Meanwhile agents of the law, led by the indefatigable Bernard Wolfshein, plot my demise. I get messages from people who have been visited by the Heat. They have questioned my parents and sister. Everyone in the Maine case pled out. Freddy Barnswallow got five years. They’ve got him tucked away somewhere in the Witness Protection Program waiting to testify against me and the Colombians who supplied him with cocaine. For all my bravado and false posturing, I know my days are numbered unless I can make a complete break and reinvent myself. Cut all my ties to my former life and become a new person—a total metamorphosis. It’s a challenge. One would need a whole new belief system. And that would entail denouncing the former me. Spin the globe, point my finger down on some distant land. Argentina. They take Nazis down there. Surely they would not mind a fugitive dope smuggler. Resurface when it’s legal, when I am 150 years old.
Each day is like a precious stone in the mosaic I am constructing from my fragmented life. Out walking in the hills, stupefied by the beauty of this island in the Pacific, it’s as though I can see the jail cell waiting for me: an empty, gray, steel-enclosed chamber suspended in the cloudbank beyond the horizon. I blame only me; this is the result of the choices I made. There is drug and alcohol-fueled madness, decadence and decay; there is death; or there is the monastic life of the prisoner. Yet I discern some other future if only I can find the pieces of the puzzle and put together a renewed vision.
As I walk, I think of a time sitting in the basement of a Greenwich Village apartment with Tom Forçade, founder of High Times magazine. I had brought Tom a sample of some class A-plus herb from high in the Sierra Madre del Sur out of Guerrero, Mexico. We agreed Mexican weed got a bad rap. True most of the commercial pot available in the country then (early ’70s) was low-grade, heavily seeded pressed bricks. Colombian pot was just beginning to hit the market. But there is good, bad, indifferent, and superb herb available from wherever pot is grown. I’ve seen pot from Thailand that was as bad as the worst Mexican dirt weed. And the tight, lime-green-and-gold, lightly seeded colas I gave Tom took you as high as the mountain peaks whence it came.
“Good sticks,” Tom said after we shared a joint. He was lean and intense, a good listener. The editorial staff wanted to hear all about the adventures I had getting the load out of Mexico and bringing it to New York.
The second issue of the magazine had just been published, the one with the cover showing a seaplane being loaded with bales of pot. The magazine was in their face, all a great lark, or so we thought. Anything seemed possible. High Times was a huge success from its first issue. Modeled on Playboy, with pictures of cannabis in the centerfold, it was brilliantly conceived and executed. The future looked bright. We believed that the government would soon see the folly of their War on Plants and free thinking and declare a truce. A few years later, Tom blew his brains out.
Anaïs had been with me when we imported the load I showed Tom, which eventually graced the spread of the High Times centerfold and announced a new legitimacy for premium-grade Mexican bud. The magazine became our advertising vehicle. We were living in a villa in Cuernavaca, where Cortes had gone to rest and recuperate with his Indian mistress after subduing Montezuma’s Aztecs. Anaïs wanted to go with me to Xixila, the tiny pre-Colombian village high in the mountains of Guerreo where I bought my weed. We brought Karamazov along to keep us company. The plan was to drive up the mountain in our four-wheel-drive truck. In the village at the foot of the mountain, we were informed that a company of federales was on patrol along the single dirt-and-rock-strewn track leading up to Xixila. The presence of gringos in a big, American truck with a big white dog could mean only one thing: a load of mota was being readied for shipment; bribes, the mordida, the bite, were in the offing. It was decided we would climb the mountain on burros to avoid the soldiers.
It was incredibly hot. The sharp stones along the trail cut and burned and turned the pads on the dog’s paws raw and bloody. He limped along valiantly until he could hardly walk. I had to dismount and strap him to the back of my donkey to continue the trek. As I walked along beside him, the dog looked at me with a pathetic expression as if to say: Why are you humiliating me like this, tying me to the back of this inferior beast? And he would snap at the animal’s haunches. It was a grueling, ten-hour hike, but we made it undetected.
