B004L2LMEG EBOK (6 page)

(d) That Leonor Curinchila, who has already reached an agreement with Humberto Sipa, alias Snotnose, the owner of a pleasure house in the district of Punchana, to transfer Casa Chuchupe to him, will work in the Special Service on the following conditions: 4,000 (four thousand) soles in wages plus 300 (three hundred) soles as a bonus for field work, and the right to collect a percentage no greater than 3 percent, for a period not to exceed one year, on the wages of the specialists contracted through her mediation. Her functions will be those of chief of personnel for the SSGFRI, taking charge of recruiting, fixing schedules, shifts and staff members of the convoys, controlling operations and maintaining general supervision over the female element.

(e) That Freckle will receive a basic wage of 2,000 (two thousand) soles plus 300 (three hundred) soles per assignment in the field, and will be expedition leader and be responsible for maintaining the logistics center (with two associates: Sinforoso Caiguas and Palomino Rioalto). These three collaborators have joined the SSGFRI as of Monday, 20 August, at 0800 hours.

3. (a) That wanting to give a suitable and distinctive look to the SSGFRI and to provide it with symbolic badges that, without announcing its activities to the outside world, would at least permit those who serve in it to recognize each other as well as permit those whom it will serve to identify its members, locations, vehicles and property, the undersigned has proceeded to designate green and red as the emblematic colors of the Special Service, with the following symbolism:

(b) That he has already given orders that both the command post and the transport teams of the Special Service display their emblematic colors and that for the sum of 185 soles (receipt attached) he has ordered The Tin Paradise to make two dozen small red-and-green badges (without any inscription, of course), insignia that can be worn in men’s buttonholes or on women’s blouses or dresses and, without breaking with the discretionary norms required of the SSGFRI, will substitute for the uniform and letter of credentials of those who have and will have the honor of forming this Service.

Iquitos, 26 August 1956

Dear Chichi,

Sorry I haven’t written in so long. You must be really annoyed with your sister who loves you so much, and talking yourself hoarse asking why that silly Pocha doesn’t tell me how things are going for her out there and what the Amazon is like. But honest, Chichita, even though I’ve thought about you a lot since I got here and missed you terribly, I didn’t have time to write or the desire either. (Don’t get mad, O.K.?) And now I’ll tell you why. It turns out that Iquitos hasn’t been very good to your sister, Chichi. I’m not so happy with the move, things are not coming along very good and they’re funny. I don’t mean that this city is uglier than Chiclayo—just the opposite. Although it’s small, it’s cheerful and friendly, and the nicest thing of all, of course, is the jungle and the huge Amazon River that you’ve always heard is as enormous as the ocean, so you can’t see the other side and a thousand other things, but really, you can’t imagine it till you see it up close: it’s so pretty. Let me tell you, we’ve made a couple of trips in a glider (that’s what they call the small launches here), one Sunday as far as Tamshiyaco, a little town upstream, and another to a town with such a charming name, San Juan de Munich, and another as far as Indiana, a little town downstream, where practically everything was built by some Canadian priests and nuns, isn’t that terrific? That they’d come from so far away to this lonely place and all this heat to civilize the wild jungle Indians. We went with my mother-in-law, but we’ll never take her on a glider again, because all three times she spent the trip scared to death, hanging on to Panta, whining that we were going to turn over, you’ll save yourselves by swimming, but I’ll drown and the piranhas will eat me. (I wish it was true, Chichita, but the poor piranhas would get poisoned.) And later, coming back, complaining about the bites, because, I’m telling you, Chichita, one of the terrible things here are the mosquitoes and the sand fleas (mosquitoes that hide in the grass), they’re after you all day long, covering you with bumps, and you spraying on repellents and scratching yourself. So now you see, dear, the disadvantages of having fair skin and blue blood that stir up the little pests to bite you (ha, ha).

