VICTORY AT ALL COSTS by Peter Nolan Smith

In November of 2010 the GOP and its Tea Party constituents swept the Democrats from the House of Representatives in the biggest shift of power of the 21st Century and this morning I was greeted at work by the security guard, Andy, who boasted, "We had a revolution last night."

"At least it was non-violent," I replied, knowing that the next years would be a disaster for non-whites, gays, lesbians, and women.

Obama is the worst president in my lifetime," a white realtor said with heartfelt conviction. Errol came from the Beltway. His father sold truth serum to right-wing believers. The lies tasted better with single malt Scotch.

Worst than GW Bush or Ronald Reagan?"

I didn't mention WH Harding, the traditional choice for the USA's worst president.

"Ronald Reagan was a great president." Errol had met Old Dutch in the White House. His father was that connected inside the Beltway.

"Really?" Not many people read history and I launched into a list of Reagan's sins. “A 40% increase in defense spending, cutting taxes for the rich in belief of the 'trickle down theory' while slashing Medicaid, food stamps, and federal education programs. Let’s not forget Iran-Contra, the savings-loan debacle, cut and run in Lebanon, forcing NASA to green light the Challenger Space Shuttle launch in sub-zero temperatures for a photo-op, the arming of Islamic fundamentalist in Afghanistan, SDI, and worst for the nation the War of Drugs."

"What was wrong with the War of Drugs?" Andy had been NYPD, when the CIA had flooded the crack flooded the streets of Brooklyn with crack cocaine during the 80s. He had arrested scores of users and dealers. Most of them were still in prison.

"Nothing, other than it was a failure and the CIA financed the Contra War by importing cocaine?"

"Do you have any proof of that?"

Errol was an intelligent conservative. He read the Wall Street Journal and believed that the banks had ruined the economy.

"Of course not, it's only a guess, but my hunch tells me that CIA were shipping arms to the countries around Nicaragua and returning with cocaine to sell in the United States."

Manny, my boss, seethed at his desk. The old man hated my bullshitting with the guards and non-buying customers. Like every boss he considered every minute that I wasn’t working for him as theft, but Manny hadn't given me a raise in two years, so I didn't care what he thought about my wasting his time.

"That’s a bullshit hunch." Andy read the Post. It cost fifty cents.

"Really? Where did the CIA planes fly into? Fort Chafee."

"Where?" Americans were abysmal at geography, so I said, "That's in Arkansas and who was governor of the Razorback State? Bill Clinton and his cooperation in the Contra cocaine traffic is why he became president."

"That's fucked-up thinking, but I appreciate how you put Slick Willy in the shit." Andy like most reactionaries hated the fact that Clinton got away with getting a blowjob in the White House.

"But you’re still talking shit."

Like millions of Americans voting for the right in this past election Andy preferred a lie to the truth.

As did everyone on the left, but I had to say, "It's only because shit is all you've heard since birth."

"Fucking liberal.” He gave me the finger and went on break to smoke a joint.

"One day you'll wake up out of that haze and realize I was right. I hope it won’t be too late."

His parting smile was a sneer, because I don't have any proof of the CIA selling crack in LA.

"My hunch was based on a trip to Peru fifteen years ago.

"Ms. Carolina and I had traveled to the Andes for a hike on the Inca Trail.

The secondary purpose of this voyage had been to break up with the blonde athlete. Her married status had been unimportant, until I had met her husband. The elderly doctor was a good man for a southerner and adultery with a friend’s wife violated my moral code, so I had figured that nothing said "I don't love you" like a coke binge on a romantic vacation, except I hadn’t been able score any blow in Lima.

The police at the airport had recognized my intentions to break the law and trailed me on my search to score an oz. of legendary pink flake.

The dealers spotted my tail and accused me of being DEA.

I hated the DEA. I loved Ms. Carolina. She deserved better than me.

We left town for the Andes, but upon our return I resumed my search without success.

I couldn’t lose the cops and finally approached them explained my strategy. The police shook their heads. They had had seen Ms. Carolina and their commander tapped a finger to his heads.

"Tu es muy loco."

Ms. Carolina was as beautiful as she was good.

"I'm doing this as a gift to her. She should be with her husband."

"Nothing in this world is a gift. Whatever must be learned must be learned the hard way," he said this as if it were meant to be a deja vu, then added, "Carlos Castenadas."

"A warrior never worries about his fear." THE TEACHINGS OF DON JUAN had been required reading for hippies in the late-60s.

"Exactemente." The cop saluted me and I returned to my hotel straight as a Mormon missionary. Ms. Carolina was sitting on the terrace drinking a Diet-Pepsi. It was her drug of choice.

"I've been reading about the Incas." She held up the Rough Guide book on Peru. "They had no wheel."

"They had the wheel, but used it as a toy, because the llamas were too weak to haul a wagon. Freight was carried on the backs of people. Still is off the road." I had read Prescott's CONQUEST OF PERU along with accounts of Bingham's discovery of the Macchu Picu ruins and several historical books about Tupac Amaru, the last Incan ruler.

"I'd like to see that." Ms. Carolina was a curious traveler.

"You will on our trek."

"Fantastic." Ms. Carolina clapped her hands together. She loved the unusual.

Tomorrow we were flying to Lake Titicaca, which was over three thousand meters above sea level.

