Connie Willis - Cibola

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CIBOLA

Connie Willis

Connie Willis lives in Greeley, Colorado,

with her family. She first attracted

attention as a writer in the late ‘70s with a

number of outstanding stories for the

now-defunct magazine Galileo, and went

on to establish herself as one of the most

popular and critically acclaimed writers of

the 1980s. In 1982, she won two Nebula

Awards, one for her superb novelette “Fire

Watch,” and one for her poignant short

story “A Letter from the Clearys”; a few

months later, “Fire Watch” went on to win

her a Hugo Award as well. In 1989, her

powerful novella “The Last of the

Winnebagoes” won both the Nebula and

the Hugo, and she won another Nebula last

year for her novelette “At the Rialto.” Her

books include the novel Water Witch,

written in collaboration with Cynthia

Felice, Fire Watch, a collection of her short

fiction, and the outstanding Lincoln’s

Dreams, her first solo novel. Her most

recent book is another novel in

collaboration with Cynthia Felice, Light

Raid. Upcoming is a major new solo novel,

Doomsday Book. Her story “The Sidon in

the Mirror” was in our First Annual

Collection; her “Blued Moon” was in our

Second Annual Collection; her “Chance”

was in our Fourth Annual Collection; her

“The Last of the Winnebagoes” was in our

Sixth Annual Collection; and “At the

Rialto” was in our Seventh Annual

Collection.

Willis’s is a unique and powerful voice,

comfortable with either comedy or

tragedy—here, in a story that tastes of

both, she takes us to a remote and exotic

corner of the world—modern-day

Denver—for a tantalizing glimpse of an

elusive and fascinating vision.

“Carla, you grew up in Denver,” Jake said. “Here’s an

assignment that might interest you.”

This is his standard opening line. It means he is about to

dump another “local interest” piece on me.

“Come on, Jake,” I said. “No more nutty Bronco fans who’ve

spray-painted their kids orange and blue, okay? Give me a real

story. Please?”

“Bronco season’s over, and the NFL draft was last week,” he

said. “This isn’t a local interest.”

“You’re right there,” I said. “These stories you keep giving

me are of no interest, local or otherwise. I did the time machine

piece for you. And the psychic dentist. Give me a break. Let me

cover something that doesn’t involve nuttos.”

“It’s for the ‘Our Living Western Heritage’ series.” He

handed me a slip of paper. “You can interview her this morning

and then cover the skyscraper moratorium hearings this

afternoon.”

This was plainly a bribe, since the hearings were front page

stuff right now, and “historical interests” could be almost as bad as

locals—senile old women in nursing homes rambling on about the

good old days. But at least they didn’t crawl in their washing

machines and tell you to push “rinse” so they could travel into the

future. And they didn’t try to perform psychic oral surgery on you.

“All right,” I said, and took the slip of paper. “Rosa

Turcorillo,” it read and gave an address out on Santa Fe. “What’s

her phone number?”

“She doesn’t have a phone,” Jake said. “You’ll have to go out

there.” He started across the city room to his office. “The hearings

are at one o’clock.”

“What is she, one of Denver’s first Chicano settlers?” I called

after him.

He waited till he was just outside his office to answer me.

“She says she’s the great-granddaughter of Coronado,” he said, and

beat a hasty retreat into his office. “She says she knows where the

Seven Cities of Cibola are.”

I spent forty-five minutes researching Coronado and copying

articles and then drove out to see his great-granddaughter. She

lived out on south Santa Fe past Hampden, so I took I-25 and then

was sorry. The morning rush hour was still crawling along at about

ten miles an hour pumping carbon monoxide into the air. I read

the whole article stopped behind a semi between Speer and Sixth

Avenue.

Coronado trekked through the Southwest looking for the

legendary Seven Cities of Gold in the 1540s, which poked a big

hole in Rosa’s story, since any great-granddaughter of his would

have to be at least three hundred years old.

There wasn’t any mystery about the Seven Cities of Cibola

either. Coronado found them, near Gallup, New Mexico, and

conquered them but they were nothing but mud-hut villages.

Having been burned once, he promptly took off after another

promise of gold in Quivira in Kansas someplace where there

wasn’t any gold either. He hadn’t been in Colorado at all.

I pulled onto Santa Fe, cursing Jake for sending me on

another wild-goose chase, and headed south. Denver is famous for

traffic, air pollution, and neighborhoods that have seen better days.

