‘The Healer’
Author: J.F. Simpson
Published by John F. Simpson at Smashwords
Copyright © 2001 by John F. Simpson
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the author.
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and events are a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events or locales is a matter of entire coincidence'
Cover design by Alex M. Sanchez
ISBN: 978-0-9737706-4-3
For my brother who told me about the eternal journey.
“No one knows the journey until they have taken it.”
Salomõn Sanchez Perez—the Healer
'The Healer'
Chapter 1
Neither the hierarchy of the Catholic church nor the Colegio de Medicos y Cirujanos nor the government of this tiny Central American republic believe that a man by the name of Salomõn Sanchez Perez, who has the shape of a well fed truck driver and the finesse of a cowboy, can have the same divine healing power as the Master teacher, Jesus, had.
With the evidence they have collected they are going to put a stop to the hundreds of patients seeking him out every day. Right now they are plotting to put him in jail—for ten years at least, until public enthusiasm has waned.
Billy Freeser is waiting for him in the shade of a palm tree. He watches Perez cross the open plaza with a small band of neighbors trailing after him. Suddenly he stops, turns around, throws out his arms, palms up, and tries to shoo them away like he would his dog.“Hey? Hey?”
They laugh.
He shakes his beefy head and carries on with the slightest turn of a smile.
They follow.
Even for Billy Freeser it is hard to believe this awkward looking man can do the things reported in the American Journal of Medical Science. He notices Perez is wearing his strawberry red baseball cap and that his shiny blue polyester pants are again sliding below his avocado shaped torso. There is a bounce to his walk that keeps his hand busy at the pocket of his blue cotton shirt to protect the cheap plastic ball point pens from falling out. It seems to him that Perez is no less uncomfortable under the hot sun in his heavy clothes than the people following him wearing tank tops and shorts.
Some say that Salomõn Sanchez Perez dresses different because he doesn’t know what is normal.
Everyone in the pueblo of Purescal knows he has changed since the accident. People were killed. He was found not guilty, even though they all agreed he drove the mountain roads as if he was in a race.
In a pueblo of three thousand, everyone's life is an open book for their neighbors to read. Everyone, except for Salomõn’s. Something very strange happened to him which neither he, nor his wife, nor their five children, ever talk about.
After the accident, he went away for two years, came back, then went again. He did this for twenty years. Where he went, he never said. He sent money to his family, but it was only enough to buy rice and beans and inexpensive chicken. If there was any money left over he had his wife put it towards the electric and water bills. The vegetables came from the garden he had put in behind the house. Sometimes he would leave one or two sacks of harina to make tortillas. Each time he returned he spent more and more time alone, walking in the mountains, kneeling in the cathedral. He didn't have the look of a pious man or someone doing penance. He just seemed mysterious, as if he was exploring his soul.
His departures and arrivals went on for the best part of twenty years, until one day he arrived home on his forty-fifth birthday and never left. But he was not the same Salomõn Sanchez Perez who had grown up in Purescal.
Today he still has his risqué sense of humor and ready smile, but somehow his explosive temper and big ambitions and mood swings disappeared into the ether. No one asks where they went. A lot of people were whispering he suffered a nervous breakdown; others say he joined a monastery. There isn’t a person in the pueblo who hasn’t noticed a change in him. He still enjoys football but his obsessive passion for it is gone. The biggest change in him, everyone agrees (next to whatever he is doing at the abandoned cantina) is his attitude; nothing seems to disturb him.
God knows he has enough problems.
Salomõn knows people are talking about him. Whenever someone is bold enough to ask how he has been getting on, he says, “Take a look—haven’t missed a meal in twenty years.”
It isn’t the changes that have taken place within Sal that make him the most talked about citizen in Purescal; it’s what he is doing at the abandoned cantina that has caught their interest. No one believes he can do what is reported in the weekly newspaper. Nor do they pay any attention to Monsignor Fernando’s exhortation not to mix with him. What they believe is this: he has a knack for business; even as a teenager. The local football lottery, the second hand bicycle shop, the used clothing store and taxi and pulperia, were once his. He has ideas. True, most of his enterprises ended in failure, but it wasn’t his ideas that were at fault, it was him. He gave credit to whoever asked for it. At the end of the day he had given his business away.
It's different this time and everyone knows it. They'd have to be blind not to see the taxis and cars and chartered buses rolling into town filled with pilgrims from the cities of the central valley and even from countries far beyond their own. They come, day after day. Multitudes line up in front of the old cantina waiting for Salomõn to perform his magic.
