Caesar the War Dog 4

by Stephen Dando-Collins

  ‘Why would I get a new mummy?’ Maddie asked.

  ‘Well, sometimes a daddy will marry again after his wife passes away,’ Nan explained. ‘But your dad is much too busy and away on missions too often to even think about something like that.’

  ‘Yes, he is,’ said Maddie, screwing up the piece of paper. ‘And I don’t want a new mummy!’

  Ben walked through the doors of the Hilton Garden Inn’s coffee shop feeling a little apprehensive as well as pleased to be able to catch up with Amanda. A day had passed since they’d spoken on the phone. As glad as he would be to see her, he worried that this was a dangerous place for a journalist, let alone a female journalist. Here, Ben’s Australian military fatigues didn’t turn a single head. There were thousands of Mexican soldiers, sailors and airmen stationed in Monterrey as part of the government’s bid to put an end to the crime wave in Nuevo León, and they were a regular sight all over the city.

  ‘It’s good to see you,’ said Ben, bending to give Amanda a kiss on the cheek before sliding into the booth across from her. As he did, he recalled the very first time he met her – in a coffee shop back in Sydney, after Caesar had gone missing in Afghanistan.

  ‘You must be worried sick,’ said Amanda, reaching across the table and squeezing his arm. ‘All this time, and no word of him.’

  ‘We do have a lead,’ said Ben, trying to sound upbeat.

  ‘You do? Do you know where the Green Parrot is?’ Amanda had lowered her voice so that hotel guests at adjoining tables couldn’t overhear.

  Ben shook his head. ‘We are pretty certain that it was two of his gunmen who kidnapped Caesar. The same guys also nabbed a police dog handler here in Monterrey.’

  Amanda raised her eyebrows. ‘Really? To look after Caesar?’

  ‘That’s what I’m hoping.’

  ‘So you haven’t pinpointed the Green Parrot’s location?’

  ‘Not yet. He could be anywhere in this city.’

  ‘What if I could get you that information?’

  Ben looked at her with surprise. ‘How could you manage that?’

  Amanda smiled coyly. ‘Well, I’ve noticed that there’s a lot of chat on the internet about the Green Parrot – on one site in particular: Friends of the People. It tries to portray Carlos Marron like General Santa Anna and Pancho Villa and a lot of other historical revolutionaries from Mexican history – as a friend of the common people.’

  Ben shook his head. ‘Those men were dictators and bandits.’

  ‘We know that, but a lot of Mexicans harbour romantic notions about those guys.’ Amanda shrugged and opened her hands. ‘What can I say? Poor people seem to need heroes. Anyway, I wrote an article on the flight over about how the rest of the world views the war between the crime cartels and the Mexican Government. In the article I mentioned how much I’d love to interview the Green Parrot in person, to get his perspective on the crime war. I mean, who else in the media is going to give him that sort of opportunity to put his own case forward? The plan entails submitting the article to the Friends of the People, with the hope that the Green Parrot will invite me to interview him.’

  ‘That’s a dangerous thing to contemplate,’ said Ben, looking concerned. ‘I wouldn’t want you to put yourself at risk like that, even if it is for Caesar’s sake.’

  ‘Too late,’ Amanda said with an impish grin. ‘I’ve already sent them the article, and they’ve posted it on their site. Look.’ Amanda pulled her iPad from her bag and showed Ben the site.

  ‘It’s in Spanish,’ he said. ‘Did you write it in Spanish or did they translate it?’

  ‘I wrote it in Spanish. My mother’s from Spain and she’s multilingual. I was fluent in Spanish, French and Italian before I was ten years old.’

  Ben tilted his head and smiled at Amanda. ‘I didn’t know that about you.’

  Amanda grinned. ‘There’s a lot you don’t know about me, Ben. Anyway, my language skills have really helped me over the years in my job.’

  ‘I bet they have,’ said Ben. ‘So, you’re hoping the Green Parrot will set up an interview with you as a result of your article?’

  Amanda nodded. ‘From what I’ve heard, this Parrot guy has a big ego. If I play my cards right I might be able to get some clues about where’s he’s hiding out.’

  Ben pulled a face. ‘Sounds risky.’

  ‘Well, I’ll decide what to do when the time comes.’

  Ben smiled, and shook his head. Amanda was being her typical feisty and independent self.

