Even Silence Has an End: My Six Years of Captivity in the Colombian Jungle

by Ingrid Betancourt

  Consuelo was stirring on her chair. She said, “That may be true—there are surely some sapos here, but I would like to insist right away that it’s not me.”

  I turned to look at her.

  “You handed in your radio, you gave it to Arnoldo, you have nothing to worry about. But if ever one of us had a radio that you could use to get messages from your daughters and there was a search, would you be prepared to take responsibility, collectively, for the hidden radio?”

  “No! Why should I have to take responsibility! I didn’t hide it!”

  “Let’s suppose that during this hypothetical search the radio was confiscated for good. Would you be prepared to give yours, if they give it back to you, in replacement for the one that was taken away?”

  “Why me? No, it’s out of the question! Why should I have to pay for other people’s stupidity?”

  “Okay, I just wanted to illustrate how ‘everybody’ wants to make the most of a hidden radio but nobody is prepared to take any risks. And that’s just the point: If you want a radio, you have to be willing to share the risk.”

  “We don’t have to play your game,” Keith exploded. “You’re a politician, and you think you can fool us with your fine speeches. We asked you one question, we want one answer: Yes or no, have you got a radio hidden in your caleta?”

  His words stung me. I would have liked to have found an outlet for the blood that was boiling inside me. I asked Lucho to hand me a cigarette. It was the first cigarette I’d ever smoked in captivity. Never mind, I wanted to remain calm, and I thought that if I inhaled the smoke that was scraping my throat, I might be able to keep my self-control. I snapped shut like a clam and answered, “Deal with it yourselves. I’m not about to submit to your pressure, your insults, and your cynicism.”

  “Ingrid, it’s very simple: Either you give us the radio or I swear to you I will go and denounce you this very minute.” Keith was on his feet, threatening me, waving his finger in my face.

  I got up, trembling, livid. “You don’t know me. I have never given in to blackmail. For me it’s a question of principle. You didn’t have the courage to hide your radio, so don’t come lecturing me. Go right ahead, tell the guerrillas whatever you like. I have nothing more to say to you.”

  “Hey, we’re out of here,” Keith said, rallying his troops. “Let’s go talk to Arnoldo right away.”

  Marc got to his feet, looking at me with hostility. “Too bad, you asked for it.”

  I answered him in English. “What are you talking about! You didn’t understand a thing—you don’t speak Spanish!”

  “You’re treating us like fools. That’s enough for me.”

  If they were going to turn us in, I had to be ready. Lucho was as pale as I was; Jorge and Gloria were worried. “We warned you, they’re monsters,” said Gloria. “What are you going to do now?”

  Before I was able to leave the barracks, Orlando got up and blocked my way, grabbing Keith by the arm.

  “Stop it. Don’t do anything stupid. If you report her, no one will get any news about anything!” Turning to me, he said, “Don’t go out. Come with me. Let’s go talk.”

  He led me to the other end of the barracks, and we sat down.

  “Listen, I can understand why you’re worried. And you’re right. Someone here is going to tell the guerrillas everything. Except that this jerk, whoever he might be, needs you just now, because you’re the only one who can give him access to his messages. That’s it. No one can betray you, I guarantee. I’ll offer you an agreement: In the morning I’ll come and get the radio. I’ll listen to the messages for everybody, and I’ll inform the group. I’ll bring the radio back at seven o’clock in the morning, after the program with the messages and the news bulletins. If we have the slightest problem with the guerrillas, I’ll take responsibility for everything together with you. Does that suit you?”

  “Yes, that suits me.”

  “Thanks,” he said, shaking my hand and giving me a big smile. “Now I have to go and convince those guys.”

  I told Lucho what we had agreed. He didn’t seem pleased. “Sure—the least little hitch and all hell will break loose.”

  Gloria and Jorge didn’t seem too pleased either. “Why is it Orlando who gets to listen to our messages, and not us?”

