by Lou Cameron
He growled up into the unfeeling darkness, “Okay, God. You’ve stuck me with a bunch of poor dumb kids and I have to do my damnedest for them. But, no shit, God, I sure could use some inspiration about now! Just between You and me, old buddy, I haven’t any fucking idea how I’m going to get us out of this mess!”
Captain Gringo got a little restless sleep and woke at dawn to see that the sunrise had been canceled until further notice. The rain had been replaced by a gray flannel fog. It didn’t look like it planned to go anyplace in the near future. The trade winds had either died completely or decided to skip over the low swamplands west of the coastal cuestas. Visibility was maybe ten feet, if one squinted.
He could see Florita sleeping next to him. He didn’t wake her up. He couldn’t think of any positions they hadn’t already tried, and between the sex and the restlessness of the night just past, he wasn’t looking forward to a day’s march, given the strength he still felt.
He hauled on his clammy duds. It was amazing how cold one could feel in a tropical jungle when one wasn’t streaming sweat from every pore. That was one of the reasons people died a lot down here. Next to yellow jack, pneumonia was the bug you had to worry about most in this grotesque clime.
He strapped on his shoulder rig, put his jacket on over it, and rolled out of the hut quietly to avoid the morning quickie Florita would doubtless demand. He found his way by homing instinct and feel to where Morales should have started the morning grub fire. All he found was a big black puddle of damp ash and char. He hunkered down and started to build a fire. It wasn’t easy. There was plenty of fuel piled nearby. But the palmetto fronds were damp and the windfall faggots the peones had gathered for the cook were punky and even wetter.
But, thanks to blundering into those guerrillas, they now had more ammo to spare than matches. So he wiped a palmetto blade more or less dry on his pants, roughed out a splintery depression with his pocketknife, and pulled the slugs from a couple of rifle rounds with his teeth. He poured the powder on the palmetto blade, covered it with punk rubbed to powder between his palms, covered that with grass stems and twigs, and struck a match to see what would happen.
It worked. It took some praying and blowing, but in the end he got enough of a fire going to pile on more substantial stuff. He rose and groped his way to the tarp-covered supplies. Gaston joined him as he’d just found some coffee and was wondering what the hell to perk it in. Gaston said, “Morales will be here to do that in a moment. I just kicked the species of slugabed awake. I was about to do the same for you when I smelled the fire. I have been up for hours. Minutes, at any rate. I find it disturbing to sleep with only my hand for company.”
Captain Gringo didn’t comment on Gaston’s sex life as they sat on the sand near the fire, letting it bake at least their fronts dry. They lit smokes. Gaston said, “I might have known you wouldn’t tell me how Florita is in the feathers. I don’t suppose you’d like to loan her out for a while? We are obviously not going to be able to leave this soggy hammock until this fog lets up, hein?”
Captain Gringo said, “We have to. We’re already behind schedule. I want to finish the damn job and enjoy that bonus up in the high country with dry socks on for a change.”
Gaston snorted in disgust and said, “I wish you would not say such silly things, my stubborn child. I have been thinking about El Generale’s threats. They probably carry as much weight in Costa Rica as this rubber check I carry in a rubber for some reason.”
Captain Gringo said, “I don’t think it’ll bounce. I’ve been thinking about how the hell Portola could have managed a cashier’s check in the field. He must have had it made out, with the name blank, when he left Leon. Someone higher up gave him orders to use it as a bribe, hire guys like us, or whatever. He was telling the truth about Leon wanting that dam taken out.”
‘Perhaps. El Generale himself could not care less. He is merely going through the motions for his superiors. If he was sincere, he would have given us real guides and not saddled us with a useless aide and other bad odds. Try it this way. El Generale is secretly opposed to taking out the dam his superiors told him to do something about?”
Captain Gringo shook his head and said, “I think he just doesn’t give a shit, despite his speech about the poor Indians. George Armstrong Custer was always making speeches back east about some guy called Lo, the poor Indian. The junta’s orders struck him as a pain-in-the-ass distraction, and meanwhile he has the Granada army to worry about. So he threw us at the problem, not caring one way or the other, and hoping that whatever we did would distract the Granadines, since they ought to be between us and him about now.”