Adelberto, the village jefe, put us up in his adobe home. There was no electricity in the village, no running water. We ate stone-ground blue corn tortillas, black beans, chili peppers, and an occasional scrawny chicken leg. We slept on mats on the dirt floor. Adelberto was a prince in this primitive realm. Handsome, poised, dignified in his bearing, humble and yet bold. He had a young wife and five little kids who had never seen anything like Karamazov, this fearsome white giant, a god of a dog next to the skinny, mangy village mutts. It was Quetzalcoatl and Cortés all over again.
I gave Adelberto twenty-five grand, enough money to keep him and his whole village for a year. We stood on a precipice overlooking the nearly vertical stepped clearing where he had planted his next crop, and he pointed across the steep valley to the opposite mountainside. A patch of black like an oily smear or a blurred smudge on a photograph, marred the landscape. It looked like the earth was diseased. Nothing grew there, Adelberto told me. Not since the helicopters came and sprayed the mountain with poison. It was part of the American campaign to eradicate marijuana cultivation in Mexico by spraying the fields with a powerful, deadly herbicide called Paraquat. Adelberto went on to say that several villagers who had been in the fields tending the plants when they were sprayed had become ill and two young kids died.
Early on our second day in Xixila, Adelberto received word that the soldiers were coming to the village. It was believed they had heard rumors of gringos in the vicinity. Anaïs, Karamazov, and I were sequestered in a windowless storeroom beside the pigsty behind Adelberto’s home. His wife delivered our meals. Our second morning there, Anaïs turned to me and said she had to “spend a penny,” using the British colloquialism for taking a shit. Where, she wondered, was she to go? I told her I had been instructed to use a spot out behind a freestanding wall in the pigpen. She was to sneak out, squat behind the wall and relieve herself.
“Really?” she said, incredulous.
“It’s that or hold it,” I told her.
Brave lady. She did it, but came back horrified. Mortified. And covered with mud and pig slop. “The brutes knocked me over!” she said. The bigger pigs, in their haste to get to her leavings, rudely shoved Anaïs aside and gobbled up the excrement.
“Now you know why we don’t eat pork,” I said.
A moonlit night a few days later, a burro-train delivered the bales to the base of the mountain. We piled them in our truck and drove to the villa in Cuernavaca. The load sat there for two weeks. One morning I loaded the single-engine Maule on a lonely roadway in Morelos, delivered the load to the ranch in Goldthwaite, and took it to New York in the Global Evangelism machine. The pot sold in two days. That $25,000 netted not quite ten times the investment in profit, a little over $200,000 after expenses. We used part of the money to buy the place in Provincetown.
Of course, I should have quit then, maybe done the occasional off-load, brokered someone else’s trip and invested my money in real estate, my other great passion. By now I’d be totally legit—and possibly a multimillionaire. But the feeling I got when I handed Adelberto that initial investment, and to see how good it made him feel; to know the whole village would benefit and be sustained, and the feeling I got from that vision, the burros silhouetted in the moonlight and sure-footing their way along the mountain trail, bails of fresh reefer strapped to their backs; the excitement I feel when I first hear the plane’s engine and look up in the sky to see the aircraft approaching; the rush of landing the load on the US side of the border; and finally sitting and sharing the herb with a connoisseur like Tom Forçade, having him pronounce it good—I live for all that.
Now I’m a man on the run. Each day when I wake up I ask m
yself: Will this be the day they catch me and put me in a cage? The prospect of going to prison bothers me less than the thought that by arresting me and locking me up, they will win. The authorities will win; I will be the loser. Wolfshein and the other cops and dope agents will sit around gloating, go out for drinks, and toast their victory while I sit in a jail cell feeling like an asshole for having made one too many false moves.
Oh, well—fuck it. Like Wolfshein said after they popped me in Maine: “You had a good run.”
Still running. It’s all about the adventure, the experience. The game. And they haven’t caught me yet.
