aGood. So the rest of you go on. Iall see you in the morning. Milton, tell Rodrigo Iall be at the store by seven.a aMay I drive you somewhere?a Milton asked.
Dr. Swenson shook her head. aItas a perfectly good night. Iam sure we can manage a walk. Can you manage, Dr. Singh?a Marina, in her column of gray silk and her high heels, was not entirely sure she could manage, but she said that a walk would be good after sitting so long.
aWeall take Easter back to the apartment,a Barbara said. The child had begun to braid the section of her hair that he was holding on to.
Dr. Swenson shook her head. aHe hasnat eaten. Heall come with us. Put him down, Jackie, he isnat a monkey.a Jackie set Easter on the ground and the boy looked from one party to the other. In spite of not having heard he seemed to be in tacit agreement with the plans. aWeall see you later then,a Jackie said, finding the part in the boyas hair with his fingers and smoothing it down. Then, remembering what in fact was new, he held out his hand and Easter shook it goodbye. aBrilliant,a Jackie said.
The streets around the opera house were made of flat stones fitted together into an uneven jigsaw and Marina found herself wishing that Milton had come with them, if not to drive then at least to keep his hand under her arm. Marina was a very tall doctor who worked in a lab in Minnesota and those three things: the height, the work, and the state, precluded the wearing of heels, giving her little experience to draw from now that she needed it. She shifted her weight forward onto her toes and hoped not to wedge the heel of Barbaraas shoes into a crevice. Even as Marina slowed, Dr. Swenson kept to her own unwavering pace, a trudge of metronomic regularity that Marina remembered. In her khaki pants and rubber-soled shoes, she was quickly a block ahead without seeming to notice that she was alone. Easter stayed behind them both, perhaps to alert Dr. Swenson in the event that Marina went down. The crowd from the opera had dispersed and all that remained were the cityas regulars who stood on the street corners in the dark trying to decide whether or not to cross. They watched Marina as she pulled her borrowed shawl up over her shoulders.
aAre you coming, Dr. Singh?a Dr. Swenson called out. She had gone around a corner or stepped into a building. Her voice was part of the night. It came from nowhere.
Are you coming, Dr. Singh? She would dip so quickly into a patientas room that suddenly the residents would lose their bearings. Had she gone to the right or the left? Marina squinted down the street, the darkness broken apart by streetlights and headlights and bits of broken glass that showered the curb and reflected the light up. aIam coming,a she said. Her eyes shifted constantly from one side of the street to the other in a slow nystagmus. In order to steady herself, she made an organized list in her mind of all the things that were making her nervous: it was night, and she wasnat exactly sure where she was, though she could have easily turned around and found her way back to the opera house and from there, her hotel; she was unsteady in her shoes, which, along with the ridiculous dress, made her the human equivalent of a bird with a broken wing to any predator who might be out trawling the streets late at night; if there was a predator, she now had a deaf child to protect and she wasnat exactly sure how she would manage that; as she felt the blisters coming up beneath the sandalsa straps she could not help but think of the countless explorers throughout history who had been taken down by the lowly blister, then she reassured herself that there was very little chance that this was how she would meet her end given the three different types of antibiotics Mr. Fox had sent along with her Lariam and the phone; and since this was a list of anxieties, she could not neglect the most pressing fear of all: assuming she made it to her destination tonight, she was then to sit down with Dr. Swenson and have a discussion about what exactly? Vogelas rights and interests in Brazil? The location of Andersa body?
Then, without so much as a footfall to announce him, Easter came up from behind her and put himself in the lead. At first she thought he must be bored by how slow she was and figured he meant to leave her, but instead he aligned himself to her pace. He would have been in easy reach had she just put out her hand. He had made himself her seeing-eye boy. As she watched his back, his shoulders barely wide enough to hang a shirt on, half the anxieties on her list fell away. With one hand she held Mrs. Bovenderas wrap firmly to her chest while her other hand was full of the silk of her skirt which she held up in order not to trip on it or let it drag in the pools of muddied rain left over from the late afternoon deluge. The night air pressed against her, moving roughly in and out of her lungs. It was very recently that she had been ill. Despite the pins and the spray and the black lacquered sticks with the gold Chinese fans, she could feel random sections of her hair breaking free and sliding damply down the back of her neck. When they reached the corner, Easter turned right, and without question or thought, she followed him.
Two blocks later, at about the point she was certain she would not be able to take another step, Easter dipped into a restaurant Marina had never seen before, on a street she couldnat remember. He could not have seen Dr. Swenson go in but there she was, sitting at a table in the corner, a bottle of soda water in front of her that was already half consumed. If possible, the room was slightly darker than the night she had come in from and a small, single candle on every table stood in place of the stars. Half a dozen tables were occupied, a dozen more were empty. It was late. The boy, having completed his job, cut the shortest path between the other customers and sat in a wooden chair beside Dr. Swenson. Had she brought him in with her from the jungle or did Easter, along with Milton and the Bovenders, have his place on Vogelas payroll? Dr. Swenson tilted the bread basket towards him and he took a piece and laid it nicely on his plate. Marina tried not to limp as she made her way towards them. For a moment she stood at the table saying nothing, her resplendence melted in the heat, and waited for the other woman to acknowledge her arrival. She could have waited for the rest of her life. aI lost you,a Marina said finally.
aClearly you didnat,a Dr. Swenson said. aEaster knew where we were going.a aI didnat know that Easter had been informed.a Dr. Swenson was looking at the menu through a pair of half glasses. aIam sure you realized soon enough. This place is a bit farther but thatas why the opera crowd avoids it. I can always get a table.a Marina pulled out a chair beside Easter, across from Dr. Swenson, and felt a significant throbbing in her feet as the blood shifted back up her legs. She decided to be grateful for the chair and for the audience.
After taking in all the information the menu had to offer, Dr. Swenson laid it down. Now that she knew what she would have for dinner she was ready to begin. aAllow me to be direct, Dr. Singh,a she said, folding her glasses back into their padded case. aIt will save us both some time. You shouldnat have come. There must be a way of convincing Mr. Fox that continual monitoring does not speed productivity. Maybe that can be a project for you when you return home. You can tell him I am fine, and that it would better suit his own purposes to leave me alone.a A waiter approached the table and Dr. Swenson proceeded to order for herself and the child in broken Portuguese. When the waiter turned to Marina she asked for a glass of wine. Dr. Swenson added to the order and sent the waiter away.
aIam glad youare fine,a Marina said. aAnd youare right, Iave come to find out about the progress of the drugas development, thatas part of the reason Iam here. But I was a close friend of Dr. Eckmanas. I am a friend of his wifeas. Itas important for her to understand the circumstances of his death.a aHe died of a fever.a Marina nodded. aSo you wrote, but she would like to know more than that. It would help her to be able to explain to their children what happened.a Easter sat at the table without fidgeting, both of his feet on the floor or nearly on the floor. He tore neat pieces off his bread and ate them slowly. He did not seem to be the least bit bothered by waiting, which caused Marina to wonder if he had had a great deal of practice.
aAre you asking me if I know what caused the fever, if it had a name? I do not. The list of possibilities is too long. I suppose at this point checking his recent vaccination records would be a place to start. I can also give you a list of antibiotics he failed to respond to.a aIam not asking you what kind of fever it was,a Marina said. aIam asking you what happened.a Dr. Swenson sighed. aIs this my deposition, Dr. Singh?a aIam not accusinga"a Dr. Swenson waved her hand, brushing the words out of the air. aI will tell you: I liked Dr. Eckman. Every aspect of his visit was a great inconvenience to me but there was something ingenuous about him. He had a sincere interest in the Lakashi, in the work. You were a friend of his and so you know this about him, he had a singular ability for demonstrating interest, if it was in birds or in the estrogen levels in the collected blood samples; he asked a great many questions and took in every word of the answers he was given. He was polite and affable even when I was trying to convince him to leave, which, you should note to his wife, I did constantly.a She interrupted herself to finish her glass of water and before the empty glass had come to rest on the table it had been refilled by the hovering waiter. aMr. Fox was an idiot to send him down here. Iave hardly ever seen a man so ill suited for the jungle, and thatas saying a great deal. Most people are ill suited for the jungle. The heat, the insects, even the trees made him anxious. Now, one would think when a person comes to a place where he doesnat want to be and he is not wanted, he would have the sense to go. Dr. Eckman lacked that sense. He told me that the company needed me to speed up the progress of my work, that they needed to see my records, bring in other researchers, move as much of the project back to Vogel as soon as was possible. I believe our entire exchange could have taken place in an hour, fifteen minutes if both parties were succinct, but there was something about Dr. Eckman. It was as if he needed to see everything for himself. He had come a long way and by God he wasnat going to take my word for the fact that there was a drug in development. He felt the need to retrace the entire course of my work. He was going to rediscover the Lakashi tribe himself. He was going to find the roots of their fertility himself. He refused to let his misery inform his actions.a A small man in a dirty white apron came out of the kitchen with two plates of yellow rice covered over with chicken. The meat was the same color as the rice and was glossy and loose on the bone. He gave one to Dr. Swenson and one to the child, whose face became incandescent with joy when he saw what was for dinner.
