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shake hands with Cousin Carlos (who had no trouble with the concept), I noticed the woman was now holding her right hand out from her side, and her smile was more fixed than before.
    I smiled and nodded farewell to Cousin Carlos, who merely nodded at me, not being a man to waste his smiles. He and Arturo said a word or two, and then Arturo and I departed, taking again the path around the side of the house. As we left the lawn area, I looked back, and it seemed to me the woman was just turning toward the swimming pool. I knew what she was going to do: rinse that hand in chlorinated water.
    I followed Arturo around the house and through the door in the wall and out to the grubby street again, full of the sounds of motorcycles. We walked along toward Cousin Carlos's shop and the Impala, and I said, "I just wish it didn't have to be syphilis."
    Arturo laughed. "She got to you,
hermano.
I knew she would!"
    "What do you mean?" I felt a little bad-tempered in this noise and heat, what with being full of beer and not liking to be a syphilitic. "Who was she, anyway?"
    "We talked about her in the car the other day," Arturo said. "Lola and me. Remember Lola?"
    "Oh, don't be stupid, Arturo," I said. "Who is she?"
    "Luz," he said. "Luz Garrigues."
    "Oh," I said.
    I remembered now. Luz. If it weren't for this Luz, the Tobón family wouldn't have any gossip worth mentioning.
    We walked another dry noisy half a block, and I said, "You mean, she and Cousin Carlos…?"
    "No, no," he said. "She's his niece. Carlos, he's her uncle, he wouldn't do a thing like that."
    "Oh," I said.
    We walked some more, and I became aware that Arturo was watching me, with that overly boyish grin of his. I said, "What now?"
    "Don't go get yourself in trouble,
hermano,"
he said. "You know what I mean."
    I looked at him. "What, me? You don't have to worry about me."
     
8
     
    Friday was the day: Two days after my meeting with Cousin Carlos, almost a week after our arrival in Guerrera, and the beginning of the weekend. What better time for it? And what better place than Vista Alegar, the closest thing Guerrera has to a tourist attraction?
    At 837 feet, Vista Alegar is the highest spot in Guerrera, up in the mountains along the southern border with Brazil. As the crow flies, it's probably sixty miles from Sabanon down to the border, but roads are few in Guerrera and meandering, mostly following the rivers and circling around mountains, so it can take nearly three hours to make the trip.
    The last several miles, one drives due south but steeply uphill, beside a narrow rocky tumbling northbound river called the Conoro. As the road climbs, the descending river becomes more and more agitated, till there are actual rapids, visible from the road, and swirling deep pools that the more adventurous tourists swim in, and even brief noisy white waterfalls. Vines dangle down over all, and there's huge-fronded and huge-leaved jungle growth and incredibly gaudy birds flickering here and there, occasionally making sounds like a Marine Corps drill instructor.
    For the last few miles to the border and the town of Vista Alegar, the road veers away from the river, and soon there are dirt roads angling off leftward toward tourist spots constructed along the steep banks. Most of these turnoffs are marked by rough-and-ready signs painted on or carved into wooden planks. The one we wanted had two such signs: GLOBAL WARMING CAMP and THE SCARLET TOUCAN, that being the restaurant we were headed for.
    We turned in there and jounced over the roots and stones and brick-hard ruts of the narrow tan road through the jungle, the Beetle bounding around like a Christmas ornament in a hurricane and the both of us holding on for dear life, me to the steering wheel, Lola to whatever she could find. Twilight came more rapidly in the jungle, and I had to stop at one point to find the headlights.
    Soon those lights picked out another car ahead of us, going the same way, even more slowly; a bright red Honda