I’M TOO PARANOID to go to the airport to meet Val. When she arrives, she takes a taxi to a hotel in Lahaina. Checks in. Chills. And when she’s sure she has no Heat, she calls me. “Hi, Dad. Want a date?”
We meet at our favorite restaurant. One look at her and my suspicions are confirmed. She’s got dark circles under her eyes, looks like she hasn’t slept or had a good meal in days. “Let’s talk biz later,” she says. “I’m starved.” Yet she picks at her food. She’s nervous, can’t look me in the eye. When she feels me looking at her, she gives me a guilty smile. She excuses herself and goes to the ladies room to powder her nose. Yeah, right. I can see her, looking in the mirror, scooping a little mound of blow out of the bag with her fingernail and whiffing it up those large, flared nostrils. When she comes back and sits down, she’s full of that false sincerity and artificial chemical ebullience that comes with the initial coke rush.
Dog that I am, and horny after weeks of no loving, I’m thinking I’m not going to confront her until after we fuck. We drink a bottle of champagne and a bottle of red wine with the meal. She staggers slightly as we leave the restaurant. I slap her in the ass.
“What was that for?” she says.
“You know.”
“’Cause you love my ass?”
“’Cause I’m gonna tear that ass up.”
We step out onto the balcony of the hotel room and smoke some Hawaiian herb. It seems to straighten her out—for a minute. Back in the room, she sits on the bed and rummages through her handbag. Almost as an afterthought, she presents me with a business card: James Sullivan, embossed with the Department of Justice, United States Marshals seal. “He came to my mother’s house with that other guy. You know the guy,” she says as I sit staring at the card, expecting the hotel room door to burst open and agents to come crashing in at any moment. “He was at the restaurant that night when we had dinner with Norman. The one with the curly dark hair.”
“Wolfshein. He’s DEA.”
“I thought they were comin’ for me. Flipped me the fuck out. But they didn’t even know I’m a fugitive. They only asked about you.”
“Don’t underestimate what they know.” I’m looking around now, rushing with fear, imagining Wolfshein outside poised to make his move. I’m ready to get up and run. They didn’t arrest her, I’m thinking, because they knew she would lead them to me. “What did you tell them?”
“Nothing. I said I hadn’t seen you since that night in New York.”
“They probably followed you here.”
“No way, José,” she says. “I’ve been lammin’ it long enough to know how to shake the Heat. I drove to San Fran, flew out on fresh ID.”
I hand her back the card.
“What am I supposed to do with this?” she asks.
I shake my head. When she reaches for her handbag, I grab her wrist. I take the bag, dump the contents out on the bed. There it is, the little glassine bag of glittering white powder. It looks inviting. Why not do a couple of lines? Drink some more. Get totally fucked up. Party my brains out. The evil twin urges me: Fuck the girl. Suck that pussy. Have fun! So when the Heat comes down, you go to jail all played out.
I pick up the bag of blow, dangle it in front of her.
“And this?”
“What?”
“You know what.” I get up and start for the bathroom. “This is what you were doing over there when you were supposed to be taking care of business.”
Val is beside me. “Where’re you goin’ with that?”
“I’m going to dump it down the fucking toilet.”
“No, Richard, please, don’t. Just… give it to me.”
“You—” I stammer, shake my head. “You’re strung out.”
She reaches for my hand holding the bag. “Give it to me.”
I pull away.
“When it’s gone,” she says, “that’s it. I’ll—”
“You’ll what? You’ll find another bag somewhere.”
“Don’t get all self-righteous on me. Just give me the fucking bag.”
“Here.” I toss the bag back on the bed. “That’s what you want, take it. I’m out of here.”
“Ah, honey.” She puts her arms around my waist, rests her head on my chest. “C’mon, Dad. Don’t go. Love me up. I’ll stop, I promise.”
