Читать книгу Treasures of the Heart - Carol W. Hazelwood - Страница 5

It had all happened too fast. When school let out for the summer, Beth flew to Mexico City. After going through customs, Beth found everything muddled as people pushed, shoved, and greeted each other in chattering Spanish. She understood only a smattering of words. At least she could read the signs pointing the way to the street. The people reminded her of geese swarming onto a lake, and she was caught in the middle. She searched the crowd for Doctora Lucia Delgado, her mother’s long time college roommate and Beth’s godmother. At last she heard a familiar voice.

“Beth. Beth Sorenson, over here.”

There was Lucia, smiling broadly and waving her arms over the head of the woman in front of her. Beth hurried forward to be greeted by a loving embrace.

“Hola, my chiquita. Welcome to Mexico.” Lucia’s black eyes flashed with love and joy. “Come along.” Lucia grabbed Beth’s shoulder bag and let Beth wheel her heavier suitcase.

In a whirlwind of greetings, well wishes, and small talk, they bustled off to the parking area. Astonishment spread across Beth’s face when they stopped next to a beat up green pickup truck. The frame perched higher above the chassis than a normal truck. It was so unlike the Lucia that Beth knew. Even now in the summer afternoon heat, Lucia’s maroon business suit was impeccable, her black high heels spotless, and her short dark hair glistened with a gold barrette. Beth, who had worn jeans on the plane, felt raunchy next to her.

Lucia opened the tailgate to the camper shell and tossed Beth’s shoulder bag inside and motioned Beth to put her suitcase in the back. After settling in the truck’s cab, Lucia hesitated, leaned against her door, and took stock of Beth.

“You’ve gotten prettier since I last saw you, more of a woman, more like your mother.” She patted Beth’s hand as she said this. “I’m delighted your parents had enough sense to send you to me.”

“Do you know why?”

“Why?”

“Why they sent me here?” Beth studied Lucia’s face. “They’re mad at me, and I think they’re having marriage troubles and wanted me out of the way.”

“That’s news to me.” The truck’s engine rumbled as Lucia turned the key. “Elaine sounded happy over the phone, and Paul has always been the quiet Nordic brooding type. There was no hint of anything amiss. The felt you needed a change of scenery and a good dose of Mexican happiness. Sometimes our imagination begins when we don’t understand something.”

“What don’t I understand?” Beth asked.

“That only you can say.” Lucia maneuvered the truck out onto Avenida Rio Churubusco.

“Is this truck yours?” Beth asked, changing the subject.

“Surprised? I need it for my trips to the various archeological digs. I’m off to a dig this weekend, so you’ll get a full lesson on what life’s like in the jungle. You’re dressed for rugged work, I see.”

“Yeah, but I hadn’t figured on the jungle. Are we going through downtown Mexico City now?”

“Madre de Dios. Not if I can help it. I take the bus or a peso cab when I go into town. I live in Colonia San Angel near the University.”

Lucia’s short arms and heavy torso seemed to encircle the steering wheel. Beth grinned at the picture she made, then she looked out the window. It was all so unbelievable to be here. Only a few hours ago she’d said good-bye to her parents at the Los Angeles airport. “What time is it?”

“Thirteen fifteen. You’ll get used to the twenty-four hour clock system here. We’re on what you call Central Time, two hours later than Los Angeles. Perhaps you know that we have our main meal at midday and eat supper around twenty two hours. That’s ten o’clock in your time system. Rosario, my landlady, is having a barbecue for us. She’s a great cook, and I often buy meals from her, so I don’t have to prepare them myself.

“Tomorrow I must be at the University early, but later we’ll go into the city to meet a friend of mine, and I’ll take you on a short tour of the Museo Nacional De Anthropologia. What do you say to that?”

Beth shrugged. “Whatever you think.”

“Good. I think it best, because the following day we leave for the state of Guerrero and the Local Institute of Man in the town of San Jeronimo. That’s on the coast. There you’ll meet the other students who work and study in connection with the University in the fields of anthropology, paleontology or archeology. Also there’s a special site at San Jose de Concha where we’ll spend some time.”

“What’s the Institute of Man?”

“A small museum with a director who monitors the findings of the western cultures in the area.”

“Western cultures?”

“The term can be confusing. We use it to describe those subcultures that had villages that coexisted at the time of the Aztecs, but have many similarities to the earlier Olmecs. The locals find artifacts in the tropical forest and bring them to the Institute to sell or trade. The Director of the Institute keeps the artifacts and records where they were found.”

Lucia smiled at Beth’s blank look. “Don’t worry. You’ll learn all about this as well as improve your Spanish as if you were a sponge. By the time you go home the end of August, you won’t be the same person.”

“Hope my parents are like they used to be when I get back,” Beth said more to herself than to Lucia.

