The Jaguar

by A. T. Grant

  The Governor turned and walked away. The men above pressed in on either side of Felipe to finish their butchery. Then they too were gone. All that remained on the top corridor was Felipe’s torso, seated, as if in a deep and drunken slumber, against the metal fence. A whistle blew. Cell doors automatically slid open and cautious figures began to emerge above and below. Still there were no guards. Small huddles formed on each side of the body and around the severed head, which lay smashed and staring amidst a scatter of sticky puddles on the lower floor. Someone picked it up and began running around the block in mock triumph, a bloody fist buried deep into the matted, curly grey hair. Everyone knew what this meant: a change to the order of things. Some inmates looked around warily and backed away into cells. Others joined the procession behind Felipe’s battered and frozen features. Soon there would be a reckoning.

  Chapter Ten

  Sierra Madre

  Maria Barosso scaled the steep trail through the mountain homeland of her Aztec Indian community. The morning was clear and fresh and - for the first time since an unexpected visit from the local police chief and two polite, but intimidating “businessmen” - she felt relaxed. A heavy-dew worked its way from the thick scrub into her woollen poncho and leggings. As she struggled across slippery ground to the top of a ridge and looked down at a boulder-strewn riverbed beyond, she was surprised to see a foaming torrent snaking its way between the rocks. This valley was nearly always dry. At best it was a series of crystal clear pools in which her children would sometimes splash or pretend to fish. Not since her own childhood had she observed a scene such as this. That was before most of the old growth forest had been cut down for timber, and the local climate had dried.

  Maria made several agile leaps from rock to rock across the flow, defying her advancing years. She squatted on the far bank to scoop two handfuls of water. It was unexpectedly cold as it trickled out between her fingers. As she feared, a small quantity of sediment settled onto her palm. She shook her head slowly and moved on. A flock of green parrots scattered as she pushed her way through the streamside vegetation and into a short stretch of pine forest beyond. The path meandered between the tree trunks then forked left and right. To the right the way would grow steep and begin to zigzag, as it made its way towards a grassy summit often favoured by courting couples. Maria branched left, following the contours of a second ridge, which descended steadily towards her, until she found herself at a col, staring down into a bowl of terraced fields beyond. A wisp of smoke ascended from a distant shack: her husband heating a kettle in their rudimentary fireplace.

  Within minutes Maria could see the damage: muddy channels carved through fields, patches of sodden debris, and piles of stone where a wall had given way. Worst of all she had a clear view of the poppies. Between one and two feet high, these thick-set, pale green plants jostled for space and light and had been close to flowering. Everything was ruined now. Broad leaves lay as if painted on the ground. Stalks leaned at crazy angles or hung their heads in shame. Whole patches lay flattened or bent - sat upon by some giant beast.

  It was going to have been a good crop this year - the family would have been able to afford their first car. They had already acquired a flat-screen television the previous season. Now Maria couldn’t help but think back to the weather-ravaged crops and food riots she had witnessed on her imposing new T.V. There would be no car now and the money they had borrowed to improve their home and to send their children to school would not be repaid. Worst of all, they could lose their land. Then they would join the dispossessed, tending fields they had once owned for the Mafioso bosses whom they had so recently entertained. She began to cry, as she recalled days of wheat and corn and fresh vegetables. Then she had been young and it had been her parent’s farm.

  By the time she reached the shack and threw open the door, Maria wanted to curse. Her fists were clenched and she would rage and scream at her husband. “How did we get into this situation? Why did I ever listen to you and your grand schemes?” Lo que siembres, cosecharás (what you sow, you will harvest). But she didn’t. At the sight of the guilt and defeat in her husband’s eyes as he handed her a steaming cup, all she could do was to set it down carefully with a trembling hand and hug him.

  “Somehow, we’ll be OK,” Maria lied. She began to pray. Then she hugged him tighter, as both her body and his were wracked by heavy sobs.

