"Steven Gould - Jumper 03 - Griffin's Story" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gould Stephen Jay)

We'd arrived. I couldn't smell the sea. I couldn't see it. I smelled diesel smoke from the
bus. I smelled something involving cattle. I smelled someone cooking onions.
My stomach rumbled. Except for some crisps on the bus, we'd last eaten in Oaxaca, half a
day before.
Most of the passengers who'd gotten off at La Crucecita took the street toward downtown
but Consuelo led me behind the station and up a forested hill on a trail half overgrown by
banana trees and brush. It was humid but not too hot–not like some of the places on our
journey where it had taken all my willpower not to jump back to some air–conditioned mall.
We crested the hill in less than ten minutes and walked into a breeze that did smell of the
sea. Looking between the trees I saw flashes of sapphire blue. Consuelo turned up the ridge,
away from the water, but thankfully, still in the breeze. After another five minutes she pointed
downslope at a red clay–tiled rooftop visible between the trees. "Finalmente hemos llegado!"
I shifted until I could see more of it around the trees. It was narrow rows of building
around three sides of a brick patio. A low wall stood at the open end but there was also
construction–additions to both wings were in progress, extending the rectangle.
Consuelo crossed herself and then turned to me. "Wal–Mart. Okay, Greeefin?"
We'd been working on my Spanish the whole trip. "No, acuerdate me llamo Guillermo."
"Okay. Lo recordare. Wal–Mart, okay, Guillermo?"
"Claw que si," I said. "Un momento."
The first time I'd jumped in front of Consuelo, she'd gone back to the altar in her room and
returned with a vial of clear liquid. She'd splashed it across my face and chest and began a long
Latin speech that began "Exorcizo te" but that's all I caught, really.
There followed an extremely long argument and discussion between Sam and Consuelo in
which she kept using the words el Diablo and demonio, and he used the word milagro
multiple times. Finally, to settle it, I had to go into El Centro with her and kneel in the
sanctuary of Our Lady of Guadalupe, cross myself with holy water and take communion at
Mass, which was probably a sin, since I wasn't Catholic, but she wasn't concerned about sin
per se, but poderes del infierno.
She decided I wasn't a demon or possessed but she was never completely comfortable
about it.
Sam wasn't home but the stuff was waiting where we'd left it, in the old stable–two garden
carts (bigger than wheelbarrows) and a large pile of clothes, shoes, toys, diapers (for her
grown daughter's newest baby), and tools. I started with the carts, a jump apiece, then began
ferrying the rest. Consuelo took what I brought and stacked it in the carts, lashing the resulting
head–high stacks in place. It wasn't all bought from Wal–Mart. Just mostly.
It was bumpy but downhill to the house so the issue was keeping the carts from running
away from us rather than pushing them. Consuelo's mother, the matriarch of the family, was
the first to see her. There were tears and hugs. Consuelo hadn't been home since her husband
and son's funeral three years before.
Children and a few adults followed quickly, but most of the adults were at work and the
older children were en la escuela. I was introduced as Guillermo, the orphan. La Crucecita is
a village on the south coast of Oaxaca, part of a larger resort area called Bahfas de Huatulco,
about five hundred kilometers southeast of Mexico City, a couple of hundred west of the
Guatemala border. The blue Pacific water reminded me of the Bay of Siam, like sapphires
shining in the sun. It wasn't that crowded, compared with Aca–pulco or Puerto Vallarta, but
being a gringo, I wouldn't stand out that much, because of the tourists. That was the theory,
explained by Consuelo through Sam.
Her extended family worked for the resort hotels as maids, gardeners, busboys, and cooks.
Those who didn't work for the resorts were in the U.S., sending money back, but this was
changing as the resorts grew and entering the states became harder.