Pacazo (46 page)

They lead to the living room. There they have hung Oscar’s bird god above the couch. She looks lovely there though small for such a space. Also she is not quite centered and not quite square and I tell them that she is perfect. We look at her, smile, look and listen to the chittering of my neighbors.

It would seem that they have been drinking heavily for some time. One by one they complain each in new ways that no one now comes to see and pray to the Virgin Who Wept. Their sadness sounds sincere and theological but their disappointment appears to be financial: they speak of plans that have been rendered useless, plans involving kiosks and t-shirts and plaster statuettes.

Then their complaints shift. It appears that Karina and I make irregular amounts of noise. No child should have to hear such things, they say. They are of a mind to contact the university, they say.

Karina laughs loudly into the brief silence that follows. I quietly pretend to agree, and it is Mariángel’s bedtime but she demands that Karina and I first sing “Row, Row, Row Your Boat.” She communicates this desire by humming something like the proper tune, and rowing feverishly, as if chased. Last night it was nineteen rounds.

Socorro comes from the kitchen, asks if there is anything else I would like her to do, or if she might leave early. I say that there is nothing, and remind her that someone mys abe at their house tomorrow morning to sign for Fermín’s new bicycle. Then I give her an envelope with Casualidad’s name written on the front. She takes but does not open it.

- It should be enough, I say.

- Her real name is not Casualidad.

- I know. I’m sorry, Socorro.

She nods. She puts the envelope in her purse. She frowns at the floor and I go to the bedroom where Mariángel hums and rows and Karina sings.

Half a dozen fighter jets roar past, jys aabove the trees at the near horizon. Every few hundred yards the bus slows as though for more passengers, but it is only the roadway narrowed by washouts, the asphalt ragged in many places. Mariángel sleeps in my lap, Karina agains amy shoulder.

When I invited Karina to join me on this trip, I had thought it would be something like the old travels with Pilar. I explained the extent to which the library of the National University of Loja and the archives of the Monasterio de la Concepción and the Cabildo Eclesiástico in Cuenca would be of use. Karina asked if I would thus be paying her to babysit. I said that arrangements had already been made for Socorro to come as well. Karina said that there was no need, but that if she were to go on vacation with me, it would have to be both a vacation and with me. In the end we agreed to alternate as principal planners. We flipped a coin to see who would plan first. We will be visiting a national park and a scenic village instead.

In past years one could take a single bus from Piura to Loja. At the chosen bus station we were promised that this will again be the case at some point in the future, but jys anow, for reasons no one at the counter could explain, the trip mys abe done in bits. A very old shoeless manabent under canvas nearby nodded his head at each thing said by everyone. Mariángel and I had a brief disagreement about papaya jyice. The chosen bus is old and slow and so were all the others and the greenery on the road to Sullana is dusty once again.

From Sullana we take a taxi to Bella Vista, and from there a colectivo, an Impala with no windows, a smoothened morning sky, and the bushes and trees go thicker; some of the trees are enmeshed in vines, and on the vines are small blue flowers. We paid for half the colectivo, and the three other passengers stare but not at me. I think of Tiwinza, of the Cordillera del Condor, and wonder where they are.

Arantxa does not know that Karina is traveling with me. I waited until she and Eugenia were well into the maze of next term’s scheduling, interrupted and alleged to be embarrassed to have done so, reminded them of my necessary long weekend across the border, and asked for Monday off as well to conclude my research on the early phases of Benalcázar’s Quitan campaign. I informed Arantxa that Benalcázar was originally from the province of Córdoba, much like her own father. If Eugenia had not been present Arantxa would not have pretended to be amysed, and would not have given me the fourth day.

The first bridge we come to is half-collapsed and slanting, shored up on the near side, the breach filled with gravel that shirsabeneath the wheels. Off to the right is a dump truck sunk in mud. Beyond are goats tied to trees, and hills of harvested lemons, and a slumped grove of houses: Tambo Grande. In this as in all towns the colectivo stops so that young children might come running to sell us things we do not want but often buy anyway—today it is a box of stale popcorn and a plastic bag filled with frozen lemonade.