  Chapter Eleven

  Ciudad Juarez

  Luis was sitting in the general manager’s office of a large jeans factory in a small town not far from Juarez. Ever since Alfredo’s departure for England, he had been in a fire fight. Discipline was breaking down in one location after the other, as various loose-knit crime organisations and chancers tried to threaten or bribe their way into different aspects of the family business. The Contadona clan had managed personnel and security for many of the smaller factories and workshops in the main industrial belt around the central section of the US border for two decades. The larger multinationals also unwittingly employed staff hand-picked by them. This was one of Luis’ favourite roles. Not only had his father left him in full control, but it was also as near to legitimate commerce as his family came. Luis was proud that, in their twenty year involvement in the factory zone, serious crime in the area had all but disappeared and conditions for the workforce had greatly improved. This was why he was so angry with the man sitting in front of him.

  “Why did you punch her in the stomach?” he hissed at the plant manager.

  “She was always trouble, always complaining that the supervisors were harassing her.”

  “Was she pretty?”

  “Yes,” acknowledged the man, with a leering smile. He leaned forward at his desk, trying to connect with Luis, who was sitting at some distance across the room. It also helped him ignore the goons stood impassively on either side. “That was probably why we hired her in the first place.”

  Luis’ features hardened. “So that’s how you deal with employees who cause you trouble? Do you think that hitting a sixteen year old girl in the stomach makes you a big man?”

  The manager at last realised he had taken the wrong tack. He gave up trying to hold Luis’ gaze, drew a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped it across his brow. “I thought she might be trying to hide that she was pregnant. You know no one stays on if they are expecting.”

  Luis exploded, jumping to his feet, his chair clattering to the floor. “She was pregnant, you idiot. Apparently, she was raped by one of the supervisors you’re so keen to protect. Now the baby’s dead, the girl is fighting for her life in hospital and half of your workforce is out on strike. “

  “I’m sorry.”

  “You’re not sorry,” Luis shouted across the room, “you’re just scared for your own skin.” He turned towards a greasy, multi-paned window which overlooked a drab concrete courtyard. He folded his arms and looked out upon the scattering of individuals soaking up the winter sunshine below. “Have you got a daughter?”

  “Please!” The manager shrank back in his seat and issued a plaintive visual appeal to the man on either side of him.

  Luis walked slowly towards him, leaned on the desk, grabbed him by the hair and smashed a left hook into his face. As the man spluttered and bled onto the papers in front of him, Luis turned to retrieve his own chair. He sat down heavily and tried to recover his breathing, shocked by the depth of rage that had swept through him.

  “You,” he growled, “are going to sort out this mess - I don’t care how, or how much it costs, then you’re going to resign and get your wretched arse out of this town!”

  “Boss.” One of Luis’ minders was holding out his cell-phone. Luis snatched at it, letting it ring several times as he gestured to the bloodied figure to leave. “If I were you, I’d get your family out now, just in case that girl dies,” he hissed.

  “Yes?” he yelled at the phone.

  “It’s Gennaro. D
on Felipe has been murdered.”

  Luis disconnected. He did not react. He knew at once that he must not be seen to react. He calmly handed back the phone, his face the same impassive mask he always adopted when forced to do things not to his liking. He gestured to the others then waited for one of them to hold open the office door. As he descended the stairwell to his jeep the urges both to swear and to cry fought for supremacy. He did his best to do neither. Again he waited patiently as the passenger door was opened for him and his driver took his seat. Several bystanders now stood where they had previously sat, out of respect for Luis. He smiled an awkward smile of acknowledgement, but everything external was now a dream, whilst everything meaningful was drowning in turmoil within.

  As the car passed the security checkpoint and sped out into the open landscape beyond, Luis did his best to focus on the detail of what was passing. He needed to get back to this world and to take control, even though he knew it was now one in which everything had changed. He could almost feel his family’s grip on power starting to weaken. In the ditch beside the road he saw the metallic blue sheen of water which did not reflect the sky: a soup of dye and other chemicals released whilst bleaching jeans in the factory. He remembered a previous labour dispute, with those who then farmed the wasteland he now stared across. The farmers complained the runoff from the factory gave their fields and crops the same metallic sheen. They’d waived a positive test for heavy metal contamination at him and he’d responded by buying their land off them at the full market rate. To Luis this had been a simple, humane and entirely satisfactory conclusion, but the looks of pain and defeat that had greeted his generosity now returned to haunt him. He wondered how it might feel to be torn from all that you know.