  The concierge approached their table and held out a folded slip of paper to Amanda. ‘A message was left for you, Miss Ritchie,’ he advised.

  ‘Who left the message?’ Amanda demanded.

  ‘I don’t know,’ the concierge replied. ‘I was not at my desk when the message came.’ Turning on his heel, he hurried away.

  ‘What’s it say?’ Ben asked as Amanda read the message.

  ‘It says: “El Loro Verde agrees to a Skype interview with you.” They’ve provided a local phone number, too.’

  ‘That was quick. Your article hasn’t even been up for that long.’ Ben suddenly grew serious. ‘Please be careful, Amanda. It could be a hoax.’

  ‘Well, even if it’s for real,’ Amanda said, taking out her phone, ‘I’m not accepting the invitation. I don’t want to Skype the Green Parrot. That’s no good to us. I’ve got to be in the same room as him if I’m to pinpoint his location, and therefore Caesar’s location, for you.’ She dialled the number on the note.

  ‘Sí?’ a voice answered abruptly.

  ‘This is Amanda Ritchie, the Australian journalist.’

  ‘Sí.’

  ‘I will only interview the Green Parrot if we are in the same room, face-to-face, or it’s not on. Do you understand?’

  ‘Sí.’

  ‘Will you pass on the message?’

  ‘Sí.’ The call was then disconnected.

  ‘Well?’ Ben said expectantly.

  Amanda put her phone away and looked him in the eye. ‘Now, we wait.’

  In the early hours of the next morning, Amanda was woken by the hotel phone.

  ‘Yes? Who is this?’ she answered groggily.

  ‘Miss Ritchie, this is hotel reception,’ came a young male voice. ‘Please do not be alarmed, but there is a fire emergency on your floor of the hotel and the fire alarm is not working. Please leave your room immediately and wait for a staff member in the corridor. They will escort you from the hotel via the fire escape. Please hurry. Thank you.’

  Amanda quickly jumped out of bed and pulled on the clothes she had been wearing the previous day. She slipped on her shoes, grabbed her bag and stepped out into the corridor. Immediately, an arm snaked around her neck. A rough hand clasped firmly over her mouth, preventing her from screaming, and something cold jabbed into her neck. After an instant’s uncertainty, she realised it was the barrel of a gun. And suddenly she was very afraid.

  ‘Say nothing,’ came the soft, menacing voice of Tommy el Uno in her ear.

  Amanda was hustled to the fire escape, where Diego was waiting for them. Like Tommy, Diego was wearing a ski mask, which covered his head and only revealed his dark eyes and solemn mouth. As Tommy tied a blindfold around her head, Diego quickly searched Amanda’s bag and then frisked her, looking for a weapon, a hidden radio transmitter or a tracking device.

  When Diego found none of these, the two men led Amanda all the way down to the hotel car park. Their hurried steps echoed around the concrete stairwell as they went. In the car park, the blindfolded Amanda found herself thrust into the back of a van.

  ‘Keep quiet, and everything will be okay,’ Tommy whispered in her ear.

  ‘Where are you taking me?’ she demanded.

  ‘To see el padrino. Now, keep quiet!’ He closed the van’s rear doors, and the engine started.

  Amanda slumped against the van’s metal wall as it drove out of the car park and through the city for what she calculated to be ten minutes. As the van rolled alo
ng, Amanda took her mind back to the call she had received, the call that had sent her scurrying from her hotel room and into the arms of the bad guys. She kicked herself for falling into such an obvious trap.

  Amanda had been in a similar situation once before in Lebanon. Hotel management had called her in the middle of the night, urging her to get out of the building because of a bomb threat they had received. That time the call had been legitimate, and she now remembered hearing the phone ring in the room next door to hers, as hotel management passed the same warning onto others. She had not heard the phone ring in the adjoining rooms this time. Amanda hoped she was genuinely being taken to a face-to-face interview with the Green Parrot and that she’d be set free again. She knew what big business the kidnap-and-ransom industry was for Mexican cartels. There was no guarantee that the promise of an interview wasn’t merely a means of luring her into a trap, with the crooks intending to ransom her rather than let her interview their boss.

