Trash

Father Juilliard says that he would have prevented Olivia from going, if he knew what she had agreed to. But “six years in Behala have taught me that some of our children are the best liars in the world. I guess it is survival” (91). He says that what Jun did “took my breath away” (91) and that things are about to get very dangerous.

Olivia says the taxi takes them into Colva, the worst part of the city she has seen yet. They reach the prison and approach the guardhouse. She shows her passport and tells them about the situation with Gardo’s grandfather. They are let into the prison. A guard escorts them to a waiting room where they sit for over an hour. Gardo asks her what “in memoriam”(94) means. She tells him that it means “in memory of,” and he says he learned it in a video game. A soft-speaking man comes in and introduces himself as Mr. Oliva, the social welfare officer. He says that Mr. Olondriz gets many requests for visits and that there are some formalities they must address. He tells Gardo that Olondriz is in the hospital and is very sick. If they really need to see him quickly, there will be a 10,000-peso fee. He also worries that Olivia will be upset by the conditions she will see.

She pays Mr. Oliva, and he takes her picture. A guard leads them through many locked doors. After the final door, a guard invites them in and smiles at them, “[a] smile of genuine interest and warmth, which seemed so wrong for the hell we were walking into” (100).

There are no cells, only cages, stacked three high. Each cage is small enough that an average-size man cannot even stand. Olivia sees an 8-year-old boy in a cage, holding a smaller boy on his lap. When they make it through and are on the other side of a locked door, she closes her eyes and cries. As they wait, she asks Gardo what the children in the cage could have done to deserve imprisonment. He says it was probably fighting or stealing, but that it is “not so bad” (104). Two guards eventually arrive, helping an old man walk with them.

The old man thanks Oliva for coming. To her, he seems far too sick to be in prison: “The man was not simply weak: he was dying” (106). She is also confused because the man has not greeted Gardo and is supposedly his grandfather. Gardo and the man speak to each other quietly and briefly in their own language. The man tells Olivia that he and Gardo are not acquainted and that Gardo used her to bribe his way into the prison, as many people do with other social workers. She says that she does not understand why so many people want to see him. He tells her that Gardo is playing a game and that he has told the boy that they will speak in front of Olivia in English.

He tells her that thirty-five years prior, he brought corruption charges against Senator Zapanta. Zapanta had stolen $30 million in international aid money. The money was for schools and hospitals and could have changed Behala. The old man received a life sentence, and the case never went to trial.

Gardo writes to Olivia that he is sorry for deceiving her. He says that he, Rat, and Raphael already knew they would be leaving Behala soon, and they didn’t want anyone to know. He apologizes again and asks for her forgiveness, saying, “I am sorry how it ended for you” (113).

Olivia asks Gabriel Olondriz—she now knows his name—how a man can steal $30 million. He says it was mostly done through fraudulent contracts and “clever accounting” and bribes (115). Zapanta had the money stashed in a vault in his home. Gabriel’s office was raided and his house burned down on the same night, but he was elsewhere. All of Gabriel’s evidence was gone.

Gardo asks who Dante Jerome is, and Gabriel answers that Dante Jerome is his son. Gardo asks what is meant by the phrases “It is accomplished” and “Go to the house now and your soul will sing” (117). Gabriel asks him to stop playing games and says that he obviously knows things that are important. Gardo tells him about the locker and José’s letter but says he was too afraid to bring the letter. He tells Gabriel that José was killed during questioning, and Gabriel begins to shake.

Raphael also apologizes to Olivia. He says that he has to discuss what Gardo did in the jail before revealing what he and Rat were working on at the same time. Raphael never “felt right since the police station” (120). He can’t sit still and feels that everyone is watching him. He reads José’s letter repeatedly but cannot make sense of it. He tells Rat that Zapanta’s house is in Green Hills. Rat says they should visit him. He says that he has enough money for them to make the trip and that there are things Raphael does not know about him.

At Rat’s house, he shows Raphael a metal box. Inside is over 2,000 pesos. Raphael asks what he is saving for. Rat tells him that he is not from Behala. He came from the island of Sampalo and is saving to go home. Once he has 50,000 pesos, he will be able to return home and live off what he has while he fishes on a boat he will buy. He wants to take Gardo and Raphael with him because he knows that the cops will never stop looking for them and at them. Raphael thinks about how frightened he has become. He sleeps poorly and wets the bed frequently. Sometimes he wakes up screaming.

Rat narrates Chapter 9. He and Raphael take a bus to the gates of Zapanta’s lengthy driveway. There are armed guards patrolling with dogs. They find a tree that the guards are not watching and climb up into the leaves to look over the fence. They drop down on the other side and run to another cluster of trees. The house looks like a palace to them. A calm voice behind them asks what they want. The voice belongs to a gardener, who invites them to smoke with him. The gardener tells the boys that lots of people have been dropping by to look, and he isn’t sure what the police are looking for. There have been seven police cars there that day, and cops walking through the house, but no one seems to know what they want. He has worked there for twenty-two years and has spoken to Zapanta only twice.

He laughs and says he imagines that the police are asking Zapanta how his houseboy walked away with $6 million. He tells the boys that the rumor among the staff is that José Angelico used a refrigerator for the robbery. José was told to buy a new fridge. He put the money in the old one and rode with the deliverymen to a graveyard after paying them to let him keep it, saying that he wanted to use it for himself and make something out of it. He says that he hopes Zapanta never gets a cent of it back “[a]nd I hope the shock kills him” (138) because by stealing the money, Zapanta stole from the boys and even himself, the gardener.

Olivia narrates as Gabriel tells her and Gardo that Dante adopted thirteen boys and nineteen girls, giving Gabriel many grandchildren. Dante had started a school and, through a government program, found it “safest to adopt the children in his care” (140). José had been one of Dante’s favorites. He wanted to become a doctor and then a lawyer. He wrote to Gabriel every year. Gardo tells Gabriel he has the letter memorized and recites it for him. The letter contains various family updates and then says “the seed-corn has been planted” (142). It states that the letter has been hidden somewhere, with instructions. It then contains the lines about the work being accomplished and the harvest being at hand. José also writes that if this letter reaches Gabriel, he can assume that he has been taken.

Gabriel asks what instructions accompanied the letter. Gardo tells him that the slip of paper just contains numbers and slashes, and he cannot remember more than the first two numbers. Gabriel tells him that the numbers are a code and that he is holding a key. He says the numbers can be decoded with a Bible. A guard enters, and Gabriel asks for his Bible. The guard’s name is Marco, and he tells Gabriel that he will give them the Bible after they leave, but the visit is over. Outside, Marco and Gardo speak in their language. Gardo tells Olivia that Marco will bring the Bible to Behala and will want money. He also says that Marco could betray them and now they are both in danger.

The next morning, Gabriel dies. Marco keeps the Bible, knowing that he can find a way to profit from it. Three policemen arrive and take Olivia to the police station. Mr. Oliva faxed all of her information to them, including her address. She is eventually released later in the day, after someone from the British Embassy pressures the police officials. She takes a plane out of the country that day.

Later, Olivia understands that in Behala, “I learned more than any university could ever teach me. I learned that the world revolves around money” (150). She compares the absence of money to a drought in which nothing can grow, and Behala is the dry place in the drought. She writes “thank you so much for using me” (150) to the three boys.