C. M. MAYO

      The
      Last Prince of the Mexican Empire

      A
      novel based on the true story

      
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From the first chapter; the setting for
      this scene is Washington DC in the late 1850s. (Angelo de Iturbide
      was the secretary for the Mexican Legation.) 



      MISS ALICE
      GREEN would not be budged:
      Mr Iturbide was the beau for her. He was so handsome, sensitive
      as a poet, well-read, he had been to New York, London, Paris,
      Italy, La Havana, and Texas, too. And his handwriting, so frank,
      so elegant, however did he learn such penmanship?



      "The priests always said, ask yourself, ‘Can the Pope
      read it?'"



      That sent her into peals of laughter.



      By spring-time, several times a week, Mr Iturbide came all the
      way up the hill to Rosedale
      to call on her. With a wary Mrs Green chaperoning, they went
      to hear the Marine Band play, and one time, they took a buggy
      out to see Great Falls.



      Angel (properly pronounced Ahn-hel), was his Christian name,
      but his family and friends called him Angelo, which was Italian.



      Angelo stirred his coffee with a stick of cinnamon, wasn't that
      fascinating? Angelo drank Madeira wine, he smoked Cuban cigars,
      he had a piping of silver on his ruffled shirt-sleeve cuffs.
      Such panache! And he was very brave. They were picnicking at
      Mount Vernon, tossing leftover breadcrumbs to the gulls, when
      Alice made the little question that had been tugging at the corner
      of her mind. Not so long ago, her country and his had been at
      war. As she had been too young to be reading newspapers at that
      time, she had not understood, nor cared since to learn the whys
      and wherefores of it. (Her older sister had caught a glimpse
      of the war's hero, General Winfield Scott, at a White House levée;
      she had thought him "very wrinkly.") Now, anyone who
      had eyes to see colored pictures knew that Santa Anna, the "Napoleon
      of the West," he had the smarter uniform, not that boring
      old navy-blue. Santa Anna may have lost the war, but the Mexicans'
      leader did not just have epaulettes and a couple of rows of brass
      buttons, he had a crimson coat with a breastplate of the most
      arabesque gold embroidery!



      Alice tossed her last handful of breadcrumbs at the gulls. "Why,"
      she finally asked, "did you not go fight in the Mexican
      conflict?"



      "Santa Anna was my father's enemy."



      "So?"



      "If I'd shown myself in Mexico, he would have gone straight
      for me." 



      The meaning of that washed like a great wave into Alice's mind;
      as it receded, she was left with a sparklingly new appreciation
      of her beau. Alice nodded sagely. "You stayed here to avoid
      assassination."



      Angelo was lying on his side, propped on one elbow. He looked
      at her strangely, then gave her a wry smile. "I suppose
      one could see it that way."



      For a time they were silent. Mrs Green was napping in the buggy,
      which was parked in the cooling shade of an oak tree. There were
      others picnicking on this same lawn, but none close enough to
      overhear. A flock of geese was feeding near water's edge. The
      breeze pulled at the strings of Alice's bonnet.



      And then Angelo told her how it had been for him, that he had
      been heart-sick with grief and shame, not so much that his country
      had been invaded, but that the Mexican army had been so incompetent
      in its defense. "They were a gang of barbarians. Santa Anna
      is a creature out of a cess-pit."



      "And General Almonte?" Alice asked, because she remembered,
      hadn't the ambassador been at the Alamo with Santa Anna?



      "Oh." Angelo twisted his mouth. "He's alright."



      His family had been granted generous pensions by the Mexican
      government, he went on, but during the war years, and for some
      time afterwards, they were not paid. It was bitterly hard for
      his mother. To save his pennies, he himself had had to go live
      in the country. For news of the war, every day that the Senate
      was in session, Angelo would cross the bridge over Rock Creek
      and walk the several miles up the gravel of Pennsylvania Avenue
      to the Hill, to sit in the gallery. When Mr Thomas Corwin of
      Ohio spoke, one wanted to be sure to hear every word! Angelo
      did not say where he was going, but his landlady had suspected
      he was up to something. "Your shoes are wearing out,"
      she'd said. "And you've got the appetite of a hippopotamus."



      Alice laughed. She plucked a grape.



      Angelo went on, "I would receive messages in Spanish that
      said, Watch your back. Be careful. I did not know what it meant,
      or who was sending them."



      "You were in mortal danger!"



      "Maybe..." He was watching a schooner glide by. Ducks
      bobbed in its wake. "I only wanted to know what was going
      on, but I could not show any concern about the war, because then
      people would think I knew something."



      "Now that Santa Anna may go into exile, will you return
      to your country?"



      His gaze met hers. He looked all of a sudden very pale. He came
      up from his elbow and he reached over and took her hand. "Miss
      Green— " he began.



      "Yes," she interrupted. "I will go with
      you."









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      excerpts

      Photos:
      Rosedale