Gaston grimaced and said, “I wish you hadn’t said that. If Portola drives the other side back, where does that leave us?”
“Moving south a lot. Fast. Look at the bright side. The Costa Rican border patrols will be having too much trouble preventing a beaten army from crossing the border to worry about us and a handful of peones, right?”
“You intend to take these pobrecitos with us, Dick?”
“If we have to. We sure as shit can’t leave them lose in the jungle. We have to either do the job and let them go back to their village with El Generale’s approval, or we have to add them to the population of Costa Rica without Costa Rica noticing.”
Gaston thought. Then said, “Eh bien. Let’s save ourselves a lot of trouble and just start running for the border as soon as this fog lifts. We most obviously can’t lead anyone anywhere in a waist-high swamp full of soup of the pea.”
“You’re right about the fog. Wrong about the direction. Don’t you have any sense of curiosity, Gaston?”
“Merde alors, if I even had a sense of direction I’d know which way Costa Rica is. What is there to be curious about? We agreed this expedition is just a side issue to El Generale and a great pain in the ass to you and me, non?”
“I want to find out what the stinger is. At least somebody on the ruling junta doesn’t want that dam built. Somebody important in Greytown wants it built bad enough to send blondes to seduce hired guns to ride shotgun on the project. Somebody else is murdering people on both sides. That’s the part I’m really curious about. I never did say no to the strawberry blonde. So it couldn’t have been her people who tried to take you in that alley while she was, ah, recruiting me. It couldn’t have been Portola’s guys either. You hadn’t said no to them.”
“True. But were our mysterious thugs trying to prevent us from going to work for the British construction company or from going to work for El Generale?”
“I don’t know. That’s why it’s such an interesting puzzle. Meanwhile, we’re not going to solve it sitting here smoking cigars. I’m going to scout to the west and see how much farther it is to dry ground. Feel like a morning stroll, Gaston?”
“Mais non; I feel like breakfast. Morales should be here any minute. Join us for breakfast, and with luck the fog will lift as well, hein? I am not sure a boy your age should be playing in the puddles out of my sight. That swamp is trés dangerous even when one can see one’s hand before one’s eyes, Dick. No shit of the bull, don’t try it in this fog.”
Captain Gringo got to his feet, saying, “The poor visibility makes it safer in some ways. I don’t have to lug the Maxim or even a rifle, if nobody can see far enough to hit anything at pistol range. I’ll just go out a little ways. If all I meet is more of the same, I’ll come back and we’ll stay here until the fog lifts. If there’s dry land within a mile, I’ll come back and herd you all across.”
As he moved away, Gaston called after him, “Wait until I have at least some coffee and I’ll go with you, dammit!”
But Captain Gringo just kept walking. He could have used that coffee, too. But he was wide awake and restless now. He wanted to know what his plans for the day were before he settled down for grub.
The swamp was spookier than ever, now that you couldn’t see much either on or below the scummy surface. The sun wasn’t casting shadows in any particular directio
n to navigate by. Captain Gringo had a good sense of direction, but this was a little much. He fumbled in his jacket pocket and took out the little tin compass he’d hoped he still had. It was little more than a toy he’d picked up a while back to cheer the pretty lady selling junk in the Greytown market. But at least the needle pointed north. He was sort of surprised about that. He’d thought north was over that way. ,
Palming the little compass, he took a bearing on the farthest bole he could make out to the west and headed for it. The water seemed to shallow a little by the time he reached it, took a bearing on yet another tree in the middle distance, and headed for it. He grinned as he noticed the water was indeed now swishing around his knees. Dry land seemed to be nearer than he’d figured. He repeated the process with compass and trees until the black water gave way to scummy black muck. He growled, “Come on, swamp, make up your mind.” The mud flat he was crossing, or trying to, was harder going than the swamp itself. The humic acid in the slime kept anything more advanced than vomit-green algae from growing on the slippery surface. His mosquito boots sank ankle-deep in the muck, and when he pulled a foot out of the goo it sounded and smelled like a farting elephant.
He bulled on. At least he didn’t have to worry about alligators and snakes on this mud flat. He saw a wall of reeds ahead, looming in the fog. That meant more water or the edge of the swamp. He’d left his machete in camp. But if the reeds were just a hedge, a football block ought to punch him on through.
