“Where would I go?”
“I’d be very sad if you left me,” he said, pouting. It made Alameda feel powerful to do this—yank her about. Maria was his plaything, but she was, after all, his favorite plaything. “You really shouldn’t worry, Maria.”
“I ask for a reason. The state of emergency troubles me.”
“You can’t be afraid of the bandits?” Alameda scoffed. It was irrelevant that he had just asked the American ambassador for a hundred metric tons of napalm to battle the “antisocial elements” who now roamed the Ñancahuazú.
“I have already lost my home once,” Maria said. “And I very nearly lost my life.” She waited a moment, choosing her words carefully. “If you had not helped me, I wouldn’t be here. I am grateful. I’m still grateful.”
“I am your friend,” Alameda said.
“You are more than my friend.”
Alameda looked at her in the candlelight. She was a mistress, and he’d had several; he would have several more; but there was not a single man in the world of flesh and blood who would not be swayed by Maria now, moved by her, enraptured by her.
Alameda leaned back in the leather booth. “You’ll have your passport back,” he said. “Perhaps we’ll get you a diplomatic one. Would you like that?”
He was pompous, and she wanted to toss a drink at him, but she maintained a remarkable poise.
“Just valid papers to show at the roadblocks,” she said.
He smiled.
“And really, if there is a problem…”
“A revolution?” Alameda sniffed as though one might be hiding under the table.
“Yes. A revolution.” Maria looked at him and did not vary her gaze. “I don’t want to be left here.”
“I would not leave you, querida,” Alameda said. “I would never do that. You couldn’t think that I would do that?”
She smiled at him, but she had seen all of it happen before; she knew what happened when the toys were left behind, and she did not trust him any more than she loved him.
“No,” she lied smoothly, and she reached across the table. “I know you would not leave me.”
14
THEY CAME AROUND the base of the hill, still in the shadow of the trees, to a place where the trail turned uphill, away from the river, and a small track branched off, running parallel to the stream. Guevara crossed to this path and worked gradually through a thicker copse of trees. The column behind him moved quietly, no one speaking; the only sounds were the scuffing of boots against the places bedrock revealed itself under the dirt. The smaller trail continued beneath the hill, in stages swinging north, and above the treetops, the sun revealed itself to the left, twenty or so degrees below zenith. In the places the sun broke through the canopy, Guevara could make out the boot prints of the vanguard. Then he came upon Pombo, who was kneeling behind a tree with his carbine cradled in his arms.
Pombo held up his palm, signaling halt, and Guevara crouched next to him. Beyond a low-hanging branch, he saw the cornfield—the first trace of human presence they had seen in a week of marching.
Guevara listened, as Pombo did. There was the sound of the wind through the corn, and from somewhere came the rattle of a crow. At the far end of the field, on a slight rise, was a small house made of mudbrick and palm frond. Its front door faced west, affording a view of the river, and the corn between the tree line and the house prevented Guevara from seeing directly into the clearing around the house. There was no chimney, just an open space in the roof where the smoke could come out. Guevara could not hear voices or the sound of an ax, but the smoke said for certain that the house was occupied. The corn was chest-high in the places the insects had not attacked it, and the orderly rows told a story of hard labor. The cornfield was not large enough to be worked by more than a single family, but there was a possibility that other houses were nearby, so Guevara sent Miguel and Coco around to the right.
He kept his voice low and said to Pombo, “Tell Joaquin to take the rear guard to the river. Tell them to cover the approach.”
Pombo nodded and moved off. Loro watched eagerly, but there was nothing to do until the scouts came back. Guevara sat back against a tree. Their cover was good, and the wind was blowing toward them, so he took out his pipe and sucked on it. After ten minutes, the scouts returned, walking unhurriedly, and Guevara stood as they approached.
“Just one house,” Miguel said. “Some kids playing in the yard, and a couple of pigs.”
“No one else?”
“We didn’t see anyone.”