Most people in town laugh behind closed doors at the naiveté of the strangers. Who, they ask, would cross the street to ask Sally to perform a miracle? But what a gift from God, they say, that all these people are converging on their pueblo. Business has never been better. Everyone is making money.
Everyone is making money, except Perez. He still has his piddling security job at the Water Works office. He works there from 6 am to 11am. From noon to late in the night he attends to the infirm at the cantina. He’s the kind of person, his neighbors like to think, that doesn’t need sleep.
Today is the second meeting between Salomõn Sanchez Perez and Billy Freeser. Yesterday, Billy was in the cantina most of the afternoon watching. Salomõn had been so busy he hadn’t time to say more than this: “First you should observe and then we will meet on the plaza at twelve o`clock tomorrow.”
“Yes, first I would like to observe.”
He calls for his first patient to come forward but before the patient arrives; Salomõn says to him, “Did you know I am a product of Immaculate Conception?”
Billy Freeser doesn’t wince; instead he nods his head and with his large brown eyes open, watches. For the first time, here they are, shaking hands.
The two men stand under the palm tree, turn their backs to the eaves-droppers and talk in whispered tones, or at least Billy does. Sal has a strong voice; it isn’t shrill, it’s booming. Ever since his return, he’s more introspective, less verbose, but still talks loud. Some people think his volume switch is broken.
Their conversation does not flow easily as neither can speak the other’s language with clarity. But there is enough Spanish and English mixed together for the rat pack, standing a few feet away, to piece together the ideas they are trying to convey.
Billy is whispering this: “What do I call you? Sal, Salomõn, Sally?”
“You can if you want. It’s my name.”
“Different, isn’t it?”
“I’ve gotten used to it. My brother’s name is Socrates. I think my papa was looking for wisdom in the wrong place.”
Billy looks down at his dusty tennis shoes and chuckles. After a moment he says, I think I can help you with your problem.”
Salomõn tips back slightly to look up into his face. He wonders if his color isn’t a permanent shade of red just beneath his sunburn. It’s a face well lived in, even projects a certain amount of inner harmony despite the wrinkles around the eyes and what appears to be a broken nose. After a moment he turns his gaze beyond the other man to the green mountains looming in the background. “So you know about the problem,” he says, his thoughts somewhere else.
“I read about them in the report.”
“Is that why you are here?” He searches his eyes; they are large, deep brown and secretive.
Billy thinks of all the answers he can give. He feels a hot flush in his cheeks. “Not exactly.”
The healer looks up at the soaring frigate birds, suspended, floating on mountain air currents, their split tail moving up and down and sideways the way a tightrope walker uses his pole for balance, their heads turned down, observing them. He waits for the other man to elaborate.
“I thought maybe I could help you with your problem.” He knows why he came to find Salomõn but is feeling insecure and confused about his reason.
“What makes you think I need your help?”
“I think that if—umm, the facts were to get out—well, in the early days I did what they call investigative journalism. I mean, I have contacts with television networks in North America.” He fumbles about in his mind, searching for a point of entry to his story. “It’s my opinion that those opposing you might change their attitude if it became an international story.”
“You came here for that?” He sounds disappointed, almost like he wants to go to sleep.
“No.”
“So then it was by chance—?”
“I don’t believe anything happens by chance.” Billy fingers the pack of cigarettes in his pocket which he is tempted to take out even though he knows that smoking is one of the things that Sal has a bad attitude towards.
“Then what?” Without moving his head, Salomõn has shifted his gaze to meet his eyes.
“Maybe, maybe you are the person destined to be my teacher.”
He turns away. “I have nothing to teach. You need look to someone else for that.”
“Then I suppose providence, serendipity, whatever.” He wants to keep his reasons private. “Does it matter?”
You don’t know?”
“I promised a friend.”
Sal nods his head and waits for Billy to elaborate. The North American looks away . They stand in silence until Perez says, “So you have another reason?”
“I told her I would come and see if what they say about you is true. Maybe you can help.”
“Where is your friend?”
“It's not for her—it's for her friend.”
“You are losing me, Senor.”
“She has this friend, you see, and now she has no time for—life. Her time is consumed with this guy—a wealthy guy who has been ready for God knows how long to die. She says it's a contract she made with God and the guy has nothing to do with it. But he's not dying.”
Salomõn gives no indication he is interested in the story. Indeed, he is having a hard time remembering the plot. He asks: “So, she told you to come here?”
