Captives

by Tom Pow

  “He’s not so bad.” Eduardo’s soft voice came with an undertow of sadness. “You should not be so hard on him.”

  “And why not?” said Louise.

  “It’s like you said: He’s your father.”

  “Yeah. And who are you anyway?” Louise’s question came with force, as if she had been saving it up for the first good opportunity to ask it. Martin looked at Eduardo and saw how his eyes met Louise’s and did not flinch. Eduardo smiled slightly, lifted his head back and, as his body twisted, sang:

  “I’m a Chicago mobster,

  I’m a fairy queen,

  I’m each godforsaken place

  My guitar’s ever been…”

  “Test Drive?” gasped Louise. “You like Test Drive?”

  “Hombre, I love Test Drive.”

  “Martin?”

  He shook his head. “I … em…”

  “You really got to get into Test Drive,” Louise said. “They’re pure energy.”

  “Sure, I’ll just nip down to the store now and pick up their latest.”

  “Good one, Marty,” said Louise.

  She laughed, but Martin felt a small bitterness at how his failing had excluded him. He turned to Eduardo: “Like Louise said, Eduardo, who are you?”

  “I am Eduardo. I am a guerrilla.”

  “We know the first,” said Louise, “but you’ll have to explain the second.”

  “OK,” said Eduardo, “I will tell you why…”

  * * *

  Both Eduardo’s parents had worked at the university. They’d known Rafael’s father there, but he was a number of years older and held a more senior position. Besides, his parents hadn’t stayed long at the island university. They wanted to travel and both secured posts at a university in Chicago. There was a growing interest in the literature of the Conquest, and that was where his father had specialized. His mother, on the other hand, was more concerned with the developing literature of the island, particularly in emerging poets, like the young and talented Rafael Portuondo. Portuondo had only published a thin pamphlet, but with its mixture of sensual and political imagery it had created quite a stir. Island Lover, Eduardo remembered, had been his own mother’s favourite poem and so had become one of his also.

  “No one can impose a curfew on your beauty.

  No one can send a police patrol around my heart.

  And if they drive our love underground

  Like a secret river

  It will still be cool and sweet…”

  Eduardo had attended the early years of high school in Chicago. He missed his grandmother and the close-knit intimacy of the island, but he marvelled at snow and at the easy availability of the latest PlayStation and the latest Test Drive CD. Test Drive had been formed in Chicago—its members had come from the housing projects Eduardo had been told to avoid. “There are many ways to find freedom,” his father used to say. Test Drive had certainly found one. Their music was the sound of walls breaking down. Eduardo and a couple of friends began to jam in the basement of his house—Test Drive numbers mostly, with a couple of their own raw compositions—and were aiming for a high school gig when his parents announced they were returning to the island.

  “It’s time to go back,” his father said simply. “There’s a possibility for change, and your mother and I, and some time you, Eduardo, can play a part in the transformation of our island.”

  Eduardo paused, respecting the memory of his father’s words.

  “And that is what happened. But their timing was bad. What they saw as opportunity was only a tiny seed of democracy. They returned just when the war got dirty.”

  “The war?” said Louise.

  “Yes, that is really what it became. A war carried out underground—its signs, blood-stained basements, and unmarked graves. A war fought by torturers and death squads. Within two months both of my parents had been ‘disappeared.’”

  “Disappeared?” said Martin.

  “Yes. Eliminated. Got rid of. Liquidated.”

  “But how?” said Louise.

  “About that I try not to think. But one thing I can tell you is that this small, dirty war will not be a secret from the world for much longer.”

  Martin and Louise nodded. It felt strange for them to share such thoughts with one of their captors. Louise glanced up at the forest canopy and felt giddy.

  “So that is who I am,” said Eduardo. “But I am also ‘a Chicago mobster.’ I am Tony Kurlansky, and here I am with my band, Test Drive, for a one-off performance in the heart of nowhere. Is my lead guitarist ready?”

  “Ready and on fire,” said Louise.

  “Is my drummer in position?”

  “I don’t really know any—”

  “Oh, come on, Marty, Test Drive’s drummer’s immense. Just get into it. Use your thighs or something.”

  “A thigh-drum?”

  “That’s the one!”

  “OK, Test Drivers,” said Eduardo. “We’re going on a burn-up! It’s a one and a two and a three …

  “Everywhere I go

  I feel you breathin’

  Down my neck—

  Baby, you’re turnin’ me

  Into a paranoid wreck…”

  Eduardo peeled his T-shirt off and waved it over his head as he scissor-jumped and then spun around with one foot rooted to the spot. His singing and dancing caused a couple of parrots to rise from their perches—pure blue and green patches fluttering above their heads.

  “But baby, can’t you

  Feel my breath

  Turned on you like fire—

  These red-hot flames

  Tell of my desire…”

  Louise played air guitar as if her life depended on it. Martin lowered his head and drummed on his thighs, trying to lay down a beat behind words Eduardo would sometimes deliver like a punch and at others tease out till they broke into screams. He felt sweat pouring down the back of his neck and down the sides of his rib cage; but he drummed on till he was beating out a tune that was completely new. And somewhere, woven into this new rhythm, was the strangest thought: Eduardo is OK.

