The Scared Stiff

25

So once again, in the semicool of the evening, I stretched out naked on my futon. I’m too tired to sleep, I thought, especially after doing nothing all day. So I’ll just lie here and...

“Get out! Get out!”

It was a shrill whisper, full of panic and urgency. I sat up, completely bewildered. No idea where I was, what was going on. Stupidly, I said, “What?”

“Get out get out get out!”

Voices, male voices, nearby. The futon, the glassless window, the darkness, Luz’s panic-stricken voice, thumps of boots on the front room floor.

The cousins! I was naked, in the dark, I couldn’t remember what I’d done with my pants, where’s anything, what can I do?

Still seated on the futon, I grabbed the windowsill, pulled myself up, put a leg over the sill, and my terrified toes found a tiny ridge along the outside, the same height as the floor within. The floor was the platform the house was built on, and the platform extended less than an inch beyond the rear wall.

My toes clung to that slender line, as I turned my back to the window and put the other leg over. Now I had about six toes on the narrow band of wood, and one arm around the window frame, pressed to the wall.

Light came from the other side of the doorway, turning the scarlet curtain into dark blood, a scab, a wound. The cousins were in there, in the bedroom. If they opened that curtain—

The window was very near the corner of the house. Even if I could move sideways, there wasn’t room enough to hide between the window and the end of the wall. And in the other direction, toward the lavatorio, there was nothing to hold on to at all.

I hated this, but what could I do? I grabbed the windowsill with both hands and lowered myself. One foot reached down and down, the toes of the other turned prehensile against that sliver of platform.

It was no good. Nothing but air, nothing to hold onto. I had to let the other foot slide down off that ridge while I gripped the windowsill, so I hung there with my feet straight down. Water tugged at my ankles, warmish water, from right to left.

Above me, light increased; the curtain was open. I let go of the windowsill.

Chest-deep water, tugging at me, wanting me to go leftward with it, wanting to take me along for a ride, past the fertilizer factory, past San Cristobal, on past Rancio into Venezuela, on to introduce me to its big brother the Orinoco, who would coast me on his broad shoulders all the way to the delta and out to the North Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf of Paria, and the narrow passage by Trinidad called the Serpent’s Mouth.

No, thank you, I’m already in the serpent’s mouth.

I reached in front of me and touched the slimy post holding up the house. It was an unshaped log, with the bark gone, and it was as slippery as a fish. Still, I rested my palm against it, tried not to think about the soft squishiness around my toes, the mud or worse on which I stood, in which I stood, and tried instead to concentrate on what was happening above my head.

Dim light was at the window up there, which meant the curtain was still drawn back and I was seeing illumination from the bedroom. Somebody was looking into the back room and not seeing anybody.

What now? Would he come in the rest of the way, light the kerosene lantern, look around, find my Rolex? Find my passport, my driver’s license, my clothing, my suitcase?

No. The light dimmed. It was a person he was looking for, not a Rolex. In what dim light he had to work with, he’d seen there was no person in that room, and that’s all he wanted to know.

Plainly I could hear their boots, above me, scuffing around in the bedroom. Indistinctly I could hear the voices, Luz trying to be outraged but merely being scared, the male voices gruff and discontented.

Splash-sssssshhhhhhhhhh... Oh, for God’s sake, one of them’s using the lavatorio!

I couldn’t stand being here, in this piss-warm water, while piss splashed down twelve feet away: downstream, thank God, but still. What if somebody in the house just over here to my right decided to get rid of tonight’s beer? Or tacos?

Where I stood was not completely inky black. There was starlight, and it reflected off the water, and I could make out the post in front of me and the building above me and the other houses up and down the row. And I could see a support board attached to the post in front of me at an angle just above the water-line, then up at a diagonal to the end of a floor beam halfway between here and the bank. Moving my feet with great reluctance, I got around to that support board and used it to pull myself along the side of the house.

The water got quickly shallower, so that it was only to the top of my thighs when I reached the other end of the board, and I was pressing my hand to the rough plank siding of the house instead. Ahead of me was land, and up beyond that point was the side window to the front room. Light gleamed from there, a searchlight band of it that I didn’t dare walk through. Of course, it wasn’t as bright as a searchlight, it was merely the rosy glow from Luz’s pink-shaded living room lamp, but it would show movement.

Where were they? The sounds of voices, it seemed to me, still came from the bedroom. They weren’t going to have sex with her, were they? They were all cousins. On the other hand, these guys struck me as the kind who’d go to family reunions to pick up girls.

I couldn’t go past the window, but maybe I could get close enough to peek inside, if I stayed out of the band of light. I moved forward, the water now to my ankles, the mud under my feet firmer, the slope steeper. I came up to land, very steep and stony, pulled myself along the side of the house, and here was the window. I chanced a peek inside, and the room was empty.

The voices seemed different now, Luz less scared, the males less belligerent. Everybody was still talking, but it seemed to be merely a general discussion at this point, without suspicion in it. Talking about me? Where I might be, probably.

Out here, wet and naked.

The quality of the light changed in there, and I had just realized that must mean the bedroom doorway curtain had been pulled back when into my line of vision stepped a Mexican bandit. It’s true he didn’t wear a sombrero or a bandoleer, but he did have the slouching walk and the walrus mustache and he did carry — oh, Lord! — a machete.

