by Lou Cameron
“Are you serious, my captain?”
“You said he’s dead didn’t you? We don’t leave our dead behind and it’s a pain in the ass to carry them. Do as I say.”
The man left for the moment. Captain Gringo fired another flare and as it lit up the canyon again, two men came back, dragging the man who’d commented so casually on being hit. One of them said, “We know you are a professional, señor. But for why are we throwing Hernan to them like a bone? Won’t they be able to identify his body?”
“They will if you leave him up here! Make sure there’s nothing in his pockets connecting him to your barrio. Then get him over the side, damn it!”
“Ah, the fall will make him hard for to recognize, no?”
Captain Gringo didn’t answer. He heard the muffled rumble of what sounded like thunder in the next valley and bent to grab the corpse by the ankles as he let the machine gun fall over the edge. He said, “Jesus, it’s hard to get good help these days,” and rolled the body over to follow the Maxim.
“You dropped your machine gun, señor!”
“I know. I was finished with it and it won’t work worth a damn for anyone else now.”
The highest parachute flare was swinging low. So he picked up another and fired it. As it burst high above, the valley was flooded with light – and water. A five-foot wall of muddy, churning flash flood from the dynamited reservoir rounded the bend, scooping up everything in its path. Captain Gringo said, “Good old Chisparo. A couple of minutes late, but not bad, considering.”
The flood waters spread out across the compound, shallowing slightly, and then they could see the rip currents as water found the level of the mine openings and started running into the mountain under them.
Captain Gringo yelled, “That’s it, gang! Destroy what you don’t feel like packing home. This place will be crawling with army in about an hour, so it’s every man for himself, and let’s haul ass!”
Most of the guerrillas of course ran toward their old neighborhood. Captain Gringo moved the other way. He passed a couple of laughing, shouting kids and then he was alone and some dumb son of a bitch had left the Maxim at that end in place. He swore, picked it up, and heaved it off the cliff, grunting in satisfaction as he heard it hit a boulder with a ruinous clang. He kept going, running as fast as he dared on an unfamiliar trail by moonlight. He had a general idea of the lay of the land, of course, and knew the rails from the mine led toward the main line out of town. The flood waters didn’t follow the canyon as far as the rail yards, now that they had a mine to run down into. He still didn’t know if someone had salted the American mine or if there’d really been a gem pocket in it. Chrome was a strategic war material, too. But the Germans had really seemed surprised about Liza’s literally cunny trick, and it hardly seemed likely the Brits would sabotage Uncle Sam. But he knew he’d never know how high was up or who shot Cock Robin, either, so what the hell.
As he started passing hillside shacks and people shouting questions, he slowed down and straightened out his clothes. The nice thing about a linen suit was that it looked like you’d worn it through a war an hour after you put it on, anyway.
He made it to the rail yards and followed them to the station. The midnight train was moving when he leaped aboard, checked his appearance, and moved inside to take a coach seat. He’d bought his tickets ahead of time, of course, and Gaston would have seen that no luggage or other evidence was left behind when he’d checked out quietly that same afternoon.
The conductor punched his ticket and moved on. Neither he nor the engine crew knew, of course, that all rail travel out of Bogotá was canceled until further notice. He’d told his man at the station to cut the wire just after he heard the distant gunfire. Only the telephone wire from town, of course. The train wouldn’t have left if its own telegraph signals were out. It would take them some time to think of sending a runner to the station master, if they thought about it at all. He’d heard the other explosions near the center of town as he’d made his way to the train. The not-too-bright guys who’d been running things were going to have a lot on their minds for the next seventy-two hours or so.
He’d taken a seat near one end of the car. So his back was to the bulkhead and he had a clear view of everyone else. Most were facing the other way, as he’d planned. But the backrests of the wooden bench seats were movable fore and aft, so a few passengers who apparently chose to ride backwards were doing so, facing his way. All but one were nondescript natives. The heavyset European in the brand-new seersucker suit and straw hat was watching him in the reflection of the window beside his seat, pretending to look out.
