Children of Paradise: A Novel (26 page)

As they approach the capital, the river narrows and traffic grows, and the waves from other boats, some speeding past on both sides and in both directions, cause the
Coffee
to bump and sway and force the captain to slow down and shout to the passengers to hold on. The first mate throws an anchor rope to a man posted on the dock, and he pulls the
Coffee
port side to the boardwalk. The first mate steps off and offers his hand to each passenger. Joyce accepts the help and squeezes the first mate’s hand as she clambers from water to land. The two guards thank the captain and hand him a few extra notes. He thanks them in turn and says he will see them in a couple of days. He looks at Joyce, who averts her eyes.

Three men and one woman (fieldworkers, as those who work away from the commune refer to themselves) greet Joyce and the guards. The four operate out of the commune office in the capital. They shake hands and wish each other blessings. The guards surrender their heavy briefcases and position their rifles across their chests with both hands. The group walks quickly in loose marching formation, slicing through the crowded port to two jeeps. Heads turn, and talk stops in the crowd. The speculation about the group ranges from military in plainclothes, to government secret service, to a new opposition party, to commune people. Some among the group carry handguns, but the sticks carried by most of the men, a trademark of the commune, settle the question. A commune driver hands a few notes to some youths hired on the spot to watch over the vehicles, and the youths step away from the jeeps and admire their easy money.

The guards and Joyce drive direct to the commune’s office building in the city center. Getting out of the port requires a near-continuous laying of hands on the jeeps’ horns and countless near misses of pedestrians who dash across the road at the last second. The jeeps slow to a crawl for herds of sheep grazing by the roadside and spilling into the path, for goats dragging shredded ropes and making unexpected leaps into the middle of traffic—hunting food scraps that appear inedible to untrained eyes, for children who fetch water from standpipes with basins and buckets on their heads or in both hands, and along stretches of road with rickety stalls selling fruits and jars of honey whose proprietors wave at the jeeps to stop and buy, and slow for short stretches of the roadside covered with pieces of coconut laid out to dry in the sun. Near the city, the traffic increases and houses cramp near the road. The rearview mirrors of the jeeps pass inches from people nonchalantly walking along. Occasionally, the jeeps are forced to steer around perilous potholes so deep and wide that they must enter the lane of oncoming traffic to avoid blowing out a tire.

The jeeps pull up and park at two reserved spaces in front of a large four-story building. The armed guards jump out first and stand by the jeeps as Joyce and the others bearing the briefcases file out of the jeeps and into the building. They greet each other, and the office manager welcomes Joyce back into the fold. One receptionist asks how Trina is getting on, and Joyce says very well, and the receptionist says she keeps hearing great things about her daughter.

A person curious about the building can walk in off the street and pick up a leaflet about the commune and meet two friendly receptionists in the front office, decorated with framed photos of land being tilled and a band playing and a congregation singing and several portraits of the spiritual leader in action shots, preaching with a smile, holding up a baby, surrounded by older pictures of him shaking hands with world-famous dignitaries. The two receptionists know to smile and offer warmth and courtesy always, no matter who walks through those doors, since it can be anybody: a potential recruit or a spy. A camera at the door captures footage of the comings and goings downstairs, and a guard in an upstairs room watches the live feed on a monitor. Another armed guard sits all day at the door that leads from reception to the rest of the building. Joyce climbs to the top floor and selects a bunk bed on which to rest her bag. She hops into the shower and exhales at the luxury of warm water and the absence of a time limit. She stands still, inviting the water to do any damage it can. Her skin wakes up, and the tingle forces her to banish an image of the captain for one of Trina, then hurry out of the shower. She gyrates into a light-blue knee-length pencil skirt and a cream sleeveless nylon blouse, runs a brush through her hair and pins it back by touch alone, since she cannot face a mirror, and heads down one floor to join the group strategizing about the imminent meeting with the interior minister.

They run down their checklist of who says what and where the minister must sit. Remember not to interrupt and pause to allow the minister to have his say and listen and do not rustle papers or make unnecessary background noises. And remain seated. Do not leave the table. Let the minister do most of the moving and talking. The office manager reminds Joyce to observe and keep quiet and deflect any direct questions from the interior minister to someone else. Joyce says she is not stupid. The office manager says she knows Joyce has a university degree, so if it was not stupidity that got Joyce into a big mess with the captain the last time, what was it? Did she act out of self-interest against the interests of the commune? Surely that could not be it. Joyce says the office manager must sleep really soundly at night, knowing what a perfect person she is. Someone else begs Joyce not to argue.

The interior minister’s Mercedes pulls up in front of the building and settles in the no-parking zone behind the two jeeps. The guard at the monitor alerts everyone in the house to take up their allotted positions. The driver stays with the car. A secretary accompanies the minister. A receptionist holds the door, and the minister steps inside, followed by his secretary. Right away he asks the receptionists how Joyce is keeping, and one of them replies that she has just come back from the interior. The minister looks pleased. The second receptionist whips up a tray of iced Cokes and slices of cake for the minister and his secretary. The guard takes the tray and leads the VIP guest and his secretary upstairs to the second floor. That same offer of an iced carbonated drink and cake is extended to the very appreciative driver, and the receptionist explains something to him as he nods and feeds his face. The receptionist returns inside and locks the front door and turns the open sign to the closed position. The group gathers around a large mahogany table in a second-floor room and launches into their affairs from chairs padded with soft velvet. The minister and secretary examine the contents of two briefcases on the table. Both pat the bars of light and smile. The minister’s secretary transfers the gold to ten plain burlap sacks previously used to store paddy. The minister speaks.

—Gold suits these strong bags much better than rice. The piper must be paid, and there are plenty of them.

