Christopher Buckley - Wet Work

"So?"

"Where are the women?"

"Back home," laughed the military commander. "Maybe he wants to try the canuweras ." The canuweras are peculiar to Iquitos-Venice of the Amazon-prostitutes who ply their trade in dugout canoes.

"They don't look like businessmen to me. Look at them. They look like bodyguards. And what about these matchbooks? Conquistador? "

"Well, ask him. Myself, I'm going to eat."

Charley said, "We're having a very simple supper tonight, I hope you don't mind." Stewards entered with platters, cold pear soup sprinkled with mint leaves, poached guinea hen eggs on fried toast layered with chutney and carpaccio, miniature acorn squash stuffed with cold ratatouille and dusted with Parmesan cheese, green tomatoes in balsamic vinegar topped with a cilantro seviche.

"I'm trying to shuck some weight," Charley said, smiling. Stewards appeared with more platters bearing grapefruit sorbet in Siamese incense vessels adorned with candied violet blossoms. Then more platters, the main course: small filets of Chateaubriand wrapped in bacon, grilled mushrooms in beurre rouge , pencil-thin spears of fresh asparagus. Chateau Lafon-Rochet '66.

Charley spoke excitedly about the trip. He said he'd always dreamed of going up the Amazon, and now that he was in the Indian summer of his life he was finally going to do it. He said how grateful he was to the senator for making it possible.

The senator, overcome by the wine and Charley's companionship, suddenly turned to the military commander and demanded that two Peruvian Navy patrol boats escort the Esmeralda on her trip upriver.

Charley placed his hand on the senator's arm. "Felipe," he said, "that's most gracious, most generous, but hardly necessary. And of course, it would be a scandal if our friends in the press"-everyone chuckled-"learned that the vital resources of your fine military were diverted to protecting a silly old gringo off on a pleasure cruise."

"But, Charley," said the senator, "the Huallaga region is… bueno, un poco desequilibrado ."

Lovely way of putting it: "a little unbalanced." Just a few weeks ago Sendero had floated twenty decapitated corpses down the Huallaga past a base where DEA men were stationed.

"Why not go up the Maranon River?" he said. "Ecologically speaking, the Maranon is fantastic." Everyone agreed.

"I don't doubt it for a moment," said Charley, signaling for the dessert, "but my heart is set on seeing the 'Eyebrow of the Jungle.' I've read so much about it, you see."

"Well," said the senator, "the 'Eyebrow of the Jungle' is in a situation of lamentable extremity. Since the 1970s, almost a million hectares of the forest has been cut down by the narcos for the cultivation of coca."

"Is that a fact?"

"Yes. And now as a result we have erosion problems. For the first time in seven thousand years, eh? When the Inca planted his little coca, he built trenches, with stone walls, with yucca plants interspersed here and there to keep the soil from sliding off the mountain. Now-pah!-you think the narcos care about erosion?"

"Deplorable," said Charley.

"And what they flush into the soil! The chemicals they use for the refining. In one year, Charley, fifteen million gallons of kerosene. Eight million gallons of sulfuric acid. Two million of acetone, two million of toluene and sixteen thousand tons of lime. In one year ."

"Criminal," said Charley.

"Coca cultivation has become the Attila of tropical agriculture."

"I'm sorry, Felipe, the what?"

"Attila the Hun."

"Ah," said Charley, "dessert. I hope you like ice cream."

It was a map of the Amazon done entirely in ice cream: the jungle floodplain in pistachio; the river, snaking from the Atlantic to the Andes, a geographically precise vein of mocha fudge. The Cordilleras rose on vanilla slopes to sorbet summits of blue and boysenberry ices. Candied jaguars, marzipan toucans, caramelized coleoptera, licorice crocs and skulls of spun sugar. (Charley wondered, were the skulls in good taste?) Chef Ralph had contrived an active volcano that spouted wisps of vapor by means of a concealed chip of dry ice.

Charley handed the knife to the senator, saying he would be honored if he would make the first cut.

The senator made several false starts. Finally, with a smile, he put the tip of the blade into Lima-represented by a macaroon star. "Since everyone blames Lima for everything these days." Everyone laughed.

Coffee, brandy and cigars were taken on the helicopter deck. The commissioner of customs lit Charley's cigar.

"I found these in an ashtray," he said, showing Charley the Conquistador matches.

Charley puffed, looked at them. "Hm," he said, "how about that. Donald Trump was aboard couple of weeks ago, they must be from his boat." Charley winked, "Wouldn't you know he'd call a boat that?"

The abrazos at the head of the gangway were copious. Charley sent them all off with a case of the wine. Forty-nine ninety was fueled and ready at the airport to fly the senator back to Lima. The next morning it flew back to the States with the stewards and crew. Esmeralda cast off her lines at 0900 and Charley nosed her bow into the current. The beggars waved rosaries at him. He gave them three blasts on the ship's horn.

"Hey, Frank-Jesus, what the hell happened?"

It was Taccarelli, from Training. "Nothing, it's fine."

"Nothing? You look like a fucking hard-boiled egg."

"I fell asleep under the tanning machine. It's a little sunburn is all."

"Oh. Hey, uh, how's your sister, Frankie?"

Something about the way he said it. "She's much better, thank you, Al."

Taccarelli gave him a conspiratorial wink. "Gubanovich mentioned."

"Mentioned what, Al?"

"You know. Your stomach problem. Kincaid's bullet acting up?"

"Uh, yeah. It's nothing."

"You okay?"

"I'm much better, Al."

"Is it-"

Diatri sighed. "It's my bowel, Al. My small bowel, if you really want to know." These elevators.

"Gubanovich said you were Intensive Care the whole time."

"You two had a nice mention about all this, I see. Well, I got news for you, Alphonse. There's no such thing as Intensive Care anymore. No one cares. Except one of the cleaning ladies. She gave me a flower. It was dead, but it was nice of her anyway. Other than her, no one really gives a rat's ass. One night the guy next to me dies, right? One minute his heart monitor is going beep… beep… beep, then it's going beeeeeeeeeeeeeep, you know, we-now-conclude-our-broadcasting-day? Six minutes. I counted six minutes before they came. I'm yelling for them and I would've got out of bed except for this tube in me the size of a garden hose and I'm a little afraid my plumbing is going to come out with it if I get out of bed. Six minutes. You know what they were doing? They were watching the ball game. The guy was cold by the time they came in. He was a TV dinner. Suddenly they're charging in shouting, 'Stand back, stand back!' like I'm trying to block their way, and they start hitting him with the paddles. The fibrillator paddles. They must have hit him twenty times. They had this poor guy jumping like a frog. I'm telling the fangool with the paddles, 'Hey, he's been dead for a week. Why don't you thaw him out first. Put him in the microwave.'"

"Jesus. What hospital was it?"

"The VA."

"The VA? Oh yeah, right, Gubanovich said."

"Next time, I don't care if the SAC does find out. I'm not going back to the VA."

"I'll see you round, Frank. Take care of yourself, okay?"

"You bet. Hey, Al, listen, Gubanovich wasn't supposed to go shooting his mouth off. I mean, I don't mind you knowing, but-"