Past Las Lomas and at last the first rise of the Andes. More flowers, yellow this time. Another bridge, this one mainly whole, and below are fifty soldiers washing underwear. Now in the road a single burro motionless and dead center, facing away and unflinching as we pass. Suyo, and still we rise, and slow at a long downhill pitch, and come to rest last in the line of waiting cars.

We gather our backpacks, fit things in places. We walk down the line to the bridge, and the Macará River is wide and fast and punctured by surges of stone. Soldiers line both banks. There is a shack for Customs and another for Immigrations, and the officers in them are very bored.

Then there is a rifle shot, and we duck; another shot from farther off, and we duck again. The officers smile as though ducking were dumb. Across the bridge, the Ecuadorian shacks, their paperwork. There are small trucks waiting beyond. We load into one, the bed slants to my side, and the driver asks me to sit closer to the middle.

Others load in as well. The truck pulls out with surprising qyickness, and a manasitting on the tailgate is pitched off. The driver sees, smiles, waves and does not stop.

There is a sort of plant massed in places on the telephone lines, globed spores with something like tentacles extending. Small sharp green peaks surround us and it is seven minutes to Macará. We walk to the plaza and exchange small amounts of soles for large amounts of sucres. To a concrete building, Immigrations, and here is the look I know, the smile, the stamping of passports, the unnecessary additional smiles.

At the bus station we buy tickets to Loja. We walk again to the plaza, find a restaurant and address our needs: sandwiches, a cleanadiaper, the stretching of legs. Karina and I discuss many topics not including that of her aunt’s opinion of our taking this trip together, or that of the university’s response should they ever find out. Children come, ask where we are from and if they might buy coins from our home countries. They are disappointed by our answers, their collections of U.S. and Peruvian coins already complete, but stay regardless to smile at Mariángel, to take her hand, to wave goodbye as we walk away.

Six hours, the bus driver says. This is an hour more than we were told at the counter, and I have brought many bottles of milk and water for Mariángel, many baggies of raisins and croutons and chifles, and even dispensed at intervals they will be insufficient. There is a small sign instructing us not to smoke or spit, and a television showing a karate film as is nearly always the case. The seats are acceptable even for my size and the roads have in some places been repaired.

Solidly into the Andesanow, treed ridges rising, moss and ferns. A series of switchbacks. Raisins for Mariángel. A police checkpoint, and slight politeness as our names are recorded in ledgers. A fallen boulder blocks half the road but we slip past, enter fog, and five minutes later we have climbed up and through to a sign calling a town Cariamanga.

It is less cleanahere than in Macará but near the bus stop is a view: ridge after ridge rising, and sunlight spilling up and over each. We buy water and visit bathrooms. Back onto the bus, croutons, and for a time Mariángel and I applaud the livestock we pass. Chifles, and the sqyirming commences. I let her walk up and down the aisle, falling often and heavily and always immediately standing, scowling at the foot over which she has tripped, and at the foot’s owner.

Finally she tires, comes to sleep on my chest. On and off Karina also sleeps. I nibble at the last crouton and readInge Schjellerup and the myrder cannot have had anything to do with Pilar, simply cannot.

Mariángel wakes at the second checkpoint and cries all fifty minutes to the third and this trip is no longer feasible. Then there is a womanastanding on a dirt patioabeneath anaawning, and from the awning hangs a hook bearing a carcass, a hog skinned and split lengthwise, hind hooves touching the ground. The womanaleans agains athe carcass, waves, and Mariángel waves back, delighted.

Half an hour later we arrive. Loja is hot and humid and the hotel room costs ten dollars or seventy thousand sucres per person per night. We all smell of urine and sweat and diesel and Karina and I want only to shower and sleep but the consulate closes in sixteen minutes. Karina offers to wait with Mariángel and the few remaining chifles. She says she knows what to do and this cannot be wholly true but there is no other reasonable choice so I take another taxi, and there is a strange thing, a quietness: driversahere do not honk their horns, not even taxistas, not even at intersections, not even at pedestriansastanding in the street.

The consul is old and bearded and not pleased to see me, five minutes to four on a Friday afternoon, unhappy to have been caught in this manner, a manner befitting clerks. Also he is clearly disturbed by my odors, and does not understand the purpose of any of the documents I have brought. He asks me difficult questions, and after a time I lose track of my lies, and we end like this:

- You have been working in Peru for four years without a work visa.