It was unlikely that parents would run off and leave their children, so it was almost certain the column had not been detected. One or both of the parents were sure to be about, perhaps working in another field or inside the shack. Guevara ordered the first column forward and sent back word for the others to follow, bringing up the mules and the packhorse.
Skirting the cornfield, they approached the house, which looked even more decrepit and sorry as they drew closer. There were a dozen chickens scratching the dirt in front of the house, and a quartet of skinny pigs was penned into a wallow between the woodpile and the cornfield. As the column came near, Guevara saw a little boy and a girl under a tree beside the pigsty. The little boy ran for the house, and the girl stood and watched them come on. Her dark hair was bobbed short, and she wore a white cotton dress with yellow flowers printed on it. Her feet were bare, and her face was dirty. She did not move as the boy ran away, feet slapping.
Guevara swung his carbine behind him and smiled at the little girl. “Hello,” he said.
The child seemed rooted in place, like a sapling. She looked up, and Guevara noticed that there was a honey-colored sore on the corner of her mouth.
“My mama is hurt,” the little girl said.
“How did your mommy get hurt?”
The little girl stood on her tiptoes. “She’s going to have a baby. Papa went for a doctor.”
THE DELIVERY WAS straightforward, though the woman bled considerably, there being some difficulty in passing the placenta after the child was breeched. Guevara detailed Moro to handle the birth; Che was no obstetrician, and although he could by no means be called prim, he preferred a bit more mystery regarding women. The infant, a girl, was healthy, though underweight, and the mother did as well as she could to feed her daughter with a flat, wrinkled tit.
While the woman gave birth, Guevara treated the remaining children, two boys, aged six and ten, and two girls, aged five and three. Their afflictions were all symptoms of rural poverty: impetigo, ringworm, and an obvious case of conjunctivitis. The youngest shyly pulled up her sleeve to reveal a scarlet-colored boil. This was discovered to be furuncular myiasis, and the child then bravely endured the removal of a living boro fly larva from the oval-shaped cyst on her forearm. Guevara afterward inoculated each of the children, their smiles by then dissolving into tears, three injections each and the surgical excision of a live maggot being more than most children will bear. This was made right by Pombo giving them each half a stick of chewing gum—the only candy of any sort to be had in the entire column. The tears were soon dry, and the children ran and played. Joaquin, whom they called El Oso, became their favorite.
Just before sundown, the sentries relayed that a man with a rifle was approaching. It was determined that he was the farmer, leading a broken-down mule. Willy and Rubio were sent to meet him on the trail and escort him to the farmhouse. The farmer was exhausted, and the mule was sullen; they both had jogged as far as Tatarenda, looking for the doctor, who was drunk and had anyway driven his car to the whorehouse at Abapó.
The farmer was named Honradez Rulon, and he was dressed in a pair of creaseless brown pants, a white shirt, and a torn wool sweater. On his head was a battered brown fedora, the brim pulled down. With one hand, Honradez led his mule, and in the other, he carried an old Mauser rifle. The rifle’s bolt was back, and the receiver was open; Willy had made Honradez jack the bolt and put the bullets in his pockets when they met on the trail. Honradez had
heard rumors that there were armed men in the forest, and he had thought they must be smugglers. It only slowly dawned on him that the men who surrounded his farm were insurrectos, not smugglers, and he was astounded.
As he entered the clearing, his children ran toward him, jabbering happily, and as Honradez tied the mule to the woodpile, there was nothing else for him to do except grin the way people do when there is a possibility that they might inadvertently give offense and be killed.
“Congratulations,” Guevara said. “Your wife had a little girl.”
At this Honradez broke into a childlike laugh, so honest and heartfelt that it spread instantly to every one of the comrades who heard it.
“A girl!”
Honradez had prayed hard all the way from the river that the Virgin of Urkupiña would spare his wife and that he please God would return home and not find his children gathered around a dead woman. Tears streaming down his face, Honradez handed Guevara the rusty gun and rushed into the house.
