We could have left the city as many others did, but mother insisted we hide in the cellar. Before he died, father had erected a false wall, behind which he had stored some food and wine. A lead pipe with a faucet brought water in from the spring and a sluice carried away our waste. When the British finally breached the city walls, we hid. On the second day a soldier found our hideout but I was lucky and managed to get a knife into his neck and close the secret panel before anyone else was alerted. We didn’t know how long we would be down there so we fed on the soldier for many days, cutting him apart on the altar and apologizing to the goddess for being unable to raise a flame to her.
          After a time the British left and a new family moved into our home. I sneaked up there one night and watched them as they slept. I knew them: a rich family, afrancesado when convenient, now, I assumed, loyal subjects of Ferdinand.
          This was a dilemma. To kill them would bring attention to the house, but if they stayed they would certainly discover us. In the end, I tainted their dinner with one of mother’s concoctions and drove the father mad. He murdered his wife and children and was hanged within the week.
          In the years that followed I tried to discourage attention. Children wandering at night might disappear, and their bodies might be found, but never near our home. I expanded the tunnels until they reached far outside the borders of Badajoz. Landlords fell drunkenly down stairs and broke their necks. Land agents drowned.
          We raised our children to study the Law by candlelight and deposit gold with Italian bankers. Soon our grandchildren were rich. They bought back our home and its land under other names, Hebrew and American names that no one would recognize. They visit on the important days and then return to the world, hearts refreshed by the grace of the goddess. Sometimes one or two die screaming at the hands of some witch-hunter or another, but mother, though certainly not young, still has many fertile years ahead of her and many more children yet to bear.
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