aWe havenat had much luck keeping chickens,a Dr. Swenson said. aWe have both been looking forward to dinner.a She tapped Easteras hand and at that permission he picked up his fork and began to pull the meat apart by holding the chicken in place with two fingers. She tapped his hand again and handed him a knife. aWe have Dr. Eckman to thank for Easteras table manners. All this is new. It frankly wasnat anything Iad stressed before, the Lakashi table manners are not our own, but Iave kept up with it. Dr. Eckman took such an interest in the child. I can only think he was missing his owna"a She stopped and looked at Marina, leaving the question unspoken.
aBoys,a Marina said. aHe had three boys.a Dr. Swenson nodded. aWell, you could see it. I donat suppose Iad thought of this before but surely a great part of my sympathy for Dr. Eckman came from his kindness to Easter.a The original waiter returned and put a piece of tres leches in front of Marina, who shook her head at the sight of it. She was thinking of those three boys on the sofa, the ones whose hearing was so acute that adult conversations were forced into the kitchen pantry and conducted in whispers.
aI ordered it for you,a Dr. Swenson said, and sent the waiter away. aItas good cake. It goes with the wine.a Marina saw the boy eyeing her dessert, caught between the joy of his own meal and the longing for hers. aHow long was Anders with you before he got sick?a aIt would be hard to say since I donat actually know when he was infected. In retrospect, I think he may have picked up something here in Manaus and brought it out with him. I didnat know Dr. Eckman before this. Itas possible that I never saw him when he was completely himself.a aYou did,a Marina said. aYou met him at Vogel before you left. He was on the review committee for your financing.a She pictured Anders leaning against her desk. He had been so certain Dr. Swenson had liked him.
Dr. Swenson nodded, her attention given over fully to her chicken for the moment. aYes, of course, he told me that. But I didnat remember him. I wouldnat have any reason to remember him.a aOf course,a Marina said, and for the first time it came to her with certainty: She does not know me.
The older doctor took a bite of rice. aItas difficult to trust yourself in the jungle,a she said. aSome people gain their bearings over time but for others that adjustment never comes. Itas simply too foreign. We canat find a common application for what we already know. Iam not just thinking of moral issues or rules of law, though both of those apply, but the simple concrete facts of existence arenat what weare used to. Take the insects, for example. Hundreds of thousand of new species are discovered around the world every year, and who knows how many other species vanish. The means by which we separate out the deadly from the merely irritating are extremely limited considering that the insect that just bit you might not have even been classified yet, and at what point does constant irritation itself become deadly? Youare bitten by so many things, thereas no way of keeping track. You simply have to accept the fact that whatever it was probably isnat going to kill you.a She motioned to Marina with her fork. aDid you know your arm is bleeding, Dr. Singh?a Marina had let the shawl slip behind her in the chair and she could see now that there was a thin line of dried blood about six inches long that came from a puncture of her right biceps. Dr. Swenson took the unused napkin from the fourth place at the table and dipped it into her water glass. aHere,a she said. aClean yourself up.a Marina took the napkin and wiped her arm, taking a minute to apply some pressure to the wound as washing it had started up the bleeding again.
aIam sure itas nothing,a Dr. Swenson said, working industriously to get the last of the chicken off the bone, abut it goes to my point. Itas easy to become hypochondriacal out here but the more dangerous state is hypochondriaas opposite: the insistent voice that says you must be overreacting to things, and so in turn you begin to ignore real symptoms. Doctors, Iam sure you know, are notorious for this sort of behavior, and I think it may have been the case with Dr. Eckman. His substantial fears actually led him too far in the other direction. Every time I asked him if he was sick he would exhaust himself denying it. When it became ridiculous for him to deny it, I told him I was sending him back. No, no, no, he said to me, like some sort of child who doesnat want to miss his part in the school pageant, he would be better in a day or two. I couldnat make his decisions for him, Dr. Singh, though believe me, I tried. He had waited for me a long time in Manaus and he wasnat about to turn back around without completing whatever mission he imagined it was his responsibility to complete. The next thing I knew we were setting up an infirmary. He required nearly constant attention.a Dr. Swenson looked over at Easter, who had picked a chicken bone up from his plate and was gnawing on it. She raised a hand to tap him and then lowered it instead. She let it go. aDo you see the problem here?a she said to Marina, her voice maintaining every inflection of composure. aThe man who had been sent to prod me along in my work was keeping me from it. He had crossed over a line from feeling that he would recover quickly to feeling he was too ill to travel. He told me he wanted to wait until he was in a better condition. He didnat want to be out on the river. He was afraid of the river. What he wanted was to be home, but getting home from the Amazon requires a great deal of effort and after a certain point he no longer had that in him. I liked Dr. Eckman well enough, but I donat believe that makes any difference to the story. He was an impediment to me when he was well and he was an impediment when he was sick. I will not have him be an impediment now that he is dead. I will not attempt to retrace every moment of his illness when I cannot alter its outcome. I am sorry that his wife will have to bear that, but there was nothing I could do about it then and there is nothing I can do about it now. He made his own choices. He received the best care we could have given him considering our resources, but Dr. Eckman died. Does that shed any more light on the subject? I wasnat with him at the end. If there were some final words, a message, I missed it.a Marina sat at the table and thought of her friend dying of a nameless fever in some room or some hut at the end of the world. Karen Eckman made her promise she would ask if Anders was dead. Instead she asked Dr. Swenson if he had died alone. It was a sentimental question but she wanted some other picture in her mind than the one she had.
aWhen he died? No,a she said. Her eyes cut over to the boy for an instant and then back to Marina. aEaster was with him.a Easter, who was possibly the age of the oldest Eckman boy, or the middle one, had seen him out. His plate was scraped clean and wiped down with bread, a neat pike of chicken bones stacked in the center. She gave him her cake and in return he gave her such a smile that she wanted the waiter to come back so she could order another piece and give him that one as well.
aIt isnat a story to bring home,a Dr. Swenson said.
aNo,a Marina said.
aThe story isnat meant for her anyway.a Dr. Swenson tapped the corners of her mouth with her napkin. aItas a story for you. Without getting into the details over dinner, you will trust me when I tell you that Dr. Eckman suffered. I mean it to be a cautionary tale.a Marina nodded, trying to find some untapped vein of stoicism within herself as she wanted very much to cover her face with her hands at the thought of Andersa end. aI understand that.a aI donat imagine that anyone has been too worried about this back at the pharmaceutical plant, but Dr. Eckmanas death was difficult for me as well. I was cautious to begin with and now I am doubly so. Iam not looking to take on a new responsibility. If you want to know how my work is going I will tell you: I am behind schedule. This is a delicate piece of science. I give it every waking moment of my life but at this point it still requires more time. I understand that it is not an unlimited number of years I have in which to finish this, both from Vogelas perspective and from my own.a Dr. Swenson signaled the waiter to bring the check and drank the last of her water. aSomeday I would like to leave the Amazon myself, Dr. Singh. I am used to this place but I am not in love with it. I have every possible incentive to complete this project as quickly as possible. Mr. Fox seems to think that Iam enjoying myself so much that I would need a series of Vogel emissaries to remind me that the goal is to finish. You may report back that I have not lost sight of the goal.a Marina nodded. She understood that she was being given her ticket home.
