Sanibel Flats

by Randy Wayne White

  "That one monkey has a better arm than I do," Ford said to Tomlinson. Tomlinson was playing catch with him, handling the glove and throwing better than Ford had expected. He was pretty smooth; he'd played the game, which was another surprise.

  Tomlinson said, "What I don't understand is why you get a uniform and I don't." Like a child slighted, and now he was throwing harder as if to prove he had talent enough to deserve the gray double-knit suit with MASAGUAN PEOPLE'S ARMY emblazoned in blue on the front. "I played in high school, man. I played two years in college. I mean, this was my sport before I got interested in substance abuse."

  Ford said, "I'll give you my uniform if you promise not to get any hits off Rivera. No joke. Strike out if you can. But don't make him mad by getting a hit. We want to get this game over with fast, and then I'm going to have to ask him for a favor."

  "It's just that it seems a little arbitrary, putting me on a team without uniforms just because he doesn't like long hair. It's not in keeping with Marxist-Leninist philosophy to choose a ball team that way. How can the guy pretend to be a communist?" As if he hadn't even heard Ford. Still indignant, still throwing hard, Tomlinson was already being drawn onto competitive avenues, and Rivera wasn't even on the mound yet.

  "I'm surprised a Zen Buddhist could get upset about a game."

  "The Buddha woulda been a baseball fan, believe me."

  "Ah."

  "Baseball is more than a game, man. It's a ceremony."

  "Oh."

  "All the people who have ever played baseball are linked by virtue of having dealt with predictable game situations in unpredictable ways, each person trying to resolve random events within an orderly sphere of balls, strikes, and outs—"

  "Boy oh boy."

  "Plus there's the scorebook: a historical document more accurate and succinct than, say, the Old Testament. All these thousands and thousands of scorebooks all over the world forming an unbroken ceremonial chronicle far more detailed than, say, Ireland's Book of Kells—"

  "Tomlinson, all we want to do is finish the damn game without offending Rivera. He's a baseball fanatic. He takes it very seriously."

  "Well, I'll try . . . but I'll feel like a heretic."

  Tomlinson didn't have to try too hard to look bad, nor did anyone else on the opposing team: a ragtag bunch of teenagers and men in khaki who played with enthusiasm but not much skill.

  Rivera could pitch. He'd lost some velocity on his fastball, but it still moved; still tailed in on right-handed hitters. He had a fair curve, a split-fingered sinker, plus his new pitch, the one he said he had invented, a one-fingered knuckleball he threw side-armed so that it broke like a screwball. He presented an imposing figure on the mound, too: six feet tall, probably two twenty, bushy black beard and in full uniform except for the fatigue cap he always wore, lighting a fresh El Presidente cigar between each inning. In a potential strikeout situation, Rivera would call Ford out to the mound. "You probably do not realize it," he would say, "but this man at the plate hits as well as the great George Brett." Ford would look back to see some stringy kid who didn't look old enough to drive. "Watch how I handle Señor Brett." Then he would kick back and strike the kid out looking. Another hitter was as good as Pete Rose. Another was as powerful as Mantle. Tomlinson reminded him of the great DiMaggio. Rivera struck them all out, using the knuckleball, lost somewhere between fact and fantasy like a child playing alone in the backyard, winning the World Series in the last of the ninth on this remote jungle field.

  Doubling as umpire, Ford moved the game along as quickly as he could, giving Rivera every close call. But he still found pleasure in being behind the plate, calling pitches, blocking low stuff, talking to the hitters. The knuckleball was hard to handle, especially on third strikes, and his concentration drew him deeper into the game, like a kid again, for Tomlinson was right in a way: a world seen through the bars of a catcher's mask is timeless, unchanging, and for those few innings Ford became a creature whose life had been interrupted by nothing more than twenty-five years of passed balls and stolen bases. Better yet, he hit two singles and a double, driving in three runs.

  Going into the top of the seventh, Rivera had walked four but had a no-hitter going, and Tomlinson came up with two out.

  "It's rally time," Tomlinson was saying, swinging three bats like he meant business. "No more Mister nice guy. Rivera has a ten-run lead and one little hit can't hurt."

