And at last there is the hot wind. It warms and protects
and envelops everything. It is a night wind for sorcerers. Its
power goes together with the darkness.
Those are the four winds. They are also associated with
the four directions. The breeze is the east. The cold wind is the
west. The hot one is the south. The hard wind is the north.
The four winds also have personalities. The breeze is gay
and sleek and shifty. The cold wind is moody and melan-
choly and always pensive. The hot wind is happy and
abandoned and bouncy. The hard wind is energetic and com-
mandeering and impatient.
The Nagual told me that the four winds are women. That
is why female warriors seek them. Winds and women are
alike. That is also the reason why women are better than men.
I would say that women learn faster if they cling to their
specific wind.
How can a woman know what her specific wind is?
If the woman quiets down and is not talking to herself, her
wind will pick her up, just like that.
She made a gesture of grabbing.
Does she have to lie naked?
That helps. Especially if she is shy. I was a fat old woman.
I had never taken off my clothes in my life. I slept in them
and when I took a bath I always had my slip on. For me to
show my fat body to the wind was like dying. The Nagual
knew that and played it for all it was worth. He knew of the
friendship of women and the wind, but he introduced me to
Mescalito because he was baffled by me.
After turning my head that first terrible day, the Nagual
found himself with me on his hands. He told me that he had
no idea what to do with me. But one thing was for sure, he
didn’t want a fat old woman snooping around his world. The
Nagual said that he felt about me the way he felt about you.
Baffled. Both of us shouldn’t be here. You’re not an Indian and
I’m an old cow. We are both useless if you come right down
to it. And look at us. Something must have happened.
A woman, of course, is much more supple than a man. A
woman changes very easily with the power of a sorcerer. Es-
pecially with the power of a sorcerer like the Nagual. A male
apprentice, according to the Nagual, is extremely difficult. For
example, you yourself haven’t changed as much as la Gorda,
and she started her apprenticeship way after you did. A
woman is softer and more gentle, and above all a woman is like
a gourd; she receives. But somehow a man commands more
power. The Nagual never agreed with that, though. He be-
lieved that women are unequaled, tops. He also believed that
I felt men were better only because I am an empty woman. He
must be right. I have been empty for so long that I can’t re-
member what it feels like to be complete. The Nagual said
that if I ever become complete I will change my feelings about
it. But if he was right his Gorda would have done as well as
Eligio, and as you know, she hasn’t.
I could not follow the flow of her narrative because of her
unstated assumption that I knew what she was referring to. In
this case I had no idea what Eligio or la Gorda had done.
In what way was la Gorda different from Eligio? I asked.
She looked at me for a moment as if measuring something in
me. Then she sat up with her knees against her chest.
The Nagual told me everything, she said briskly. The
Nagual had no secrets from me. Eligio was the best; that’s why
he is not in the world now. He didn’t return. In fact he was so
good that he didn’t have to jump from a precipice when his
apprenticeship was over. He was like Genaro; one day while
he was working in the field something came to him and took
him away. He knew how to let go.
I felt like asking her if I had really jumped into the abyss. I
deliberated for a moment before going ahead with my ques-
tion. After all I had come to see Pablito and Nestor to clarify
that point. Any information I could get on the topic from
anyone involved in don Juan’s world was indeed a bonus
tome.
She laughed at my question, as I had anticipated.
You mean you don’t know what you yourself did? she
asked.
It’s too farfetched to be real, I said.
That is the Nagual’s world for sure. Not a thing in it is
real. He himself told me not to believe anything. But still the
male apprentices have to jump. Unless they are truly magnifi-
cent, like Eligio.
The Nagual took us, me and la Gorda, to that mountain
and made us look down to the bottom of it. There he showed
us the kind of flying Nagual he was. But only la Gorda could
follow him. She also wanted to jump into the abyss. The
Nagual told her that that was useless. He said female warriors
have to do things more painful and more difficult than that.
He also told us that the jump was only for the four of you.
And that is what happened, the four of you jumped.
She had said that the four of us had jumped, but I only
knew of Pablito and myself having done that. In light of her
statements I figured that don Juan and don Genaro must have
followed us. That did not seem odd to me; it was rather
pleasing and touching.
What are you talking about? she asked after I had voiced
my thoughts. I meant you and the three apprentices of
Genaro. You, Pablito and Nestor jumped on the same day.
Who is the other apprentice of don Genaro? I know only
Pablito and Nestor?
You mean that you didn’t know that Benigno was Genaro’s
apprentice?
No, I didn’t.
He was Genaro’s oldest apprentice. He jumped before you
did and he jumped by himself.
Benigno was one of five Indian youths I had once found
while roaming in the Sonoran Desert with don Juan. They
were in search of power objects. Don Juan told me that all of
them were apprentices of sorcery. I struck up a peculiar
friendship with Benigno in the few times I had seen him after
that day. He was from southern Mexico. I liked him very
much. For some unknown reason he seemed to delight himself
by creating a tantalizing mystery about his personal life. I
could never find out who he was or what he did. Every time I
talked to him he baffled me with the disarming candor with
which he evaded my probes. Once don Juan volunteered some
information about Benigno and said that he was very fortun-
ate in having found a teacher and a benefactor. I took don
Juan’s statements as a casual remark that meant nothing. Dona
Soledad had clarified a ten-year-old mystery for me.
Why do you think don Juan never told me anything about
Benigno?
Who knows? He must’ve had a reason. The Nagual never
did anything thoughtlessly.
I had to prop my aching back against her bed before re-
suming writing.
Whatever happened to Benigno?
He’s doing fine. He’s perhaps better off than anyone else.
You’ll see him. He’s with Pablito and Nestor. Right now
they’re inseparable. Genaro’s brand is on them. The same
thing happened to the girls; they’re inseparable because the
Nagual’s brand is on them.
I had to interrupt her again and ask her to explain what
girls she was talking about.
My girls, she said.
Your daughters? I mean Pablito’s sisters?
They are not Pablito’s sisters. They are the Nagual’s
apprentices.
Her disclosure shocked me. Ever since I had met Pablito,
years before, I had been led to believe that the four girls who
lived in his house were his sisters. Don Juan himself had told
me so. I had a sudden relapse of the feeling of despair I had
experienced all afternoon. Dona Soledad was not to be trusted;
she was engineering something. I was sure that don Juan could
not under any conditions have misled me so grossly.
Dona Soledad examined me with overt curiosity.
The wind just told me that you don’t believe what I’m
telling you, she said, and laughed.
The wind is right, I said dryly.
The girls that you’ve seen over the years are the Nagual’s.
They were his apprentices. Now that the Nagual is gone they
are the Nagual himself. But they are also my girls. Mine!
You mean that you’re not Pablito’s mother and they arc
really your daughters?
I mean that they are mine. The Nagual gave them to me