Chapter 24

Posted: May 11, 2007 - 01:06:05 amUpdated: May 11, 2007 - 10:03:15 am?

Pete Ballard sat on the steps of the wrap-around back porch of his spacious home and watched as the sun set behind the massive Cordillera Central (central range of the Colombian Andes). Over the last two and a half years, he'd seen the sun glinting off the perpetually snow capped mountains hundreds of times, and he was still awed by the sight. With this vista, every night it was hard for a man to get too full of himself.

Marta came out of the house then and plopped down in his lap.

"So, Mr. Geologist, trying to spot us another mine?" she asked teasingly.

Peter smiled and hugged her closer to him.

"If I ever get tired of this view, I'll know I've become too jaded to live," he replied.

They sat in companionable silence as the sun slipped behind the mountains and darkness quickly fell. Finally Pete looked at his watch and patted Marta on her shapely butt.

"Come on wifey, it's bath time for the hellions."

Marta let out a mock groan and stood up. Bath time for five toddlers and a baby was barely controlled chaos, no matter how sweet and beautiful your children were. It took a solid hour before the kids were polished up and tucked in bed.

When the kids were finally down for the count, Pete grabbed a beer and went back out on the porch. As he sat in the rocking chair his wives had gifted him with on his last birthday, he reflected on how good life was for him and his family. The last three years had been wonderful, fulfilling and amazing. Soon Marta and his other wives came out and joined him, each with a cup of coffee or glass of tea. As soon as Stephanie plunked two baby monitors down on the table, his wives took their usual seats around the long table at the head of which his rocking chair was situated. As was their custom, they all shared their day with each other and talked about what was coming up. The big topic of discussion that night, as it had been all week, was the third annual celebration of the battle of Montaña de Zorra.

The anniversary of the battle was not celebrated for its military significance. Rather, it was celebrated as the event that triggered Prado's rebirth. As the women sat around the table batting around ideas, Pete's mind drifted off again.

The town of Prado had much for which to celebrate, thanks to his wife Marta and Platina del Pueblo. They were up to recovering four to six tons of tailings a day from the gorge and mine tunnels. Pete had made improvements to the ore processing facility that had increased the yield of recoverable metals by fifteen percent per ton. As a result, they were churning out twenty to thirty thousand dollars a day. After expenses, that worked out to ten to fifteen thousand dollars of profit. The major direct cost of the operation was labor, as the company employed almost one hundred people. Platina del Pueblo was Prado's biggest employer. Pete conservatively estimated that they had five to seven years of easy pickings left.

Surprisingly, Pete was bringing in almost as much money in royalties from Consolidated's exclusive use of his patented refining process. He paid the taxes on his earnings, put half of it into Marta's projects, and socked the rest away for his wives and children's future. With the royalty money and the profits from the ore, Marta now had about a million dollars a year for her work. Used wisely, a million bucks went a long way, and Marta was a fanatic about squeezing the maximum usage out of every peso.

About one quarter of the money they earned this year would go to keeping the Carlos Sanchez Medical Clinic in business. The clinic was actually starting to bring in money of its own, but Marta kept agreeing with Darla when Pete's sister asked for modern equipment or to expand their services. The clinic now had a doctor, two nurse practitioners, an x-ray tech and a nurse-midwife. Marta was proud that the x-ray tech was a local young woman that mine money put through school in Bogotá. Platina del Pueblo seemed to always find enough money to award five or more scholarships to the best and brightest of the town's youth every year.

Another quarter of their revenue this year was going toward establishing the Prado Technical School. Prado Tech had been two and a half years in the offing; it had been tangled up in bureaucratic red tape over accreditation. Marta was adamant that the school be accredited, so that the diploma a man or woman received was recognized Colombia-wide. Marta had been doggedly tenacious on the issue, and accreditation was recently finally approved for a three-year trial period.

The physical plan for the school had been ready for over a year; staff had been hired and the curriculum finalized. This year's Prado Day celebration would include an open house at the school. Formal classes would start the following Monday. There were seventy-five students in the first class. So far, the school was offering auto mechanics, computer applications and culinary arts, but Marta had plans to add one or two trades each semester. Students would receive full scholarships at the school, but were required to pay the tuition back later, either in cash or labor.