What’s for sure is that if coming to Iquitos hasn’t been great for me, it’s been fatal for my mother-in-law. Because she was happy there in Chiclayo. You know how sociable she is, having her clubby life with the old fossils on the army base, playing canasta every afternoon, crying like Mary Magdalene at her soap operas and giving her little teas. But here, everything she liked so much, everything that made her stop calling it “her life in the convent” (oh, Chichi, it kills me just to think of Chiclayo), here she hasn’t got all that, so she’s taken up religion to console herself, but really it’s witchcraft, you better believe it. Because—this’ll kill you—that was the first slap in the face I got: we’re not going to be able to live on the army base or get together with the officers’ families. That’s all there is to it. And it’s terrible for Mother Leonor, who came here with great illusions of becoming an inseparable friend of the wife of the Commander of Region V and putting on airs like she did in Chiclayo because she was an intimate friend of Colonel Montes’s wife and the only thing the two of them hadn’t done was get into bed together (to gossip and chatter under the sheets—don’t think dirty thoughts). Listen, do you remember that joke? Joey asks Charlie, Do you want my grandmother to act like a wolf? Yeah, sure. Grandma, how long has it been since you did anything with Grandpa? Ou-
o-o-o!

The simple truth is that with that order, the Army’s put us in a real mess, Chichi, because the only modern, comfortable houses in Iquitos are on the army base, or the navy or air force base. The houses in this city are very old, very ugly, very uncomfortable. We’ve taken one on Sergeant Lores Street, one of the ones they built at the turn of the century, during the rubber boom, the most picturesque ones with their tiles from Portugal on the front and their wooden balconies. It’s large and from one window you can see the river, but it certainly doesn’t compare at all to the poorest house on the base. What makes me really mad is that we can’t even swim in the Army pool or in the Navy or the Air Force’s either, and there’s only one pool in Iquitos, the municipal pool, a horrible place where everybody and their brother goes. I went once and there must’ve been a thousand people, how disgusting, lots of men just waiting around like vultures for the women to get into the water so they could pretend to be jamming in together and you can just imagine what. Never again, Chichi; the shower’s better. How furious I am when I think that the wife of any little lieutenant can be at the pool on the army base this very minute, sunbathing, listening to her radio and taking a dip, and here I am glued to the fan so I won’t roast: I swear I’d cut off General Scavino’s you-know-what (ha ha). Because besides, it turns out I can’t even do my household shopping at the PX, where everything’s half as expensive. Instead I have to shop in the town stores, just like everybody else. And that’s not all—we have to live just as if Panta was a civilian. They’ve given him a two thousand soles raise as a bonus, but that doesn’t make up for anything. As you can see, Chichi, for money for food, poor Pochita is screwed. (That came out like a poem. It can’t be so bad if I haven’t lost my sense of humor, right?)

Imagine, they have Panta dressed up like a civilian day and night, while the uniforms he likes so much are being eaten by the moths in a trunk and he’ll never get to put them on. And we have to make everybody believe that Panta’s a merchant who’s come to Iquitos on business. The funny thing is that some awful mix-ups come up with the neighbors and my mother-in-law and me because sometimes we invent one thing for them and at other times another, and suddenly some military memories of Chiclayo slip out that must just intrigue them, and all over the neighborhood we already have the reputation for being an odd, rather suspicious family. I can see you bouncing up and down on your bed asking what’s going on with this idiot that she just doesn’t tell me right away why there’s so much mystery. But it turns out, Chichi, that I can’t tell you a thing, it’s a military secret, and so secret that if they found out that Panta had said anything, they’d court-martial him for treason against the country. Just think, Chichita, they’ve given him a very important mission in the Intelligence Service, a dangerous assignment and so nobody is supposed to know that he’s a captain. Oh, what a dope I am, I already told you the secret and I’m too lazy to tear up this letter and start over. Swear to me, Chichita, that you’re not going to say one word to anyone, because I’ll kill you, and besides, you wouldn’t want them to put your brother-in-law in the guardhouse or shoot him because of you, would you? So keep quiet and don’t run around telling the story to your gossipy Santana friends. Isn’t it funny that Panta’s turned into a secret agent? Let me tell you that Mother Leonor and I are dying of curiosity to know what he’s spying on here in Iquitos, and we’re eating him up with questions and we try to get it out of him but he wouldn’t let one syllable escape even if he was going to be killed. We’ll have to see about that, your sister is as stubborn as a mule, so we’ll see who wins. I’m only warning you that when I find out what Panta’s mixed up in, I don’t plan to tattle to you even if you’re wetting your pants with curiosity.

