In the Footsteps of Giovanni the Hermit
Laureano de la Torre begins his tale
Giovanni fell easily into step alongside the dead man. Laureano de la Torre was moving steadily, almost with the singular purpose of getting to the village of Arroyo Seco before nightfall. He seemed to be an individual of very few words
— he usually spoke only when spoken to and otherwise rarely volunteered any information by himself.
“Tell me how this valley is protected by God himself,” Giovanni asked his traveling companion as he paused to catch his breath. “How long has it been around?”
“Why, since the beginning of time,” came the answer. “But recorded history only dates it back to the late 1700s, less than a hundred years ago. It is mentioned in the chronicles as the valley being watched over by the Eye of Heaven, el Lucero del Cielo. The point where the sun rises in the morning is the same spot where the Río Lucero begins until it is a mighty torrent when it gets to the foothills. It is a land grant, a merced, given to two brothers from Abiquiú. The brothers Cristóbal and Gregorio Martínez were given permission to settle this valley. They brought their families over and built three towers — torreones, they called them — at the foot of El Salto.”
“What is El Salto?” Giovanni asked.
“It is the name of the domed mountain looming over the town of Arroyo Seco,” Laureano replied. “It is baptized by seven waterfalls cascading down it’s rock face until the waters reach the very valley. Then the water disappears underground, only to resurface farther on down the valley, where it is least expected.”
“Was there no one here before the coming of the brothers?” Giovanni asked.
“There were some nomadic tribes, Cuampis mainly,” the dead man told him. “But it was the site of a mighty crossroads for several others. The Arapaho, the Ute, the Comanche and the Apache often used this area to approach the local Indian village. And before them, in prehistory, the cave at the bottom of El Salto Mountain was the scene of human sacrifice and blood rites.
“The brothers built their torreón fortifications on some strong stone foundations that contained my own blood,” he continued. “The narrow windows on each were high on the rounded walls and just wide enough to allow light into the place and to poke rifles through them. And they sternly warned their children everyday, not to go outside for fear that they might be carried off by one of the nomadic tribes.”
The holy Hermit was busy trying to study the profile of the dead man as he walked and listened. He noted that his skin was white, almost colorless. His gait, though strong and determined, was also stiff and unnatural. Whenever he did look at Giovanni, he seemed to be looking past his face and reading his very soul.
“One day when their parents left for the morning to uproot some brush, they repeated their instructions to the children not to venture outside,” Laureano went on. “But the children soon tired of their chores inside the torreones and stepped out to enjoy the morning sun. So busy were they in their horseplay they didn’t even notice, until it was too late, that the shadow of two people darkened their patio door. They looked up in fear, sure that the strangers were Indians who had come to carry them off. Instead, they saw an old man and a younger man with long white robes smiling down at them. ‘¿Quién eres? [who are you],’ they asked the strangers in Spanish.
“‘We live in this valley; we have always lived in this valley,’ the strangers replied. ‘We chose it to be our home.’
“‘But there is nobody else who’s supposed to be living here,’ the children said, surprised. ‘Only our parents have permission to settle here. And besides, aren’t you afraid to be carried off?’
“‘No. We have a little dove that tells us whenever strangers are approaching, see?’ they said, pointing to a bird perched on the branch of a nearby pine.
“The children looked up to gaze at a snow-white bird cooing softly amid the dark green branches a few yards away. When they turned around to look back, the old man and the young man were gone.
“Well, like it or not,” Laureano went on, nearing the end of his story, “the children had to tell their parents they had stepped outside without permission and they had seen two strange men who weren’t supposed to be there. Their parents cast gazes around uncomfortably. They knew what they had to do. They needed to go down into the valley and to seek these men out.”
Giovanni reached out his hand to ask Laureano de la Torre to stop. He had a pebble in his sandal that he needed to dislodge. He wished to give the tale his full attention.