Marching Powder

by Rusty Young

  The day of his final sentencing, Fantasma scratched, ‘I will never repent’ into the cubicle wall in the court bathrooms using his handcuffs. When the judge sentenced him to the maximum thirty years, he laughed and swore at her. With such a long sentence, Fantasma had absolutely nothing left to lose. Everyone avoided him even more, including me. This suited him well; by then he had developed strong ties with the guards and taxistas at the gate and he decided to take over the prison tours completely. I didn’t protest. I didn’t have enough energy to fight him. And to tell the truth, I didn’t really feel like doing the tours anymore. I still felt very sad about Abregon and exhausted by my experience in La Grulla. Instead of the tours, I decided to spend more time on my own in order to stay out of trouble.

  Gradually, the guards began allowing more tourists back into San Pedro. With the help of the gangs, Fantasma and the other tour guides continued to prevent me from running my tours, but every now and again, travellers came to the gates asking for me. My reputation had spread worldwide and these travellers had been told by friends back in their home countries to visit me. I wrote a letter of complaint to the governor saying that I was a foreigner and therefore should have the right to receive foreign visitors. He gave me a permission slip that allowed me to have visitors in my room. Many of the tourists didn’t care about the tours, anyway; they just wanted to talk. I couldn’t charge anyone for this, but many of them would buy me lunch or leave some money to help out with expenses. Occasionally, when the other tour guides were sick, I was called in to do the tours.

  With my restaurant and the occasional tourist coming through the prison, I eventually managed to pay off all my debts. Whenever I had any spare money or leftover food from the restaurant, I would send it to Samir in La Grulla, where he was doing another ninety-day sentence. Samir continued to threaten to write a letter exposing the police he had worked for in the car-theft ring, if they didn’t let him out. The police, worried about being implicated, had him transferred to Chonchocoro. I wanted to send him money there, but it was impossible. From what I heard, the police kept him in the isolation cells so that he couldn’t communicate with anyone.

  I kept a low profile and managed to stay out of harm’s way for over a year. I would have been content to patiently wait out the remainder of my sentence, but one morning during the lista my whole world was shattered yet again. The major asked me to stay back after we had answered our names. He was a friend of mine and I could tell that he had bad news for me. When everyone had gone, he looked at me like someone had died and handed over an envelope.

  ‘This is from the administration office.’ He stood by while I opened it.

  The envelope contained an official charge sheet with the name ‘Thomas McFadden’ written at the top. At first, I tried to hand it back, thinking that there had been some mistake. But the major refused to take it, and held up his hands to say it wasn’t his fault. I read further down the page and saw the names of my co-accused: Jorge and Jose Luis Velasco. We were being charged for the commercial trafficking of two hundred grams of cocaine.

  At almost the same time as I received notification of the new charges against me, the other prisoners received the best news they’d ever had. A new law – Extra Muro – was introduced, which halved the sentences of most prisoners in Bolivia’s overcrowded penitentiary system. Many became eligible for immediate release.

  Ricardo came straight to my room and opened the door without even knocking, using the spare key I had given him. He had come to return it.

  ‘Did you hear the news?’ he said excitedly, turning on the light and slapping the daily newspaper on my table. It was open at the page of the article. ‘We’re out of here, inglés.’

  Ricardo and Jack the Mexican were two of the lucky ones. And if it hadn’t been for my new charges, I would have been leaving with them. Technically, my sentence was now over. In fact, owing to an administration error, my release papers had already been signed. However, since I had new charges, I was back in the same position as when I first arrived at San Pedro – stuck in prison until my hearing started, with no right to bail. And this time, I was innocent.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ said Ricardo, producing a small packet of cocaine. ‘We should be dancing. Let’s put on some music.’ It was the only time I ever saw Ricardo sniff more than two puntitos in one sitting. He did three to start off with. He jumped around and hugged me. I couldn’t spoil his mood by telling him my own news right then. I did three puntitos too, then one more for good luck.

