John Irving - Avenue of Mysteries

Haud ullis labentia ventis meant “Yielding under no winds.”

My dear Lord, what have we here? Brother Pepe marveled; poor Pepe believed the content of the Latin was religious. Pepe had met those Jesuits who too fanatically patterned their behavior on the life of Saint Ignatius Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order — the Society of Jesus. It was in Rome where Saint Ignatius had announced that he would sacrifice his life if he could prevent the sins of a single prostitute on a single night. Brother Pepe had lived in Mexico City and Oaxaca all his life; Pepe knew just how crazy Saint Ignatius Loyola must have been to ever propose such a thing as sacrificing his life to prevent the sins of a single prostitute on a single night.

Even a pilgrimage can be a fool’s errand when undertaken by a fool, Brother Pepe reminded himself as he stepped forward on the feather-strewn tarmac to greet the young American missionary.

“Edward — Edward Bonshaw,” Pepe said to the scholastic.

“I liked the Eduardo. It’s new — I love it!” Edward Bonshaw said, startling Brother Pepe with a fierce embrace. Pepe was awfully pleased to be hugged; he liked how expressive the eager American was. And Edward (or Eduardo) immediately launched into an explanation of his Latin proclamation. Pepe was surprised to learn that “Yielding under no winds” was a Scottish dictum, not a religious one — not unless it was of Protestant origin, Brother Pepe speculated.

The young midwesterner was definitely a positive person and an outgoing personality — a joyful presence, Brother Pepe decided. But what will the others think of him? Pepe was wondering to himself. In Pepe’s opinion, the others were a joyless lot. He was thinking of Father Alfonso and Father Octavio, but also, perhaps especially, of Sister Gloria. Oh, how they will be unnerved by the hugs —not to mention the parrots-in-palm-trees theme of the hysterical Hawaiian shirt! Brother Pepe thought; he was happy about it.

Then Eduardo — as the Iowan preferred — wanted Pepe to see how his bags had been abused when he had passed through customs in Mexico City.

“Look what a mess they made of my things!” the excited American cried; he was opening his suitcases so that Pepe could see. It didn’t matter to the passionate new teacher that the passersby at the Oaxaca airport could see his strewn belongings.

In Mexico City, the examining customs officer must have torn through the colorfully dressed missionary’s bags with a vengeance — finding more of the same unsuitable and oversize clothes, Pepe observed.

“So understated — must be the new papal issue!” Brother Pepe had said to young Bonshaw, indicating (in a small, disheveled suitcase) more Hawaiian shirts.

“It’s all the rage in Iowa City,” Edward Bonshaw said; maybe this was a joke.

“A possible monkey wrench in the ointment for Father Alfonso,” Pepe cautioned the scholastic. That didn’t sound right; he’d meant a possible fly in the ointment, of course — or perhaps he should have said, “Those shirts will look like monkey business to Father Alfonso.” Yet Edward Bonshaw had understood him.

“Father Alfonso is a little conservative, is he?” the young American asked.

“An underdescription,” Brother Pepe said.

“An understatement,” Edward Bonshaw corrected him.

“My English has rusted a small size,” Pepe admitted.

“I’ll spare you my Spanish, for the moment,” Edward said.

Pepe was shown how the customs officer had found the first whip, then the second. “Instruments of torture?” the officer had asked young Bonshaw — first in Spanish, then in English.

“Instruments of devotion, ” Edward (or Eduardo) had answered. Brother Pepe was thinking, Oh, my merciful Lord — we have a poor soul who flagellates himself when what we wanted was an English teacher!

The second suitcase in upheaval was full of books. “More instruments of torture,” the customs officer had continued, in Spanish and English.

“Of further devotion,” Edward Bonshaw had corrected the officer. (At least the flagellant reads, Pepe was thinking.)

“The sisters at the orphanage — among them, a few of your fellow teachers — were quite taken with your photograph,” Brother Pepe told the scholastic, who was struggling to repack his violated bags.

“ Aha! But I’ve lost a lot of weight since then,” the young missionary said.

“Apparently — you’ve not been ill, I hope,” Pepe ventured.

“Denial, denial — denial is good, ” Edward Bonshaw explained. “I stopped smoking, I stopped drinking — I think the zero-alcohol factor has curtailed my appetite. I’m just not as hungry as I used to be,” the zealot said.

“Aha!” Brother Pepe said. (Now he has me saying it! Pepe marveled to himself.) He’d never had any alcohol — not a drop. The “zero-alcohol factor” had not once curtailed Brother Pepe’s appetite.

“Clothes, whips, reading material,” the customs officer had summarized, in Spanish and English, to the young American.

“Just the bare essentials!” Edward Bonshaw had declared.

Merciful Lord, spare his soul! Pepe was thinking, as if the scholastic’s remaining days on this mortal earth were already numbered.

The customs officer in Mexico City had also questioned the American’s visa, which had a temporary delimitation.

“You’re intending to stay for how long?” the officer had asked.

“If everything goes well, three years,” the young Iowan had replied.

The prospects of the pioneer before him struck Brother Pepe as poor. Edward Bonshaw seemed an unlikely survivor of a mere six months of the missionary life. The Iowan would need more clothes — ones that fit him. He would run out of books to read, and the two whips wouldn’t suffice — not for the number of times the doomed zealot would feel inclined to flagellate himself.

“Brother Pepe, you drive a VW Beetle!” Edward Bonshaw exclaimed, as the two Jesuits made their way to the dusty red car in the parking lot.

“Just Pepe, please — the Brother part is not necessary,” Pepe said. He was wondering if all Americans made exclamations about the obvious, but he quite liked the young scholastic’s enthusiasm for everything.

Who else would those smart Jesuits have chosen to run their school, if not a man like Pepe, who both embodied and admired enthusiasm ? Who else would the Jesuits have put in charge of Niños Perdidos? You don’t add an orphanage to a successful school, and call it “Lost Children,” without a good-hearted worrier like Brother Pepe to oversee everything.

But worriers, including the good-hearted ones, can be distracted drivers. Perhaps Pepe was thinking about the dump reader; maybe Pepe was imagining that he was bringing more books to Guerrero. For whatever reason, Pepe turned the wrong way when he left the airport — instead of turning toward Oaxaca, and back to town, he headed to the basurero. By the time Brother Pepe realized his mistake, he was already in Guerrero.

Pepe wasn’t all that familiar with the area. In looking for a safe place to turn around, he chose the dirt road to the dump. It was a wide road, and only those smelly trucks — moving slowly to or from the basurero — usually traveled there.

Naturally, once Pepe had stopped the little VW and managed to turn it around, the two Jesuits were enveloped in the black plumes of smoke from the dump; the mountains of smoldering garbage and trash towered above the road. Scavenging children could be seen; they scrambled up and down the reeking mounds. A driver had to be wary of the scavengers — both the ragamuffin children and the dump dogs. The smell, borne by the smoke, made the young American missionary gag.