by Tom Epperson
PRAISE FOR ROBERTO
“Epperson immerses readers in a dense jungle seething with treacherous flora and fauna and murderous men, punctuating terror with startling moments of beauty.” —PUBLISHER’S WEEKLY
“A fast-paced political thriller, full of twists, turns, and a very unexpected ending . . . Epperson will wow you with astounding revelations . . . His prose is reminiscent of Haruki Murakami.” —MELISSA RATCLIFF, PAPERBACK PARIS
PRAISE FOR THE KIND ONE
“Tense, emotional, and unforgiving, Tom Epperson’s The Kind One is a beautifully written take on the dark Hollywood of the 30’s—a perfect noir novel that is pure and original, with a heavy heart that beats through each page.” —ROBERT CRAIS
“On every page, the language is crisp and fresh, the details sharp and keenly observed, the dialogue real, never forced. When Epperson elevates his prose to the lyrical, he reads like a streamlined Joseph Conrad.” —LOS ANGELES TIMES
“Tom Epperson recalls Horace McCoy, Raoul Whitfield, and of course, Nathanael West. The spirits of the classics haunt this book.” —CAROLYN SEE
PRAISE FOR SAILOR
“Exquisitely written, expertly plotted . . . a hard-edged thriller, full of violence, action, and suspense. In places, the novel reads like a modern day noir; in others, it feels like a Tarantino movie—not surprising, perhaps, from an author whose 2009 debut novel The Kind One was Edgar-nominated and who makes movies with Billy Bob Thornton.” —BOOKLIST, starred review
“This book is as au courant as any crime-fiction novel or neo-noir flick, but its themes (courage, morality, loyalty, grace under pressure) are as old as Hemingway or Lao-Tzu.” —TOM NOLAN, WALL ST. JOURNAL
“Simply a great thriller—full of action but about people, fast and yet thoughtful.” —LEE CHILD
ALSO BY TOM EPPERSON
The Kind One
Sailor
ROBERTO TO THE DARK TOWER CAME. Copyright © 2018 by TOM EPPERSON
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be used, reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For information, contact Meerkat Press at [email protected].
ISBN-13 978-1-946154-08-8 (Hardcover)
ISBN-13 978-1-946154-10-1 (eBook)
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018939238
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Author photo © Carlos Gaviria
Cover and book design by Tricia Reeks
Printed in the United States of America
Published in the United States of America by
Meerkat Press, LLC, Atlanta, Georgia
www.meerkatpress.com
To those journalists around the world who have risked or lost their lives in pursuit of their Holy Grail: the truth.
Acknowledgements
I’d like to thank Carlos Gaviria and Mariela Llorente for sharing their country with my wife and me, and Tomás Silva Arirama for guiding Carlos and me through the jungle.
. . . .noise was everywhere! it tolled
Increasing like a bell. Names in my ears
Of all the lost adventurers my peers,—
How such a one was strong, and such was bold,
And such was fortunate, yet each of old
Lost, lost! one moment knelled the woe of years.
There they stood, ranged along the hillsides, met
To view the last of me, a living frame
For one more picture! in a sheet of flame
I saw them and I knew them all. And yet
Dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set,
And blew. “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came.”
—from “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came”
by Robert Browning
Contents
Ten days until the day Roberto is to die
Nine days until the day Roberto is to die
Eight days until the day Roberto is to die
Seven days until the day Roberto is to die
Six days until the day Roberto is to die
Five days until the day Roberto is to die
Four days until the day Roberto is to die
Three days until the day Roberto is to die
Two days until the day Roberto is to die
One day until the day Roberto is to die
The day Roberto is to die
About the Author
Ten days until the day Roberto is to die
“Roberto?”
“Yes?”
Silence.
“Hello?”
“Is this Roberto?”
“I said it was. Who is this?”
“Roberto. Listen.”
He listens. He hears outside the soft sound of rain falling. He glances at the clock by his bed. It is 6:03 a.m. The phone is silent and he’s about to hang up but then he hears: “You think you have fooled us? You have fooled no one. Only yourself.”
The voice is male. Middle-aged perhaps. Impersonal and calm.
“What are you talking about?”
“We know it was you who wrote about them.”
“Wrote about who?”
“The poor Indian children who live with the vultures on the garbage heap. Manuel, the crippled soldier. The juggler on the street corner who had his balls cut off.”
These are the last three stories Roberto has done for his paper. Because of previous threats, the news editor suggested that he start to write anonymously. The stories all carried the byline “from the staff of The Hour.” Although he’s gone along with it, he has never thought for a second this was a secret that could be kept.
“You continue to prove where your sympathies lie,” says the voice. “With the Communists and terrorists. Not with the decent people.”
“You really think those children—” Are terrorists?, Roberto’s about to say, but the voice interrupts sharply.
“We’ve run out of patience. This isn’t a game we’re playing. It’s time for action. On your part or our part.”
Roberto lies very still in his bed holding the phone to his ear.
“Listen. You must leave.”
He wishes the phone hadn’t rung. Wishes he was still sleeping.