Dr. Swenson put both of her hands on the table and gave it a gentle tap to signify that their interview was now concluded. aEaster and I will walk you back to your hotel. Weall go right past it on the way to the apartment. There we will say good night and goodbye. This wonat be a long visit for me. You understand I need to get back.a Marina cautiously moved her toes side to side. Her feet had swollen while she had been sitting and the straps of her sandals were now cutting deep into the skin. She reached under the table and, with some effort and a sharp strike of pain, pulled the shoes off. Easter, having finished the cake, ducked to look.
aIam afraid I wonat be able to walk back,a Marina said. What harm would there be in telling the truth now? She was finished.
Dr. Swenson called out to the waiter and Marina clearly understood her to say Miltonas name. The waiter nodded. aHeall come and pick us up,a she said. She motioned for Easter to hand her one of the shoes and she looked at it as if it were a rare archeological find. aItas difficult for me to understand why a woman would choose to do that to herself.a She returned the silver sandal to its mate.
aIt is a mystery to me as well,a Marina said. She would not try to defend the shoes. They were indefensible. She would walk barefoot for the rest of her life before shead put them on again.
aBarbara tells me you were a student of mine,a Dr. Swenson said. Perhaps it was the shoes that made her think of it, she was wondering how a student of hers had learned so little about the workings of the human anatomy.
aYes,a Marina said. All of her fears were floating away from her now. What difference did it make? One by one she met them and then let them go.
aThat would have been Johns Hopkins?a Marina nodded. aIam forty-two.a Dr. Swenson signed her name to the bill and left it on the table. It would no doubt be mailed to Vogel. aWell, I must not have done a convincing job if you went into pharmacology. But then here I am developing a drug. I suppose we both wound up in the same field after all.a She reached down to the floor and handed Marinaas sandals to Easter to carry. He seemed very pleased to have the job. aNone of us knows how life will work out, Dr. Singh.a Dr. Singh was in the process of agreeing with that exact impossibility as Milton, who must have been idling the car outside, walked in the door to take her home.
That night Marina spent a long time in the bath paying attention to her various wounds: the turned back flaps of skin that dotted her toes and heels, the pillowy blisters that had yet to drain, the different bites that were itching or bleeding or bruised, she scrubbed them all with soap and washcloth until the skin around the red lesions was red as well, then she dried off and slathered up with salve. All of this had to be done before calling Mr. Fox. It didnat matter how late it was. She was planning on waking him up. She was hoping even that waking him up would give her something of an advantage in their conversation. She pictured the phone ringing on the night table beside the bed she had on occasion fallen asleep in but in which she had never slept an entire night, the very bed she hoped to go home to. Mr. Fox answered on the fourth ring, his voice alert and composed. He would have given himself two rings after waking to collect himself.
aTell me youare fine,a he said.
aSome blisters,a she said, gently pushing at one of them on her toe, abut absolutely fine. I found Dr. Swenson.a She said it straight out. She did not wait for him to ask her because he had asked her every time they spoke, as if finding Dr. Swenson was something that might have happened and then slipped her mind. She told him about the opera house, about Easter and the dinner. She told him what had been said about Anders and, in trying to recreate the conversation, she realized how little of a conversation it had actually been. She could report that the project was behind but moving forward. Even if she lacked the details she was sure about the essential fact: Dr. Swenson wanted to see this done more than anyone, and she would get it done, on that point she had been very convincing, though she had neglected to say when she projected the drug might be submitted to the FDA.
aNo time line?a Mr. Fox said.
aNothing absolute,a Marina said, but in truth she hadnat asked. Why hadnat she asked? All these years later, she still listened to Dr. Swenson as a student listens to a teacher, as a Greek listens to an oracle. She didnat question her, she simply committed the answers to memory.
aDonat worry about that,a Mr. Fox said. aIt was a preliminary meeting. Youare smart not to push her yet. Do you think youall leave tomorrow?a aTomorrow or the next day. It depends on tickets. Iall be on the first plane that has a seat.a aYouall take a plane?a Mr. Fox asked.
aTo come home.a The line was quiet, and into that silence Marina did not extend herself. Even as she realized the error of her assumption she wanted to stay with it for as long as possible. Her hopeful imagination had let her drift all the way home. She had no luggage. They had never found her luggage. Everything she had acquired in Manaus would be left behind, save the little white heron and the red beaded bracelet that was knotted to her wrist. Through the window of the Minneapolisa"St. Paul airport she saw white blossoms. She drank the honeyed breeze as she stepped outside.
aDonat quit this now,a Mr. Fox said. aNot after all the time itas taken to find her.a He would still be saying this after six months, after a year, Donat quit this now. Maybe he wanted her to stay until she could promise she was bringing back the chemical compound for fertility in her pocket. aI delivered the message,a Marina said. In retrospect she was not entirely sure that she had said anything but she was certain that any message she delivered to Dr. Swenson would never be listened to anyway. Dr. Swenson didnat listen to Marina, or Anders, or Mr. Fox. Listening was not Dr. Swensonas habit. Marina was not going to change the course of the river. aAnders delivered the message. She told me that. She understands exactly what it is you want and I believe she will get it to you as soon as is humanly possible.a aIt isnat the sort of thing you can take someoneas word on. The drug could be finished or she could never have started it. This is a project of enormous importance and expense. You need to find out where we are in development,a Mr. Fox said, and then he added the word aexactly.a She looked at her feet, bright and raw in the overhead light, slick with Neosporin. aYouall have to find somebody else.a aMarina,a he said. aMarina, Marina.a He said it with tenderness in his voice, with love.
She could smell her own capitulation coming on from a mile away. It was her nature, her duty. She told him good night and hung up the phone. She couldnat blame him much. Inside the envelope of his own warm, dry sheets, he really couldnat understand what he was asking her to do. When she was still at home, she hadnat been able to imagine this place either.
It was a Lariam day. She had been putting it off since this morning, but what difference did it make? She always wound up taking it in the end. The pills she had so cavalierly tossed in the airport trash had managed to find her again. Tomo never complained about having to come up from the front desk to settle her screaming by banging on her door. And if she dealt with intermittent nausea, paranoia, my God, she could hardly pin that on the Lariam. Even if she went home tomorrow she would have to take it for another four weeks. It was the drugas way of reminding the patient that the trip isnat over. The trip would be in the bloodstream, in the tissues. All the potential disasters of the place would continue to linger inside. Marina set the pill on her tongue and swallowed it with half a bottle of water which was sitting on her dresser, then she turned out the light. She was becoming accustomed to the dip in the middle of the mattress, to the foam-rubber pillow that smelled like cardboard boxes, to the sound of the water piping into the ice machine down the hall and then, hours later, the dumping release of its little frozen charges into the bin. She wondered how long these things would stay with her once she was home again. She wondered how long Anders would stay with her, and what it would be like to settle back into their lab alone and who would eventually come to replace him. She wondered how long it would be that she would think of him every day, and what it would feel like to realize that days had passed and she had forgotten to think of him at all. She thought about the stack of letters that Karen had written sitting in the drawer of the table beside the bed. She thought of Anders buried in the jungle floor three thousand miles from Eden Prairie. As tired as she was, it kept her awake. When the mind could no longer bear the newsa"Anders is deada"it busied itself with the details: Where is his camera? Where are his binoculars?
When Marina woke up she was standing in front of the window in her hotel room with no memory of having gotten out of bed. It was freezing. She and her father had been at the campus of the University of Minnesota where he had done his doctoral work in microbiology. The snow was coming down hard. All she could really remember were the Indians coming out of all the buildings, and how the women in their red and purple saris completely changed the landscape, the men in pink shirts broke the whiteness apart. They shivered in the arctic wind until the colors began to vibrate, making a sea of trembling, snow-covered poppies. She had gone to sleep with the air conditioner left on high and now the inside of the hotel window was so wet that she wondered from the stupor of interrupted sleep if it was finally raining inside. Beads of water streaked down the glass, reducing the view of the world outside to a deep purple darkness punctuated by balls of glittering light. The cold air blew gale force at the cheap cotton nightgown she had bought from Rodrigo. She squatted down in front of the unit beneath the window, her hair blown back by the wind, and blindly pushed the little buttons until the system gave one final frozen exhalation and died. She was shaking, and unsure how much of that was the temperature and how much was a dream. All she could be certain of was that she had been trying to go home and that she couldnat because of the snow. She wasnat going home. Maybe Mr. Fox had whispered in her ear all night, but while she slept the world shifted away from the airport and towards the docks. The clear resolve she had had in the restaurant seemed to have broken like a fever sometime during the night and as she was waking up she could feel Minnesota recede with the rest of her dream. She would not get back into bed now. She was finished with that bed. Like a somnambulist half awake she gathered up everything that belonged to Barbara Bovender, the gray silk dress that was muddied around the hem, the savage shoes, the wrap, the hair pins, and put them all together in a plastic bag. Then she opened every drawer and removed the meager contents. She folded what she owned and put it into small piles on the dresser. As she went to every corner of the room, she told herself that what mattered now was movement, that the point was not so much to get home as it was to leave Manaus. She was certain of nothing except the fact that she wouldnat spend another night in the Hotel Indira. She put the packet of Karenas letters on top of her three folded shirts. She didnat have a bag for what she owned but that, she imagined, would be the least of it.
