by Joan Francis
Maria was waiting outside her home and waved us down to make sure we didn’t miss the house. As Roberto got my bags, Maria and I traded introductions. Like every place I had seen on the drive here, Maria’s property was surrounded by a high wall, which was crowned with three rows of barbed wire. This was another first impression that belied the guidebook assurances that Costa Rica has a very low crime rate. If crime was so low, why was every home and business fortified?
She led us through the wooden gate to her inner courtyard. Stepping into her yard was like leaving a black and white Kansas and entering the Technicolor land of Oz. The walls were covered in three colors of bougainvillea, red, magenta, and light orange. The patio was effusively planted in various types of hibiscus, small palms, banana plants as well as other shrubs and trees I was at a loss to identify. Two trees were festooned with dozens of bromeliads and tilanzias clinging to the trunks and limbs like brightly colored sconces. Scattered about the yard was an assortment of pots filled with multicolored orchids ranging in size from a half an inch long to five inches across. As the profusion of color and sweet fragrance delighted my senses and nurtured my soul, the eight sleepless hours on the plane and the exhaust-filled fright-ride from the airport slipped into the almost forgotten past. A huge blue and gold macaw sat on a perch in the middle of the garden and let out a mighty screech as we walked by.
“Oh, you have a guacamaya.”
Maria looked embarrassed. “I’m sorry. Quiet, Sammy.”
“Sammy pretty bird,” replied the macaw.
I laughed at him and he preened. “Oh, not a problem. We had guacs in Venezuela when I was a kid. I’m delighted with him.”
We climbed the flagstone stairs to the apartment on the second floor of Maria’s house and Roberto deposited my bags. As I paid him, I asked if he was available the next day and made a deal with him on an all-day rate.
Maria showed me around the apartment, checking me out on all the appliances and making sure I had everything I would need to be comfortable. She had even stocked the refrigerator with a pitcher of lemonade and a casserole dinner in case I got in too late to shop.
Once they were both gone, I poured a glass of lemonade, went out on the balcony and sat down on the rattan couch. The view was lovely and the weather was glorious, about 72 degrees, a few scattered clouds, and a cool, gentle breeze. I was asleep in sixty seconds.
* * * * *
CHAPTER THIRTY
I sat back in the patio chair at Café Ruisenior and drained the last sweet drop of my second coffee. I had Roberto pick me up early so we could start our day with breakfast and had asked him to recommend a place where I could get a good cup of espresso coffee. Surprisingly, espresso in not popular in this coffee producing country, and a latte is hard to find. During breakfast we had chatted and I had learned that he had a wife and a fourteen year old son who was both an outstanding soccer player and a straight-A student. This small family was obviously his joy and the thing that grounded him.
Roberto beamed me his charming and slightly flirtatious smile.
“Well, Tia Tillie, how was your latte?”
“Perfect, and the bakery goodies are wonderful. I will spend many of my mornings here.”
“I’m glad you like it, but I don’t know how you can drink that stuff. It’s too strong. You should try a nice cup of Costa Rican coffee, not so dark and strong.”
“Maybe next time,” I answered, but I was thinking of the cup of Costa Rican coffee that Evelyn had served me. The memory of her sad, pail face as she rode off in the taxi caused a wave of sadness and distracted me momentarily.
Roberto stood and handed me my cane, his action pulling me back to the present. I pushed back from the table and gathered up my computer and purse and he led the way to his cab. Putting my equipment in the back, I climbed in front with Roberto. We made a stop at the Mas por Menos grocery store so I could get a bottle of scotch and a few vitals for the apartment, then a stop for me to buy a local cell phone. After that we headed toward downtown.
“Roberto, this is such a delightful place but the exhaust from the cars on the boulevard is almost enough to ruin it. It’s like sucking on a bus tail pipe almost everywhere we go.”
“Yes, the air is very bad, too many diesels, no emissions control.”
