Читать книгу The Luck of the Maya - Theodore Brazeau - Страница 10

CARLOS

We were running without lights, close to shore. Made me nervous, but I supposed the Capitán knew these waters. He seemed pretty good at this boat business. I saw a dim light flashing where I imagined the shore would be, and realized that behind me Capitán Sebastián had a five-cell flashlight and was signaling back.

We slowed to a stop, swaying in the swells with the exhaust gurgling. Eusebio and Humberto lowered a rubber boat, loaded our stuff into it, and we all tumbled down a rope ladder and got in. Humberto rowed and, with the waves helping, we were sliding up on the beach in a short time. A shape slipped out from the darker blackness of the trees. “Jaime,” Lucy said, and gave the shadow a quick hug. “¡Vengan! Come on!” the shadow said quietly but urgently. We followed blindly through the trees until we got to an unpaved road. There was a vehicle there, a Land Cruiser I thought, but couldn’t see it very well.

We all got in and Jaime started the quietest motor I’d ever heard, especially in rural México. No headlights, but the boy seemed to know what he was doing. After a few minutes I realized there was another vehicle behind us, also without lights. Lucy reassured me they were friends. More relatives, in fact. “They’re the ones I told you about,” she said, “Arnulfo and Arnoldo. My cousins. Good guys, you’ll meet them when we get there. They’re going with us into the Petén, and we’ll be glad they’re there.”

Why all the sneaky darkness stuff, I asked. We’re not even there yet. Are we hiding from the Runt and his friends? “Basically, yes,” she said, “and anyone else that might be interested. They’ll know about us eventually, of course, can’t be helped, but the later that happens, the better. Besides, if we find them first it gives us an edge and we need all the edges we can get.”

Our car lurched out of the trees onto a paved road, much easier going. Headlights on, we accelerated to highway speeds, as did our companions behind. The road was narrow but, at least, paved. After an hour or so we turned off to the west, still on pavement, and presently went through a little unlighted town without slowing down much. Jaime seemed to be a surprisingly good driver for a teenager. Maybe he was just on best behavior tonight. The ride became monotonous, the highway reasonably smooth with the occasional pothole to relieve the boredom. It would probably be pretty in the daylight with the tall trees all around.

“Do you have a novia yet?” Lucy was leaning forward, talking to Jaime.

“Well, yes,” he said, sounding embarrassed.

“Anyone I know?”

“Well, maybe. She is María Elena Santamaría y Camacho from over in Chetumal. Her father is Jorge Santamaría.”

“¡Oooy Sí!” Lucy said in that tone women use when anything to do with love and romance is happening. “I know her! She’s that pretty little girl with the big brown eyes! I haven’t seen her for ages. She’s all grown up! I’ll bet she’s even prettier now ¿verdad?”

“Well, uh, yes, I guess so.”

“You guess so! Don’t you know?”

“Well…umm…yes, she is. She’s kind of wonderful,” Jaime was forced to admit. We couldn’t see him, but I’m sure he was blushing up a storm.

“When is the big day? I want to be there!”

“Well, uh, we don’t know yet, but you are invited. We’ll let you know.”

Lucy leaned back and whispered to Jeb, and me “Nothing bad is going to happen to this boy. Are we agreed?” We were agreed. We always agree with Lucy anyway, but this was a no-brainer.

After a while, I nodded off, which was just as well. I would need the sleep.

Some bumps and scrapes woke me after a couple of hours. We had turned off the nice smooth highway. No more nodding off. Where are we? I asked Lucy. “Pretty much the middle of nowhere,” she assured me, “somewhere around Xpujil, if that will pinpoint it for you, but we aren’t going there. It’s good that we have four-wheel drive. We’ll need it from now on. Better if we had eight or ten wheel drive.”

We sped along at four or five miles an hour on a dirt road until after midnight and then seemed to run out of road entirely. We slowed to a crawl. Walking would be faster and in fact we did get out from time to time, mainly to help by pushing. Occasionally we were stuck in holes too big to four-wheel out of, even with our pushing. Luckily the vehicles were equipped with winches and the terrain equipped with numerous sturdy trees so it wasn’t really a problem, just slow.