“No—well, it was sort of my idea. But now I would like to help you.” It is not lost on Billy that Perez has a tenacious character.
“You want to help me and you want me to help you. Is that right?”
“Sure.”
“It cannot be done.”
“Why?”
“Because you have not spoken the truth.”
Before Billy can object, Sal silences him with the slightest motion of his hand.
“So what is the truth? It is this: do you really want this man to live?”
That little smile that had turned on Salomõn's face when he was crossing the plaza is there again. His question takes Billy's breath away. He searches inside himself, shifts uncomfortably from one foot to the other. He gazes off into space as a glut of questions cross his mind. Pushing his fingers through his long graying hair he brings his attention back to Perez and says: “I love this woman very much.”
It sounds like he is apologizing for his feelings.
“Yes, I would like to see him die.” He looks Perez directly in the eyes. “Or at least get better.”
“Finish or get off the pot.” Salomõn's subtle smile is now an open grin. “Is that what you mean?”
“I guess so.”
“And you're experiencing jealousy?”
“I suppose. I don't like it though. I thought I had seen through that stuff years ago.”
“You cannot rush through uncharted waters.”
Billy has a smile on his face; it is a relief to admit what he has been covering up to himself. He is sick of hearing a chorus of praise from his friends about what a wonderful thing Luz is doing. A Mother Teresa! He agrees with them but in his heart he feels different. What he feels is quite black. He has doubts, serious doubts. He cannot help wondering about the purity of her motives. No one would criticize him if he said his thoughts out loud, but he never utters them; he wants to be above judgment and condemnation; maybe others assume he is, but in his heart he knows he is not. He cannot dismiss his suspicions; is Luz doing this only for the guy's money? Yes, she is always befriending someone, but this case is different. He is her ex lover and he has money, and he probably still loves her because most men do, and because of this, Billy cannot hold back the wave of black thoughts that fill him with doubt. It is not in his character to be so open, yet he feels no pain in admitting to Perez what he had kept secret for so long.
“Yes, that's the name of it,” he says, nodding his head, “jealousy, attachment. I guess l love her too much.”
“Of course you know,” says Salomõn, grinning, “that it is as dangerous to your health to love too much, as it is to hate too much.”
Billy shrugs. “I know that.”
Perez's dark round eyes are brilliant with life as he stares into Freeser's sunburned face. “We all know that—don't we? What does it say in the Book? 'Stop putting your faith in man whose breath is in his nostrils—he can't be accountable for anything.' It's the spirit of man that we have to look to.”
Billy turns away to hide his inner struggle. With his gaze averted he says, almost with a look of pain, “Appearances can be a tough nut to crack.”
“Tough? They can be a bitch!” Salomõn leans even closer. “It's one thing to memorize a truth; it's another to discern it.”
When he talks, he likes to touch. No one is surprised when he reaches up and puts his thick stubby hand on Freeser’s bony shoulder like a survivor pulling his shipwrecked friend onto his raft. Billy is surprised. He has cultivated the habit of keeping a distance between himself and others; it is his defense against getting too involved. On this occasion his defenses are down.
“Never met anyone who said it was easy,” says Billy with his crooked smile. He is being careful to keep his voice low so the others can't hear. They both know how people love to jump in and squabble whenever there is a conversation about the principles of life.
“Well, don't waste your time trying to walk on water,” Sally laughs. Billy laughs. It is infectious. Those standing around straining to hear their conversation start to laugh. Salomõn glances over at them and shakes his arms.
“Hey?” he shouts at them. “That's the truth about truth.”
The eaves-droppers clap their hands in gratitude that he is acknowledging them. Sal dismisses them with a grandiose shrug. He has no opinion about this tall North American who calls himself, Billy Freeser. If he has been sent to help with the problem, then so be it. What he is certain of is this: he has not arrived by accident. As he starts to turn away he notices the pilgrims assembling in front of the old cantina on the north side of the plaza. He frowns. When it comes to his work, he presents another face, one that is serious, committed, that has no time for intrigue.
Perez knows that his eaves-dropping neighbors are only interested in his comings and goings in order to get an inside tip on how to do business with the tourists. They have no interest in what he is doing, other than to make themselves money. Whenever an outsider visits him they follow to hear if there is going to be problems; they worry about investing too heavily in the tourist business. He loves them enough, but when he has patients to care for, he wishes they would attend to their own affairs. They are like a pack of dogs waiting for him to throw them a bone.
