37

“I’m not frustrated,” Waxman said. “I’m confused.”

They sat around the dining room table drinking thin, tepid coffee—the reporter, Axel, Jude, Eileen—each of them sagging. The heat of late afternoon turned liquid against the blank white walls. Consuela was upstairs, consoling Oscar’s inconsolable mother. “The last time we met,” Axel said, “I was very off-the-cuff in my speculations and probably spoke out of school.” He looked spent, eyes glazed, shoulders rolled forward. He tugged at his shirt and fluttered the fabric to cool his skin. “There are a great many variables and complex calculations that go into analyzing water table variation.”

“On the other hand,” Waxman said, “it could be as simple as this: The bottling plant is depleting the aquifer.”

“I don’t know that for a fact.”

“A woman died, trying to get people to notice.”

Axel glanced over his shoulder. Oscar sat perched on the stairs, chin pressed into the fold of his arm, gazing with an otherworldly calm at the strange adults below, yammering in their meaningless language. “I realize that,” Axel said, turning back again. “And it’s a terrible turn of events. But many of the wells the villagers use are dug by hand and very shallow, five to ten meters, and they routinely go dry by the middle of April every year.”

“The ones downstream from the bottling plant have been drawing up muck since January.”

“Mr. Waxman, it’s easy to assume the worst about these things. But trust me, analyzing water involves a little more than parading around with a dowsing rod. Aquifers are inaccessible. The only way you can venture a guess how vast they might be, or how exhausted, is through tracking very specific data.” He ticked them off on his fingers: “Transmissivity, hydraulic conductivity, porosity, specific capacity, specific yield, specific retention. You have to track head loss versus change of gradient across the well field, then cross-check it against regional water level trends, precipitation, evapotranspiration. Then you have to load all that data into a computer modeling program, and I’m sure I won’t shock you by confiding that computer models can be inaccurate. And on top of all that, you have to microscopically analyze the rock samples obtained when you drill your test wells. You have to measure the total dissolved solids in any water you draw, to check for organic and inorganic contaminants. And all those factors have to be logged over lengthy periods.”

“You’re saying you haven’t had enough time to draw a sound conclusion.”

“I’ve not completed my work yet. Normally, a full climate cycle should be enough to make reasonable evaluations.”

“But not enough to make a simple, honest statement about whether the bottling plant’s water usage is negatively impacting the domestic wells nearby.”

Axel slumped back in his chair. “Mr. Waxman, pardon me if what I’m about to say begins to sound a little like a game of snow-the-reporter—”

“In contrast to everything else you’ve been saying?”

“—but I’d like to at least briefly sketch a few things it appears you imperfectly understand. Now, as it has been explained to me—”

“Marta Valdez said the water in the well near her village started going bad when the bottling plant was built a few years back, and it’s steadily been getting worse. First there’s poor draw from the pump, then what water does come up tastes wretched. Like most people down here, poor people in particular, she tried to get along as best she could and not make waves. This year it got so bad she decided she couldn’t keep quiet any longer. She meant to be heard. Her courage cost her. But that’s a lesson everybody understands down here: You interfere, look what happens.”

Axel blanched. He’d heard all this from Consuela, of course. And Waxman probably guessed that.

“If you’ll just permit me—”

“You think it’s all just a coincidence, the bottling plant’s drawdown and the wells going bad.”

“I’m saying assumptions aren’t facts. The problems you’re describing can be caused by a great many things. First, all over the country, alluvial aquifers outside the coastal areas are often only thirty meters deep, and shallow aquifers disproportionately suffer from high contamination, especially ones close to populated areas. Second, the villagers here aren’t terribly sophisticated when it comes to understanding how underground water moves, and many times you find they’ve built latrines too close to the wells. It’s a surprisingly common problem, and the major reason why so much drinking water is contaminated. Third, a great many smaller wells are poorly constructed and badly maintained. Most last less than five years. They go bad for any number of reasons. Fourth, the well for this village is not terribly far from the alluvial plain for the river leading from the Laguna de San Juan, which feeds off a geothermal spring and is notoriously brackish. The well’s drawdown may have been enough to cause hydrothermal intrusion, which would lend a very foul mineral taste to the water, rendering it undrinkable.”

