Worthy said: ‘Now, what was it you wanted to ask me?’
I told him about my recent adventures and the mission that had brought me back to Tenochtitlan. ‘I need to find out what’s really happening down there, and warn my family as quickly as possible.’
Worthy stroked his chin thoughtfully. ‘There have been some funny goings-on around here, now that you mention it. You don’t exactly have the whole city spread out before you here, like they do in the great temples in the Heart of the World and Tlatelolco, but I can keep an eye on the neighbouring streets. I do seem to have seen more armed men than usual skulking about.’
‘Did they include a huge man with one eye?’ I demanded anxiously.
‘It’s hard to count people’s eyes from up here. Huge man, eh?’ He stroked his chin thoughtfully. ‘Well, come to think of it I may have seen one or two huge men about lately…’
‘So he has been here.’ I gulped nervously. ‘I’m going to have to go down there. I just wish I could be sure of being able to reach the house without being seen.’
‘Difficult one. You won’t be doing it by way of the front gateway, that’s for sure.’ He paused, before a sly smile began to spread across his face, opening little cracks in the pitch that coated it. ‘Now, I wonder…’
6
I looked at the object the priest had given me with mounting concern.
‘I really don’t think this is going to work.’
‘Why ever not?’ he said impatiently.
‘For one thing, I’m not a great swimmer.’
‘That’s the beauty of it. You don’t need to be.’
Worthy’s scheme was a simple one, in principle. I was to wade along the canal at the rear of my parents’ house, going on my knees so as to keep my head beneath the surface – the water would only come up to my chest otherwise – and breathing through the long hollow drinking tube the old man had put into my hands.
‘It’s foolproof. You’ll be invisible. You can sneak right up to the rear entrance and be inside the courtyard before anyone even knows you’re there.’ Worthy sounded pleased with himself as he enthused about his scheme. ‘You know how, at the sacred wine sellers’ festival, the old people sit around big bowls sucking the stuff through these straws…’
‘They’re for drinking through,’ I objected. ‘Drinking’s not the same as breathing, is it?’
‘I don’t see why not. If the sacred wine doesn’t leak out through the tube then water won’t leak in, will it? It stands to reason.’
‘Well, maybe, but if I’m underwater how can I see where I’m going?’
‘It’s a narrow canal, Yaotl. You get in the water a reasonable distance from where your parents live and just keep going forward. You can’t get lost.’
‘It’ll be cold!’
The old priest looked at me scornfully. ‘So what? Didn’t you get used to being cold when you were a priest?’
It was true that some of the rituals I had had to undergo had included baths in the icy waters of the lake at midnight, and this ought not to be as bad as that, since it was early afternoon, with the sun still high in the sky. On the other hand I had been much younger then, and I had not had a chance to get used to the rich food, chocolate and lazy routine of lord Maize Ear’s palace.
‘Have you ever tried anything like this yourself?’ I asked suspiciously.
Worthy laughed. ‘Me? You must be joking!’
I had been right about its being cold. The plunge into the still, dark water of the canal was shocking. I shot out into the air again, gasping and plucking long streamers of something wet and slimy from my face.
‘What’s the matter?’ asked Worthy innocently.
‘It’s bloody freezing and it smells!’
‘What do you expect? I don’t know, young people…’
‘Oh, don’t start that again. If I were young it might be different. I’m getting too old for this sort of insanity. Where’s that tube?’
‘Tube? Don’t tell me you dropped it in the canal?’ Then, hearing my groan of despair, the priest added with a chuckle: ‘Only joking. Here it is… Good luck! And don’t forget to keep the top of it above the surface!’
I accepted the long, hollow reed from him. After looking at it doubtfully for a moment, I took several deep breaths, stuck it in my mouth and kneeled down.
It did not take long to realize that wading along the canal breathing through a pipe was not going to be the simple proposition that Worthy had supposed. First, there was the sheer terror I felt when my eyes dropped below the surface. I was convinced that my first breath would fill my lungs with the evil, brackish stuff. I held my breath for as long as I could, and then, when I felt as if I would burst, I found myself taking rapid, shallow gasps like a dying fish. And the moment the water closed over my head, I was plunged into darkness. I wanted to stretch out my hands in the hope of at least touching one side of the canal, just to remind myself where it was, but I had them clamped around the tube, holding it rigidly upright for fear that its top might dip below the surface of the water. I was completely disorientated. It did not help that in order to hold the tube in place I had to keep my neck craned at a ridiculous angle so that I was looking up all the time.
Finally, water kept leaking into my mouth, and it tasted foul. I began to worry about whether I would reach my parents’ house without poisoning myself.
I do not know how long I remained where I was, fighting the temptation to scramble out of the water and give up the whole reckless scheme. Eventually I decided I had better just get it over with.
No sooner had I begun to creep forward,
