As the sun rose behind the hill, somehow I managed enough strength to take photos of our rescuers together, one of Roque and his wife, and some of the Desdre clan. Then I showed a young man—who I don’t believe had ever seen a camera before—where to press the button to photograph Roque and Silverio with Fitz and me.
The twenty-foot boat, piled high with Brazil nuts, was roofed from bow to stern. Fitz and I plopped down on top of the mountain of bumpy nuts. Gregoria handed us the chicken and hugged us. I photographed the well-wishers cascading down the hill to see us off. Silverio and Roque and his wife boarded briefly to say good-bye. We sat on the nuts, not able to rise easily. Eyes misty, we each hugged these men who had plucked us from certain death.
Lines were hauled, the engine roared, and the men pushed off. The trip would take about six hours.
Two girls, also passengers from the barraca, offered us Santo Domingo oranges. “The best on the river,” one said.
“The best anywhere,” I replied, and meant it.
We ate all of Roque’s bananas as we talked, then extras were passed out. We ate some of those, too. Then we offered our chicken. Most travelers politely declined, saying it was ours to eat. It was our second dinner from Gregoria. I saved the wishbone for good luck.
It was Saint Patrick’s Day. I would accept more of Fitz’s Irish luck if it came. I’d never seen the serendipitous monkey, but I gave him thanks for guiding Roque and Silverio to us. I hoped that he’d have a blessed life.
“I don’t think that monkey came by chance,” I said to Fitz. “He could have been a spirit of good fortune sent to save us.”
Fitz was looking out at the Madre, which was perfectly reflecting a bank of clouds and the never-ending jungle as we motored along. He turned his gaze to me. “I’ve been wondering about that myself.” His voice was barely audible over the engine. “There’s a monkey on my family’s Irish coat of arms. It seems such a coincidence.”
“A monkey?”
“Yeah. Supposedly it snatched a FitzGerald baby from its cradle and carried it out of a burning home.”
“Amazing!”
Fitz nodded. “Doesn’t it seem weird that a monkey has saved FitzGeralds again?”
I tried to fathom how the pieces came together. “Remember how I just knew we’d get out of the swamp yesterday? I felt so sure of it but didn’t understand why. Perhaps it was divine intervention.”
“Maybe so,” Fitz replied, gazing at the riverbank.
—
Within the hour I felt urgently hungry. The cook on the small boat had boiled rice with some unknown meat and tossed baked bananas into it. After the others had eaten, one of the passengers shoveled a pile of rice into his bowl and handed it to me, along with his spoon. I grabbed the rice with my hands and gobbled it down. Fitz complained about stomach cramps and didn’t eat the meal. He did crack open a few Brazil nuts, using a board as a hammer.
We became tranquilized by the breezes and scenery, forgetting that just a few hours earlier we could barely walk to the launch. We discussed continuing our trip, as if nothing had happened to impede us. Too happy to sleep, I relished the feeling of being safe.
Fitz dozed as the motor hummed. By midafternoon, Riberalta’s waterfront appeared.
Closer to the harbor I noticed circles of iridescent oil undulating on the surface. Small motorboats buzzed every which way. Long, flat-bowed riverboats, just like ours, floated near the worn clay bank with planks thrown to board or exit.
Hacked from the forest, Riberalta stood high up the bank, a jumble of structures with corrugated roofs and peeling stucco walls splattered with mud. I was transfixed as I watched the men moving about on the bank, loading and unloading boats.
“Wake up, Fitz. We’re here!” I jiggled his shoulder and grabbed his hand.
Gregoria had told us to stay with her sister in Riberalta, but no one had mentioned that on the trip. As the captain steered the boat to shore, he asked us where we were going. Fitz and I looked at each other.
“The hospital,” I said, and turned to Fitz. “Afterward we can go to a restaurant and get a huge meal.”
The plank from the boat to the bank was narrow and long. My legs began to sway under the weight of my backpack and the camera bag. I tried to put one foot in front of the other without falling.
“Fitz, are you okay?” I called behind me. He didn’t reply.
