84 DATE WITH THE GODSmore receptive to the idea that she was some form of
super intelligence from another world, I was still afraid
to believe it. I wanted to know more, I was ashamed of
my ignorance.
I opened one of the drawers in my desk where I still
kept the copy of the Denuer Post, dated Monday, June 24,
- Again I tried to find a reasonable explanation for
its appearance in the remote region of the Andes
Mountains the morning it was to hit the streets in
Colorado. A jetliner takes between six and eleven hours
to get to Lima, Peru, depending upon which city it
departs from and how many stops it makes before it
arrives. Then, from Lima, it would have had to travel
another six hours to the place where we had been, by
train or automobile. By train it would have taken eight
hours. I know some newspapers go to bed dated before
they hit the streets, but this was one of the newsstand
copies, a regular city edition. I knew my airline time
tables by heart. The connection from Stepleton Interna
tional Airport in Denver, Colorado to Jorge Chavez
International in Lima was not that simple.
Even if I assumed the paper had hit the street at five in
the afternoon the day before, it could never have made it
to Huancayo by twelve noon the next day. I tried
working it out in very possible way. I couldn't come up
with any logical answer. To add to my confusion, I
recalled that there was a two-hour time difference. And I
couldn't imagine anybody going that far out of their way
to play a joke on someone.
I knew I had to go back and see her again. The
Peruvian general manager of our office was vacationing
in Europe. Nancy and I were minding the store. As far as
my work was concerned, everything was somewhat
under control. This was my golden opportunity to
return to the Andes Mountains.
This time I was prepared. I made up my mind that I