The Green Cathedral

by Kerry Mcdonald

  Tired as Abel was, though, he found his mind not cooperating with the idea of going to sleep. Too many things were swimming around in it. Some were like peaceful schools of fish lazily drifting about when he thought of Rimi and his newfound relationship with her. Others were much more ominous, like sharks or barracuda lurking around, ready to devour the peaceful fish with much blacker thoughts. He was keenly aware, despite the blissful times he was having with Rimi, that it had been at least five days now since he had sailed his boat back to Monti’s dock and reported on his progress in eliminating the “evil presence” on the island. And that, along with the three days he’d come to the island before meeting Rimi, was putting him dangerously close to the time Monti had said the job must be accomplished because his investors would be arriving. After hearing Rimi talk of how heavily armed and violent Monti’s previous visitors to the island had been, he was becoming increasingly convinced that his hunch that he’d hinted at when he’d called Lopez—that Monti was preparing to use the island for nefarious purposes, like providing a refueling stop for Colombian cartel smugglers and not turning it into a tourist attraction—was in fact true. If that were so, he and Rimi could be defending the Green Cathedral against any number of vicious Colombians as well as Monti and Paco in a mere matter of days! Couple that with Rimi’s impending health crisis, and there was plenty enough to keep Abel’s head spinning.

  One thing he’d learned in the SEALs, though, was that when in a tight situation where things seem to be spinning out of control, you look for an opportunity to take control. Never let the circumstances determine your actions. Never act in a reactionary way. Seize the initiative, take charge, and control your own destiny. And that’s what they’d do at first light the next morning. Bibi would search his data files all night for anything that could help them find where Rimi’s parents had crashed. It couldn’t be that far away—probably within a few hours by boat or car—judging from how close the ship was to the surface when Rimi, inside Bibi, had been ejected. Once that was determined, and a plan made, Abel would take the boat back to Monti’s dock, give him some explanation for his long absence, and assess how dangerous the situation might have become. He also thought that he needed to pay Faviola a visit. He had to do something with his things, and more importantly, the snarky innkeeper was probably the only one in town who would give him a straight answer if anything untoward had gone on in his absence.

  With his mind now satisfied that he had a plan, and that it was a good one, Abel finally relaxed, and he was asleep an instant after that.

  20

  —

  Fat Monti got up from his chair about the same time Abel and Rimi started for their home in Bibi’s clearing, but instead of walking up to his house as was his usual practice, he turned the other way, walked along the beach, crossed the Rio Palma on the bridge, and headed to the front office of the Rio Palma Inn.

  When he stepped in, Faviola was there, as he expected, checking in a new guest and his family. Faviola gave him the evil eye as she continued her work, and Monti smiled and waved, then sat in one of the plush upholstered chairs in the lobby. By the look of these guests, their clothes and luggage, they were tourists, probably from America, and of considerable means.

  Ah, Favi, he thought. Where would I be without your American Automobile Association three-diamond Best Western motel with rooms and beach houses just steps from the Pacific Ocean and an easy walk to every shop and soda in Playa de Palma? Let us hope you will continue to be a cooperative influence even as changes come to the community. It will serve you well if you do—and could be fatal if you don’t, but you’ve always been a reasonable person, regardless of your petulant attitude from time to time.

  The guests finished registration, and a porter arrived to take them and their things to one of the beach houses.

  “Welcome to Playa de Palma!” Monti said to them as they left. “Enjoy your stay.” The man, tall and brawny, and his slim, very fit wife smiled graciously as their two children, probably teenagers, gave Monti a look that usually meant “What a perv” in the current index of the “If Looks Could Kill” guide to the facial expressions of high-school-age American youth.

  Monti paid them no mind. He approached Faviola’s front desk as if he were an old friend stopping by for a drink.

  “What brings you to this end of your domain at this time of the evening? You should be at home eating tacos with Maria and Lucia.”

  “I wonder if we could speak in private somewhere?” asked Monti.

