Panama

by Shelby Hiatt

  This whole thing, canal construction and the hard labor, is a theatrical backdrop for what really concerns him: the tragedy played out by his people, corrupt government, corrupt king, wretched corrupt Church. The canal's nothing, the labor only a means to an end.

  The shacks in Lirio interest him, not the passage between the seas. It's what Harry talks about—the workers of the world, the all-powerful who run everything, the impoverished laborers making it possible. And in spite of my great marks in school and my interest in the larger picture, I know nothing about all this. Not in a firsthand visceral way. Federico may be aristocratic, but he knows the dirt and the toil better than I do by far.

  He gestures, runs his hand through his hair, frustrated.

  I still feel the heat hovering around my face and I hardly breathe.

  I try to take in what he says and I do hear it, but what's going through my mind is something else. It's a picture of the two of us, a couple, in our house with Mother and Father.

  There, the force field of rebellion coming off Federico doesn't fit, not in our quiet domestic scene.

  My parents never talk about such things. Large world issues concerning the poor aren't in our lives. We give money to the church, to schools, to special funds for disasters, but there is no outrage or passion in the giving. We do our part only to help those in need, the regular business of decency.

  We tithe but there's no emotion to it.

  A bloodied body with parts hanging by strips of skin is unknown to us. That's a newspaper headline or a blurred photo—it's not something in our lives.

  There's mildness in our giving, a sense of kindness and goodwill. Political fire is for the old world, Europe, and no closer than the pages of history books or the columns of the Canal Record.

  Federico goes on about events in Spain, and I realize I know only what Mrs. Ewing presses on us in class, which sticks in me long enough for a high mark on a test, then it's gone.

  The peasants of Spain aren't real, breathing human beings to me. Neither is the talk of war in Europe, though I've read about it. That's going to be thousands of miles away, fought between countries I'll never see by people I'm unlikely to meet. It will never involve Americans. I'm safe. I live on my Yankee island. I'm sequestered in my colonial Zone.

  "...we have to organize, force a change. It will take violence..." Federico's voice comes back and I make myself listen, come out of my dream, then he stops himself.

  He looks me in the eye and the distance between us is gone. I'm not imagining this. He is no longer unapproachable.

  He's human and I guess weakened by loss and grief, and I'm in the presence of that and, for a little while, inside it. My plan has worked better than I could have imagined. I'm right there with him and I'm softened into silence.

  Forty-Six

  Suddenly he smiles. "The Whitman..." Just that fast, back on Earth.

  I hold it up. "You gave it to me."

  "Ah, right."

  We're quiet. I feel small and dumb and silly again. Finally I say, "I have quite a bit to think about."

  "Good," he says and stands. Our intense little encounter is over but something lingers—the closeness of his mentor's death. How do you wash blood out of a wooden floor? Or out of your life?

  The usual pleasantries make no sense—we've gone too deep for that. No man—no human—has ever talked to me the way he has. Nobody's ever opened up to me like that.

  I walk to the screened door and he follows and holds it open. It's inky dark outside.

  "Isn't it dangerous out there for you?" he says.

  "I'm a worker," I say, and my old kidlike ways come back. I pull the hat down over my face, stuff my hair into it, and give him a sly smile.

  He looks me over. "I'm coming with you."

  ***

  We walk along the track and I attempt to explain what a tomboy is, to justify my getup and willingness to pose as a worker at night. "It's an American expression," I say, thinking he doesn't know it.

  "I've heard it in England," he says. "It's not considered bad or good, just a phase for certain young girls. But you are always ladylike at the Tivoli." Of course when I'm going to see him, I'm very much the lady.

  We don't say much more, just pass a couple of workers carrying bottles in a hapless stagger. Then a woman passes with a bundle on her head and two children clutching her skirt, silent, never giving us a glance.

  There's a heavy fragrance from the orchids hanging in the trees and clumps of orange flowers and amaryllis and wild lemon. I nearly trip on a vanilla vine. Federico reaches out and steadies me. I feel like a woman, not a kid helping Orville or Harry's androgynous pal. He steadies me and it's a natural movement between a man and a woman.

  Neither of us speaks. When we get to my house he says goodbye and watches while I climb the steps. I go in the porch door and look back. He gives me a nod from below and a little smile and then he walks away.

  It's still early and Mother asks where I've been.

  "Sitting on the steps, sketching." Concern about lying is the last thing on my mind.

  Forty-Seven

  We've crossed a line. I'm now something more than Federico's supplier of books.

  After the death of Miguel there's an understanding between us, but it's not the death that makes the change—it's talking about it with me.

  I read El Unico, which he respects. I share his emotion for the loss of his mentor. I suggest new books from our library I know he'll want to read. But for me it's no longer about books. Federico has become pure desire.

  True physical desire.

  It cooks my dreams—daydreams at school, reveries on the train, deep night dreams that wake me with their heat. This is the new world.

  Still, I move carefully with plans for our meetings, proceeding with secrecy outside my parents' awareness. I make sure they think I'm at some school event or with friends or neighbors when we meet.

