Randy White - Night Vision

There was no rush, no need for more complicated sexual maneuvering. I could luxuriate in what was to be. I’m no romantic, but I do love women. Hidden beneath a cotton blouse, bound by elastic, what would Emily’s breasts look like unveiled in the back-bay light of my bedroom? Her hips, her thighs… and what subtleties of layered coloring in the lady’s shadowed triangle?

“Did you hear what I said, Doc?” Emily asked, nudging me. “You just disappeared on me. Where’d you go?”

I noted the lady’s intuitive smile, which told me she knew full well where my mind had gone-probably because her mind had been there, too.

Yes, I was right, because she turned to a subject that had all the freeing implications of seeing the bones of a dead woman’s hand. The bawdiest of sexual behavior can be excused-even celebrated-by reflecting on unexpected tragedy, the inevitability of death.

As I had told Emily: People do whatever it takes to justify pleasure by manipulating our own guilt.

“I was thinking about the Guatemalan girl,” she said. “I asked if you’d read the story in the Naples Daily News last week. It was about human trafficking. I’m interested because I joined the Florida Coalition Against Human Trafficking. I’ve been to only two meetings, but I’d like to get a lot more involved.”

I said, “A biologist doing social work?”

“I can’t think of a better cause.”

I said, “When I put that together with you new car, it suggests to me you’re wealthy. Isn’t that an oxymoron? Wealthy biologist?”

“Normally about now,” she smiled, “I would get very self-righteous and ask what money has to do with a social conscience. But you guessed right, our family has money. My father did well for himself. Maybe I should have mentioned it. He’s an ornithologist.”

I replied, “A wealthy bird-watcher. Another oxymoron.”

“Oh, that is the least of the mysteries about my dad,” the woman said, giving my a searching look. “He gets a big kick out of telling people that bird-watching was an inexpensive hobby-as long as you had a passport and your own private jet.”

I was struck by the mix of her inflections. Emily said it in a joking way, but she also seemed to be baiting me with information that invited further investigation.

Because I couldn’t discern her purpose, however, I dodged the temptation. “So your paternal family has money,” I said.

Emily replied, “My grandfather left me a trust fund when I turned twenty-one. Not a ton of money but enough. Paul had a problem with that. He’s a nice man. He really is. But he has ego issues. Would you have a problem if your wife had a lot more money than you?”

I found the word “wife” startling so shrugged and dodged that question, too. “The human-trafficking thing,” I said, “I’ve always had an interest. Probably because I worked in Central America for several years. I spent some time in Africa, too. Tell me what you know.”

A moment later, I had to ask, “Why are you smiling?”

“Because you’re funny,” Emily said. “The way you guard your secrets by asking questions. Your interest is real, though-that’s makes it okay for some reason. You care about people. I can tell. By the way, you left out the time you spent in Southeast Asia and Indonesia and a bunch of other places, too.”

Before I could reply, the woman told me, “I know more about you than you realize-including all the traveling. I already told you, I’ve read your research papers. In your writing, the really interesting stuff is always between the lines. Like when Tomlinson mentioned the smell of oil in your lab. I recognized it. I know what kind of oil it is. Do you want me to tell you?”

It was gun oil and specialized solvent. Tomlinson had surprised me by mentioning it. He had never mentioned it before.

“The pumps and aerators in my lab require special lubricants,” I said. “There’s no mystery about that.”

Emily replied, “Really?” to let me know that she was aware that I was lying. “You became sort of a hobby of mine, Dr. Ford. Paul embarrassed me so bad this morning when he mentioned it-which was precisely what he intended to do. Not that there’s a lot out there about you. Only two photos. That’s all I could come up with on the Internet. And I’m pretty damn thorough when I get on a research binge. Does that bother you?”

“Money and the attention of a beautiful woman,” I said, turning to face her. “Why would that bother anyone?”

“I’m not beautiful,” Emily said, her face tilting suddenly downward. “You don’t have to say that. We’re both pragmatists. People like us prefer the truth. I might be handsome on a really good day, but I’m not beautiful. I never have been. So there you are. I came to terms with it long ago.”

I replied, “I’ll be the judge of what’s beautiful and what isn’t. If you don’t mind.”

The woman hesitated, wondering if I was going to kiss her. She gave it a moment, looking into my face, then she took my hand and tugged. Suddenly we were returning to my stilt house, walking faster than before.

After a minute or so, she was talking again, back on a safe subject. “Trafficking is big business,” she began. “A lot bigger than the average citizen realizes.” Because I was momentarily confused, she explained, “You asked, so I’m telling you what I know. More than a thousand undocumented workers, men, women and children, arrive in Florida daily. They’re smuggled in by Mexicans, mostly. And a lot of the smugglers are Latino gang members. Coyotes-that’s what they’re called in the trade. But you know about all this. Of course you do.”

I was thinking about recent headlines that detailed the gang wars now going on in Mexico and California. Mass murders, men, women, and children pulled from their beds and shot in the back of the head execution style. Eighteen near Ensenada. A dozen gangbangers killed the same way in Chiapas. “Ceremonial-style murders,” as one survivor had described it.

I replied, “I’ve never learned anything in my life while my mouth was open. Keep going. You just filled in a couple of blanks.”

“Okay,” she said. “If that’s what you want. Coyotes are usually in the drug business, too. It’s a natural. Prostitution and pornography, those are the other primary sidelines. The people they screw over… it makes me furious to even talk about it because the people they use have nowhere to turn for help. They’re slaves by every definition of the word. The way coyotes and their gangs abuse women and children is beyond despicable.”

Emily started to continue but then hesitated. “I’d rather not go into some of awful things they do. It’s really upsetting to me. Not if you already know.”

Along with the news stories, I had also read Florida Law Enforcement reports that detailed how traffickers recruited sex slaves and controlled them. Fear was the common weapon. One gang, the Latin Kings, had videoed a live vaginal mutilation. They showed it to new recruits to keep them in line. There had been at least one ceremonial beheading, the perpetrators all wearing bandannas to cover their faces, their tattoos hidden by long-sleeved raincoats.

Cell-phone video cameras. It was what they used.

“No need for details,” I told Emily. “Keep it general.”

The woman let her breath out, relieved. “I’m not going to tell you why I appreciate that, but I do. Okay… so come up with the very worst punishments you can imagine and that’s the daily reality for a lot of small brown women and boys. These are people we see every day working in the fields, riding their bicycles, hanging out at the supermarket and cashing their checks to send money home.”

I said, “That’s why Tomlinson’s so worried about the girl. Me, too.”