Word: sapo
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Dates: during 1953-1953
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First Fight. Love had mellowed El Sapo, a man who could stand some mellowing. By his own count, he had killed more than 100 men in his 45 years. As a boy of nine in a northern village where his army-officer father was stationed, he began his life work by stabbing a schoolmate with the sharp point of a compass. Released from prison at 15, he joined the army, and was working in a road gang when an officer kicked him for not saluting. El Sapo killed the man with a dagger and was sentenced to be shot...
Twice during his career, El Sapo was able to kill to his heart's content, quite legally. He was an army private during General Saturnino Cedillo's rebellion of 1938. "I killed Cedillistas on sight," he remembers with satisfaction. Later, when Sinarquistas (local Fascists) rioted in León, he had the pleasure of working the rioters over with a machine gun. "Blood ran that day!" he recalls proudly...
Through the years, El Sapo's friends had predicted that some day he would go too far. In Mexico City, in 1946, he and Congressman José Torrero got into a pistol duel, with the usual result-El Sapo killed his adversary. An unsympathetic judge gave El Sapo 18 years in the Black Palace of Lecumberri, as the district pen is called. After a period of inactivity, he killed an annoying cell mate two years ago, did a stretch in solitary confinement...
When he emerged, public opinion in Cell Block D had hardened against him; last December a fellow prisoner sidled up and slit El Sapo's belly open with a homemade shiv. It was a near thing, and for weeks El Sapo lay in the prison hospital with nothing to do but think. Finally he sent for the warden and made a momentous announcement: "General, I want to go straight. I am not going to kill anyone any more." Cell Block D, on the whole, was glad to hear...
First Sight. Soon after that, Maria de Jesus came into El Sapo's life. She was a housemaid, serving two years in the women's section for jewel theft, and had heard of El Sapo's fame from the other girls. It was love at first sight. After she was paroled she came back every visiting day, and El Sapo soon popped the question...