by Lewis Shiner
«All of these crimes were committed at the orders of, or under the direct supervision of, or by the hand of the accused. Osvaldo del Salvador, how do you declare yourself, guilty or innocent?»
«This is not a trial,» Osvaldo said. «You are nothing more than kidnappers yourselves. And murderers, if you ‘execute’ me.»
Mateo had himself under control again. «When the state is unwilling or unable to deliver justice, then the people must do it for themselves.»
«The people? What people? You? How many of you are there? Four, five, half a dozen? You call this justice?»
«It is the only justice you have,» Jesús said.
«And you, Mateo,» Osvaldo said. «A murderer, a terrorist, a communist, a subversive, how can you sit in judgment on anyone? And how can you begin to claim objectivity?»
«I urge you to take advantage of this opportunity,» Mateo said. «Regardless of what you think, we are not savages. You will be given every chance to account for your actions.»
«I have nothing to say to you,» Osvaldo said.
Jesús shrugged, apparently ready to get it over with. Mateo looked stunned. The rest of Mateo’s group shifted in their seats, disappointed at not getting the high drama they’d bargained for. The silence dragged on and as Mateo was about to end it, Elena said, «Papá, you must speak to them.»
Inside the hood, Osvaldo’s head swung around in the direction of her voice. «Elena? Dear God, you’re part of this?»
«Talk to me, Papá. Tell me why you did it. Tell me why you killed my mother.»
The strength went out of his legs. He slid to his knees and then the strain of his arms, chained in place at the hands, pushed his head and shoulders forward until his forehead touched the floor in a kind of pained yoga pose.
He lay that way for an endless time, until Elena said, «Give him a chair.»
Mateo brought over a ladderback wooden chair. He undid Osvaldo’s cuffs, repositioned him with the back of the chair against the railing, then cuffed him to the chair so that Osvaldo’s arms were behind him and he could sit more or less normally.
Mateo came over to perch on the arm of the couch next to me. Osvaldo convulsed a couple of times and I realized he was choking back sobs. Finally he began to talk.
«I was 23 years old,» he said. «I was recruited for the Triple A from the Army. I wasn’t given a choice. My commanding officer recommended me because I was disciplined, patriotic, and a devout Catholic. We believed then, all of us, that there was no greater danger in the world than Communism. We looked at it the way you would look now at AIDS or syphilis. It was an infection that corrupted and destroyed healthy minds. It was filthy, and so were many of the people who practiced it, with their beards and long hair and sores on their faces, their dirty, shabby clothes. Our officers told us they were no better than animals and we believed it.»
His voice was like a radio announcer’s, his Spanish precise and easy to follow, the opposite of Jesús’s, which I could barely understand. But the golden voice had run dry. In the silence I pictured him licking his parched lips, forcing himself to swallow.
«There were those of us who enjoyed the work. You could see that. The ones who enjoyed it too much were transferred out. I don’t know what happened to them and I don’t want to think about those men. I didn’t like the work, mi Elena. I believed it was necessary. There were men from the CIA who trained us and they made us feel important, like we were psychologists—»
Jesús said, «Fucking hell! Psychologists?»
Mateo shook his head. «Let him talk.»
«After the first time I interrogated someone,» Osvaldo said, «I thought I would feel something. Shame, disgust, sympathy, something. I felt nothing. Nothing at all. It was a job.
«We learned skills. You had to know the background of the person to know how to best approach him. The idea was to take him back, through repeated shocks, to a childlike state. Until you became his parent and he gave all control to you.»
Jesús let us all see that he was disgusted, but didn’t interrupt again.
«There was no…there was no normal. There was only the daily reality of the detention center, of the work. We all did it, we all pushed each other on, we made jokes, we competed with each other, we got drunk together afterward. We never talked about it to our wives, to our families, not to anybody who was not one of us.