The Juana Jimenez Preschool was almost self sufficient now, as more mothers were able to donate either time or money to pay for its services. Father Gonzales's pet project, the Our Lady of Redemption Primary School was a drain of a hundred thousand dollars a year, but it was money well spent. The school was academically strong and the children attending were sponges, soaking up their lessons at a gratifying rate.

During the past year, Marta had also contributed a large chunk of the three hundred thousand dollars required to remodel and expand Prado's historic, mission style town hall. The city's administration was now computerized, and services were faster and better. As mayor, Marta insisted on prompt and helpful customer service for anyone doing business with the town. To Marta, any citizen walking into the town's offices was the most important person in the building.

The rest of the money they had spent in the last year was on the Prado Farmer's Cooperative. The co-op was something that Pete's father had dreamed up as an extension of his idea about growing coffee instead of cocaine. The farmers as a group decided what crops to plant and when to plant them, so they could harvest and market together. Marta rented warehouse space for the farmers, and provided a bridge loan for them to rent trucks from Delgado to take their produce to Bogotá, Ibague or even Cali. Marta had also been surreptitiously buying up fallow farming land for the cooperative's use. The farmers were a year or so away from their coffee plants bearing enough fruit to harvest.

After they had hashed out a few more details, Marta turned to Adriana.

"How much money does it look as if we'll be able to donate to the Fathers this year?" she asked.

It was Marta's habit to donate any monies not spent in the year and not obligated for the next, to Father Gonzales and Padre Paco. Last year, the nearly forty thousand dollars went for a new roof and other much needed repairs of the church and parsonage. Adriana answered immediately.

"Sixty-six thousand and some change, Marta. It would be fifteen thousand more, but I opted to buy the tractor for the farmers this year instead of next."

Marta nodded.

"Good thinking. With the tractor they can start farming the acreage down by the river and get in a crop before rainy season."

The conversation wound down and everyone rose at once to head to bed. The six of them slept on a large bed made by joining two king-sized mattresses on a frame built by Pete's father. Who slept where on the bed was determined by some womanly magic that Pete was never privy too. The older children slept in the nursery adjacent to the bedroom; the new baby was in a crib near the big bed. Lorena was the mother of six months old baby Juliana. The children sleeping in the nursery were Stephanie's daughter Alexandra, Lorena's son Lorenzo, Pilar's son Julio, Adriana's daughter Britney (Pete was still incredulous she'd named the baby after Britney Spears) and Marta's son, Peter, Jr.

Pete loved all of his kids and was lucky to have the opportunity to spend so much time with them. As much as he loved them though, he was very relieved that his wives were all on the pill now. Six kids under the age of three was a handful.

Pete climbed in the middle of the bed and waited to see how the wives were playing it tonight. He grinned when Marta and Stephanie slid in on his right side and the other three on his left. Whenever Stephanie crawled in behind Marta, everyone knew that Marta and Pilar were in for a wild night. Every couple of weeks, Stephanie and Pete would double team Marta, while Adriana and Lorena did the same to Pilar. For Marta and Pilar, both of whom had to be so in control dealing with the business and Marta's fledgling political career, the nights of being dominated and lovingly, if roughly, used by their spouses was a magnificent stress reducer.

Pete grinned again as Stephanie reached under the edge of the bed and pulled out a couple of bags. She handed one bag to Adriana, and dug around in the other. With a wicked grin, Stephanie pulled out a strap-on fake penis about the same size as Peter and some velvet and leather wrist restraints. Stephanie saw Pete's inquisitive look, and her grin grew even larger.

"I ordered this stuff from the internet. It seemed to me that our little sluts needed two dicks in them on nights like this. Plus Katherine will be here in a few days, and we can see how she likes them too."

Stephanie had seemingly thought of everything, including blindfolds and plenty of lubricating gel. Stephanie passed the blindfolds to Pete and Lorena for their 'victims'.

"The masks are so you won't know who is in you and the lube — well, lets just say you'll know what its for in the end..."

A hundred feet away in a similar but smaller house, Gabe Ballard was sitting on the comfortable overstuffed couch in his living room. Selena and Marisol were snuggled against him on each side. Belicia sat on the floor between Selena's legs. Gabe was reading a James Grippando novel, Marisol was sewing a button onto one of his shirts, while Selena's nimble little fingers were deftly unbraiding Bebe's hair from the long single braid the women favored. Soft classical music played in the background and baby Gabriel, Jr. slept peacefully in his room. As opposed to the organized bedlam that ruled Pete's house, it was peaceful and serene at Gabe's.