Later, they roasted a pig and made humitas of moist corn dough flavored with onions and chilies and rolled up in corn husks. Moro carved great hunks of pork with his scalpel, and they each used a piece of banana leaf as plates. Honradez sat with Guevara, Inti, and Moro as they ate. During the meal, Inti was introduced as the guerrilla column’s leader, a ruse Guevara would repeat each time they met peasants. Honradez pretended enraptured attention as Inti held forth on the reasons the guerrillas had come and the need to take up arms against La Paz. Guevara listened as Inti spoke, and he watched Honradez closely. To Inti’s points Honradez would only nod and say, “Es verdad,” and in the end the farmer proved as noncommittal and inscrutable as any peasant in history.
As Inti talked, Honradez became certain that this thin Boliviano was not really the man in charge; Honradez’s nose for authority proving as acute and unfailing as a dog’s. He also detected the Cubans’ accents, which, implausibly, Honradez thought were North American. After midnight, mostly to change the subject from politics, Honradez offered Inti, Marcos, and Guevara each one of the bottles of beer he had been saving for carnival. The beer was poured out into tin cups and downed with saludos all around.
“I’m in your debt,” Honradez said. “I don’t know how I can begin to thank you.”
Joaquin patted his stomach. “Listen, man, you’re even with me.”
“There is something you could do for us.” Guevara opened his map case and spread the paper on the dirt at their feet. Honradez’s face betrayed no expression, but he thought, So this is the one in charge, the one with the papers.
It had grown dark, and Guevara angled the map sheet at the fire to light it. “Which trail did you take to Tatarenda?”
“I’m sorry,” Honradez said. “I can’t read, Señor.”
“This is like a picture. From the air.” Guevara’s finger touched the map, to the left of where the Ñancahuazú flowed into the Rio Grande, a place roughly in the center of the map. “We’re here,” he said. His fingernail touched a dotted pencil line on the map where he had marked down the trail. “This is the path by the river. This is the one on the ridge.”
Honradez looked puzzled, the expression accentuated by the light of the fire and an earnest attempt to look harmless.
“You headed east to Tatarenda,” Guevara said patiently.
East was something Honradez understood. The map was a swirl of colored splotches and made no sense.
“I took the river trail,” Honradez said. “They told me the doctor had gone to Abapó, so I came back.”
“Did you see soldiers?”
“With beards? Like you?”
“Army soldiers,” Guevara said.
“I didn’t see any soldiers. Anywhere. Only trucks of the oil company when I got to the Camiri road.”
Inside the house, the baby cried, and Honradez stood. He said, “Excuse me, kind gentlemen,” then bowed out of the firelight and into the house.
“We’ve made a friend,” Joaquin said.
“It’s been six weeks since we ambushed the convoy. You think it’s possible that the army hasn’t put out one patrol, even on the highway?”
“Why would he lie to us?” Moro asked.
Guevara popped a last bit of humita into his mouth and chewed as he spoke. “That rifle he was carrying—it’s army surplus. The government gives them out to the peasant militias.”
“You think he’s militia?”
Guevara tossed his banana leaf into the fire. Whether or not the farmer was a member of the home guard was moot. The army would soon know the column had passed the river.
“What do we do?”
“We thank him for dinner,” Guevara said.
The column leaders readied their groups for movement, this taking a bit longer than expected, as Eusebio and Chingolo had already put their hammocks up and removed their boots. The animals were again loaded and backpacks swung up onto shoulders. Honradez came out of the house holding a kerosene lantern as the men were assembling into lines.
“I hoped you would stay. It’s safe here. I was going to milk the cow in the morning,” Honradez said.
Inti was already leading the vanguard back around the cornfield, so Guevara answered: “You’ve been kind, sir, but we’d better move on. We don’t want to bring any attention onto your family.”
“Where are you going? I can show you the way,” Honradez said.
“We know the way, friend.” Guevara’s gaze was piercing. Honradez could not hold it.
“Thank you for the food,” Guevara said. “Good night.”
At the tree line, Guevara paused with Joaquin, watching the men walk past and into the jungle, humpbacked shapes against a thin sliver of moonlight.