Waxman shook his head. “That’s nonsense and you know it. The well’s too shallow, the drawdown’s nothing. But if you throw in the cone of depression created by an industrial well field, like the bottling plant’s, sure, I could see that happening.” Waxman tip-and-tailed his pen against the tabletop and a coldness settled in his eyes, as though he meant to say: Snow the reporter? Go ahead. Try.

“But you could still get heavy sediment or mineral intrusion,” Axel countered, “if whoever drilled the well inadvertently struck a perched aquifer. That’s a reservoir suspended above the water table—”

“I know what a perched aquifer is.”

“Then you know they’re often limited in capacity and tap out quickly.”

Waxman reached up beneath his sweat-streaked glasses to pinch the bridge of his nose. “You realize that you’re speaking almost entirely in hypotheticals.”

“Granted, most of what I’m saying is speculative. By necessity.”

“But what you intend to tell Estrella or your client, Torkland Overby, that won’t be speculative, will it?”

“I’ve not been authorized to discuss that with you.”

Almost desperately, Waxman leaned forward, saying quietly, “This really is beneath you.”

“Suppose we leave considerations of that sort—”

“If you really—”

“Even if the plant were, in fact, causing significant exhaustion of the aquifer, it wouldn’t mean the end of the world.”

“Not for you.”

Axel bristled, his blue eyes flared. “Look. First of all, you’ve got SOUTHCOM and USAID and God knows how many NGOs stumbling all over each other trying to help with this issue. The Salvadoran government has a plan to drill wells throughout the country, with one hand pump well for every five families.”

“A plan. How noble. What’s the funding? And what difference will it make if the aquifer’s depleted?”

“Second, as you know, water trucks visit these villages—”

“They’re unreliable at best, and the farther from San Miguel you get, the less reliable they are.”

“Well, that can hardly be blamed on Estrella, can it?”

Waxman snorted. “Not until the national water system’s privatized, and they take over for the region.”

“Well, let’s stick to the present, shall we?”

“Sure. In the present the wells are going bad.”

“I’ve personally drilled test wells along a water-bearing fracture not far from here, and I found a significant amount of untapped groundwater there.”

For the first time, Waxman seemed taken aback. “Enough to make up for the bottling plant?”

“Certainly enough to provide the locals with a healthy supply of fresh water.”

Waxman studied Axel’s face. “Estrella would be that magnanimous?”

“I think Torkland would be willing to make that a condition of the capital outlay.”

“And if Estrella takes the money, then doesn’t perform?”

Axel waved dismissively. “Let the lawyers slug that one out. Meanwhile, another way to mitigate any drawdown problem would be to install a recirculation system in the sugar processing plant located upstream.”

“You’re joking. Judge Regalado owns that plant.”

“I’m aware of this.”

“Why would a man like that go to the trouble, let alone incur the expense, of installing a recirculation system—what’s in it for him?”

“Pressure might be applied from ANDA or some of the other national water agencies.”

Waxman barked out a grim little laugh. “Excuse me. I could’ve sworn I saw a pig fly by.”

“It’s not so inconceivable.”

“They have no enforcement capability. Not that the judge would obey them if they did.”

“It’s also not inconceivable, as I suggested earlier, that Torkland might consider having Estrella divert some of the capital for the bottling plant’s expansion—”

“Into the judge’s pocket? I’m sure. But it won’t build a recirculation system unless somebody puts a gun to his head. And maybe not then.”

Axel grimaced wearily. “How am I supposed to respond to statements like that?”

Waxman made a disgusted little huff, shifting in his chair, then wiped the sweat from his face and dried his hand on his shirt. “Fine. Let’s get back to square one, a simple yes or no—can you come to a conclusion or not about the bottling plant’s impact on the aquifer?”

“As I stated earlier, I’m not at liberty to divulge specifics.”

“If it’s the truth, what’s the problem?”

“It’s proprietary. But Bob Strickland from Torkland Overby arrives this week, and we’ll review matters. That’s high on the list, believe me. I will say this, however: The plant has deep-bore, high-yield wells that were properly engineered. The well field’s being competently maintained. The wells continue to be productive.”

“That sounds like damning with faint praise to me. Beyond which, it’s not an answer.”

“At the risk of repeating myself—”

“Have you discussed this with your friends at ODIC?”