  Apart from me, the only people who weren’t celebrating the Extra Muro announcement were the poorest inmates. Being released wasn’t automatic. Before having your release papers stamped and finalised by the administration, every prisoner had to pay las costas del estado – ‘the costs of the state’. Until these inmates had enough money to pay for the water and electricity they had consumed during their imprisonment, they weren’t allowed to leave.

  I was very sad that Ricardo was due to be released. I pretended to be happy for him, but I didn’t want him to go. Ricardo had been like a father to me and I didn’t know what I was going to do without him. He had also been extremely popular with everyone in San Pedro. The night before he left, we held a huge farewell party for him. Most of us were still a little drunk the following afternoon as the time to say goodbye approached.

  Tears came to my eyes when he hugged me at the gates, but I held them back because I didn’t want him to see me crying. It must have been hard for him also, leaving behind so many good friends. I had only told him the day before about my new charges.

  ‘I’m going to miss you, inglés,’ he said, giving me one final embrace and then picking up two of his suitcases. It had been four years since he had changed my name to ‘inglés’ for my own protection. I no longer needed protection, but he had never gotten out of the habit of calling me by that name. The lieutenant turned the key and opened the gate for him.

  ‘I’ll come and visit you,’ was the last thing he said to me before he walked out of the courtyard. The moment the gate clanged shut behind him, a cheer went up from the inmates gathered in the courtyard. The taxistas applauded, and even the guards patted him on the back as he passed them.

  ‘Chao, hermanos,’ Ricardo called back to us, dragging his heavy suitcases behind him.

  A friend of Ricardo’s was waiting outside the prison with a car to help him transport all his belongings. Even with his friend’s assistance, Ricardo had to make two more trips back to the gate to pick up the rest of his furniture. San Pedro must have been the only prison in the world where an inmate arrived with only the shirt on his back but left with enough possessions to fill a house. I tried to find this funny but when I laughed to myself I could feel sadness sneaking in between the breaths of laughter and had to stop. Ricardo waved to me for the final time from the outer gates, but I turned away, not wanting him to see that I was about to cry.

  I didn’t cry properly until I was back in my room. I left the light off and I cried all that night. Ricardo had saved my life. He had taught me how to survive in prison. And he had been the best friend anyone inside or outside prison could ever ask for. I was happy for him, but a selfish part of me wished he hadn’t been released. When one side of my pillow was soaked with tears, I turned it over and discovered a note underneath. I don’t know how Ricardo had managed to get into my room without his key, but somehow he had.

  My dear friend from Inglaterra,

  By the time you find this letter, I will be a free man, living like a king somewhere in the streets of La Paz.

  I can still remember the first day I met you by the main gates, holding on tightly to your blanket because you thought I was going to steal it. Do you remember? You couldn’t speak a word of Spanish. And no matter how many times I told you, you could never pronounce ají. Do you remember the time Simón refused to sell you the beef?

  I’m going to miss you, little brother. I have many good memories of our times together. I will never forget the look of s
hock on your face when you tried to sell me the stuff you had smuggled in and I refused because we already had tons of it inside. And that big smile you gave me when you tried your very first puntito.

  The world needs to know the truth about this place. You’re the only one of us brave enough to do it. You owe it to me and your other brothers in San Pedro. Stay out of trouble and keep your nose clean. Remember: puntitos only. Just like I taught you.

  Te quiero mucho, hermano.

  Ricardo

  PS. You still owe me US$40 million from the bet.

  Ricardo had said that he would visit me at least once a week. He did come a few times, but only ever to the interview room.

  ‘Why don’t you come in and smoke some ganja with me, Ricardo?’ I suggested each time he visited. ‘Like old times.’ But he always refused.

  ‘I’d like to, inglés. But I can’t.’ He shook his head apologetically. When he saw how disappointed I was, he added, ‘You already know why.’