  To Maria they looked like the flustered birds in the forest, flailing around as if their senses had left them. But there was no space for ruffled feathers here: what could Eduardo be thinking of?

  “Ya está bien! Están locos? Qué están haciendo?”

  “Disculpa,” said Eduardo. “They are not locos—crazy—just letting off a little steam.”

  “And you? What do you do, Eduardo? Leaving your weapon lying there on the grass. Like you’re a child.”

  Eduardo shrugged. He’d picked up his T-shirt and, breathing heavily, was wiping it over his face and his smooth chest.

  “Cuidado!” Maria said. “Remember who we all are here, yes?”’ Then to Martin and Louise: “To your shelters. Now.”

  “Jesus,” said Louise. “I’m getting so pissed off with all of this!”

  * * *

  The next day they drifted to the same place. But it was a quieter, more composed Eduardo who stood guard now—back to the reserved interpreter of the first days. Louise trailed her frustration from the previous day.

  “And our parents! God, our parents. My father just sits in the shelter like a kid, nursing his shame. My mother can’t find the right words, as usual…”

  “And mine seem barely here.”

  “Exactly. So, Eduardo”—she stood up now and approached him—“what is supposed to stop me from walking right out of here?”

  “You would starve to death.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “Miguel would track you.”

  “Miguel does not scare me.”

  “He should.”

  “Well, he doesn’t anymore. None of you scare me anymore, so what’s to stop me from walking?”

  With each question, Louise had moved closer to Eduardo. She was almost as tall as he was and she stood before him now, her shoulders back, her head raised and a slightly taunting smile on her lips. What would you dare
? she seemed to be saying.

  Every nerve in Eduardo’s body and in his face was still. Before Louise, he was impassive, rooted as one of the palm trees that surrounded them.

  Martin saw all the energy with which Louise had confronted Eduardo break upon him until, drained, her shoulders slumped and she stepped back from him.

  “Why would you not let me go?” she asked.

  “Because I could not let you go.”

  “But just then, what would you have done to stop me?”

  “Please. Do not insult my parents’ memory. I do not even know what suffering they had to bear. How can I forget that? Believe me, I would have stopped you.”

  “And if they have to kill us, what then?”

  “I’ve been living each day as it comes since my parents disappeared. This is today.”

  Later Martin wondered if that had been the moment Louise finally fell in love with Eduardo—the moment when the bars may as well have fallen from the cage, for she stayed willingly now where he held her, taking each day as a gift.

  “Come on then, Marty, if we’re going to stay around here, there have to be changes. I can’t bear another night with my parents—and I bet you feel the same.”

  [CHAPTER 6]

  you think we don’t listen

  The room in the police station was bare apart from the scarred wooden table and a chair. Mason was wearing a shirt splashed with red and green parrots, and shorts and sandals. He looked up at Gabriel and shook his head sympathetically. The days in solitary had left Gabriel unshaven and weak. Under the single lightbulb his skin appeared pallid and gray. Cousin Pablo was leaning against the wall with the same bored impatience he’d shown at Gabriel’s home.

  “Mi amigo,” Mason began, the vowels slithering into each other in the heat of the windowless room.

  “Why am I here?” said Gabriel. “I do jobs for Island Adventure. That’s all.”

  “Espérate! Not so fast,” said Mason. “Don’t you want to hear what I’ve been doing? Sure you do. This is such a pretty island. The windsurfing, the snorkelling is out of this world. You’ve got to take these opportunities while you can, and Pablo here has been a most obliging guide.”

  Pablo looked over and nodded in acknowledgment.

  “I do not play games,” said Gabriel.

  “No games. Quite right. Let’s get straight to the heart of the matter. There’s no one around here who has the knowledge of these parts that you do. We’ve learned from those who’ve known you since you were small that your father led you everywhere around here, that he taught you—”

  “Yes,” said Gabriel, “he taught me these lands are sacred.”

  “That may be as you see it,” said Mason, “but there are other forces at work here, you see. And, boy, you’re dealing with something way over your head.”

  “It’s our country, our land, and you’ve no right—” Gabriel’s rising voice was silenced when Pablo swung his truncheon into his stomach. He fell to his knees, retching.

  “Hey, Pablo,” said Mason, “there’s no need for that. No need for that at all.”

  Pablo held up his palms and shrugged.

  “Look,” Mason continued, “we know your sympathies, your situation, your knowledge. We know you’re in this. But, hey, that’s not what’s most important. What’s important is where we go from here. Now come on, Pablo, help Gabriel up.”

  Gabriel brushed off Pablo’s hand and got shakily to his feet, his arms around his stomach.

  “Thing is,” said Mason, “you don’t help, we will be forced to act.”

  “So act,” spat Gabriel.

  “Now hold on there a minute. Let’s get straight exactly what’s at stake here. Nickel is one of the most important metals for the developed world. Combined with other metals—iron, copper, chromium, and zinc—it makes alloys that are used for all kinds of things. But to make it simple, most nickel is used to make stainless steel. Have you any idea the amount of stainless steel a country the size of America needs? Probably not, but let me tell you, for the military alone the demands are huge—more than you can possibly imagine.”

