‘The priests took me to their parish. For the first time in weeks I had a good hot shower. They gave me clean clothes and fed me. The nuns tried to console me for your loss. They told me that the Tuichi was known as a particularly dangerous river.
‘“Your friend surely drowned, and even if he did make it out of the river alive, his chances of surviving in the jungle were slight.”
‘No one in the entire town offered me any hope of finding you alive, but I just wouldn’t believe it.
‘On the tenth day a plane from La Paz was supposed to come in at eight in the morning, and I went to the terminal to wait for it to land. The priest, Father Fernando, had filled out officiallooking papers, testifying to what had happened and allowing me to fly without a passport. I waited until five-thirty, but no plane ever showed up. I was upset, for I wanted to get to the Israeli embassy in La Paz. The navy office in Rurrenabaque hadn’t even sent the embassy a telegram as they had promised me they would. I was raging. I had wasted an entire precious day doing nothing.
‘The following morning one of the nuns awakened me excitedly. A plane was about to land at any moment. She had a truck standing by. By quarter to nine I was airborne.
‘When I arrived in La Paz, I headed straight for the American embassy. I knew that I had to hurry to the Israeli embassy, but I needed some kind of identification. The consul listened apathetically to my tale. He simply remarked that I was lucky to be alive and offered his consolations on the death of my friend.
‘“But he’s not dead,” I insisted.
‘“Of course he is. How could he possibly have survived alone in the jungle? Just thank God that you’re alive, and get yourself home to spend Christmas with your family,” the consul replied.
‘“And what if I was lost in the jungle? What would you do? Wouldn’t you even send a party out to look for me?” I yelled.
‘“We would notify this country’s foreign office and your family,” he answered.
‘“And what if it was your son or brother out there in need of help?”
‘He didn’t reply. Before I stormed out of his office, I asked him to prepare a new passport for me and to notify the Israeli embassy that I was on my way over. Afterward I found out that he never even bothered to make that simple phone call.
‘I arrived at the Israeli embassy. I spoke into the microphone at the entrance, explaining in broken Spanish that I had just come from the jungle and that an Israeli friend of mine was still lost back there. I was aware that I was being observed on closed-circuit television. A door finally opened, leading to an inner room. A security man scrutinised me from behind a plate of bulletproof glass. Then he took from me, through a slot in a window, the documents that the navy office and Father Fernando had given me, and finally I was allowed to enter.
‘The consul listened carefully to my story. I kept emphasising how urgent it was to get a helicopter and start looking right away. Then I spoke with the ambassador and went through it all again. I told him that my brother had a white-water business in Oregon, and I asked him to call your parents in Israel and get them to help pay the expenses of bringing my brother, together with the necessary equipment, to Bolivia in order to go looking for you. The ambassador promised to do all he could and asked me to call him back that afternoon.
‘At two that afternoon I placed my call to the Israeli embassy and was informed that on Monday morning they would have a meeting with the Bolivian air force and that I should come to the embassy then.
‘I went straight to the Rosario Hotel, and the desk clerk there told me that Marcus hadn’t been back yet. I didn’t yet think much of that, for I had never agreed with Karl’s estimate of how long it would take them.
‘I went over to the Jewish old-folks’ home to try to find some Israelis who would be willing to come help me look for you, but the place was empty. No one but Grandma was there, so I just left a note.
‘So the twelfth day passed and the thirteenth. Monday finally arrived, the fourteenth day. A Bolivian officer was waiting for me at the Israeli embassy, and he took me to La Paz air force headquarters. We wasted long, precious hours there going over the accident in detail, exactly where it had happened and the events that had led up to it. They listened to my less-thanfluent Spanish and promised that they would do everything that they could, but I had no faith in them at all.
‘The Bolivian officer then took me to navy headquarters, and we went through the whole business again.
‘When I got back to the Israeli embassy, the consul informed my that he had gotten hold of a plane and that the search would begin the next day. Thank God.