When I made it to shore I turned to see him trying to carry the typewriter and his bag down the plank. His eyes rolled upward as he began to teeter. I wanted to run to him, but I could barely stand myself. I wanted to yell at the captain, but I could only whisper, “Please help him.” He didn’t hear me. Incredibly, Fitz reached the riverbank.
Catching my breath, I called to the captain, “How can we get to the hospital?”
He pointed for us to walk up a high hill to the plaza, saying that we’d find a motorbike taxi. We knew Riberalta had few roads, all of them dirt. Motorbikes had arrived in town only within the past year. We stared up the hill, immobile. Finally, the captain beckoned to a young relative to carry some of our luggage.
Fitz stumbled, fragile as a feather, up the steep, red-mud slope, carrying the typewriter and the camera bag. I wobbled close behind him in case he fell. Pure grit got Fitz up that hill.
Two motorbike taxis pulled up next to us. Fitz struggled onto the first one; the second driver helped me onto his dusty seat. We clung to our drivers as the motorbikes swerved around mudholes and over bumps, then screeched to a stop at a low, white stucco building just a few minutes away.
A woman in a white uniform called from the porch in English, telling us to go to another entrance, before she disappeared. Now that we’d arrived at the hospital, my legs and arms refused to work. I slumped over the gate.
“Are they just going to leave us here?” I said to Fitz. “I can’t take another step.”
“If they don’t come, we’ll have to drop here and sleep on the ground,” Fitz said softly. A nurse with snow-white hair came out the door and walked down the path toward us. A halo of sun sparkled around her and bounced off the gold cross at her neck. “I’m Sister Bernice, director of this hospital,” she said, in a New England accent. She studied us with her piercing blue eyes under black eyebrows. “May I help you?”
“Yes, please.” I could barely lift my voice.
“Speak up, please.”
“Can’t walk…need food.”
She asked me how we got to the hospital—as if there were no urgency.
Fitz was too weak to talk. I couldn’t stand it a moment longer. “My husband needs help! Please!”
“Come in,” she said, finally taking charge and opening the gate.
Fitz and I willed ourselves to move. We leaned on each other as we walked the ten-yard cement path then staggered up the four stairs to a porch. A round-faced nun was drinking lemonade and eating cookies.
“We don’t see many Americans in Riberalta.” Cocking her head in the direction of the round-faced nun, she said, “This is Sister Patricia. Please, sit down.”
Fitz and I slumped onto wooden chairs.
Sister Bernice gestured toward the blue tin of Danish cookies. “Help yourselves. I’ll get you glasses for the lemonade.”
“What are you doing out here, in the jungle?” I asked, before crunching a buttery cookie.
“We’re Maryknoll sisters, based in New York,” Sister Bernice replied. “The Maryknoll brothers asked us to help with health care along these rivers. We saw the need was great, so we started this hospital.” She smiled as she set down two glasses and poured.
My hands shook as I lifted the lemonade to my mouth. Fitz and I gulped down four glasses each. The nuns stared at us but politely said nothing.
“I’ve called the doctor,” Sister Bernice continued. “He doesn’t live far from here. Where are you from?”
“Connecticut.” I looked at Fitz, who was trying to get comfortable in the chair. He had a cookie waiting at his lips to replace the one he was
chewing.
“So am I!” the nun replied.
Turns out her hometown was only a half hour from where I grew up. I shook my head. This day was surely strewn with stars. Reality seemed unhinged, as if we were sitting on porch chairs back in the States.
Despite the sugar boost, Fitz and I could not prop ourselves up. We were both flopped over when Dr. Vaca Diez arrived.
He was a portly, distinguished-looking man in his sixties with gray hair, and dressed in a gray summer suit. He first conferred with Sister Bernice then he examined Fitz and me.
“You’ve lost a great deal of weight,” he said as he escorted me down the hall toward the scale. “You’re both extremely dehydrated. Your husband’s reflexes are imperceptible. How long have you been unable to walk unaided?”
“We’ve been crawling for weeks,” I replied.