  Faviola looked up from her work and all around the empty lobby. “Certainly. What is on your mind?”

  Monti sighed, annoyed by her obstinance. “Perhaps somewhere where there is no elevator that could open at any moment, or someone might wander in asking where the nearest ice machine is?”

  “I’m here by myself tonight. I can’t leave the desk. What is this all about?”

  Monti harrumphed. It was not unusual for Faviola to be teasingly difficult, but this had the feel of insolence, like she couldn’t be bothered to accommodate his request. She knew how that would make him feel, and she was clearly enjoying it. Monti was not used to being treated with rudeness in his town, and he would not let this slight go undealt with for long. He stepped to the end of the front desk and walked around it, blocking Faviola in.

  “Perhaps in your office behind the desk, then?” he said more forcefully.

  Faviola gave him another evil eye, shoved some papers into a file drawer, and beckoned Monti to come. As he passed the check-in station, Monti saw the call bell that was typically used only late at night to summon the desk person from doing laundry or restocking the breakfast room and put it on top of the registration desk.

  “There,” he said condescendingly. “Now you won’t miss anyone.”

  They both went into the little back office. It was cramped, with Faviola’s desk and file cabinets taking up most of the space. A small coffee maker sat on top of one of the cabinets, and a water cooler and a couple of other chairs were crammed into corners. Faviola sat behind her desk and Monti in one of the chairs.

  “So what is this all about?” snapped Faviola directly. “Please be quick. I have much to do.”

  “So snippy tonight, mi amor,” cooed Monti.

  “It’s been a long day, and one of my clerks is sick, so it’s going to be a long night as well. I apologize. What can I do for you?”

  “Muchas gracias, señora,” replied Monti. “I’ll come right to the point. I have not seen our beach house guest in over three days now. I’m becoming quite concerned. Has he come back to his beach house over the past few days?”

  “I cannot tell you that, one way or another, and you know that, mi amigo,” she replied. “My guests deserve their privacy. All I can tell you is that he is still a guest of the motel.”

  “A guest is not a guest if he never uses his room,” countered Monti.

  Faviola bristled. “I do not know if he uses his house on the beach or not, and it is none of my business one way or another. He has not checked out of the motel. Therefore, he is still a guest, and that is all I know.”

  “Forgive me, Favi, but I was only concerned for his safety. As you know, he was a guest of some importance, and it would be bad for all of us if something . . . untoward were to happen to him.”

  Faviola’s eyes blazed. Despite all his money had done for the community, Monti was still a snake at heart and full of shit to boot.

  “If he is so important, and you wouldn’t want anything ‘untoward’ to happen to him, why in the name of the Madre did you send him to the Isla del Diablo? No one you’ve ever sent to that accursed place has ever returned. Why should he be any different?”

  “Where did you hear this from, that I sent him to del Diablo?” snapped Monti.

  “Do you think I am blind and stupid? I didn’t hear it from anywhere! He told me that you had sent him up the coast, which is probabl
y what you told him to say, but I would watch his boat go up the coast, then, much later, go toward the isla from far out in the ocean. For three days he did that, and then on the fourth, he did the same thing, but whether he has come back or not, I do not know.” She shook her head at Monti in disbelief. “How many people have you sent to that island with how many guns? And now you send this man and wonder where he is? Why he has not returned?”

  “I would like to inspect his room,” commanded Monti as he rose from his chair.

  “Sit your ass back down in that chair!” Faviola ordered. “You go near that beach house, and I’ll call the national police in Jacó after I shoot out your kneecaps.” She drew a small semiautomatic pistol from her drawer.

  Monti held up his hands to calm her. “There, there, now, mi amor. No need for violence. I am just concerned is all.”

  “Be concerned at your own house,” Faviola said. “Get out. Go home where you belong.”

  “There is one other thing,” Monti said, holding his ground. Faviola sighed and rolled her eyes. “I have another guest coming in the day after tomorrow, a very, very important guest, for all of us here. He is an investor, someone who would like to help us develop another tourist attraction . . . on the island. He will need your very best room. This could potentially mean millions of dollars for our community. We must all put our best foot forward. I assume that I am making myself clear?” Monti gave Faviola a hard look.

