“You worry me, Bill,” Katie said. “Now come lie down inside, it’s cooler there.”

“Oh, I’ll be well in a while,” Billy said. “It’s just a spell.”

When he felt a little better, Katie coaxed him across the scorching plaza to her hut. She was soon back to draw water from the river, and after that we saw them no more that day.

“I hope he don’t go take on Old Whiskey on a day when he’s likely to get a spell,” Joe said. We idled through the long hot afternoon at my table under the tree.

I guess we were both worried—Billy had sunk so fast. “I hope he doesn’t go after him, anyway, well or sick,” I said. “What was Katie’s mother like?”

“Oh, I never knew her,” Joe said. “She’s been dead for years. She must have been a beauty, though—they say Old Whiskey offered to marry her, but she refused.”

“I’m surprised anyone could refuse him,” I said.

Later, in the castle, when I asked Isinglass about her, he looked sad for a second—it was one of the few moments of emotion I ever caught him in. But he told me nothing.

“I’ve shut my mouth on that, Mister,” he said. “And when I shut my mouth I shut it for good.”

5.

There was little to tire a man in San Isidro except carousing. I was never any good at carousing and seldom attempted it; consequently I was usually awake by daylight, or soon after. The mornings were lovely and quiet—someone had belled a nanny goat, and you’d hear the bell tinkling as the nanny wandered around; the doves fluttered and the wrens conversed, but it was a quieter place, by far, than Philadelphia.

I had formed the pleasant habit of taking myself an early morning stroll by the Rio Grande. I liked to watch the flare of colors over the mountains to the east as the sun rose—the fresh air and the clear light brought a brief exemption from the sadness I was struggling with.

The morning after Joe Lovelady arrived I was strolling back toward the village, trying to avoid snakes—they were hard to spot at that hour—when I came upon Katerina Garza sitting by the river in a long white nightdress.

She had drawn a bucket of water and had then sat down beside it to cry. She looked around at me but made no effort to hide the fact that she was crying.

“Why, Miss Garza,” I said—we were still on formal terms—“you seem distressed. Is Billy worse?”

“He’s not worse, he’s fine,” she said, wiping her wet cheeks with the hem of her nightdress.