Saving Fish From Drowning (17 page)

How sad, Harry thought, that he and Marlena were not similarly engaged. It was awkward for him to watch the young couple, see this contrast to him. It almost seemed they were flaunting their sexual intimacy. Marlena, meanwhile, resented their prolonged sessions of 1 0 8

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French kissing. A little smooching was fine, but this was exhibitionism. Who wanted to see their tongues damp-mopping each other’s gums? The tongue-thrusting looked like a puppet show of a penile-vaginal encounter. Since these slurping antics were right in front of her, she had to work hard to ignore them. It was so embarrassing.

She thought about asking them to stop, but then Harry might think she was a prude. Harry, in fact, was thinking of what he could say to begin a conversation with Marlena and reestablish their flirtation.

As Wendy and Wyatt worked themselves into a more fervent session, Harry unintentionally interrupted it by saying to Marlena,

“Look at those huge birds! Those wings, how glorious!” He pointed out the window to circling birds. Heads turned, as did Wendy’s and Wyatt’s.

“Vultures,” Wyatt said.

“Mm,” Marlena said. “That’s what they are, all right. We’ve certainly seen a lot of them. Must be there’s a carcass in the field.” She was grateful that Harry thought to point out something that quickly snuffed out thoughts of sensual pleasure. “Chocolate or peanuts, anyone?” She began tossing out Halloween-sized bags of M&M’s and trail mix. She had brought a huge duffel bag worth of snacks.

Wyatt started popping chocolates, and Marlena hoped that his mouth, thus occupied, would not continue the lingual gymnastics.

Harry was mentally kicking himself.
Vultures!
What a sod he was.

It was obvious Marlena thought so. Of all the stupid things to point out Of course they were vultures. He should have put on his bifocals.

What happened to their spark, their frisson? Like an old married couple, they munched on their candies and stared wordlessly at the scenery with feigned interest and glazed eyes. The flat patches with different hues of green, a few low hills with clusters of trees. It all looked the same.

What they were actually seeing were fields of sugarcane with feathery tassels, thickets of tall bamboo, and twenty-foot-high small1 0 9

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needled pine trees. On the right was a hillside of tea bushes, a plot of carrots with white flowery heads. On the left were golden fields of rapeseed, and next to those, groves of rubber trees with leaves turned orange, red, and brown. Running alongside the road were the most vibrant bursts of life: fiery balls of lantana and scarlet hibiscus with their trumpet flowers open to hail a perfect afternoon. A perfect afternoon wasted on Harry and Marlena.

The bus turned up a bumpy dirt road, and all the nappers were jounced awake. Lulu conferred with the driver, and they came to an immediate agreement. It was time to disembark and walk the rest of the way to the village. The driver turned off the engine. “Bring your hat, sunglass, and water,” Lulu ordered. “Also insect cream if you have. Many mosquitoes.”

“Is there a restroom nearby?” Roxanne called out. Her camcorder was looped around her neck.

“Yes, yes, this way.” Lulu gestured to the side of the road, to the tall vegetation. As people gathered their necessary belongings, tiny whimpers came from the back of the bus. Eyes turned toward Esmé, who appeared to be doubled over in pain.

“Wawa!” Marlena cried out. “Are you sick? What’s the matter?”

Light-headed with fear, Marlena ran toward the back of the bus, and the closer she drew, the more miserable Esmé appeared to be. Marlena leaned down to try to help her daughter sit up. A moment later, Marlena gasped: “Oh my God!”

The puppy whimpered again.

Harry ran toward them. Esmé began to howl, “I’m not leaving it!

If you do, I’m staying here, too.” Since the night before, Esmé knew the inevitable would happen. They would find out what she had done, and having kept her secret for so long, she had grown more anxious, and now she could not help but bawl. Surges of adolescent hormones contributed to a sense of doom.

Harry lifted a scarf that Esmé had fashioned by cutting up a 1 1 0

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T-shirt. There in the crook of the hysterical girl’s arm was a very lethargic-looking puppy. “Let me have a look-see,” he said quietly.

“You can’t have it!” Esmé blurted and blubbered. “If you try taking it I’ll kill you, I swear I will—”

“Stop that!” Marlena scolded. In the past year, Esmé had said this a few times to both her and her ex-husband’s new wife. Though Marlena knew it was just histrionics and empty threats, it pained her to hear her daughter use the word “kill” when there were teenagers who had acted upon such enraged thoughts.