  Ricardo had told me he was afraid that one of the inmates might make him an offer to do some negocios on the outside. He had promised himself he would never go back to it, but he was worried that he might be tempted, if he came inside.

  I think there was another reason he didn’t want to step foot in San Pedro prison again – he wanted to forget the place entirely. On his last visit, Ricardo told me of a bad dream he had been having recently: he had come back inside to see his old friends, but when visiting hours were over and he went to leave, the guards wouldn’t let him out. They told him he was still a prisoner and none of the officers would believe him when he said he wasn’t.

  ‘Adios, inglés,’ he said, putting his hands up against the screen to say goodbye. By that time, the guards had placed wire gauze across the interview room bars so that inmates couldn’t pass drugs through so easily.

  ‘Adios, Ricardo,’ I replied, matching my fingertips against his. I knew from his eyes and the way he said goodbye that he wouldn’t come again. I think his telling me about his dream was also his way of saying that this was his final visit. Dreams like that may seem silly to most people. But if you’ve ever been in prison, you know they’re not.

  Once Ricardo had left, I felt very alone. However, because I now had new charges pending against me, I quit the tours completely and tried to avoid too many dealings with the other inmates. Instead of going out, I spent almost all the time in my room. The only prisoners I socialised with were foreigners, including a new arrival called Roberto.

  Roberto had been busted for international trafficking at El Alto Airport. He was twenty-nine when he arrived at San Pedro, older than me, but I always thought of him as being younger, like a kid brother. He looked and dressed like a university student. He had glasses and black, curly hair and talked about star signs all the time. He read books on astrology and believed in destiny. I don’t know why, but I felt sorrier for him than I did for all the others. It was probably because Roberto wasn’t a real criminal. He wasn’t even a proper drug trafficker. Well, not a professional one, anyway.

  There’s a rule that you learn in South America if you stay there long enough: if someone offers you a stack of money to smuggle drugs on to a flight, don’t do it if the amount is anything less than two kilos. You’ll be the sacrifice to get five other passengers through with the main shipment. If you’re going to take the risk, then you might as well organise the whole thing yourself. That way, no one can set you up and you get to take all the profits yourself.

  You’re an idiot if you traffic drugs, anyway, unless you’re prepared to face up to the consequences. Most people aren’t. Prisons around the world are filled with stupid tourists who thought they could pay off their holiday or put down a deposit on an apartment back home by doing just one run. Statistically, their reasoning is correct; most mules do get through. But what if you are the unlucky one who gets busted? There are no credit points for having been a law-abiding citizen your whole life up until that moment. You get thrown in with the rest of them. So, if you’re ever thinking of doing a drug run, before making your final decision you should visit the local prison where you’ll be living if you get caught. And if you’re in La Paz, you can even do a guided tour or stay the night as practice.

  Roberto was one of those stupid tourists. The police caught him at the airport with a kilo of cocaine hidden in shampoo bottles. It must have been a tip-off; when cocaine is dissolved in liquid it’s a lot harder to detect, so the cops have to be very certain in order to detain you just for carrying two extra bottles of hair conditioner.

  Since tourists no longer stayed to party with me at night, I had almost stopped taking cocaine completely. However, once I was friends with Roberto, I started up again. Roberto wasn’t a professional trafficker, but it was obvious that he had been taking cocaine for some time. He wasn’t at all surprised to discover that you could buy drugs in San Pedro. He had started sniffing heavily within a week, long before he knew the outcome of his trial.

  We began doing coke almost every night of the week, always staying up until daylight. I wanted to completely forget about my upcoming trial. With Ricardo no longer there to watch over me, we would sometimes keep sniffing even after the morning lista. Roberto wasn’t at all what you would expect of an Italian. He spoke very quietly, sometimes in broken English and other times in Spanish, but his voice never varied and he never got excited about anything. The scary thing was that when Roberto took cocaine, it didn’t seem to have any effect on him. His mood didn’t change at all. He didn’t get high or nervous. He didn’t need to drink anything. He didn’t talk too much. He just sat there at my table, doing more and more coke and smoking the occasional joint. I tried to cheer him up, but if anything, he seemed to become more depressed.

