The Risk of Returning, Second Edition. Shirley Nelson

offering one to you. If you can stand it to ride in an ancient jeep.”

      “I’m not fussy.”

      “To be honest with you, I’d like the company. I may still be a little shaky.”

      “What time?”

      “Morning. No later than 6:00. All right?”

      “I’ll be here.”

      “Bueno. —Hasta mañana.”

      “Mañana, sí. Bueno. Sí.”

      Sometime during the night Antigua treated me to a farewell surprise, my first earthquake. Not an important one, very low on the Richter scale. But it woke me up. My jacket swayed gently on its hanger on the back of the door and the Holy Family trembled on the bureau. Outside it was pouring, with occasional flashes of lightning. Downstairs the parrot gave a sleepy squawk and swore. I sat up, with a new sense of anxiety, as if the quake had spilled negative energy into the night air. I connected it to Catherine, a delayed distrust of that momentary rapport. Or more likely, it was just the obscurity of tomorrow’s agenda.

      I wrote for a while and read here and there in Thoreau and Dickinson. Usually they both offered composure. But that didn’t work this time, so out came the baseball game, which I hadn’t called on since my night at the Pan American Hotel. Batting order. I labored into the W’s, regardless of team or position. Honus Wagner, Bucky Walters, Bill White. I stopped at Ted Williams. It occurred to me with sleepy amusement that maybe he, another namesake, was actually the guy who was harboring my soul. If so, he could have it. It seemed safe enough in his hands.

      FOURTEEN

      When my alarm went off at 5 A.M., the foreboding was still there. I had to deal with it, and did, under the tepid stream of the shower. Facts were still the answer, I told myself. I pictured them as a little collection of hard objects I could pack in my suitcase or bury in the ground and leave behind. Then back to Boston, like it or not. I made that a mental contract, with the date: Saturday, August 22, 1987. Signed it.

      I helped myself to a quick breakfast in the quiet kitchen, the family still asleep. I wrote them a note of thanks and put it on the table under the saltshaker. The maid arrived while I was there. I gave her a tip, a little wad of quetzales, which she accepted shyly, slipping it into the band of her skirt, still refusing to look me in the eye. On the way out I whispered adiós to the parrot, who lifted her head from under her clipped wing and hoarsely reminded me of who she really was.

      Outdoors I could hardly see for the fog. It was not raining; it was as if the air had turned to water. It settled in a layer on my head and face, and the soles of my shoes squeaked on the wet street. Catherine was waiting for me in her jeep at the curb, the motor running and the windshield wipers carving an arc in the collected dew. She hadn’t exaggerated its age—an old Willys that had seen many moons, its once red body now a nasty brown. The passenger door was jammed shut. She signaled me to stand back, then gave it a hard kick. It popped open. I dropped my luggage and hat in the back beside a suitcase and her familiar woven tote bag.