  Ford said in a low voice, "He'd be happier with a no-hitter. Let's try and keep the general happy."

  "Doc, I got my own integrity to consider. I really think I can tee off on this guy."

  Ford thought for a moment, then said, "Okay. Maybe you're right. Hit away."

  Tomlinson did, too; caught a tailing fastball fat and drove it deep, but not deep enough. The centerfielder tracked it to the camouflage netting, which had now become the outfield fence, leaped and made a nice catch, stopping the home run and saving the no-hitter. Rivera seemed to love the moment of suspense more than anyone; got Tomlinson in one of his affectionate bear hugs, leading him back to Ford at homeplate, saying "It took the great DiMaggio to solve the mystery of my fastball, but even he did not solve it entirely!" delighted with the last out of his no-hitter. Ford told the general he had pitched a superb game and that he was anxious to communicate the information to his friend with the Pittsburgh Pirates, but first he had important business in Masagua. And Rivera, who was speaking English to Tomlinson, talking baseball, said to Ford in Spanish, "If there is any way I can hasten the completion of your assignment, you need only ask. You did not tell me this hippie friend of yours is not only a great baseball player but also a student of the game. He knows almost every statistic for all of those who have pitched for the Red Sox of Boston!"

  Four hours later, after Ford had bathed and eaten and slept, he walked out of his tent to see Rivera and Tomlinson—both of them in uniform now—still talking baseball, sitting beneath a tree while howler monkeys rattled the limbs above.

  Rivera said Ford's plan to rescue the kidnapped child might work, but it was also very dangerous. "You do not know this man Julio Zacul. You do not understand him. If he does not believe your story he will have you killed. You will get no second chance. I am not a selfish man but, if you are killed"—Rivera made an empty, open-handed gesture—"who will tell the third-base coach with the Pirates of Pittsburgh about the great no-hitter pitched by me?" Smiling, but not kidding; actually concerned about Ford's scouting report.

  They were sitting at a table outside Rivera's tent. The sun was behind the mountain and they talked in the fresh wind of the coming daily rainstorm, speaking in English for Tomlinson's benefit while orderlies took the dinner dishes away. The camouflage netting had been rolled from the clearing and several hundred of Rivera's men performed marching drills, their foot cadence echoing through the trees. Rivera watched his men as he talked, taking pleasure from their discipline, taking pleasure in the cigar he had just lighted.

  He said, "Julio Zacul could have been one of my most gifted lieutenants—not most trusted, mind you. Most gifted. He came to me straight from the University of San Cristobal in Peru, an outstanding engineering student who said he was prepared to give his life to the revolution. This was six, perhaps seven years ago. Yes, this is the way he looked in those days." Rivera picked up the photograph Herrera had provided Ford, studied it for a moment, then spun it back onto the table. The Julio Zacul of college days looked neither like a guerrilla leader nor a killer. He had a lean, aesthetic face that was slightly feminine with long lashes, high soft cheeks, and dark eyes that looked neither fierce nor menacing, just bored, as if he wanted the photographer to hurry up and finish. It was one of those gaunt, good-looking faces out of an Arrow Shirt ad; a young man already in control who was anxious to get started; anxious for more.

  Rivera said, "He has changed since then, of course. He is heavier by seven or eight kilos. His hair is longer, almost to his shoulders, but still very black. He has a scar here." Rivera touched his
cheek, making a crooked line. "But he still has that soft look, like a child or a girl nearing her readiness. Though I am a man of the world, it is a thing that always bothered me, that softness in his face, like a young woman. He came to my camp with a half-dozen of his friends from the university, all enthusiastic about the revolution. He was so obviously the leader that I immediately trained him as an officer. Within six months he commanded his own company with these six friends as his subordinates. They lived together, Zacul and these men. That they were more than friends soon became evident, but, as I said, I am a man of the world and such relationships trouble only small minds. Zacul led his company brilliantly, though neither he nor his subordinates were courageous fighters. They preferred the techniques of terrorism, the coward's way. I would have banished him from my camp when I first realized this, but I had no choice. I needed men." Rivera looked at Ford. "You may remember that six years ago was a time of much fighting, much ugliness in this country."