  Roberto got five years and four months from the judge, but the news took a while to sink in. On the day he came back from sentencing, he didn’t seem that sad. He told me how he had been thinking of getting back together with his ex-girlfriend. The way he talked about her, it was as if she was in the next room, not back in Italy, and that sorting out their problems was something that might happen quite soon. With Extra Muro, he’d be out after three years. But even that is a long time for a university student, even a philosophical one like Roberto. When you think about it, that’s a whole degree.

  46

  MEETING RUSTY

  Even with Roberto to keep me company, I got very lonely during that period without the tourists coming in to see me. Sometimes, when Fantasma was locked in La Muralla or La Grulla, the guards would call me to take a tour group. However, almost none of the tourists were allowed to stay the night. One of the only people who did stay during my fifth year in San Pedro was Rusty, a 25-year-old backpacker from Australia. He boasted to me that he had a law degree, although I didn’t believe him at first. He didn’t seem like a proper lawyer to me. For a start, he had hair down to his shoulders and dressed badly in dirty jeans and a T-shirt. Also, he laughed a lot and didn’t seem to care that any of us were criminals.

  Rusty thought he was pretty clever because he spoke more Spanish than the other tourists, but I knew straight away that he was genuine. During the official tour, I told the whole group about a Brazilian prisoner who had been bashed and brutally stabbed for being a suspected informant. The Brazilian’s injuries were so severe that the guards sent him to a hospital outside the prison, but after the doctors stitched him up, he couldn’t afford more treatment and his wounds became infected. Every one of the tourists that day promised to come back to San Pedro to drop off some medicine for me to send to the Brazilian, but Rusty was the only one who kept his word. In fact, he went directly to the hospital where the Brazilian was supposedly being kept, only to discover that he had been transferred to a cheaper hospital. Then he went to find the new hospital. When the police guarding the Brazilian told him he wasn’t allowed to visit, Rusty bluffed them that he was an international human rights lawyer and therefore had the legal right to take some antibiotics to the patient. The Brazilian
later thanked me and told me how Rusty had stood in the hospital ward arguing loudly until the police gave in.

  It seemed that Rusty wasn’t afraid of the police. He would have made a good drug trafficker. For that matter, he wasn’t afraid of the Bolivian inmates either. As soon as I told him that tourists used to sleep the night in San Pedro, he insisted on staying. That evening I took him to the inside sections to see the conditions of the poorer prisoners. He appeared to get along well with everyone, including the base addicts and the dangerous prisoners. Even Crack Cat purred when he picked him up.

  The next time Rusty came into San Pedro, he had photocopied a colouring-in book and bought some marker pens. He organised a drawing competition for the little children in Alamos and handed out small prizes to the winners and made hot chocolate for all the entrants. I knew by then that he was the one who should help me with the book I had decided to write about San Pedro. He agreed to stay with me in the prison to conduct recorded interviews so that he could understand how the inmates lived.

  I bribed the governor to get a permission slip that allowed Rusty to go in and out of the prison whenever he wanted. To avoid suspicion, I told everyone that he was my cousin who was here to visit because I had medical problems. I also explained to Rusty that you had to make the guards laugh in order to keep them happy. When the guards asked how he could possibly be my cousin, if I was black and he was white, he repeated to them exactly what I had told him to say: ‘Thomas was born at night and I was born during the day.’

  The only trouble with Rusty was that he didn’t take things seriously enough. He thought it was fun to bribe the police, and he didn’t seem to realise that I would be the one who would get into trouble if something went wrong. If anyone found out what we were doing, it wouldn’t be hard for the police to get to me.