Thompson, Hunter S (8 page)

One Saturday in late March, when the tourist season was almost over and the merchants
were bracing themselves for the muggy low-profit summer, Sala had an assignment to go down
to Fajardo, on the eastern tip of the island, and take some pictures of a new hotel that
was going up on a hill overlooking the harbor. Lotterman thought the
News
could strike a cheerful note by pointing out that things were going to be even better next
season.

I decided to go along for the ride. Ever since I'd come to San Juan I'd been meaning to
get out on the island, but without a car it was impossible. My furthest penetration had
been to Yeamon's, about twenty miles out, and Fajardo was twice as far in the same
direction. We decided to get some rum and stop by his place on the way back, hoping to
get there just as he paddled in from the reef with a bulging sack of lobsters. “He's
probably damn good at it by now,” I said. “God knows what he's living on -- they must have
a steady diet of lobster and chicken.”

“Hell,” Sala remarked, “chicken's expensive.”

I laughed. “Not out there. He shoots them with a speargun.”

“God almighty!” Sala exclaimed. “That's voodoo country -- they'll murder him, sure as
hell!”

I shrugged. I'd assumed from the very beginning that Yeamon would sooner or later be
killed -- by somebody or some faceless mob, for some reason or other, it seemed
inevitable. There was a time I had been the same way. I wanted it all and I wanted it fast
and no obstacle was big enough to put me off. Since then I had learned that some things
were bigger than they looked from a distance, and now I was not so sure anymore just what
I was going to get or even what I deserved. I was not proud of what I had learned but I
never doubted it was worth knowing. Yeamon would either learn the same things, or he would
certainly be croaked.

This is what I told myself on those hot afternoons in San Juan when I was thirty years
old and my shirt stuck damply to my back and I felt myself on that big and lonely hump,
with my hardnose years behind me and all the rest downhill. They were eerie days, and my
fatalistic view of Yeamon was not so much conviction as necessity, because if I granted
him even the slightest optimism I would have to admit a lot of unhappy things about myself.

We came to Fajardo after an hour's drive in the hot sun and immediately stopped for a
drink at the first bar. Then we drove up a hill on the outskirts of town, where Sala
puttered around for almost an hour, setting up his camera angles. He was a grudging
perfectionist, no matter how much contempt he had for his assignment. As “the only pro on
the island,” he felt he had a certain reputation to uphold.

When he finished we bought two bottles of rum and a bag of ice. Then we drove back to the
turnoff that would take us to Yeamon's beach house. The road was paved all the way to the
River at Lolza, where two natives operated a ferry. They charged us a dollar for the car,
then poled us across to the other side, not saying a word the whole time. I felt like a
pilgrim crossing the Ganges, standing there in the sun beside the car and staring down at
the water while the ferrymen leaned on their poles and shoved us toward the palm grove on
the other side. We bumped against the dock and they secured the barge to an upright log
while Sala drove the car to solid ground.

We still had five miles of sand road before we got to Yeamon's place. Sala cursed the
whole way, swearing he would turn back except that he'd be hit for another dollar to go
back across the river. The little car thumped and bounced on the ruts and I thought it
would come to pieces at any moment. Once we passed a pack of naked children stoning a dog
beside the road. Sala stopped and took several pictures.

“Jesus,” he muttered, “look at those vicious little bastards! We'll be lucky to get out
of here alive.”

When we finally got to Yeamon's we found him on the patio, wearing the same filthy black
trunks and building a bookshelf out of driftwood. The place looked better now; part of the
patio was covered with an awning made of palm fronds, and beneath it were two canvas deck
chairs that looked like they belonged in one of the better beach clubs.

“Man,” I said, “where did you get
those?”

“Gypsies,” he replied. “Five dollars apiece. I think they stole 'em in town.”

“Where's Chenault?” Sala asked.

He pointed down at the beach. “Probably sunning herself down by that log. She puts on a
show for the natives -- they love her.”

Sala brought the rum and the bag of ice from the car. Yeamon chuckled happily and poured
the ice in a tub beside the door. “Thanks,” he said. “This poverty is driving me nuts --
we can't even afford ice.”

“Man,” I said. “You've bottomed out. You've got to get some work.”