“They are hardly my friends.”

“You’ve met with Al Lazarek.”

“Not by choice. And I would hardly be shocked to learn his role with ODIC is merely cosmetic.”

“You think he’s with the intelligence community.”

“It would not surprise me. Be that as it may, it has nothing to do with the water table along the Río Conacastal.”

Eileen touched Waxman’s arm lightly, preparing to step in. “I may be wrong, Axel, but I get the sense something has changed since I told you about Oscar’s sister being abducted.”

There, Jude thought. The little dark heart of the matter. When Eileen had shown up with Waxman, she’d looked helpless, as though to say she’d had no choice, he was coming here one way or another and she might as well tag along. Secretly, Jude had felt glad to see her, but then Axel had pulled him aside to whisper, “What can your friend be thinking, bringing a reporter here?” Jude hadn’t missed the reproach lurking in your friend. Now she was asking questions herself and getting straight to the point—maybe a rebuke was in order.

Axel, meanwhile, hid behind a blank stare. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

“We all want to do anything we can to help this family,” she said, lowering her voice as though Oscar might somehow crack the language barrier and understand. “But if you think not telling the truth about the bottling plant might somehow—”

Axel waved her off. “Listen. My job here—”

“You can’t trust these people. God only knows what else they might do, who else might suffer.”

Axel, never one to be lectured to, looked off, his face knotted up like a fist. A tin clock atop the dish cabinet chimed the half hour. Finally, he came back and leaned forward, lacing his fingers together on the table. “Can I tell you a story? An old story, admittedly, but one that’s apropos, I think.”

Eileen sank back against her chair, eyes blighted. “Of course.”

“It goes back to when I was studying geology at Purdue.” Axel dropped his gaze to contemplate his coffee dregs. “I attended a Lutheran church near campus. The pastor was quite old-school, but the younger ministers who came through there for their studies were decidedly au courant. Two in particular, Bill Dickey and Frank Fairchild. I had a number of discussions—arguments, I guess—with both men about the war, about race relations, about everything. It was a strange time, the sixties, with people like myself being every bit as naïve in a phony, hardheaded way as others were in their flakiness. But there’s one discussion in particular that has always stuck in my mind.

“I was visiting Reverend Bill, we were teamed together for some sort of fund-raiser for the church. Can’t even remember what now. But Reverend Frank came in, clearly in a state. He took Bill aside as though I weren’t even in the room and told him what the trouble was. I just sat there, fiddling about my business, but listening in, too.

“It turned out there was a boy at a local high school who’d gone down to the steps of city hall and in a fit of high drama burned his draft card. He was young enough to think this was heroic—women would weep, boys would cheer. This is West Lafayette, mind you, the heart of the corn belt. He got arrested on the spot, tossed in jail, and told he should prepare himself for ten years in prison.”

Axel unlaced his fingers and began turning his cup slowly in its saucer.

“The young man didn’t call his parents from jail. Or a lawyer, or someone from the War Resisters League. He called Reverend Frank—and was scared to death. Like a lot of high school kids in town, he’d come down to the church coffeehouse to hang out, smoke cigarettes, talk Kafka and Camus, that whole scene. That’s where he’d met Reverend Frank and, like a lot of young people, was smitten. If there is such a thing as Lutheran magic, that man had it. Not a handsome fellow—shortish, pockmarked face, kinky brown hair—but very genuine, very sharp, very committed. This boy, I wish I could remember his name, he asked Reverend Frank to come to his defense, say something in the papers or from the pulpit, let them know he wasn’t the craven pinko deviant they were making him out to be.

“The problem was, Reverend Frank was already on probation with the church hierarchy. His sermons were meant to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. Not surprisingly, they’d drawn complaints, nasty ones from important people. He’d been warned in no uncertain terms that one more little scandal and he was gone. That meant no more pursuit of his master’s in sociology. It could well mean giving up the cloth.

“He poured all this out to Reverend Bill and said he knew he could do more good for more people if he gained his degree, stayed within the church. It wasn’t just the safe choice, it was the practical choice—the compassionate choice when you balanced the benefit for the many against just one. But, he said, every time he thought about telling this young man that he’d have to seek help elsewhere, he thought about the parable of the one lost sheep. And he could not bring himself to abandon this scared, asinine boy, even if it meant giving up so much else.”