Harry put his hand on Esmé’s shoulder to calm her.

“Don’t touch me!” she shrieked. “You can put your grimy hands on my mom but not on me. I’m underage, you know!”

Marlena flushed, and Harry did, too, with embarrassment and indignation. He looked up to see the others in the bus staring at him.

“Esmé, stop this right now,” Marlena said.

Harry, remembering his training as an animal behaviorist, recovered his equanimity. With frightened dogs, shouting never helped matters. He made himself a symbol of calmness. “Of course no one is going to take away your puppy,” he said in a soft voice. “I’m a veterinarian, and I can see what’s the matter with him.”

“No, you’re not!” Esmé sobbed. “You play a stupid dog trainer on a TV show. You make them do stupid pet tricks.”

“I’m also a veterinary doctor.”

Esmé’s sobs subsided into sniffles. “For real? You’re not just an actor?” She eyed Harry, assessing whether to let go of her distrust.

“For real,” Harry acknowledged, using this Americanism he normally despised. He began to talk to the puppy. “Hey, little wiggle-waggle, not feeling so well?” Harry opened the puppy’s mouth and expertly peered at its gums, touching them lightly. He pinched up the skin on the puppy’s back and let it fall back. “Gums are quite pale,”

he noted out loud. “See here? Slightly grayish. And see how the skin slowly drapes. Dehydration.” He lifted the puppy and peered at its 1 1 1

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underside. “Mm. And it’s a little lassie. . . . With a hernia in her umbilicus . . . About five weeks old, I reckon, likely not properly weaned.”

“A lassie,” Esmé said wondrously. Then: “Can you save her? Those girls in the hotel were just going to let her die. That’s why I had to take her with me.”

“Of course you did,” Harry said.

“But darling,” Marlena intervened, “the sad, sad thing is, we can’t bring a dog with us, no matter how much—”

Harry put his palm up to indicate that her tack was going to backfire. He continued petting the pup as he spoke to Esmé. “She is a beauty.” And then in tones of admiration: “How in the world did you get her past security and onto the plane?”

Esmé demonstrated by draping the triangled make-do scarf as a sling for her arm. She put a zippered sweatshirt over that. “It was easy,” she said proudly. “I walked right through. She never made a peep.”

Marlena looked at Harry, and for the first time since the debacle at the temple, their hearts and minds sought one another.

“What are we going to do?” Marlena mouthed.

Harry took charge. “Esmé, do you know when it last ate?”

“I tried to give her some eggs this morning. But she’s not very hungry. She ate only a tiny bit, and when she burped, it came up. ”

“Mm. How about her stools?”

“Stools?”

“Has she been making any poops?”

“Oh, that. She’s peed, but no—you know, none of what you called the other. She’s really well behaved. I think whatever it is has to do with that lump on her belly.”

“Umbilical hernia,” Harry said. “That’s not necessarily serious or uncommon. Rather prevalent in toy breeds. Strangulation of the intestines could be a problem later, but most resolve in a few months’

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time, or if needed, it can be repaired with surgery.” He knew he was saying more than was necessary, but he wanted Esmé to believe completely in his ability to help.

Esmé stroked the puppy’s fur. “So what’s wrong with her? Sometimes when she gets up, she runs really fast like she’s crazy, then she falls over.”

“Could be hypoglycemia.” He hoped to God it was not parvo.

“We need to get her rehydrated at the very least, and right away.” He stood up and called to the others on the bus. “Would anyone by chance have a medicine dropper?”

A terribly long silence. And then a small voice asked, “I have an eyedropper, but would a sterile needle and syringe be better?” That was Heidi.

Harry was too surprised to answer at first, then blurted, “You must be joking. You have one?” And when Heidi’s face reddened and fell with embarrassment, he revised himself quickly: “What I mean is, I didn’t expect—”

“I brought it in case of accidents,” he heard Heidi explain. “I read that you should never get a transfusion in a foreign country. AIDS is rampant in China and Burma, especially on the border.”

“Of course. Brilliant.”

“I also have tubing.”

“Of course.”