Dr. Vaca Diez told Sister Bernice to admit us to the hospital immediately.
“We have two beds you can have for a couple of days,” she agreed.
I’d expected to be examined, given medication, and then sent off to a hotel. The doctor’s verdict flooded me with relief. The luck of the Irish was with us still.
The nurses put Fitz to bed, drew blood, and hooked him up to an IV. I was disappointed to learn that patients were separated by gender, married or not, four to a room.
After Fitz fell asleep, Sister Bernice sat with me in a dark hallway with dim generator lighting. “Tell me how this happened.” She slipped an IV into my arm.
“I don’t know where to start.” I began to shiver as our reality settled in.
“You’re safe now,” she said kindly, placing my hands in hers to quiet them.
My words spilled out like the flooding river. Sister Bernice listened in a warm and friendly way, her intelligent eyes locked onto mine. She looked overwhelmed by my story as she massaged my hands and sometimes closed her eyes, before quietly asking for more details.
I described the three phases, as I saw them, of survival that Fitz and I had gone through as we’d faced death on the raft. There was the initial action stage, when we’d tried to escape the swamp, fueled by our hope of getting out. Then came the talking and meditation stage, a period of acceptance that we were stranded, when we’d prayed, reasoned with, and questioned God.
Finally, we’d entered the single-focused hunt for food, no matter how small the morsel. These stages intertwined and overlapped, but they also felt like separate experiences because of the emotions that characterized each one.
I talked on and on. Now that we were safe, now that Fitz was safe, I wasn’t afraid to face the truth. The relief was staggering.
My worst thoughts were confirmed when Sister Bernice said that she and Dr. Vaca Diez didn’t think we could have survived beyond another day or two. The realization that we’d been so close to death, that Fitz was still too close, battered my mind. I began to cry.
Fears that I hadn’t dared even to write in my journal were validated. Each night I had prayed that Fitz would wake in the morning. I hadn’t feared not waking up myself. If I’d gone first, it would have been better than my waking up to find Fitz dead. Watching him deteriorate had been unbearable. Now I was free to feel it all.
“What would I have done with his body?” I asked Sister Bernice, shaking violently. “I don’t think I could have pushed it into the swamp, or held him as he rotted in the sun.”
She hugged me, silently, as we both shook with tears.
Chapter 43
Riberalta
It was midnight when Sister Bernice finally led me to a room. She dressed me in a clean pink-and-white-striped hospital gown, also called a johnny gown or johnny, and a pink floral cotton bathrobe. On the table that swung across my bed she placed a toothbrush, toothpaste, a bowl to spit into, and a mirror. “Tomorrow we’ll give you a sponge bath. You’re not ready to stand in a shower just yet.”
I climbed between the crisp white sheets that smelled so fresh, felt so good against my skin. As I brushed my teeth, I examined my sunburned face in the little handheld mirror and told my bony self that I was the most fortunate woman on earth. Lying back on the bed, I sank into the pillow, breathing a deep, luxuriant sigh.
—
That first night did not go well. I worried about Fitz being way down the hall. We’d been together through this whole ordeal. Half of me had been cut away. What if he needed help and no one was there?
During the night I sensed an enormous dark figure emerge from under my bed and move slowly up the footboard to hover over me. Even without opening my eyes I knew Death. Had he already taken Fitz? My heart was a jackhammer. I tried to calm myself, but my whole body was shaking. It took me a few minutes to find the courage to open my eyes to see that I was safe. I smelled an antiseptic hospital odor and saw light coming into the room through the opened door. Our rescue was real. I willed myself to relax into the sheets and smooth mattress until I eventually slipped into sleep.
I was confined to bed for several days, and so was Fitz. My arms ached to hug him. I wrote love notes and sent them to him through the nurses and their aides making rounds. Fitz sent me notes as well. I constantly asked the nurses for updates. His blood work showed that he had parasitic amoebas, which explained the cramps whenever he ate. No one could understand why I didn’t have them, too. The doctor hypothesized the amoebas had been lying dormant in Fitz since Vietnam. He prescribed strychnine to rid Fitz of them. The poison gave him even worse cramps, but apparently that was the only way to kill the parasites.
