The bridges were always approached at an angle, so that they were seen whole, from the side; they appeared as a framework of slender girders, or sometimes wooden beams, tensed across two cliffs. It seemed as if this was the view of a bridge on another track, as if we were going to bypass it. But always the train turned sharply, and became noisy as it started onto it; and the torrent beneath it looked peculiarly menacing - a staircase of cataracts frothing into the greater torrent yonder. I wondered how it was that Costa Rica could be so cool and piney, and it was not just that it was so different from its near neighbours, but that it was cool and piney like Vermont, and freshly watered - here a sawmill and there a dairy, the cows cropping grass on the hillsides; and horses, oblivious to the train, tethered to fences. Later, I was to meet an American horse-dealer in Costa Rica. He said, 'My horses would bolt and hang themselves if I tied them that near the tracks.'
It is, for the first third of the trip, a mountain railway, the train travelling along a narrow shelf that has been notched into the mountainside. How narrow? Well, at one point a cow had strayed onto the line. To the left was the sheer mountain wall, to the right the drop into the river; the cow was baffled and for almost a mile she lolloped ahead of the engine, which had slowed so as not to kill her. At times she stopped, put her nose against the mountainside, sniffed at the precipice, then started away again, rocking back and forth, stifflegged, the way cows run. The track was too narrow to give her space to allow us to pass, so she ran ahead rocking, her tail swinging, for almost a mile on this high shelf.
Nearer the river the coffee bushes were thick, and there was cocoa, too, the wide leaves, the plump, bobbin-like pods. It was easier to make notes here, as the train moved slowly on the flat tracks by the riverbed. But my notes were not extensive. Boulders, I wrote, Valley -River - Spray - Frail bridge - Trapped cow- Cocoa.
'You Americans like to travel alone.' It was Luis.
I said, 'I hate to travel alone. It is depressing. I miss my wife and children. But if I am alone I see more clearly.'
'You never talk to each other, you Americans.'
'You mean in Oregon?'
'Here, when you travel.'
'We talk all the time! Who says Americans don't talk to each other?'
'There is an American,' said Luis. 'You see him? Why don't you talk to him?'
The man wore a blue cap, a Barney Oldfield cap with a peak; his shirt was bright green, his trousers cut like a sailor's. Although he was seated, the strap of his bag was over his shoulder and he clutched the bag tightly, as if it had something valuable in it. He was sunburned and I guessed he was in his sixties - the hair on his arms was white. He was seated near the blacks, who were talking in Spanish and English; but he did not speak to anyone.
I said, 'I did not know he was an American.'
Luis found this funny.
'You did not know he was an American?'
I suppose it was his cap, which Luis took to be foolishly youthful. Costa Ricans wore felt hats and fedoras. This man's cap was tilted at a rakish angle, and it did not quite go with his craggy face.
'Talk to him,' said Luis.
'No, thank you.'
Talk to this old man, just because Luis wanted to hear us speak English? I had met enough Americans in San José. It was the reason I had left the city, to seek out and assess the reputedly uninhabited Atlantic coast, perhaps wind up swapping stories with a grizzled black in a Limón bar, tales of mule-skinning and piracy on the Mosquito Coast.
'Go ahead.'
'You talk to him,' I said. 'He might teach you some English.'
It was, mainly, my other fear: the distortion of companionship. I did not want to see things with anyone else's eyes. I knew this experience. If they point out something you have seen already you realize that your own perception was rather obvious; if they indicate something you missed you feel cheated, and it is a greater cheat to offer it later as your own. In both cases, it is annoying. Oh, look, it's raining is as bad as Costa Ricans have their own unit of length - the vara.
I wanted to concentrate my whole attention on what was outside the window; I wanted to remember this valley, this river, these mountains, the breeze freshening the train, the fragrance of the wildflowers that grew next to the track. Pretty flowers, I wrote.
Smiling nervously, Luis got up. He went up the aisle and mumbled to the old man. The old man did not understand. Luis tried again. You bastard, I thought. Now the old man turned and smiled at me. He rose. Luis took the old man's seat. The old man came towards me and took Luis's seat. He said, 'Boy, am I glad to see you!'
He had missed his tour. It would have been all-inclusive, the train to Limón, a boat-trip up the coast, a chef travelling with the party, some wonderful meals. He would have seen monkeys and parrots. Back to Limón: some swimming, a four-star hotel, then a bus to the airport and a plane to San José. That was the tour. But (the river was dashing an old canoe to pieces, and those little boys - surely they were fishing?) the hotel manager had gotten the time wrong and the tour had left at six, not nine, so on the spur of the moment, and with nothing else to do in San José, the old man asked about the train and hopped on, just like that, and you never knew, maybe he'd catch up with the rest of them; after all, he had paid his three hundred dollars and here was his receipt and his booklet of coupons.
Six hours lay ahead of us, before we would reach Limón.
'Did you know the train was going to take so long?'
I said, 'I would not mind if this train took four days.'
That took care of him for a while, but as soon as the splendour of the valley returned he began chattering. His name was Thornberry, he lived in New Hampshire, and he was a painter - of pictures. He had not always been a painter. Until recently he had had to make his living as a commercial artist and designer. It had been a real grind, worrying about how he was going to buy groceries; but a few years ago he had come into some money - quite a lot of money - and he had set about seeing the world. He had been to Hawaii, Italy, France, the West Indies, Colombia, Alaska, California, Ireland, Mexico and Guatemala. His impressions of Guatemala were different from mine. He loved Guatemala. He liked the flowers. He had been two weeks in Antigua with a charming fellow who gave parties every night. On Mr Thornberry's report, the fellow was an alcoholic. Mr Thornberry had not gone to Zacapa.
'This scenery,' said Mr Thornberry, 'it blows my mind.' Mr Thornberry had a curious way of speaking, he squinted until his eyes were no more than slits; his face tightened into a grimace and his mouth went square, mimicking a grin, and then without moving his lips he spoke through his teeth. It was the way people talked when they were heaving ash barrels, sort of screwing their faces up and groaning their words.
Lots of things blew Mr Thornberry's mind: the way the river thundered, the grandeur of the valley, the little huts, the big boulders, and the climate blew his mind most of all - he had figured on something more tropical. It was an odd phrase from a man his age, but after all Mr Thornberry was a painter. I wondered why he had not brought his sketchbook. He repeated that he had left the hotel on the spur of the moment. He was, he said, travelling light. 'Where's your bag?'