“And dextrose . . . in an IV solution.”

“Wow!” Esmé said. “That’s so cool.”

Harry scratched his head. “That’s . . . that’s absolutely amazing. . . . I’m not sure if we should use them. After all, if we used your emergency supplies, they would not be usable later, if, well, you know, an accident did happen—”

“That’s okay,” Heidi said right away. “That’s why I brought it, for any emergency, not just for me. I also have glucose tablets, if you want to try those instead.”

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Harry again couldn’t help registering surprise.

“I’m hypoglycemic.” Heidi raised her right wrist and displayed her MedicAlert bracelet.

Harry figured Heidi had what was often referred to in medical circles as “Marin County disease,” a vague unhappiness that led people, women in particular, to complain of sudden weakness, shakiness, and hunger. Heidi had the medical knowledge and equipment of a hypochondriac. “Well, then,” Harry said, “the eyedropper will do for now, if you would be willing—”

“Yes, yes.” Heidi was in fact delighted. For once, her arsenal of remedies would come in handy. “I need to get into my suitcase first.”

Heidi dug out her medical supplies, and the others scoured their hand luggage for items that might be useful: a wool cap for the puppy’s bed. A facecloth as washable bedding. A pretty ribbon the puppy might wear once she was well and happily licking the faces of her saviors.

While Harry, Esmé, and Marlena tended to the sick puppy, the rest of the group followed Lulu out of the bus. Dwight went over to the side of the road and unzipped his fly.

It annoyed Vera that he was peeing within eyesight of her, that he assumed it was the responsibility of others to avert their eyes. The audacity. He controlled the group by acting as if he were the exception to every rule. He demanded alternatives when none should have been suggested. Grousing to herself, she trudged deeper into the tall grass to find her privacy. The brush closed in on her and she looked up at the clear sky, at its directionless blue. She was engulfed, disoriented, and she enjoyed the sensation, knowing she was not actually lost. She could still hear voices a few yards away. She lifted her dress, careful to bunch up the voluminous material so that she did not accidentally soil herself. How did the ladies of Victorian days manage to relieve themselves with those gigantic hoopskirts and petticoats?

In her wallet she carried a photo of a young black woman stand1 1 4

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ing in front of painted scenery, solemnly staring at something off to the side. It was her future, Vera liked to think. Her hair was coiffed in the style of the times, wound and pinned, and she wore a high-collared black dress, an oval pendant at her throat, with a skirt that was smooth in front and in back as full as a Christmas tree. This was her great-grandmother, Eliza Hendricks. Vera often felt that woman in her soul; she had been a teacher at one of the first colleges for black women. Eliza had also published a book called
Freedom, Self-Reliance, and Responsibility.
For years, Vera had tried to find a copy.

She had contacted hundreds of antiquarian book dealers. She imagined what Eliza Hendricks had written. As a result, Vera often thought about those subjects: freedom, self-reliance, and responsibility, what it meant then, what it meant now. She had hoped one day to write a book herself about the same themes and include anecdotes about her great-grandmother, if only she could glean more from public records. But in recent years, she felt frustration more than inspiration. What place do freedom and responsibility have when you’re plagued with budget cuts, conniving upstarts, and competing charities? No one had vision anymore. It was all about marketing.

She sighed. The trip to China and Burma was supposed to reinvigorate her, help her see the wild blue yonder once again. She looked up at the clouds. The village lay half a mile up a road thick with wild daisies growing eight or nine feet tall.

All at once, a hair-raising scream echoed down the road. “What the fuck was that?” Moff and Dwight said almost simultaneously. It was coming from the village up ahead. “A girl?” Moff guessed. Heidi pictured a girl being raised in the air by a tribal chief, about to be tossed over a cliff in a sacrificial ritual. Then came a whimper. A dog that was being hit with a shovel? A moment later, it was wheezing and braying. A donkey being whipped as it struggled to pull a load uphill? Next came what sounded like the blood-curdling cries of a woman. Someone was being beaten. What was going on?

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Moff, Harry, Rupert, and Dwight sprinted up the road, crouching slightly in a protective posture. Roxanne, Wyatt, and Wendy followed. Adrenaline sharpened their eyesight, and heightened their hearing. They were on a mission.

“Come back!” Heidi shouted, a futile request.