By six oaclock she had dressed and left. The early morning city had the tick of action, children were on their blankets, the painted bowls and crude flutes and beaded bracelets they had to sell were all in even lines, the women were moving towards the market hall, not briskly but faster than they would move at any other point for the rest of the day. Dogs trailed along far to the sides of the streets, heads low and watchful, the shadow and light making valleys between every rib.
It seemed in all of Manaus only Nixon was still asleep. In the lobby of the Swenson-Bovender apartment building, his face was pressed sideways against the desk, his hands stretched out in front of him and open wide. Marina gave herself a moment to watch such a deep and dreamless sleep, feeling a fondness for him she couldnat account for unless it was just the fact that there were so few people in this city she knew by name. She imagined he was a good man even though her only evidence was his fidelity to this post.
She sat down in the lobby to write the Bovenders a note, but after going to the trouble of locating paper and pen found she had no idea what to say. She couldnat thank them. They were the grand jury after all, keeping her there in the holding cell of the Hotel Indira for two weeks while they decided if her case was fit for Dr. Swenson to hear. Or maybe she should thank them for managing to make their decision in two weeks. They had kept Anders for over a month, an entire wasted month of life while his boys rode their bicycles alone through the slush of spring. Marina was distracted by the sound of Nixonas labored respiration. Then, on his desk, he stopped breathing. Twenty seconds, thirty seconds, she was just about to get up when at forty-five seconds he gasped, his back heaving, and then began to breathe again. Still asleep, he sighed and turned his face in the other direction. Apnea. There was nothing she could do about that.
She settled back into the winged chair in the lobbyas small conversational grouping of furniture where she sat by herself. If Marina couldnat thank the Bovenders, she found she couldnat blame them either. At twenty-three she would have gladly done their job. She might have stayed in the position until she was forty-three if certain events had played out differently. Without the Bovenders there to remind her, she might have forgotten what it was like to be enthralled, to fall hard in love for principles and a singularly remarkable mind. They were little more than pretty children, feather-light, proven capable of no end of lies, and yet there was something in their shiny nature that made them indestructible. She would have given anything to take them to the jungle with her. So in the end she put down the truth as she knew it at that exact minute. I will miss you. She wrote their name on the bag and added twenty dollars U.S. for the cost of cleaning the dress, knotted it all together and left it on the desk beside one of Nixonas sleeping hands. Dr. Swenson tended to be early. If rounds began at seven she was on to the first case at six-thirty. It didnat take long to figure out the clock. Marina didnat want to meet her in the lobby for fear it might look like an ambush. She walked quickly to Rodrigoas store. It was busy then, all the stores were busy. She fixed herself a cup of coffee from the pot on his counter and found a nylon duffel bag while he waited on customers. She picked up more sunscreen, more bug spray. It was important not to think too deeply about what she would need or she might wind up taking all of it. Everything went on the Vogel account, down to the coffee. She picked up another box of Band-Aids, a second pair of flip-flops. She was looking at a length of netting that was meant to hang over a bed when Dr. Swenson came in with Milton.
Rodrigo saw them first. There wasnat room enough for Dr. Swenson and all the women who had come in for flour and thread, things they could easily wait until later to buy. He began to rush his other customers by shouting at them and no one objected to his harassment. A few of them put down whatever was in their hands and left the store immediately, while others grabbed a few more things off the shelves nearby and rushed to the counter to pay. Maybe they knew Dr. Swenson. Maybe they were as anxious to leave as the clerk was to see them go. Rodrigo, always so careful to write up bills of sale, gave a quick visual assessment of the pile of goods and barked out a price that each woman paid without question. Dr. Swenson noticed none of this. Her chin was pointed up. She was mainly interested in the high-shelf items, the goods ignored by the daily foot traffic of Brazilians. She was muttering her thoughts to the ceiling and Milton was writing them down. She would not have noticed Marina had Marina been dipped in yellow paint, and Milton, who never looked up from his pencil and pad, had missed her as well. One by one the customers fled the store. Marina followed the last of them to the counter to have her purchases added to her account. Rodrigo, who seemed to understand exactly the decision that had been made, added in an extra hat, three more cotton handkerchiefs, several rolls of LifeSavers.
aYouare up very early, Dr. Singh,a Dr. Swenson said to the ceiling.
Milton, startled, looked up. aThere you are!a he said. aThen finding you this morning is one thing I can cross off my list.a aYou said youad be here early,a Marina said. aAnd there were a few things I needed myself.a aThereas no end to what one needs in the Amazon,a Dr. Swenson said. aWhat isnat eaten by insects is quick to rot. Thatas why our friend Rodrigo does such a booming business. Nature provides a state of constant turnover. Still, I would think if you are leaving today youad be better off making your purchases at home, unless youare looking for souvenirs.a There was nothing to do but say it. Marina told her she would be coming along. This did not seem to surprise Dr. Swenson. She took the news as if it were both unpleasant and expected. aYouave been talking to Mr. Fox.a Marina looked up towards the high shelves as well, wondering what she might be seeing there. aAt the very least I should get Andersa things.a aRaisins,a Dr. Swenson said to Milton, who added it to the list. aTapioca.a She turned to Marina. aDoes it matter at all that you are not invited?a It would be easier had she been invited but to the best of her knowledge Dr. Swenson had never welcomed students to her classes or interns to the program or patients to the hospital. She couldnat see how this experience should be any different. aNot really.a aDr. Rapp always said that people would attach themselves to an expedition.a She moved very slowly, putting her hand first on a box of crackers, next on a bag of coffee. Milton continued to write and then Rodrigo was writing as well. An older woman with a baby tied across her chest in a bright red scarf opened the door and, seeing the people who were inside, turned and left without comment. aCertainly they did with him. I saw it myself. An endless succession of mongrels and malingerers, the laziest dropouts who fancied themselves explorers. He made his policy clear: he was not responsible for their food, their shelter, their safety, or their health. He didnat waste his time discouraging them because frankly there was no discouragement they could not withstand. All of the energy they could have put into their intelligence they had used to develop their tenacity. But what I quickly learned was that their tenacity was for going, not for staying. Once they were out on the trail they fell like flies. Some took a day, two days, others were gone in a matter of hours, and Dr. Rapp never stopped for them. He remained beautifully consistent: he was there to work and he would continue to work. He would not ferry back the weak and the lame. They had chosen to get themselves in and they would simply have to figure the means to get themselves out. People were quick to accept these terms until they themselves were weak. Then they changed their tune entirely, then they said Dr. Rapp was heartless. They couldnat slander him as a scientist but they said no end of scurrilous things about him as a man. He hadnat rescued them! He hadnat been their father and mother! I will tell you, none of that troubled his sleep. If he had made them his responsibility, either by dissuading them from their ambitions or by bailing them out of their folly, the greatest botanist of our time would have been reduced to a babysitter. It would have been an incalculable blow to science, all in the name of saving the stupid.a The air, ever heavy, now was paralyzed. Milton had slipped his pencil and pad in his pocket without thinking, and Rodrigo had put his pencil down as well. While Dr. Swenson continued to calculate how much food she would need to take back with her, the other three stood breathless and unblinking. Marina felt as if she were trying to remember the answer when there hadnat been a question posed. They were all waiting. aI donat think youall find me to be nearly that much trouble,a she said finally.