I was constantly hungry. For the first two days at the hospital, we ate only soup. The doctor didn’t want us to eat too much, too soon. Our stomachs had shrunk and would need time to expand. We were allowed a snack of crackers, fruit, and tea before lunch and dinner to hold us over.
It didn’t take long to notice that my Bolivian roommates, two women and a little girl, received far bigger meals. When the food arrived from the kitchen I threw up my hands and said, in an exaggerated tone, “¡Que! ¿Nada?” to make them giggle. My tray came later, from the sisters’ kitchen, with boiled, filtered water, and North American food. Playing to my audience, I’d stare at the single cup of soup then groan, “¡Que! ¿No mas?” This entertained them immensely.
Meals were markers of the day. When I wasn’t eating, I was lying in bed reading or writing letters. Sometimes I’d write in my journal, or tell my roommates stories in poor Spanish.
The nurses enjoyed listening to my stories and liked to tell stories, too. Sister Virginia, who had vibrant red hair and luminescent skin, couldn’t understand how we’d survived in the swamp for so long. Eyes round with terror, she described poisonous spiders and boa constrictors dropping from trees.
“And the caimans,” she emphasized, “they’ll eat you in a minute! God’s will kept you both alive. A miracle.”
I marveled that we had never even seen a caiman.
Green geckos scampered up and down the wall behind my headboard.
“They’re just catching bugs,” Sister Virginia grinned. “It’s tarantulas you have to watch out for in the shower—when you get well enough to take one.”
Dr. Vaca Diez dropped by every day. The sisters boasted that he came from a pioneering Bolivian family for which the province was named. He explained that even though the hospital had just twenty beds, it was one of the finest in Bolivia. I looked out my window at the brown Rio Beni passing by the hospital grounds before it emptied into the Madre de Dios. This is the finest hospital on Earth, I thought.
After three or four days I was strong enough to walk down the hall to Fitz’s room, pushing my IV cradle before me. Fitz wasn’t ready to walk, so we played cards on his bed table and talked about the hospital, food, and home. He was ever ravenous and grouchy from his pain.
In our second week, we both began to receive normal-sized portions of food, though Fitz didn’t believe it. One day he studied his breakfast tray of oatmeal, two eggs over easy, bacon, toast, and tea. He banged his hand on his tray and demanded of
Sister Bernice, “When am I ever going to get a decent meal around here?”
I was stunned, but Sister Bernice understood that Fitz was not in his right mind.
Starvation made him feel like he was never going to get enough food, ever. “Your body is malnourished and craves food. It’s normal to feel this isn’t enough,” she explained.
I held Fitz’s hand. “Hang on, Fitz. We’re lucky to be alive. And look at all this food—more breakfast than we dreamed of on the Pink Palace! It’s a feast!” I tousled his hair. “Your stomach just hasn’t caught up to your head.”
“It’s hard to believe this really is enough,” he grumbled, simmering down.
—
I knew I was getting better when my yearning for food was replaced by a strong desire to talk to my parents. Brother Casmir, a ham radio operator, lived in a house next door to the nuns. He was able to patch us through to a ham radio operator in Rhode Island, Dick Canavan. Our parents hadn’t known anything about our disappearance until Dick called them at home and explained where we were.
My heart soared at my mother’s voice.
“Oh, darling,” she cried. “We had no idea. You said you’d be off in the jungle and wouldn’t send mail. We’re so glad you’re in such a wonderful hospital. How are you feeling? Are you getting plenty to eat?”
“We’re having great food,” I assured her, fighting back tears. “We’re getting stronger by the minute. What are you and Dad up to? How’s Zelda? How are Mimi and Brad and Liza?” I didn’t dare talk about what we’d been through.
“The symphony is throwing a fund-raiser ball with a moon-walk theme.” She giggled. “Dad has blown a twenty-foot-tall Styrofoam coating onto chicken wire and painted it mustard. It makes quite a mountain in the backyard.”
Ruthless River Page 25