  Pablo knew, though, or he could easily imagine. He saw the skyscrapers of Nueva York shining stainlessly in the sun.

  “And do you know how many nickel mines there are in the whole of the USA to meet that need? One. One lonely mine. So don’t think for a minute that America can ignore what’s happening in places that keep it…”

  “… a shining beacon for the world,” said Pablo, looking very pleased with himself.

  “Something like that,” said Mason. “So let me spell out the options to you. Number one, we can wait. Not too long, but long enough. You see, your boys are very clever, so we need to be clever too. They hold a bunch of tourists and it looks like they have power. But, you see, we hold you. You don’t help and we hold you indefinitely. I can think of any number of charges we could bring against you. Number two, any rights you do have are only courtesy of United Nickel. It’s only our involvement in this, our desire to bring it to a satisfactory conclusion, that’s stopping you from being put directly in the care of the authorities here. You know that would not be so pleasant.”

  Pablo nodded agreement.

  “Number three, think of your family without your wages. You know what? Your sweet mother—Pilar, yes?—comes here every day asking for you. She looks worn down with it all. Think of your dying father.”

  A nerve flitted up the side of Gabriel’s face.

  “You think we don’t understand. You think we don’t listen. How, you ask, can a huge multinational like United Nickel understand what’s happening on a tiny island? Of course we understand. Times change and it’s hard. The world’s full of envy and that’s hard too. But these things fade, the world settles again into its new groove. But, amigo, there are always winners and losers. And that’s your choice, Gabriel. It’s a man’s choice, and you’re making it for yourself and for your family. What I can offer you is your freedom and an increased pension for your father to ease the pain of his last days. I mean, there are drugs. No reason why the poor man has to suffer so.”

  “What do you want of me?”

  “That’s the question I’ve been wanting us to get to since we met, Gabriel, and I’m very pleased you’ve finally decided to ask it. That’s the mark of a wise man.”

  Oh, look on and learn, thought Mason. This is how to carry out a successful interrogation. It requires experience and sophistication—psychology, for Christ’s sake—not simply hanging a guy from a meat hook and beating his kidneys till he passes out.

  Gabriel was grinding his teeth so hard, he couldn’t believe they didn’t crumble to dust in his mouth. Yet still a traitor tear escaped and made its way slowly down his cheek.

  “Trust me, a man’s decision it is. Like I said, Gabriel, your friends—the guerrillas, the freedom fighters, whatever you want to call them—they’re my old friends too. We meet them all over the world. They don’t like change, don’t like the way of the world. They think what they’re doing is for good. Oh, I know they’re not evil men—hell, they may even be heroes. But they just can’t see the way forward. Sure they’ll have to have their knuckles rapped, do some time, but I don’t think they deserve to die like animals hunted down in the forest. I fear for them, though. For if we have to go in and get them, that’s what will happen. People will die.”

  More than anything, Gabriel could hear his father’s screams of pain in the night.

  “Sure as hell, people will die. Unless someone can lead them all down to safety, to a place where the whole sorry episode can be concluded with as little damage as possible. So the world can start turning again. There are many ways to be a hero, Gabriel, and I mean, really, what’s the alternative?”

  [CHAPTER 7]

  promise me something

  There had been less opposition to the building of another shelter than either of them could have imagined. Martin thought it was all down to Louise. She seemed to glow with defiance as she told Rafael
what she and Martin were going to do and demanded each be given a machete for the task.

  Louise put all she had into cutting and weaving the frame of the hut. And, though Martin helped and at times lost himself in the task, he couldn’t stop himself every so often from just watching her body, shining with sweat, become a perfect arc, before the machete cleaved through another branch.

  “Come on, Marty homemaker,” she called to him. “We need at least three more of these.”

  Their parents understood what they were doing without asking. For the past couple of years at home had they not been insisting on more isolated, private rooms? Keep out. Unless you’re an alien. So they let them go now as they were always going to one day. They needed space. They weren’t children anymore. You can’t hold them to you forever. And for their part, they were tired: tired of being judged, tired of exposing frailty and shame. Especially here, surrounded by guns, in a forest clearing, where there was nowhere to hide. Let them get on with it, see how they fare. Sure, it’s earlier than they might have wished, but which one of us has the energy to take them on?

  Tony, Carol, and Melanie looked to Jacques one last time. But he turned from them and shrugged as if it had nothing to do with him. As if somehow the dark bruises he wore across his stomach were their fault. From now on, each man for himself.

  * * *

  The shelter they had built was inexpert. The thatch had not been closely woven enough. So the edge was taken off the sheer darkness where they lay.

  “Well, this is an improvement,” said Louise. “Marty?”

  “Yes,” said Martin. His chest was tight and his voice when it came was thin and ragged.

  “God, your father and his poetry.”

  “I know.”

  “What do you miss most, Marty?”

  “A burger and a cold Coke come to mind.”

  “Yeah, junk food. Heaps of it. Bring it on.”

  “With ketchup.”

  “Unlimited … What else do you miss?”

  “I … I don’t know.”

  “Well, what’s the first thing you’ll do when this is all over?”