Dr. Swenson, who had been distracted by a small bin of socks, did not look up. aAs much trouble as what?a aThe mongrels,a Marina said. aThe malingerers.a aDonat be so self-referential. I was telling you a story. I wasnat telling a story about you.a At that Milton inhaled as abruptly as Nixon at his desk. aThere you go,a he said, willing himself to accept the explanation. aHow many cans of apricots?a Dr. Swenson waited a moment, as if making a tally in her head. aA case more than usual,a she said, looking at Marina. It was impossible to know how many apricots a person would eat once they had been removed from civilization.
It was agreed then that Milton would pick Marina up in front of the Hotel Indira at eleven, and despite the heat of that hour she was standing ready at the front of the hotel, tucked beneath the awning with her half-empty bag. She had said goodbye to Tomo, who was more than happy to store her coat and sweaters until she returned. She had not said goodbye to Mr. Fox. This city, so busy when she woke up that morning, was practically empty now. The dogs pressed themselves into doorways beneath thin strips of shade. The cars drove by slowly, as if every driver was trying to decide if he was the one who was supposed to take Marina to the docks. They looked at her carefully and tapped their horns.
When Milton did arrive, Easter was in the passenger seat. When he saw Marina through the open window, he reached both of his arms out to her as if he were hers alone in all the world. There was something brilliant about being recognized, the happiness on his face entirely disproportionate to his knowing her. Marina went to him and took both of his small hands in her hands and he gave her an enthusiastic shake. Milton put a thumb on the boyas shoulder and pointed to the backseat. Easter immediately flipped backwards, a trick he had been saving.
aForgive me,a Milton said in a tired voice when she got in the car. He was sitting on a folded towel, his shirt and pants and hair soaked through. Even the small straw hat on the back of his head was wilted and damp. There could have been a rainstorm blocks from here that Marina never saw. He could have fallen in the river.
aForgive you for what?a Milton shook his head. aIt took us longer to load the boat.a He took out a smaller towel and wiped down his face.
Easter was craning his entire upper body out the window to see as far as he could in every direction: boy as turtle, car as shell. The wind dried out last nightas soccer shirt and ruffled the dark, wet curls against his neck. Looking at him, Marina realized he was a marker. The boat was loaded, Dr. Swenson was on the boat. If Milton hadnat taken Easter there would have been no reason for her to wait the minutes it took for him to drive to the hotel. aItas not as if I had anywhere else to go,a she said.
aHe likes the car,a Milton said, tilting his head back.
aIam sure he does.a The dock was farther up river than Marina had been before. The wooden planks on the walkway were warped by the endless succession of sun and hard rain. A collection of rusted tugs and houseboats that looked like they had been pieced together over the course of many generations bobbed between the low-riding water taxis. From the top of the bank she could see the freighters and cruise ships in the distance lining up against the great cement piers. Below her was a small figure pacing beneath the shade of a black umbrella.
aWe are late, Milton,a Dr. Swenson called. The engine of the boat was running and a pale lavender smoke spread out across the water.
aThis would be the time to change your mind,a Milton said quietly. aIf you are inclined to change your mind.a Easter flew ahead of them now, running in flip-flops, forsaking the perilous steps for the more perilous slope of mud and rock and weed. The boat was a pontoon, the kind of boat her father had rented for a weekend every summer when Marina was young and her parents were married. Her father was not much for boating but the pontoon he said was like a pony rented out for children: stolid and low, not given to sudden movements.
aIall be fine,a Marina said. She was in motion now. She was as good as on the river.
aI donat remember telling you to take Easter along,a Dr. Swenson said when they reached the old pontoon with a flat metal roof. The boy was standing behind her now, his hands on the wheel in an imitation of steering. There were boxes stacked neatly around the circumference and the boat sat low and even in the water.
aI donat believe you did,a Milton said. He gave Marina his hand to board and in the moment she held his hand she thought about him the way she thought about the Bovenders. It would all be better if he would simply board the boat behind her.
Dr. Swenson tapped Easter on the shoulder and pointed to the lines, at which point the boy jumped off the boat and untied them. He curled his toes around the edge of the dock and pushed the boat away. He let it go so far that for one horrible instant Marina thought he wasnat coming either, but then he leapt, his childas bones filled with springs, and landed with both feet planted on the deck.
aTravel safely,a Milton said, and raised his hand up to them. He was the only person on the dock and he stood there as if they were the Lusitania. He was waving them back instead of waving them on.
Easter was firm at the wheel now. The child steered the boat out into a low swirl of current, a seriousness in his eyes as he scanned the wide horizon. Dr. Swenson, safe beneath the boatas cover, closed her umbrella. Marina dropped her bag at her feet and held on to the railing. Milton receded but stayed in place, his arm raised as he grew smaller and smaller. Dear Milton. She waved to him. She hadnat made it clear how grateful she was. After all those empty hours to spend in any conversation in the world, they had left in a matter of minutes with no discussion of where they were going or how long it would take them to get there or when they might think of coming back. But somehow none of that mattered anymore. Marina hadnat understood the enormity of the river until she was on it. The sky was spread over in white clouds that banked and thinned depending on the direction she turned in. Some of the clouds had covered over the sun so for the moment it was cooler, and the breeze of their forward momentum kept the insects down. The birds shot out from the banks and cut over the water. Marina thought of Anders at the bow, his binoculars raised. How glad he must have been to finally leave this city. Marina never would have believed it until she was on a boat herself but the water was an enormous relief. aBeautiful,a she said to the one member of the party who could hear her.
aWe always feel better heading home,a Dr. Swenson said.
Six.
There was traffic on the Negro, barges and tugs, water taxis with rotting thatched roofs where river swallows nested, dugout canoes containing entire familiesa"sisters with babies and brothers and cousins and grandfathers and aunts holding open umbrellas, so many people crammed into one log that the lip of the boat sat nearly level with the surface of the brown water as one man in the back rowed carefully on. The smaller boats stayed near the shore, while a cruise ship, white as a sailoras dress uniform, churned up the center aisle. Easter remained fiercely alert, his damp hair pushed back by the breeze, his eyes sweeping slowly side to side. He pulled the throttle to cut his wake in deference to the boats that were smaller, and he waved to those larger boats that cut their wake for him. Every appearance was that of an orderly world. Then the boy would turn and look behind him, and when he did he would nod to Marina and Dr. Swenson and they would nod back.
aDoes he drive all the way?a Marina asked, not having any idea how far they were going.
Dr. Swenson nodded. aHe likes it.a She was sitting on a box of canned hash while Marina stood. aWhat boy wouldnat want to drive the boat? It gives him standing in the tribe. I drive or Easter drives, no one else. A few of the men have outboard motors that theyave traded for over the years, but theyave never captained a boat like this. It forces them to show respect when they see how much I trust him. Heas good with the engine, too. Heas figured it out.a Marina was no judge of children but she would say that Easter looked too young to captain a boat or fix an engine or walk alone in a city at night, though not a mile back she had seen a child alone in a child-sized log who could not have been more than five, a spear lying over the bow, his paddle even as it went in and out of the water. aHow old is Easter?a Dr. Swenson looked up and gave a squint in Marinaas direction. aShall I ask him?a If Dr. Swenson had not been changed by time or experience or geography or climate, was it possible that Marina had not been substantively changed either? Was she in fact the person she had been in medical school, in grade school? aYouall have to forgive me,a Marina said, and then set about restating the question. aI donat know any more about the Lakashi than what youave written and youave written nothing about their ability to record time. Does anyone know how old anyone is? Do his parents know?a aYou make no end of suppositions, Dr. Singh. Is that a habit of yours? I have to say that was one thing I admired about Dr. Eckman: no preconceived conclusions whatsoever. A truly open mind is a scientistas greatest asset. He must have been very thoughtful in his research. Had the circumstances been different I could have imagined asking him to stay on.a Marina was not in the least bit unsettled by the praise for Anders. She knew the role of compliments in Dr. Swensonas pedagogy: they were used not to raise one person up but to tap another down into place. She was only sorry that she didnat have Anders to repeat it to, no doubt he would be shocked to hear such kindness after his death.
aYou, however, suppose that Easter is Lakashi. He is not. I of course cannot be certain where he came from as he simply appeared in camp one morning and could neither hear nor speak. Were I to follow your example, I would suppose that he was Hummocca based on the shape of his head and the arrangement of his sinuses. The Hummocca have sinus cavities that are less pronounced than the Lakashi. Their faces are more curved, not quite so flat, but the difference is subtle. The Hummocca are somewhat smaller as well, and this goes to your original question about his age. I say all of this based on a single brief and unpleasant encounter with the tribe many years ago. Still, I find that fear can sometimes heighten our powers of observation to a point of great clarity. I remember the heads of the Hummocca so vividly it was almost as if I had dissected one.a A double-decker tourist boat glided by without slowing and for a moment they were caught in its churning wake. As they pitched forward and back, rolling like a barrel in the little waves, Marina grabbed on to a pole and Easter raised his fist at the bigger boat. A tourist on the upper level pointed a camera in their direction. Dr. Swenson dropped her head for a moment, as if willing the other boat to sink through powers of concentration.