  Ford said, "Yes. I was in South America at the time, but I remember."

  Rivera nodded as if he could hold Ford responsible, but chose not to. "It was during that fighting that I began to hear stories about Zacul and his men. War is not a pretty thing and all of us involved in war have done things we would rather not discuss. Someone once said that an immoral act is anything we feel bad about afterward. That is not true. I have often felt bad after doing things that needed to be done. In my mind, an immoral act is anything that makes us feel shame. I have never been ashamed of the things war demanded I do. I have felt bad about them, but I have never felt shame. But there were things that Zacul and his men did that made me feel ashamed. Many things—in the way he tortured prisoners, in the way he dealt with the women of the enemy, in the way he dealt with the enemy's children. When I finally confronted him with these stories, he laughed at me. He called me a weak old man. He called me this in front of many of my people." Rivera signaled to the orderly, handed him his empty coffee cup, and asked for beer.

  Ford was trying not to smile. "What happened after you hit him?"

  Rivera shrugged. "You are right. I did hit him. He has the look of a woman and he is a coward, but his men were watching.

  There was a fight, of course. His men stayed out of it because my men would have killed them. It was a long fight and very painful. Zacul left with the scar I have described. It was nearly a week before I could hold a baseball. I was surprised to hear later that he lived." Rivera looked at Tomlinson. "He was not a fan of the game. He refused to play because he said the game originated in the United States."Tomlinson had been following along attentively. "Hell no, a guy like that wouldn't play. This Zacul sounds like the original conehead to me."Rivera said, "I have not seen him since that day, nor his six friends. It is a matter of pride that very few other men followed him. His soldiers hated him. He used fear to command. Since that time, though, he has gathered many other troops so that now the strength of his army equals mine. Zacul is the only reason that I am not now sitting in the Presidential Palace in Masagua. I know I must first defeat him. He knows that he must first defeat me. We both wait like great cats, gauging the other before we stalk the prey. I am confident, though, that my army will prevail. We have always performed with honor on and off the field of battle. But Zacul does not know the meaning of the word. Fate will play a hand, do not doubt. We will emerge victorious. Soon I will live in Masagua City, in the Presidential Palace. I will be the servant of my people."

  "As a communist," Ford said. He was not smiling now, holding the fresh beer the orderly had brought.Rivera did not reply for a moment. Then he said, "Have you watched my men marching? Have you seen how they are armed?"Ford had, of course, noticed. Many of them carried Soviet weaponry, but older arms: AK-47s with the scythe clips and wooden stocks, plus odds and ends of other eastern bloc ordnance.Rivera said, "There was a time when the Soviets gave me their full support. Now it is Zacul's men who carry their new weaponry. I do not know how he won their attention, but it doesn't matter. Other than that, I will say no more to you about my intentions. Understand, you are my friend, but you also once worked for a government that may even now be planning my destruction. Perhaps you still do."

  That raised Tomlinson's eyebrows; he looked at Ford quizzically as Ford said, "No, I don't—but you have no way of knowing for sure. I understand that. But your intentions are important because, in asking you to help, we'll also be helping you. I don't care anything about politics. You know that. But I'm not politically unaware."

  "If I enter the Presidential Palace," Rivera said carefully, "it will not be as a puppet. Besides, communism is dead in the Soviet Union. Perhaps it is dead all over. It is a truth that brings me great sadness." He paused. "This much I will tell you even though I truly do not see how you can be of help. "

  "I think I know where Zacul's main camp is."

  "So you have said. But it is a thing I often hear. Besides, why do I need to know where Zacul hides when he and his army know so well where my camp is?"

  "Your plan is to wait until he attacks you?"

  Rivera made a sweeping gesture. "Look around and you will see my plan. Look around and you will see the mountains that protect us. On each mountain we have built an observation tower. In each tower is a man with a radio who communicates with my headquarters. If Zacul tries to attack us here, we will destroy his army as it comes up the mountain. And he surely will try to attack. He is an impatient man."