“How come? I thought Costa Rica was ahead of the entire world in environmental protection, but you had the only green machine at the airport.”
“Until now it was no good to have catalytic converters because the leaded gas just ruined them and still polluted.”
“But leaded gas has been illegal for years.”
“In the U.S., not here, not in most of the Third World countries. And besides, government taxes make it easy to import used cars and very expensive to import new, unleaded gas ones. I must be away from my family for two years in the U.S. to make that much.”
My admiration for this industrious young entrepreneur rose several notches. “I’ll bet that was hard. Seems like a strange government policy. I wonder why.”
In about ten minutes he had me to my first destination, a home in downtown San Jose that had been converted into the offices of the Tico Times, an English-language newspaper.
“I’ll be a couple hours here, Roberto, so feel free to take some other fares. Just pick me up about eleven, OK?”
He shrugged. “OK.”
I explained to the young woman at the door that I wanted to do a bit or research. She issued me a visitor’s badge and called a reporter to help me. Fifteen minutes later a woman arrived, introducing herself as Helen. From her frazzled and slightly resentful demeanor, I suspected that I had arrived in the middle of a big story or at press deadline. However, it was her reaction to my request for information on the fire at Evelyn’s house that was the shocker.
She blanched, becoming so pale I was afraid she was going to pass out on me. As she reached for the wall to support herself, I took her hand. “Let’s sit down over here on the couch. Are you all right?”
She nodded but sank onto the couch. “Why are you asking about that story?”
I had a cover story about being Evelyn’s aunt from Iowa, but she was so visibly shaken that I just said, “I wanted to see if there had been any follow-up on the investigation, any response to Evelyn’s claims that all three victims were already dead when the fire started.”
“Who are you?”
“I’m an investigator from the States.” Seeing her doubtful look, I hoped she would not ask for my license as it was not made out to Tia Tillie.
She considered me a moment, then shrugged. “It will be in the paper tomorrow, anyway. There was a reporter from another paper, Costa Rica Hoy, who was following that story. He disappeared three weeks ago and was just found this morning in the morgue.”
“How did he die?”
“The police say he overdosed in Sabania Park the night he disappeared, but they can’t explain where his body was for the last three weeks. His friends had already checked the morgue.”
The color returning to her face, she stood up. “If you want to research our newspaper, all the volumes are up there on those shelves. Help yourself, but it might not be a very safe time to be too curious about that story.”
She turned and walked away leaving me staring at the shelf of both loose leaf and bound volumes. The young woman at the front desk confirmed my suspicion that there was no index, so I picked up the volume that covered the right period of time and searched it page by page.
By the time Roberto picked me up I had made copies of all the stories I could find on Evelyn, her work, and Lilac Environmental Institute. I had also copied the only story I found regarding the disappearance of reporter Mark Rojas. Sitting in the front passenger seat, I stared blankly at the material and considered where to go next. In the States I would run every name and address through an assortment of computer databases, develop a number of leads, then follow them. None of my databases had data in Costa Rica, however. Well, back to BC: Before Computer.
He reached under the front seat and magically produced a region-wide phone book. I smiled and said, “Could you be faster next time?”
He chuckled, put the car in gear, and pulled out into traffic.
Costa Rica Hoy was like an armed camp. Plain-clothes security barred our entrance and we were carefully screened outside the door. I was required to show my passport, tell them where I was staying, and state my business. When I said I was at the Selva Verde hotel and wanted to look through their old papers for a story they had printed on my niece, Roberto’s eyes widened slightly and he studied me thoughtfully.
After a brief conference with someone inside, the guard declined to admit me, saying he was sorry but the office was closed due to the death of an employee. He invited me to come back next week if I was still in town.
Back in the car, I studied the phone book and Roberto studied me. “You speak pretty good Spanish. Funny accent. Not like most from the U.S.”
