The Geronimo Breach

by Russell Blake

  The trip to Acandi lasted only for an uneventful half hour so Adrian gave Al the thumbs up sign and pointed the bow farther out to sea. The coastline was breathtakingly beautiful, with myriad small islands and reefs offsetting the deeply turquoise Caribbean water. A few random pelicans took up flying sentry duty off the boat’s stern, as if to keep the men company on their voyage. It would have been idyllic if Al hadn’t been slowly sobering up and mentally replaying the numerous fatal encounters of the last few days.

  He quickly became bored with watching the water go by. His mind turned to his main problem – how to figure out why Ernesto had been stalked and killed, and more importantly, how to determine whether he was in any real peril. He didn’t want to go back to Panama if accomplished gunmen were waiting for him, and so far his instinct was that, having been with Ernesto, he remained in danger until proven otherwise. Maybe that was an over-reaction, but then again it had been raining grenades just a few days earlier, so perhaps a little caution was prudent.

  He’d no way of knowing how Carmen had made out in the gunfight, and who, if anyone, she had talked to about him escorting Ernesto to the rendezvous point, so he had to assume the worst until he could verify otherwise. He wished he understood what this whole nightmare was about. Trying to operate in the dark wasn’t helping, and being unable to contact Carmen posed a serious problem, assuming he believed whatever she told him. Al doubted it, but it was always possible that she had leaked Ernesto’s whereabouts to whoever he was trying to escape from and thrown them to the wolves.

  His thoughts drifted as the boat bounced over the small waves, eventually turning to the camera Ernesto had secreted in his backpack. Al couldn’t imagine how a camera justified a killing spree. Then again, he hadn’t watched the video, so he didn’t know what Ernesto had filmed. The man hadn’t really had any other possessions to speak of, unless he’d had blood diamonds stuffed in an orifice, so it looked like the camera was the cause of all the drama.

  If so, it had to be something pretty inflammatory and of tremendous value to someone powerful or dangerous. Or both. Perhaps Ernesto was blackmailing someone in the Panamanian government? Maybe he had footage of someone big playing slap and tickle with a fifteen year old boy?

  He made a mental note to check the camera once he wasn’t pounding through the ocean at twenty knots with spray spattering sea water over him as he held on for dear life.

  ~ ~ ~

  Sam’s office phone rang. The direct line, not through his secretary. He picked up, and Richard’s abrasive voice barked at him.

  “What’s so important, Wakefield? This better be good,” Richard seethed.

  Sam told him about the sketch artist, and about the aborted phone conversation with Al. Richard was silent for a full thirty seconds.

  “And how long did you have the sketch before you made the connection?” Richard asked.

  “Uh, well, sir, we got it on Monday, but with all the commotion it didn’t get pursued until today, when he called. I thought it wouldn’t be an issue if he wasn’t...active anymore.”

  Another long silence.

  “How well do you know this guy?” Richard asked.

  “I’ve known him for over twenty years, since the service...but we aren’t close,” Sam added hurriedly.

  “You’ve known him for that long, you’re both living in Panama City, and you aren’t close?” Richard summarized incredulously.

  “He’s an acquaintance. A guy I know from the military. Maybe we have a drink now and then, say every four months or so. The guy’s got serious problems with booze, gambling, you name it...” Sam wanted to distance himself as much as possible.

  “Married?” Richard inquired.

  “No, sir. He’s a loner. I’ll e-mail you his file,” Sam said. “He’s a walking disaster. I’m completely surprised he’s still got a job, much less with the State Department.”

  “Any idea what he was doing with the cook?” Richard asked.

  “None. There’s a lot here that doesn’t add up. But it was a whorehouse, and Al’s definitely that kind of guy, so who knows?”

  Yet another pause.

  “This needs to be contained, Sam. I’ll be on a plane back to Panama within the hour. Tell me what, if any, steps you’ve taken so I understand what we’re dealing with,” Richard said, calmly, which alarmed Sam more than anything else he could have done.