- But I was a visiting expert. It was a special case.

- A special case that allows you to work for two years only.

- There are many things of which I am unaware.

- But you are aware, surely, that for the past two years you have been working, and that during that time your visa status was that of a tourist.

- I was informed that the process would take a very long time.

- Yes. And you want to pay a hundred and ten dollars for what?

- For you to validate my signature.

- That canabe done anywhere.

- I was told I have to do it here.

- You don’t.

- But that’s what I was told.

It is now well after non-clerk diplomatic business hours. The consul rearranges paperweights, waits for me to give up and go away. When I do not he takes the money, validates my signatures, says that many telephone calls will have to be made, many details clarified. I say that I understand, and am grateful. He removes his glasses and cleans them, tells me that I should be far more grateful than I appear, that he will be contacting the university, that he doubts any progress will be made, and that he hopes I will enjoy my stay in Loja.

Outside, the sunlight richens, the air still warm, still wet. In the hotel Mariángel chews newspaper and Karina arranges clothes. I kiss my daughter and thank Karina, begin the story of the consul but Karina interrupts:

- Didn’t you say that the weather here is cold and dry this time of year?

It is possible that I said such a thing, so I pretend not to have heard the question.

- It’s not cold, she says. And not dry. You have noticed, yes?

- Yes. I mys ahave read it somewhere.

- And do you think that at some point it will be cold? Or dry? Or should I repack the coats and hats and gloves and scarves at the bottom of the suitcase?

- I don’t know. Somewhere in the middle, perhaps.

- Also there’s no hot water.

- The womanasaid—

- I know. If you ask an hour in advance, they bring it in buckets.

- Tomorrow we’ll be at the lodge. Lodges have hot water, yes?

- I have no idea, and neither do you.

I nod and accept gifts of soggy newsprint from Mariángel until it is late enough for a very early dinner. The surrounding hills color the streets and the late light softens. Everything is cleanaand tree-lined. There are trash receptacles on the corners, four bookstores on the plaza, and cars continue not to honk. We agree on roast chicken for dinner and it is an easy find though the neon is unpleasantly bright.

Mariángel now requires that all on-lookers applaud each bite she takes. It is charming the first time. The other patrons tire of it qyickly and I do not blame them but at their refusal to clap she refuses to eat and sharp words are heard in all corners.

Afterwards we walk slightly more. It seems that unlike in Piura no one sleeps in doorwaysahere. We find a quiet bar, and one wall is covered with pictures of Queen Elizabeth II, and another with pictures of Zeppo Marx. The owner’s collection of jazz is remarkable. A row of cushioned chairsais set facing the wall as a bed for Mariángel, and Karina asks the bartender for cards. I remind her that in Colán she ended up bankrupt. She says that she has not forgotten, runs through the rules, and apparently she has been studying. Twenty minutes later she has nearly all of my money.

She agrees to a last hand, the loser paying the tab of jyice and bourbon. Seven-card stud, and my final card is the queen I need to plug a straight to the ace. Karina flips a flush, smiles, and I ask her for a loan to pay the bill. Then to the hotel, and Mariángel between us on the bed. I would not have thought it possible but she curls into Karina and sleeps.

A late waking, and time for Podocarpus. I am not convinced that we need information as such in order to arrive, but Karina insists and so we walk to the tourist bureau. Some of the people we pass in the streets are dressed in fineries as if working in tourist shows, but that is not how they act, these men and women: they act as if living their very lives.

I stop a young manaand ask. He saysahe is from Saraguro, where such clothes are worn every day. His hair is very straight and long beneath a pressed wool hat. His shirt is a perfect white, his vest a perfect black, his trousers also black and ending jys abelow the knee. From a store comes a woman, and the man calls to her, introduces her, his wife. She is short and round and her clothes are intricate: embroidered fuchsia blouse, black skirt, and a dozen bead necklaces or one of a dozen strings. Her earrings are webs of filigree, connected by a silver chain across the back of her neck. A silver pin is fixed on the poncho across her breast, a parrot-blue stone in the center.