Gabe Ballard was a content and happy man and had been for the three years he'd been in Colombia. In these wild mountains, among the tough but gentle Muisca people, he had found what he'd been seeking all his life. He figured that by any standard you picked, his life was better than excellent. He had it all: a wonderful loving family, the best friends a man could ever want, and a life that was fulfilling and meaningful.

Gabe put down his novel and leaned back with a contented sigh. Selena leaned over and kissed him on the cheek.

"What was that for, my husband?" Selena asked.

Gabe put his arm around her and kissed her back.

"I was just thinking how lucky I am. If I died tomorrow, I would have a hard time finding something to regret about the last three years."

Selena stopped brushing Bebe's glossy black hair and climbed up into Gabe's lap. Every day she thanked both the God of the Catholic Church and the old Gods of her people for this amazing man. Surely it had to have been more than an accident that brought them together. Bebe and Marisol were of the same opinion; there was just something about Gabe that resonated with anyone Muisca. The local members of the Hunza tribe agreed, and Gabe was a man of great respect and influence among them.

"You will not die for a long time, because your wives love and need you too much to let that happen. Besides, you have much work to do for our people, and already they count on you."

Gabe nodded in agreement. He really did have much more he wanted to accomplish for these forgotten people. The projects he already had underway dovetailed nicely in Marta's much larger plan for the people of Prado, as a number of the campesinos that farmed the sides of the mountain were Muiscas. Marta's efforts had already improved the quality of their individual lives. What Gabe wanted was to bring the Muisca People the respect they deserved as Colombia's true indigenous population. To that end, two years ago, he had converted an idea Stephanie gave him into the wildest scheme he'd ever tried.

Nine months after the disbanding of the Carlos Sanchez Column, everyone had finally moved out of the mines. Stephanie, who was interested in the history of the mines and caverns, learned a great deal about them from the oral traditions of the native Muiscas. Stephanie said they should give tours of the caverns to tourists as another way to raise money. Gabe built on that idea and by the end of six months, had a small village of six pre-Colombian style, conical shaped huts constructed near the bathing pond on the east slope of the mountain. The native Muiscas were still adept at building the huts, because they still used the same techniques to build outbuildings on their farms.

During slack seasons for farming, some of the campesino families occupied the village, and lived much as their ancestors had. For the men that meant mining and farming; for the women it was pottery making and weaving colorful material out of native cotton and flax. The men did their 'mining' by actually cleaning up tailings from the side tunnels and hauling them out to the waterfall entrance to the mines and dumping them into a cart supplied by Marta.

Tours started in the caverns at eight in the morning and were timed so that the visitors were out of the mines by noon, Platina del Pueblo's ending time for gathering tailings. The mining company actually paid the reinactors, so it was a good deal for everyone. From the mine, the tours went to the village and from the village to the gorge. At the gorge, a narrator explained the legend of El Dorado. According to the legend, once a year a warrior-priest covered himself in gold dust and dived into the lake as homage to the Gods to ensure a good harvest. To illustrate the point, a young Muisca man covered with gold colored make up dived into the lake from a ledge next to the waterfall. It was hokey, but it played well with the tourists.

To get the tourists to the caverns, Gabe promoted Prado, the caverns and the Muisca village on American and European websites devoted to people looking for outdoor adventure or exotic locales. He also heavily promoted the venture in Bogotá, as he figured many urban Colombians would want to explore some of their roots. In their first four sessions they'd had five thousand visitors. Each session was two weeks long, Monday through Friday only, so they averaged over a hundred visitors a day. Gabe figured that as word got out, the security climate in Colombia continued to improve, and they added more sessions, that number would more than triple this year.

The money the tours raised was being used to politically unify the far-flung pockets of Muisca and Chibcha peoples. The Chibchan Culture had formed the Muisca Confederation two hundred years before the Conquistadors arrived, and in Gabe's opinion, it was high time for their descendants to revive it.