Later in the week we were heading to Cuzco and then taking a taking a train to the trailhead for the Incan Trail, after our lungs were acclimated to sea level.

"I wish we had some coke for this."

"I wouldn't let you down." Ms. Carolina placed a small bag in my hand. She had gone out and scored me a bag of blow. I knew better than to ask how.

It was good gear.

She also knew about my attempt to break up with her and after a tearful discussion we agreed to be intimate ex-lovers. That evening the two of us sat at a bar overlooking the Pacific. We ate tuna ceviche and drank Pisco Sours. The lemony brandies went well with the blow. Back at the hotel I showed my gratitude with a kiss.

"Just doing my part to keep you happy." The next morning the plane took us over the Andes. The bag went fast on the reed-strewn shores of the Lake Titicaca and my lungs never suffered from the altitude, but Ms. Carolina was wheezing like she had been transported to the surface of Mars I offered her a hit in the hotel.

"Not for me." Ms. Carolina was a good citizen.

"You sure?" I asked hesitantly, since I was almost out.

"I’m sure." She liked whiskey, sex, and loved me. The next day we flew to Cuzco. I killed the bag high above the old Incan capitol. Ms. Carolina struggled the altitude. I bought coca leaves in the market place before the cathedral and brewed tea for the two of us back at the hotel.

"Drink it." It was an order.

"If you insist." Ms. Carolina gasped for breath.

"I insist." Leaves were not powder. They were legal in Peru. A half hour later she and I were at the hotel bar drinking beer.

"It’s a miracle drug."

"That it is, which is why we're taking a big bag with us for the hike on the Incan Trail. We’ll chew it in the morning and while we’re hiking. At night we’ll drink it as tea." The guide had insisted on this addition to our diet. Its ingestion was for our own good.

That evening Ms. Carolina breathed easy for the first time since we arrived in the Andes. We slept without fits.

In the morning the two of us met with Juan, our guide, for the ride to Kilometer 88.

After the ancient locomotive lurched from the Cuzco station to switchback over the mountains, the three of us crammed our cheeks with coca leaves, which Juan prepared with ilucta or the ashes of the quinoa plant.

"It strengthens the effect." Juan ignored the rest of the gringo tourists in the 2nd Class car. They were mostly elderly Yankees or longhaired backpackers. He was in charge only of us.

"I’m good with that."

One middle-aged hiker with two teenage boys studied us with disdain. He had a buzz-cut and wore impeccable mountain gear. I figured him for military.

"Giving me a little buzz." We were having a good time on the ride over the Andes, as Juan told us about the trail.

"Once we leave the train, we go back to the 19th Century. Maybe even the 15th. There is no electricity and very few communities. Only pack animals, horses, mules, donkeys, and llamas are allowed on the trail and only some of it, because their hooves break the trail."

"Just like you said." Ms. Carolina grabbed my hand in excitement. Her life back in the South consisted of golf, shooting shotguns, and church. This was a real adventure and she liked adventure.

"It was a lucky guess." I had been in the Himalayas, where the only pack animals were yaks and Sherpas. I gave Ms. Carolina a kiss as a peace gesture. We weren't over yet. "Are you okay?"

"Fine." We were both revived by the miracle cure. An hour later the train shimmied to a halt by the river. This was Kilometer 88.

"This is it." Juan clapped my shoulder. The other hikers rose from their seat.

"Not much to look at." I peered out the window. The water roared over the rocks with a glacial fury. The trail disappeared into fingers of fog. I blew into my hands. They were cold.

"Just a kilometer sign and a small bridge over the river." Juan pointed up and signaled to four barrel-chested Quechuan men, wearing filthy parkas discarded by previous trekkers. The cheeks of each bulged with coca leaves.

The same faces had greeted Pizarro on his march into the Incan Empire in 1526.

"These are your porters. They get $20 a day. They sleep in the dining tent. Please keep the night short. They need sleep and it gets cold up high." Juan came from a travel agency known for treating the porters with dignity. “Cold porters with little sleep are bad porters."

"We’ll be good." Ms. Carolina’s kindness heart was dedicated to everyone.

"Gracias, senora." Juan helped her from the train. About twenty gringos were struggling with their packs.

"Glad they’re here." I handed over my bags to the tallest of the three and said, "Napaykuyin."

"A shallow nod muddied the stony stoicism in response to my hello in Quechuan. “Guess he didn't understand your Boston accent."

"Ms. Carolina repeated my salutation with a smile. The porter returned her gesture with a broken-toothed grin. “See, he's a Southerner like me."

Ms. Carolina was in high spirits.

The other trekkers were hefting heavy bags onto their shoulders. The older folks on the train pointed cameras out the window and snapped photos of the forlorn stop. The middle-aged father was already herding his sons up the steep path. My lungs were gasping for air and I looked at Ms. Carolina.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" The path led into the Andes for a three-day hump to the ancient ruins of Machu Picchu. In 1911 a young Quechan boy had led the American explorer to an unknown site of Incan ruins. Several families of Quechuans lived on the mountaintop, but Hiram Bingham announced his discovery, as if Machu Picchu had appeared out of the clouds.

The train whistled its impending departure.

"“Precious, don’t even think about it." Ms. Carolina had grown up in the Jersey Pine Barrens. They grew them tough in those swamps. "We came here for this."

"If you say so." I stuffed more leaves in my cheek. The porters nodded their approval.

"You ready?" Juan only wanted one answer.