He charged into the reeds, busted through to the other side, and staggered out across more slimy muck a good six paces before he got stuck. Then, as the slimy muck reached his knees, he froze in place, looked down, and muttered, “Oh boy, now you’ve done it, you silly son of a bitch!”
Even standing still, he was slowly sinking. He couldn’t tell if he’d blundered into muck over quicksand or just unusually soft goo. It didn’t matter about the geology. He was up to his thighs now!
He twisted to look wistfully back at the reeds he’d pushed through. They were too far. He tried moving that way anyway. It made the scummy goo rise faster. By the time he gave up, his crotch was buried. A wave of panic swept over him and he yelled out in mindless fear. Then he shuddered, got a grip on himself, and growled, “Easy now. You got into this alone and you have to get out of it alone. You’re too far from camp for anyone to hear and … hey!”
He drew his .38 and fired three shots in the air. He waited, counting to ten, then fired twice more. Three shots were the recognized distress call, but Gaston would know, too, that men who lived active lives didn’t pack a six-gun against their chests with a live round under the hammer of a double-action.
He reloaded. He kept the gun out but didn’t fire again just yet. The muck was up to his waist now. How fast was it inching up him? Too fast, if anyone expected to find more than his hat floating on a big bubbly puddle of black goo!
The muck was to his rib cage when he heard the sound of farting elephants coming his way and shouted, “Over here! Watch your step! I’m stuck in quicksand!”
Somewhere in the fog a gun roared three times, and three slugs ticked through the reeds to send up inky gobs of muck too close to Captain Gringo for comfort!
He snapped, “Bastard!” and fired back blindly.
The unknown on the far side of the reeds sent two more shots his way as Captain Gringo replied in kind. Then it got very quiet in the foggy swamp as both of them had to stop and reload. The muck was almost to Captain Gringo’s armpits now. He remembered hearing somewhere that a guy could sort of swim in quicksand if he bit the bullet and forced himself to lie flat in the shit. But if he did that he wouldn’t be able to fire back. So if the bastard trying to nail him poked a head through the reeds to see him floundering in the mud like a pig …
A distant voice called out, “Dick? Where are you?” and Captain Gringo called back, “Over here! Watch it! Aside from quicksand, there’s some son of a bitch with a gun in the neighborhood!”
He braced himself for more slugs aimed in the direction of his voice. But all he heard was another series of elephant farts, either coming or going. It was hard to tell, the way sound echoed in the trees and fog.
He’d either hit bottom or the muck didn’t want what was still floating above his outspread upper arms. So he was still head and shoulders above the surface when Gaston poked his own head through the reeds, grinned, and said, “I told you not to play in the puddles without me.”
“Watch your ass, dammit. I was only doing half the shooting you heard.”
“Oui, I can tell a .38 from a .45. There is nobody about but we trés adorable chickens at the moment. Don’t go away. I’ll find a pole, hein?”
A few minutes later Gaston had. As he braced himself at one end of the gumbo-limbo sapling he’d pulled from the mud, roots and all, Captain Gringo hauled himself out of the trap hand over hand. As he joined Gaston on the relatively dry land, which was still ankle-deep slime, he sniffed and asked, “Do you smell what I smell, Gaston?”
“Aside from frog shit? Oui, when one follows people to assassinate them it is not a good idea to do so smoking violet tobacco, non? May I have him, or do you wish to flip a coin for the lieutenant?”
“Hold the thought for now. El Generale could consider knocking off his observer a breach of contract, you know.”
“Merde alors, Dick! The depraved species of a stinkard just tried to murder you!”
“Well, he doesn’t know that we know it. By now he’ll be back in camp, looking innocent. Let’s play along with him until we figure out why he just pegged those rounds at me.”
“Sacre bleu, I have heard women were curious. I have heard cats were curious. But you, my curious child, are a species of too much! Who cares why a man is trying to kill one, once one knows he wants one dead?”
“Come on. We can’t ask anyone to pack heavy loads through this fog and quicksand too. We’re stuck until the fog lifts. Mum’s the word on the pistol play for now. Ought to be interesting to watch bugs squirm on the pin while we enjoy a leisurely breakfast, right?”
