Dennis had provided each of us a list of names,
and places, where we’d be staying. Of course, they were all fiction, so Stan
and I transferred the list into address books we’d bought for ourselves. Dennis
gave instructions for how we were to get through customs while on the flight,
“When we get there, go in separate lines. We don’t want them to see us as a
group of hippies. The addresses I gave you… don’t show them unless they ask.
Answer their questions, yes or no. Don’t try to explain with long detailed
stories. Keep it simple and you won’t be tripped-up.”
We were shepherded into two separate
lanes at the open-air terminal at Montego Bay. Dennis, Stan, and I went through
the same line, while Jamie and Steve stood in a longer line across the room. I
followed a line with Dennis as two very suspicious agents checked our baggage.
“Where will you be going?” mine asked,
while checking out our fishing poles on the conveyer belt. All of us had one surf fishing and one fly rod for
fresh water casting as did Jamie and Steve. These would also be good to sell
when we ran out of denims.
I put on an act, smiling, trying to
convey excitement, “Yes, sir, going camping and fishing.”
Stan told his agent, “We fish all
over the world and we heard Jamaica has great trout in its streams. We’re eager
to do some casting.
While the agent left the counter, and
busied himself with paperwork, Dennis gave Stan a scolding, “Remember what I
said. It’s yes or no. Got it? Let me do the talking.”
The agent returned “And do you have
reservations in any hotels?”
Dennis answered before either of us
could, “Ochos Rios with friends.”
We showed our address book.
Jamie and Steve had scoffed at the
notion that an address book would make any difference. They took out the
original pages kept folded in their wallets and pockets when asked the same
question. I saw Jamie, with Steve, waving his page, arguing with the agent, and
throwing up his arms, while trying to explain the unexplainable in detail. His
agent wasn’t buying any of it. I lost track of where they were in the process
while we were being okayed.
Dennis left the terminal ahead of us.
I tailed him and looked back to see Jamie and Steve being escorted away by
customs officers somewhere else and decided to wait for Stan.
Dennis was haggling with some men at
the curb when we caught up with him. One of the
men said, “Sure, mon. We know where Hoss Bozz lives.”
Stan interrupted, “What will happen
to them?”
Dennis had been talking to the men in
an annoying and pretentious white boy patois and kept at it. He looked annoyed
but just said, “Damn, mon, I wish we could’ve got deer denims.”
Not to be put-off, Stan insisted, “Will
they be in jail?”
Dennis turned to me. He might’ve been
embarrassed that I might’ve overheard the talk of Hoss Bozz, so he answered
Stan, “No, I’m sorry. Dey’ll put dem up in a hotel in Montego Bay and send dem
back to Miami on the first flight tomorrow.”
“Can’t we find out where they’ll keep
them?” I wondered, “They can just walk out, right?”
“Eef yee are tinking of busting deem out, dat
ees a very bad idea. You don’t want-to spend the next teen years in a Jamaican
jail.”
Dennis separated himself from us again
and began haggling with several hustlers on the docket. These guys were
offering everything from pot to girls and taxis. I heard snippets here and
there of him talking to the hustlers about a cab to Cockpit Country and the
name Hoss Bozz drifted out of the patois several times.
“How much, Mon?” I heard him ask.
The guy looked up at me coming and
said under his breath a number protesting, “Hey, it all dee way to dee meedle
of Cockpit Country… Whot you expect, Mon?”
I watched the man walk away saying
something that sounded like “Pussy-blood-clot!” I would find that it is the most common curse on the island. In
fact, anthropologists have observed, it is the most common curse world-wide. It
is even in the Bible. Translation; Menstrual Rag!
“What was that about?”
“Uh, nothing.”
“I thought I heard you mention Hoss
Bozz?”
“Oh, you heard of him?”
A taxi pulled up and the driver swung
out with his door waving. It wasn’t the same guy Dennis had been taking to,
“Hey, Mon, you want to go to Hoss Bozz, I take you dere cheap.”
I wondered, Hell, it is a completely
different person than Dennis had been talking with…. I had to say something,
“What the fuck is this Dennis? How come you never told us about Hoss Bozz?”
“Don’t worry, Max, I got this under
control.”
Stan hadn’t said much until then but
chimed-in, “Yeh Dennis, Max told me a dude in Coconut Grove told him that this Hoss Bozz was bad news.”