"Si." Ms. Carolina nodded and our troop of seven hit the trail.

The uphill trudge was a test of our endurance, however the coca leaves enabled us to breathe without exertion. The porters spoke in their language and smoked cigarettes, while joking about the struggling backpackers.

"They never leave the high altitude." Juan was a half-caste. He offered Ms. Carolina a pinch of coca leaves. It was better than ours and the effect erased years from her body. We passed the American and his sons at the edge of a eucalyptus forest. The wind was cold.

"What are you doing?" The bush-cut American demanded, re-arranging the packs on his two teenage sons.

"Climate acclimatization." I crammed my cheek fill of coca leaves.

"That’s coca.” His erect stance was the result of a long career in the military. "That's against the law."

"Not the leaves. Just the powder." I held up my bag. "You want to dry some?"

"Stay away from us." He grabbed his two kids and tramped up the dirt track with a warning glare. A mist descended down the slope. Cold and wet were ch’ulli and armay in Quechuan Juan shrugged with a smile. "Macho man."

"Like Randy Savage."

"Yeaaaaah. Slim Jims." Juan echoed the crazed wrestler's famed cry, showing that the WWF's reach traveled far and wide. The Indian signaled it was time to go. We had five hours to make the first night’s camp.

We passed the angry American again within fifteen minutes. HHIs sons and he were suffering from oxygen deprivation. We were at 2500 meters. The highest I had been was 3500 meters in Nepal.

"You need some help?" My offer was sincere.

"I told you to stay away from me.” His eyes blazed with hostility.

"Suit yourself." I shrugged and his sons stepped to the side to allow our passage.

"What’s that about?" Ms. Carolina was accustomed to Southern manners.

"People like him hate the idea of drugs, unless prescribed by a doctor. Our chewing cocaine like it was normal grates against his grain."

"I feel fine." She was a convert to the benefits of the coca leaf. My mistress was no square.

"As you should."

While chewing coca leaves aren’t supposed to induce euphoria, the juices were a stimulant and I sucked on them with purpose.

The clouds masked the mountains, as we zigzagged up the slope past various ruin, tombs, and terraces. Our rest stops were frequent, but we arrived at the village of Llullucha before any of the other trekkers. The porters set up a dining tent and Juan arranged a room in the decrepit inn.

"Better than sleeping on the ground."

The rest of the hikers straggled into the makeshift tambo on their last legs. Ms. Carolina and I drank coca tea and our lungs were sucking down paper-thin Andean air with pleasure. I thought about offering the other trekkers some tea, but Juan said, “Mana, let them be monse gringos. Maybe they make problem."

"Problem?"

"Some think it is bad. Some think it is too good. Gringos." Juan spat out a wad and replaced it with new leaves.

"Why did you give it to me?" Ms. Carolina and I were as gringo as you get without wearing a flag.

"Because you have the face of someone who like coca and your lady is a good woman." Juan translated this conversation into Quechuan for the porters. They had a good laugh and even better one when the American stumbled into camp at dusk.

He stared at me and shook his head before dragging his sons to set up their tent.

"What'd I do?" I asked Ms. Carolina.

"You took the easy way out." This was a sin for hard-cases like the father with the two boys.

"It’s the only choice this high up." I stuffed more leaves into my cheek and sipped at the tea. The fire burned warm against the soles of my feet.

Warm was q'onichiy in the High Andes.

"Later that night the father explained to the other hikers that he was a DEA colonel stationed in La Paz. He had raided a series of cocaine plantation. Guns had been his calling card.

"We tear up the crop and arrest the growers," he spoke proudly of his accomplishments.

Juan and the other porters spat coca juice on the ground.

"A fucking narc," I muttered under my breath.

"Stop it." Ms. Carolina punched my leg.

The man noticed the hit and glared with righteous superiority.

"Don't." Ms. Carolina grabbed my arm. She was no stranger to my temper. "He's with his boys."

"Okay, but only because you say so."

Actually the real reason was that this man looked like he was a black belt and I was in no shape to fight someone of that skill even with the advantage of coca.

Juan prepared a traditional dinner of Olluquito con charqui or crunchy cooked yellow tubers with llama meat washed down with fermented corn maize or chicha. The father glowered at us, as we entered the inn for the night. The MRE on his lap was an unappealing reward for a hard day’s hike, but it was his choice and I slept with a clear unconsciousness.

The next day was a hard one.

The trail rose to a pass of 4,200 meters. Juan checked on us during the ascent for the effects of soroche or altitude sickness. Neither Ms. Carolina nor I had any headaches, although two of the backpackers were suffering badly and picked up the pace for the descent to the valley of a river with many syllables.

"Better safe than sorry." Juan watched the pair disappear down the trail.

"I agree."

At this height my responses tended to be short and sweet.

"That night Ms. Carolina hit bed and I avoided any contact with the DEA colonel by wandering farther up the trail. When I returned to the campsites, he and his sons were heating up MREs. The content smelled like Chef Boyadee.

"Me and my sons are champion runners," he explained to the other trekkers. "I figure that exposure to this altitude would open their lungs, which is why I pulled them out of school for this trip."

"Just be careful about soroche." High-altitude sickness was potentially fatal.

"What would you know about it?" He was about my age, but in tiptop shape.

"I've been up in the Himalayas, but never this high." I stirred the fire with my walking stick. "Seen people get sick very fast from too little oxygen. Just don't push yourself too much. It's a long way back to the trailhead."