I pressed myself against the wall of the house. He turned, almost facing me, and spoke, and two more of them entered the picture. So that was Luis with the bad arm: ugly son of a bitch.

Next Luz came into view, smiling nervously, wearing a great white cotton sack of a nightgown she must own for hospital stays and visits to grandma’s house; I couldn’t believe that was how she normally spent her nights.

Did I hear her use the word cerveza? If she was being a hostess now, asking them to stay, it was a perfect way to remind them they had to go; they had miles to travel, podner, and an ornery in-law to kill.

Yes. That was the way it was working; they were all trending toward the door. Six of them in all, and there’s poco Pedro; I could probably take him if he weren’t carrying that machete. Three of them held machetes; the other three apparently would prefer to rip me apart with their bare hands.

Out the door they went, still taking their time, Luz wishing them luck in their quest, assuring them there was no problem in their having showed up so unexpectedly, drop in any time, bring your machetes, come by when you can stay longer, give my love to the dogs and the chickens back at the hacienda.... Would they never leave?

Yes. There they go, poco Pedro last. Luz stood in the doorway for more farewells, these hushed for the sake of the neighbors. I crept forward, trying to duck under the light from the window, and saw their pickup truck, big and dirty and saggy. They came into sight one at a time, moseying toward their truck just as though it actually was a passel of ponies. They climbed aboard, three inside the cab and three in the open back. It wasn’t as dramatic as a posse on a passel of ponies, but it would do.

I was so absorbed in watching them, I almost forgot to duck out of sight of the headlights. The truck faced the house, which meant it faced me. But then the starter ground and ground, and I suddenly realized what was going to happen next, and I moved back and downslope along the side of the house as far as the window. I looked in there, and Luz still stood in the open doorway, smiling, waving bye-bye, until she was suddenly flooded with glary light. Then she slammed the door and turned, and her expression had switched to great worry.

I wanted to speak, but the truck was slowly backing off, headlight beams spraying everywhere, and I didn’t dare move. Luz hurried away, toward the rear of the house, no doubt looking for me, and the truck at last completed its turning retreat. It stopped, then moved forward, engine rasping, and limped away toward San Cristobal.

Now I hurried around to the front and in. I shut the door behind me just at the instant Luz came rushing back through the doorway from the bedroom, still looking deeply worried until she saw me, then becoming joyously relieved. “Felicio! You’re okay!”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve been in the river. I’ve probably got most of the world’s tropical diseases by now.”

“Oh, we gotta get you washed,” she said. “C’mere.”

I followed her to the sink, where she pulled out a gleaming metal contraption and attached it to the faucet, saying, “Here. This’s how you get clean.”

Ah. It was a telephone shower, a shower head attached to a flexible metal hose. I took it, and she said, “There’s the soap. Get the water hot like you want it. I’ll do your back.”

I said, “Luz, I’ll get the whole house wet.”

She pointed down and said, “You stand there.”

I looked and there was a metal grid, about two feet by three, in the floor in front of the sink. “That’s terrific,” I said. “What’ll they think of next?”

I ran warm water over my chest and arms. Some splashed on the floor, but most of it ran down me and through the grid.

Luz said, “I’ll do your back.”

“Okay.” I gave her the shower head and started to soap my front. She ran water over my back, and all at once I saw the situation I was in: wet and naked, being washed by Luz Garrigues. Then, to make matters worse, I immediately produced physical evidence of my awareness.

“Okay, here’s the water,” she said, coming around front. “Gimme the soap, I’ll do your back.” Then she did her loose smile and said, “Well. You are glad to see me.”

“Warm water,” I said. “It’s a well-known turn-on.”

“Uh-huh.” She took the soap, went around behind me, and soaped me very well indeed, while I tried to think about other things. Any other things.

Even those guys. I said, “Why did they come here, anyway? Did they think I was here?”

“They don’t know what they think, those bums,” she said in disgust. “A couple of them — I think Manfredo, maybe not — they said I give you a warning so you could run away. They argue, did I do it, did I not do it. Then I was dancin’ with somebody tonight nobody knows. Somebody got on the phone, called Manfredo or somebody, ask about this guy. So they come down, look around, just in case you’re here.”

“Somebody called your cousins about me?”

“They wanna know who you are. Nosy people. So they call a cousin of mine: Who’s this guy stayin’ with Luz? So that’s why they come down. I say you ain’t stayin’ with me, you’re a truck driver work for the factory, you off on your run.”

“Jesus, that was close.”

“I pray to Jesus, too, lemme tell you,” she said. “Those guys can get mean. Especially that poco Pedro, he’s a mean guy even when he ain’t drunk.”

“Luz, tomorrow, from the factory, could you call Arturo? Tell him to come down here. Don’t say why, just tell him come down, it’s important.”

“Sure, in the morning. Okay, you’re done. Here’s the water.”

I kept my back to her. “Thanks, Luz, I’ll just rinse the rest, you know, myself.”

“I seen those before,” she told me. “I’m goin’ to bed, I’m tired.”

“Thanks,” I said. “For... you know, for everything.”

“Sure. Goo’night.”

What with one thing and another, it took me a long while to get back to sleep.