The two men blended into a sea of travellers on the pedestrian bridge into the Mexican town of Reynosa. A group of Policía Federal idled near the border crossing. At that moment, B.J. again asked Rafael what he did for a living. Without waiting for a reply, B.J. told Rafael, the last man on earth with whom he should have shared this confidence, that he was an auto parts salesman. “My first time south of the border, amigo. I’m heading for a trade show in Saltillo. I hear there’s good Mexican food there. Got any recommendations?”
Auto parts manufacture in Saltillo? Finally B.J. had Rafael’s full attention. He turned on the stunned salesman and shouted. All of his frustrations poured out in an incoherent bill of particulars that included his wife, his mother, cancer, water pollution, air pollution, black vines, Jamaican ale, selfish restaurant owners and houses on stilts.
The police overpowered Rafael and detained B.J. for good measure. They discovered the gun and ammunition in Rafael’s bag. He was thrown to the ground, handcuffed, picked up, and thrown down again. They dismissed the terrified salesman who, forsaking the conversational arts upon which his profession is built, returned home and took to his garden where he silently raised prize-winning bonsai trees until an untimely death six years later when struck by lightning in an elfin forest near San Luis Obispo, California.
The disposition of Rafael’s case hinged on Mexico’s revised gun laws. In 1998, the Mexican House of Representatives reduced the penalties to as little as a fine for an illegal handgun less than .380 caliber in size. But punishment was severe for larger weapons. Rafael’s Colt was a .45 caliber pistol, a fraction of an inch larger than the .380 caliber limit.
His day in court arrived after seven months’ pre-trial incarceration. “Your honor, the facts are incontrovertible!” the prosecutor boomed. “This man sneaked a weapon into our sovereign nation with the sole purpose of disrupting economic life through murder. Why else would he bring such a large gun?” The prosecutor laced his charge with the term, “economic terrorism” and swept aside any consideration of leniency. “And given the defendant’s long criminal history”—one arrest for trespassing—“I must beg this court to protect the people of Mexico and impose the maximum sentence.”
The magistrate complied and awarded the prosecutor a thirty-year sentence. Rafael’s new home was Penal del Altiplan. His new social circle included drug lords, corrupt officials, murderers, and political assassins. Three-foot reinforced walls, armored personnel carriers, and air patrols ringed the maximum-security facility.
When Marta learned of his confinement she appealed to her Congressional representatives and to the State Department. Their responses were uniform, crisp, and curt. Rafael Cruz had been convicted of a serious crime in a foreign country. The mighty resources of the United States would not be brought to bear on behalf of a terrorist.
Eva Rozen’s resources were another matter. She worked in secret, not only to keep her role from being discovered, but because the severity of the sentence affronted her private sense of honor. Her skills at jacking into secure databases and ghosting through foreign legal systems were not yet fully ripened and she could not set him free. She did, however, effect a transfer for Rafael to Isla Maria Madre, a minimum-security prison with a focus on genuine social rehabilitation.
This became Rafael Cruz’s home until the Great Washout.
12
HARVARD
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS
AUTUMN 2030
Marta Cruz was eager to begin the work-study project and ended her maternity leave and returned to Harvard a week earlier than expected.
She carried Dana in an infant carrier strapped to her chest as she walked across a green swath of grass to the columned entrance of the science building. Marta turned her face up to the sun and breathed the fresh morning air. Every leaf, flower, and blade of grass before her was in sharp focus. Marta felt that invisible tendrils emanated from each green point of life to touch her. It was a sequel to her parents’ vision, the twinned vines with a golden stalk emerging. The child she carried at her breast was the focus of this new transcendence. Dana gurgled in happy affirmation of Marta’s walking meditation.
Her reverie was short-lived. She entered the building, took an elevator to the fourth floor and found her way to the office that she would share with Eva. She’d planned to arrive before Eva and review her colleague’s work. Instead she found Eva lost in a holographic display of Marta’s own research files. How did Eva get her notes?
The office door snicked shut and Eva spoke without turning. “Didn’t expect you for another week.”
“What are you doing, Eva?”
“Harvesting data. Your research is central to our work and I need the notes.”
“But how did you get my notes?”
Eva turned and peered at Marta. “Nice baby.”
“A darling, although now I understand what sleep deprivation is all about. But—what are you doing with my notes?” Her voice took on an edge. The meditation in which she’d been wrapped was displaced by a growing annoyance.
“Just getting things organized. Soon as I finish, I’ll bring you up to speed. Good that you’re back early. There are a handful of flowers and plants that have properties that are hard to isolate but might be perfect for molecular assembly. Good stuff here, Mom.”
“But my notes were in my dataslate.” She spoke quietly so as not to disturb Dana but she felt her face flush with irritation.
“I copied your slate when we were on the way to the hospital. Didn’t take too long with the changes I made to my datasleeve.” Eva grinned, “I can jack just about anything with it.”
“You jacked my slate? Eva, that’s private. All you had to do is ask for my work and I’d have linked it to you. You didn’t have to jack me.”
Eva continued, as if Marta had not spoken. “Okay, here’s where we are. Out of the 141 plants in your catalog, there are three or four that hold promise for nanoassembly—”
Marta took in a deep breath and let it out. She repeated the cycle and then pinched her ear to stimulate the acupressure points that would lower her blood pressure. She said nothing more about Eva’s intrusion. It was time to compartmentalize in order to focus on her work.
The baby cried and Eva cooed. “Would you like to hold him?” Marta offered. “I could use a minute to stretch my back. If I push too hard, my JRA pushes back.”
Marta unslung Dana, checked his diaper, and then held him out to Eva. “Here—take him for a minute, will you?”
“Me? The maternal type?” But Marta could see something in Eva’s eyes. Curiosity? Admiration? She handed Dana to Eva who examined him at arm’s length. “He’s not going to pee on me or something?”
Marta chuckled. Don’t I just wish. “Don’t worry. He’s wearing diapers.”
“Great,” said Eva, “I really want to smell like a dirty baby bottom.”
But Eva’s gaze at Dana belied her words. Marta watched as her colleague crooned one of Gergana’s lullabies. Something wistful, then sorrowful, passed across Eva’s face. She cocked her head as if she’d heard something, and then turned back to the baby. Whatever memory had been evoked passed, and she embraced Dana. She held him and closed her eyes. Her face relaxed and for that moment, Marta thought that she saw another Eva, childlike, innocent. Which is the real Eva? she wondered, and thought for a moment about bibijagua. Was Eva the biting ant, destroyer of crops? Or was she the nurturer of the soil? Abuela said that both qualities live within a person. Marta could imagine both within Eva, but it was hard to imagine both coexisting in her.