"We”ll be fine." He was proud of his purity of body and soul, although his two boys appeared ready to join my side of the argument.

"All the best." I had already said enough and walked over to our fire. The porters were smoking cigarettes and playing cards. Juan offered me a cup of coca mate.

"Thanks." The heat warmed my hands.

"You did good today."

"We owe it to the coca leaves." I almost played basketball every day back in the states and my lungs were in good shape.

"Many gringos cannot make it this far."

"I was in Nepal several years ago. The mountains are high like this." They were actually taller. "The porters are all Sherpas and they say that the first thing that a westerner learns in Sherpa is 'carry this' and the second is 'carry me'."

"Same in Quechuan." Juan nodded with a wide grin. His teeth were covered by the green slime of coca leaf residue. The light of the fire flashed the 14th Century against his face. “Buenos Noches."

The porters muttered the same and I lay down on my sleeping bag next to Ms. Carolina. The stars clustered overhead like grapes on the vine. She pointed out the Southern Cross.

"I never saw it look so big." MS. Carolina snuggled closer. "Thanks for not starting with that father. He”s with his boys."

"I wouldn’t want to embarrass him in front of his kids."

"Not you wouldn't want to do that." She kissed my cheek and the two of us watched the wheel of heaven spin across the sky.

"The next day the clouds dissipated to reveal a 360-degree horizon of mountains, glaciers, and valleys. Juan and the porters were ready to go after we finished our breakfast. The day ran long and the path was high. The stone trail dated back to before the Incan Empire. We skirted more ruins and climbed through the terraces to village of ancient buildings known as Sayaqmarka.

The other trekkers explored the various ruins. Ms. Carolina and I joined them, while Juan prepared our lunch of noodles and eggs. I ran into the DEA colonel and his sons. The hike had exhausted them. So was I.

"Pretty amazing these sites." I extended a peace offering and spat out my wad without replenishing it. "Back before Pizarro thousands of people traveled these trails every day. They were the freeways of their time."

"And I suppose that coca was the gas of that civilization."

"It's not easy doing anything strenuous this high without it, but you three have proven that it can be done. The Spanish called it the tool of the devil."

"Yet you chew it like the natives."

"I'm not in as good a shape as you." I turned to his sons. "Prior to the 1968 Olympics many of the athletes trained in the mountains to get used to the high altitudes in Mexico City. I wish you luck back in the States."

"Thanks, mister." The oldest nodded to me.

"After today Macchu Picu and then we get back to a lower altitude.”

"I think I’m going to like that." His younger brother was having a more difficult time with the oxygen-short air.

"We all will."

"I bid them good-luck on the trail and joined Ms. Carolina at the lunch tent.

Juan sent back two of the porters. Their bags were empty. I tipped them $20 and they muttered thanks in Spanish. As they left, I stuck coca leaves in my mouth. The exertion of the last hour had zapped my energy. After a few minutes the coca juice restored my vitality and I got to my feet. I was ready to go.

Ms. Carolina and I cruised along the trails like Steve McQueen in the jungle escape scene in PAPILLON after the convict gives him coca leaves. I didn't have an ache in my body and could have climbed the nearest mountain with the agility of a goat. Coca was not a god, but the leaves came from the sun and the sun was all there was above the mountains in the Andes.

Our shrunken group arrived at Runkuraqay slightly before 4. Juan suggested that we continue to a visitors center near the Phuyupatamarca ruins and we tramped ceaselessly to the orchid forests near the Way Wayna ruins.

That evening we shared beers with the other trekkers.

Even the DEA colonel had one.

We toasted our achievement and I offered them coca leaves.

Our conversation became our animated with the effects of the coca and the DEA colonel motioned for his boys to move away from me. I was the antithesis of his struggle against drugs.

"I know you’re dedicated to the struggle against drugs, but it's a losing effort."

"We make progress every year."

"That’s what the charts say, but I've seen the streets of South Phillie and East New York. There's no victory there and the only way to escape defeat is to alter the lines of supply and demand by shipping all the junkies and crack heads to drug-producing countries. That way supply will meet demand face-to-face."

"That’s madness."

"It would work same as the coca leaves in this altitude."

"I’ll beat you to Machu Picu without them."

"First one to Machu Picchu buys the beers," I said before he disappeared into the darkness.

"Is that a bet?"

"I guess so."

"You’re on."

"That was a stupid bet." Ms. Carolina was amused by my wager. "Losing means you drink for free."

"I don”t intend on losing." The DEA killed people. Their war was waged on the poor. They never attacked the banks or the rich or the tobacco barons of Richmond, Virginia.

Under normal condition the colonel might have bested me, however the coca leaves gave us an unbeatable edge and we tramped past them thirty minutes after departure from the previous evening bivouac.Later that morning, we sat at the stone gate marking the entrance to the Incan fortress awaiting the colonel's arrival. When they arrived, we gave Coca-Colas to his sons and a cold beer to him. He didn't refuse and we accompanied them to the ruins.

"You know you cheated." The colonel drained the beer in one go.

"We played by local rules." I stuffed a wad of leaves into my cheek. The noon sun was high above the sharp Andean ridge. The guides were huddled around a fire casting a welcome warmth.

"No game, I see you every day chewing those leaves, looking back at me, thinking that I can’t walk as fast as you."