It’ll be very exciting now the Army’s given him this assignment in the Intelligence Service, Chichita, and maybe it’ll help his career a lot, but I tell you I’m not one bit happy with this business. In the first place because I hardly ever see him. You know how reliable and fanatic Panta is about his work, he takes everything they give him so seriously that he doesn’t sleep or eat or live until he’s finished with it, but at least in Chiclayo he had his duties on a regular schedule and I knew when he was coming and going. But here he spends his life outside the house, you never know what time he’s coming in and (this will knock you off your feet) not even in what condition. I’m telling you, I’m not used to seeing him as a civilian, wearing sport shirts and blue jeans and the little jockey cap they’ve given him, it seems to me I’ve switched husbands and not just because of that. (Oh, I’m so embarrassed, Chichi, so much I really wouldn’t dare tell you.) If only he worked during the day I’d be happy. But he also has to go out at night, sometimes till very late, and he’s shown up three times falling-over drunk, he had to be helped out of his clothes and the next day his mama had to put compresses on his forehead and make tea for him. Yes, Chichi, I can see the surprised look on your face, even though you don’t believe it, Panta the teetotaler, who only drank pasteurized milk ever since he got hemorrhoids—falling-down drunk and with a thick tongue. Now it makes me laugh because I can remember how funny it was to see him stumbling over things and hear him complain, but at the same time I was in such a fit I wanted to cut off
his
you-know-what too. (No, I’d be cutting off my nose to spite my face, ha ha.) He swears to me and double swears that he has to go out at night on account of his assignment, that he has to search for some guys who only live in the bars, who make their appointments there to throw you off the track, and maybe it’s the truth. (Just like the spy movies, right?) But listen, would you be so calm if your husband spent the night in bars? No, well, my dear, not even if I was fool enough to believe you can only see men in bars. There have to be women there who come up to him and start conversations and God only knows what else. I’ve made a few terrible scenes, and he’s promised me not to go out at night anymore except when it’s a case of life or death. I’ve gone through all his pockets and shirts and underwear with a fine-tooth comb, because let me tell you if I find a shred of proof that he’s been with women, poor Panta. It’s not so bad because his mama helps me with all this, she’s horrified at his going out at night and his binges—her little boy, who she always thought was a church saint and who it now turns out isn’t quite that. (Oh, Chichi, you’d die if I told you.)

