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"Good morning to you, Fortunata. How are you?" "All right. But Maria Antonia's got the curse today and her belly's aching something fierce." She sat Indian-fashion, with bent knees, huddling hip to hip against Panchita. "I've got no laurel leaves, honey," Remigia answered, pausing a moment in her work to push a mop of hair back from over her sweaty forehead.
"Come on, Remigia, you do it, you certainly know how," the women said. Out of a reed sheath, Remigia pulled a long and curved knife which served to cut cactus fruit. She took the pigeon in one hand, turned it over, its breast upward, and with the skill of a surgeon, ripped it in two with a single thrust.
Then he might fall for you." "That's what you'd do, all right!" "Oh, you think so, do you? Well, you're quite wrong! Faugh! I despise a tenderfoot, and don't forget it! Ho there, Remigia, lend me some eggs, will you? My chicken has been hatching since morning. There's some gentlemen here, come to eat."
Pancracio, Anastasio Montanez, and Quail lay down beside the stretcher like faithful dogs, watchful of their master's wishes. The rest scattered about in search of food. Remigia offered them all she had, chili and tortillas. "Imagine! I had eggs, chickens, even a goat and her kid, but those damn soldiers wiped me out clean."
She sat down beside Remigia Indian-fashion, and, glancing furtively toward where Demetrio rested, asked in a low voice: "How's the patient, better? That's fine. Oh, how young he is! But he's still pale, don't you think? So the wound's not closed up yet. Well, Remigia, don't you think we'd better try and do something about it?"
Wiping his sweating brow with the back of his palm and turning on one side, he gasped: "May God reward you." Then his whole body shook, making the leaves of the stretcher rustle. Fever possessed him; he fainted. "It's a damp night and that's terrible for the fever," said Remigia, an old wrinkled barefooted woman, wearing a cloth rag for a blouse. She invited them to move Demetrio into her hut.
"Hallo, there, Remigia," another neighbor said as she came in, bowing her bony back to pass through the opening, "haven't you any laurel leaves? We want to make a potion for Maria Antonia who's not so well today, what with her bellyache." Remigia lowered her eyes to indicate that Demetrio was sleeping. "Oh, I didn't see you when I came in. And you're here too, Panchita? Well, how are you?"
"In the name of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph," Remigia said, blessing the room and making the sign of the cross; next, with infinite dexterity, she placed the warm bleeding portions of the pigeon upon Demetrio's abdomen. "You'll see: you'll feel much better now." Obeying Remigia's instructions, Demetrio lay motionless, crumpled up on one side. Then Fortunata gave vent to her sorrows.
Remigia, naked from the waist up, stretched her thin muscular arms over the corn grinder, pounding the corn with a stone bar she held in her hands. "Oh, I don't know; they might not like it," she answered, breathing heavily as she continued her rude task. "They've got their own doctor, you know, so "
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