"Well, you can’t." I'm pro-drug. The DEA is the enemy. They couldn't win in the end.

"Only because of those leafs."

"Hey, It”s all natural.”" I had a bone to pick. A persistent rumor. "Unlike the crack the CIA was selling in LA."

"The CIA never did that."

"Everyone knows it."

"Rumors."

"Not rumors. The truth."

"No way it could happen. They were too many people involved. Someone would have said something."

"Not unless they killed them and that is what the CIA and DEA do best. Kill people."

I stood up and walked away before the words got too angry.

The colonel and his sons left the fire, taking my beers.

That afternoon all the trekkers rode a tourist bus down to Aguas Calientes and caught the afternoon train to Cuzco. Ms. Carolina and I luxuriated in the hot waters and spent the evening drinking chicha with Juan and the porters underneath the ruins long abandoned by its gods.

"You were mean to that colonel." Ms. Carolina snuggled next to me.

"He deserved it." I wasn't in a sleeping mood.

Chicha and coca leaves were a combination made for a long night of staring at the universe.

"But not his kids."

"She was right, for a father knows best for his kids even when he's wrong.

I kissed her on the lips and she said that she loved me.

I said the same words, as if they were spoken by another person. The coca had numbed my lips, but not my heart and I closed my eyes to breathe the fragrance of a woman in love.

A hand tapped my shoulder.

Peru was gone.

"Are you going to work today at all?" Manny stood over me.

"Yes, I was lost in thought."

I was on 47th street.

"I can see that.” Manny studied my face. "Where were you?"

"Someplace far away and long ago."

Only several seconds had passed since I first remembered getting off the plane in Lima. The reminiscence was not a flashback, for the memory of that bonfire in the Andes smelled of victory on Ms. Carolina's skin and it will last forever in my mind, because the word for the past is Xdit in Quechuan, which is never far from Xnākht or the future in every language.

ROUGH ROAD by Peter Nolan Smith

Peru sucked in 1995.

The country was under siege.

The War of Drugs had replaced the War against the Shining Path.

The capitol city Lima was cool, but I had unsuccessfully spent the better part of two days trying to score a bag of cocaine. The airport police fingered me as a user and an undercover squad tailed my ventures into the slums. Their obvious presence had scared off any steerers. To the dealers I was either DEA or a fool.

Ms. Carolina didn't understand my mounting frustration. The golfer pro had been reared in a convent. People like me didn't frequent the 19th hole at country clubs.

The blonde southern beauty and I had been seeing each other for over five years. Her husband was in his late-60s. They had an understanding. Charles had given his wife space to take trips on her own, so she didn’t feel trapped after twenty years of marriage. Ms. Carolina came back to South Hills with a smile and the small town doctor had a monthly week of peace and quiet. The arrangement had worked for years, except Ms. Carolina had violated an unspoken tenet of her pact by falling desperately in love with me on a winter ski trip.

While the Ten Commandments had no influence over my soul, I had met the old doctor at a party in New York. Charles was a good old boy from the tar forests. He helped people black or white and my rule about never sleeping with the wife or girlfriend of someone I respected was stronger than any law from the Bible.

Charles and his wife were meant for each other and Ms. Carolina deserved better than a nightclub bouncer.

I figured nothing said an affair was over faster than a coke binge in Peru.

The Lima police refused to cooperate.

On our last night in our seaside hotel Ms. Carolina stroked my skin and mewed with pleasure. Convent girls were tough to refuse in the dark, even in their 40s, so I pretended to be asleep.

The next morning I left the hotel and there were no police on the sidewalk. A heavy fog was rolling off the Pacific and I headed over to a plaza in Miraflores, where I noticed several nasty pieces of work hanging on the sidewalk. I approached the one with the best clothing and explained my proposition. I gave him $20 and promised another $80, if he came back.

"Non problema." The dealer shifted his eyes left and right. "Trente minudos."

I sat at a cafe and ordered an expresso. The bastard hadn't shown up by my third. I swore under my breath, thinking I had been ripped off, then spotted the dealer across the plaza. He walked, as if he was carrying the mother lode. We exchanged smiles. My hand went into my pocket. A car screeched to the curb. An undercover squad of 'tomba' hit the pavement and threw us against the wall.

"I am screwed." I muttered several times, but the cops cut us loose.

"Bamba." The lead detective hefted the bag of powder.

"Bamba?" This word didn't register in my lexicon of Peruvian slang.

"Fake." The detective spoke English like he had spent time at a police academy in LA. "You got ripped off. Via con dios."

I returned to the hotel in a black mood.

Ms. Carolina and I had been together long enough for her not to question my mood.

After check-out we exited from the hotel. A black rental Nissan Sentra was waiting outside. I sat in the driver seat. The odometer read 70,000 miles. The steering wheel betrayed the real wear and tear. Lima's potholes had taken their bite from the suspension, but once out of the city the coastal highway was smooth as the surface of a frozen Maine lake.

We drove north along the Pacific, taking turns at the wheel. I acted 'nice' and put CDs in the stereo. Ms. Carolina liked my music as we passed through a desert without houses or no trees, only a few giant chicken farms with millions of chickens pooping out eggs into basket for capitol's consumption dotted the sand expanse far from the rare towns huddled next to streams flowing with the Andes glacial melt.

According the guide book the Sechuran Desert received close to no rain each year.

