Betrayed (6 page)

The driver had started the engine. Giving him a nod, Vicki added, “Holly, I promise we’ll talk more tonight. No matter how late you finish up, give me a call. Meanwhile, don’t do anything foolish.”

 “Oh, don’t wait up for me.” Holly stepped back. “If that’s the best you can do for advice, I’ll handle the rest of it myself.”

“The rest of it? Holly, what are you talking about?”

“Oh, believe me, the animals are the least of it. But, hey, you’ve got your priorities.”

“Holly—”

She had already swung around on her heel, and the taxi was moving away from the curb.

Leaning back with a sigh, Vicki didn’t bother to watch her storm back through the glass doors.

In the years she’d been in this business, she’d seen countless volunteers like Holly come and go. Not just American. British too. European. Australian. They were all the same. Young. Idealistic. Determined to save the world—or at least their third world portion of it.

They arrived with backpacks over their shoulder, cameras around their necks—and a cause. Each sure his or her own cause was the most vital to the future of the planet.

And equally sure they had only to throw enough of their Western technology and money to solve the planet’s problems. That the corruption and evils they encountered were never by any human choice but unavoidable circumstance.

But most would be gone soon enough, anyway. Broken against the hard reality of this place and the enormity of the mess they’d found. Or because they’d accumulated enough picturesque facts and photos to put themselves on the map with a scholarly dissertation that established their own future in academia.

Or just because dirt and poverty and primitive living conditions and inept bureaucracy and never-ending insecurity lost their charm, and not even retreating to the air-conditioning and walled luxury of Zone 10 sustained an illusion of home.

It was better not to get involved. To let them come and go with their short-lived dreams and convictions and missions. To save the emotional energy for battles Vicki could win. A handful of garbage pickers. A Mayan baby. A mother.

Just walk away.

Except this time it wasn’t so easy. Because this particular youthful and naive volunteer who had stomped with angry self-righteousness into the airport was Vicki’s younger and only sister.

Chapter Four

Only for my sister would I put up with this.

Vicki pushed Redial on her cell phone. Eleven o’clock at night, and Holly had neither called nor answered Vicki’s repeated attempts.

“Hi, this is Holly. It’s an awesome world. Help me save it.”

With irritation Vicki cut off the voice mail without leaving another message.

Walking across the smoothed concrete that was the infirmary ward floor, she looked down into a portable crib.
Maritza
was the hand-lettered name taped to the end. The sleeping baby girl was clean and freshly diapered, her thick black hair spiking with perspiration from a lingering fever, but the bronze features smoothed to peaceful lines, her rosebud mouth making contented sucking motions.

Sleeping beside Maritza in a narrow cot was her mother, her dusty homespun exchanged for a faded but serviceable nightgown. Even in sleep, her thin fingers clutched the bars of her child’s crib. Casa de Esperanza’s volunteer doctor had diagnosed her with malnutrition and a postpartum infection that had lasted for months.

In the end Vicki had been late to her meeting at Casa de Esperanza. It turned out to be a dilapidated colonial-era mansion in one of the oldest parts of the city, close enough to the ravine she’d seen from the air to smell the acrid fumes of burning garbage. Again familiar.
I could be back in Mexico City or even India
.

A small door set into the right-hand portal opened onto a courtyard that was scrupulously clean, even festive, with potted citrus trees and ornamental bushes. The house itself had been built two stories high around three sides of the courtyard, with all rooms up and down opening onto a wide veranda.

The verandas were made cheerful with potted plants, and if Vicki immediately spotted where gray Duralite slabs patched the original red tile roof, the interior walls were all freshly whitewashed, giving an overall effect of a peaceful, green oasis. Quiet it was not. In the courtyard, this was because of women and children, even some men, who waited their turn through a door identified by a square red cross as well as the
Clínica Esperanza
hand-lettered above it.

But most of the noise came from over the wall to the right where a concrete building rose above the old colonial mansion to at least five stories. Vicki had recognized the sounds of playing children. Presumably, the subjects of her investigation.

Now Vicki smiled wryly at the recollection of the meeting. The short- and long-term missionaries were far different from what Vicki had expected. There were more than a dozen, some Guatemalan, others expatriates. Unlike Evelyn, they all wore jeans and yellow T-shirts with Casa de Esperanza and a child’s rendering of a house imprinted on them.

Each team leader took Vicki through a neat printout of their particular responsibilities—including the clinic Vicki had already seen, the children’s home next door, and a number of nonresident nutrition and educational programs—as well as their accompanying financial statements.

All of which Vicki would verify later. It was easy enough to write an impressive report. Though at first glance it looked almost too good for Vicki’s inherent cynicism.

Once team members had been dismissed, Evelyn had given Vicki a tour, beginning with the clinic and offices housed in the original colonial mansion, then the concrete block next door.

This was no less crowded than that Mexican orphanage, , but the children here looked well fed, their black hair shining with health, their chatter as cheerful as the yellow T-shirts they too wore as uniforms. Though Vicki saw no toys or individual possessions, there was plenty of sports equipment. Surplus land between the building and property wall had been paved over for a playing field with basketball hoops and portable soccer goals on all four sides. All were in use as Vicki and Evelyn walked by.

Evelyn led Vicki upstairs to one of the dormitory wards. The girls who slept there had maneuvered the two rows of bunk beds together to make two opposing platforms, blankets forming walls around the sides and ends.

“We’re
Cristóbal Colón
on the
Santa Maria
,” a pigtailed ringleader announced proudly from one set of bunks. “And they’re the English pirates stealing our gold. The boys said girls couldn’t fight to save their ships. But we can, can’t we?"

