“I love you, Lola, I love you!” he shouted as loud as he could and the officer pulled out his gun and stuck it against his head. Christmas heard a cry.
Was that her? Did she still care?
He sat down, other officers shouting at him as he watched the coastline, her form already indistinct, blending into other villagers, blending into the village itself, now just a collection of shapes beneath the green mountains. Then San Cristóbal was gone, eclipsed by rock. Christmas was alone with policemen and the body of William Slade.
The boat was silent. There was only the noise of the outboard and the prow slamming against the waves that littered spray onto Slade’s black plastic shroud. The sun was going down. Christmas stared at the body. There were white patches of drying salt water.
When they arrived in Guiria it was dusk. He watched the body be lifted out of the boat and into the back of a police van. Slade was gone.
The officers got Christmas to his feet and helped him out. He was put into the back of a car and taken to Guiria’s police station for further processing. He was given a plain arepa with some water. Then they put him into the back of a police van and told him they would be driving through the night to Caracas.
The engine started. Christmas lurched. It was dark, the occasional streetlight illuminating the van so that he could make out the dirt and stones rolling around by his feet. He stared at them as if they were runes, thrown and re-thrown with every bounce. They told him he had lost Lola, completely. He felt her chain against his chest, tucked beneath his shirt. He had saved her son. Would she remember that? He felt afraid of what might happen in Caracas. He felt afraid of a life without her. He searched his heart for Emily but she was gone. Montejo lay ripped to pieces on Lola’s floor. What did it matter? It was just a book.
They drove westward along the coast between the soughing of the sea and the heave of the land. The jerking movements of the van pulled him about. His buttocks were numb. The policemen listened to the radio. They smoked constantly. Other men were picked up along the way, but they weren’t prisoners and were let out again. When the policemen stopped to eat, Christmas was not allowed to get out of the van. They gave him water but he wasn’t fed.
Christmas did not sleep. There was only Bridget and Judith and Lola and Slade and his soul’s pleading for alcohol. After many hours, with dawn breaking, Caracas enfolded them.
The engine slowed, then stopped. The back doors opened. Christmas was in front of Cotiza police station, headquarters for the Metropolitana police district.
They took him inside. It smelt of urine and dried screaming. He was led past ancient computers and walls of chipped paint to an interview room. After three hours he was visited by someone from the British Embassy, a tall, balding man in shorts who asked him exactly the same questions as everyone else had, scribbling down notes as he did so.
“Have you told his stepmother he’s dead?”
“She has been notified, yes. We are flying the body back today, so I expect she’ll be there to pick it up from the airport. Can you sign this please?” Christmas signed several documents.
“What happens now? I’ve got to—” but he stopped himself.
“A bloody enormous amount of paperwork, that’s what happens now. You are going to have to stay here and find out what they plan to throw at you over this hotel thing.”
“You don’t know?”
“Me?” he said, collecting his papers. “No.”
“But I don’t have any money – don’t I need a lawyer or something? I mean aren’t you meant to provide—”
“We can provide an interpreter to make sure that you and your lawyer can communicate. Other than that we can make contact with your family and ensure that any money they send gets to you, but the embassy will not get involved with actual judicial proceedings. Have you got anyone you wish us to contact?”
“No, but—”
“I’m sure there’s no need to be overly concerned. Goodbye, Mr Christmas.” He knocked on the door and was let out.
Christmas was left in the room for another couple of hours. Then he was taken back through the building and sat down in front of the sergeant’s desk. He was a stooped man with a moustache and pointed cheekbones. He was smoking. He detailed the charges of theft and fraud against him – charges that were, he emphasized, a different matter to what had happened in Sucre where he had no jurisdiction and about which he had no interest. The sergeant then proceeded to lay out the prisoner’s options.
“Two thousand dollars. Two thousand dollars or you go to prison.”
“I don’t have two thousand dollars. Could I please have some food?”
“Perhaps you do not know about prisons in Venezuela. The cells we have in this station, Señor, are bad enough, but prison? This would be very bad for you. Very bad.”
“I’m telling you, I do not have any money.”
“If you do not get me two thousand dollars, then we take you to prison. It is probable that you will be raped.”
“I don’t think anyone is going to want to rape me.”
“Even when the meat is rotten, Señor, the hungry dog will eat.”
“I wish to call the British Government.”
“If you do not have any money, how will you call them?”
“There’s a phone right there.”
“Yes there is.”
“Can I use it?”
“For two thousand dollars.”
“You can’t deny my right as a British citizen to—”
“Are you telling me what I can do?” he bawled. Christmas looked up at the ceiling.
“Wait – I have a friend – a Metropolitana police officer ...”
“What is his name?”
“His name is ...” What was his fucking name? The taxi driver, the first man he met, the man who took him to the club where he met Lola. “His name is ... his brother owns a bar, and his name is ...” The custody sergeant raised his eyebrows, then called in another policeman to take him away.