The ocean was a dark blue mystery. The Humboldt Current surged south from the Arctic. Balboa had named it 'Pacific' as a joke. The waves crushed ships on desolate shores, doldrums starved men to death, and storms sucked armadas to the fathomless depths.

I went for a swim at a nameless beach. The cold water stun my skin. Seals surfed the waves. Ms. Carolina took pictures. She was happy. It would have been easy to make her sad, but I kept my mouth shut, as she handed me a towel.

Back on the road Ms. Carolina handed me a Pilsen Callao. The bottle was icy cold and I thanked my passenger.

"You're a good traveler companion."

"Is that all, precious?" She only said the words precious to dogs, children, and people who annoyed her.

"Why?" It was a question a man is never supposed to ask of a woman.

"Because there's also this." She held up a bag of green leaves and explained with a southern accent, "Coca. I know it's not what you want, but it's the best I could do with my limited habla espanol."

"Okay, you're a saint too." I stuck a wad of dried leaves in my cheek.

Breaking up was hard to do with a woman this nice.

"That's what I thought too." She smiled and joined my predilection for epiphany.

The coca and the beer loosened my tongue.

I recounted Pizarro's conquest of the Incan Empire. His march in 1532 had traversed the coastal wasteland. "His troops numbered less that 200. They headed into the mountains and found the Royal Incan at a place now known as Baños del Inca. For some reason Atahualpa and his army of 80,000 were defeated by a sneak attack on the king. They later garroted the Incan when he didn't give them more gold."

"Nice people." Ms. Carolina loved hearing my shortened versions of history and smart enough to absorb the parts that sounded almost true.

"You know that coca makes you real talky, precious."

She was right and I said, "Pass me a beer, please."

Like Pizarro we left the coast and drove east into the mountains. The road to Huarez wound through an arid valley walled by ever-steeper cliffs to arrive on the high plain with the horizon blocked by snow-covered mountains.

This was the first sight of the Andes for both of us and Ms. Carolina lowered the window of the rented car to admire the sun gleaming off impressive peaks.

"Mind if I drive?"

"How are you feeling?" I asked Ms. Carolina.

Traveling in rural Peru was more dangerous than Lima, since the local motorists drove as if they were used to empty roads. They passed on blind corners and sped through switchbacks with deadly intent. Being a defensive driver I anticipated their every stupid move with an almost ESP alacrity.

"Fine." She sounded a little dreamy.

"Good, the coca makes it easier to breath at this altitude." We were 3000 meters above sea level, which was higher than most of the Rockies.

"You want me to drive?"

"No, I'm good." The surface of the valley road was impeccable and she said, "You enjoy the view."

She loved the mountains and we arrived in Huaraz in the late afternoon. Our hotel was cheap, but cheerful and we sat on the roof drinking wine and examining the map for the next day's travels.

Ms. Carolina held THE ROUGH GUIDE TO PERU. She loved reading about where she was to learn the history and geography. As the sun set the temperature dropped, but we were warm in our alpaca sweaters purchased at the city's farmers' market.

"Those mountains are the Cordillera Blanca.

About fifty miles north of here a road crossed the Andes to descend into the Amazon jungle.

"It's probably dirt and none of it good. I bet fewer than ten westerners travel it each year."

A couple of years before the trip would have been too dangerous. The Shining Path had ruled the Andean highlands. Their president had been captured by the military and there was no number two to take over the role of leader for the Maoists.

"What are you thinking?" She fluttered through the guide book without finding any references to the region. It was terra incognito.

"It might take two days from here and back to Lima." I spit out a gigantic chaw of coca, which hit the tiled roof below us with a splat.

"Then I'm all for it." Ms. Carolina tried to imitate by projectile gobbing. The green goop rolled down her chin onto her new sweater. Girls from convent schools were terrible at spitting.

"Good thing your sweater is green." I brushed the dregs from the alpaca with my sleeve. She laughed at the absurdity of this gesture and we clinked glasses to honor the possibilities of tomorrow's trip.

The Olluquito con charqui accompanied our excellent dinner of lake trout. The waiter hailed from Matibamba. He pointed it on the map. His hometown town was on the other side of the Andes.

"No one goes there. Only people leave." His eyes clouded with suspicion, as if we might be DEA.

"We're not the police." Ms. Carolina had changed into a lovely traditional dress. Her smile reconverted him to our side. She knew how to treat men and bought him a beer.

"How's the road?"

"Road? Malo. Muy malo e mucho peligroso." He begged us to only visit the twin glacial lakes east of Yungay. "Very beautiful same."

"Muchos gracias." She toasted him for braving his fears as well as his compliment.

Gringos were never good luck in Latin America.

As we retired to our room, Ms. Carolina hooked her arm with mine.

High altitudes played havoc with hard drinking. Now was not the time to say that we were over. I kissed her with the tenderness of a sailor about to leave his port and fell into bed as soon as we reached our room. I didn't have to fake going to sleep.

At dawn I stood on the veranda and watch the sun glow over marshmallow white glaciers cloaking the Andes. Some of the mountains rose to 6000 meters plus. Their names came from the Quechuan language.

Stone fireplace, hummingbird beak of ice, and the butcher were just a few.

Climbing those monster were for experts.

Driving through them was strictly for fools.

