The Adventurer's Son(49)
Eventually, I gave up kicking off Cruz Roja’s warm blanket. Giving in kept my shock at bay. It felt good. Cody was everywhere and doing fine. He just wasn’t contacting his friends or parents.
Relieved, I emailed Roman that night:
Looking for you. Everyone is. Wished you’d emailed us when you had the chance. They say you were with this guy Pato de Lorra or something like that. And he has been arrested and is being questioned. They say you’ve crossed the mountains twice now. With Pato de Lorra. Practice for Darien? Hope to see you safe and sound and soon.
I had Thai ask Tony, who lived in Puerto Jiménez, where was the best place in town to eat. Feeling gracious, I wanted to treat Dondee, Tony, and Thai to a meal. As we waited on our dinners of seafood, rice, and plantains, a gentle sea breeze carried the night air into the restaurant. I stepped out to the busy waterfront and called Peggy on my cell.
Waiting for the call to go through, I gazed out into the tropical night, looking hopefully at every young man in a tank top and short hair, expecting him to say, “Dad! What are you doing here?”
Peggy picked up. Just hearing her voice soothed me.
“It looks like people have seen Roman around. He left some stuff at the hostel and now the old lady who runs it remembers him coming back. It looks like everything’s okay. I hope he’s not mad that I’m here.” We both chuckled.
“Oh, good,” she cooed. “It sounds like he’s back, but just not checking in.”
“I still think coming down was the right thing to do.”
“Of course, it was. He wouldn’t have written us if he didn’t think we’d come down to help. You had to go down to be sure he was okay. You’re his dad. What are you going to say when you see him?”
“I don’t know. Maybe, Let’s do a hike in Corcovado?”
We both went quiet. Our silence admitted that the whole thing was unlikely. But it felt good not to worry. To think he was safe. That he was okay.
Chapter 24
The Helicopter
Corcovado mountains from the air, July 27, 2014.
Courtesy of the author
After dinner, Dondee informed us there’d be a helicopter search in the morning. This suggested in actions, if not words, that somebody besides me was not fully convinced by Pata Lora’s story. Or that Do?a Berta from the Corners Hostel had convinced Dondee that Cody had gone back into the jungle a second time—and not come out.
More likely, the helicopter search was a response from American pressure to look more thoroughly. Since the day I left Alaska, the state’s lieutenant governor, a friend of mine named Mead Treadwell, had been pushing for U.S. National Guard involvement. Ultimately, Mead’s push for military assistance would reach the four-star general in charge of the Southern Command, General John F. Kelly, one step below President Obama’s Secretary of Defense.
Thai and I went back to the Iguana and heard the story of Pata Lora there, too, a narrative ossifying like a plaster cast across the Osa. Whenever one local whispered “Pata Lora,” another nodded solemnly, or twisted his face in a grimace. Maybe frontier justice was a simple matter of picking the local pariah for the most recent crime. Innocent or not, truth be damned, at least they’d be rid of the rat.
Depending on who was talking, Pata Lora was currently being held for drugs, theft, even murder. Pata Lora told the OIJ that the gringo paid him from an ATM on July 16, after Roger Mu?oz had seen them in Carate. Here was something tangible that we could check: when did Roman last withdraw money?
I filled my notebook haphazardly with scribbled names, numbers, notes, and quotes. Still half convinced Cody Roman was around somewhere, but just too stoned to check his emails, I’d written in the margin, “We could just wait for him to walk out—but too many people involved, too much momentum.”
Back at the Iguana, Thai and I shared a room stuffed with gear. He wore his long black hair in a ponytail that reached past his shoulders and a choker of dzi and other beads he’d bargained hard for on our trip to Tibet the year before, when we had searched Himalayan glaciers a second time for ice worms. Thai was an adventurer who could do everything—climb, boat, ski, paraglide, hike fast, mountain-bike, navigate, save lives. Importantly, with his golden-colored skin and almond-shaped eyes, he fit in everywhere he went. People welcomed his warm smile, easy laugh, and honest enthusiasm.
“We gotta get to the Conte River, where Roman said he was going,” I implored. “Cruz Roja doesn’t seem to believe he ever went there. And this Pata Lora story—much as I wish it were true—it doesn’t seem right. If Roman came out, he would’ve contacted at least his friends, if not me and Peggy.”
Thai frowned sympathetically. “Yeah, I know. But first we have to establish credibility with Dondee and the park service. We have to show we are capable in the jungle without making mistakes. Accidents happen and with us wandering around out there . . . well, we could create another rescue situation. That’s their concern.”
Thai was right, of course, but my son was missing. My son, who I hoped would be twice the father I tried to be. I’d seen Roman’s tender side, an easy patience, and playfulness with little kids—qualities that are rare in young men. Besides, parents who want kids—like Peggy and me—usually want grandkids one day, too.
Instead of wringing my hands in town, where all I could do was mull over why this Pata Lora story wouldn’t go away, I wanted to search in the park myself. That’s why I had come, even if everyone saw me like Joe’s dad at the Anchorage airport carrying downhill skis, desperate to find his son on a wild mountain glacier.