  But we exchange books in open public places, never at his cabin, which is what I want. That would require some special arranging, and his thoughts, I'm fairly certain, are centered on his people, their rapacious government, and his anger at the Spanish Church—not on being alone with the American book-girl, no matter how much of a mind we are.

  ***

  A new idea. I go to Mother.

  "You know those events at the Ancon Women's Club?"

  "Yes?"

  "I think I'd like to attend a class."

  "Oh, well..." She perks up, misperceives me completely, thinks I'm interested at last in homemaking skills.

  She takes a list from a kitchen drawer that contains all the lectures the club has made available for Zoners. I sit down and study it, not the least bothered by how blatant and defiant my deception has become. It's a long list.

  Native Fruits and How to Prepare Them.

  Lace-Making and Mending.

  A Lecture on Japan: Its People, Its Music, Its Art and Literature.

  These are proper topics for intelligent conversation with which to snare a promising young man—I can see why Mother suddenly has hope.

  The Women's Club in Las Cascadas is offering a dance class, Cristobal offers Shakespeare, and our own Culebra has announced a dramatization: the Battle of Lexington in colonial garb.

  I study these—the meeting times, the content, the requirements—and the choice is simple: an art class. For my purposes it's just what I need.

  Sketching: one hour.

  Art appreciation: half an hour with comments by the instructor.

  Break: twenty minutes, snack and tea.

  Social hour: discussions of artwork.

  That's the hour I'm focused on, that last one. I'll never have to return to the class after the break and I won't be missed, because I can see it's all going to be talk and chatter, looking at one another's sketches and gossiping. Technically I'll be in art class, my whereabouts accounted for, not expected at home until later, when the class is over.

  That last hour is free. It will belong to me—a
nd to Federico.

  Forty-Eight

  The plan goes well. It becomes our regular meeting. Federico and I exchange books and talk after art class for more than an hour, but we're still formal. No more intense personal exchanges, not like the one about the death of Miguel. But we're much more at ease with each other. We discuss local labor issues, and he often mentions something he's heard from Spain. I quote El Unico. He quotes his fellow workers. But it's not personal, not intense.

  I make sure I wear a fresh white dress, ironed before class. Mother smiles, pleased the class is having such a good effect on me. My shoes are clean and my hair brushed smooth. She's happy. So am I.

  In the cool of the evening when we meet, Federico doesn't mention how I look, but he always gives me a quick once-over. It's unconscious, I think. He's always immaculate—his hair still damp from a shower, clean, simple workman's clothes. It's the best hour of my week, and I'm pretty much satisfied with the way it's going. Then, a month into the art-class meetings, it happens.

  "Thanks for letting me keep these so long," he says.

  "It's no problem." I give him two new volumes, he gives me the ones he's read.

  I ask about Miguel, hoping to get more personal, always trying for that. "Is someone taking his place for you?"

  "No, not really."

  I can tell he wants to talk about it, so I'm direct. "Can you do what he was doing? Carry on for him?"

  "I'm trying. We're a group, you know—there are many of us." He's walking me home at this point. "Movements are only as good as their leaders, and Miguel was the best." More walking.

  Somebody laughs somewhere. A rooster crows for no reason on top of a hill. There's a sound of blasting in the distance.

  "What is that?" I say.

  "It's not in the Cut—it's the main channel through Gamboa."

  "I've never seen it."

  He looks at me again, more than just a glance. I meet his eyes but I don't know what it means.

  "You should, you know. They're blasting trees." Still he looks at me.

  "I want to see it," I say.

  "Do you mean that?"

  "Of course."

  "Come on, then." He takes my hand and starts walking fast.

  He leads me along the Cut, not a word, very fast, determined, holding my hand so I'll stay with him. The first time we've touched—something I expected to be electric but it's only practical. We pass other couples walking slowly, enjoying the balmy evening. We hurry a quarter mile up the Cut to the clearing crews.

  I'm breathless when we get there, not a word exchanged the whole time. Then I can hardly believe my eyes.

  Forty-Nine

  Spread before us are hundreds of tree trunks that remain after the cutting of the forest, an ugly stubble across the acreage. I've never seen it before. A blasting gang made up of West Indians is chopping holes into the stubby trunks, hacking with axes, moving fast, never looking up, sweat flying off their bodies. Federico still holds my hand in a protective grip, not affectionate. He walks me through the men, saying, "Look at this."

  The workers hack away at a feverish pace and pay us no attention. As many as fifteen holes in a single trunk, put in two or three sticks of dynamite, add cap and fuse, then plaster it over with mud until all the holes are filled and they go on to the next trunk. We watch the furious work—hundreds of men surrounding us, hacking the trees and packing in dynamite, no talk, only hard labor.

  Federico holds my hand with the grip of a parent. He's excited, his eyes shining, darting across the men and the dynamite sticks bristling from the trunks. We watch for a time, then a work whistle sounds and everything stops.

  A pall drops over the whole area and the workers move off to the side. Federico squeezes my hand and pulls me away, forces me behind him, his glance still darting around the alien landscape.

  In moments the laborers come back carrying lit torches in each hand. They stand at the farthest row of loaded trunks and wait. "We'll run with them," Federico says and squeezes my hand again.