“It is no use lying to me, Señor. You are a gringo. You have money. Now you will be taken to a cell while arrangements are made. You will be there for three or four days. If you have no money, you will not eat. There will be many men in there and they will hate you because you are a gringo. When things start to happen to you then maybe, if one of my officers hears you, you can send me a message that you are ready to pay. Or why not we make it simple? You can pay now.” Christmas didn’t reply. “You look like an intelligent man,” the sergeant added, “but this is not true. You are stupid.”
For an hour, Christmas was left handcuffed to a bench. He tried to stretch out his brain that it might give up the forgotten name, but the harder he tried the tighter it shrank.
Eventually he was taken to Calabazo Para Detenidos Mientras Esperando Translados – the detention block. It was a narrow, noisy corridor that reeked of sewage. There were rows of numbers written along the wall and Christmas could see people pissing out of the bars. As soon as they saw the policeman they started jeering and insulting, directing their piss towards him. When they saw the gringo, their tone lowered.
The policeman pulled his gun. The men backed away from the bars. The policeman unlocked the door and pushed Christmas in.
The cell was four metres squared with a low ceiling. It contained fifteen other men. The smell was suffocating. Graffiti covered the blue waterproof paint, flaking and pitted, and everyone was wearing their clothes inside out to protect them against the filth.
No sooner had the policeman disappeared than Christmas found himself crammed into a corner by a jury of faces, blackened gums and scars. “Why are you here?” came the question, once, twice, again and again. “Why you here? Why you here, you gringo son of a bitch?”
“Can’t talk?” Someone pushed him.
“You’re a fucking dead man, gringo.”
“I am here ...” he began, fighting the panic. He knew his survival relied on one thing: an impressive lie. “... because I stabbed a pol
iceman.”
“What?”
“Eh?”
“What did he say?”
“You stabbed one of them?”
“I was drunk. We got into a fight. I stabbed him.” Applause rang out round the cell. Some of the men introduced themselves. As the crowd moved back and he fielded more questions about the fight and who he was, Christmas was better able to survey the human wreckage. In one corner a man was crying. His clothes were awry and he was bleeding from the ear. In another someone was taking a shit on a newspaper. When he was done he rolled it up and threw it out into the corridor. Some were crouching against the walls, trying to sleep with their eyes open. People were looking at Christmas and whispering to each other.
Loud jeering started up again. The police officer was outside. Christmas looked down at the floor and tried yet again to summon the name. It began with a ‘P’ ... Pablo? Perry?
“Hey, gringo,” said the policeman. “So what you going to do? You like it here?”
“I told your boss—”
“You see those numbers on the wall? We like to make bets on all the men here. Odds. Those numbers are odds. About what happens to these sons of bitches. And to you too. We agree the odds, then we bet. If you pay the money to the sergeant, then you get out of here. And everybody thinks that’s what you do. I am betting that’s what you don’t do.”
“Why?”
“I don’t think you have any money. If you don’t have money, I win money from them. Do you have any money?”
“What are the odds?”
“Five to one you don’t have any money. Do you have any money?”
“So you’re betting I go to prison?”
“No. Prison is a separate bet. Then there are bets about what happen to you in prison, which depend on the prison you go to. Like that.”
“What do you mean?”
“If you get raped, if you get killed. Like that.”
“You’re betting on whether I will be killed?”
“Of course,” he shrugged.
“What are the odds I will be killed?”
“If you don’t have money, so you can’t pay for protection, it’s around eight to one. It’s an OK bet.”
“And being raped?”
“Much shorter.”
“Who’s setting these odds?”
“Him. This guy. Gonzalo!” Christmas strained his head against the bars to see another man doing the same in the cell further down. “He’s a bookmaker for gangsters.”
“Well, what are the odds on me getting out of here?”
“No money? No prison?”
“That’s right.”
“Ha – you mean, what the odds on you escape? You dig a tunnel?”
“I didn’t say escape; I said what are the odds for me not paying the sergeant, and not going to prison, just walking out of here.”
“Are you saying you don’t have any money?”
“Could you just ask that man what the odds are?”
“OK?” he shrugged, “Hey, Gonzalo! This gringo wants to know what the odds are he gets out of here with no money and he doesn’t go to prison!” Everybody started laughing.
“I give him five hundred to one!”
“Five hundred to one!” shouted the policeman to the officers at the other end of the corridor. They nodded their agreement. The policeman took out a pen and wrote it up on the wall.
“OK, now it’s on the wall, it’s official. You are a funny man.”
“Why don’t you put some money on me? You could win.”
“Ha, ha, yes, but it cannot happen. So I lose.”
“Not if you let me out.”
“What?”
“You put all your money on me, then let me out. So you win the bet, I go free and you’re rich. Everybody wins.”
“You know, that is a very good idea. But there is one problem: the sergeant does not win. The sergeant wants two thousand dollars and if I let you out and he does not get his money, maybe he will shoot me.”
“But listen, you could bet ten dollars, let me out, ten dollars at five hundred to one is five thousand dollars, give the sergeant his two thousand, you’ve got three thousand, I’m free. Everyone is happy.”
“You think of everything, gringo. You are a very clever man!”
“OK, then!”
“But we are just poor policia, betting on misfortune. These men do not have five thousand dollars to give me if I win. If they had five thousand dollars, they would not be policia.”