“The moon’s almost down,” Guevara said. “When it’s full dark, have the men exchange packs and weapons, then circle back past the farmhouse. Have everyone pass through at least twice.”
Joaquin smiled. Doubling the column would make the force seem twice as large.
“If this pendejo is going to sing,” Guevara said, “he might as well sing a tune we like.”
15
CARRYING HIS M16, Hoyle moved toward the sound of the river. The path was loomed over by an endless arch of trees, so the light that fell on the ground was yellow and green. As it neared the Rio Grande, the trail became broad and sandy, and there were signs that it had been used to drive cattle to market. In most places, the track paralleled the river above the valley floor, staying predictably just inside the tree line. It was exactly the type of trail to be avoided in Southeast Asia: a jungle altar upon which lazy soldiers were sacrificed.
To the left and right along the path, Bolivian conscripts sprawled in various states of repose. Some squatted on their packs; a few sat directly on the trail as they chatted, their rifles leaning against trees or in the dirt at their feet. The patrol had halted for the fifth time in as many hours, and had progressed, Hoyle guessed, no farther then ten kilometers from the road head at Tatarenda. They’d started from the trucks before dawn, and Charlie was frankly delighted to be left behind with the vehicles. Hoyle remembered him saying adios with a limp and fatalistic shrug when they moved off into the forest.
As he passed up the column, Hoyle did his best to appear pleasant and kept his corrections to a minimum. Here and there he asked an NCO to stand and keep watch, pointing in a direction away from the trail. Occasionally, he’d ask a cabo how he was doing—he’d fix a rifle strap for one, close a pack flap for another—and by the time he’d reached the head of the column, Hoyle was convinced that he had just walked through a convention of military retards. For almost all of the Bolivian soldiers, this was the first time they had been issued live ammunition, and their sergeants had been busy all morning reminding the men not to be fucking idiots and shoot themselves.
Fretting for the Bolivian republic, Hoyle continued down the trail, negotiating a steep stretch just before the river. Inside the tree line, above the place where a dozen large boulders loomed over the watercourse
, Hoyle and Valdéz exchanged silent glances. Their impressions were the same, and their moods similarly depressed. The morning’s walk had been a farce—they had individually and collectively overestimated the Bolivian army, and now there was nothing to do but complete the planned march and hope there would not be trouble. To the right, Smith crouched at a boulder, shooting a compass bearing down the river and marking their position should support become necessary. A Bolivian radio operator stood next to him, smoking a cigarette and looking up into the sky. The sky!
“Jesus Christ,” Valdéz said, disgusted.
He wore a pair of khaki pants with cargo pockets and expensive Austrian hiking boots. Over an Izod shirt, he wore a flak jacket and web gear, canteens, magazines, grenades, and first-aid pouches all arranged just so. On his face was a pair of swept-back Ray-Ban sunglasses that gave him a slightly debonair aspect, though Hoyle knew him to be a thorough-going killer. The Colt model 609 rifle in his hand was oiled immaculately.
They were at a place along the Rio Grande where the valley opened and the Ñancahuazú joined from the south. A ford called Vado del Yeso was somewhere to the west. Or it was supposed to be. The maps had proved less than perfect, but that was to be expected—a map was always someone else’s best guess, and navigation, Hoyle knew, was the art of eventually getting home. The scouts had said that Vado del Yeso was the only safe place to cross the river for twenty kilometers. It looked like the river could be forded directly in front of them, but again, that was only because the water was low; Hoyle noted several large tree trunks jammed into boulders well up from the water. This quiet river had run in deadly spate and had done so recently. Half an hour ago, Santavanes had taken two Bolivian troopers and gone to look for a place to cross.
“Who did he take?” Hoyle asked Valdéz.
“Two sergeants. One of them used to be French Foreign Legion. The other guy’s a paratrooper.”
Hoyle had no idea how the Bolivians would work out, but he knew Santavanes well. Santavanes worked best on his own, and it could not be said that he suffered fools gladly. He might wind up shooting his Bolivian charges, but he would not allow them to tumble into folly.
Killing Che Page 12