«Even so, there were things I would not do. Raping the women. Even in the altered mental state of that place, I knew that was wrong. I accepted it, I didn’t try to stop the others who were doing it. I looked the other way, and I ask God’s forgiveness for that. But I never did it myself.»
His head turned inside the dark blue hood. I understood that he was trying to look at Elena. «I know you will think me contemptible for saying this. I know you have lost your own faith. Still, it is the truth. At the time I believed I was doing God’s work. As the Jesuits had, as the Inquisition had. And God’s work did not include rape.»
Mateo said, «But it did include torturing women.»
«I interrogated some women—»
«Tortured them, you mean.»
«—but not Elena.»
Mateo jumped up and stood over him, fists clenched. «How can I believe you, old man? Why should I?»
Mateo had left his gun on the couch. It was a foot away from me. I could have picked it up and used it, if I’d had any idea of what to use it for.
Osvaldo said, «I’m not talking to you, Mateo. I’m talking to my daughter.»
«She’s not your daughter, old man. She’s mine.»
«I raised her,» Osvaldo said. «All you did was put your seed in her mother.»
As did so many others, was the implication.
I thought Mateo would kill him then. If he’d still had the gun in his hands, he might have. Osvaldo must have known the risk he took, but it didn’t show in his posture.
Mateo drew his right fist back and then hesitated, long enough for Elena to go to him and gently take hold of his arm. They stood that way for a few long seconds, then Mateo let the arm fall to his side.
«Go on, Papá,» she said. «Tell me about my mother.»
«She had already been badly beaten when they brought her in. They took her to one of the cells and…»
«Raped her,» Elena said.
«Yes. It made me sick, in spite of my conditioning, even though I had let it happen to so many others. The other women, I could tell myself they were whores, they were criminals, communists, murderers.»
«But not my mother.»
«Not Elena. No.»
«You’re a liar!» Mateo shouted. «You’d say anything now, to save your miserable life.»
«Would I?» Osvaldo said. «Then kill me right now. There’s no one to stop you and I certainly don’t care. Not anymore.»
Mateo turned away. He walked around the opening in the floor to the far side and stood with his back to us, leaning against the railing, mirroring Osvaldo.
With his arms cuffed behind him, Osvaldo could only gesture toward Elena with his head. «Look at her,» he said, though he couldn’t see her himself, or see that Mateo was no longer looking. «Only a monster could torture someone who looked like that. I have done bad things, terrible things in my life, but I am not a monster.»
Jesús said, quietly, «How ugly does somebody have to be? For it to be okay to torture them?»
Mateo, from the far side of the hole, said, «Who did it, then? Who was the monster who did it?»
«No. I will not tell you his name. That’s all over now.»
Mateo turned toward us. His face was hideous with rage. «It’s…not…over!» he screamed. It was so loud that it must have been audible on the street.
Osvaldo ignored him and continued to point his head toward the last place he’d heard Elena’s voice. «I tried to talk to her. I pleaded with her to tell them anything, everything she knew. She swore she knew nothing. We knew she was Mateo’s lover. We wanted Mateo more than we wanted anyone else in Buenos Aires, bec
ause he had escaped us, because of the men he killed, because he was a ruthless and implacable enemy.»
Jesús said, «When did you know she was pregnant?»
Mateo turned his back again.
«She told the task group when they arrested her. They told the rest of us when they brought her in.»
«And you tortured her anyway.»
«Me personally, no. But yes, she was interrogated. If Mateo hadn’t escaped, if he hadn’t been in hiding, we would never have touched her. But as it was—»
Jesús walked up to Osvaldo and backhanded him. He did it without apparent anger and with terrible force, putting his whole body into it, and Osvaldo, who could not see the blow coming, was knocked completely out of his chair and his arms were jerked nearly out of their sockets by the handcuffs.
«Do not,» Jesús said calmly, «ever again, attempt to justify your atrocities by putting the blame on someone else. You are responsible for what you did. No one else. That’s the reason we’re here.»
