Aragon tried to imagine the effect of this kind of social life on the Hollywood Freeway. After the initial chaos it might be quite pleasant for those who weren’t going anywhere in a hurry.
Zalamero said anxiously, “You won’t tattletale the agency in the U.S. about the oil and tires?”
“No, but you should be more careful.”
“Yes, yes, yes, you bet I will be. I will personally inspect every part of every car every day.”
“Your social life is bound to suffer.”
“You’ve convinced me I have a duty to my customers. Besides, I can talk while I inspect. All Zalameros can do two things at once... How soon will you bring the car back?”
“A week, perhaps less.”
“Go with God.”
“Thanks.”
He paid a deposit on the Ford and a week’s rental in advance. It was nearly two o’clock when he started the engine.
For about twenty kilometers beyond Rio Seco the road continued to be fairly good. Then gradually it began to deteriorate, as if the surveyors and the foreman and the key workers had lost interest and dropped out, one by one.
The traffic was heavier than Aragon had expected but still sparse: dilapidated pickups and compacts and subcompacts with Mexican license plates, and newer vehicles mostly from the Western states, vans, trucks with cabover campers and complete houses on wheels like Dreamboat. The road hadn’t been built with Dreamboats or highway speeds in mind. It was narrow, the curves were poorly banked and the roadbed inadequately compacted. Drivers accustomed to American standards of engineering took the curves and unexpected dips too fast in vehicles that were too wide and heavy. The accident rate, according to a safety pamphlet distributed on the plane by an insurance company, was extremely high.
He began to understand why his rented Ford looked old for its age. Sand blew across the roadway from the low barren hills to the east and the coastal dunes to the west, pitting the car’s finish and burrowing its way through the closed windows. At times it was so fine and white that it swept past like a blizzard of talcum powder. Aragon could feel it clinging to the roof of his mouth and the membranes of his nose. It scratched the inside of his eyelids and mixed with the sweat of his palms on the steering wheel to form a sticky film of clay. The cars and vans and campers heading north were suddenly all white. They passed like ghosts of accidents. A few kilometers farther, the powder turned to sand again.If I were going in the opposite direction, I’d be halfway to San Francisco by now. Laurie might manage a couple of days off and we could splurge and stay at the Clift. Just stay. No night clubs, no theaters, no fancy dinners...
He braked to avoid a jackrabbit leaping across the road. Except for an occasional gull soaring overhead, the rabbit was the only sign of wildlife he’d seen. It was an inhospitable countryside. Clumps of creosote bushes and spindly spikes of cholla were the main vegetation, with here and there some mesquite or a palo triste like a billow of grey smoke.
Just short of two hundred kilometers the landscape suddenly changed, indicating the presence of fresh water and some kind of irrigation system. Fields of beans and chili peppers alternated with groves of palm trees. An abandoned sugar mill overlooked a scattering of adobe houses with children playing outside, and chickens and goats and burros wandering loose among them. This, according to a sign on the gas pump where Aragon stopped, was the village of Viñadaco.
The gas pump was operated by an entire family. While the man filled the tank, his wife cleaned the front windshield and a couple of small girls cleaned the back. A boy no more than five wiped off the headlights with the torn sleeve of his shirt while two teenagers lifted the hood and stared expertly at the engine without doing anything. They were mestizos, half-Indians, copper-skinned and thin-featured, with black eyes and straight black hair. Their solemn dignity reminded Aragon of Violet Smith.
He asked the woman for directions to Bahía de Ballenas.
“Nobody goes there.”
“I do.”
“But the road turns the other way towards the gulf. And it’s late, it will soon be dark. You might get stuck in the sand or lost.”
They were valid reasons but not the real one: she happened to have a vacant cabin which she rented out to tourists. Nothing fancy, of course, no running water or electricity, but a nice clean bed. For this nice clean bed the asking price was about the same as for a suite at the Beverly Hilton. The señora admitted that the price was high, but she didn’t offer to change it and Aragon didn’t argue. It was Gilly’s money. If she wanted to come down here and haggle over it, let her. He was tired and hungry.
He ate at the nearest place, a shoebox-sized cafe overlooking a pond where a dozen or so coots were floating on the water and foraging on the banks. When he was a child he’d often eaten coot, which his mother called black mallard. This sounded better but didn’t improve the taste or texture. As he ate the machaca he was served, a kind of hash, he tried to identify its contents. Coot maybe, dried goat meat probably, and chilis unmistakably, the small green innocent-looking kind that lit up his mouth and throat and brought tears to his eyes to put out the fire. Dessert was a dish of fried beans and a cactus fruit with sweet juicy pulp. He drank two bottles of beer and bought two extra to take with him in case his teeth were extra dirty.
He returned to the gas pump and the Viñadaco Hilton. The señora had left a kerosene lamp burning for him, and a basin with a pitcher of water and two small towels. After he’d stripped and washed he sat down to drink some beer. Almost immediately he discovered that the Viñadaco Hilton had one other thing which the Beverly Hilton didn’t — mosquitoes. The first bite coincided with the first twinge in his stomach. He went to sleep trying to remember some of the things Laurie had urged him to take along — antibiotics... head lice... tooth beer... Laurie, I miss you...
He woke up at dawn. So did every man, woman, child and beast in the village. Children chanted, donkeys brayed, roosters crowed, dogs barked. Aragon got up and opened the door. The sun was shining and a cool moist wind was blowing steadily in from the sea. It was the kind of day he wanted to rush out to meet.
During the night the señora’s conscience must have been bothering her: she appeared at the door with a cup of coffee and two tortillas rolled up with guava jelly and a pot of hot water.
“Are you hungry?”
“Yes.”
“And you want hot water. Why do Americans always want hot water?”
“To shave.”
“You have hardly anything to shave. And who is going to see you in that forsaken place? I’ve never been there myself but I hear the people are very dark-skinned and ignorant.”
While he shaved she gave him directions to Bahía de Ballenas and even borrowed his pen to draw him a little map. He didn’t put much faith in the map — she held the pen as though it were the first one she’d ever used.
Also during the night someone — probably the two teenaged boys who were now leaning casually against the gas pump — had washed the Ford. He appreciated the gesture, but unfortunately the car was now parked in the middle of a large puddle of water. He took off his shoes and socks, waded through the puddle and climbed in behind the wheel. His feet felt pleasantly refreshed. People checking out of the Beverly Hilton might have their cars waiting at the front door, but they didn’t get guava jelly tortillas, farewell footbaths and all the fresh air they could breathe.
He stopped at the café where he’d eaten dinner the previous evening and picked up a dozen bottles of beer. If the señora’s prediction came true and he was going to get lost, he might as well do it in style. He was on a little dirt road a couple of miles south of Viñadaco when he stopped to consult the map and discovered that the señora had neglected to return his pen. He might ask for it on the way back, assuming he arrived at any place to come back from. Or, better yet, he would put it down as a business expense, Gilly’s small and undoubtedly grudging contribution toward international relations. She was, in her own words, pretty tight with a buck.