The Long and Storied Life of Jose Montoya

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The Long and Storied Life of Jose Montoya 40Americans, and bored. This turned out to be a bad combination. Women's undergarments started to flythrough the air and land in the front seat of the aeroplane, along with shouted offers of what might betraded for a ride. The dashing young pilot might have been able to withstand such tortures for anextended period of time, but the gathered crowd then started taking turns burning holes with theircigarettes in the canvas-covered frame of the aeroplane for amusement. With the aid of a pistol, a loud,clear voice, and threats, the pilot was finally able to bravely face down the crowd and get the planeback to base. At least, that was the version of events as Jose had heard them, and the holes burned inthe wings were there for everyone to see, even if the undergarments had gone mysteriously missing.Not that women's undergarments were in short supply around the headquarters, however. Likeevery army in the field throughout history, the expedition into Mexico had attracted a following ofwomen eager to be of a certain service to the soldiers, if the price was right. The Army, a much moreprogressive and forward-thinking organization than it had been in the past, but still fond of rules andregulations, decided that the interests of both the ladies and the soldiers would be best served if theseeconomically and carnally motivated encounters were regulated, too. It negotiated a fixed rate with thewomen for their services and in return provided them with their own small adobe huts and facilities tomake use of, the whole of which was then cordoned off into its own stockade. This stockade had itsown sentries assigned to protect the women from soldiers who might otherwise be tempted to try andget free samples, and a station outside the entrance where soldiers who had availed themselves ofservices were required to stop and take an anti-venereal prophylaxis upon leaving. It was anarrangement that both the Army and the ladies were quite satisfied with.Jose was torn whenever the thought of going to the stockade crossed his mind. The smell ofbodies and perfume made his vision spin to the point where he could only stagger like a drunkard,thinking that he should resist the call of the sirens within the stockade but ultimately unable to do so.It was not for lack of trying on Jose's part that the scent of the women was too much for him.
The Long and Storied Life of Jose Montoya 41He tried going to mass, but the stripped-down field version of the rites offered by the army chaplainlacked the passion and sensuousness of the masses that he had grown up with. In place of the gold andthe velvet and the candles and the bloody, tortured statuary of his youth was a canvas tent with a priestin olive wool underneath his cassock who offered neither comfort nor chastisement, the two elementsthat Jose most needed if he was to overcome the muddy concupiscence of his flesh.Jose next turned to the boxing matches organized for the soldiers to watch and to take part in.As soon as he knew mass would provide no armor of either a physical or a spiritual nature, Jose signedup for the lightweight division. He had never entered a boxing ring in his life, so he was hopeful thatthe punishment his body would receive there would make him too tired and too sore to entertainthoughts of the women in their stockade. This plan also backfired, however, when Jose proved to havesuch a natural talent for fighting that none of the other lightweights could defeat him, or even land aneffective punch. Instead of leaving the ring physically battered and bloodied, Jose found himselfleaving it even more tense and his mind more full of the women than before the fights started. Afterjust three fights in which each successive opponent was beaten more severely than the last, Jose retiredfrom boxing forever, afraid that his frustrations were going to beat a man to death sooner rather thanlater.Religion and violence both having failed him, Jose next took up gambling as his weapon ofchoice in his internal struggle to avoid the ladies in the stockade. He reasoned to himself that if hecould lose all of his pay at dice and cards he would not in any case be able to visit the ladies, since theguards at the entrance always made sure that entering soldiers had the cash to pay the fee that the Armyand the ladies had agreed upon. But just as with boxing he had discovered he had talent, with gamblingJose now discovered he also had luck. It seemed to him like almost every hand of cards he was dealtcontained three queens, with the assembled ladies faintly smiling like a promise. In dice he rolledevery seven or eleven or point that he needed, and he watched with alarm as his money grew and grew
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The Long and Storied Life of Jose Montoya

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