I will tell you what I am doing. What in fact I have already done. For even knowing you will have no power to stop it. Do you wish me to tell you?
He says nothing, the suitor. Very well. Here is my plan. A medical transplant. To put the suitor's mind inside his thigh. What do you think of that?
He circled. The knife wafted slowly back and forth. I think it may be there already. And how is such a man to think? Whose mind has undergone such a relocation. He still hopes to live. Of course. But he is becoming weaker. The sand is drinking his blood. What do you think, suitor? Will you speak?
He feinted again with the switchblade and stepped away and continued his circling.
He says nothing. Yet how many times was he warned? And then to try to buy the girl? From that moment to this all was certain as dark and day.
John Grady feinted and slashed twice with the knife. Eduardo twisted like a falling cat. They circled.
You are like the whores from the campo, farmboy. To believe that craziness is sacred. A special grace. A special touch. A partaking of the godhead.
He held the knife before him at the level of his waist and passed it slowly back and forth.
But what does this say of God?
They moved simultaneously. The boy tried to grab his arm. They grappled, hacking. The pimp pushed him away and backed, circling. His shirt was sliced open at the front and there was a red slash across his stomach. The boy stood with his hands low, the palms down, waiting. His arm was laid open and he'd dropped the knife in the sand. He did not take his eyes off the pimp. He was cut twice across his stomach and he was reeking blood. The slicker had come unraveled and hung from his forearm and he slowly wound it up again and caught the end of it in his fist and stood.
The suitor seems to have lost his knife. Not so good, eh?
He turned, he circled back. He looked down at the knife.
What are we going to do now?
The boy didnt answer.
What will you give me for the knife?
The boy watched him.
Make me an offer, said Eduardo. What would you give at this point to have the knife back?
The boy turned his head and spat. Eduardo turned and paced slowly back.
Will you give me an eye?
The boy feinted to bend and reach for the knife but Eduardo warned him away and stood on the blade with his thin black boot.
If you let me pry one eye from your head I will give you your knife, he said. Otherwise I will simply cut your throat.
The boy said nothing. He watched.
Think about it, said Eduardo. With one eye in your head you still might kill me. A careless slip. A lucky thrust. Who knows? Anything is possible. What do you say?
He paced away slightly to the left and returned. The knife lay crushed into its mold in the sand.
Nothing, eh? I'll tell you what. I'll make you a better offer. Give me one ear. What about that?
The boy lunged and grabbed for his arm. He spun away and passed the blade twice more across the boy's belly. The boy made a lunge for the fallen knife but Eduardo was already standing over it and he backed away, holding his stomach, the warm blood running between his fingers.
You are going to see your guts before you die, said Eduardo. He stepped away. Pick it up, he said.
The boy watched him.
Pick it up. Did you think I was serious? Pick it up.
He bent and picked up the knife and wiped the blade on the side of his jeans. They circled. Eduardo's blade had severed the fascia of his stomach muscles and he felt hot and sick and his hand was sticky with blood but he was afraid to turn loose holding himself. The slicker had come unwound again and he shook it free and let it fall behind him. They circled.
Lessons are hard, said Eduardo. I think you must agree. But at this point the future is not so uncertain. What do you see? As one cuchillero to another. One filero to another.
He feinted with the switchblade. He smiled. They circled.
What does he see, the suitor. Does he still hope for some miracle? Perhaps he will see the truth at last in his own intestines. As do the old brujos of the campo.
He stepped in with his knife and feinted at the boy's face and then the blade dropped in a vanishing arc of falling light and connected the three bars by a vertical cut to form the letter E in the flesh of his thigh.
He circled to the left. He flung back his oiled hair with a toss of his head.
Do you know what my name is, farmboy? Do you know my name?
He turned his back on the boy and walked slowly away. He addressed the night.
In his dying perhaps the suitor will see that it was his hunger for mysteries that has undone him. Whores. Superstition. Finally death. For that is what has brought you here. That is what you were seeking.
He turned back. He passed the blade again before him in that slow scythelike gesture and he looked questioningly at the boy. As if he might answer at last.
That is what has brought you here and what will always bring you here. Your kind cannot bear that the world be ordinary. That it contain nothing save what stands before one. But the Mexican world is a world of adornment only and underneath it is very plain indeed. While your worldhe passed the blade back and forth like a shuttle through a loomyour world totters upon an unspoken labyrinth of questions. And we will devour you, my friend. You and all your pale empire.
When he moved again the boy made no effort to defend himself. He simply slashed away with his knife and when Eduardo stepped back he had fresh cuts on his arm and across his chest. He flung back his head again to clear his lank black locks from before his face. The boy stood stolidly, following him with his eyes. He was drenched in blood.
Dont be afraid, said Eduardo. It doesnt hurt so bad. It would hurt tomorrow. But there will be no tomorrow.
John Grady stood holding himself. His hand was slick with blood and he could feel something bulging through into his palm. They met again and Eduardo laid open the back of his arm but he held himself and would not move the arm. They turned. His boots made a soft sloshing sound.
For a whore, the pimp said. For a whore.
They closed again and John Grady lowered his knife arm.
He felt Eduardo's blade slip from his rib and cross his upper stomach and pass on. It took his breath away. He made no effort to step or to parry. He brought his knife up underhand from the knee and slammed it home and staggered back. He heard the clack of the Mexican's teeth as his jaw clapped shut. Eduardo's knife dropped with a light splash into the small pool of standing water at his feet and he turned away. Then he looked back. The way a man might look getting on a train. The handle of the huntingknife jutted from the underside of his jaw. He reached and touched it. His mouth was clenched in a grimace. His jaw was nailed to his upper skull and he held the handle in both hands as if he would withdraw it but he did not. He walked away and turned and leaned against the warehouse wall. Then he sat down. He drew his knees up to him and sat breathing harshly through his teeth. He put his hands down at either side of him and he looked at John Grady and then after a while he leaned slowly over and lay slumped in the alleyway against the wall of the building and he did not move again.
John Grady was leaning against the wall on the opposite side of the alley, holding himself with both hands. Dont sit down, he said. Dont sit down.
He steadied himself and blew and got his breath and looked down. His shirt hung in bloody tatters. A gray tube of gut pushed through his fingers. He gritted his teeth and took hold of it and pushed it back and put his hand over it. He walked over and picked up Eduardo's knife out of the water and he crossed the alley and still holding himself he cut away the silk shirt from his dead enemy with one hand and leaning against the wall with the knife in his teeth he tied the shirt around himself and bound it tight. Then he let the knife fall in the sand and turned and wobbled slowly down the alleyway and out into the road.