It took Osvaldo a full minute to recover. Then, with infinite patience, he untangled himself, struggled to his feet, fumbled for the chair, set it back on its legs, and sat down again. He was trembling, and from the upright, even arrogant position of his head, I sensed he was embarrassed by that show of weakness.
Jesús said, «At what point did you decide to steal her baby?»
When Osvaldo didn’t answer, Elena said, «Please keep talking, Papá.»
«She asked me…Elena…» Osvaldo was slurring his words and his concentration seemed shaky. The blow had been strong enough to loosen teeth and split his lips. «One night she said to me, ‘You’re going to take the baby, aren’t you?’ There was no way to keep the prisoners from talking to each other—in fact, we counted on it, because it made them more confused and afraid. So she had heard stories.
«I told her yes, we would take the baby, we couldn’t let her keep it there, and we couldn’t let her go until we had Mateo. And she said…she said, ‘Please see that he gets a good home.’ She was so sure it was going to be a boy. She was going to name it…»
He shook his head. «I felt like she was asking me to be responsible. So I took the baby myself. I think she would have wanted it that way.»
Jesús said, in a very reasonable tone, «I think she would have wanted not to be kidnapped, not to be separated from her lover, not to be raped, not to be tortured, not to be killed. That’s just a guess.»
Osvaldo still showed no sign of having heard him. «I raised you the way I would have raised my own daughter. I gave you every advantage, a good home, the best schools, the best of everything—»
From across the pit Mateo said, «You gave her a broken nose, you shit.»
Osvaldo hesitated. After a second, he said, «An accident. She fell—»
«I’ve heard enough,» Mateo said, cutting him off again.
Osvaldo sat back stiffly in his chair.
In the silence, Jesús said, «Are there any other questions for the accused?»
He looked at Elena and Elena said, «Papá, did you kill Marco Suarez?»
If the question surprised him, it was not obvious through the hood. «No,» Osvaldo said. «Cesarino found out Suarez was on a witness list and was afraid he would talk. He wanted me to make him disappear, like the old days. I told him I was too old, that I had put that behind me. He threatened me and I put him off and put him off, and finally he sent some of his policemen to do it.»
«Do you know where the body is?» Elena asked. «For the sake of his family.»
«I’ve told you everything I know. I refused to have anything to do with it.»
Elena looked at Jesús, shrugged, and looked at the floor.
Jesús said, «Anybody else?» He pointed to me and I shook my head. Then he pointed to each of the others in turn, and they all passed except for the small woman with the short dark hair.
She said, «Was it worth it?»
«I don’t understand,» Osvaldo said.
«All the people you tortured. Did you get the answers you wanted? Did it make a difference in the end? I’m not asking what you thought then, I want to know what you think now, today.»
Osvaldo didn’t say anything for a long time and when he did, he only said, «I think—» and then he changed his mind and said, «I don’t know.»
Jesús looked at Mateo. Mateo reached into his pocket and took out the keys to the handcuffs. He threw them across the gap in the floor and Jesús grabbed them one-handed out of the air.
Macho, grandstanding assholes, I thought. I was sick with fear.
Jesús unlocked the cuffs, disentangled Osvaldo from the chair, and cuffed both wrists behind his back again. Osvaldo tried to keep his dignity as Jesús marched him out of the room, but he was still shaking and the rope tied to his ankles made him stumble.
The two women talked in hushed voices with the Middle-Eastern man. Mateo had turned his back again. I still had hold of Elena’s hand, but I couldn’t look at her.
Jesús came back alone. «Discussion?» he said.
«Let’s vote,» Mateo said.
«Any objections?» Jesús asked. No one raised a hand. «You guys would never have been montoneros in the old days,» he said. «In the old days we would argue all night long. There would be shouting and tears and at least one fistfight.»
«Fuck the old days,» Mateo said. «Let’s do this.»
Jesús went to the pile of small stones and began to count them out. «Bueno. There are ten of us, counting Elena, so it will take six votes to convict.»