“Of course you can,” Evelyn assured her as she and Vicki moved between the battling quarterdecks.

Vicki found herself blinking back sudden moisture at the normality of the scene. “I remember playing just like that when I was a little girl.”

“Yes, children really are the same the world over,” Evelyn responded placidly. “It would be nice to give them an American standard of space and living conditions. But then, how many more would have nothing at all? As it is, we turn away dozens for every one we can squeeze in. Besides, this is the country they have to live in, and it’s a poor one. Plenty of people outside these walls are living ten into a room or a thatched hut.”

“Do you ever try to get them into foster homes?” Vicki asked.

Evelyn shook her head. “In Guatemala that would just mean becoming unpaid servants. Occasionally an expat will adopt, usually the babies, though the laws here make it a difficult process. Nor do we kick them out, like so many of the state homes do, as soon as they’re old enough for manual labor. Our children stay until they’re out of school and able to hold a job. And why shouldn’t they? This is no holding station; it’s their home. The other children, the staff here, become their family over the years. A very big family but family nonetheless.”

Family.

The word echoed now in Vicki’s mind as she brushed gentle fingers over baby Maritza’s soft, dark head. Was that the difference that set this place apart from any Vicki had surveyed to date?

Don’t jump ahead. There’s plenty I haven’t checked out yet. How many other good impressions have turned out to be rotten underneath?

Satisfied her two charges were comfortable, Vicki gave the night attendant a smile as she left the ward. She dug into a pocket for her room key and headed down the hall to where several smaller dormitories provided quarters for live-in nursing staff and visiting volunteer teams.

Vicki dropped the stack of reports she’d acquired on a nightstand and let her purse slide from her shoulder. Someone had already deposited her duffel bag on one of two single beds. The room was as austere as the rest of the building. High walls and ceiling whitewashed a pale green. Mosquito nets hanging down over the beds. A single lightbulb dangling on a wire. A door leading to the room’s one luxury, a private bathroom.

Tired though she was, Vicki was too keyed up to sleep. Crossing the room, she pushed the heavy wooden shutters open and wrapped her arms around herself as she leaned out. Her room was high enough to afford an excellent view of the city, and not far away she saw the red flickering glow of the fires that smoldered endlessly beneath the surface of Guatemala City’s municipal dump.

Rather like the fires that must still be smoldering beneath the surface of Guatemala itself, Vicki thought reflectively, for all its current theoretical Peace Accords. Fires of anger and greed. And revenge.

But not here at least. Not in this place.

Resting her arms on the windowsill, Vicki listened to the sounds wafting upward through other open shutters below. A child sobbing in the dark. The soothing reply of an adult. Girlish whispers and giggles from a dormitory ward somewhere below the window.

Family.

If this noisy, restless, breathing building beneath her feet could be characterized so, then it was Evelyn McKie who was its matriarch. And a much loved one. Vicki had stayed with the missionary during a supper of lentil stew and the madhouse of supervising each age group through bathrooms, story time, and lights-out.

Everywhere they had been besieged by excited cries of “
¡Tia Evelina!
” “Aunt Evelyn.” Small bodies hurled themselves against the fragile, straight figure for a hug. Teens paused to respond shyly to her interested queries about schoolwork or plans. And she’d called every one by name. How did she keep them all straight?

Family.

It had to be the smoke gusting from the ravine that burned Vicki’s eyes. Impatiently blinking it away, she retrieved her phone and hit Redial, cutting it off with a stab as she heard Holly’s voice mail.
Holly, come on, pick up. I know you’re mad, but honestly . . .

“Vicki, dearie, you’re still awake after the long day you’ve had?”

Vicki hadn’t yet closed the door, and as she turned, Evelyn stepped into the room.

“Forgive me for disturbing you this late, but I thought I’d leave these with you if you were still awake.” Evelyn handed Vicki two yellow T-shirts. “You’ll want to wear them out on the project for ID and protection. Even
las maras
—the street gangs—will usually give Casa de Esperanza personnel a pass.”

Her glance fell on the cell phone in Vicki’s hand, and she added sympathetically, “Still haven’t got through to your friend, eh? Is she with your children’s foundation as well? I don’t think I’ve ever met her in the expat community.”

“Oh, definitely not. No, Holly’s pure tree hugger.” Seeing gentle interest in the bright gaze, Vicki explained briefly.

Evelyn nodded. “I’ve always worked with children myself, and for some people, that seems to put us in opposite camps. But to be honest, I’ve always felt a sneaking kinship with the tree huggers. You couldn’t even imagine what this country was like when I arrived fifty years ago. Green and wild and beautiful—and no garbage. Back then we’d never have imagined anything like this would ever be possible.” She gestured at the fiery glow of the dump through the window.

“The children’s needs come first, of course,” Evelyn continued, “but it really would be a shame for them to grow up with nothing left of the incredible beauty God put into their country, and for that I applaud people like your friend. It always reminds me of an old hymn no one sings much anymore.” Her voice was surprisingly strong and steady as she started singing, “‘This is my Father’s world: I rest me in the thought of rocks and trees, of skies and seas—His hand—’”

“Don’t sing that!” Vicki’s sharp rejoinder cut through the melody.

As Evelyn broke off to stare, Vicki caught herself. “I’m so sorry. You caught me off-guard. I . . . I’ve always hated that song.”

It was hardly an adequate explanation for rudeness, so she added quickly, “When I was a kid, I always thought the song was talking about my biological father. And since he never figured in my life, it always rubbed me the wrong way.”