  The van stopped for a minute, then eased forward. Amanda suspected they had just gone through a gate of some sort. The rattling of what sounded like a metal roller door could be heard before the van made its way down a slope. Soon after it came to a stop, the van’s rear doors were flung open. Tommy and Diego reached in and hauled her out.

  ‘Is this her?’ asked a male voice.

  ‘Sí, this is the Australian journalist,’ Tommy replied. ‘The telephone trick worked like a charm. It got her out of her room in a flash.’

  ‘Have you frisked her?’

  ‘Of course,’ Diego responded indignantly. ‘Do you think I’m an idiot?’

  ‘What about for a bomb?’ Vargas demanded.

  ‘A bomb?’ Diego snorted. ‘Where would she have a bomb?’

  ‘Did you check her shoes?’ Vargas pointed to Amanda’s sneakers. ‘Terrorists have been known to hide plastic explosives in shoes. What if Estrella set us up? They organised two car bombs for Rocky, didn’t they? So, we can’t put anything past them.’

  Neither Diego nor Tommy had an answer for that. Vargas, for all his frequent and annoying stupidity, was right. After what the Estrella cartel did in San Antonio, they could be expected to stop at nothing to get their boss.

  ‘Diego, get the dog and the cop,’ Vargas instructed.

  Diego hurried away and collected Caesar and Juanita from their temporary prison in the laundry. Juanita led Caesar on a short leash, fearful of what was in store for them this time but keeping up a brave face. Caesar’s tail was hanging limp, and every now and then he glanced up at her uncertainly.

  When they reached the garage, Vargas called, ‘You and the poopy dog, do your thing. Check this señorita for a bomb. Pay particular attention to her shoes.’

  As soon as Caesar saw Amanda, his tail began to wag furiously. He knew Amanda well and recognised her as a good friend of Ben’s. The sight of her suggested to him that Ben could not be far away. Excited, he pulled hard toward her and let out a bark.

  ‘Is that you, Cae–?’ Amanda began. She caught herself just in time. If she let it be known that she and Caesar knew each other, the game was up. ‘Is that your idea of a welcome?’ she said, correcting herself. ‘Unleashing a dog on me.’

  ‘He will not hurt you,’ Tommy answered.

  Juanita was surprised by Caesar’s reaction. ‘He seems to like her,’ she said, as she led the labrador up to Amanda. When Caesar reared up on his back legs and tried to lick Amanda’s face in greeting, Juanita tugged hard on the leash to pull him back.

  ‘She is Australian and so is the dog,’ said Vargas. ‘Maybe he smells something familiar.’

  Tommy chuckled. ‘Does she smell like a kangaroo?’

  Diego laughed.

  ‘Make him check out her shoes, cop lady,’ Vargas commanded.

  Juanita dropped to one knee in front of Amanda and pulled Caesar in close. ‘César, are there any explosives here? Huh?’ She patted Amanda’s shoes. ‘Sniff the shoes, César.’

  Caesar, not knowing what Juanita wanted of him, lowered his head and tried to lick Juanita on the face.

  ‘Well?’ demanded Vargas. ‘What does the dog say?’

  ‘I am not sure,’ Juanita confessed. ‘I think César is a little confused, after being cooped up in the laundry for so long. But, from his reaction, I do not think there is a problem with this woman’s shoes.’

  ‘There is only one way to be certain,’ said Vargas. ‘Diego, bring me her shoes.’

  Diego stooped and roughly yanked them from Amanda’s feet.

  ‘Not so rough there,’ Amanda protested.

  Ignoring her complaint, Diego brought the shoes to Vargas. At the same time, Vargas lifted his shirt to reveal a knife on a scabbard attached to his belt. He slid the knife out and held it up.

  ‘I did not know you carried a knife,’ Tommy said with surprise.

  ‘I even sleep with my knife under my pillow, amigo,’ Vargas responded. ‘A knife was my first toy as a boy.’

  First taking one shoe from Diego, Vargas slit open the heel, lopping off the rubber, which fell to the floor. He did the same to Amanda’s second shoe.

  ‘The dog was right,’ he said with satisfaction. ‘No explosives there.’ He motioned to Diego. ‘Return the dog and the woman to the laundry. Tommy, you and I will take the reporter to meet el padrino.’