‘I went to the Swiss embassy and notified the ambassador that Marcus and Karl were missing and asked him to put in a call to Apolo to find out if they were there. I myself didn’t yet think there was any reason to worry about them, but later at the Austrian embassy the consul gave me a great reason to worry.
‘The mention of the name Karl Ruchprecter caught their attention. The clerk asked me to wait and then showed me into the consul’s office. He was a heavyset, red-faced man, smoking a pipe.
‘“Have a seat, my young friend,” he said. “Tell me what you know about Karl Ruchprecter.”
‘I told him briefly about Karl, what he had told us about himself, and how he had talked us into going along with him on an expedition into the jungle. I told him how he had changed plans because of his uncle.
‘“Uncle?” the consul asked. “What uncle?”
‘“He told us he had an uncle named Josef Ruchprecter, who owns a big cattle ranch in Reyes Province. Karl was supposed to bring him a truck from Chile next month.”
‘I told him the story that Karl had told you, Yossi, that his uncle was a Nazi war criminal and that that was the reason he lived in Bolivia.
‘“Interesting, very interesting,” the consul kept repeating.
‘I told him about the Indian village that we had been supposed to visit, how it had turned out to be farther away then we had thought, so we had to turn around and go back, and I told him how we had rafted down the river, how we had split up from Karl and Marcus, and about the accident that you and I had had on the river. I told him that I had come to report Karl’s disappearance and perhaps to organise a rescue party if no one heard anything from him within the next day or two.
‘I was amazed when the consul laughed. “That’s a good one: help you look for Karl Ruchprecter,” he said. “We’d much rather help him get lost.” And he laughed some more. “An uncle who raises beef cattle? A fugitive Nazi? Karl has such a vivid imagination.”
‘He noticed the stunned look on my face, and this is what he told me: “Karl Ruchprecter is quite well-known to us, but he doesn’t have an uncle in Bolivia. Karl himself is the escaped fugitive. He is wanted by both the Austrian government and Interpol. He’s a professional troublemaker, an instigator. He was involved with radical leftist groups in Europe about ten years ago. He and his friends stirred up a lot of trouble, and the Austrian police were looking for him. He was either lucky or well connected enough to make his way here. Someone must have provided him with a false passport.
‘“We know that he is here, but there’s nothing we can do about it in Bolivia. Now you’ve brought me some really good news: he’s out there in a dangerous jungle without proper food or equipment. It would be nice if he never came back. We certainly aren’t going to help look for him,” the consul told me with a good chuckle.
‘I was angry of course.
‘“And what about the Swiss guy he’s got with him?” I demanded, but the consul just shrugged his shoulders.
‘I was anxious and confused when I went back to the Israeli embassy. The same Bolivian officer helped me to clarify a few details. First he looked on maps and aerial photographs for the Indian village that we were supposed to visit and then made a few phone calls, but he always got the same answer: there is no Indian village, civilised or otherwise, in that entire region.
‘I learned that Karl had the reputa
tion of being a dangerous bastard. A few years ago he talked a young German guy into going into the jungle with him, promising him exciting adventures. The German became sick and weak after a few days and pleaded with Karl to take him back, but Karl refused and just abandoned him. The poor guy managed to make it to a little ranch, where they saved his life.’
A chill ran up my spine. Could it really be true? Karl had seemed like a good guy to me. Marcus had taken to calling him Poppa. Could it be that Karl was a threat to Marcus’s life? I couldn’t bring myself to believe that. Karl had been fond of Marcus; he would never harm him.
‘On the morning of the sixteenth day the flight they had promised me took off at nine in the morning and landed in Trinidad, a town in the interior, an hour later. I waited there until the afternoon, when the pilot of the rescue plane informed me that the weather was horrible and he couldn’t take off. I was asked to come back the next morning.
