“I will wait until it is empty,” I replied cheerfully.
With no other excuse to offer, she took refuge in silence. An hour passed before I broke it again.
“And the rice, señora,” I suggested.
“No hay manteca,” she repeated in the same dull monotone, and the conversation went on again around the same vicious circle. For more than an hour I coaxed and cajoled, for a single harsh or loud word to these unwashed mountain-dwellers can undo a day’s careful pleading. As constant dripping of water in time wears away even stone, so my incessant return to the subject at length became even more painful than the stirring from their customary lethargy. The younger female rose languidly and took from the wall in a dark corner a perfectly sound kettle just suited to the purpose and, after deftly stealing about half of it, set to boiling what I had kept for myself.
The adjoining den had not only an earth floor, but the hillside had not been levelled before building. The peon spread a saddle-blanket and one of his own ponchos for me as solicitously as a valet preparing his master’s quarters; yet in as impersonal a manner as he might have herded his sheep into their corral for the night. With this protection, and my own garments wrapped about my head, I passed a tolerable night, virtually on the ridge of the central range of the Andes. My peon, the two women, several children, two half-Indian youths who had arrived long after dark, at least six dogs, and a score of guinea-pigs all slept in the same room—all, that is, except the cuis, which spent most of it squeaking about in the dark, and now and then running over my prostrate form.
On the bleak, rolling pampa of sear yellow bunch-grass, dotted by a few shaggy wild cattle, across which howled wintry winds, I was not uncomfortable afoot; but the peon from the “tierra caliente” of his native valley was blue-lipped and chattering with cold, even with his head through several heavy blankets and a scarf about his face. I was passing back over the Cordillera Central for the first time since Hays and I had traversed it by the Quindío pass. Not far below the arctic summit we sighted the Huancabamba river, born a few leagues to the north, its broad, swift-sloping valley-walls spotted with little green chacras, and gradually dropped into summer again. Trees grew up about us, birds began once more to sing, cultivated fields shut in by cactus hedges bordered the trail. When at last we sighted the town of Huancabamba from far off, the peon halted and asked to be allowed to turn back. He seemed to fancy his services had been chiefly those of “guide,” instead of baggage-carrier. I refused to take up my burden again merely for what I took to be a whim to be back lolling in the shade of his own mango tree. It was not until later that I realized that, like most country youths of his class in Peru, he dreaded entering the provincial capital, lest he be held and forced to serve in the army.
The swift Huancabamba river we crossed astride the peon’s horse, though not both at a time. When I had dismounted on the further bank, my companion called the animal back by a peculiar sound, half whistle, half cluck, and not long afterward we clattered into the famous city of Huancabamba. Once dismissed, the peon left town at once, though darkness was already at hand. Medina had insisted that I pay him nothing, as he owed the hacienda more than two years’ rent—namely, nearly four dollars.
On the map Huancabamba seems of about the size and importance of Philadelphia; on the ground it is a moribund mud village in a half-sterile hollow between barren, towering mountains. Historically it is famous. Prescott assures us that “Guancabamba was large, populous and well-built, many of its houses of solid stone. A river which passed through the town had a bridge over which ran a fine Inca highroad.” How times do change! Officially, to be sure, it is still a city; but a “city” in this region is a place where bread is made, as those who wear shoes are white, and those who wear bayeta are cholos or Indians. Picturesqueness of costume there was none, this having disappeared near Cuenca along with the Quichua tongue. Indians of pure race and distinctive garb had been rare south of Zaraguro; here was still plenty of Indian blood, but only in the veins of “civilized” mestizos. It is not far from the watershed of the Andes. The town of Huarmaca, just up on the ridge of the Cordillera above, has a church one side of the roof of which sends its waters to the Pacific, and the other to the Atlantic.
There was no suggestion of hotel. The subprefect studied my papers in great curiosity, with half the town looking over his shoulder, before he answered my most important query with:
“Ah, it is impossible to-day, on such short notice. But to-morrow—”