“Don’t fret, chiquita. You can’t influence their lives, so do the best with your own.”

Beth lapsed into silence and listened to Lucia’s running commentary about the countryside. Although Beth was excited to be in Mexico, she felt drained. Lucia turned off the main road and drove uphill on a cobblestone street. They emerged into an area with five story apartment houses covered with pink stucco. She parked in front of apartments with barred windows and bright colored tiles set along the base of the foundation. After hauling out her suitcases, Beth waited while Lucia unlocked a double steel door, then followed with her suitcase bumping as she trudged up a flight of tiled stairs behind Lucia. By the time she entered Lucia’s apartment, she was out of breath.

“It’s the altitude,” Lucia said, as she showed Beth around the small apartment.

It was neat, small and full of cheerful colors, just like Lucia. The tiny kitchen had a propane stove. Throw rugs covered the multicolored tile floor. A book case lined one wall of the living area, and doors opened onto a small balcony that had a view of the University and the city beyond. At least, that’s what Lucia said about the view. Thick smog screened the scenery.

“You’ll stay in my bedroom. I’ll use my office while you’re here.” Before Beth could argue, Lucia raised her hand. “No arguments, chiquita. This is the best solution. Sometimes I get up in the middle of the night to work. My brain does not always like to rest when my body does.”

Just as Lucia opened the doors to the balcony, large raindrops pummeled the tile. “Lovely, no? It will stop soon, and the air will be fresher. Las aguas, the summer rains. A little early. Next week is San Juan’s Day, the traditional beginning of las aguas.”

After Beth had settled in, and the rains had stopped, they went down to visit with Rosario, who was outside in the garden overseeing a steaming pit. She was well named; her hair was flaming red and, although it was cut short, it frizzed out in all directions. Rosario welcomed them with a cheerful flood of Spanish and pressed a lukewarm coke into Beth’s hand. Lucia cautioned Rosario to speak slower. Although interested in everything around her, Beth’s head throbbed from Rosario’s rapid Spanish.

“You’re pale and tired, Beth,” Lucia noted. “It’s from the trip and the altitude. You’ll feel better tomorrow. Today eat only a little bit. Rosario will understand. I should take my own advice.” She giggled like a young girl and patted the sides of her curvaceous hips.

“You’re beautiful.” Beth couldn’t imagine Lucia any other way. “You don’t have to worry.”

“For those words, you are my truest friend. No matter how much I muck around at digs, I cannot lose this baggage.” She glanced down at her rounded body.

In slower Spanish, Rosario told Lucia that she was too concerned with her looks. “Marcos likes you just as you are.”

Lucia blushed and turned toward Beth. “You’ll meet him tomorrow. Doctor Marcos Arillos Gonzales is an absent-minded veterinarian, who’s devoted to his patients. In return, all animals embrace him. He’s consumed by a dream of establishing an exotic animal park where inner city children can experience the wildlife of Mexico. I take only a little part of his heart when it’s not occupied with the thoughts of animals.”

Beth hoped Marcos wasn’t one of those people who believed wild animals belonged in cages. “I worked in a pet store at home.”

“Then you’ll be soul mates.”

Rosario fussed over Beth as though she were a long lost child and served the barbecued meal with a flourish, adding little plates of condiments on the side.

“What kind of meat is it?” Beth asked.

“Barbacoa,” Rosario said.

“I know, but what kind of barbacoa?”

Lucia noticed Rosario’s discomfort and intervened. “It’s goat’s meat, steamed and baked in an earth pit, but we don’t use the name goat in Spanish because it has become what you call in English a four letter word. A filthy word.”

“Cabrones?” Beth asked with a merry glint in her eyes. “It’s an eight letter word.” She’d learned about Spanish bad slang from her Mexican friends at school.

Rosario gasped. Lucia put a finger to her lips. “We just call it barbacoa. Enough said.”

After the midday meal, Rosario insisted upon showing off her rose garden. The red and scarlet blooms were as bright as the tile around the building. Despite her interest and Rosario’s enthusiasm, Beth’s eyelids sagged.

“We must call your parents,” Lucia said. “Then I will let you sleep.”

The only telephone in the apartment complex was in the landlady’s flat. Afterward, Beth wished she’d never made the phone call. Her father had left on another assignment, and her mother was home alone. She heard the strain in her mother’s voice even though she assured Beth everything was fine. Lucia got on the line and explained the plans for the following week. There would be little opportunity for another phone call from where they’d be staying.

The following morning dawned with the evening coolness giving way to the warmth of the summer sun. “We can’t dress like peasants when we visit the city.” Lucia said and insisted Beth wear a skirt and blouse and proper shoes, before she dragged a sleepy Beth off to the University.

