A Sinister Splendor by Mike Blakely

Author:Mike Blakely
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates

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Arriving at the docks, he found a handful of his trusted agents, a single platoon of infantrymen, a small brass band, and a gathering of curious citizens. Juanito returned from the boiler room in time to help him across a gangplank to the pier. Still feeling the sway of the open seas, Santa Anna felt obliged to hold his manservant’s shoulder as he trudged toward his supporters.

The first to step forward was Manuel Escandon, a profiteer who had benefited from dictator Santa Anna’s takeover of abandoned church properties, which he sold to chosen investors, including Escandon.

“Viva México!” Escandon shouted. “Viva Santa Anna!”

No one added the customary echoes.

“Manuel,” Santa Anna said, shaking Escandon’s hand, “just one cannon shot as a salute to my return? Only one?”

Escandon shrugged his apology. “The generals did not want the Americans to mistake your salute for an act of aggression.”

“This fear of the Yanquis is disgusting,” Santa Anna groused. Then he smiled and added, “But this will change.”

“Ah, senora!” Escandon said, bowing before Maria.

Santa Anna looked past Escandon to the others who had come to greet him. He recognized the familiar faces of Haro y Tamariz, Tornel, Sierra y Rosso, Valencia, Canalizo … Generals, politicians, bureaucrats. All useful men, if closely supervised. He stepped forward, shook off his manservant’s helping hand, and pointed at the soldiers on the jetty.

“Why are these soldiers not standing at attention? Where are their officers?”

“The officers all went to a tavern in the town,” Escandon admitted. He turned to the men in uniform. “Fire a musket salute to Santa Anna’s return!” he shouted.

A few of the men loosed random shots out over the Gulf.

“Strike up the band!” Escandon goaded. “The Hero of Veracruz has returned!”

As he listened to the band butcher a haphazard version of some march, General Antonio López de Santa Anna inhaled a breath of Mexican air and offered his elbow to Maria. With his comely wife, he hobbled up the pier toward sacred ground. Though he fumed inwardly at the disorganized welcome he had received, he forced himself to smile and swagger as if reviewing the troops. Soon, he told himself, there would be parades in his honor. There would be banquets, festivals, concerts, and celebrations. Just like old times.

“I have returned,” he said to himself, under his breath. Just then, he noticed an old man standing in his path on the dock. As Santa Anna limped nearer, the graybeard shook his fist at the general.

“Santa Anna, you scoundrel!” the curmudgeon railed. “For more than twenty years you have endeavored to ruin our country! Why did you not stay in Cuba, where you could reign as king of the cockfights?”

Santa Anna drew himself up into a defensive posture, though the tirade had done little to ruffle him. He had been called worse than king of the cockfights.

“Sir, you stand with two good legs upon the very pier where I lost one of mine in defense of Madre México!” Now he looked the old man in the eyes and smiled at him.

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