  “I put out a bulletin through the embassy in Bogota,” Sam said. “Which hopefully by now has made it to the police, with the sketch and a general ‘Approach with Caution, Hold’ advisement. But you know how that goes in areas where we don’t have much pull – it can take a while to circulate, and there’s no telling how good cooperation will be.”

  “So you already put this out? Is there any way to retract it?” Richard asked.

  “I don’t understand, sir. I thought we wanted to bring him in...” Sam stuttered.

  “Sam. I need this kept low key. Let me rephrase this. How long will it take for you to cancel the bulletin?” Richard asked, clearly annoyed.

  “Colombia’s tough, sir. It’s so fragmented, so many factions and so much drug money circulating, there’s no telling whether we’ll ever hear anything. My guess is if I put through a cancellation it’ll work through the system within 12 hours. Maybe less. For all I know, it hasn’t even gone out to the police yet,” Sam offered hopefully.

  “Do it. Immediately. I do not, repeat not, want this Al character touched by the locals, is that clear? I’ll be down there within six hours to deal with things. If you hear from him, call my cell. It’ll be on even while I’m in the air.” Richard gave him the number.

  “Okay. I’m on it.”

  “And Sam, if he calls you again, find out specifically where in Colombia he is. Promise whatever you need to, but find out – and then call me. Don’t take any action of your own,” Richard emphasized.

  “Will do, sir.”

  A thought occurred to Richard.

  “Did you run a trace on the number he called you from? Is it a mobile phone? If so, let’s track it,” Richard said.

  Shit. That hadn’t occurred to Sam with everything else going on. He’d been so busy trying to arrange for Al’s fall from grace, he’d spaced on the obvious.

  “Not yet, sir. But I will as soon as I’m off the line,” Sam mumbled.

  “Sam. You had time to put out a bulletin to Colombia, but not to trace the phone so we can locate him?” Richard sighed, obviously exasperated. “Are you kidding me? Is this your first day on the job? How did you even get your position with the Agency?” Richard asked.

  “I...I don’t know what to say, sir,” Sam began. “I know I should have done that. It’s just been hectic here, so I missed it. It won’t happen again. But you know it could take a few hours to triangulate the signal.”

  More silence.

  “Sam, if anything even remotely questionable transpires before I get there, anything that even has a whiff of you buying your buddy some time by making slips, I’ll personally cuff you and file treason charges. Do you read me?” Richard over-enunciated every syllable.

  Sam swallowed audibly. “Loud and clear, sir.”

  Chapter 29

  At six o’clock, with a few more hours of daylight left, Adrian pulled his old panga boat into the bay that sheltered Turbo from the open Caribbean sea. He expertly glided up to one of the commercial docks, and pocketing the cash Al handed him, tied the boat to the piling so Al could disembark.

  Al’s ass felt like it had been pounded with a board for the last three hours. The waves had kicked up as the day had worn on, and they’d spent a good deal of the trip slamming over the sea’s surface. He made a mental note never, ever, ever to get into another panga as long as he lived.

  That pain steadily receded as he moved into town from the dock, his raw feet reminded him that hiking didn’t agree with him any more than boating.

  His first impression of Turbo placed it firmly in the world class poop-hole category. The heady atmos
phere smelt like a combination of sewage, decaying seaweed and contaminated mud. Even after his brief sojourn exploring the wonders of Capurgana, which was as low end as anyplace he’d ever been, Turbo struck him as a real dump.

  He’d made a mental list of things to do and finding a pay phone was priority number one. As he passed a dismally poor looking little market he quickly re-prioritized – he was parched from the trip and in need of hydration.

  After a few minutes in the store he emerged with a Ballena of beer in a bag – a liter of high octane malt liquor. He walked up the block, if you could call it that, to where the store keeper had told him he could find a pay phone. He sorted through the coins he’d gotten as change, fed them all into the slot and dialed the number he’d scrawled on a scrap of soap wrapper at the hotel. Sam answered on the first ring.