  I realized it would be impossible to try to meet everybody’s expectations. However, I thought that Orlando’s suggestion at least had the advantage of easing the situation. I looked outside. Orlando and the others were sitting around the big table. Keith was ranting.

  “It’s out of the question! Let’s give her two hours to turn over the radio. If it’s not in my hands at twelve o’clock sharp, I’ll tell the receptionist!” To prepare for a possible search, I went to find a better hiding place for the radio under the floor of the washroom. I figured that if someone ratted on me, the guerrillas would concentrate their search on my belongings. Noon came, and the big guy did not get up. Neither did Marc. The day went by slowly, filled with tension, and fortunately there were neither reprisals nor suspicious movements among the guards. I breathed a sigh of relief, and Lucho did, too.

  Orlando arrived at nightfall and went to sit at the little table between Lucho and me, as always.

  “We have to find some headphones,” he said. “Otherwise we might get caught.”

  “The reception on the radio is terrible,” I said. “I think we’re going to have to make an antenna, or we’ll have been through all this for nothing. Right now even the headphones would serve no purpose.”

  “Well, are you going to bring out your radio or not?”

  “Don’t even think about it. It’s not a good time.”

  “Yes it is. Lucho and I can carry on a normal conversation. Our voices will cover the radio. You stick it up next to your ear, put the volume on low, and we can test it to see what we need.”

  In the days that followed, we concentrated on improving the quality of the reception, doing what was necessary to arouse no suspicion. By now it was clear that my companions were not going to carry out their threat. The general belief was that their blackmail had been disgraceful. I was sorry that once again our quarrels had created permanent barriers between us.

  In spite of everything, we set up a new routine. We would listen to the radio every evening and share all the information we had. Orlando devised a ground antenna by sticking an old battery in the mud, wrapped with wire as thick as the mesh of the fence and connected to a metal wire that was plugged into the jack for the radio headphones. The effect was astonishing: The volume and sharpness of the reception were now almost perfect. In the morning the connection had to be changed and the radio plugged into an aluminum wire that acted as an aerial antenna, a wire so thin that it became almost invisible, wound in the branches of one of the trees in the courtyard. At dawn, starting at four in the morning, the reception was excellent, but very quickly it would decline, and it became absolutely useless by eight in the morning.

  There were only two times of day when it was easy to listen—at dusk and at dawn. Orlando waited impatiently for me first thing each morning, already on his feet in the barracks. We had finally worked out a procedure whereby I would listen to the messages until Mom had been on the air and then Orlando would take over.

  For years Mom called in only on weekends, on Herbin Hoyos’s program. She had just discovered La Carrilera, hosted by Nelson Moreno, a warm anchorman from the Valle del Cauca, which broadcast every day of the week, from five to six in the morning. She’d become the most faithful participant, and she made it her duty to be on time, calling before dawn, to be the first to be aired.

  This suited everybody, because when I handed over the radio to Orlando, the messages for our other companions had not yet been broadcast. Clara and our foreign companions received hardly any. So those of us who waited for our messages every day arranged to rotate the radio, taking turns listening to a part of the program. In the long run, this made everyone feel more relaxed, since obviously we were all bou
nd by the same secret.

  Orlando came to see me one morning. He wanted to know if he could lend the radio to our fellow hostages. They wanted to listen to the news.

  “Go ahead. Just make sure they don’t give it to Arnoldo,” I said wryly.

  No sooner had I finished speaking than I was biting my lip. The wound had not healed. I still bore a grudge against them. Even less honorable was the sense that I would find it easier to forgive those who kept me locked up in prison—because in a way I expected nothing from them—than to forgive my own fellow captives, my comrades in misfortune, because I had always hoped for something better from them.

  Once again we were divided in the camp, more intensely than ever. But I no longer felt isolated, and I no longer wanted to be. We went on with our French lessons, we played cards, and every evening we reinvented the world. I listened religiously to the news as soon as it was lights-out, and my companions took over from me for part of the evening. When a certain report or commentary drew our attention, we informed the others, and the topic of conversation immediately changed so that we could all debate the latest piece of news.

