State of Wonder - Ann Patchett [92]
“Cholesterol,” Marina said, thinking that in all probability no one in the rain forest had ever considered their cholesterol nor did they need to. There were so many lanceheads to step on. “I work as part of a group that does long-range tests with statins.”
With that Thomas Nkomo put his long, elegant hands together and pressed the tips of his fingers to his lips, his head moving sadly, slowly from side to side. She saw his gold wedding band bright as a beacon against his skin. The Lakashi, who never stopped watching him, were leaning forward now, concerned to see the distressed look on his face. It was a very long time before he said anything at all. “You are here about our friend then.”
Marina blinked. Of all the other doctors who had come here before her the chances were good that only one of them was interested in cholesterol. “Yes.”
He sighed, his chin down. “I had not put this together but of course, of course. Poor Anders. We have missed him very much. How is his wife? How are Karen and the boys?”
Car-ron was how he said her name. It had never been feasible for Karen to make this trip and yet Marina wanted her there to see the suffering on Thomas Nkomo’s face, to be the recipient of such gracious sympathy. “She wants me to find out what happened to him. There has been very little information.”
Thomas Nkomo’s shoulders slumped forward. “I don’t know what to say. How can we explain this to her? We thought he would recover. People in the jungle get extremely sick, fevers are common things. I am from Dakar. In West Africa I can tell you that the very young will die suddenly and the very old will die slowly but the people in the middle, healthy men like Anders Eckman, they pass through these illnesses in time. We are doctors here.” He covered his heart with his hand. “I am a doctor. I was not expecting this.”
As if in response to this show of emotion the Lakashi stood abruptly and gathered their children and their knives. They made quick work of putting twigs and clothing into baskets and in less than a minute every last one of them had retreated into the jungle. Thomas Nkomo glanced nervously at the sky. “We should go now, Dr. Singh. The storm will be heavy. The Lakashi have the most uncanny meteorological abilities. Come with me, then, yes? I will show you the lab. You will be impressed by what we have made in our primitive circumstances.”
To the west she could see the storm heading up the river and feel the sudden shift in the texture of the air. Dr. Nkomo put his hand against her back. “Now, please,” he said, and they began to walk quickly in a direction Marina had not been in before. Birds came reeling past the water and dived straight into the canopy overhead while other things, things that Marina couldn’t make out exactly, darted up trees. Then there was a single, nuclear flash of lightning that was followed some milliseconds later by a clap of thunder that could have cracked the world in half, and then, because these things come in threes, there was rain. Marina, half blinded by the light and deafened by the boom, suddenly thought she would drown standing up.
There had been many occasions in Manaus when Marina had outrun a storm, or outrun the worst of it, she had pounded up the street in her flip-flops, finding shelter beneath an awning before the sky broke apart, but to run in a jungle one must have been born in a jungle, otherwise the roots and vines are snares, leg breakers, with mud that slicks the landscape into oil. The Lakashi had long since vanished with the birds and those other skittering unknowns, all of them back to home and nest and hole, leaving the place empty for Marina and Dr. Nkomo who made slow progress on the uneven path. Every drop of rain hit the ground with such force it bounced back up again, giving