He laughed and filled three glasses with ice. “I'm still after Lotterman,” he said. “It
looks like I might get my money.”

Just then Chenault came up from the beach, wearing the same white bikini and carrying a
big beach towel. She smiled at Yeamon: “They came again. I heard them talking.”

“Goddamnit,” Yeamon snapped. “Why do you keep going down there? What the hell is wrong
with you?”

She smiled and sat down on the towel. “It's my favorite place. Why should I leave just
because of them?”

Yeamon turned to me. “She goes down to the beach and takes off her clothes -- the natives
hide back in the palms and watch her.”

“Not always,” Chenault said quickly. “Usually it's just on weekends.”

Yeamon leaned forward and shouted at her. “Well goddamn you! Don't go down there anymore!
From now on you stay up here if you want to lie around naked! I'll be goddamned if I'll
spend all my time worrying about you getting raped.” He shook his head with disgust. “One
of these days they'll get you and if you keep on teasing the poor bastards I'll damn well
let them have you!”

She stared down at the concrete. I felt sorry for her and stood up to make her a drink.
When I handed it to her she looked up gratefully and took a long swallow.

“Drink up,” said Yeamon. “We'll invite some of your friends and have a real party!” Then
he fell back in the chair. “Ah, the good life,” he muttered.

We sat there drinking for a while, Chenault saying nothing, Yeamon doing most of the
talking, and finally he got up and picked a coconut off the sand beside the patio. “Come
on,” he said, “let's have a little football.”

I was glad for anything that would clear the air, so I put down my drink and ran
awkwardly out for a pass. He spiraled it perfectly, but it smacked my fingers like lead
and I dropped it.

“Let's get down on the beach,” he called. “Plenty of room to run.”

I nodded and waved to Sala. He shook his head. “Go play,” he muttered. “Me and Chenault
have serious things to discuss.”

Chenault smiled halfheartedly and waved us down to the beach. “Go on,” she said.

I slid down the bluff to the hard-packed sand on the beach. Yeamon threw up his arm and
ran at an angle toward the surf. I tossed the nut high and long, watching it fall just
beyond him in the water and make a quick splash. He fell on it and went under, bringing it
up in his hands.

I turned and sprinted away, watching it float down at me out of the hot blue sky. It hurt
my hands again, but this time I hung on. It was a good feeling to snag a long pass, even
if it was a coconut. My hands grew red and tender, but it was a good clean feeling and I
didn't mind. We ran short, over-the-middle passes and long floaters down the sidelines,
and after a while I couldn't help but think we were engaged in some kind of holy ritual,
the reenactment of all our young Saturdays -- expatriated now, lost and cut off from those
games and those drunken stadiums, beyond the noise and blind to the false color of those
happy spectacles -- after years of jeering at football and all that football means, here I
was on an empty Caribbean beach, running these silly pass patterns with all the zeal of a
regular sandlot fanatic.

As we raced back and forth, falling and plunging in the surf, I recalled my Saturdays at
Vanderbilt and the precision beauty of a Georgia Tech backfield, pushing us back and back
with that awful belly series, a lean figure in a gold jersey, slashing over a hole that
should never have been there, now loose on the crisp grass of our secondary and an unholy
shout from the stands across the way; and finally to bring the bastard down, escape those
blockers coming at you like cannonballs, then line up again and face that terrible
machinery. It was a torturous thing, but beautiful in its way; here were men who would
never again function or even understand how they were supposed to function as well as
they did today. They were dolts and thugs for the most part, huge pieces of meat, trained
to a fine edge -- but somehow they mastered those complex plays and patterns, and in rare
moments they were artists.

Finally I got too tired to run anymore and we went back up to the patio, where Sala and
Chenault were still talking. They both seemed a little drunk, and after a few minutes of
conversation I realized that Chenault was fairly out of her head. She kept chuckling to
herself and mocking Yeamon's southern accent.

We drank for another hour or so, laughing indulgently at Chenault and watching the sun
slant off toward Jamaica and the Gulf of Mexico. It's still light in Mexico City, I
thought. I had never been there and suddenly I was overcome by a tremendous curiosity
about the place. Several hours of rum, combined with my mounting distaste for Puerto Rico,
had me right on the verge of going into town, packing my clothes, and leaving on the first
westbound plane. Why not? I thought. I hadn't cashed this week's paycheck yet; a few
hundred in the bank, nothing to tie me down -- why not, indeed? It was bound to be better
than this place, where my only foothold was a cheap job that looked ready to collapse.