Gabe shook those thoughts out of his mind when his wives all stood up to go to bed. Gabe figured his conversion from a loner was most evident when he and his wives were in bed. His wives loved to sleep in a pile as if they were puppies, and all of them wanted to be touching him. Gabe had grown to love that too.

Gabe was astonished by the screaming sexuality of his shy and reserved little mates, when they had him in bed. Whenever he said anything about it, the wives claimed that it was all because of him. He didn't believe that for a minute, but he loved to hear it nonetheless. Unlike Pete's wives, Gabe's only fooled around with each other as a part of making love to him. That meant that Gabe had to keep fit, just to have the stamina to satisfy his three little Muisca Maidens.

Two days later, Gabe was once again in Bogotá, picking up Katherine. He had business in the city anyway, so he had volunteered to drive her back to Prado. He and his wives had come up the day before to meet with the Cacique of the Bacatá Tribe. In the original pre-Colombian Muisca Confederation, the Bacatás were the largest of the northern tribes, and lived in the area that eventually became Bogotá. Marisol was actually the official emissary for her brother, the Hunza Cacique, but that was just a formality. Gabe and the other chief had met once before, and Gabe's connection to the Muisca was just as apparent to the northern Cacique. The matter the men had to discuss was the establishment of cultural and trade relations between the two tribes, just as it had been before the Conquistadors.

The day after reaching an agreement with the Bacatá Cacique, Gabe and his wives picked up Katherine at the airport. Katherine was delighted that Gabe and his wives were there to meet her. Katherine was nineteen now, and this was her third trip back to Colombia for a two month visit. Surprisingly, she had not moved there after graduating from high school. Instead, she had settled down and elected to attend the University of Central Florida. She was majoring in anthropology and pre-Colombian history. Katherine was so taken with the mysterious Muisca people, that she wanted to make studying them her life's work.

Katherine spent as much or more time with Gabe's family as she did her brother's. She was crazy about Gabe, Selena and the other two women, and loved spending time with their little clan. She also loved being part of her brother's family, even if it was only on a part-time basis, and she still had a special place in her heart for Pilar.

As they rode back to Prado, Katherine, who spoke very good Spanish now, filled Gabe and his wives in on her life as a coed. Gabe and company were impressed with Katherine's zeal toward her major and the study of all things Muisca. They were also impressed with her maturity. To Gabe, Katherine was a carbon copy of her mother at that age. Katherine had slimmed down enough to be the spitting image of Alexandra, and the similarity in their demeanor was uncanny. Gabe couldn't help being drawn to her, just as he had been to her mother all those years ago. It was also natural for Katherine to feel the same way, after all, she was her mother's daughter, and the same things that appealed to Alexandra did the same things to Katherine. The difference in how the two thought was that Katherine was more than ready to act on her feelings while Gabe was fighting his.

Gabe asked Katherine about her parents and how they were coping with being empty nesters. Katherine suddenly turned serious.

"I think Daddy is having an affair and Mom knows it. Daddy bought himself a Corvette, had Lasik eye surgery and joined a health club, things you wouldn't think my stodgy father would do in a thousand years."

Gabe told her that he hoped that wasn't true, because her mother deserved better. After that revelation, conversation died out for the remainder of the trip. Gabe did resolve to call Alex and see how she was doing as soon as he was home, however.

Of course, calling her was unnecessary, because at eight that evening the phone rang. Gabe answered it to a very hot under the collar Alexandra.

"That rotten bastard left me for another woman. Not just any other woman, but some hot to trot thirty-year-old junior accountant at his firm!" she spat into the phone.

Gabe could tell Alexandra was angrier than she was hurt by Charles's betrayal. So he suggested the first thing that popped into his mind.

"I thought better of Charles than that, and you deserve better, Lexie. I never would have thought he could be that stupid; he'll never find anyone half as good as you. So listen, why don't you come down here and spend some time with your children and grandchildren, and forget that idiot?"

Alexandra didn't take much convincing.

"I have an appointment with a divorce lawyer tomorrow morning, so I'll try to catch a flight out the day after tomorrow. Don't say anything to the kids; I need to tell them myself. Can you pick me up at the airport?"

The annual Prado Day celebration was the biggest yet, as practically everyone in the district had made the trip into town to party. What was most gratifying to the organizers, were how many of the campesinos and their families attended. The party was a family oriented event that included much showing off of children and grandchildren. From just among the former members of the FARC, there were a platoon of toddlers and a few new babies. Included in that count, were Lupe and Serafin Morales's two. Lupe and Serafin were blissfully happy with each other and their children.

