Paul Theroux - The Mosquito Coast

We were used to the damp shade of our own trees, the buggy riverside, the flat gardens and cool hollows of Jeronimo. Up here, the trees were thin and burned dry by the sun, the slopes were rocky, there was no shade or shelter. We heard dogs bark and now and then we smelled smoke. But we saw no people. Father was still talking, still promising us lunch and predicting that soon it would be all downhill.

Pretty soon, Jerry and I were walking in mud. Water was shaking out of the bamboo sled and drizzling onto the ground. The ice was melting fast — the lower portion of the banana-leaf mitten, all that insulation, was blackened with moisture. The angle of the track was so sharp that the ice sled was not pulled steadily but jerked, and water flew out from the runners with each jerk.

I crept with Jerry from behind the sled. The Zambus were bent double in their harnesses. They gasped in their wood-sawing way, and their chins dripped with sweat and their faces were twisted horribly. Crouched like this, struggling forward practically on their knees, they no longer looked like men. They had been turned into suffering animals by this hard pulling, with dog faces and bruised thumbs. Their nostrils were wide open and their eyes buried in squints. They looked so frightening with froth on their necks, we did not dare tell them the ice was melting. And we knew that if we told Father he would go into fits.

It was well past lunchtime. Father had hurried on to get a glimpse of what lay ahead. When he came back and said "Let's break for lunch," we guessed that we were near the top of the mountain.

Jerry and I were carrying the lunch in our knapsacks. We spread it on a rock — tomato sandwiches, boiled corn, guavas, bananas, and Jungle Juice — and Father began describing how much more useful a cable car would be on this tortuous path.

"Project a series of tripods, bearing a cable for slinging passengers and cargo up and down the mountain." he said. "It would be no more trouble to build than a ski lift."

And while the Zambus were panting and Jerry whimpering over his sore feet. Father cantered around the slope saying, "Section it — that's the way. Hoist some pylons here and get pulleys working. Your trolley simply swings up and over these little cliffs. If you had a system of finely meshed cogs, you could work it manually above or below, or counterbalance it on an opposing line and make it self-operating. Then your descending weight would hoist your hopper to the summit. That's not ordinary rock you're wearing out shoe leather on — that's potential ballast. Oh, Gaw!"

He had jogged over to the sled to admire its size, but he had seen that the ice was melting.

"We've got shrinkage! Charlie, you fruit, why didn't you say something? Come on, let's move out before it all goes to pieces."

And he ran ahead saying. "We should have put a rubber sock around it!"

The Zambus sighed, and harnessed themselves again.

By mid-afternoon we still had not reached the ridge. But Father shouted so much, the Zambus stumbled. And they tried so hard to please him, they rushed the sled into a boulder that punched it apart. With a grunt that was almost human, the block of ice cracked in half, splitting its mitten of leaves and fracturing the sled.

"That's wonderful," Father said quietly. "That is just what I need. Thank you very much, gentlemen. Now, don't mind me. I'm just going to take a walk around the block. You stay here, and if you're inclined to pick up the pieces, I promise you I won't stand in your way." He gave us all a weak smile.

He disappeared. A minute later we heard him scream from behind a rock.

Francis Lungley looked at me in alarm.

"He's mad." I said. "You'd better fix this."

The Zambus cut the ice free and, grumbling among themselves, made two sleds. It was almost an hour before we could set off again, but now Father and Bucky were harnessed to one sled, and Francis and John manned the other. This was worse than before, for Father was angry, growling at his work, straining and yelling. The broken ice had melted smaller, the two teams moved fast along the track. But we were no nearer to the ridge. Jerry and I scampered ahead, listening to the men breathing hard beneath us.

The next rise brought us to a bowl in the mountainside that was filled with white flowers and bees. The track, descending for the first time (but it rose again on the other side), gave Father and the Zambus a chance to take it easy. When they caught up with us, Father said, "Your hands and necks are filthy. What's the matter with you kids? Can't you keep clean?"

We explained that we had rubbed black berry juice on our skin to keep the flies and bees away. It was the trick Alice Maywit had shown us at the Acre. The berry juice was as good as insect repellent. The Zambus had used it too, only it was impossible to see the dark juice on their black skin.

Father had been bitten — his wrists and neck were pebbly from insect bites. I thought he might thank us for this information. It was natural medication, it worked, and it was free.

But he hated the look of it. He said, "You think I'm scared of a few bug bites? Ha! If you're scared of bugs, you've got no business here."

The bees swarmed around him as he spoke. He batted them away. "They know when you're scared! They can smell fear!" A little while later he was stung on one ear. His ear lobe swelled fat and shook like a turkey's wattle. He said he could not feel a thing.

The sun was ahead of us, dropping behind the mountain we were climbing. It dazzled us, but it had lost most of its heat. I wondered what would happen when it sank, because in all the time we had lived in Jeronimo — almost seven months now — we had always returned home at sundown. But we had not reached the village. Jeronimo was hours behind us. Father and the Zambus were still grunting in their harnesses, dragging the two sleds.

I said, "We'll have to go home in the dark."

"We can't go home until we deliver this ice!"

Deliver it where? I looked at the cargo on the sleds. The banana-leaf insulation fit loosely, like a man's clothes on a child. There was not much ice left.

"Why didn't I think to put a rubber sock around it? Those two buffoons insisted on those useless banana leaves!"

And now the sun was half gone, a segment of cold fruit, and Father's face brassy bright in its last glare. He urged the Zambus on, as if chasing the sun to the summit. But the sunset was quicker, and while they heaved the sleds along the track, the sun slice blinked behind the rocks, and its afterglow was a dusty pinkness in the sky.

Father's determination left him then. He stepped out of his harness and walked up the path to snarl at the dying daylight.

"All right," he said, "we'll make camp."

"Where will we sleep?" Jerry asked.

"Why, just over there, across the street, in the Holiday Inn! You two kids can lounge by the poolside while I fix us up with a couple of rooms. Want a king-sized bed? I know I do, and I sure hope they've got air conditioning and color TV—"

He was walking in circles and biting a new cigar as he spoke.

"— barbecue pit, Ping-Pong, cheeseburgers, and a funny-bunny piano player in the cocktail bar. Want a roll of quarters for the juke box, Jerry? Play some tunes?"

Jerry had begun to cry. He had knelt down to tighten one of his sandals and, crouching there, put his head against his knee and sobbed quietly. I pitied Jerry. All he had asked was where we were going to sleep, but Father went on mocking him with this speech about the Holiday Inn and have a nice hot shower bath and good long rest.

"There goes Charlie, off to buy a Fudgsicle. Careful crossing the road, sonny!"

I knew Father was disappointed that we had not made it to the Indian village, so instead of sulking or crying, like Jerry, I had decided to do something helpful. I said, "I'm" looking for some wood to build a lean-to."