‘I was at the air force headquarters early the next day, but the unpaved runway at the airport was still wet from the previous night’s rain. The plane still couldn’t take off through all the puddles. The pilot kept telling me there was simply no way anyone could survive seventeen days in the jungle. Especially not in this kind of weather. And especially not a gringo. He didn’t come right out and say, “Your friend is dead,” but he might as well have.
‘Once we were finally up in the air, the pilot told me that an order is an order, so he would fly over the river as he had been told to, but that there was absolutely no point to it, that it was all a dreadful waste of fuel.
‘At first we flew at a reasonable altitude over the river and followed its course, but the mountains soon forced us to go higher. From up there we couldn’t see anything but trees, and the pilot was not careful to follow the crooked path of the river. He flew a straight course over it, and I realised that there was no hope of spotting you, unless you managed to set the whole jungle ablaze.
‘I was more depressed than ever. The pilot made it clear that this was the last search flight he would take me on.
‘I went to the navy headquarters in Rurrenabaque. It was evident that no effort was being made to find you despite all the promises I had received. The commandante was nice enough, polite, full of good intentions, but he explained to me that the navy could not possibly organise a search party, as it was against regulations to take a boat up the Tuichi. The only other option I had, he said, was to find someone who would accept payment for taking me up the river.
‘“Do you know of anyone who might be willing?” I asked.
‘“Come with me,” he said, “quickly.”
‘After a five-minute motorcycle ride we were at the house of Tico, the king of the river.
‘“Would you take me to San José?” I asked him.
‘“Sure, I was going there tomorrow anyway,” he told me, “with Father Diego.”
‘I explained to him what had happened. “Would you take me on to Curiplaya?”
‘“I can take you even farther than Curiplaya,” he declared.
‘“Up to San Pedro Canyon?”
‘“Yes, almost. But that’s as far as I can go.”
‘On the morning of the eighteenth day it was pouring rain, and we had to put off leaving for another day. The next day we travelled upriver until evening and set up camp on a pleasant beach. We were back on the river by six thirty the next morning.
‘Tico really is a pro at river navigation. He manoeuvred through the dangerous passes, and when we came to shallows, one of the crew stood up in the prow and hit at the river bottom with a stick, indicating to Tico how deep it was.
‘We arrived at San José at ten thirty, and Father Diego set off up the path to the village. Now we could start searching. Tico told me that he had to be back in Rurrenabaque two days later, so he intended to go upriver until we came to a beach called Progreso and then turn around and head back to Rurrenabaque.
‘“If your friend is still alive,” he said, “then he is most probably near the river, and it is reasonable to assume that we will spot him.”
‘We travelled upriver – Tico, two crewmen, and I – into a stretch of the Tuichi that Tico was less familiar with, and he was very cautious. We went on without stopping, looking right and left. We saw no trace of a campsite or fire. The storm had left its mark everywhere. Once in a while we encountered a flock of large birds swarming around a carcass on the shore. Tico and I exchanged glances. I didn’t want to stop. I didn’t want to check. I had never in my life been so depressed.
‘Hours passed, and I was beginning to resign myself to the fact that we weren’t going to find you alive. Yes, Yossi, it was very sad. I was already thinking of heading back to La Paz. I thought that I would probably find your brother there, and together we would be able to organise another, more effective search party.
‘The crewmen stopped the canoe; they had spotted some game and wanted to go into the jungle to do some hunting.
‘“I’m paying, and you’re not going to stop. We’re going on!” I insisted.
‘The crewmen looked angry, but Tico understood me, though I don’t think that he harboured any hopes of finding you. Half an hour later they stopped again. They had spotted a fawn that had come down to the river for a drink. Tico took aim and fired, and the fawn dropped to the riverbank.
‘Around five thirty it started to get dark. The canoe was slowing down. I looked desperately at Tico. He shook his head with sorrow and said, “We’ll have to stop at the next shore and turn the boat back. That’s it. I’m really sorry, Kevin.”
‘Then I saw the shore and I knew it was over; tears were choking my throat. Yossi, how will I lead my life knowing I’ve lost you?