  She looked down and sighed again. “Fine. What is the name of this very, very important guest so I can make his reservation?”

  “His name is Vicente Galvan. He is a businessman from Cartagena, in Colombia.” He narrowed his eyes at Faviola as he saw shock and disbelief wash away her former defiance. “Good evening, mi amor,” he said, excusing himself, and he left.

  Faviola leaped up from her desk and charged out after him.

  “You’re going to trash everything we have here for the sake of those snakes and your bank account?” she yelled as he crossed the lobby to the door. He opened it and left without a word. “You fucking Mexicano!” she yelled after him.

  21

  —

  Abel lay awake in his hammock, staring at the glorious ceiling of the grand Green Cathedral that sprawled everywhere his eyes could see. For the first time, he homed in on various places in the canopy and the understory, noting colorful parrots and toucans that fluttered about, a group of capuchin monkeys cleaning each other on the limb of a giant tree, and a jaguar that was barely visible due to its camouflaging lounging on another limb directly above the camp. Abel wondered if it was just visiting or if it was actually on guard, one of Rimi’s specially trained bodyguards. The air was crisp, and the light filtering through the trees flashed in dramatic rays, piercing the canopy that made it look like a band of angelic beings approaching from somewhere. The peacefulness and beauty of it all made him not want to move from the hammock, which swayed oh so gently in the morning breeze.

  Suddenly, it all disappeared, and before he knew it, Abel was lying flat on his face on the ground listening to quiet giggles behind him. He flopped back over to see the only thing more beautiful to him than the rainforest, Rimi, chuckling nearby.

  “I decided it was time for you to awaken.” She laughed. “You looked far too comfortable just lying there staring at the canopy.”

  “And why’s that?” asked Abel as he dragged himself up from the ground, the sleeping clothes that Bibi had made him a bit disheveled.

  “Because I cannot join you.” She laughed.

  “Guess Bibi maybe needs to make us a bigger hammock,” said Abel. He reached out to give Rimi a hug when she suddenly disappeared and was now standing on the other side of the hammock from him.

  “Playing hard to get, huh?” He smiled and leaped at her over the hammock, but again, she somehow moved to where she was now directly behind him.

  “How the hell do you do that?” Abel asked as Rimi now invisibly moved two or three more times so fast it seemed as if she’d teleported.

  “I don’t know.” Rimi laughed as she finally came to Abel and gave him a warm hug and a passionate kiss. “It is just something we can do. Everyone from my world can do it to some extent. It just depends on how much talent you have and how much you work at it.” She kissed him again, and he responded back. “Come inside and eat,” she said. “Then you can talk to Bibi about the crash of my parents’ cruiser.”

  A half hour later, Abel and Rimi stood before a large video screen that Bibi had unveiled over a part of the sphere’s wall. “I have found what you asked for,” said Bibi in his mellowed metallic voice. “It is what one of my external auto cameras shot as we descended to this island.”

  Everyone watched as the giant cruiser, out of control and descending like a missile at an unbelievable speed, zipped into the range of the camera, which then tracked it over its final few seconds. It clipped some tall trees and the volcanic summit of a rocky island not far from the mainland shore, then plunged straight into the sea just a few hundred yards away, breaking up and sinking instantly after sending a sizable tsunami toward the coast, where the water lifted up and rushed inland for a considerable distance. Fortunately, it was only palm trees and shrubbery that suffered. There was no beach settlement anywhere in the view. Everyone was silent for a moment, and Abel held Rimi close. He stroked her hair gently.

  “I don’t suppose anyone would have survived that,” she said quietly. Abel gave her another squeeze.