There wasn’t any breakfast to enjoy and everybody was acting more like chickens with their heads cut off than bugs on pins when they got back to the hammock. The gunfire had aroused the camp, of course. But it didn’t look like anyone in sight had followed Gaston out into the swamp to see what was going on. Everybody’s pants were dry.
Lieutenant Vallejo’s boots were even dry as he sat on a pile of supplies by the cook’s fire, smoking one of his perfumed cigars and pouting. As Captain Gringo and Gaston joined him, Vallejo said, “I can’t find Sergeant Morales anywhere. Was he out in the swamp with you two?”
The two soldiers of fortune exchanged glances. Captain Gringo said, “He might have been. Are you missing a box of cigars as well as your private cook?”
Vallejo looked up blankly. Captain Gringo had naturally rinsed the crud off in the deeper swamp water on the way back, but he still squished when he moved. He added, “Do you have an extra pair of dry boots, lieutenant?”
Vallejo shook his head and said, “Even if I did, your feet are much bigger than mine. What’s going on? What’s all this about Morales and my cigars? I mean no disrespect, captain, but you are not making much sense this morning.”
The tall American called Nogales over and said, “Put a couple of the adelitas to work preparing breakfast. Tell them to make the coffee strong and black. I want everyone awake and on their toes when this fog lifts.”
Nogales saluted self-consciously and trotted away to round up a kitchen detail. Gaston chuckled and said, “Give them a little rifle drill during trail breaks and, voila, soldiers of the half-ass species, non?”
Vallejo pouted, “I don’t want to eat peon cooking. Where’s my regular army cook?”
Captain Gringo said, “Over the hill. Through the swamp, at any rate. He probably had a lot on his mind.”
Vallejo swore and said, “I told him to forget that cheating wife of his, dammit!”
“Oh boy, yo
u told him she was a cheat?”
“Why not? It was a matter of common knowledge. Man to man, didn’t you enjoy her favors the night I sent her to your tent? Half the staff of El Generale must have had Dulcenita by now. I don’t know why Morales couldn’t see she was a puta.”
Florita and a girl called Luisa came over to the fire and started breakfast. Luisa was a dog. Florita looked prettier with that secretive little Mona Lisa smile she had on this morning.
The two soldiers of fortune took a walk to have a private talk as the adelitas worked and Vallejo went on pouting. Gaston said, “Eh bien, one down and one to go. I wish it had been the lieutenant. He eats as much as any three of the others and refuses to either work or carry his own load.”
“Forget El Generale’s pet for now. Do you think Morales is gone for good?”
Gaston shrugged and replied, “Unless you hit him. In the fog, I could see nothing four or five meters away as I floundered toward the sounds of your dramatiques. If he caught a lucky round, he is under the mud by this time. If not, he would be miles from here by now, non?”
“I hope he’s either down or trying to get back to his wife. I don’t really need a pissed-off husband laying for me out there in the shrubbery wearing horns and a gun!”
“Relax. I laid his wife too. He knows he has other targets back with the main column, and his woman is there as well. I think that would be his main destination, thanks to the lieutenant’s big mouth. You were just a target of opportunity when he found you stuck in quicksand so trés tempting, hein?”
“Maybe. We’re going to have to keep a sharp lookout for more than snakes and ‘gators now. Let’s go back for coffee and grub.”
They did. The coffee was good. The Moors and Christians the peon girls had whipped up with beans and rice, while predictable and boring, stuck to the ribs. When they’d eaten, the fog was still haunting them. So Gaston spent the morning drilling the troops, if that was what one wanted to call eleven bewildered-looking guys who had trouble telling their left feet from their right feet and referred to rifle rounds as ‘brass Cigarillos’. Gaston already had them more or less convinced that .30-30s worked best if one loaded them in the clip all facing the same way. There was no way to tell if they had any idea what he meant by lining up the sights on a distant target. There were no distant targets, and if there had been they couldn’t spare the ammo and risk the noise of even modest target practice. Half the men had at least fired muzzle-loading hunting muskets in their time. So, if push came to shove, they could probably figure on at least one ragged volley before they got too confused.