Axel left off fiddling with his coffee cup and folded his hands again.

“It left quite an impression on me, like I said. I’d never seen anyone grapple with his conscience openly like that—haven’t seen much of it since, to be honest. It was the first time I’d seen the Gospel treated as something concrete, something to live by, not the shopworn taradiddle you normally get from the pulpit on Sundays.” He looked out the dining room window, past the gauzy curtains at the fading daylight. The street beyond was empty. “You can pray, you can examine your conscience, search every book you please, holy or not. But none of that provides guidance the way you want. What would be the point of faith if it did? You choose. If you err, as you inevitably will, hope for forgiveness.” He turned back finally, meeting Eileen’s eyes with artless conviction. “Well, I’ve made my choice. I hope it’s the right one. If not, please forgive me.”

No one spoke for a moment, and Jude found Axel’s words resonating in a way he couldn’t quite place. Gradually, though, it came to him: If we fuck up, as we invariably do, we try to make good for the people we’ve screwed, which is the best we can offer. He felt a sudden moral uneasiness, a sense that men like Axel and Malvasio, the honorable and the conniving, might in fact somehow be indistinguishable. How many ways, he wondered, does a man remain a stranger to himself? The thought devolved into a wormy little terror—that from this point forward every step he took would be not just blind but tragic. Cry your eyes out, sucker. Then the sound of a door opening and closing upstairs rescued him, luring him back to the here and now.

Shortly, Consuela appeared, gently stroking Oscar’s head as she passed him on the stair. The boy seemed oblivious to her touch. She dropped into the chair beside Axel, fanning herself with her hand.

“I do not believe,” she said, “that young woman will survive this.” She glanced at Jude. “She told me something I hadn’t realized before.The men who came and took her little girl—one of them, the leader, was an American.”

The import didn’t hit Jude all at once. Then his insides clenched. “Did she describe him?”

“Yes. She said he was tall, like you—which was why she stared last night when you came into her room. But he was older. Darker. And his eyes, his voice—this is odd, but she said they made her think of Chupacabra. He’s a monster, a scary story the country people tell, a kind of vampire who roams the hills, sucking blood from goats.”

Jude’s mind raced. Nothing came. He just sat there staring at the blank white wall while, beneath the scrabble of unspoken words, an undertow of guilt thickened into rage.

Axel said quietly, “Jude?”

“I was thinking,” Jude managed finally, “of people at the embassy or anyone else who might fit that description.”

Waxman said, “This man’s linked to the embassy? My God—”

Axel waved the notion away. “Let’s not be idiots.”

Jude nodded. “I didn’t mean—”

“Are you all right?” It was Eileen, staring across the table at him. “You look a little, well,friquiado.” Freaked out.

“I’m fine.” Jude shook his head. “I’m just fading a little. Spotty sleep the last few nights.”

“Which should serve as our cue.” Axel rose from his chair.

“I’d like to talk to the boy’s mother,” Waxman said. He looked bitter and spent. The story was slipping away. “Would she be willing to do that?”

“She is terrified,” Consuela said. “A reporter, these people, the danger to her child—”

“But you’ll ask?” Waxman made another rat-a-tat with his pen. “Please.”

Consuela trudged back upstairs, an empty exercise. Everyone knew that, even in the unlikely instance Oscar’s mother felt inclined, Consuela would talk her out of it. Around the table, amid the smells of cold coffee and bodies ripened with sweat, no one spoke. These people, Jude thought. People like Bill Malvasio. Like me. You stupid, needy, gullible fool.

Soon enough, Consuela returned, shaking her head. “I’m sorry.”

Axel, still standing, gestured ungraciously to the door. His manners had frayed—the heat, the questions.

Waxman didn’t move: “What if this girl ends up dead? What if she already is? What will you have gained?”

The blood drained from Axel’s face, aging him ten years in an instant. “I really do think we’re finished here.”

Jude showed Waxman and Eileen out, feeling light-headed and numb. Evening was falling, scarcely a breeze, the air smelling of metal and foul water and dust. An old couple walked a small, quivering dog down the shadeless street. Waxman plodded to his car but Eileen lingered, telling Jude, “I know you two are up to something, and if it’s what I think it is, you’re insane.”