Dennis waved the cab away, “Some of
these drivers work for him. Their job is to haul hippies up to his place for a
cut of the action. We just need a cab to take us out of town where we can head
on out the rest of the way by foot or by thumb.”
“What action?”
Stan called it with a finality that
stopped Dennis a minute, “I fuckin’ didn’t come here to be taken for a ride by
any jungle voodoo chieftain and I ain’t taking a cab anywhere from this place.”
Dennis wiggled out of an
uncomfortable confrontation by explaining, “Look, we have to get out of town
and it isn’t likely we will be getting anywhere without a cab ride.”
I ceded him this point, “Okay, we
just take the cab until we’re out of the city but I’m not keen on meeting up
with this Hoss Bozz character either.”
The three of us jumped in one of the
several cabs that didn’t solicit us earlier.
Dennis dropped the patois and told us,
“We don’t have to go to Hoss Bozz. I know some growers in the mountains.”
It felt good that we were getting
away from the airport hustlers. I hadn’t time to give much thought about the
fate of Jamie and Steve with all the confusion around the airport hustlers and
cab drivers.
“Maybe in town we’ll have time to bust-out Steve
and Jamie …” Stan mulled the option over, “Naw, that would be stupid. Yeah,
forget that, I wanna see some of the action around this place... before we go
Jungle-Jim. Like, you know, music and clubs and girls.”
Dennis ordered the driver “Take dee
Queens Drive into town, Mon,” bantered in patois about spliffs and ganja the
driver wanted to sell us… where the action was in town… what clubs to go to,
and so on. I was getting tired of hearing Dennis with his bad patois and began
to suspect that Dennis had some other undefined and secret agenda and didn’t
want us around for it. The cab wound its way through a maze of streets with
colonial names like St. James or obscure references to an even more obscure
past such as Corinaldi Avenue.
Nonetheless, we got into town where
Stan and I found the Charles Gordon Market vibrant with all kinds of fruit,
fish and fowl. The several varieties of bananas alone impressed me with the diversity
of what is grown on the Caribbean island.
Dennis was impatient with us because
we appeared as tourists having no inclination to act otherwise.
“Don’t get more stuff than we can
carry out with us,” he admonished.
Exasperated, I had to blow him off,
“Lighten-up, Dennis, we’re eating most of this stuff before we leave town
anyway. I came to this place to enjoy every bit of it.”
Dennis was irritated at being called
out by me, “Yeh, well, we’d better be getting out of town before dark because
we don’t have enough cash to throw away on hotels and bullshit.”
Stan and I just ignored him and did
as we pleased. We went inside one club where the music was as incredible as
Dennis promised. The club was just an old house that had all its interior walls
torn-out, leaving room for a platform for musicians, and a kitchen separated by
a counter for selling Red Stripe Ale. The smell of herb was so strong that we
didn’t have to smoke any of it to get high.
When we were ready to go, I turned to
Dennis, “Which way now, Bwana?”
“Remember that stuff I talked about
back in New Mexico about the Maroons?”
I nodded at Stan, “Yeh,” we said, in harmony.
“Well, let’s go to Maroon Town.”
We grabbed a cab up Fairfield Road
out of town. As we climbed the hills I sensed that this is where the adventure
begins…. once the buildings of the town had more space between them and the
fields gave-way to rolling hills, Dennis told the cab driver to pull over and
we put on our packs to begin our hike. We found a place by the roadside where
we could lay out our sleeping gear with enough cover to have a small fire
without being seen.
I couldn’t help but to think about
the stories of banana shipments and tarantulas, so I asked Dennis, “How about
spiders… any snakes or tarantulas out here.”
Dennis got back at me for my attitude
in town, “Yeh, deer are all kind of spiders and scorpions all over dis place.
But yee can sleep well enough wit ‘em. Just don’t let dem fuck you and be
careful how you brush ‘em off.”
Stan and Dennis laughed but I didn’t
take it so lightly. I had a fear of big hairy spiders that went to my core. I
imagined waking up in the middle of the night with a huge tarantula planted on,
and gripping my face, with its hairy legs. I shivered to think of it. I had
dreams that night of a million eyes from a hundred tarantulas surrounding,
watching, and creeping-up on me as I slept on top of my bag.
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