  FORTY

  GLORIA’S CHILDREN

  JULY 13, 2004

  One evening I was listening somewhat distractedly to the news, trying at the same time to follow the conversation between Lucho and Orlando, when my heart skipped a beat: They had just mentioned Jaime Felipe and Juan Sebastian, Gloria’s children. I moved away and crouched down in the corner of my hut, cupping my hands over my ears. I wanted to be sure I heard properly. Gloria’s children had been kidnapped at the same time as their mother. The guerrillas had stormed their building and forced everyone out in the street in pajamas. Her youngest son, who hadn’t woken up, had been spared during the raid, as had his father, who was away traveling. The guerrillas were demanding an outrageous ransom for their release. The father, thinking it was for the best, managed to get his wife elected, in absentia, as the local deputy for their department. At that time the general impression was that so-called political prisoners had a greater chance of getting out than the economic prisoners, above all more quickly, because the guerrillas had entered into peace talks with the Colombian government and a demilitarized zone had been allocated to FARC. It turned out to have been the wrong move when the peace process failed. Gloria was separated from her children. The guerrillas had made her believe she would see them the next day, but she’d never seen them again. During all these months of cohabitation, I had held Gloria in my arms hundreds of times to comfort her, because the thought that her children were in the hands of the FARC drove her insane. We prayed together every day. She was the one who had explained to me how to use the rosary correctly, with the stations and devotions for each day.

  She was a great woman with a big heart and a strong character who didn’t let others step on her feet and who knew how to put people in their place. I had seen her hold her own, even though some of our companions mistreated her. She refused to backpedal, even if I saw her weeping with rage afterward, hiding up on her bunk.

  Now the newscaster repeated the headlines. In fact, it was the top news on all the stations: Gloria’s children had just been liberated. Their father was already with them. They’d been let go in San Vicente del Caguán, the place where I was headed when Clara and I were taken hostage.

  My heart was racing. The journalist announced that the children would make their first statements to the press in just a few minutes. I ran into the barracks to find her. Lucho and Orlando were looking at me as if I’d gone mad. Trying to explain to them why I was so agitated, all I managed to say to them was “Gloria! Gloria!” while waving my hands frenetically, getting them into a panic, as well.

  “What about Gloria? Tell us! Speak, for Christ’s sake!”

  It was impossible to say anything more. I set off, stumbling, trying to adjust my sandals on the way, nearly falling over with each step. Gloria was sitting in the dark, and I didn’t see her. I burst in, breathless, the radio hidden under my T-shirt.

  She came up to me, alarmed. “What’s going on?”

  I put my arm around her neck and whispered into her ear, “The children, the children—they’ve released them.”

  She cried out, and I reached to stifle her cry with both hands, weeping like her, trying like her not to attract attention with our wild display of emotion. Dragging her over to the darkest corner in the barracks, I pressed the radio up to her ear. And there, huddled together in the dark, clinging to each other, we listened to her children, mindless of our fingernails painfully digging so hard into each other’s skin that we bled. I was still crying, even though she had stopped, transformed by the joy of hearing their voices and the loving words they’d prepared especially for her. I stroked her hair and said, “It’s over. It’s all over.”

  We followed the children’s voices on all the stations until there was nothing more, Gloria was transformed. She took me by the arm and leaned close to me to say, “I can’t look too happy. I’m not supposed to know anything! Oh, my God, what if they come to tell me tomorrow? How am I going to hide my feelings?”

  I kissed her before going back into my hut and warned her not to arouse the guards’ curiosity.

  “Wait, you’ve forgotten the radio.”

  “You’re going to need to listen to it all night. They’ll probably keep rebroadcasting the children’s interviews, and tomorrow morning you’ll have their messages on La Carrilera. Keep it.”

  Strangely enough, while some of us were happy for her, others seemed dejected. In our world, one person’s suffering could bring relief to another by making him feel that his own fate was better. Likewise, another’s joy could be just as unbearable.