  I don't know what he means until it starts.

  A whistle sounds and workers run back in among the trunks, and we run with them. Each worker lights his fuses, some trunks so large they have sixty-five or seventy dynamite sticks, and they run from one row to the next, from tree to tree, lighting fuses as fast as they can, the two of us with them at the edge of the wave of men moving across the stubbled forest, torches dipping and flying from trunk to trunk. Then behind us the first trunks begin to blow.

  Chunks of trees fly into the air. Dirt rises and rains down. Red streaks the sky, and the men with us are still lighting the rows ahead.

  The blasts creep forward in a wave from behind, my heart is bursting out of my chest. Federico never lets go of my hand—he pulls me along while the drum booms send spinning chunks of wood sky-high—thunderous, magnificent, one after the other. We reach the end gasping for breath and turn and watch the advancing explosions move across the blackened terrain—irregular, massive, huge clumps of wood lifting into the sky, branches and dirt and more blasts, and then the last explosions and quiet. The air clears and the workers move back in—they aren't finished. They do this every night.

  Federico leads me to a grassy hill off to the side. He lets go of my hand and we sit and watch. The laborers gather the splintered wood and pile it into gigantic heaps. They douse the heaps with crude oil, waves of the acrid scent drift to us, then one by one they touch off the stacks and the bonfires flare, looping high into the sky with crackling, breaking sounds. Federico never once looks away. The hell roars boom in front of us. The closer fires snap and pop as they eat through the remaining wood.

  What I know of blasting is in the Cut where Father does his work, and it's mild compared to this—battalions of tripod and Star drills run by compressed air pounding and grinding and jamming holes into the rock, followed by gangs of powder men, always black, of course, with boxes of dynamite that they carelessly throw down and then pound the drill holes full of explosives. They blow at 11:30, when the men are at lunch, and at 5:30, when they've gone home—mighty explosions, twice a day in addition to the ongoing smaller ones that make our porch chairs rock and Mother's cakes fall and are heard out at sea.

  But this, the clearing of the woods, I've never seen, only heard about vaguely. It's not a difficult part of the dig and Father has never mentioned it. To me it's staggering. And I don't know why Federico has me sitting with him to watch it.

  Fifty

  The bonfires finally die down and still Federico stares at them. He's transported and pensive, somewhere else. Finally he takes a deep breath and turns to me.

  "What do you think?" A quaver in his voice.

  I shake my head, amazed, still breathless from running and the exhilaration of what I've seen. I smile, go serious, smile again, and shake my head in confusion. I don't know what he wants from me. "It's incredible," I say.

  He looks out over the scattered glowing embers and says, "I love it."

  "Why?"

  "It reminds me of home."

  I go quiet again and look at the blackened landscape. Can't quite imagine what he means. There's an occasional pop or breaking sound. The workers move along the periphery, black silhouettes striking at flaring spots along the edges and speaking to one another as workers do during the most common workday.

  Federico stands.

  He holds his hand out to me, not like a parent this time.

  I reach for him. His grip is soft and he keeps his eyes on my face.

  We start walking but not in a rush. He holds my hand gently. It makes me forget what we've just seen. I'm seventeen. Still in school. I'm on another planet.

  We pass other couples and workers along the way. When we're at the meadow in front of the Tivoli, he stops and we look back at the glow of diminishing fires.

  "It's beautiful," I say.

  He moves me against him and holds me. I feel him, his sex, between us and I don't pull away. He holds me a long while—it seems very long
—and I embrace him, embarrassed at the pounding of my heart that he must feel, embarrassed at not being more sophisticated.

  To the side is the gazebo belonging to the Tivoli but overgrown in disuse. The sagging structure stands a few yards off the path, almost hidden by weeds and completely abandoned. He leads us inside, pulls me to him again, and presses us together.

  He begins to reach in my clothes and I help, unbutton and unhook and he pulls me against him over and over. His breathing gets heavy and he lays me down and caresses me and makes love to me, trying to be gentle but needing it so much that toward the end he pleads softly, "Hold me ... hold me."

  I'm overwhelmed and my emotion is so powerful, I don't feel any discomfort of my own—there must be some. I'm only holding him and feeling how much he needs me. He needs me. Then I lie quiet in his arms and he shudders a last time, still holding me against him.

  I can't think of anything to say until I'm aware of the warm streak between us and think there might be some correct behavior about that.

  Finally he lifts himself and says, "Are you all right?"

  "Yes..." I take a stab at the right thing: "Are you?"

  A soft laugh comes out of him. "Yes." He wipes his shirt across my belly.

  "I know ... I know what to do," I say. A desperate attempt at sexual savvy.

  "You do?" He doesn't believe me.

  "Yes, don't worry." But I don't know what to do or how to behave—I don't know anything.

  We put our clothes back on and pull the weeds and grass from each other's hair and clothing—sexual camaraderie, like old friends. We stand and he runs his hands down my arms.

  "I'm all right," I say.

  We make our way through the vines that cover the gazebo and walk slowly along the track until we're at the steps to my house. He seems disturbed and says, "You have to be careful."