“I learned my Spanish in Mexico and Venezuela. It’s been a lot of years, though, and I’ve forgotten much.”
“What were you doing in those places?”
“I was being a kid. My dad was opening an iron mine in Venezuela and an opal mine in Mexico.”
The phone book had a long list of Rojas, but none with the first name of Mark. Most listings had no address or had only a postal box. “Roberto, is there an office supply someplace close?”
“Si, you want to go there next?”
I nodded, noticing that he was dying to ask more but too polite to do so. While he waited in the car, I got a medium-sized box, brown wrapping paper, some mailing labels, an ink pen with washable blue ink, and some scotch tape.
On the way back to the car, I passed a small working man’s sidewalk café. I had seen them everywhere we drove that morning, and Roberto had told me that here such lunch spots are called “sodas.” The delicious aromas emitting from it reminded me it was past lunchtime. I flashed Roberto a hand signaled-question, pointing to my mouth and then to the Gallo Pinto Soda. He nodded, turned off the engine, and joined me. As we lunched on rice, beans, and fried banana, I asked for a third order to go. Roberto was explaining the tradition of the term Gallo Pinto.
“It means ‘spotted rooster’ because its colors looks like one with the white rice, and black beans, green cilantro, and red chile. It’s sort of a . . .”
As I put the Styrofoam container with the third helping into the box, he paused to stare at what I was doing.
“. . . It’s sort of a joke, the man who has no chicken eats spotted rooster, but it is a dish we . . . ”
I then wrapped the box of Gallo Pinto in the brown paper and applied the address label.
“ . . . it’s a dish we take great pride in. But not so much that we make presents of it.”
On the return address I wrote “TIA TILLIE’S KITCHEN, Avenida 6, Calles 5/7.” For the mailing address, I wrote MARK ROJAS on the first line, then made up another address in San Jose. I dipped the corner of my paper napkin in my water and smudged the address until it was totally illegible.
“What are you doing?”
I met his eyes but avoided his question. “Finished with lunch, Roberto?”
He gave me what I was now recognizing as a characteristic shrug. “Sure.”
Back in the car, I pointed to the first Rojas in the phone book and handed Roberto the local cell phone I had bought. “I need someone with a local accent to call these people and ask if this is the home of Mark Rojas. Could you do that for me? If they ask why, you can tell them we have a delivery for him.”
He looked at the cell phone and looked up at me. “Tia Tillie, are you a cop?”
“No”
“Mark Rojas was a good reporter, but dangerous. I must know what you are doing. I think it could be dangerous too.”
I had been studying Roberto for two days and made my decision quickly. “Do you know who Professor Evelyn Lilac was?”
Again the shrug. “I do not know her but I have of course heard of the Lilac Foundation. Everybody has and they . . . Was?”
I nodded. “She was found murdered in Arizona. I am trying to find out a little about her life here, her friends and her enemies, to try to help find her murderer.”
“You are a cop.”
“No, a private investigator. My little investigation is not official, and I need it to be very quiet.”
He smiled, almost laughed. “San Jose is not so big a city, and Mark Rojas has disappeared. You go to deliver Gallo Pinto to Mark Rojas all over town and your investigation won’t be very quiet. Gossip here is faster than email.”
“Maybe, but I don’t have the resources to find people here that I do in the States.”
He shrugged. “But you have me.”
“You know where Mark Rojas lived?”
“No, but I know where his girlfriend work . . .wait . . .You did it again. You said lived. Is he . . .?”
I nodded. “It will be in tomorrow’s papers.”
Roberto shook his head, shoved the car in gear, and drove a short way across the inner city, navigating expertly along the narrow, congested, mostly one-way streets.
As we passed an attractive older hotel, he pointed and said, “That is the Selva Verde hotel you give to the paper. You pick a nice one. It have big rooms, restaurant, casino. Many fisherman stay there. Some fish for marlin, some fish for pretty young Ticas in the Golden Macaw Bar.” He gave me a self-satisfied grin, then socked it to me with a final pointed observation. “But, not so many older aunts stay there.”