The very large, extended Ballard family had staked out a couple of picnic tables and a considerable area around it. The tables groaned with food the women had prepared as the family sat on the ground around picnic blankets spread on the ground. Gabe watched in amusement as Pete, Alexandra, and Pete's wives tried to corral their rambunctious kids. Of course little Gabriel was in the thick of it, just as wound up as the other two-year-olds.

Darla and Eduardo Garza had a blanket spread out near her brother's family, but she was too pregnant to help chase her nieces, nephews and baby brother. Gabe and his family, including Alexandra, Katherine and Gabe's brother-in-law, the Hunza tribal chief, sat around three large, brightly colored blankets crafted by the Muisca women at the mock village by the caverns. The blankets were a popular item with the tourists, and sold for some serious pesos. One consequence of the seating arrangements, was that Alexandra and Marisol's widowed brother hit it off right away. Another was that Gabe's wives treated Katherine as if she were one of them.

After everyone was stuffed from all the great food, Father Gonzales stood at the portable lectern from the church and called for everyone's attention. He gave a short prayer, bestowing his blessings on the crowd, then launched into a short speech.

"My children, I have come to look forward to our annual day together, not just for the fellowship or the good food." He drew a laugh when he paused and rubbed his ample stomach. "But also for the chance to reflect on all we have accomplished during the last year. The strides we have made as a community warm my heart and humble me before you. It is all the more amazing when we consider that it is all because of the vision, compassion and leadership of one person, Marta Maria Cardenas-Ballard."

Epilogue

Five years later, the former members of the Columna Carlos Sanchez stood on the rim of the gorge. It was a somber gathering that day, as Marta Cardenas-Ballard formally announced that Platina del Pueblo was ceasing the recovery of tailings, and turning the mineral rights for the mountain over to the Hunza Tribe. It was a sad thing for most of them, this letting go of something that had been so much a part of their lives for the last decade. It was especially sad for Marta, but it had to be done, as the tailings that were recoverable without disrupting the environment had all been harvested.

The Muiscas controlled the entire mountain now by virtue of government decree, anyway. The caverns had been converted into a museum of Muiscan culture, and the village by the bathing pond had expanded to fifteen conical huts. Young Muiscans from around the country came there to learn about their heritage.

The Cacique of the Hunzas, accompanied by his wife Alexandra, formally accepted the documents transferring the mineral rights. The mines were going to remain active, using the ancient mining methods, as part of the heritage experience. Consolidated Minerals and Metals would process what little material was removed from the mountain. There would be no more tailings left behind.

Platina del Pueblo had removed over twenty million dollars worth of tailings from the mine tunnels and gorge. Twenty million dollars that had been used to make Prado the model for other towns across the region to emulate. The mining company was not out of business, as they had plenty of other sites they were reclaiming. However, the rest were just business, the mine on Montaña de Zorra were a part of every person standing on the rim of the gorge.

Gabe Ballard was one of the people watching the proceedings. Gabe was standing with his wives, three little dark skinned women and one younger blonde. The blonde was Pete Ballard's sister, Katherine. Katherine lived in Prado now, and was the Colombian government's resident anthropologist in charge of collecting the oral history of the Muiscas. Despite the importuning of his wives, it had taken six years and the intervention of Alexandra to convince Gabe that Katherine should be a permanent part of his family.

Pete Ballard was standing back with his other wives and his ever-growing flock of children. There were nine of them now, and Adriana was pregnant again. It was quite a feat for a man who once thought he was sterile.

Marta finished the formal presentation of the documents and turned around to face her friends and family. She was as sad as any of them. She was sad but as always she was looking forward. The things she'd accomplished in Prado, through her brand of capitalism with a heart, were starting to ripple across the country. It was time to turn that ripple into a wave.

Se Termina La Historia (The End)

Story concept is from the fertile imagination of the woman with a thousand ideas, my co-author, Wet Dream Girl. Wet Dream Girl and Terry Steyaert edited this story. If there are mistakes in it, you can bet that they are most likely from old Joe messing with it after editing.
Joe J & Wet Dream-Girl