After the worst of the rolling had abated, Dr. Swenson lifted her head, her blue eyes bright and ringed in sweat. aAlways buy a pontoon,a she said, panting lightly as if making an effort not to vomit. aYou cannot imagine how hard that wake would have hit us had we not been in a pontoon. But I was making a point: Easter is a very small child, I would go so far as to say he is stunted. This could have been caused by a consistent lack of nutrition. It seems quite possible that no one was willing to give much of the tribeas resources to a deaf child, or it could be that whatever illness rendered him deaf also rendered him small but now I am straying into what can only be called guessing, which is never helpful. Given his skills, his ability to learn, I would think him to be a twelve-year-old of normal, perhaps above-normal, intelligence. Iall have a more precise judgment when he reaches puberty. The onset of puberty in the Lakashi male falls consistently between thirteen-point-two and thirteen-point-eight, a much narrower window than you find in American males. Whether or not this holds true of the Hummocca I am afraid I will never know. Do you have children, Dr. Singh?a Marina was at least three questions behind. She wanted very much to know about the unpleasant encounter but, feeling she had been called on to give the easiest answer, merely shook her head. aNone.a aThatas good. Dr. Eckman had no business coming down here leaving three children behind. Are you married?a aI am not.a aGood again.a Dr. Swenson nodded her approval before turning her face towards the breeze. The sky spooled blue above the river in both endless directions. aThis is a business for old maids, and I donat say that derogatorily, being one myself. I feel better about you being on the boat knowing your circumstances.a Speaking of suppositions, how much light could being unmarried and childless shed on her circumstances? Did it mean that no one would miss her terribly if she were to die, that there wouldnat be the same set of complications brought about by Dr. Eckmanas death? Marina said nothing but sat down on the deck near Dr. Swensonas feet. The sun edged beneath the boatas awning and she wanted more of the shade.
Dr. Swenson leaned to the side and patted her case of canned hash with an open hand. aI prefer to sit on a box. A box doesnat protect one from the roaches but I like to think it sends a message: We are on another level. There is a case of grapefruit juice there. I would recommend that.a Obediently, Marina got up and pushed the box of juice forward, sat. They passed a handful of open houses built onto stilts. Several children, all of them too young to be standing alone in the water, were standing waist deep in the river, waving.
aAs for Easteras parentsa"a Dr. Swenson stopped then and looked at the captainas small back. She tilted her head. aParents seems a very sentimental word to use in his case. The man who inseminated the woman, the woman who pushed the child out of her body, other members of the tribe who may or may not have tried to raise that child when the original duo failed in their responsibilities: his parents have not been in evidence. The Hummocca left it up to the Lakashi, which, considering the nature of the tribe, strikes me as a startling act of humanity. I would have thought them more inclined to abandon a child in the jungle to starve to death or be eaten. All of which is to say he has been with me some eight years now, eight this past Easter. I suppose I am his parents.a aIt sounds as if the Hummocca may have left Easter for you then and not the Lakashi, assuming they knew you were here.a Marina realized she had made another assumption as soon as it was out of her mouth but this one Dr. Swenson let pass.
aOh, they knew I was here,a she said, nodding her head. aEveryone knows everything eventually. Upon first consideration a person believes herself to be very isolated in the jungle but it isnat the case. Word travels between the tribes, although Iave never figured out how it happens as many of them refuse to communicate with one another. It would make a brilliant dissertation topic if you ever become interested in furthering your education.a (Marina would have mentioned her Ph.D. as well as her M.D. but there was not a glimmer of a break.) aI say itas the monkeys,a Dr. Swenson said. aBut then I tend to blame the monkeys for everything. aA white woman is living with the Lakashi.a News like that goes up and down the river in a matter of hours. Then one afternoon a boy is cutting at a tree with a machete and when his arm goes back he sinks the blade into his sisteras head. Amazing that this sort of thing doesnat happen every fifteen minutes out here. So I found a needle and some gut in my bag and I sewed the girl up. It was mostly blood, she was a very dramatic bleeder, but one hardly has to go to medical school to sew up a head. It didnat take many events like this, a snake bite, a breech birth, and suddenly the whole of Brazil knows there is a doctor available off the Negro. Now, you must understand this, Dr. Singh, so few people do: I am not Mdecins Sans Frontires. I have not come to the Amazon to be a family practioner. I am simply a person who made certain mistakes at the onset. They didnat know me as a doctor when I arrived. The Lakashi knew me as a member of Dr. Rappas party. They thought I was like Dr. Rapp, that I was there for the flora and not for them. For the first few years I came alone they were forever bringing me mushrooms and various fungi to look at. They lugged so many fallen trunks of enormous, rotted trees back to camp it would have sent any mycological society into a frenzy. The fact that I took their temperature and drew blood samples and measured their children was completely lost on them, they continued to see me as the person they first meta"as an extension of Dr. Rapp. And it had been my intention to be like him, to float on their misguided perceptions, but then I sewed up that girlas head. It was my fatal mistake. The next thing I knew sick people were being paddled up the river to receive my care, and a deaf child had been left off for me to deal with.a The deaf child had gotten her to town. He had ferried her guest to the restaurant after the opera and loaded the boxes on the boat and steered the boat through the river. The deaf child was not without his uses. aWhat would the alternative have been?a Marina asked. aGoing back to that first girl.a aThe bleeder. The question is whether or not you choose to disturb the world around you, or if you choose to let it go on as if you had never arrived. That is how one respects indigenous people. If you pay any attention at all youall realize that you could never convert them to your way of life anyway. They are an intractable race. Any progress you advance to them will be undone before your back is turned. You might as well come down here to unbend the river. The point, then, is to observe the life they themselves have put in place and learn from it.a Marina felt remarkably unmoved by this. aSo go back in time, do it again: there is a child standing in front of you with a machete in her head. What do you do?a The farther they went down the river, the fewer boats they saw. From time to time there was still a group of people, mostly very small children, in clusters on the shore but they were thinning out. It felt good to ask a question twice. It was something she could never have managed in the past.
aThatas a dramatic flourish, Dr. Singh. Did I tell you the child had a machete in her head? I said she was cut. There was no doubt that she had a skull fracture. I picked out bone fragments with my tweezers but there was nothing else to be done about that. If she was draining cerebral spinal fluid she didnat do it in front of me. I sewed her up, I gave her some antibiotic ointment, hooray for me, now I can meet your expectations of decency, unless of course your expectations include my taking her back to Manaus for an X-ray. But the actions you admire are not thoughtful, they were automatic, the actions I had brought with me from my Western medical background. The question you should be asking is what would have happened to the girl if I hadnat been there? There was someone in the tribe who had managed these situations before me and I suppose that he, in this case it was a he, would have used the available means to help her. Would it have been a sterile needle? I think not. Would she have died? Very doubtful. And while you are moralizing, ask yourself this question as well: What happens to the girl whose brother cuts her after Iave gone? Does the tribe still have faith in the man who sewed up heads before me? Has he kept up with his own skills or was he too busy watching mine? I donat intend to be here forever.a aThe man who puts the girlas scalp back together, the one you are respecting, do you think his methods are as successful as yours?a aNow you are being purposefully ridiculous. I have very little respect for what passes as science around here. Thereas nothing a Westerner loves more than the idea of being cured by tinctures made of boiled roots. They think this place is some sort of magical medicine chest, but for the most part the treatments here consist of poorly recorded gossip handed down throughout the ages from people who knew very little to people who know even less. There is much to be taken from the jungle, obviouslya"I am here to develop a druga"but in most cases the plants are as useless as the potted begonia that grows on your kitchen windowsill. The ones that do have potential can only be medicinal when they are properly employed. For these people there is no concept of a dosage, no set length for treatments. When something works it seems to me to be nothing short of a miracle.a Marina remembered that cup of sludge Barbara Bovender had brought her from the shamanas stand and wondered if she was no more than a Westerner given to the charms of boiled tinctures. It was a cure she would never admit to now.