We drove past an attractive city park, and as Roberto paused in traffic, I noticed an older mansion with the delightfully romantic name of Key Largo. In his constant tour guide mode, Roberto pointed it out and said it was a very lively night spot. Then with a mischievous grin, he added, “So if Tia Tillie doesn’t find what she want at the Golden Macaw, she could check out the action at the Key Largo.” It occurred to me that this kid could turn into a real smart ass.
Circling the park, he rounded the corner and stopped in front of a huge two-story building that from the outside resembled a concrete bunker. It was surrounded by a tall chain-link fence that was topped by the ubiquitous strands of barbed wire. The windows on the upper floor were all covered with dark drapes. The entrance, a huge set of heavy wooded doors, was blocked by two armed guards. Even before I noticed the name over the entrance, I was speculating as to its probable uses, and most of the ones I considered were salacious. As we pulled around to the entrance and I saw the name, I had to laugh. It was aptly named The Shady Lady. Where was Roberto leading me?
* * * * *
THIRTY-ONE
Hollywood could not create a better den of iniquity than this real-life one, but in the shuttered, under-lit gloom of the afternoon, it was just a big, empty, decrepit, bar that stank of stale beer and aged floors and walls. I suspected that the dark lighting was in lieu of cleaning and painting. Not even the life-sized posters of can-can dancers that hung in the shadows at the back of the stage could add any glamour to this dive.
The bar lined three of the walls so that one need never be too far from a drink, but only one small section was lighted and in use in the afternoon. The only two people in the place were the bartender, a hard-looking woman who was probably in her forties, and a pretty young woman seated on a bar stool. They sat gossiping quietly while a muted television flickered silently on the wall behind them. I had no doubt that there would be women in the upstairs rooms, but at this hour they would be resting up for their night’s work. At night, when the place was gyrating with human bodies and afloat with booze, it was probably exciting enough to satisfy at least the prurient interests, but at this hour it was just distasteful. I wondered what Mark Rojas’s girlfriend did here.
Either Roberto was very good at people reading, or I was becoming entirely too transparent for this business. He turned to me and said, “At the
day Patricia is the assistant bookkeeper here and at night she sell flowers and earrings to the customers. Don’t worry, Tia Tillie, I wouldn’t bring you to such a place at night.”
Roberto greeted the woman behind the bar as Elina and gave a polite nod to the one seated. Elina returned his greeting and looked suspiciously at me as I limped in, leaning heavily on my cane. She asked what we would have, and Roberto ordered us each a beer. As she drew the beers, he introduced me as a visitor from the United States and said I was interested in some of the hand-carved wooden earrings that Patricia made. He asked when she would be in or if we might go to her home to see the earrings.
When Elina set the beers in front of us, her face was a mask, and she mumbled a quiet, “Un momento.” She picked up the phone, dialed just two digits, turned her back to us and spoke softly. She hung up and walked over to Roberto. Speaking in a very quiet voice she told him that Patricia was staying at the Shady Lady for a day or two and would be down in a few moments with her earring box. She would meet us in the outside garden. Roberto thanked her, picked up our beers, and led me to the garden.
The “garden” was a rather bleak cement patio which nested in the center of the U shaped building and was not visible from the front entrance. It’s only redeeming virtue was that it had a nice view of the city park beyond. Once seated on a concrete bench, Roberto leaned over and reported confidentially, “The employees here think the owner has the whole place bugged with tape recorders and video. I don’t know if it is so, but they won’t talk much inside.”
I nodded and sipped my beer. Across the street the small park offered gardens configured around a domed, circular structure that was built in the style of a neo-Roman temple. My ever-observant companion followed my gaze and said, “That is the Parque Morazan with the Temple of Music in the center. It is like one in Paris. Very pretty park, no?”