  “Hello? Al? Is that you?” Sam offered by way of greeting. His cell had obviously popped up with a Colombian phone number.

  “Si, senor,” Al intoned, feeling somewhat better having chugged half the beer while approaching the phone.

  “Where are you?” Sam asked.

  “I told you,” Al said. “I’m in Colombia. And Sam, I kind of could use your help.”

  “Sure, Al, whatever you need. I’m here for you, buddy.”

  That was odd. Al thought he’d have to spend a while talking Sam into coming to his aid. He knew Sam secretly harbored feelings of envy that made him a little petulant sometimes. Maybe Al had misjudged the man for all these years? He fished out a cigarette and lit it, blowing smoke into the heavy air surrounding the outdoor phone.

  “What I need is for you to look into a shooting that happened at a whorehouse on Saturday night – a place called Esperanza in old town. I need to talk to the woman who runs the place, and I want to make sure she’s okay,” Al said. He didn’t want to explain more to Sam if he didn’t have to.

  “Uh, okay, buddy. I can do that. But why don’t you tell me where you are, exactly, so I can see about getting you back here?” Sam asked – immediately regretting his haste. Even to him it sounded too pushy, and overly interested in Al’s specific location.

  The phone clicked twice and went dead. Al had run out of time.

  His frustration almost overwhelmed his gut, which had rumbled that Sam’s eagerness to help was far too out of character. The guy was a prick, after all, and Al had been shot at enough times in the last few days to be justifiably paranoid, and his nerves were signaling that maybe Sam didn’t have his best interests at heart. But why?

  Then Al remembered the man dangling from the end of the rope in the jungle, and his comments in perfect English. Was it possible the guy wasn’t a private gunman after all? Had Carmen gotten him into something that had put him at odds with the CIA? What the fuck was going on?

  Maybe his nerves were shot and he was reading too much into Sam’s good Samaritan thing…

  Al needed more change to call back, so he decided to return to the market. Halfway there he froze at the sight of two uniformed Colombian police standing in front of the market flirting with three late-teenage girls. He didn’t know whether drinking from an open container was considered a no-no in Colombia and didn’t want to risk finding out the hard way – the lady at the market might have put the beer in a bag for a reason. He slowly turned, and realized he was standing next to their police truck – he wasn’t used to seeing the rural Colombian version of a cop vehicle so he hadn’t even registered it as he’d passed by. Al caught sight of a white fax sheet laying on the seat.

  It was a crude drawing, but unmistakably one of him. If there was any doubt, his embassy photo was on the fax next to the drawing – although that looked nothing like Al’s appearance now, given that it was over four years and thirty pounds ago. And he’d actually possessed a decent amount of hair...

  Al trundled back up the block, strolling as unhurriedly as his internal panic allowed, past the phone and further into town – just a random tourist backpacker exploring the wonders of Turbo.

  This was bad. He knew that much. And the photo confirmed his instinct about Sam – there weren’t a lot of ways the Colombian civil police in the boonies could have gotten his embassy photo other than with Agency cooperation.

  What the hell was he going to do now? What did the Colombians even want with him? He hadn’t done anything...

  The camera.

  It had to be.

  Al caught sight of his tanned reflection in a dingy store window and realized with some relief that, disheveled and unshaved for three or four days, he looked little like the drawing and even less like his old photo. Still, he was a Gringo in Colombia, and as such would stick out. Even though he didn’t bear a strong resemblance to the drawing it was too close for comfort.

  He needed to change his appearance and find out what, if anything, was on the video. But where could he do it in peace?

  Al turned another street corner, where the already-seedy area degraded further. A crudely-lettered hand painted sign advertized a ‘Hostel’ outside of a peeling building. That was just the sort of establishment he needed.

  He entered the tiny lobby area, which was more like a dark, poorly-converted twelve by twelve living room with a desk on the far end.

