Slow River

They book themselves into a hotel in Belmopan, Belize. It is hot in the two weeks before the rainy season. Lore drives out alone to the beach every day to dive the reef, the second-largest barrier reef in the world, and the most beautiful. She tries not to think about Tok while she glides through the cool water with the blue tang and banded butterfly fish, through the aqua and rose of the coral. She rents a jeep and drives through the interior, stopping sometimes to film chechem and banak tree, sapodilla and blood-red Heliconia. There are leaves here the size of canoe paddles, and beetles as long as her thumb. All around her she can feel life—creeping, crawling, running, leaping from branch to branch.

The nights are warm and soft, black skies streaked with bright city light, laughter, and the scent of honeysuckle and cold cocktails.

Lore is in the shower when her phone rings. She ignores it. It rings again. She climbs out of the shower. It is her mother. “Turn on the news,” Katerine says. “They’re announcing the verdict on the Caracas class-action suit.” The screen clicks off. Caracas… Lore, undecided, finds a news channel, but then turns the volume up high and gets back in the shower, only half listening.

“… great disappointment this afternoon in Caracas… Michel Aguilar, chief attorney for the plaintiffs, said earlier that this was a blow to all those who expected justice to ignore matters of privilege and influence…”

Lore hums to herself as she soaps her legs.

“… Carmen Torini, former head of the project in Caracas that…”

At the sound of the familiar name, Lore turns off the shower and pads into the living room. Carmen Torini, surrounded by reporters and looking older than when Lore first saw her on Oster’s screen, is talking to the camera. “And we think it is an absolutely fair settlement. The van de Oest company has always maintained that it scrupulously obeyed the law and all guidelines of the federal government of Venezuela. We are not to blame for the terrible tragedy of twenty years ago. The project undertaken here, the bioremediation of groundwater contaminated by careless contractors in the past, should have proved faultless. It would have proved faultless if not for the greed of the government-supervised subcontractors. If greed had not motivated the substitution of the correct bacteria there would not have been the release of mutagenic toxins into the water table…”

Lore, still watching, punches in her mother’s code. The news shrinks to a box in the upper left-hand corner of the screen. “When did you find out?”

“A few minutes ago. The judge just called.”

“And our liability?”

Katerine laughs. Her eyes, green today, sparkle. “None. None whatsoever. We’ll help, of course—that’s only good PR—but at least we won’t be suffering variations on this damn lawsuit for the next three generations.” She punches the air in triumph. “See you in the bar.”

Lore expands the news box. Now a mestizo woman is talking. She looks upset. “… got nothing! ‘Oh,’ they say, ‘it’s not our fault.’ Then whose fault is it? The government can’t afford to help. Look, this is my daughter…” She pulls a flat from her pocket, the camera zooms in. It is a picture of a limbless child, grinning. “She’s dead now. My only child. And thousands of others ruined because someone thought they could make some money. Because…” She seems to catch sight of something offscreen “Because of you!” She points and the camera pans wildly, picking up Carmen Torini, still talking to reporters. The reporters, sensing drama, part and let the two women confront each other. One, plump and weeping, beside herself with rage; one slim, well-dressed, patient.

“You’re all so greedy! For the sake of making more money-”

“It was not our fault. If our design specification had been followed to the letter, this would not-”

“Fault! Liability! Just words! Does it matter to our children who is to blame? No. All they want is their lives back. Lives that were ruined because of the van de Oest patenting policy. What would it cost to set right? A few million? Hardly a drop in the company coffers. You should do what you can out of common decency. Who cares about who should have done what? We want to fix it. If guilt at your greed doesn’t motivate you, then humanity, common decency should.”

Carmen seems impervious. “The van de Oest Company sympathizes with your grief in the light of this tragedy. Although the suit for compensation and total grafts for all victims has been dismissed and we have been judged not liable, as a gesture of sympathy to the people of Caracas, the company has authorized me to offer prostheses to all who feel the need-”

The mother of the dead child is having none of that. “We don’t want charity,” she spits. “We want justice. We will not give up. While our children lie in their beds and look at us with their sad eyes we will follow you from country to country, crying ‘Justice! Justice!’ and we will be heard!”