Guatemala’s currency, the quetzal, dangled by IMF machinations and a prayer. Violent crime in the country had reached absurd, Hieronymus Bosch-style levels. The free markets were at work, just give them time, urged his newspaper’s editorial writers. But they were in London, and even to Russell—who believed in the system—their opinions on the crisis seemed hopelessly out of touch. Come to Carl’s Party in Antigua, the email had said. The invitation had come to Russell’s office computer in Guatemala City, the Thursday after he’d returned from Tres Rios. It gave an address and a long list of people, some known to Russell, who were planning on coming. He scanned the list of names. It promised a good time and he immediately wrote back, saying he planned to come. He called Katherine Barkley, an American girl, asking if she’d like to go to the party with him. She answered her cell phone from somewhere out on a coffee plantation, building housing for poor families. Barkley was the opposite of the wealthy Guatemalan girls he’d been dating, girls whose main preoccupations had been their hair and their breast size.