The neighbors prefer to laugh with, Don Salomõn, rather than at him. They have grown up with his humor. How are they supposed to take serious a man whom they remember as a happy kid who loved to imitate famous singers? Some people thought he might have had a future as a professional soccer player when he was young, but the old men in town, who really know the game, said that his frame was all wrong—too stocky, too short, too prone to the inevitable pear shape of his father. They were right.
They knew him when he was a good bicycle mechanic, before he opened his losing bar and restaurant with his thief of a cousin.
How can they take him serious when most of them don't know for certain if he is doing what the priest at the cathedral says he is doing? They have their own doctors. They trust them. Their doctors have university degrees hanging on their office walls. How are they supposed to take Sal serious? They went to school with him. Everybody knows the family. Besides, the priest has forbade them to visit the cantina. No one in town, other than the friends of Monsignor Fernando, want to see his new enterprise fail, but what are they to think when he never tells them what is going on? And now that he is in demand, he has no time to visit the bar for a beer, which could loosen his tongue.
His more enterprising neighbors shun the idea of following him. They go directly to his house under the guise of a friendly coffee visit with his wife, Maria. But they soon tire of that when Maria tells them she has neither time for coffee nor interest in her husband's affairs.
“I don't know what he does over there,” Maria tells them. “All know is that it has caused us nothing but problems. He's gone all the time, we don't have any money, other than the little we can save from his stealing cousin's hand at the restaurant, and the piddling salary he gets from the Water Works. With five children, who has time to sit down and have a cup of coffee?”
Most of the residents of Purescal have decided to keep their investment in the tourist business at a minimum, considering the unstable situation. Last year, when some of them overheard him talking about a team of doctors arriving from North America to investigate his work, they moved their children to grandparents, cleaned the rooms of their houses and entered the bed and breakfast business. But even fewer were prepared to take a risk like the Delgado family, who traveled by bus to Guatemala to buy a thousand towels and T-shirts to sell to the pilgrims. The neighbors said they were crazy: waited for them to fall on their face. Within three weeks they sold everything. There are people who are jealous, maybe even envious, but aside from that, they admit that opportunities are still there; nothing big, mind you, but one can still make a dollar. Nevertheless, until the authorities are finished investigating Sally's business, most of them have decided to hold on to their jobs picking coffee beans.
While Perez tries to estimate the number of people waiting for him, Billy toys with the cigarette package in his pocket. It was not his intention to move in the direction events are steering him. He thought he would stay the night and leave the following day. Now he is filled with uncertainty. It feels like he is being propelled by a strong current to God knows where. He is tempted to light up a cigarette but suspects it is an inappropriate time. He fingers the packet to relieve the urge while the other man's attention is diverted. He is uncomfortably aware of the people in front of the cantina watching them, waiting for him to release the source of their hope. When Perez finally turns to face him, Billy empties his pockets of his hands and points over at the line of people.
“What about them? Don't you love too much?”
“I want nothing from them. I don't own what comes through me, it's a gift.”
“Well, of course I don't have your gift,” says Billy, uncertain as to how he can describe it, even after watching Salomõn work.
“Everyone has a gift to offer,” says Sal with his big smile. “You are a writer. You too must have a unique gift to offer.”
“Not anymore,” Billy interrupts with a mumble.
“Not what?”
“Not anymore a writer.”
Sal throws his big hands into the air with a look of disgust. “What's this? A man learns to drive a truck, later on he decides to grow oranges, is he supposed to believe he doesn't know how to drive a truck?” His dark eyes are chastising and impatient. “What you are aware of is always there; it cannot be taken away. It's part of your consciousness. Would you not agree?”
Tall, skinny Billy Freeser, with his pony-tail hair, stirs uncomfortably under the other man's forceful gaze. The palms of his hands have started to sweat like they used to when he did on-camera appearances. They called it stress. He does not want to think about writing another book, or another movie. No one is interested in what he has to say. What the world wants is more of what it is already getting. He responds with his characteristic shrug.
Sal raises his black eyebrows with a smile. He is not particularly interested in soliciting a response; in his own heart there is only one answer. He takes off his strawberry colored baseball cap and wipes the sweat from his forehead. The people gathering in front of the old cantina occupy his thoughts. There is a look of impatience on his face when he estimates the crowd to be in the vicinity of one hundred or more. He sweeps his gaze around the plaza; past the teenage lovers, the young children playing soccer with an empty plastic coke bottle, beyond the drunk sleeping on the pigeon's favorite park bench, turning a complete arc until he spots his assistant, Hector. He is with the eaves-droppers.