Santa Fe isn’t one of those neighborhoods. It’s been a decaying line

of rusting railroad tracks, crummy bars, old motels, and waterbed

stores for as long as I can remember, and I, as Jake continually

reminds me, grew up in Denver.

Coronado’s granddaughter lived clear south past Hampden, in

a trailer park with a sign with “Olde West Motel” and a neon bison

on it, and Rosa Turcorillo’s old Airstream looked like it had been

there since the days when the buffalo roamed. It was tiny, the kind

of trailer I would call “Turcorillo’s modest mobile home” in the

article, no more than fifteen feet long and eight wide.

Rosa was nearly that wide herself. When she answered my

knock, she barely fit in the door. She was wearing a voluminous

turquoise housecoat, and had long black braids.

“What do you want?” she said, holding the metal door so she

could slam it in case I was the police or a repo man.

“I’m Carla Johnson from the Denver Record,” I said. “I’d like to

interview you about Coronado.” I fished in my bag for my press

card. “We’re doing a series on ‘Our Living Western Heritage.’” I

finally found the press card and handed it to her. “We’re

interviewing people who are part of our past.”

She stared at the press card disinterestedly. This was not the

way it was supposed to work. Nuttos usually drag you in the house

and start babbling before you finish telling them who you are. She

should already be halfway through her account of how she’d traced

her ancestry to Coronado by means of the I Ching.

“I would have telephoned first, but you didn’t have a phone,”

I said.

She handed the card to me and started to shut the door.

“If this isn’t a good time, I can come back,” I babbled. “And

we don’t have to do the interview here if you’d rather not. We can

go to the Record office or to a restaurant.”

She opened the door and flashed a smile that had half of

Cibola’s missing gold in it. “I ain’t dressed,” she said. “It’ll take me

a couple of minutes. Come on in.”

I climbed the metal steps and went inside. Rosa pointed at a

flowered couch, told me to sit down and disappeared into the rear

of the trailer.

I was glad I had suggested going out. The place was no

messier than my desk, but it was only about six feet long and had

the couch, a dinette set, and a recliner. There was no way it would

hold me and Coronado’s granddaughter, too. The place may have

had a surplus of furniture but it didn’t have any of the usual crazy

stuff, no pyramids, no astrological charts, no crystals. A deck of

cards was laid out like the tarot on the dinette table, but when I

leaned across to look at them, I saw it was a half-finished game of

solitaire. I put the red eight on the black nine.

Rosa came out, wearing orange polyester pants and a yellow

print blouse and carrying a large black leather purse. I stood up and

started to say, “Where would you like to go? Is there someplace

close?” but I only got it half out.

“The Eldorado Cafe,” she said and started out the door,

moving pretty fast for somebody three hundred years old and three

hundred pounds.

“I don’t know where the Eldorado Cafe is,” I said, unlocking

the car door for her. “You’ll have to tell me where it is.”

“Turn right,” she said. “They have good cinnamon rolls.”

I wondered if it was the offer of the food or just the chance to

go someplace that had made her consent to the interview.

Whichever, I might as well get it over with. “So Coronado was your

great-grandfather?” I said.

She looked at me as if I were out of my mind. “No. Who told

you that?”

Jake, I thought, who I plan to tear limb from limb when I get

back to the Record. “You aren’t Coronado’s great-granddaughter?”

She folded her arms over her stomach. “I am the descendant

of El Turco.”

El Turco. It sounded like something out of Zorro. “So it’s this

El Turco who’s your great-grandfather?”

“Great-great. El Turco was Pawnee. Coronado captured him

at Cicuye and put a collar around his neck so he could not run

away. Turn right.”

We were already halfway through the intersection. I jerked the

steering wheel to the right and nearly skidded into a pickup.

Rosa seemed unperturbed. “Coronado wanted El Turco to

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摘要：

CIBOLA ConnieWillis ConnieWillislivesinGreeley,Colorado,withherfamily.Shefirstattractedattentionasawriterinthelate‘70swithanumberofoutstandingstoriesforthenow-defunctmagazineGalileo,andwentontoestablishherselfasoneofthemostpopularandcriticallyacclaimedwritersofthe1980s.In1982,shewontwoNebulaA...

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Connie Willis - Cibola

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