“That’s interesting, coming from you. Remind me—who brought Oscar and his mother here?”

“Does Axel really think he can bargain with these people?”

Don’t let her drag you into this, he thought. “Your imagination’s getting the better of you.”

“That little homily about Reverend Frank?” The sun caught her hair as she shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

“He just wants to do the right thing, and he’s having a hard time figuring out what that might be.” He wanted to add: Now let it go.

Her eyes scoured his. “What about you?”

“Me?”

“Say what you want, I can tell something’s wrong.”

Secretly, he enjoyed the scrutiny, though he felt pretty sure that wasn’t wise. He glanced away. “I told you, I’m just tired.”

“I’m checking in on you tomorrow.”

He mustered a smile. “If you come, don’t bring Wax along, okay? You didn’t score any points there.”

She looked stung. “He wouldn’t do anything to hurt anyone. That’s the last thing he wants.”

Like want has anything to do with it, Jude thought, but all he said was, “Be careful.”

Back inside, music wafted faintly from a secondhand boom box in the living room—Kiri Te Kanawa, the “Four Last Songs” of Richard Strauss. Consuela had grown up at the Salvadoran embassy in Bonn, her father the socialist colonel exiled to Germany for his support of the leftist coup in 1960. The Strauss played sadly, fatefully in the background as Axel sat at the dining room table again, mindlessly smoothing the coarse linen tablecloth.

Sensing someone there, he glanced up at Jude. “Well, that was an experience.” His eyes floated in their sockets; he looked baffled and dour. “Think I’ll make an early night of it.” But he just sat there, staring at nothing, till Consuela finished washing the cups and saucers, turned off the music, and led him upstairs.

Alone finally, Jude dragged a chair from the dining room table, propped it in the front doorway, and sat there, staring blankly out at the staid, shabby neighborhood in its sweltering Sunday calm. His stomach roiled and the same numb dizziness as before returned—only now he realized it came from a kind of inner free fall, as though all his psychic moorings had come undone. It wasn’t just that he felt duped and used—what particularly galled him was that same phrase circling back to haunt him, The people involved in your hydrologist’s project could be the worst of the worst down here. Malvasio had known all along who Axel was working for; he was working for them himself, just to different ends. And worst of the worst, as it turned out, hardly came close.

Too bad knowing all that doesn’t solve anything, he thought. You got thrown a curve by what Fitz told you, that stuff about the fire in California, the work up north, but you can’t pretend anymore, hope you left this problem behind somehow. It’s right here. You can’t see it just yet, but it’s here, has been all along. Not just Strock working for whomever, but Malvasio, who faked you out of your jock from that very first phone call, worse than he did the old man. Down the road somewhere you can take the time to flog yourself properly for being such a perfect mark, but right now you better smarten up and do it fast. You won’t have the luxury of figuring out the plan ahead of time—who knows if the two are in it together, if they buried the hatchet somehow, what it took to make that happen? None of that matters. God only knows what’s in play—you’ve just got to stay on the ball, prepare for anything and everything, because something’s going down. It’s been in the works all along.

Gradually, as he sat there staring out into the hot dusty night, he began to sense why it was that he’d not seen any of this clearly until now. What was it Eileen had said: You’ve got two modes, kinda okay and complete disaster. She was right, of course, and not just in the way she’d intended. That wasn’t just how he dealt with the outside world—it was how he faced himself. From the very beginning, those first get-togethers with Malvasio, collecting Strock—Christ, even his bungled night with Eileen—every time he’d sensed something wrong, he’d gone from being savagely critical to blindly stoic, nothing in between. And invariably he’d resolved his doubts, cured his paralysis, by telling himself to forget about it: Keep your head down, soldier on. It was why he’d never seen what was coming. Given his training, he had an intuitive sense of how to predict trouble, avoid danger, at least when it came to protecting someone else. But he had no reasonable critical faculty when it came to his own actions—he either eviscerated himself or numbly kept on moving. Moving toward disaster, as it turned out—and not just for himself now.

As much as he could see where this behavior came from—the logical result of his upbringing, he supposed—he also realized it was pointless to dwell on that. Mom and Pop won’t be taking the fall if you screw this up, he realized. He’d set himself up for a real test, the defining moment of his life, maybe. Bummer for Axel and Oscar’s little sister—and God only knew who else—if he fucked it up.