We were again without headlights, but the parking lights and the moon were good enough for traveling at this speed. The land was rather flat here, which was a help—at least we wouldn’t be falling off any mountains. The underlying rock seemed to be limestone. When it was bare of vegetation it was sometimes almost like pavement.

About mid morning we came to a stop in what I thought at first was just a clearing. In fact, it was a clearing, but it also was a sort of village or settlement. Six or eight thatched houses stood around at random under the trees. I learned later there were more back in the jungle.

“Here we are,” Lucy said. “Welcome to Los Muertos, Vacationland of The Petén.” Is there a bed anywhere? I asked, never mind vacations. “Come on,” she said, “siesta time. We’ve got a couple of hours, then we load up and we’re out of here. From now on we’ve got to keep moving.” Isn’t that what we have been doing all along? I thought.

LUCY

We sat forever in that bouncing car. It was actually a relief when we had to get out and push, we weren’t going any faster than a walk anyway. Finally we arrived at Los Muertos.

“Are there any hammocks?” I asked no one in particular. I looked around. I’d never been here before, but I’d been in places like it. Not bad, but not much to do. Fortunately, I had no intention of doing anything but sleeping.

Just then the Notario, don Emilio, came out of one of the huts. I was surprised to see him, and a little paranoid after our recent experiences.

We exchanged the usual pleasantries and don Emilio was off on his horse headed for other business, as he said.

I had nothing against don Emilio. He’d always been pleasant to me, but somehow I didn’t totally trust him. His being here right now was probably coincidence, I knew he did travel this area, but it made me nervous.

I sighed. I had another chore to perform. I wanted Jaime out of this. It was too dangerous and he was too sweet a kid. And too young a kid. I couldn’t imagine myself explaining some disaster to María Elena, not to mention my aunt and uncle and even my own parents and grandmother. Or to myself.

CARLOS

Before we could find a good place to collapse, a man emerged from the nearest hut. He was medium height, middle aged, and unusually dressed for that part of the world in a brownish gray suit, a buttoned white shirt but no tie, and sporting a wide brimmed straw hat, Lucy seemed surprised and said, “Don Emilio, how good to see you.”

“Lucy! What a surprise! As beautiful as always,” replied don Emilio. “And who have we here? A novio at last?”

“¿Quién sabe?” said Lucy, “don Emilio please meet my friend Carlos Montoya y Garza.” Well, I thought, rather surprised at her answer. ‘Who knows’ is better than ‘Hell No’. Con mucho gusto, I said to don Emilio. We shook hands. I had no idea she knew my full name, any of my full names.

“Encantado,” he said with a wide smile that didn’t seem to quite make it to his eyes. “Any friend of Lucy’s is a friend of mine.”

Don Emilio maintained the smile for a few minutes of chitchat. Lucy told him we were going on to visit her family in Chetumal and might see him there.

Don Emilio hoped so.“Well, as you can see,” he said, “ my horse is saddled. I’m on my way to El Naranjo, then Las Paredes for some business in both places, land problems and perhaps something about goats. I don’t like to sleep in the woods and it’s dangerous to travel after dark, so I better be on my way. It was good to see you, Lucy, and a pleasure to meet you, Señor. ¡Que les vaya bien!” He mounted up, turned to wave and disappeared down a trail I hadn’t even noticed, the hat on his head and a shotgun hooked on the back of his saddle.

No sleeping in the woods? Dangerous after dark? I would definitely keep that in mind.

Lucy was looking thoughtfully after him, a hint of her funny smile on her face.

Tell me, I said. “I’ve known don Emilio all my life,” she replied slowly. “I don’t think of him as a bad man, but I do think he has his own interests, his own agenda, and that’s what he’ll follow. It bothers me that he is right here right now. Is it a coincidence, do you think? Probably. He is a Notario and does travel through here a couple of times a year. I don’t want to be paranoid.” Yes, you do, I said, let’s keep it in mind.