When they arrived at the campus, Lucia introduced Beth to a homely, serious, girl. Consuelo Payon, one of Lucia’s students, was to show Beth around the area. The girl’s English was perfect, but once she realized Beth could manage in Spanish, she insisted they converse in that language. It soon became apparent to Beth that Consuelo wasn’t pleased with her assignment of guiding a Norteamericana through the labyrinth of the modern campus with its large and brilliant murals.

Whenever Beth asked a question in halting Spanish, Consuelo answered in slow flowing Spanish, but her broad, flat features remained etched in stone. When they stood in front of the central library, Beth gazed up at the giant stone mural in awe. “It’s incredible. All the murals are so massive and colorful.”

“They’re by Juan O’Gorman, an architect as well as an artist. The stadium mural we saw earlier was by Diego Rivera. Mexico has many great artists.”

“You know a lot about art,” Beth said, attempting to be friendly.

“Mexicans know a great deal about their culture. The United States changes history to suit itself, teaching only the negative things about Mexico. We, Mexicans, have much to be proud of.”

“History is not a subject you can fake.”

“You’re wrong!” The two girls stood toe to toe in front of the library. “You’re taught that Mexico started the war that won Texas and California from us,” Consuelo said. “Read more than your textbooks. You’ll see that it was your President Polk and the expansionists who wanted the war, so they could claim those territories for themselves.”

Consuelo’s vehemence stunned Beth and her cheeks flamed red. She was angry at Consuelo, for saying bad things about the United States and herself, for not knowing enough history to argue back. Since Beth was out of her depth, she said nothing but seethed about Consuelo’s game of one-upmanship.

Silence fell between them as Beth followed her guide’s broad swaying hips through the university’s botanical gardens. Only when Beth put forth a question or murmured in surprise or awe at a particular plant did Consuelo speak. They walked through two large greenhouses then out onto three acres of exterior planting. Beth perspired; her feet and her head ached. Consuelo, on the other hand, maintained an aloofness both from Beth and the heat.

Unable to withstand her guide’s behavior any longer, Beth stopped and, with arms akimbo, asked, “Am I taking you away from something you’d rather be doing?”

“Doctora Lucia asked me to show you around, and that is what I’m doing.”

“But you don’t like the job or me!”

“I have no feelings about you. You’re a mere Norteamericana.”

“Well, this ‘mere Norteamericana’ will continue the tour alone since you’re so unhappy about everything. Just show me how to get back to Lucia’s building.”

Consuelo stared at Beth, her black eyes buried beneath heavy eyebrows. “I don’t mean to be rued, but truthful. I am cautious. Your people view Mexico with disdain.”

“Not all Americans do.”

Consuelo shrugged. “My country’s history is tied to those who wish to dominate us. My lineage dates back to the pre-Columbian peoples.”

“Really? How do you know?”

“I know. That’s what’s important. Your country has not been kind to us. I’ve experienced your hospitality in the north. You do not like us if we are not beautiful. That’s what is important to you.”

“I’m sorry. Perhaps I can change your mind about us.”

Consuelo’s taught lips relaxed. “Perhaps.” She walked away, stopped, and looked back at Beth. “Are you hungry?”

“Very. And thirsty.”

“We can walk to a torta shop. Doctora Lucia sometimes forgets about eating. Not everyone is so engrossed in their work that they forget to eat.”

At the store Consuelo bought tortas, a hard roll filled with avocado, cheese, and ham. Beth accepted the lukewarm Coke with a shrug. Didn’t they believe in ice in this country? For fear of getting another lecture, Beth kept quiet about the ice. While they ate, Consuelo continued her lecture about Mexico’s history, while Beth kept thinking that what happened years ago wasn’t her fault.

When it was time to meet Lucia, Beth sighed with relief. She’d thought the morning would never end.

“We’ve got a ride into town,” Lucia said. “You’ll miss the bus ride.”

“What a shame.” Beth smiled for the first time since she’d been with Consuelo. Although Beth was wearing comfortable shoes, the hot weather and walking had made her feet swell, and she had a blister on her heel. At the moment the last thing she wanted to do was walk through a museum, but she had little choice. Lucia’s enthusiasm was boundless.

“How was the tour?” Lucia asked.

“Interesting.” Beth waited for Consuelo to add something. When she didn’t, Beth felt obliged to continue. “We had a snack.”

“Good. Glad you thought of that, Consuelo. Especially after I explained to Beth how we eat our main meal at midday.” Lucia smiled. “Pobrecita. You won’t believe anything I tell you anymore. It’s getting late. I want to show Beth some of the Museo Anthropologia before we meet Dr. Gonzales.” With Beth and Consuelo at her heels, Lucia walked to her friend’s car that waited to give them a ride into town. “We’ll see you at five-fifteen tomorrow, Consuelo.” Lucia noted Beth’s surprised expression. “Didn’t Consuelo tell you? She’s joining us on the dig this week. I thought you’d enjoy the companionship of another girl near your own age.”