Cuaupopoca, I repeat, was only a minor Mexícatl official. I may be the only person who even remembers his name, though many still remember the fate to which his tonáli brought him. The man was diligent in his duty of collecting levies, and that was the first time in his career that he had ever met defiance from a tributary nation, and he must have been as fiery-tempered as his name implied—it meant Smoldering Eagle—and he would not be balked in accomplishing his mission. He snapped an order to his force of Mexíca warriors and they leapt eagerly into action, because they were fighting men, bored by an undemanding journey of escort duty. They happily seized the opportunity for combat, and they were not long deterred by the few harquebuses and crossbows discharged at them from the stockade walls of the white men's village.
They killed Escalante and what few professional soldiers Cortés had detached to his command. The remaining population of unwarlike boatmen immediately surrendered. Cuaupopoca set guards there and around the Tzempoalan palace, then ordered the rest of his men to strip clean the entire surrounding country. This year, he proclaimed to the terrorized Totonaca, their levy would comprise no fraction of their goods and produce, but all of it. So it had been something of a feat for Patzinca's messenger to escape from the cordoned palace, and to slip past the scourging warriors of Cuaupopoca, and to bring Cortés the bad news.
Surely Cortés perceived how much more perilous his own position had suddenly become, and how uncertain his future, but he wasted no time in brooding. He went immediately to Motecuzóma's palace, and in no subdued or fearful mood. He took with him the red giant Alvarado and Malintzin and a number of heavily armed men, and all of them stormed past the palace stewards and, without ceremony, directly into Motecuzóma's throne room. Cortés raged, or pretended to rage, as he regaled the Revered Speaker with an amended version of the report he had received. As he told it, a roving band of Mexíca bandits had without provocation attacked his few men peaceably living on the beach, and had slaughtered them. It was a grave breach of the truce and friendship Motecuzóma had promised, and what did Motecuzóma intend to do about it?
The Revered Speaker knew of the tribute train's presence in that general area, so, from hearing Cortés's account, he would have supposed that it had got involved in a skirmish there and had done some damage among the white men. But he need not have hastened to conciliate Cortés; he could have temporized long enough to find out the true state of affairs. And the truth was this: the white men's one and only established settlement in these lands had surrendered itself to Cuaupopoca's Mexíca troops; the white men's one most biddable ally, Lord Patzinca, was cowering inside his palace, a prisoner of the Mexíca. Meanwhile, Motecuzóma had almost all the rest of the white men contained on his island, easy prey for elimination; and Cortés's other white and native troops could easily have been held off the island while the mainland armies of The Triple Alliance gathered to pulverize them. Thanks to Cuaupopoca, Motecuzóma held the Spaniards and all their supporters helpless in his hand. He had only to close that hand into a fist and squeeze until the blood ran out between his fingers.
He did not. He expressed to Cortés his dismay and condolence. He sent a force of his palace guard to make apologies in Tzempoalan and Vera Cruz, to relieve Cuaupopoca of his authority, to bring him and his chief military officers under arrest to Tenochtítlan.
What was worse, when the praiseworthy Cuaupopoca and his four commendable cuáchictin "old eagles" of the Mexíca army knelt in obeisance before the throne, Motecuzóma sat flaccidly slumped on that throne, flanked by the sternly erect Cortés and Alvarado, and in a not at all lordly voice he said to the prisoners:
"You have exceeded the authority of your mission. You have seriously embarrassed your Lord Speaker and compromised the honor of the Mexíca nation. You have broken the promise of truce I granted to these esteemed visitors and all their subordinates. Have you anything to say for yourselves?"
Cuaupopoca was dutiful to the end, though he was recognizably more of a man, more of a noble, more of a Mexícatl, than the creature on the throne to whom he said respectfully, "It was all my doing, Lord Speaker. And I did what I thought best to do. No man can do more."
Motecuzóma said dully, "You have caused me grievous hurt. But the death and damage you caused have more grievously hurt these our guests. Therefore..." And incredibly the Revered Speaker of the One World said, "Therefore, I will defer judgment to the Captain-General Cortés, and let him determine what punishment you deserve."
Cortés had evidently given prior thought to that matter, for he decreed a punishment that he must have been sure would deter any other individuals trying to oppose him, and it was at the same time a punishment intended to flout our traditions and spite our gods. He commanded that the five should be put to death, but not to any Flowery Death. No heart would be fed to any god, no blood would be spilled to the honor of any god, no flesh or organ of the men would remain to be used as any least sacrificial offering.
Cortés had his soldiers bring a length of chain; it was the thickest chain I ever saw, like looped constrictor snakes made of iron; I learned later that it was a segment of what is called an anchor chain, used for mooring the heavy ships. It took considerable effort on the part of the soldiers, and surely caused considerable pain to Cuaupopoca and his four officers, but the giant links of that chain were forced over the heads of the condemned men, so a link hung around each man's neck. They were taken into The Heart of the One World, where a great log had been fixed upright in the square... just yonder, in front of where the cathedral now stands, where the Señor Bishop now has his pillory for the exposure of sinners to public vilification. The chain was fastened around the top of that heavy post, so the five men stood in a circle, their backs to the log, pinioned by their necks. Then a pile of wood, previously soaked in chapopotli, was heaped around their feet and as high as their knees, and it was set afire.
Such a novel punishment—a deliberately bloodless execution—had never been known in these lands before, so almost everyone in Tenochtítlan came to see it. But I watched it while standing beside the priest Bartolome, and he confided to me that such burnings are quite common in Spain, that they are especially suited to the execution of enemies of Holy Church, because the Church has always forbidden its clerics to shed the blood of even the worst sinners. It is a pity, reverend scribes, that your Church is thereby enjoined from employing more merciful methods of execution. For I have seen many kinds of killing and dying in my time, but none more hideous, I think, than what Cuaupopoca and his officers suffered that day.
They bore it staunchly for a while, as the flames first licked up along their legs. Above the heavy iron collars of the chain links, their faces were calm and resigned. They were not otherwise bound to the post, but they did not kick their legs or flail their arms or struggle in any unseemly manner. However, when the flames reached their groins and burned away their loincloths and began to burn what was underneath, their faces became agonized. Then the fire needed no longer to be fed by the wood and chapopotli; it caught the natural oils of their skin and the fatty tissue just under the skin. The men, instead of being burned, began to burn of themselves, and the flames rose so high that we could barely see their faces. But we saw the brighter flash of their hair going in one blaze, and we could hear the men begin to scream.