“Could you lend me two thousand dollars?”
“You’re going to prison, Señor.”
“Right.”
“I can sell you a knife. For protection.”
“I don’t have any money. How about a fork?”
With the policeman gone, Christmas returned to eyeing his cell mates. He imagined the taste of Cacique. As he hung onto the bars, a man stepped beside him and started taking a piss into the corridor.
Slade had tried to rape Lola. Christmas had a moment of vicious happiness that the bastard was dead before his thoughts gave way to Bridget and because he could not bear these thoughts he looked around the cell. How was he going to get back to Lola? Was it really her who had cried out? Might she still love him? Was there hope?
He kept his back against the wall near the bars. He had just about got used to the stench when someone else took a shit. The man was ill, the violent-smelling silage of his intestines poisoning the air. Everyone covered their noses. Christmas retched. The man threw the newspaper full of shit out into the corridor. Later a fight started in the opposite corner. All the men crowded round to watch something unspeakable happen that Christmas couldn’t see. He heard crying, and when he could bear to look over he saw somebody on the floor shaking uncontrollably. Various people tried to talk to him. One man said he had been tortured by the police. He showed Christmas the burn marks from electric shocks and a charred divot in his shoulder where he had been touched by the hot iron.
Christmas could not risk sleep. Instead, he let his eyes shut down and lose focus, snapping back when he sensed movement nearby. In this way he had a smeared dream of being in a public toilet and trying to dry his hands, but the machine just made them wetter. Then some female prisoners were taken past and there was a rush to the bars. The women snarled and fired out insults. The men made ugly promises.
Christmas, stunned by hunger, fear and fatigue, stared vacantly at the floor. He was at the reception after Emily’s funeral. They served beef sandwiches. She hated cold beef. He picked up a sandwich and started laughing. Everyone was staring at him, the widower laughing at his wife’s funeral, and he thought how funny she would find it, him laughing and everyone thinking he had lost his mind, all because of a beef sandwich. He laughed even louder. Then he drank to blackout.
It was the day she died. He was in Waitrose. He was looking for Robinson’s Lemon Barley Water. It was her favourite drink. He had driven to the supermarket from the hospital. She was resting. She was fine. The baby was fine. He had left his mobile phone on the windowsill. Standing in the aisles, he couldn’t find the barley water. A girl with braces showed him where it was. She told him it was her first day on the job. He congratulated her. He told her his wife was in the hospital having their first baby. She congratulated him. He paid for the barley water. He got back into the car and turned on the radio. The station was playing ‘Hotel California’.
When he walked onto the maternity ward he was told undiagnosed eclampsia meant Emily had started having massive convulsions. She had gone into a coma. They had taken out their child, a daughter, by emergency caesarean section but due to acute foetal distress her heart had already stopped. Then Emily suffered an intracranial haemorrhage. She died moments later.
He was led into Emily’s room still holding the bottle of barley water. There was a bag of flesh in her bed, wearing the mask of her face.
Christmas was watching a line of ants cross the cell floor. They carried bits of a bigger ant. Lola. He wanted Lol
a, massy with life. The smell of coconut oil on her skin, the heat of her, the peel of her laughter. His arms around her belly, kissing her neck as she leant her head towards him. On the porch with Aldo and the old man. Cooked fish and the evening wind. He didn’t even have her telephone number.
The door slammed. Lola.
But it was three new men.
As soon as they set eyes on him, Christmas could feel their greedy hatred. One wore a baseball cap. One was bare-chested with faded tattoos and a strangely distended stomach. One had a swollen eye and was cut around the mouth. All three had scrappy beards. Their eyes glittered with narcotics. They said things to him that he didn’t understand. Christmas didn’t respond. He felt too tired, too broken. Then one of them spat on him.
It hit his shoulder. Those next to Christmas inched away.
He looked down at the spit. He looked up at his enemies. Their glare was crushing him. He breathed deeply, trying to control his terror and then, suddenly, he felt a familiar pain in his chest.
The tightness knuckled his heart. It tugged at his breathing. Not now, he pleaded to himself, Not now ... The pain increased.
“This is ...” he whispered to the deadly men, “this ...”
“What? What’d you say, you gringo piece of shit? I am going to cut out your fucking heart.” The gang fanned a little and moved on him. He saw one had something rough and metal in his hand. Pepito, he thought, Pepito Rodriguez Silvas. Christmas closed his eyes. He gave up.
“Motherfuckers to the wall!” The policeman, holding a new prisoner by the neck with one hand and his gun in the other, appeared the other side of the bars. The gang cursed at the interruption but backed away. Everyone else did the same except for Christmas. The policeman put his gun through the bars and into his face.
“Move, gringo.”
“Pepito ... Rodriguez ... Silvas,” Christmas whispered, squeezing his chest.
“What?”
“Pepito ... Rodriguez ... Silvas.”
“Pepito?”
“The policeman. He is my very ... good ... friend.” At this a great wave of insults exploded over Christmas. He felt spit hit various parts of his body. He was kicked. The policeman cocked his gun and the inmates receded.
A Bright Moon for Fools Page 28