Ms. Carolina put on her explorer outfit. The pants and shirt had an excess of pockets. I wore jeans and a leather jacket. This was a road trip and not a safari, then again she was a woman and women like looking good in case they have to get dirty and handed her a wide-brimmed hat.

"I like that hat."

"You do?"

"The sun is strong up there."

"But I feel like I'm traveling with Indiana Jones."

"Sore sport." She threw me my Red Sox cap. "Jock."

It was a not good way to start the morning and we left the room.

While she ate breakfast, I filled the gas tank and had a mechanic check the engine and tires. When I told the mechanic my destination, he wished me luck.

"Mucho Gracias."

His comment reinforced my opinion that crossing the Andes in a rented car was plain old stupid.

But we weren't turning back, but it was asunny day.

Ms. Carolina got provisions for the journey. She had been born in the Adirondacks. Camping in the north woods required planning. Bad weather killed fools.

"You know I've been thinking about this trip." We had another fifteen days in Peru. This drive might eat two or five.

"Thinking what?"

That it might not be a good idea."

"Listen you always play that Steppenwolf song for me." She got in the car and motioned for me to get behind the wheel. AS I snapped on my seatbelt, Ms. Carolina said, "That singer sings 'looking for adventure and whatever comes our way. I didn't come here with you to stay at the Holiday Inn and drink chardonnay. Let's see whatever comes our way. What the worst thing that can happen?"

"We get stuck in a remote town and kidnapped by banditos."

"I was thinking about something less worst."

"We get stuck in the remote town and have to tow the car back to Lima."

"Now that's not a worst worst."

"What is?"

"Running out of coca leaves."

We supplemented the coca in our cheeks and I started the car, thankfully we were set for an emergency.

The road to Yungay was well maintained by work crews. They were happy for the work and good at it. Ms. Carolina lay the map on her lap and held the guide book in her hands.

"Yungay was destroyed by a glacier avalanche in 1970. Over 70,000 people were killed. The town was buried under ten meters of debris." She read the facts and I spotted the slide.

Twenty-four years later a mile-wide scar marked the slope under Mount Huascarán.

"Looks safe today." I turned right and the dirt road weaved through the fertile farmlands into a pine forest and then a series of switchbacks. I kept the speed under 20 to avoid potholes and roads. Several battered cars covered with dust came from the other direction. A relic of a bus appeared at a corner. The passengers waved to us. There were no towns at the lakes, so they had to be coming from the other side of the Andes.

"That's a good sign."

"What?" Ms. Carolina studied the valley floor for car wrecks. She suffered slightly from vertigo, but the coca was working a miracle to calm her fear of heights, however when the Sentra squeaked around a hairpin curve and it was my turn to feel the fears.

We rose into the chasm with the sensation of sinking, as the twin giants topped with millennia of snow and ice loomed over the road. They were close enough to shiver from the cold trembling off their unattainable summits.

More vehicles came from the east.

"Those cars are coming from where we want to go."

"Good." Her lungs were wheezing from the lack of oxygen.

"Are you okay?" I played three hours of streetball every day back in New York. My chest rivaled the width of Henry VIII and he was a fat man. Aided my the coca leaves I was fine.

"A slight migraine that's all." Ms. Carolina was a sport, but high altitude sickness was no joke.

"If it gets worst let me know."

The road leveled out for two azure lakes glistening under the high Andean sun. We parked the Nissan by the side of a creek spilling into Laguna Llaganuco. Shredded clouds fingered the cliffs and the sun blistered the lake surface with mirrored flashes of light. I stripped off my clothes and told Ms. Carolina, "I'm going for a swim."

"It has to be cold." The water was straight off a glacier.

"It's a purification rite." My anti-Catholicism didn't interfere with my spirituality. I wore my shoes into the water. The beach was water-smoothed stone. I leapt from the shore. The cold was deeper than a plunge into a Bar Harbor beach in March. Ice crackled my capillaries and I stroked back to the shore. Ms. Carolina spread a huge towel on the stones. I shuddered for several minutes before regaining the power of speech.

"Cold?" She handed me a glass of pisco. Ms. Carolina knew how to treat a man.

Stupid ones too.

"Fucking cold." I lay on my back.

Ms. Carolina lay next to me. She was warm. We were close to the sun. Ten minutes later I was on my feet. I pointed to the top of the pass.

"Beyond that the unknown." I dressed in my dry clothes and sat behind the steering wheel. I turned up the heat.

"You want me to drive?" Ms. Carolina was genuinely concerned about my condition.

"No, I'm good." My hands were shaking from the effects of exposure and I chewed more coca leaves. They weren't helping and I put the car in drive. "I'll take it slow."

Several cars passed us. They knew the road and I increased the speed to 30 mph to keep up with them. I looked out the window. The valley of lakes disappeared under a cloud bank. We were at flight altitude.

"Precious, keep your eye on the road."

"Yes, boss." I turned my head to scowl at her. The car scrapped over a rock with a screech of metal. The stench of gas filled the car. Ms. Carolina smelled it too.

"Damn."

I got out of the car and lay on the dirt. Gas spewed from a gash in the tank. My attempts to staunch the flow with electrical tape were failures. I stood up and looked up the road. The pass was obscured by a thick fog. It might be snow.

"We have to turn back. We have a full tank and it should get us back to Yungay. At worst we can roll down the mountain."

"On the road, I hope." She lifted her hand. "Just trying to be funny."