“In ten days, Roberto. You must leave the country. Or else you will die.”
It goes silent on the other end. He puts the phone down on the table by the bed. He sees it is now 6:04.
A lot can happen in a minute.
The gray light of the beginning day seeps in around the edges of the blinds. He listens to the rain and some traffic noise a block away on Avenue Six and then he hears a rapid clop clop clop clop clop clop clop, it’s getting louder, clop clop clop clop clop clop clop, and many things about this city he loves but this is not one of them: the skinny horses pulling the carts carrying junk or produce or construction materials, a hunched, shabby man holding the reins, the horse always moving along at a brisk trot, rain or shine, day or night, when do they ever get to rest, the poor creatures?
* * *
The city is high in the mountains and is surrounded by mountains except to the south. He can see the church on the top of Mount Cabanacande, then it’s hidden by a gray tumble of clouds. He takes a sip of his coffee and looks down at the street. It’s a pretty street, lined with eucalyptus and acacia trees. A woman walks by beneath him, holding a red umbrella in one hand and
in the other hand her dog’s leash. It’s a long-haired, elegant dog wearing a raincoat.
His apartment is on the top floor of a four-story building. Though it’s small, it’s not something he could afford on a journalist’s salary since it’s in the northern part of the city where the people with money live. His father bought it for him. He has plenty of money. He’s the preeminent cardiologist in the country. A few years ago he divorced Roberto’s mother and married a much younger woman and Roberto’s mother in retaliation moved to Madrid and took up with a much younger man. His name is Pedro and he paints.
Since he got up, he’s been doing what he normally does: he’s made coffee and sat down at his computer in his electric-blue Nike tracksuit and checked his emails and perused the Internet to see what new catastrophes have befallen the world while he slept. Meanwhile, he’s been telling himself that the call is nothing to be concerned about, that he’s had similar calls and emails and letters in the past and nothing happened, but finally, restlessly, he has stood up and walked to the window because the problem is this: he does not believe himself.
For they kill journalists in this country. Just last week, Susana Cordoba, a young radio reporter in San Felipe, was kidnapped, raped, and strangled to death. And earlier this year, Edgar Leonidas, who worked for a rival newspaper called The Spectator, and whom Roberto played soccer with in high school, was shot to death in a coffee shop. And last year a renowned British photojournalist named Frank Giles was traveling through the anarchic northern province of Tulcán when his car was stopped by armed men who took him away. His body minus head and genitals was found three days later, floating in the dark waters of the Aguarico River. Also last year Ricky Cortés, a fat clownish local TV personality who had an enormously popular weekly satirical show on which he made fun of just about everybody, evidently attracted the attention of someone with no sense of humor and was blown to pieces by a bomb in his car. And if Roberto went back through the years he could find more journalists, dozens of them, men and women, the young and the old, the famous and the obscure, the foolhardy and the fearful, who have all, in a variety of more or less terrible ways, died, and Roberto does not want to be among their number.
He brushes his teeth, he showers, he washes his hair. He steps out of the shower and puts back on the wire frame glasses without which the world is a blur. He blow-dries his hair, it’s brown and thick and he combs it straight back, and then he trims his dark, fashionably stubbly beard. He gets dressed: a pink, long-sleeved shirt, designer blue jeans, Italian loafers. And then he puts on a black windbreaker and goes out.
He doesn’t wait for the elevator but heads down the stairs. His shoes make a rapid rattling noise as he descends, and a casual observer might think him a happy-go-lucky young man eager to meet the morning, rather than someone deep in the contemplation of exile or death. In the lobby, Beto, the doorman/security guard, springs up from behind his desk and hurries to hold the door open for him. Beto’s a skinny kid from the country for whom this job is a big step up. Roberto exchanges good mornings with him, and passes outside onto the street.
He’s on his way to a little restaurant around the corner where he’s in the habit of having breakfast. It’s stopped raining and the sun has come out, and thus he walks into an unexpected radiance: all the way down the street he can see bright drops of rain dripping out of the trees.
* * *
The traffic, as always, is atrocious. Hundreds of thousands of little cars and tiny yellow taxis honk and veer and lurch and spew exhaust, vying for space with big blue city buses, motorcycles, bicycles, and the occasional clopping horse and cart. He drives by two soldiers with automatic weapons, hanging out in front of a tall concrete wall topped with barbed wire. They puff on cigarettes as they laugh about something. He sees soldiers everywhere in this part of the city, protecting apartment buildings and businesses and embassies. He passes the American ambassador’s residence, as big as a palace. He listens to the news on the radio. The head of the Association of Families of the Detained and Disappeared has disappeared. Rats are being trained to detect land mines. And then he hears the latest vapid pronouncement from President Dávila: “We are committed to transparency. We will do whatever it takes to ensure that honesty shines throughout the government like a bright, rising sun.”