  A three hundred pound woman appraised him. “Eight Thousand Pesos, or five dollars for the night, and you have to share the bathroom,” she announced dispassionately, by way of introduction.

  Now that was more Al’s speed. Completely off the radar, and cheaper than a meal. He quickly paid her, and she handed him a key on a grimy piece of twine attached to an old piece of driftwood.

  “Number one.” She indicated out into a dirt courtyard, around which were arranged five ramshackle cottages. One dwelling was labeled ‘Bano’ and the others were numbered one through four.

  He crossed the yard and unlocked the door of his new billet, taking in the feng shui of the dusty interior, which was furnished with a narrow, rock-hard mattress covered with a suspiciously colored sheet and blanket. A creaky table with a single chair complemented this centerpiece, and a delaminating mirror hung lopsidedly on the far wall. All in all a charming little boudoir, Al decided. He locked the door behind him and peered out the single window. Nice. He had a view of a dirt alley that ran behind the building – and it looked like tonight or tomorrow was trash collection day.

  He flipped the wall switch, and the overhead fan began a creaky rotation, causing the single light bulb mounted in the hub to flicker occasionally. He threw himself onto the bed and stared at the filthy plastic blades orbiting the precariously mounted shaft. After a few minutes he realized he wasn’t accomplishing anything so he reluctantly pulled himself to his feet, opened his satchel and withdrew the hygiene kit. Ernesto had acquired a cheap electric razor, which thankfully had the cord attached. So no worries about batteries. He’d go to work on his makeover in a few minutes – right after he got a look at the video camera’s contents. Maybe it would reveal what kind of trouble he was in.

  As he pulled out the camera, Carmen’s dead phone clattered against the wooden floorboards after falling out of the bag, finally settling under the bed. Al leaned over to look for it but soon lost interest when he saw the myriad spider webs on the underside of the box spring. Oh well, it was a goner, anyway. His attention returned to the camera.

  Sony HCR-Z5U. Expensive looking. Someone had spent serious coin on making movies.

  He fumbled with the buttons and flipped out the small playback screen, eventually locating the power. The screen blinked but nothing happened. He fiddled some more, and pushed an icon he interpreted to mean ‘Play’. The screen came to life.

  Three minutes later, Al shut the camera off.

  He was a dead man walking.

  Plain and simple. Unless he could conjure up a way to stop the entire might of the U.S. Government from swatting him like a fly, he was as dead as if he had been sitting on a pile of plutonium during his boat ride – it was just a matter of how many hours before he expired.

  His h
ands trembled as he clumsily stuffed the camera into the satchel. He staggered over to the mirror clutching the razor and considered his enlightened reflection.

  He nodded into the grime-smeared mirror – the face of a dead man nodded back.

  Chapter 30

  Sam called Richard’s cell phone the second Al’s call terminated.

  “What is it?” Richard asked.

  “He called again, sir,” Sam announced.

  “And?”

  “He still thinks I’m one of the good guys,” Sam quipped.

  “Gee, Sam, that’s swell. Did you happen to find out where he is?” Richard asked, heavy on the irony.

  “The trace came back to a trunk line in the Antioquia region, sir.”

  Sam heard the rustling of paper in the background, accompanied by a dull roar he presumed was the airplane’s engines.

  “Okay, I have a map here,” Richard said. “That’s a big area. Can you be more specific?”

  “I wish I could, sir,” Sam apologized. “The technology down there is too primitive to narrow it down any further.”

  “That’s a shame. About as helpful as telling me he was calling from New Jersey. It’s a big area, and, oh, features fun places like Medellin, population two million. You know, the home of the Medellin cartel?”

  “I understand, sir,” Sam conceded. “But it is what it is. The good news is we should have a GPS position for the phone he used on his first call within the hour, so we’ll be able to nail him to within a few meters.”

  “Let’s hope he still has it with him,” Richard said. “I’ll be touching down in Panama within an hour. I’ll see you at the office in two.”