"Ha, ha." My humor was diminished by the prospect of having the rental car towed back to Lima. I gave up trying to estimate how much that would cost in my head. "That was my bad. I'll pay whatever it cost."

"This is not a 'me' world, but a 'we' world. 50/50. Let's get going before I have to push us."

I drove down past the lakes. They were as beautiful the second time as the first, but we didn't stop for photographs and the Nissan rocked through the potholes and shivered across the ruts. The gas meter read half-full.

We made Yungay with a quarter tank to spare.

I asked a local woman about a mechanic. She pointed around the corner. The building was surrounded by wrecks and scavenged hulks. There was no way that I was leaving the Nissan here. The three men in the garage lifted their heads from a V8 block. The oldest man was sealing a crack in between two cylinders with an acetylene torch. He sniffed the air with a knowledgeable nose and turned off the torch.

I stepped out of the car. The boss signed for his young helpers to take a break. They lit up cigarettes and the older man shouted at them in rapid Spanish. Admonished by his tirade they put out the cigarettes.

The older man shook his head and wiped his grimy hands on grimier overalls. His eyes squinted in the bright sunlight like his mind was calculating the price of his solution to my problem. The passenger door opened behind me and his eyes shifted over my shoulder.

“Senora.”

The boss bowed his head with a polite deference.

Blonde hair the color of the sun was an abnormality in the high Andes and the boss offered her a chair, then quickly examined the gas tank after which he explained in passable English, “This not big problema. Road bad. Rock cut tank. I fix. Take out tank. Empty petrol. Seal hole with solder. Turn tank back upside down. Car OK. Good idea.”

“What is plan numero two?” I asked to re-establish my standing as the man here, not Ms. Carolina. It was a futile effort.

“Plan two?” The mechanic smirked at my question. “Plan numero two I go to Lima. Get new tank.”

“Sounds expensive.”

“Si mucho caro. Plan numero uno est better.”

“Very good idea. How much?” Carolina got to the point.

The man held up two fingers. I thought $200 was a rip-off, but he smiled and said, “$20.”

“Very good idea.” Ms. Carolina shook his hand.

None of his grime came off on her hand.

Goddesses were above dirt.

The man introduced himself as Chocho, “I like Chocolate.”

“Who doesn’t,” Ms. Carolina told our host that I was her husband. The lie was easier than explaining the truth.

“Bueno.”

Chocho ordered beers.

The two young man jacked up the Nissan and yanked off the tank, as Ms. Carolina shot photos of the mechanic and his children. He laughed hearing about our wanting to see the other side of the mountain.

“Nothing there. No hotels. No beer. Nada. Everyone leave there. Come here or go to Lima.” He clapped his hands and ordered his children to leave the garage, as the young men drained the gasoline into a plastic bucket. They hauled the empty tank into the courtyard and our new friend advised that we get something to eat.

“Senora, better you not here, if tank go boom.”

His fingers flicked up to aid our visualizing his plan # 1 going bad.

“Not worry. If go boom. We do plan two.”

The two young men didn’t join his laughter. I didn’t think it was funny, but Ms. Carolina laughed so hard that she swallowed her cud of coca leaves, which stuck in her throat. Chocho slapped his palm on her back and she expelled the wad across the street to strike the wall with the intensity of a bazooka shell hitting the side of a Panzer tank.

“I guess I went boom boom.”

Her joke got a rib-ripping chortle from Chocho and we had a classic Peruvian lunch of cuy chactado and olluco, roasted pig and Andean tubers along with roasted peppers. After several glasses of pisco Chocho looked at his watch.

“Car finish. You can go now. You go to other side of mountain?”

“No, I think we’ve gone far enough.”

"Si. a gas tank can only be flipped one time."

The repair looked good to my eyes and Ms. Carolina paid Chocho, then tipped the two young boys $5US, which was a good day’s pay in this part of Peru. I thanked them for their help with two baseball caps. The three of them waved good-bye, as we pulled out of the garage and Ms. Carolina checked the air with a quick sniff.

The air smelled of the ancient Andes.

“No gas.”

“And they put what they took out back in the tank.”

The Nissan had a quarter tank.

“So what the plan?”

“Head to the coast and then back to Lima. Chilbote is a city with two bays."

"I’m sure they have good fish.”

“Me too, but you know I came down here for a reason and it wasn’t a coke binge.” I had to tell her my feelings. The word love was dead on my lips.

“Honey.” Ms. Carolina lifted her hand. “We’ve been together five years. I think I know what goes on in that little head of yours. Not everything, but sometimes you’re easier to read than a comic book.”

“I am.”

“You’re a man. I’m a woman. You’re a comic book. I’m a mystery.” Her sunglasses hid her eyes, but there were no tears, despite the hurt warbling in her voice. “We had a good time. We can still have good times, but only on two conditions.”

“Which are?” My mind shuffled through the possibility of conditions like a card shark.

“No explanations. They don’t change anything and second as long as you never introduce me as a ‘friend’, I can live with being an ex-lover.” She caressed my hand. “Can you live with that?”

“I only want to make you happy.”

“You want to make me happy, then give me that bag of coca leaves.”

She stuck a clump of coca in her cheek and I put Jess Winchester's’s YANKEE LADY on the stereo and sang the words with Ms. Carolina joining me on the chorus. The insurmountable mountains paraded down the valley to the sea and the sun dazzled off their peaks. It was a good day to be on the road.