The traffic grinds to a halt at a red light. He hears three pings and pulls out his iPhone. He’s received a text message. Good morning my love mama is doing better today daddy is playing golf I am thinking as always of my roberto when are you coming I miss you too much your caroline. She dazzles him with her coppery skin and light-green eyes and he loves and plans to marry her. Her mother is dying of cancer, and she went four months ago to be with her on the Caribbean island of Saint Lucia. She worries about him and has been imploring him to quit his job and join her on the sunny idyllic island. He texts her back. I’m trapped in traffic he’s about to write but he only gets as far as I’m trapped when he hears a tapping at his window.
A woman with a pink and yellow sty the size of a cherry in her left eye is looking at him through the glass. She’s in a wheelchair. He keeps money on the console for such situations as this. He grabs a wrinkled thousand peso note, lowers the window, and passes it out to her.
“You’re a good man,” she says smiling at him. Her face is rather pretty except for the sty. “May God bless you.”
She wheels herself toward the next car. It wouldn’t surprise him if this woman was no more crippled than he is, but his grandmother has always told him he should err on the side of generosity and anyway, it must be hard work wheeling through the traffic all day. Other people are moving among the cars, selling gum and lottery tickets and candy and fruit, and here comes another cripple, undoubtedly the real thing this time, a shirtless young man with no right arm and only a stub of a left one, and two people in silver space suits are performing a synchronized robotic dance to the accompaniment of eerie electronic music from a boom box. At every busy intersection in the city he’ll see this ragtag army of vendors, beggars, and performers. Recently he wrote a story about them.
As with just about everything, it turned out there was a lot more to their story than met the eye. Not just anybody can wander onto any street corner and go into business. The people who have already staked their claims there are loathe to accept newcomers, and will demand money from them or harass them and drive them away. He interviewed a black man named Uriel, a skillful juggler with a flashing white smile and an endless supply of songs and jokes. He had moved to the cool city from the tropical coast and had enjoyed a prosperous couple of weeks juggling at an intersection downtown when three men dragged him into an alley. Two of the men held him while the third pulled down his pants. As Uriel began to scream and beg, the man took out a knife and cut his testicles off, then he tossed them to Uriel and said, “Here, juggle these.” Uriel told Roberto he had seen the men around but they didn’t work on the street themselves. Roberto found out who they were: thugs with ties to a neofascist organization called the Committee to Protect the Nation, which is basically a front group for a vicious paramilitary unit called the Black Jaguars. And he discovered the CPN was getting a piece of the action from every major corner in the city. The story has created quite a stir, and an “official investigation” has been launched. Not that he expects anything to come of it. Official investigations in this country have the paradoxical effect of carrying the investigators ever further away from the truth. All becomes a mystery, turns into murk. Hard glittering facts melt away like bits of ice.
The light changes, and traffic begins to struggle forward. The sun has vanished. Rain splatters down again. He turns his wipers on.
He’s in the habit of monitoring his surroundings closely. Now he notices the green Renault sedan that was behind him has moved into the lane to his left. There are two guys in the front seat. He doesn’t have a clear view of the driver, but the guy in the passenger seat has a moustache and a broad red face. He’s looking right at Roberto. Roberto loo
ks away, looks back. The guy is still looking at him.
Hard to tell what’s in the look. It’s not obviously hostile, or friendly, or curious. Just two eyeballs fixed on him.
Roberto’s coming up on a side street to his right, and now he takes a sudden turn on it and plunges down a steep hill, into a neighborhood he ordinarily avoids. It’s not unusual in this city that even areas of affluence contain pockets of poverty and crime, and on these few blocks a policeman is hardly ever seen and drivers like Roberto taking short cuts are routinely robbed. He drives fast past dilapidated apartment buildings and cheap shops and restaurants and people on the sidewalks beginning their day. The pavement is crumbling and his right front tire bangs into a pothole and he feels lucky it didn’t blow. He turns left and then right again, his tires squealing a bit. He honks at a guy crossing the street who has to scurry out of the way. Roberto looks in his rearview mirror. The guy is bending down and picking up a loose chunk of asphalt and now he throws it at Roberto. But he misses and Roberto reaches the bottom of the hill and turns left. He’s out of the neighborhood, on course again for downtown.
He checks his mirror. He doesn’t see the green sedan. He has no idea whether it was chasing him down the hill or not. Was the guy in the passenger seat the same person that called him at dawn, or at least connected to him? Was this just an act of intimidation, or was he on the verge of pulling a gun out and scattering Roberto’s brains across the front seat of his car? Or was he staring at Roberto because he looked familiar but he couldn’t quite place him? Or maybe he was gay and thought Roberto was cute. He knows one thing for sure: he’s unlikely to get chunks of the road thrown at him while driving in Saint Lucia.
* * *
The sky is really pouring by the time he reaches The Hour’s offices. Dark clouds are curling over the tops of the mountains as if the mountains were a dam barely holding back some vast, unimaginably powerful storm. The gutters gush with filthy water. He’s about to turn into the parking lot under the building, but he has to wait for a guy who looks like he’s out of a zombie movie to walk by. His long stringy hair is dripping with rain and he’s talking to himself and slapping his face. Probably he’s high on basuco.