Captain Gringo pulled the same sneaky trick, a little less obviously, as he studied the jasper from under the brim of his own hat. The guy looked vaguely familiar. But he couldn’t place the pudgy face. Captain Gringo felt uncomfortable as he noted the guy had been a pretty boy, before he’d gone soft. Jesus, all he needed was a traveling fruit!
If he wasn’t after slap-and-tickle with a younger guy, what did he find so fucking interesting? He was big and beefy enough to be a cop. But in Latin America? The guy’s features weren’t Hispanic and they said nobody got on the public payroll in this country unless he belonged to one of about a hundred old families.
The train was moving fast now, and Captain Gringo knew he’d made it, so far. He was too keyed up to sleep sitting up, even if there hadn’t been a faggy-looking guy giving him the eye. He decided to cruise the train. Who could say how many broads there were aboard? And even if he just wasted time buying the lady oranges and soda pop, it might give the queen a needed subtle hint. He hadn’t been bothered by the type much since he’d started shaving regular. But some of them needed to see a prospective sweetheart making an ass of himself over a skirt before they’d lose interest.
Captain Gringo rose and walked forward, past the husky but sort of swishy-looking guy. He realized he’d made a tactical error when he saw, in the glass of the door at the end of the car, that the guy had risen to follow him.
He muttered, “Shit,” as he stepped out on the vestibule between cars. He didn’t want to embarrass the poor guy. Captain Gringo was sure enough of his own manhood not to have to prove it by punching or demeaning someone who marched to a different drummer. He decided the best way to handle it with as little pain to everyone as possible was to confront the guy in private and lay it on the line. So he stepped to one side of the door and waited. The man in the seersucker suit came out. He was shorter than the American and as he turned to face Captain Gringo, the light on his face rang another bell, but the American still couldn’t remember just where he’d seen the guy before.
He smiled at the shorter, thicker-set man and said, “Okay, we’ve met somewhere before, but I can’t place you.”
The man in the seersucker suit tried to push him backwards off the train.
“Are you nuts?” yelled Captain Gringo, as he grabbed a handrail with one hand and the guy’s wrist with the other. Seersucker had grabbed him by the throat and was choking him pretty good. Captain Gringo couldn’t let go of the rail without going over the side and there was a cliff over there! He tried to pry the sweaty palms off his throat with one hand. He couldn’t do that, either, and little stars were pin wheeling between them as the hitherto silent attacker started growling at him like a bear.
“Definitely nuts,” Captain Gringo muttered as, switching tactics, he tried to punch his attacker’s head off with the one hand he could use. That was no go, either. The strangler was inside his guard, with shoulders hunched and guarding the sides of his head almost to his ears. The American was only hurting his own fist as he hammered in growing weakness on the bullet head of the bastard. He knocked the guy’s hat off. His hair was gray and close cropped.
He dropped his hand, got it between them, and reached for the attacker’s crotch. The weird son of a bitch had a hard on! But when Captain Gringo grabbed it and started twisting, he winced and sobbed, “You bastard!” as his grip slipped just enough for the American to suck in
a tortured gulp of sweet-tasting mountain air. The stars winked out in front of him and he had a good grip on the guy’s dong now, so he proceeded to twist it off.
The strangler screamed in pain and dropped one hand to grab Captain Gringo’s wrist. Captain Gringo had been hoping he’d do that. It lowered his attacker’s guard. He let go, cocked his arm, and split the guy’s lip with a right cross.
That moved seersucker far enough for the American to haul himself safely around on his feet, and as the attacker dropped into a boxing stance, he said, “Sucker,” and threw a combination. The left hook knocked the guy off balance. The right cross knocked him off the platform. He screamed all the way down the mountainside as the train rolled on through the night.
Captain Gringo leaned against the bulkhead, gasping to clear his head, and when he realized he’d drawn his revolver, he looked down at it with a puzzled frown and asked, “Where were you when I needed you?”