“Hector!” Perez calls out sharply. “Why aren't you organizing the patients?”
“You didn't tell me.”
“How could I tell you when I didn't know where you were?”
“I was here.”
“I didn't see you.”
“You looked right at me.”
“I don't always see what I'm looking at.”
“I smiled at you. Didn't you see me smile at you?”
Salomõn heaves a sigh. “Hector— please.”
“Si, Senor. Right away.” The young man with the handsome face starts across the plaza towards the waiting patients when he abruptly stops. He turns around and comes back. “I will need one of your pens.” He holds out his hand.
Sal reluctantly takes one of the cheap pens from his shirt pocket. “Try to remember to return this. You lose them all the time. They cost me money.”
Hector smiles. He takes the pen and runs across the plaza.
Billy feels a tinge of selfishness for occupying Perez's time while so many others are waiting for his attention. He immediately starts to apologize but Sal will not hear it.
“No problem.”
“Then maybe after dinner we can get together,” suggests Billy.
“We have to,” says Sally, grabbing Billy's soft fingers in his calloused hand and shaking them vigorously. “How long are you going to stay?”
“I don't know,” says Billy, consciously aware of the other man's strong grip. “I guess I'll leave when it's time.”
Salomõn smiles as he pats him on the shoulder with his free hand. “'Would you like to come and observe again?”
“I was hoping you would ask,” Billy says, making the slightest gesture to liberate his hand. “You have many people waiting. I don't want to keep you.”
“No problem.”
“I have a copy of Dr. Mustard's report. I thought I would go and study it.”
Perez increases his grip. “It's not me they are going to hurt, you understand. It's those people over there.”
“That's why I want to help.”
“Don't expect a defense from me,” declares Sal. “I did that once. Now I go about my work like I am deaf. I don't hear their threats.”
“I think they're feeling slighted.” Billy has, what some people say, a disturbing habit of seeing humor where others see nothing. “Don't you think it would help if you could get Monsignor—what's-his-name?”
“Fernando.”
“Yes. If you could get Monsignor Fernando to read what Dr. Mustard has to say about—”
“I am not interested in trying to change Fernando's mind. I am not interested in changing anyone's mind. I am doing what I have to do and he is doing what his church tells him to do.” Salomõn Sanchez Perez is irritated. He bites down on his lip for a moment. “It is very difficult to pry open a closed door.”
“That has always been the trouble with organized religion.” Billy turns and spits on the ground like the locals do. “They think they have knowledge but their beliefs are no more than coalesced opinions.”
“What do I know?” says Salomõn, trying to separate himself from the controversy. “I am a simple man with little education.”
“What about the other priests?”
“Hah! Their righteousness has blinded them. God resides only in their church. They think anything outside is witchcraft or satanic.”
“Maybe I should talk with the Monsignor,” suggests Billy.
“Do what you are led to do.”
“Don't know if it will help, but I would like to try.” Billy liberates his hand from the sweaty vice-like grip.
“Gracious,” says Sally with a childlike smile. “Who knows the mind of Life? I suspect you are here for a different reason than what you think.”
Billy responds with his noncommittal shrug; it is a gesture he often hides behind when he knows he is as far from knowing as he is from home.
“If you are hungry or maybe like a cold beer, the best restaurant is over there, on the corner.”
Salomõn is pointing at an intersection just east of the plaza. It is the very same restaurant where Billy left his friend.
“My cousin is one of the partners. But a word of advice—be sure to count your change.”
Chapter 2
The rust colored Volkswagen camper that brought him to Purescal is parked in front of the Soda Palace Restaurant. As he approaches, he can hear Gunther’s laughter pouring onto the sidewalk. He stops next to the open window, lifts his sunglasses, and peeks in.
Gunther is sitting in the far corner with his back towards him. He is leaning across the table holding a young girl's hand. Even with her excessive makeup, Billy estimates her to be no more than fifteen years old. There are four or five empty beer bottles in front of them and two small plastic plates with untouched bocas. The place is empty other than for the man at the front counter. He is working shredding cabbage. A white apron covers his huge stomach. Behind him is a hot grill, next to that a stainless steel deep fryer that is sending up vapors of grease to bond the dust to the sagging plywood ceiling. There is no music, only the loud suggestive voice of Gunther bouncing off the cement walls, followed by the girl's bird-like giggling. Someone intends to rearrange the stacked tables when they return for the mop and bucket they abandoned in the center of the immense red tile floor. Billy does not need to go inside to feel the confusion of the room; it drifts through the window.