I turned to Sala. “How much is it from here to Mexico City?”

He shrugged and sipped his drink. “Too much,” he replied. “Why? Are you moving on?”

I nodded. “I'm pondering it.”

Chenault looked up at me, her face serious for a change. “You'd love Mexico City, Paul.”

“What the hell do you know about it?” Yeamon snapped.

She glared up at him, then took a long drink from her glass.

“That's it,” he said. “Keep sucking it down -- you're not drunk enough yet.”

“Shut up!” she screamed, jumping to her feet. “Leave me alone, you goddamn pompous fool!”

His arm shot out so quickly that I barely saw the movement; there was the sound of a
smack as the back of his hand hit her cheek. It was almost a casual gesture, no anger, no
effort, and by the time I realized what had happened he was leaning back in the chair
again, watching impassively as she staggered back a few feet and burst into tears. No one
spoke for a moment, then Yeamon told her to go inside. “Go on,” he snapped. “Go to bed.”

She stopped crying and took her hand away from her cheek. “Damn you,” she sobbed.

“Get in there,” he said.

She glared at him a moment longer, then turned and went inside. We could hear the squeak
of springs as she fell on the bed, then the sobbing continued.

Yeamon stood up. “Well,” he said quietly, “sorry to subject you people to that sort of
thing.” He nodded thoughtfully, glancing at the hut. “I think I'll go into town with you
-- anything happening tonight?”

Sala shrugged. I could tell he was upset. “Nothing,” he said. “All I want is food,
anyway.”

Yeamon turned toward the door. “Hang on,” he said. “I'll get dressed.”

After he went inside, Sala turned to me and shook his head sadly. “He treats her like a
slave,” he whispered. “She'll crack up pretty soon.”

I stared out to sea, watching the sun disappear.

We could hear him moving around inside, but there was no talk. When he came out he was
dressed in his tan suit, with a tie flung loosely around his neck. He pulled the door shut
and locked it from the outside. “Keep her from wandering around,” he explained. “She'll
probably pass out pretty soon, anyway.”

There was a sudden burst of sobbing from inside the hut. Yeamon gave a hopeless shrug
and tossed his coat in Sala's car. “I'll take the scooter,” he said, “so I won't have to
stay in town.”

We backed out to the road and let him go ahead. His scooter looked like one of those
things they used to parachute behind the lines in World War Two -- a skeleton chassis,
showing signs of a red paint job far gone with rust, and beneath the seat was a little
engine that made a sound like a Gatling gun. There was no muffler and the tires were
completely bald.

We followed him along the road, nearly hitting him several times when he slid in the
sand. He set a fast pace and we were hard pressed to keep up without tearing the car to
pieces. As we passed the native shacks little children came running out to the road to
wave to us. Yeamon waved back, grinning broadly and giving a tall, straight-armed salute
as he sped along, trailing a cloud of dust and noise.

We stopped where the paved road began, and Yeamon suggested we go to a place just a mile
or so further on. “Pretty good food and cheap drink,” he said, “and, besides, they'll give
me credit.”

We followed him down the road until we came to a sign that said CASA CABRONES. An arrow
pointed to a dirt road that branched off toward the beach. It went through a grove of
palms and ended in a small parking lot, next to a ratty restaurant with tables on the
patio and a jukebox beside the bar. Except for the palms and the Puerto Rican clientele,
it reminded me of a third-rate tavern in the American Midwest. A string of blue bulbs hung
from two poles on either side of the patio, and every thirty seconds or so the sky above
us was sliced by a yellow beam from the airport tower, no more than a mile away.

As we sat down and ordered our drinks I realized we were the only gringos in the place.
The others were locals. They made a great deal of noise, singing and shouting with the
jukebox, but they all seemed tired and depressed. It was not the rhythmic sadness of
Mexican music, but the howling emptiness of a sound I have never heard anywhere but in
Puerto Rico -- a combination of groaning and whining, backed up by a dreary thumping and
the sound of voices bogged down in despair.