  Ford said, "You're the one who spoke of his intelligence. You think he'd try such a thing if he felt he would fail? When he comes, he'll be prepared. Maybe his friends, the Soviets, will provide him with planes and helicopters. The mountains aren't going to help you much if Zacul has enough helicopters."

  Rivera sat silently for a time contemplating his beer. He had plainly already considered the possibility, and it troubled him. Ford said, "Zacul knows you're a patient man. He knows you'll wait. But every day you wait, you give Zacul more time to prepare for a successful assault on your camp. "

  Rivera looked at him. "It is possible."

  "It's probable."

  "Yes, probable. So what do you propose as an alternative?"

  Ford took out the map of Masagua, the one with Zacul's probable camp location marked, and spent fifteen minutes outlining two specific strategies. When he was done, Rivera remained hunched over the map. Tomlinson stirred uncomfortably when Rivera said, "You are not talking about a battle, here." He looked at Ford, and spoke in Spanish. "This is an assassination."

  Ford could not sleep that night; could not sleep, probably, because he was anxious to be gone. He was anxious to find out if Rafe's son was still alive, anxious to be done with this business in Masagua so he could get back to Sanibel, his stilt house, his work, and the life that he had once hoped would be simple and without encumbrances. That simple life, the one recommended by Thoreau, was an unrealistic goal, though—not that he had ever wanted it; not really. He had wanted a simpler life, not a simple life, but now even that was proving impossible. In a modern world, only a person who was absolutely selfish could live an absolutely simple life, and only a hermit could live free of the personal and moral obligations inherent in taking one's own existence and the existence of others seriously.

  Tomlinson would have something to say about that; yeah, Tomlinson could spend an hour talking about the obligations of existence.

  Ford stood in the darkness beneath a huge guanacaste tree. He wore khaki fishing shorts and the blue chambray shirt. It was cool after the evening rain. The moon was up, and there was the smell of burning wood: the cooking fires of the soldiers. He had a small flashlight, and he walked from the line of tents toward the dense foliage bordering the cloud forest. There was a copse of wild plantain trees, with their large bananalike leaves and bizarre, colorful inflorescences, growing above a pool that was the confluence of several mountain rivulets. Touched by the flashlight's beam, each big leaf became a separate and living entity, each leaf the possible host or habitat of a variety of inse
cts and animals, and Ford studied the leaves, trying to relax. The best way to see the jungle, he knew, was from above; the best way to learn about it, though, was from below, one leaf at a time, because each plant was a microcosm of the great green whole.

  By crouching he could see up and inside one of the plantain leaves, and there was a colony of small bats roosting: disk-winged bats, their leathery wings pulsing with the regularity of lungs. The sudden light stunned them for a long instant and then they were gone in a panic, their eerie shapes silhouetting against the moon. The leaf that had held the bats leaned out over the water, and Ford placed his foot at the edge of the pool so he could get a closer look. There were beetles feeding on striations of the leaf, some kind of heliconia-feeder, but Ford didn't know which kind. Nearby, frogs began to trill again, and Ford used the flashlight to find them: red-eyed and brown tree frogs. It was the mating season, and several of the females had smaller males clinging to their backsides. That made Ford search for something else, and it didn't take him long to find the glutinous deposits of frog's eggs stuck to the undersides of the leaves. Some of the eggs had already matured into tadpoles, and the viscid masses hung in the light like icicles, dripping life into the water below . . . where two—no, four—cat-eyed snakes waited, feeding on the globs of tadpoles in a frenzy.

  Ford watched the snakes feeding, taking an odd pleasure in knowing that this same drama was going on all around him; the same cycle of copulation, birth, and death; the same earnest theater being played out by jaguars, dung flies, tapirs, leaf-cutter ants, crocodiles, boas, and men throughout the millions of acres of jungle darkness.

  A twig snapped behind him and Ford turned to see Juan Rivera standing in the shadows. He was bare chested and smelled of soap, as if he had just finished showering. Behind him, the face of a teenage Mayan girl peered out through the flap of Rivera's tent. She called the general's name softly, but her voice had the flavor of a command.