The guards repeat the preacher’s concerns about prying eyes and the need for this payment to guarantee strict noninterference.

—Of course, of course. You people speak my language. I hear you loud and clear. It’s a pleasure to do business with you.

And with handshakes all around, the minister tells Joyce how good it is to see her again and how attractive she looks. Joyce remains placid and says nothing. He tells her she must come out and see the town sometime. Joyce looks around the room to indicate to him that she has too much work to consider his invitation and perhaps to remind the minister of their location in the capital headquarters of the commune. She wants to say something much more rude. But she cannot speak. He looks at her and asks if he should read her silence as agreement. The office manager steps forward and shows the minister’s secretary the door. The minister and his secretary grab the sacks with help from the guards and ferry them downstairs and out the front door. The driver pops open the trunk of the Mercedes and hops out of his seat to help them. But the minister insists that they stack the two bags around him in the backseat.

—It isn’t every day that I get to play Monopoly with real bullion.

The moment the minister’s car pulls away, a guard extracts the videotape from the machine, copies it and places the copy in an envelope, seals it with a kiss, dates and labels it
Interior Minister
, and hands the envelope to Joyce for her return journey. The office manager radios the compound and tells the preacher that everything is taken care of just as he stipulated. The preacher asks for Joyce and checks to see how things went. Joyce confirms everything the office manager said, and she asks after Trina. The preacher says Trina is doing perfectly fine. Joyce asks if she can have a quick word with her. The preacher says absolutely not, that this is not a social, and Trina feels more at home on the compound than Joyce gives her credit for. His tone is irritable. The office manager edges Joyce from the microphone. Another of the office staff casts her a stern look.

For the return journey to the compound, Joyce helps a receptionist fill the empty attaché cases with U.S. currency (low-denomination dollar bills to trade for gold) collected from pensions for the two hundred or so elderly at the commune and for goods produced by the commune, principally pork, and for unspecified security services provided to the government. The commune pays the government under the table. The government pays the commune over the same table.

T
he captain stays on the docks for two days and two nights. He dwells on the woman whose company he missed for months only to see her and have her on his boat and not be able to say a word to her, a failure not his but a forced compliance that amounts to rejection, and he watches her leave his boat with a certainty that she will return and give him the same silent treatment and perhaps disappear from his life for several more months. Unless he can come up with a plan. Over a lunch of a shared half-chicken, he tells his first mate that he should take the time off but get back early or miss the boat, since commune folk do not like to linger.

—They keep their own sense of time, and the setting is always on fast forward.

The captain daydreams about Joyce, wonders about Trina, breaks a wishbone with his first mate and wins the bigger portion, and secretly wishes to be reunited with Joyce and Trina. The first mate asks about his wish, and he says it is bad luck to share it but adds that he asked the gods for a boat that never leaks. His first mate waves and struts off the jetty. For two days the captain performs rudimentary repairs and touches up the paintwork of the vessel, repaints the letters on the hull:
Coffee
. His body performs the actions of boat repairs, but his mind is elsewhere. At each part of the boat where Joyce stood, he stands and broods over the fact of their proximity and talks to her as if she were there.

He remembers the many ways he devised to make discreet inquiries about Joyce and Trina in front of the commune guards. At the time many of the guards pretended not to understand his questions or recognize the pair. But two guards who make the trips to the capital on a regular basis are on friendly terms with the captain. He asks them and at first they pretend they have no idea what he means. They play with him. They say there are literally hundreds of young women and children at the commune and that he will have to be more specific.

His past with her must be summoned in her absence, every detail of it, as his way to get around the silence between them. His mind reaches out to Joyce with his memories of them together. The guards must hear the desperation in his tone.

—Relax, man. We’re kidding with you. We know who you mean. Joyce and her daughter, Trina. The child talks a lot.

—Yes, but smart talk, not just a chatterbox.

Both guards nod at his distinction and take turns to volunteer more about Joyce and Trina.

—They’re doing fine. The child’s a godsend.

—She’s special.

The captain asks some more about Joyce. He says he cannot figure out why she stopped going to the capital on commune business:

—I haven’t seen her for a while.

Both guards warn him that Joyce is married to the commune, and unless he is thinking of joining, he will be better off if he forgets about that particular woman. There is a lull in the talk. He stands with the guards, and they watch the river flex and ripple its muscles as it turns this way and that. The warning in the tone of the guards curtails any further inquiry about Joyce and Trina. The men listen to the water slapping the side of the craft for some time before small talk ensues. And what if he listens to their warning and leaves things right there? He will be a poorer man. He takes a different line in his questions.

—How does a man join an organization like yours?

The guards say that first, the captain would have to believe in God, and second, he would have to believe in their leader or the other way around, certainly both.

—What’s third?

—No third, just those two things.

—But they’re enough, my friend, let me tell you, more than enough.

The guards remark that the captain does not strike them as a man who follows orders without question.

—Perhaps that’s why I run my boat and work my own hours.

He cannot help himself, and despite their warning, he returns to the subject of Joyce.

—Joyce is the kind of woman a man would give up quite a lot for, though, don’t you think, boys?

—Yeah, we heard all about your many letters to her, but you know we cannot deliver any messages from an outsider to someone in our community.

The guards tell the captain that they like him but he has to drop his interest in Joyce or it will cost him his business with the commune. The captain says he would not want to jeopardize his lucrative work for the commune, ferrying goods and people back and forth, and he will not mention Joyce again, but he has a last question if they will be kind enough and indulge him one more time. The guards feel obliged to hear him out. The captain gives the wheel to his first mate and walks with the guards to a quiet corner of the boat.

—All this time I wonder why I don’t hear back from Joyce or someone at the commune. Why string me along all this time? Why not just tell me to get lost?