  “Run that again, and stop it when the ship crosses the island,” Abel told Bibi. Bibi did. Abel studied the picture carefully. “I think I know this island,” he said at last. Rimi looked hopefully up at him. “It’s called Isla Heredia, and it’s not far from Jacó, just a little farther up the coast. I went there with a couple DEA agents from the Jacó post one day while I was staying there. It used to be used by drug smugglers, and they go out there to check it out every so often to make sure no one’s opened it up for business again. It looked just like that picture, and I remember the high point looked like there had been a landslide at one time, and some of the trees along this high ridge here looked smaller than the rest. There’s a nice hotel near the beach there now, and surfing and scuba supply outfits. We could just drive up, rent some gear and a boat, and go check it out. It’s not any farther from shore than this island is from Playa de Palma.”

  “So we shall go then,” said Rimi excitedly. “Get whatever things you need, and then we shall fly to the entrance to our Cathedral and go in your boat.”

  “Actually, I’m not sure that would be best. If I don’t take the boat back to Playa de Palma and report to Fat Monti, he’ll probably send people out here looking for me, and we won’t want that at all, especially if they get here when we’re not here,” warned Abel. Rimi looked disappointed. “I told you why I was sent here.”

  “To get rid of the evil presence here,” finished Rimi bitterly.

  “I don’t know, but I’ve got a hunch that he wants to do something with this island, and it’s not good. He said he wants to make it into a place for tourists to come, which might not be too bad, but just something about how he said it . . . I think he might be wanting to set up a place where bad men—really bad men—can stop in and rest. They’d come mostly on boats from the south.”

  “I don’t understand,” said Rimi. “Why here? It seems like they could rest much better in the town. There’s even a pier there.”

  “They’d be criminals, Rimi,” answered Abel. “If they ever set foot on shore, they’d have both the Costa Rican police and the DEA after them. If they use the island, they can sneak their boats in at night, rest, relax, refuel, and then leave without anyone from the town seeing them.”

  “So Fat Monti wants to bring criminals here? I don’t understand. They could ruin his town.”

  “That’s what I’ve got to find out before we go up to Isla Heredia. I don’t know anything for a fact. But
I can check it out today when I go back, then tomorrow we could go up there,” explained Abel.

  Rimi got a pouty look. “So now that you’re well, the first thing you do is go back to the mainland?”

  “I’m sorry,” said Abel. “I don’t have a choice. I’ve got to find out what’s going on, and like I said, if I don’t go back, Monti will send more bad men here looking for me.”

  “Will you spend the night there?” asked Rimi.

  “I’ll have to,” replied Abel. “If I came back, it would make Monti suspicious. He might even take his boat back.”

  “Where will you stay?” asked Rimi.

  “It’s one of the beach houses at that big motel where the Rio Palma meets the ocean—the closest one to the beach and the farthest one away from the main motel. I can see the island from there plain as day, all the way until sunset, so don’t do anything funny. I’ll be checking up on you.” Abel smiled, hoping she understood it was a joke.

  “No funny stuff now. I don’t want to have to shoot anyone!” chimed in Bibi. Both Abel and Rimi rolled their eyes and smiled.

  “Well, Mr. No Funny Stuff,” said Rimi, “it just so happens that I can see that beach house all the way from the east beach on this island, so no funny stuff yourself.”

  Abel grabbed his backpack, threw his weapons and other things into it, slung it over his shoulder, and found his hat, and then he and Rimi stepped through Bibi’s wall. They donned their special gloves. Abel climbed on Rimi’s back, and she leaped with him up into the nest above. They both found wires to fly on and zinged out of sight.

  Moments later, they stood on the beach together where Abel’s rubber boat lay just as it had for days now.

  “I’ll tell Fat Monti that I still have to clean a few things up out here tomorrow, and when I come, we’ll hide you down below in the boat and bring you back. Then we’ll take my Jeep up and check out that island.” He gave her a huge hug and another kiss. “Stay alive until I get back,” he told her. “Remember, we’re a team now.” One more kiss and he was off to the rubber raft, and moments later, his small trawler’s motor fired up, and Rimi waved as he sailed away, feeling an unfamiliar ache as if someone were pulling on her heart inside her chest.