He turns away, leans against the wall, and concentrates on suppressing his desire to escape. The first time he met Gunther was at a bar in the capital, a few months ago. The bar was open to the street; one could rest with a beer and watch the sea of humanity pushing and shoving against one another, like so many opposing currents in a river. Gunther had stepped out of the crowd, looking like 'Our Man in Havana,' in his whites and wire rim glasses, and immediately drew him into conversation.
Billy Freeser does not easily strike up conversations with strangers. Perhaps it is part of his culture because it is so damn cold in Canada. He tells people he has been too busy warming his hands with his mouth to talk. Tourists from the United States are different. He wonders if they aren't all employed as greeters with Wal-Mart stores. Bold, confident people. And so are the German tourists flooding into Central America; at least those who speak English. Gunther, with his blue eyes and receding blonde hair, is one of them. Of course the Latinos, whose country they are in, love to talk—to anyone—which they believe is their reason for being.
Gunther attached himself to Billy Freeser like a pit bull holding onto a postman's leg. He believed Gunther would drift away when he realized they had nothing in common. However, a few months have not been long enough for him to get the message, or possibly he has heard the message, and that is why he is staying. Whatever it is, he hung around, insisting he drive him to the mountains. Billy accepted his offer as providence; he does that with all things that enter into his experience. He doesn't try to analyze them, whether they are good or bad, although it did occur to him that Gunther might be there to assist him with his interviews since he is fluent in Spanish.
Billy hasn't bothered to tell him about Salomõn Sanchez Perez or the reason for his mission, nor does he need to. Gunther has no interest. He is focused. His interest is women. His preoccupation and anticipation is centered on women. His conversation from the moment they left the Central Valley has been about women. He is obsessed with his penis. He has talked nonstop how he is going to use it on the women in the pueblo they are visiting.
They have been together for two days and during that time, Waldo Emerson, has been whispering into Billy Freeser's ear: “What you are—thunders so, that I cannot hear what you say.”
Gunther has been thundering like a bass drum.
Now, particularly now, Billy needs time alone to absorb the conversation he has had with the healer. He pushes his sun glasses down over his eyes and walks quickly to the far side of the street, turns the corner, and keeps going.
There is no need for him to reread Dr. Mustard's report; he studied it for days before deciding to come and see for himself. The twenty page document details how Dr. Mustard and his five investigators carried out on-site observations, pre-testing and post-testing of patients, filmed documentary of Perez's procedures, copies of his incredible prescriptions, and their consultations with physicians who first diagnosed the patients. It also includes a summary of the opposition against him. If there is something phony about the work of Mr. Perez, it definitely has gone unnoticed by the experienced eyes of Dr. Mustard and his team. Now, Billy is also a witness to the indescribable work of Don Salomõn. He, like Dr. Mustard and his group, is at loss to provide a scientific explanation. But unlike Dr. Mustard, it is not a difficult leap for him to accept the mystical principles involved.
As Billy moves farther and farther away from the restaurant, his thoughts try to deceive him. They say this: delay your departure; investigate Mr. Perez; maybe his work is not altruistic; maybe he is amassing a private fortune; maybe it's a sham; does he really cure the sick and the maim? These thoughts cause him to blush with shame because he knows that buried beneath them is an ugly truth. It is this: he doesn't really want Luz's rich friend to be cured; what he actually wants to happen is this: for him to die. These are prickly truths for him to face; they make him feel uncomfortable. So, he coats his thoughts with this: he is probably so close to death that Salomõn Sanchez Perez's gift cannot help. Perhaps it is already too late.
He hopes.
The asphalt road he starts out on becomes gravel one block beyond the main street. He is walking it without awareness. Garbled thoughts pass through his mind like wind through a tree. Finally he stops and looks around; he is deep in the country, on a mountain road that divides a huge coffee plantation. The road has a five foot embankment on either side that has been cut out of the reddish-brown clay. Flowering coffee plants fill the air with a rich smell of sweet perfume. Billy jumps the open drainage ditch, climbs the embankment, and sits on the edge.
Mountains roll in front of him like granite surf. Below and above him, infinite rows of dark green coffee plants gift wrap the earth. Towards the horizon, barren pastures are dotted with cattle that appear to be defying gravity as they munch their way up the bald slopes. Zopilotes soar on the hot air currents over the valleys with barely a flutter of their wings, half heartedly searching for carrion.
