sentimental favorite than a classic. The others were Cuban boleros, Mexican rancheras, nothing especially Salvadoran. From what he’d learned listening to the older ones, given the annihilation of everything indigenous over the past century-culture, crafts, people-there wasn’t anything like a uniquely native repertoire except maybe chanchona, a cheesy kind of dance music, full of spicy jokes and a thumping cumbia two-beat, big with hicks and lounge acts. Regardless, the old songs obliged him to slow down, concentrate not on technique but feeling. And the key to feeling, he’d learned, was simplicity.
At times someone or other would sing along, if only under his or her breath, then chuckle soulfully when the song concluded, perhaps leaning over to squeeze Roque’s shoulder and thank him. Tio Faustino seemed particularly fond of “Sin Ti”-Without You-and Roque found himself increasingly moved by the deep whispery tone-deaf voice. He couldn’t recall, not once in the years since Tio Faustino had entered his life, hearing the older man sing. And in the pauses between songs, as he retuned the peevish guitar, he’d glance up and catch his uncle gazing at nothing, seated in one of the scrap-wood chairs they called trastos here, head propped on his hand, fingers lost in his graying hair as he nursed a glass of beer.
One night, the older man remained outside later than usual, staring across the lake toward Guazapa, the gentle slopes of the volcano luminous, a dark silvery green in the moonlight. Roque was about to say good night when his uncle gestured for him to sit.
– See that mountain, Roque? Celestina and I were living there when Pablo was born. We were part of the frente, and the volcano was a staging area for raids into the capital. I’ve never told you about all that. People your age know so little. It isn’t your fault. Hard to talk about. And what good does rehashing the bad do?
He fussed with his shirt, waved away a nagging fly. Every little gesture, transformed by moonlight, seemed cinematic, even with the clumsiness of drink.
– I was a mechanic, changing tires, this little shop not far from Chinameca, where I grew up. I knew nothing of Marx, Lenin, that was all lofty nonsense as far as I was concerned. I just wanted a better job. I wanted my girlfriend to be a little less sad, you know? I wanted a country where I wasn’t scared all the time, where I didn’t have to go to work and listen to one of my buddies whisper, “Hey, Faustino, somebody heard you moping and groaning the other day and a couple guys came asking for you this morning.”
Roque followed his uncle’s gaze across the lake.-What was it you said that pissed them off?
– Roque, I could have complained about the weather, okay? If some government snitch wanted to make points with the local jefe, he’d say I was bad-mouthing the army or the regime or some colonel’s homely wife. Though, I admit, in this one case I’d shot off my mouth stupidly.
There was this dentist named Regalado in Santiago de Maria, had connections with some colonels. Tight as turds in a frog’s ass, these people. He started what everyone thought was a boy scout troop, but these guys didn’t go hiking in the hills, learning knots and birdcalls. They killed people-teachers, union members, anybody Regalado considered a Communist. Bodies showed up at the edge of town, maybe just a severed head in a ditch. One time two hands were nailed to the door of a church where the priests were sympathetic to the campesinos.
Celestina was a teacher in Las Marias, doing Bible-study groups, teaching people their poverty wasn’t a punishment from God, they had dignity. Regalado’s scouts came looking for her one day. She got word just in time, slipped out a window in the schoolhouse, one shoe in each hand, running barefoot through the coffee groves.
I heard about it that night, no idea where she was, crazy with worry. At work the next day I was fuming, I wanted to butcher the little creeps who’d come to get her. There was a guy in the shop getting a flat fixed, some phone-company minion from Santiago. He heard me going on. We called them orejas, guys like that. Ears. They were everywhere, government informants, a hundred thousand of them, all across the country. Next day, it’s my turn for a visit. And like Celestina, I was lucky-never forget that, Roque. Call it what you want: the hand of God, the Virgin Mother, your guardian angel or just dumb luck. All of us who survived the war, we know some unseen force got us out. The ones who didn’t make it out, well, they weren’t so lucky.
He reached suddenly for his glass of beer and, aiming badly, knocked it over. He cursed, his voice catching in his throat.
– Maybe it’s time for bed, Tio.
– Don’t treat me like an old fool. I haven’t finished my story.
– I’m sorry, I-
– Be patient, Roque. Listen. I’m telling you this for a reason. A
few weeks later, I met up with Celestina again at the stronghold on
Volcan Guazapa. The comandantes discouraged men and women getting together. Marry yourself to the struggle, they said. Trust me, people were screwing right and left. Not that we were atheist sex fiends, having orgies and black masses, all that government propaganda crap. There was a very brotherly, sisterly feeling among us. The compas would bathe in the river wearing just their scanties, the men too, and nothing would happen. But we paired up when we could, if only for comfort. Nothing makes you feel more alone than knowing how easily you can die. And so Pablito came along right before the government launched its huge offensive to get us off the mountain.
We’d been staging raids from there against the army for a couple years by then. And we had radio broadcasts on Radio Venceremos telling people about the massacres, the atrocities in El Mozote, Copapayo, Mirandilla, Zacamil. The army officers, they hated that radio, hated anyone who dared tell the truth. Finally they started bombing us with white phosphorus to burn away the trees, because we hid in the forests up the side of the volcano.
There was this American, a doctor who came to help us, his name was Charlie Christian. We called him Camilo. He’d been a helicopter pilot in Vietnam, then became a doctor just to help people like us. Celestina worked with him as a nurse. That’s what most of the compas did, they worked medical, or food, or explosives. No joke, the women were very good at making and planting land mines, they had smaller hands, better control.
Celestina saw a boy who was burned all over his body being treated by Camilo and that was when she said we had to get out. The boy had been burned in a bombing raid. There was this kind of plane we called a push-and-pull, it circled once, saw a campfire, and came back, lower this time, so we knew it was on a bombing run. Everyone ran to their shelters-we called them tatus-but this boy’s mother didn’t get the door closed in time. The bomb was a direct hit. The explosion cut her in two, she was burned to cinders. The boy, he was maybe two years old, his skin hissed and steamed as they pulled him out. But he was still alive. His mother, shielding him with her body, saved him.
They took him to Camilo and he did what he could. When Celestina saw that little boy caked in mud and clay to cool his skin, only his eyes and nostrils visible… She couldn’t bear the thought of seeing Pablo like that. She began secretly making plans to desert. But it was too late. The cuilios, the government troops, they were coming up the mountain. They sent their three toughest battalions-Atlacatl, Belloso, Bracamonte-plus the First Brigade. Ten thousand men. Only way out was to go by way of Copapayo to Chalatenango, cross the Rio Lempa up there. We called it a guinda, a forced retreat, and even the villagers were coming with us, because they knew the troops would kill them regardless. That was just how it was.
He fell quiet for a moment, staring off as though at a ghost, or the hope of one. Roque brought him back with:-You had to leave the mountain…
– Right. We were struggling through the forest, dragging our mules, carrying the wounded on our backs or in hammocks strung up to a pole so two men could carry them. Nothing to eat but tortillas and sugarloaf. Some of the children died of malnutrition. I saw one boy vomit up worms from his mouth, his nose, right before he died. His mother carried his corpse with her because there was no time to bury him.
The villagers were lagging behind because they had so many children. Celestina gave me Pablo, told me to go ahead, she would stay behind and round up the others, get them to pick up the pace. I argued, but