Then, realizing it had been a delayed reflex, he put it away just in time. The door opened, the conductor came out, and asked, “Did you hear that funny noise just now, señor? It sounded like someone screaming.”
Captain Gringo said, “Yes, I did hear something weird. It was off in the night. It might have been a puma, eh?”
“Ah, of course. Pumas do make funny sounds.”
Captain Gringo waited until the conductor moved on before he went back to his seat. He decided to pass on any female passengers, for now. He lit a smoke and tried to settle his nerves as he pondered why that man in the seersucker suit had tried to kill him. He was sure he’d seen the guy somewhere before. The guy had obviously known who he was! But nothing came to him as he relived a lot of tense situations he’d been in since first he’d been on the run. He was so fucking tired of being on the run. He felt like he could sleep for a year if only he could find someplace – anyplace – where he’d feel safe enough to completely drop his guard.
But this was the last time and place he could think of, and so, though he dozed off for minutes at a time on the long broken trip toward the coast, he felt as tired, by the time they boarded the last train for the last leg to Buenaventura, as if he’d run all the way.
Going downhill took a day off the week-long trek, but it had still been a long time since he’d lit the fuse up on the sábana, so, as he approached the lowlands, he kept listening for a bang. But nothing seemed to be happening. Despite its length, the trip was mostly boredom, flavored with the cobweb taste of a constant low-key fear. He bought papers along the way. Nothing. In a country where the establishment controlled the press, the news was always dull. He had a few bad moments when uniformed men scowled at his passport along the way. But that was par for the course in any dictatorship, too. You never knew if they were really after somebody or just trying to look busy.
They reached the coastal plain and he began to feel the wear and tear of the trip more as he grew more confident that he’d made it. He could hardly believe it was over when the train pulled into the station at Buenaventura. He got stiffly to his feet and followed the others off, running a hand across the stubble on his face. He needed a bath, too.
He walked through the station, slowing down as he saw another bunch of military police checking passports at the streetside entrance. He reached in his jacket and took out his Canadian passport. He stood in line, more tired than worried, until he got to the officious corporal who was taking forever to pass people through. He wondered if the slob could really read, or if he just liked to look at pictures.
He handed the corporal his fake passport. The soldier studied the picture, looked at him, and said, “You are under arrest, señor. Stand there against that post until I am done here.”
Instantly, the tall American was wide-awake. He smiled coolly as he gauged his chances against the quartet of armed soldiers blocking him from the street. He might be able to take them out. But then what? Buenaventura was a small seaport. Even if he made it to the hideout, they’d start a house-to-house search. Theresa wouldn’t have waited this long, of course. But Gaston’s friends were there, and Gaston himself would be coming in another week or so.
He asked, “Why are you arresting me, Corporal? I haven’t done anything, damn it. The Canadian Consulate will hear about this!”
It didn’t work. The corporal smiled sarcastically and said, “There is no Canadian Consulate in Buenaventura, señor. It would do you no good if there was.”
“All right, what’s the charge?”
“Maybe nothing. Maybe something. We shall find out at headquarters when I finish processing these other people. I would finish faster if you would shut up.”
As an afterthought, he turned to one of his men and added, “You’d better search him, Perez. See what the important foreigner is carrying, eh?”
This was the moment of truth. He had to either go for his gun or let them take it from him. But they were watching him, and had the drop.
He’d just decided it was better to go down fighting than to die against a wall when another voice cut in, “Hey, for why are you estupidos stopping Señor Canada, eh?” and Captain Gringo turned with a grin to see Sergeant Vallejo, from those ambush days a million years ago.
Vallejo was sporting a new ribbon over the pocket of his old chino tunic. As their eyes met, he patted it and said, “Nice, eh? I got a three-day pass, too.” Then he turned on the corporal and asked, “What’s going on, here?”
The corporal said, “Orders from Colonel Maldonado, the new head of security under General Reyes. We are to stop and hold all men answering to the description of a Captain Gringo, an Americano who is very bad.”