Dr. Swenson brightened for a moment. aIall tell you what the locals do have a real genius for, and thatas poison. There are so many plants and insects and various reptiles capable of killing a person out here that it seems any idiot could scrape together a compound that would drop an elephant. As for the rest of it, people survive regardless of the care they get. The human animal is too resilient for it to be otherwise. It is not for me to meddle.a aI appreciate your point. Itas only that I believe in the momenta"the child, the blooda"it would be hard not to act.a aThen perhaps it will actually open up some of my time to have you here. Iall send the daily medical emergencies to you.a Marina laughed at this. aThen I know theyad be better off with the local medical care. I havenat threaded a needle in nearly fifteen years.a Suddenly Marina realized she couldnat remember sewing up that last woman shead operated on. She remembered lifting out the infant, and at that instant realizing what she had done. She remembered one of the nurses taking him away, but what came after that? Where was the needle? She didnat leave the patient there, uterus and abdomen open to the world, but she could not find a picture in her memory of closing.
aIt comes right back,a Dr. Swenson said. aYou were my student. Believe me, I pounded it all in there.a Marina was still looking for the conclusion to the surgery in her mind when she had another thought. aWhat about Dr. Rapp?a aWhat about him?a aWouldnat he have sewn up the girlas head?a Dr. Swenson snorted. aHe most certainly would not have, and not because he wasnat a medical doctor. He had a perfect understanding of human physiology and the steadiest hands I have ever seen in my life. He could have grafted a vein by a campfire had he thought it was necessary. But Dr. Rapp had no self-aggrandizing notions about his role in the tribe. He never set himself out to be the great white hero. He never took a single specimen more than what was absolutely needed. He disrupted nothing.a aSo he would have let her bleed to death.a aHe would have respected the order that was in place.a Marina nodded, thinking perhaps she was luckier than she realized to have found herself with an expedition still capable of making errors of compassion. aIs Dr. Rapp still alive?a She might as well have asked if President Kennedy had survived his assassination attempt. aDo you read, Dr. Singh? Do you live in this world?a It was a beautiful question to be asked by a woman on a boat who was taking her down a river into the beating heart of nowhere. aI do,a Marina said.
She sighed and shook her head. aDr. Rapp died nine years ago. It will be ten years this August.a And Marina, sensing that sympathy was in order, said that she was sorry to hear it, and Dr. Swenson thanked her.
aWere you studying mycology at the time? Is that how you came to work with Dr. Rapp?a It seemed possible, after all; anything was possible. She may have been coming down here as an operative for the CIA.
aI was a student of Dr. Rappas, and the location of his classroom was unpredictable. I followed him through Africa and Indonesia, but the Amazon was the source of his most important work. He studied botany, and I was free to study the workings of a true scientific mind. As an undergraduate at Radcliffe I wasnat allowed to take his class at Harvard, Harvard couldnat have stood for anything as radical as that, but Dr. Rapp let me travel on the expeditions. He was the first teacher I encountered who saw no limitations for women. As it turned out he was the only one.a They were quiet for a long time after that, both staring off at different aspects of the jungle as it rolled past them, the same bit of scenery recycled indefinitely. Two hours later, Easter left the protection of the right-hand bank and crossed the width of the Negro to the left. There he turned up a tributary that was in every way similar to the countless other tributaries they had passed, and while it was unmarked, it was the exit ramp from the interstate, the one that would eventually take them to the street where Dr. Swenson lived. No other boats followed them though the entrance was wide at the mouth. In a matter of minutes the nameless river narrowed and the green dropped behind them like a curtain and the Negro was lost. Marina had thought that the important line that was crossed was between the dock and the boat, the land and the water. She had thought the water was the line where civilization fell away. But as they glided between two thick walls of breathing vegetation she realized she was in another world entirely, and that she would see civilization drop away again and again before they reached their final destination. All Marina could see was green. The sky, the water, the bark of the trees: everything that wasnat green became green. All in green my love went riding.
Dr. Swenson announced that lunch was now in order. aThe boy deserves a break. He stands up there so rigid that I think he would shatter if a nut hit him just right. There is no way of communicating that one should relax, do you realize that? You can shake out your arms and swivel your neck and it all looks like nonsense.a Dr. Swenson put her hands on her thighs and pushed up but she did not stand. She was thicker around the middle than she had been in Baltimore and the weight and the long time sitting seemed to keep her tied to her case of hash. Dr. Swenson, so far as Marina could calculate, would be in the neighborhood of seventy. It was possible at this point that even Dr. Swenson was tired. Marina stood up and extended her hand. Dr. Swenson rubbed her knees for a minute, looking pointedly away, then she took the hand. aThank you for the assistance,a she said. She stood up and then let Marina go. aThese are different days. For all I know about the body this is still not what I expected.a She went over and tapped Easter on the shoulder, then made a turning motion with her wrist and pointed to the shore. He nodded, keeping his eyes ahead. aHe wonat go in right away,a Dr. Swenson said, coming back to where Marina was standing. aThereas a spot he likes where he can tie up to a tree. The anchor makes him nervous. Itas not reliable. Once he dropped it off and we had a devil of a time getting it back in the boat. Thereas a lot for an anchor to get caught on in this river.a Marina looked over the side of the boat. She couldnat even imagine it. aHow long have you been coming out here?a aDr. Rapp first found the Lakashiaa"Dr. Swenson craned back her head, looked towards the tops of the treesa"ait was fifty years ago, I suppose. I was on that trip, standing right on the stage of history. I remember coming down this very river for the first time. It was a glorious day. I had no idea that I would be coming back for the rest of my life.a aIt doesnat seem that anything much has changed,a Marina said, looking to the riverbank and the straight wall of plant life, not a single person on the shore now, not a hut, a boat, in any direction.
aDonat be fooled by the scenery,a Dr. Swenson said. aThings were very different then. You didnat turn a corner and find a square mile of forest burned into a field. You didnat see the constant smoke the way you do now. And the Lakashi, even theyare different. They lose their skills as fast as the basin loses forest. They used to make their own ropes, they wove cloth. Now even they manage to buy things. They cut down two or three trees and tie them together, float them to Manaus and sell them, thatas enough money for kerosene and salt, a river taxi ride back home, maybe some rum if they can strike a good deal, but for the most part they are terrible at dealing. They pick up clothing in town, the very junk that Americans drop off at the Salvation Army box. One time when I was visiting, this was years ago, the tribal elder, a man they called Josie, met me at the dock wearing a Johns Hopkins T-shirt. I had left my class at Hopkins that morning and flown to Brazil and taken a boat down a half a dozen splitting rivers only to be greeted by a Johns Hopkins T-shirt.a She shook her head at the memory of it. aDear God, he was proud of that shirt. He wore it every day. In fact he was buried in it.a aSo you would teach all week and see patients and then fly down here on the weekends?a aNot every weekend, nothing like that, though if there had been enough time or enough money I might have. There was so much work to do down here. I would leave late Thursday night after my last class. I only had office hours on Friday, and I didnat keep office hours. I never believed in them. Questions are for the benefit of every student, not just the one raising his hand. If you donat have the starch to stand up in class and admit what you donat understand, then I donat have the time to explain it to you. If you donat have a policy against nonsense you can wind up with a dozen timid little rabbits lined up in the hall outside your office, all waiting to whisper the same imbecilic question in your ear.a Marina clearly remembered being one of those same Friday rabbits herself, waiting for hours in the chair beside the office door until another student coming down the hall had the decency to explain that she was waiting for nothing. aThe department chair didnat mind that you didnat keep hours?a Dr. Swenson lowered her chin. aDid you attend parochial school as a child, Dr. Singh?a aPublic,a Marina said. aAnd so you came back on Sunday and taught Mondayas class?a aIt was a red-eye coming back. Iad land Monday morning and have the taxi take me straight to campus.a She stretched her arms overhead, the straying springs of her white hair reaching out in every direction. aI never looked my best on Mondays.a aI never noticed,a Marina said.
