Toward That Which is Beautiful

to begin negotiations for stamping.
Kate was beginning to realize that nothing official in this country would be easy. It seemed that the man in charge of stamping had gone to lunch. He would most certainly be back in two hours, but the visitors, the guard emphasized, were more than welcome to wait in the office chairs or take lunch at a nearby café.
As Kate followed the Irish priest out of the office, she tried not to hear the good-natured curses that flew between Father Jack and Tom. She hoped no one passing by understood English. Then the two priests decided to get beers at the only bar in town. “Sisters, care to join us?” asked Father Jack.
“Oh, no thanks, Father,” said Sister Josepha. “Sister and I will look around town and get a little snack.”
Kate supposed this tour would take no more than five minutes. Gazing at the shabby gray buildings, she stepped carefully around the muddy puddles in the dirt road, holding her habit above her ankles.
They found a cramped cafe with a few tables huddled in one corner. The meal for the day was rice and beans with a small piece of dried codfish plopped in the middle. The nuns ordered una gaseosa, soda, to drink, knowing it would be safer than tap water. Kate was relieved to see the owner of the cafe, who apparently doubled as the waiter, bring two bottles of Coca-Cola to their table. Her stomach felt rocky. “I’m not feeling so well,” she said.
“It’s soroche, altitude sickness,” Sister Josepha said. “It can really be very bad. Mother Mary Margaret had to have oxygen when she visited us here last year.”
“But I’ve noticed that neither you nor the priests seem to be bothered by the altitude. How long will it take me to get used to it, do you think?” Kate hated to think of herself as weak and sickly. It had scared her that every few feet they walked she had to stop and catch her breath as if she’d just run a race.
“Oh, but we’ve been here for years. Give yourself time. Your body will accustom itself to the rarefied air, little by little. Jeanne Marie says that the people who live here have more blood than we do. Their lungs have expanded, too.”
Sister Josepha poured her Coke into one of the two smudged glasses the owner brought on a tray. Kate decided she’d drink hers right from the bottle.
Sister went on, “The funny thing is that when the people from the Altiplano go down to the coast, they get sick. Their bodies can’t take the thick, humid air.” She looked closely at Kate, her light blue eyes narrowing beneath almost invisible blond eyebrows. “You’re in a different world here, Sister.”
Around two-thirty the customs official strolled toward his office, picking his teeth meticulously as he unlocked the door. Peering over his wire spectacles, he read slowly, mouthing each word silently. Finally with a flourish, he stamped their documents. Soon the group crossed the bridge into Peru, where another wait was in store as their passports were carefully inspected and stamped again. “Damn it to hell,” Father Jack muttered as he climbed in the driver’s seat. “We have at least another four hours to Puno. I don’t think we’ll make Juliaca by dark, do you Tom?”
“It depends on what’s ahead. The rain seems to have cleared.” Suddenly Tom turned around and looked at Kate. “Would you by any chance know how to drive a jeep?”
Before she could answer Sister Josepha intervened. “Oh Father, you know she just got here. We can hardly expect her to drive these strange roads.”
But Kate was determined to prove herself to the Irishman. “Of course, I can drive. My brother taught me years ago in our old Chevy Nova. One of the first things I did when I got to Lima last June was to get a driver’s license. It took at least five trips downtown and a whole month before I could take the test. I’ll be happy to drive.”
“Good. You can drive when Jack gets tired. We have a long way to go.”
In the dim light of the back seat, Kate examined Tom’s profile, his high forehead and thin curved nose. She watched as he settled into his seat, hunkering down in his wool jacket. He turned around to look at her.
“It’s grand to meet a nun who has a brother. Now maybe you won’t be so shocked by the male crudeness around here.” When Tom laughed, Sister Josepha hit him smartly on the back with her breviary. He pulled his collar up and yawned, “I’m going to sleep now. The beer has caught up with this one, I fear.”
Kate closed her eyes, too, only to wake in darkness to the screech of a train. “We’re here,” Sister Josepha whispered. Kate looked out the window. She could see the outlines of a few buildings. The town was dark except for the lights of the train station at the end of the street.
Father Jack turned into a driveway on the side of a squat solid church and drove past several buildings, dark and silent. What time was it? Kate wondered. Lights burned in one long low building at the edge of the compound.
“The sisters are still awake,” Sister Josepha said. “They shouldn’t have waited up. They’ll be dead tomorrow morning.” But she sounded happy nonetheless, and before the jeep stopped, the front door swung open and Kate saw two nuns silhouetted in the light. Soon everyone was milling around, unloading supplies and chattering. The smaller of the two nuns introduced herself as Sister Jeanne Marie. Kate had a blurred impression of brown eyes and a soft rounded body.
“We’re so glad you’re here, Sister. It’s lonely up here and we’ve been needing some young blood. We’ve been counting the days until you finished language school.” She grabbed Kate’s arm and gestured toward the white-veiled novice who was carrying groceries into the house. “And you’ll be good company for