He loves this land more than the country of his birth. Most people close to him, in the other life he lived in the north, are convinced he landed in Central America by accident. They are waiting for him to wake up and return home. He didn't plan on living here. He thought he would live out his life on the west coast. He liked it there. But after he sold all his possessions his life began to take another course. When he boarded the airplane he was not following a plan but a vague intuition. He thought his trip would be for one or two weeks. He had no reason to go—it was just a feeling, something he should do. He didn't think he would be here for three years; never thought he would meet someone like Luz. Never dreamed of being involved in so many lives. Nor had he thought he could walk away from his career—children, friends, country.
He saw his life becoming more like a movie; actors were appearing on his stage in a drama he hadn't written. He didn't know if this meant he was becoming more in touch with reality or more out of touch. His actions were not atypical, as the American tourist he had met on a bus insisted they were. He wasn't escaping the pain of his divorce; he had passed that water shed seven years previous to his yard sale. He wasn't running away from anyone or anything, he was merely starting over from point ‘a’ like he had when he was nineteen—thirty-one years ago. He wanted to see what adventures life would draw to him for his last dance on this plane.
If he is experiencing regret, it is knowing that he never produced anything of consequence. Somewhere along the way he lost his motivation—was it when he had seen the futility of it all? With nothing but empty time on his hands he would retreat to his bed. He would tell himself it was to cut down on the ungodly part of himself, but in fact it was to avoid the boredom of his existence. The most difficult part of his journey into the unknown has been his fears. Fear of no longer having a permanent place to lay his head, nor partner, nor income; the humility of doing nothing, of being neither a professional nor laborer, the empty hours of loneliness. He remembers how hard it has been to wrestle through those long periods of loneliness. How strange it is, after all those painful days and nights, that now he regularly needs to escape from others to taste the peacefulness of being alone.
These and other thoughts pass through his mind as he looks out at the slopes of the mountains which have fallen under a shroud of light and darkness like a chiaroscuro painting. One of the few things he dislikes about living so close to the equator is the predictability of the sun's departure at six every evening.
He climbs down the embankment, brushes the clay from the seat of his shorts, puts his sunglasses away in his shirt pocket and starts back towards town. He remembers his appointment. Is he to meet Sal before, or after supper? Whenever it is, he wants to be on time. He hurries his pace. There is still an hour or so of daylight.
As he approaches the intersection, where the road he has been walking on crosses the main street, he sees the flashing red and blue lights of a police vehicle. It is a pickup and it's parked on the sidewalk, in front of the restaurant. He runs across the street. The Volkswagen van has not been moved. He elbows his way into the crowd of spectators blocking the doorway to the restaurant. Taller than the others, he has a clear view inside. He shudders in disbelief. Two policemen are standing in front of Gunther while a third is locking his wrists in handcuffs. He pushes through the crowd and hurries towards him.
“What happened?” He realizes his voice is louder than necessary. The policemen look him over with stern dark eyes.
Gunther looks up with an unconvincing smile. “And how has your day been?” His ruddy complexion is pale; his white shirt wrinkled and damp with sweat.
“What is going on?”
“Ask the Nazis,” says Gunther, hissing at the policemen. Billy motions for him to be calm.
“They want to put me in jail.”
“You only make things worse if you insult them.”
“The bastards are trying to shake me down.”
Gunther is too distraught to make sense. Billy directs his conversation to the sergeant who hasn't taken his eyes from him since he entered the room. The sergeant stands as high as Billy's chin. He has greased black hair, streaked with gray. He moves amongst his men like a general, careful not to crease his immaculate pressed khaki uniform that has the blue and white shoulder badge of the Rural Guard.
“Señor—” Billy starts to say.
“Is he your friend?” the sergeant interrupts in passable English.
“We're traveling together.”
“Are you in the same business as him?”
“I don't know—what business is he in?”
The sergeant looks over at Gunther and shouts at him. “Senor, what business are you here for?”
Gunther laughs at him. “You are an arse hole.”
“Maybe you will think different when I take you to our Nazi leader, eh?”
“Excuse me,” says Billy, breaking the combatant stares between the sergeant and Gunther, “I would like to know what my friend did. Why is he in handcuffs?”
“He is under arrest,” the sergeant huffs in a voice meant to show he has the authority. He motions to the two policemen to take Gunther to their waiting truck.
Before they can move, Billy intervenes. “Just a minute. Hold on. Hold on. You need to explain a few things before you take him anywhere.”