aThatas one thing I have to give to your Mr. Fox: he made it possible for me to stay down here and do my work. I canat say I am undisturbed, as he makes every effort to disturb me himself, but I am free of the madness that comes from trying to conduct meaningful research when your subjects are in another country. Iave been down here full time for ten years now. The first three years I pieced together grants but the constant search for funding was more time consuming than flying back and forth to teach. There wasnat a major pharmaceutical company in the world that wouldnat have been willing to foot the bill for this but in the end Vogel won. I give credit where creditas due.a Easter slowed the boat and then put it in reverse, which, with their forward momentum, achieved a sort of churning stillness. He steered it into what appeared to be a slight indentation in the solid wall of trees and then took the rope that was already in his hand and flung it over a branch that hung out over the water at a better angle than all the other branches.
aWell, that worked out nicely,a Marina said when the rope was safely caught. She would rather talk about branches and rope than her Mr. Fox.
aIt always works out well. Thatas Easteras tree. Thatas the one he waits for. He knows exactly where to go.a Marina made a slow circle. Thousands of trees, hundreds of thousands of trees as far as she could see on both sides of the river without a single clearing. Branches ad infinitum, leaves in perpetuity. aHe remembers one branch? I donat see how it would be possible to remember one branch.a From time to time a flock of birds would explode shrieking from the tangled greenery but the jungle looked so impenetrable that Marina couldnat imagine how birds were able to fly into it. How could one bird ever make its way back to the nest? How could Easter remember the best place to tie the boat?
aIt has been my observation that Easter remembers everything,a Dr. Swenson said. aWhen I said I believed that his intelligence may be above average I didnat mean it sentimentally.a Every act the boy performed was done with a graceful efficiency of movement: he shut down the engine, tied a knot, turned around to nod at Dr. Swenson.
aVery good!a she said, holding two thumbs up.
Easter smiled. The minute they were properly moored he became a child again, the one that Marina had first seen outside the opera house, the one Jackie had held in his arms. The boat was now the responsibility of the tree and for these moments he could be on his own. He pointed to the water and looked again to Dr. Swenson. She nodded, and as quickly as she could move her head he pulled off his T-shirt, showing them the smooth brown skin of his chest, the matchstick of his torso. He scrambled on top of two boxes of canned apricots and flying up and over the ropes that stood in place for a proper railing he launched his body rocket-wise, up and over, up and out, out and into the brown water with a resounding splash, his knees pulled up to his chest, his chin tucked in, his arms lifted up to the light. And then he was gone.
Marina was at the edge of the boat in two steps while Dr. Swenson made herself busy looking for something in a brown paper bag. The water was velvety, undisturbed by the weight of so small a boy. It didnat even trouble itself to give up a reflection the way most water would. There was nothing on the surface and nothing beneath it. aWhere is he!a Marina cried.
aOh, thatas part of the trick. He thinks heas scaring me to death. Thatas the big fun of it all.a Dr. Swenson rooted through a bag of loose items. aDo you eat peanut butter? Americans are all determined to be allergic to peanuts these days.a aI canat see him!a The water was as impenetrable as the earth itself. The boy had been swallowed whole, a minnow, a thought.
Dr. Swenson raised her head and, looking in Marinaas direction, she sighed. aThere is a great temptation to tease you, Dr. Singh. Your earnestness makes you very vulnerable to that, Iam sure. The child has the lungs of a Japanese pearl diver. Heall resurface two-thirds of the way across in a direct line with the boat.a She waited one count. aNow.a And up came the head of the boy who flipped his wet hair aside and raised his hand and waved. The light on the planes of his face made him golden. Even at this distance she could see his enormous inhalation before he dove again, this time kicking his legs up straight so that the light caught the pink soles of his feet before they disappeared. Marina sank down on the case of apricots, the place from which those feet had so recently catapulted, and she cried.
aPeanut butter and marmalade,a Dr. Swenson said, dealing out six slices of bread along the top of a box as if it were a poker game. She twisted closed the plastic bag with a piece of wire and picked up a battered knife with a long narrow blade. She stuck the blade into a jar of marmalade. aRodrigo got the Wilkins and Son. Now there is a man who knows how to keep his customeras business. One underestimates the pleasures of marmalade until one has been separated from it. Be sure to enjoy the bread. When this loaf goes thatas it, no more. It just doesnat keep. I bring back yeast and they bake some but it has almost nothing in common with the store-bought bread. This, I must say, is delicious.a She had thought he was dead, and as stupid as that was she could not control her imagination. Of course the boy could dive, could swim. He would come back in the boat and take them where they needed to go. How had she become so dependent on a deaf child in less than twenty-four hours? What in the world was she crying for?
aPull yourself together, Dr. Singh,a Dr. Swenson said, keeping her attention fixed on the even distribution of peanut butter over bread. aHeall be back on the boat in a minute and it will upset him greatly to see you carrying on. Heas a deaf child. He does everything to make you forget that, so it is your responsibility as the adult to remember. You canat explain to him why youare crying. I have not invented a sign with which to convey foolishness, so you cannot tell him you are just being foolish. Youall frighten him, so stop it.a Easter was on the surface now doing an extravagant backstroke and the sound of his splashing was soothing to both of the women in the boat. Using the same knife, Dr. Swenson cut the sandwiches into triangles and left them there on the box. aCome and get your lunch now,a she said to Marina. It was an imperative rather than an invitation.
Marina pressed her eyes against the sleeve of her shirt. aIt just scared me. Thatas all,a she said. Neither her voice nor her explanation sounded convincing.
aWe arenat even there yet,a Dr. Swenson said, and took a triangle of sandwich for herself. aYouare going to have to toughen up or as God is my witness I will put you on the shore right here. There are more frightening things in the jungle than a boy going swimming in a still stretch of river.a After Easter was back on the boat, as sleek and damp as a seal, and the sandwiches had been eaten (he handled the peanut butter jar with such gentle affection afterwards that Dr. Swenson consented to make him another), it was announced that there would be a nap. aSesta,a Dr. Swenson said, and clapped her hands. The Portuguese made it sound essential. aIt is said the sesta is one of the only gifts the Europeans brought to South America, but I imagine the Brazilians could have figured out how to sleep in the afternoon without having to endure centuries of murder and enslavement.a She tapped Easter and pointed to a low trunk in front of the steering wheel, then she closed her eyes and rested her head against her folded hands in a childas pantomime of sleep. Having his directions, the boy pulled two hammocks from the box and then set to clipping them onto poles beneath the shade of the boatas tarp.
aBefore I came to the jungle I didnat believe in napping,a Dr. Swenson said, choosing the hammock nearest the steering wheel for herself. aI thought of it as a sign of weakness. But this country could make a napper out of anyone. It is important to pay attention to what the body is telling us.a She settled herself into the long piece of fabric and when she leaned back and lifted up her feet the hammock swallowed her whole. Marina looked at her teacher, a low-hanging lump cocooned in striped cotton swaying from side to side, the energy of her lying down to rest creating motion. aGo to sleep now, Dr. Singh,a the muffled voice said. aIt will do your nerves a world of good.a It was as if Dr. Swenson had vanished from the boat, as surely as Easter had vanished from it when he went over the side. Marina watched the hammock until its motion had settled. It was a magic trick: wrap her in a blanket and sheas gone. The quiet that was left without her was layered, subtle: at first Marina heard it only as silence, the absence of human voices, but once her ear had settled into it the other sounds began to rise, the deeply forested chirping, the caw that came from the tops of trees, the chattering of lower primates, the incessant sawing of insect life. It was not unlike the overture of the opera in which the well-trained listener could draw forth the piccolos, the soft French horn, a single meaningful viola. She leaned out from the shadeas protection and looked into the sun. Her watch said two oaclock. Easter sat on the deck in front of one of the many boxes that made up their furniture, a ballpoint pen in his right hand. Marina touched the empty hammock and then pointed to him. She folded her hands together and rested her head on them.
Easter shook his head, pointed to her, the hammock. He closed his eyes and dropped his chin. When she only stood there watching him he pointed again, this time using the pen for emphasis. She was supposed to go in the hammock.