«Eleven,» Mateo said. «Beto votes too.»
I said, «I don’t—»
Mateo cut me off. «He’s at risk as much as the rest of us. Besides, we’re supposed to represent the people. Everyone votes, or it’s not justice.»
«You want to give Osvaldo a vote too?» Jesús asked. Mateo glared at him and Jesús shrugged. «Bueno, eleven, then. It still takes six votes to convict.» He walked around the room, handing out stones to each of us in turn. «Put both hands behind your back. Bring one hand out with the fist closed. If it has a rock in it, you’re voting for death. Empty, you vote to acquit. Like declaring high or low in poker, no? Nobody shows until everyone has decided. No changing your mind. Rock means death, empty hand is life. Clear?»
He handed me a stone and I rolled it around in my hand. It was the size of a marble, made of quartzite, cloudy white, its edges rounded from centuries in a river somewhere. If I voted, did that make me responsible when the others condemned him to die? I couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t keep from being distracted by trivialities. Where did the rocks come from? Who had gone out looking for them? Were any of them original montonero rocks from the 1970s? Had they voted this way back then?
Jesús was in good spirits now that we were getting close to the killing part, as if it really were no more than a poker game and he was winning. How many times had he done this? How many men had he condemned? How many had he killed with his own hands?
Mateo took a stone from Jesús and went to stand by the railing.
My hands shook as I put them behind my back.
Elena was still staring at her rock. Everyone else had their hands behind them.
«Elena?» Mateo said.
She looked up, startled, then took the rock behind her back.
Jesús waited until all eyes were on him, then he said, «Ready?»
There were nods and murmurs. I felt my pulse in the constriction of my throat, hard and erratic. We each held out a fist.
«I’ll go first,» Jesús said. He produced the rock like a magician revealing a red foam ball and tossed it on the pile, where it clattered in the stillness. «That’s one,» he said.
He pointed at the 16-year-old, who held his closed hand straight out and slowly opened it to show the stone.
«Two,» Jesús said.
He pointed to the red bearded man, who suddenly looked like he wanted to change his mind.
«What?» Jesús said. The red bearded man wouldn’t meet Jes�
�s’s eyes. He slowly opened his empty hand, then sat back in his chair with his head down.
Jesús shook his head in disgust. «Next?»
The small dark woman showed an empty hand. The spiky haired blonde showed a stone.
«Three,» Jesús said. He pointed to the man in the skull cap. When his hand came up empty, Jesús stared at him for long, agonizing seconds, as if expecting an apology. Finally the man in the skull cap looked away.
Jesús pointed at Raul. A stone.
«Four.»
The other man who had chased Osvaldo showed a stone.
«Five. Just one more.»
I showed my empty palm and looked at Elena. Her hand was straight out in front of her and she was shaking, the tendons showing in her knuckles from the strength of her grip. She turned the hand over and opened the fingers.
Empty.
Jesús pointed to Mateo and then started to turn away, taking the final death vote for granted, when Mateo raised his fist to shoulder height and, as if releasing some tiny captive creature into the air, showed his empty palm.
*
In the first, shocked silence, I felt something like relief. Then Jesús exploded. «You fucking idiot! What have you done?»
Mateo shrugged. «I thought, is this the best we can do? To kill this pathetic old man? Is this really the face of evil? Besides, I knew the rest of you would outvote me.»
«Well, you got that wrong,» Jesús said. «Now what are we supposed to do?»
«I don’t care what we do with him. I suppose we have to let him go.»
Jesús said, «If we let him go, he’ll come after us with everything he’s got.»
«He’s wanted me dead for thirty years,» Mateo said. «Nothing’s changed.»
«Everything’s changed. He now knows you’re alive, that you’re here in Buenos Aires, that you’re operating again. He knows that Elena knows where you are.»
«He would never hurt me,» Elena said.
Jesús stared at her with burning eyes. «Are you willing to stake your life on that? How about your friend Beto’s life?»