He caught himself: There you go again, he thought, cutting yourself off at the knees. Come on, do something—not just anything this time, the right thing, the smart thing, the necessary thing.

He got up, closed the door, and climbed the stairs. Rapping on the bedroom door, he called out, “Axel?”

The door edged open. Consuela peeked out, dressed in a cotton falda, her hair held back from her face by a broad white band and her skin smeared with cold cream.

“I need to see him alone a minute.”

Consuela glanced over her shoulder. Axel sat on the bed, already stripped to his boxers. Nodding, he rose wearily and stepped barefoot into the hall. Closing the door behind him, he crossed his arms, covering the down of white hair on his chest. His voice was soft but strained: “I had an idea you’d be coming up.”

“Tell her to stay away from the window.”

Axel started, “Jude, what—”

Jude reached past him, opened the door, went in, and switched off the bedside lamp. “Stay away from the windows,” he told them both.

Axel, still standing in the doorway, said, “You’ve told us that already.”

“Then do it.”

“Jude—”

“If you have candles, use them. The shadows on the curtains won’t show so clear. And put your vests on. I’ve told you that, too, haven’t I?”

Consuela stared, alarmed at his tone. Finally, she reached down to pick up the vest from the floor beside the bed and strapped it on. Jude collected the second vest and handed it to Axel, then pushed past him and hurried down to the living room, where he gathered his own from beneath the couch. Hurdling back upstairs, he knocked on the back bedroom door and went in.

The boy sat on the floor beneath the window, folded up like a knife, clicking his teeth. The curtains hung motionless above him as he gazed at his mother, curled up on the bed. Her eyes were savage, a rosary in her fist. Jude repeated the same directive—lights off, use candles, stay clear of the windows—then he crossed the room, knelt down before the boy, and told him to lift his arms. As he attached the Velcro straps in place, he told the boy not to take the vest off, no matter how hot it became.

Back in the hall, Axel waited, looking ashen. Above the rim of his vest a wisp of white hair tickled the hollow of his throat. “My God, what is it? I saw something in your face, earlier, at the table. Something’s wrong, obviously. I should have asked but you seemed—”

“Come downstairs. Please.”

They settled in across from each other at the dining room table. Jude had no idea how to frame the thing, so he just launched in—from his father’s days in the Eighteenth District to Malvasio’s recent contact, Jude’s trip to Chicago to bring Strock back, everything learned since. As the words rushed out, he flashed on what he’d always told Axel, the importance of hiding nothing—for his own good. The irony of the role reversal felt shaming, especially since all this candor came far too late, but for once he refused to let that stop him.

“I have no idea,” he said, “beyond his taking Oscar’s sister away, what Malvasio has to do with Estrella. As for Strock, he’s a wild card at this stage. But I think we should assume the worst, prepare for it.”

Axel sat there, a look on his face as though his brain had begun to tick. He said, “Give me a moment, please,” then glanced down at the tablecloth. Shortly he reached out, as he had before, and absently smoothed the fabric until he caught himself and drew back his hand. Glancing up with a sort of pitying dismay, he said quietly, “I’d wondered, ever since McGuire first brought up your father, what the whole story was. It must have been pretty rough, going through all that. And excuse the dime-store psychology, but I’d venture a guess that the roughness of it most likely explains why you got involved with these men again. To show you’re better than they are.” The dismay and pity melted, only to be replaced a moment later by something colder, more demanding. “It’s not the noblest motive, you realize. And certainly not the smartest. But I suppose you’ve figured that out.”

It occurred to Jude it might be best if he stepped aside. “I’ll understand,” he said, “if you call Fitz, get someone to replace me.”

Axel recoiled. “Who—Bauserman? Please.”

“I’m sure they can find someone capable.”

Axel waved off the idea. “I don’t believe merely capable will fill the bill at this stage, do you? Certainly not after the song and dance we handed Fitz. And another lie to cover the last will hardly make anyone safer.”

Jude felt as though a pile of ashes had formed in the pit of his stomach. He nodded. “I suppose you’re right. Still—”

“No, Jude. I’m afraid we’re in this a little deep, my friend.” Axel glanced over his shoulder toward the upstairs bedrooms. “And I don’t mean just you and me.”