My cock jumps and twitches. It has no moral compunctions. It knows how well this girl gets it on when she’s doing blow. She can go for hours. But the weed has sent my mind wheeling off on some flight of jealousy and anger and fear and guilt steeped with self-disgust. I’m imagining Val fucking other guys. I know how she is when she parties. One of the guys she does business with is a former boyfriend. She dropped out of communication for a couple of days while visiting him in Lake Tahoe.
The worm turns. Something inside me snaps. I just want out.
“Where’s the money?”
“What money?”
“What money? What the fuck were you doing over there? The money. My money.”
“I gave it to Sammy. And that guy, what’s his name? The Lebanese guy. The taxi driver. For Nasif and Mohammed. And the other dude, in Texas. Like you told me.”
I push her away, take her by the shoulders, sit her back down on the bed. I’m thinking, I left my wife for this strung-out coke whore? A cruel thought, and not true, but some part of it sizzles like fat burning in my brain. Static. Mental white noise. I can’t get a clear, coherent picture in my mind of what I am supposed to be doing with this information, what I see and feel coming from this woman. What am I doing with my life? Something is definitely wrong. I enabled this: the money, sending her out on the road to hang with people who do blow. Every time this shit comes into our lives, it leads to one major fuckup after another. Treachery and deceit. Let’s talk biz later. This is later. She’s not telling me something.
“Our money,” I say. “My end. The money you were supposed to bring back to me.”
“Ah, well… I can get it back.”
“Get it back? Who’s got it?”
She says, “I gave it to Ally. She was going to take it back to LA for me. Because… I was worried. I had too much going on.” Her girlfriend, Ally, one of her couriers, and usually trustworthy.
“So what happened? Where is it?” I ask, trying to contain my rage.
“She gave it to her old man. He made her give it to him. I mean, he just basically took it. He picked her up at the airport and… and kept the money.”
“Two hundred thousand dollars? Some guy has it?”
“Yeah… something like that.”
She opens the bag, does a quick whiff in each nostril. Hands it to me.
“No.” I shake my head. “Give me this guy’s name and phone number.”
“I don’t have it.”
“I’m just supposed to forget about this? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Honey, you gotta lay low. They’re looking for you hot and heavy. It’s only money. I’ll get it back,” she tells me. “Besides, Ally’s good for it. We’ll work it off. This guy, her old man… he’s a bad dude. He just got out of the joint.”
“Where’s Ally?”
“LA… or, actually, Orange County.” She snuggles up to me, reaches for my cock. “C’mon, Dad. Fuck me.”
“Give me Ally’s number.”
“Not tonight. C’mon, baby—I’ve been away so long. I missed you.”
&
nbsp; She’s massaging my cock now, reaching inside my fly. “Lemme suck it,” she says. “I’m so horny.”
“No. Get away from me.” I push her off.
“Dad… don’t—”
“Give me the fucking number!”
“What’s the matter with you?” she pleads. “Not now. Be nice.”
But I can’t, I feel mean, hateful, hating myself and taking it out on her.
“Now. Give me the number. You think I’m going to just let this guy rip me off? Give me Ally’s number and her address.”
“You’re fuckin’ crazy!” she says and scribbles the number on a scrap of paper. “Here!” She balls up the piece of paper and throws it at me. She’s in tears now. “If you leave,” she cries, “that’s it. It’s all over.”
Yes, it is, I think. All over.
I walk out, leave her in the room with her bag of blow.
BACK IN ULUPALAKUA, I cruise past the house once, twice, to make certain there are no agents staking the place out before I pull into the driveway. Inside, I grab an overnight bag, a change of clothes, and ten grand in cash. There is one late flight left from Maui to Honolulu. I check in to a hotel near the airport in Honolulu and book a flight to LA for the next day.
At a pay phone in the lobby, I make a call to Biff in New York.
“Jesus, Doc, it’s like five in the morning. Where are you?” Stupid question to ask a fugitive. I don’t answer. “I’m glad you called,” he goes on. “The Captain is looking for you. You know—”
I cut him off. “Did he leave you a number?”
“Yeah.” He gives me the number. “You know the area code. He said to call anytime.”
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