And besides, because of that damned mission, he has to get together with people who’d make your hair stand on end. Just imagine, the other afternoon I’d gone to the matinee with a neighbor I’ve become friendly with, Alicia, married to a boy who works for the Bank of the Amazon, a very nice woman from Loreto who helped us a lot with the moving. We went to the Excelsior to see a Rock Hudson movie (hold me up while I pass out), and after getting out we were taking a little walk in the fresh air, when passing by a bar called the Camu Camu I see Panta at a table in the corner and what a pair he’s with! I nearly had a stroke, Chichi, the woman so covered with make-up there wasn’t room for a drop more, not even on her ears, with such tits and an ass spilling over the chair, and the guy was a little half-pint, so short his feet didn’t reach the floor, and what’s more, with an incredible ladykiller look. And Panta between the two of them, talking as lively as could be, as if they had been friends all their life. I said to Alicia, look, my husband, and then she grabbed me by the arm, very nervous, come on, Pocha, let’s go, you can’t go in there. So we left. Who do you think that pair was? The woman decked out like a parrot has the worst reputation in all Iquitos, Enemy Number One of home life, they call her Chuchupe and she has a brothel on the road to Nanay, and her lover, the dwarf, it’s enough to make you break out laughing, imagining her making it with that clown, she’s depraved and he’s worse. What do you think? Later I mentioned it to Panta, to see what his reaction would be, and of course, he choked on that bone so much he started to stammer. But he didn’t dare deny it to me, he admitted that this pair lead a bad life. And that he had to go find them for his assignment, that I should never go up to him if I see him with them and his mother even less so. I told him right then and there you can get mixed up with whoever you want to but if I ever find out you went to the parrot’s house in Nanay, your marriage is in trouble, Panta. So, my dear, imagine the reputation we’re going to get here if Panta begins to be seen on the streets with those people.

Another of his pals is a Chink. I always thought that all Chinks were very delicate, but this one’s Frankenstein, even if Alicia does think he’s very handsome; these people in Loreto have cockeyed taste. I caught him one day when I went to visit the Moronacocha aquarium, to see the tropical fish (very pretty, let me tell you, but I thought I’d touch an eel and he let out with an electric shock from his tail that nearly knocked me over), and Mother Leonor has also caught Panta in a restaurant with the Chink, and Alicia spied them walking across the Army Plaza and from her I found out that the Chink is well known as a big hood. He exploits women and he’s a parasite and a bum. Imagine your dear brother-in-law’s friendships. I’ve put it to him squarely and Mother Leonor more than me, because her son’s bad companions make her sicker than they make me, especially now that she believes the end of the world is near. Panta has promised her he won’t be seen on the streets anymore with either the woman or the dwarf or the Chink, but he’ll have to go on seeing them on the sly because it turns out that’s part of his work. I don’t know where it’s all going to lead with this assignment and with that sort of connections, Chichita, you’ll understand my nerves are upset and I’m very jumpy.

Even though I really shouldn’t be like this, I mean about tomcatting and cheating, because—should I tell you, Sis?—you can’t imagine how Panta’s changed in regard to such things, the intimate ones. Do you remember how he’s always been so formal ever since we got married so you always joked a lot and told me I’m sure with Panta you must be doing without, Pocha? Well, you can’t laugh at your brother-in-law anymore in that respect, you bad-mouth, because since he stepped foot in Iquitos he’s become a savage. Something terrible, Chichi, at times I get scared and wonder if it isn’t an illness, because imagine that before, I’ve told you, I only got him to tend to his business once every ten or fifteen days (how embarrassing to talk to you about this, Chichi) and now the little bandit’s excited every two, three days and I have to put the brakes on his passion, because it isn’t right, no, really, with this heat and sticky humidity. Besides, it occurred to me it could hurt him, it seems it affects the brain. Didn’t everybody say that Pulpito Carrasco’s husband went out of his head from doing it so often with her? Panta says the climate’s to blame, a general already warned him back in Lima that the jungle turns men into blowtorches. I have to tell you it makes me laugh seeing your little brother-in-law so horny. Sometimes he’s itching to do a little business during the daytime, right after lunch, with the siesta as an excuse, but of course I don’t let him, and sometimes he wakes me at dawn with that craziness. Picture this, the other night I caught him with a stopwatch timing how long our business took us. I asked him about it and he got very confused. Later he confessed to me he had to know how long a little business like that took for a normal couple. Do you think he’s turning into a pervert? Who’s going to believe that he has to check that dirty business for his assignment? I tell him I don’t recognize you, Panta, you who were so very, very educated, it makes me feel I’m doing it with some other Panta. Well, my dear, enough dirty talk, since you’re a little virgin, and I promise you I’ll fight with you forever if it gets into your head to mention this to anybody, especially to those crazy Santanas.