  He tossed Amanda’s shoes aside, then frogmarched her to the small lift. The three of them stood in silence as it began to ascend. Amanda’s mind returned to the encounter in the garage. She had achieved her objective. Her scheme had worked even better than she’d hoped. Not only had she been brought to the Green Parrot’s hide-out, she had found Caesar. Now, all she had to do was bluff her way out of this place again and alert Ben to where Caesar was being kept.

  The lift doors opened, and Amanda was walked twenty metres before her blindfold was removed. She was left, blinking, looking at a man with an Elvis hairdo.

  ‘We have a guest for you, Padrino,’ said Vargas.

  Carlos Marron turned in his seat and looked Amanda up and down. ‘So, you are the Australian journalist.’

  ‘And you are the Green Parrot,’ Amanda replied.

  ‘Maybe.’ He gestured to a black leather sofa across from him. ‘Sit. We talk.’

  Tommy pushed Amanda forward, and she moved to the sofa and sat down facing the one they were calling padrino. ‘There is a small tape recorder in my bag,’ she said. ‘I need it for the interview.’

  The gang leader shook his head. ‘No tape recorders.’

  ‘Could I have a pen and paper, then, please? To take notes.’

  Again, he shook his head. ‘No, use your memory. If you are truly a good reporter, you will remember what I have to say.’

  ‘Fine.’ Amanda looked around the room. Vargas and Tommy stood leaning against the wall, their arms folded. ‘I guess I have no choice.’ Her eyes came to rest on the bank of screens. ‘You watch a lot of TV?’ she asked.

  ‘It is my link with the world,’ he replied. ‘I have access to every television network there is.’

  ‘Impressive,’ said Amanda, deciding it would be best to flatter him.

  ‘What questions do you have for El Loro Verde? In your article, you said that you wanted El Loro Verde’s side of the story.’ He sat back and folded his arms, looking at her intently. ‘So, ask away.’

  There had been no photographs of the Green Parrot available when Amanda had done her background research on the crime lord. But, from descriptions she had read, especially of his Elvis hairstyle, she was pretty certain this was her man.

  ‘Tell me about your childhood,’ she began. ‘Is it true that you were born and raised here in Monterrey?’

  The crime lord took a swig from a bottle of Perrier water. ‘When I was a teenager, Monterrey was the richest city in Mexico. All the big multinational corporations that operated in this country had their head offices here. Many rich people lived in Monterrey, too – in fabulous mansions behind high walls along tree-lined streets. As a boy, I would walk th
ose streets and dream about one day having a mansion of my own, just like those ones. I vowed that when I did I would bring my mother to live in my big house and she would never have to cook another meal in her life.’

  Amanda tried to look sympathetic. ‘That was an honourable ambition.’

  ‘One day, I was walking along one of those streets, daydreaming as usual, when a woman ran out from her mansion. She told me to get rid of a battered old car that had been left in the street outside her house. She said it made her property look feo. This means “unsightly”. That is a word you did not hear where I grew up, in the poor parts of Monterrey. There, everything is unsightly in the eyes of the rich, but we poor people did not know it.’ He laughed to himself. ‘She offered to pay me, so I left and came back with my cousin Rodrigo’s tow truck. I took that wreck of a car away and dumped it out in the countryside.’

  ‘Did the woman pay you, as she promised?’ asked Amanda.

  ‘Oh, sí, she paid me a lot of money. It must have been the equivalent of around three hundred American dollars. I gave fifty to Rodrigo for the use of his truck and kept the rest for myself. Back then, it was more money than I had seen in my whole life.’

  ‘I can imagine.’

  ‘This experience, it gave me an idea. The next night, I towed that same wrecked car back to the city, to a street in another wealthy part of Monterrey. The next day, I knocked on the door of the house where I had dumped the car. I told the maid I would tow the wreck away for six thousand pesos, which is about about five hundred American dollars. She came back from her mistress with the money. Can you believe it?! Rich women have no concept of haggling – I would have done it for one hundred dollars. So I towed the wreck away, and that night I dumped it outside someone else’s door.’

  Amanda nodded. ‘Very cheeky of you.’

  ‘And so it went, every day dumping the wreck outside a rich person’s house, always at a new location. The rich people almost always paid me to remove the wreck from outside their houses. “Unsightly, unsightly, unsightly,” they would say! This became such a good business for me, I employed my brothers and cousins to work for me, paying them a fraction of what I was making.