The sergeant's black eyes flare like they are about to explode. He sticks his thumbs under his gun belt and glares up at Billy. “I need to tell you nothing, Senor. Unless, of course, you are in the same business as him.”
“What the hell business are you talking about?”
“He says I was selling dope.” Gunther sneers. “It's a setup.”
Billy turns to the sergeant. “Do you have evidence?”
The sergeant nods his head. “We have a case. The judge will decide on the evidence.”
“I'll find a lawyer,” Billy says to Gunther. “I have a friend who lives here, Salomõn Perez. He will vouch we are not here to sell drugs.”
The sergeant speaks rapidly in Spanish to the other officers. They look at Billy and laugh. He says: “You are correct. Mr. Perez can indeed put you in touch with a lawyer—perhaps his own. In a few days he is going to be in desperate need of one.”
Billy is thinking about sending someone to fetch Sal, but before he can put his thoughts into action the policemen are leading their suspect out of the restaurant. Gunther is shouting at Billy. “Call my embassy. Tell them a German citizen has been falsely arrested by the local Gestapo.”
Billy shrugs in frustration. “I'll try.”
“No. No. You must call them—now.” The policemen are pushing Gunther through the crowd of gawkers blocking the doorway. “These thugs have taken my passport and that is against international-.” His voice is muffled by the slamming of car doors.
To Billy's surprise the sergeant has returned, after following his men half way to the door, and is now standing in front of him.
“Senor—” says the sergeant, with the inviting smile of a prostitute, “this business can be corrected very easy.”
“How is that?” asks Billy, offering the sergeant a cigarette. The policeman looks at the gift and shakes his head disdainfully.
“No. No,” he says, raising his open hands. “Those are very bad for you. They will kill you.”
Billy heaves an impatient sigh. He doesn't care if the man takes one or not but why do all of them refuse with so much self righteousness, so much fear? Don't most of them carry around enough weighty concerns to violate them for eternity? In comparison to their inner turbulence the cigarette pales in potency. “Besides your fear of cigarettes what else—”
“Do not take it lightly. I have seen my uncle die of cancer from smoking. It is not very nice.”
“I suppose.”
“Today, intelligent people in my country and your country do not smoke.”
“I suppose.”
“It is very bad for you. It is very bad for my asthma.”
“You have asthma?”
“Normally I do not allow people to smoke around me. It affects my breathing.”
“You have trouble breathing?”
“And the smell is terrible.”
Billy bends down slightly and sniffs the air above him. “I understand why you use a strong cologne.”
“Educated people do not smoke. Myself, I neither smoke nor drink.”
“No excuses?”
“For what?”
“Your life.”
“What do you mean?”
“No—it's not important. We need to talk about—”
“Yes, it is important! What do you mean?” demands the Sergeant.
“I mean, should you get sick, you can't say it was because you smoked, or if you were to get into an accident, it wasn't because you drank. Obviously because you consider those two substances as having a great deal of power, you avoid them. Now you can't excuse what befalls you because of them. Now you have no choice but to accept responsibility for your life.”
“I find you foreigners frustrating! Do you think I should be responsible for an accident or if I was to be struck down with cholera?”
“Then why don't you worry about them?”
“I do! Of course I do.”
“Then you must be very tense.”
“Yes, sometimes I am very tense. I have many things to worry about—my family, my parents, my health—financial things. Do you think they pay me much for this work?”
“I don't know. But that is not what we were talking about.”
The sergeant relaxes a little, pats Billy on the arm and smiles his smile. “Yes, I was telling you how we can correct this problem.”
“You didn't say how.”
“Our laws are complex, Senor. Perhaps if your friend saw his way to remit a reasonable multa, we could—”
“Multa? You mean a fine?”
“Yes. Yes. In English, yes. You need pay. It's what you call a fine for when you contravene the law and then everything is—okay.”
Billy starts to smile. “Sergeant, I understand your meaning. But didn't you say the judge has to hear the evidence first?”
The sergeant steps back with an indignant look. His nostrils flare. “That is exactly what I said. The law is very strict on this matter. It is the only course this case can take.”
“Well, then,” says Billy, offering him his hand, “any misunderstanding will be corrected when the judge hears the case. Thank you for your help.”
The sergeant ignores the proffered hand as his stern black gaze bores into Billy Freeser's sunburned face. “If you wish to talk to your friend you may visit him at the central police station.”
“When?”
“Pronto. Maybe in two hours.”