daughters, still very young, any one of whom Bolívar might take a fancy to, quite devoid of responsibility — as was also the tradition. Handing over the gold, Santacruz believed, would mean he could expect his daughters’ honour to remain intact in return.
“That’s how simple solutions were back then,” the doctor said, “very simple indeed, as they are now, with certain variations, in order to defend honour against the passing whim of a powerful man.”
And Primavera let out a ringing laugh as she was returning from the kitchen, where up to that moment she had been listening to everything, curious and entertained by the conversation; then she, who had resolved to go straight up to bed and sleep, without saying goodnight to anyone, decided to go back in to the living room and sit down next to the bishop, brash and happy. Hearing the stuff about honour on the point of dishonour gave her renewed energy, although she would have preferred to hear it from Belencito Jojoa himself — via her Doctor Donkey, who was seducing her with stories of independence in those moments, much to her surprise.
Belencito drank some more, and spoke:
“My grandfather Pedro Pablo was still living in the house belonging to his father, Joaquín. My grandfather was one of three sons, along with José and Jesús. There were seven daughters: Redentora, Prudencia, Severa, Digna, Cirila, Metodia — pretty names, eh? — and the youngest of alclass="underline" Josefa del Carmen, better known as Chepita, thirteen years old.
“At that age her disgrace arrived, with the arrival of the Liberator. And her disgrace came at night, when the Liberator came to be there.”
Before the evening got properly underway, Joaquín Santacruz and the Liberator, escorted by a lieutenant who pretended not to take any interest, shut themselves up in the smoking room. They did not smoke in there because the Liberator loathed tobacco, but the master of the house presented his offering: sixteen chests of gold coins for the cause of freedom. Without a word, with just a gesture, Bolívar indicated to his lieutenant that he should take charge of the chests. And then he let himself be led back to the main part of the house. “The only thing I ask in return, Your Excellency,” Joaquín Santacruz dared whisper in his ear, “is my daughters’ integrity.” Bolívar still did not say a word, behaviour his host interpreted as tacit agreement, and he proceeded to introduce him to his wife, Lucrecia Burbano, as conservative a woman as ever lived, pale and dressed in black, who ceremoniously observed the customary greeting, surrounded by her children — more waxworks in the icy silence.
Lucrecia Burbano suffered, she suffered over the fate of her daughters; with great reluctance she had acquiesced to Joaquín Santacruz’s scheme, which seemed absurd to her: make overtures to Bolívar, invite him for chocolate and hold him to his word with gold. But her husband had already warned her: “He doesn’t just know about the gold, he knows about our daughters too.” Lucrecia Burbano would have preferred to flee with her daughters and the gold into the fiery entrails of Galeras itself, or at least into one of its caves, but it was already too late, the little fellow was there in the flesh, he was opening and closing his hands, small like a woman’s; his feet must be smaller still, she thought, inside those riding boots that seemed made for a child. Lucrecia Burbano observed before her the excessive mobility of the Liberator’s body, the overly large head, the curly black hair; she endured his startling proximity to the point of exasperation. At this meeting, the Liberator alarmed her with his shrill voice, but appeased her with his perfect bow. He really was a proper little gentleman, whom she knew they nicknamed “Manikin,” “Zambo” and “Chipolata,” but who she also knew could very well send them “to the other side” with a word, if he had a mind to.
Bolívar greeted the sons, and then set about complimenting the seven Santacruz daughters, the cream of the city with their beauty and good manners, the seven Santacruz sisters who, according to the ribald remarks of the first drunken liberators, could satisfy, on their own, the whole column of eight hundred mounted cazadores that Bolívar had brought with him for his entry into Pasto.
The eldest was twenty-six.
The musicians had already taken up their instruments, bolt upright on their little cane chairs, beneath a porcelain clock; the snare drum could be heard, a clarinet, a flute and a trombone were announcing the contradanza, the guests drew themselves up straight, observing themselves in the mirrors, under the glittering bronze chandeliers, and in the ballroom with its decorative urns, around the piano, Bolívar greeted the seven Santacruz sisters one by one: he would have to open the dancing with one of them, and then his officers would follow his lead. The wooden floor trembled. The house looked aflame, illuminated by torches on all four sides, the double rows of windows glowing behind the ever-present geraniums on the balconies; it was one of Pasto’s main houses, right on Santiago Square, opposite the Church of the Apostle, and, from its far-off kitchen, near the stables, came the delicate aroma of chocolate being prepared over a low heat: pastilles of fine chocolate brought from Lima and kept in cedar chests for years, for whenever an occasion might arise. And what an occasion it was, Lucrecia Burbano lamented: the entire ballroom seemed to her to smell of horse droppings, leather and sweat. A heady perfume came from the little fellow — she was later to recall — but he also smelt of blood — she would say — it was a sorry hour, a thousand times over, when that scented scoundrel appeared.
Bolívar did not dance with any of the sisters, but to many, who would later remark upon the fact, it seemed that “he spent longer than was customary over his compliments to Chepita del Carmen Santacruz.”
In spite of being just thirteen, Chepita noticed her father’s disturbing anxiety, and she found it odd that her mother should demand she carry her favourite doll in her arms for the official presentation. She complied without understanding why. How could she comprehend the maternal tactic, both childish and desperate, to signal her innocence? Chepita cradled the doll, although “the mistake had been made”—Lucrecia Burbano would confess, and confess that she thought of it too late—“of dressing Chepita like a young woman.”