‘The men were turning the boat 180 degrees when suddenly I looked over at the shore and saw a rickety thatched hut, leaning over on one side. All of a sudden someone came out of it. No, it can’t be Yossi. It doesn’t look anything like Yossi. Yes, it is. It is Yossi!
‘Dear God, there you were, after twenty days, and nobody had believed that you might still be alive. Thank God, thank God, Yossi, my dear friend.’
Chapter thirteen
GOING HOME
I hung on every word of Kevin’s tale, awed by his persistence. How would I ever be able to repay him for saving my life?
I was bewildered by the information about Karl. Could it be that the man had fooled us all along? Nevertheless I was eager to see him and Marcus, especially Marcus. I particularly wanted to apologise to him, to be his friend again.
I was in for another unpleasant surprise when Kevin informed me that my parents were aware of my disappearance. Why had they been told? My mother and father must have been going through hell.
The fact that I had been in Progreso rather than Curiplaya was another surprise, which left me completely confused. What kind of a place was Progreso, and where was Curiplaya? If I hadn’t reached Curiplaya, where had I been walking for fifteen days? Had I come close to San José? Had I stood even the slightest chance of making it? Tico answered all my questions.
Progreso was very near the Mal Paso San Pedro. It had been established ten years earlier on rumours of gold to be found in the vicinity. Miners had set out from San José, but the results had been disappointing. The camp they had built had been deserted since then, which explained the impassable state of the trail and the fact that I had encountered no signs of life on my way.
One other thing also became evident: the horrible storm I had lived through was the worst the area had suffered in a decade. Indeed, only because of the heavy rains had Tico and Kevin been able to come this far upriver; the water simply flooded a great number of obstacles that normally would have blocked their way.
The encampment was about thirty miles upstream from Curiplaya. By boat it was a short distance but could take a week to cover on foot. Tico had no explanation to offer as to why Karl had failed to mention Progreso to us. It seemed that he had intentionally lied about the location of Curiplaya.
Tico di
dn’t believe that I could have reached San José on my own. The natives did cover that distance in a few days but only during the dry season, when streams could be crossed. During the rainy season, and with my meagre provisions and equipment, it was hard to believe that I would ever have arrived in San José. That I had survived at all for so many days was cause enough for wonder.
The sun shone down on a lovely day, but it was damp in the canoe, and a chilly breeze blew against us. All along the riverbank I saw flocks of vultures swarming over the carcasses of animals, victims of the flood.
We made rapid progress, and Kevin pointed out Curiplaya as we passed. We made only one stop, to buy dried venison from some hunters. Kevin and I chewed on it all the way, and he remarked that dried meat was fabulous when you had some good beer to wash it down.
We came to the junction of the Tuichi and Beni rivers in the late afternoon. The Beni is one of the three principal tributaries of the Amazon, and the sight of it was impressive. A short while later we reached Rurrenabaque, a maze of wooden houses tucked amid the foliage. The houses closest to the river were raised up on sturdy pilings.
Tico bade us a brief goodbye near the Hotel Berlin, a wooden building with a spacious courtyard. Kevin carried me up to the hotel and set me down on a lounge in the yard. A crowd of curious townspeople gathered around me. ‘El desaparecido [the lost one],’ they murmured. All of them had seen the sad-looking gringo who had come to search for his poor, lost friend. They stared at me as if they were seeing a ghost, and in truth I did look like some kind of ghost: emaciated, unshaven, dirty, and dressed in tatters.
A crowd followed us to navy headquarters. Kevin carried me into the office. I asked to telephone my parents as soon as possible, but the commandante wasn’t in any hurry. He insisted upon hearing what had happened to me, and as he listened, he filled in forms with my name and passport number. He was about forty years old, pleasant looking, and kind, wearing blue work clothes, void of the formality and arrogance that characterises many South American military men. He referred me to his unit’s doctor and promised to call the Israeli embassy in La Paz in the meantime.
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