Not because it wouldn’t have made perfect sense to run into her at the first stop she made after returning to the world, for Caridad believed that her life had to have a turn for the better at sooner or later and this would have been as good a time to start as any.

But this attendant—who now, disappointed or just confused that Caridad had only stared at her and said nothing, had concluded that Caridad was burnt out on drugs or something and went about her business picking up wet towels off the floor—was just a woman.

The woman led Caridad to her bath after Caridad had showered for no less than an hour, feeling hot water run down her back for the first time since we all know when, and after a while, she called Caridad out of the tub to wrap her up and let her sweat out her body’s toxins.

Then the woman began to talk again, as she arranged Caridad with a huge flannel sheet and a kind of wool Army blanket, leaving her neatly wrapped like a human burrito. All the while, she went on talking as if Caridad wasn’t hearing her. “I just thought you were someone I had seen at Chimayo last year, but I guess I was wrong … Anyway, you looked so much like a cousin of mine that I ain’t seen since we were girls. She’s Pueblo, like me. Well, I’m half. My father was Mexican, so my grandma tells me. I didn’t know my mother either. She died of a bad liver, you know how that goes. That’s why I got to live with my grandma in Acoma.

“I ain’t seen none of my cousins for a long time … I sure miss ‘em. My friend, you know, the one I was with that day when I thought I first saw you? She’s kinda like my roommate, you know? She didn’t think you were my cousin. You’re not Indian, are you? But I had this feeling like we knew each other …”

Caridad closed her eyes. Then she felt the woman’s breath close to her face. “Are you sure you wasn’t that woman in Chimayo last year?” the woman whispered.

“Yes,” Caridad finally said. “That was me.” A hot tear was escaping down her left eye, making its way to her ear when the Acoma-Mexican woman caught it with her finger and wiped it off. “Shhh,” she told Caridad. “You rest now. Just rest.”

5

An Interlude: On Francisco el Penitente’s First Becoming a Santero and Thereby Sealing His Fate

Francisco el Penitente was not always Francisco el Penitente. As a boy at Our Lady of Sorrows School and to his pals in the playground, he was Frank. To his six older brothers and to his father he was el Franky. To his Mexican godmother, la doña Felicia, however, he was Panchito and, sometimes, Paquito and as he grew up, her Paco. But to his buddies in ’Nam he was Chico.