We joined Jeb in a rather roomy hut with several hammocks of various sizes hanging from the wall posts. Jeb was already comfortable in a matrimonio, a double sized hammock. Lucy and I each arranged one of the same. It had been a while since I’d done time in a hammock, but it is by far the best way to sleep in the tropics. Comfortable and relatively cool. I lay down kitty corners on it, which put me level, and was asleep before I could start worrying. A few hours snooze in a comfy hammock was more than welcome after that bumpy all night ride. I had napped, but not restfully.

LUCY

I finally got some welcome hammock time, but got up earlier than I wanted to. I had that chore to do.

I sat down and wrote a letter to Mama. I wrote in Mayan, but, since Jaime knew the language, too, that was not a big help in keeping it confidential.

“Mamatzil,” I wrote. “Jaime is taking this letter to you for me. I want him to come by to check on you while we are in the forest on our mission. He is to help make sure everyone is safe.”

“I have told him the bad guys might look for me there, and this may be true. This will be a very dangerous time in the forest for someone like Jaime (not for me, so don’t worry) and I want him there with you. And with María Elena.”

I continued with promises of visiting soon and with news from Laura and Tío Sebi, and signed off with love for all.

I sealed the letter tightly in an envelope addressed to my mother. I knew Jaime wouldn’t peek, he was not the kind of person who would.

I gave the letter to him and entrusted him with the task of getting it to my mother. Too important to mail, I told him. Besides, there was no place to mail it anywhere around here.

“But I am supposed to go with you, with Arnulfo and everyone,” Jaime said, shocked that he was losing out on his big adventure. I was sad to disappoint him. I knew it meant a lot to him, but this was way better than losing him.

“I know,” I said, “and we’ll miss you. But this is very important. You have to help keep my mother and father safe. I’m counting on you. This is an important part of the operation. My brothers will help, but they’ll be working all day. You will be the Security Agent.”

Jaime was looking very unhappy. He seemed on the verge of tears.

“María Elena is in Chetumal, isn’t she?” I asked, playing my trump card.

He admitted she was, and seemed to feel a little better, even produced a little smile. His world hadn’t totally collapsed.

CARLOS

The next thing we knew, Arnulfo was shaking our hammocks and shouting something about the horses being here. I was reluctant to move at all, much less get out of this wonderfully comfortable hammock. I’m sure Jeb was thinking the same thoughts, but Lucy was already up and bustling around. With a fair amount of groaning and griping Jeb and I rolled out of the hammocks and, from some gourdes hanging from the ceiling, splashed some water on our faces to wake up and then slouched on out to face what was left of the day.

It was mid to late afternoon and, as advertised, the horses were there, along with assorted mules, people and equipment. Arnulfo and Arnoldo were loading stuff on the mules, helped by a very capable looking couple that were introduced to Jeb and me as man and wife, Lalo and Licha Hernández. Lucy explained that their families had lived for generations, mostly from hunting, in the areas we were entering and that they traveled them all the time and knew the terrain better than anyone, except maybe Arnulfo. I felt better having them along.

Lucy strode purposefully over to where Jaime was helping load a mule with the things we had brought with us. “Jaime,” she said, “I have a very important job that I want to entrust to you. I want you to take this envelope to Chetumal, to my mother. This is not something that can wait.”

“But I am to go with you, with you and Arnulfo and the guys,” Jaime said, shocked.

“I know that was the plan,” Lucy replied, “and we will miss you, but this is way more important. And I want you to stay there for now. We have reason to believe that there are some bad people who might try to harm my mother and father to get to me. You know what they did to Gonzalo. I want you there to keep an eye on them and an eye out for any kind of trouble. You will have to be very brave. You will be the Security Agent.”

Jaime looked stricken with disappointment. His first big adventure was dissolving before his eyes. He couldn’t very well say no when it was put to him that way but he sure didn’t want to say yes.

“And María Elena is in Chetumal, isn’t she?” Lucy smiled “That will make it a little better, won’t it? Maybe more than a little?”

Jaime had to admit to that, and produced a little smile.

Is there any truth to any of that? I asked Lucy later. Or are you playing protective aunt and amateur cupid? “Cállate,” she suggested, “be quiet. And stay that way.” I didn’t say another word.