CAMAGÜEY.- I really never had the chance to know Antonia and when I did, she was buried in Cubitas Arriba, in the cemetery of Pozo de Vilató.

There is always someone grateful that leaves over her tombstone a bunch of local flowers, such as poppies, marilopes or amalias, as a memory to the history of that woman that came to pay a debt that was not hers.

Once, a long time ago, it is said, on the road up the Lesca gorge, two cart trains were passing, but in opposite directions, until reaching a point where one of them had to pull over to let the other one go through. That sparked an argument because Antonio Nápoles and Cheo the limp were hot blooded men. The matter, at that time, almost ended up drawing the machetes; but, thankfully, people intervened and broke them apart. Then each of them continued on his way. But that brooded Antonio got on his horse and chased Cheo, pulled out his carbine and shot the other one plunging him off the cliff.

Antonio went into the woods, but since he worked in one of the states of miss Velazco, I am told that he was pulled out in a barge in Puerto Piloto, taking him with his family to Havana, so he was never caught, and no one herd from him again.

But since it is not all bad, this man had his daughter Antonia, that by that time must have been about thirteen years old and must have been terribly embarrassed by that tragedy since it seems to have burden her with so much guilt. Who knows.

I do not know what she might have thought, but it is said that by 1930 Antonia Morales showed up in Vilató. She was married to a kind Galician man named Francisco Cimal Sánchez, a hard working man who made casave.

When they arrived in Cubitas they bought a plot of land and they struggled to live of viand and honey. They build up a ranch, a big house made of guano with dirt floors, like everyone else in there, surrounded by a garden of medicinal plants. The house is still there on a side of the old road heading Calderina. No one has told me if someone asked about her family or if she talked about it. Not even those who wanted to avenge Cheo brought it up.

Paco, the Galician man, died in 1981 and the woman continued undisturbed in her chores, sowing and making casave, although in her final years she was not very healthy and sometimes she had to walk using crutches or walkers.

Antonia served everyone and she was always looking to do something for the poorest neighbors. She had a gift for it. She healed any kind of disease with her herbs, excepting those too serious that her natural science could not face. For example, her with her plants was like a doctor, nurse and apothecary, because she prepared medicines, poultices and syrups. She went out to walk every corner and when she came across a house in need, she always tried to help with the little she had. She taught people to plant useful things on their gardens and backyards, and that is now a tradition. There is not a single ordinary household that does not have herbs and weeds since Antonia. Even, if you get into the woods where there is nothing and sometimes you come across the remaining of houses and if you see some medicinal plants in those forests, you can be sure that Antonia was once there. In Vilató this is more than a legend.

She had numerous godchildren and she even took care of orphan or abandoned kids. She taught them to work, to be useful, even though she lived in a terrible misery. It is said that she even took care of people suffering from typhus and contagious diseases. For what it is known, she was a strong woman, with a rosy white color. She seemed Galician. Always dressed in black, with a scarf and a bow of white hairs. Like that she walked all over, always carrying a bag. Her only vice was chewing tobacco and when she died she was about 96 years old.

Then people was left desolated and that is why there are people who go to the cemetery of Vilató to bring her flowers and remember her; to pray to her and ask her things because they say she shows up and does this and that. You know how people can be.

This woman is one of the main characters around Pozo de Vilató and many leagues around. No one can tell the history of this region without mentioning her. Then there was the Revolution and family physicians that nurture the highlands, but Antonia did not see that sunrise because she had already died. Today, in spite of the years, no one wonders when over the tombstone someone grateful has left for her a bunch of local flowers, like poppies, marilopes or amalias.

Translated by Elianna Díaz Mendieta