  The next day it was Guillermo the nurse who came to announce the news. Gloria did her best to look surprised. But more than anything she was relieved to be able to talk openly about the event and to express her joy unrestrainedly.

  FORTY-ONE

  THE PETTY THINGS OF HELL

  After the release of her children, Gloria became the target of petty little attacks. They made fun of her or imitated her in a rude way when her back was turned; they criticized her for smoking too much. Cigarettes came intermittently, and each of us was given a pack to do with as we liked. We nonsmokers gave our rations to the smokers. Or at least that’s the way it was in the beginning. Gradually the attitude changed, and I noticed that there were nonsmokers who were keeping their cigarettes to barter for things from the guards or to obtain favors from fellow inmates. I found this repellent, and as soon as the packs were handed out, I gave mine to Gloria and Lucho. They were the ones who smoked the most.

  One day one of our companions had the bright idea of asking the guerrillas not to give cigarettes to nonsmokers. He felt there was favoritism going on if some people had a double ration thanks to the others. Clearly, Gloria and Lucho were being targeted. The receptionist adopted their suggestion right away—the extra packs would be for him! When it was time for the next distribution, he asked that only the smokers come up. I demanded my pack, and he was about to refuse, so I had to smoke there in front of him to get it. He threatened me with reprisals if ever I tried to fool him. So with Gloria and Lucho, we agreed that from time to time I would smoke a cigarette very ostentatiously to avoid any controversy. The end result was ironic: After several weeks had gone by, I was smoking as much as they were. Instead of being a source of cigarettes, I had become a burdensome rival.

  Likewise, some were jealous of the canned food Lucho received for his diabetes. A bite of tuna fish was a luxury. Lucho had committed to sharing every can he opened with one of our companions in turn, so that we all could have some from time to time. He favored Jorge, who was sick, and he never forgot me. Some were so outraged by this that they would emerge from the barracks, fuming, when Lucho opened his nail clippers to attack his can of tuna.

  Their attitude contrasted greatly with that of Marc’s. During the final months of our stay in Sombra’s prison, probably in anticipation
of a planned departure—for the Plan Patriota was already under way—a series of chickens were slaughtered. The guerrillas brought the pot to us with the bird hacked in pieces, on top of the rice or floating in a suspicious-looking broth, head and feet included, curled up and sticking out of the pot. It was a repellent sight, especially as in general the neck had not been plucked properly and the bird’s eye was wide open, taken by surprise when the sudden blow of death came. Still, this was like a banquet for us, and we all lined up to get our share. The strange thing was that Marc invariably ended up with the chicken head and neck. In the beginning no one paid it any attention. But because it happened again so regularly, the third time we placed bets. Whether he stood at the front of the line or at the end, whether it was Arnoldo or someone else serving, Marc always got the head, with its quivering purple crest and staring eyes. He would look at his plate, incredulous, then sigh and say, “I always get it,” and sit down. I admired his resignation and thought there was something noble about his detachment. I knew that all the others, myself included, tried to seek compensation wherever we could.

  This realization helped to quell my animosity toward him. I had deeply resented the radio business. After that I kept away from him. But I no longer wanted to nurture any feelings that might burden my existence.

  When I heard in one of Mom’s messages that Marc’s mother was in Bogotá and that she would be trying to send him messages during the week, I put my resentment aside. For me information like this was sacred. Every effort must be made so that he could hear his mother’s voice. And I also thought that there were situations in life that made you come face-to-face with yourself, that were nods from fate: Without my radio, Marc wouldn’t have known that she had come all the way to Colombia to fight for him.

  When I gave him the news, he made no comment, but he took the radio after all the others had had their messages. And indeed the broadcaster mentioned Jo Rosano’s presence. She hoped to speak with the authorities and in particular with the United States ambassador to Colombia. She felt that her son had been abandoned by her government, which was doing its best, she said, to consign him to oblivion. Marc was embarrassed by her declarations. He believed that the American authorities were working discreetly to obtain his release.