He pointed at Captain Gringo and said, “This one fits the description to the last detail. I have it here. Captain Gringo has blue gray eyes and dark blond hair. He is over two meters tall and—”
“Idiota,” Vallejo cut in. “I read that wanted flier. It was sent to me and I gave you that copy, remember?”
“Si, and this hombre answers the description, no?”
Vallejo shook his head and said, “Madre de Dios, I have already arrested a dozen foreigners who fit it as well. None of them have proven to be the mysterious Captain Gringo everyone is after.”
“Si, but our lieutenant said—”
“Bah! I spit in the milk of the lieutenant’s mother. He should not be allowed out of the house on his own. Give Señor MacUlrich his passport and say you are an asshole. That is a direct order.”
The corporal flushed beet red and handed the fake passport over, but he didn’t say he was an asshole. Captian Gringo smiled and said, “Look, Vallejo, the man was only doing his job. I’ve heard of this Yank you’re looking for. I’ll give you a tip. He’s got a scar on his right cheek and a tattoo on one forearm. Big American eagle design. Oh, I forgot, he walks with a limp.”
“Make a note of that,” Vallejo told his corporal. The corporal nodded, but said, “Well, as long as you vouch for this one—”
It was a tactical error. Vallejo drew himself up grandly and snapped, “You act as if the choice was yours to make? You dare? God strike your whore of a sister blind with syphilis! And may you and your pimp of a father both catch it from her and give it to your degenerate mother, in her mouth!”
It got dirtier as Vallejo warmed up, and Captain Gringo would have liked to hang around and listen, but he excused himself by saying he’d buy them both a drink the next time he passed through, and as he left, the sergeant was still chewing.
He made it to the hideout. The landlady, a matronly type in a rusty black dress and mustache, gave him an extra key and warned him he had company, a lady.
He let himself in and Theresa gasped and sat up in bed. Then she saw who it was, and though she kept the sheet over her breasts, she smiled and said, “Oh, thank heavens you made it. Where are the others?”
He scaled his hat across the room to the dresser and peeled off his sweat-stained jacket as he said, “With Gaston. They went the other way. I doubt if they’ll be coming here, but Gaston should get here
in another week or so. So here’s where we wait for him.” Then he added, “Where I have to wait for him, that is. I didn’t expect to find you here, doll. You left Bogotá a week ago.”
“Silly, it took me a week to get here. I’ve only been here twenty-four hours. What are you doing? Why are you taking off your clothes?”
He said, “Bath. Next room. You do take baths, don’t you?”
“Oh, of course, the train. I was afraid you were, well, taking things for granted.”
He stumbled from the room, got in the empty tub, and turned on the tap. The water was cold. He didn’t care. He lathered himself and rinsed, then did it a couple of more times as the water rose around him. Once his face was clean, he decided the shave could wait until he’d slept a week. So he got out, dried off, and went back inside with a towel around his waist.
As he climbed into bed, Theresa gasped, “What do you think you’re doing, sir? I didn’t have time to properly pack and I’m not wearing any nightgown!”
He said, “Swell,” and lay down beside her. Then he closed his eyes and let go of the world.
Theresa said, “For God’s sake, are you asleep?”
“I’m trying to be. I’ll fill you in on all my troubles and woes if and when I ever wake up.”
“I’m certainly not going to stay here, naked, in bed with a man!”
“Honey, you do anything you want to. This is my room and my bed and I feel like I’ve been dragged through the keyhole backwards. Don’t worry. I couldn’t be wicked if I wanted to, and we’ll talk about booking you passage to Frisco after I’ve slept a million years.”
She lounged beside him on one elbow, staring thoughtfully down at his closed eyelids. Then she giggled and said, “I don’t know if I should feel reassured or insulted, Dick. Do you realize neither of us has a thing on?”
He didn’t answer. She moved a little closer and said, “Well, if you must know, I did let a steamer leave without me this morning. I mean, I never got to thank you properly for saving me, and there’s so much I still don’t know about you and … Damn it, Dick, are you awake?”