  Luis understood, instantly, what Felipe’s death meant. It meant an enemy more powerful than they. The prison at Rochas Blancas had been in the absolute control of the family: that was why Felipe had chosen to serve his sentence there in the first place. Luis mentally scrolled through the options for what may have occurred. If someone at the jail had gone rogue, Gennaro would have mentioned it and it would already have been dealt with. Barrio Fuerte had the most obvious motive for murder, but they surely did not have the manpower or the financial resources on this side of the border? It was unlikely to be the Mexican Government, as they could not be seen to be favouring one criminal organisation over another. It could possibly be the CIA, but why would they do something as difficult as infiltrate a Mexican jail, when they could take out Luis or numerous others on the streets of Juarez? That left either another family or one of the sprawling, faceless, drug cartels that had taken over the eastern and western seaboards. Luis hoped it was the former. At least then he would know the nature of the threat.

  He focused again on the passing scene. They’d entered a grid of squalid dirt streets on the edge of the industrial zone. He could smell the rotting garbage, the rancid swamps of winter and the open sewers. They passed a school, the pupils in the overcrowded yard resplendent in brilliant blue and white uniforms. There was the hope, he thought, but his eyes couldn’t help but wander to a younger child beyond the gates. He was drinking, knelt as if in prayer, from a fetid pool. Home after home flashed by in an endless reconfiguration of cardboard, plastic, stick and sheet metal construction. The jeep dodged barking dogs and muddy wallows as it slid along the street. Luis leaned forward.

  “Where does the girl live?”

  His driver didn’t hear him. Luis shouted and the vehicle pulled over. There was a turn, half a block in front of them and to the right. “I want to walk - you follow. Sound the horn when I get to the right house.”

  He stepped out into the familiar muddy ochre, and hopped onto the broken concrete slabs which served as a sidewalk. Fat women in narrow doorways held their babies a little closer as he passed. A drunk span away from him, mumbling. Three small children laughed as they poked a kitten with a stick. He crossed behind a swaying, smoking bus and briefly stopped at a metal-grilled kiosk to buy cigarettes he didn’t need. Marcelo must die like his brother, he reflected. There was no other way. It was his organisation which had started this war, whether they were responsible for Felipe’s death or not. His father would know how to do it.

  Luis turned the corner, still deep in thought. Marcelo’s death would solve nothing, but it would reduce the number of variables. Alfredo was in exile because of Marcelo, but Luis was not a vengeful man. “It’s just business,” he mouthed to himself, but it left a more bitter taste than his newly acquired cigarette.

  The horn sounded and he looked around him. His destination was just another hovel, just another woman on a doorstep. As he approached, she turned and called to those within. An old man and two teenage sons parted a dirty net-curtain screen and shuffled nervously up behind her, over-awed by the appearance of three sharp-suited gangsters.

  “Is this the home of Gabrielle Jimenez?” Luis enquired.

  The men of the house dropped their wary stares and looked at the woman. She gazed fiercely back at Luis through a traditional braided headband, weighing him up with the stubbornness of someone who’d suffered more than anything Luis might be able to inflict. Eventually she nodded in tired affirmation.

  “I’m sorry for what has happened. The men responsible have been dealt with.”

  The woman still said nothing. She stared straight through him with piercing green eyes, but nodded again. Luis stretched a hand behind him and passed the thick wad of notes that was promptly placed there on to her. Immediately the old man shuffled forward, took the pile and disappeared, with a wary glance, within.

  “All the hospital bills will be paid. Your daughter’s getting the very best care. I hope she pulls through.”

  There was no response. Luis and his two attendants turned to leave. The woman spoke at last in a deep and distinctive voice, betraying her southern, Mayan origins: “For one who is alive, nothing is quite enough. For one who is dead, anything is too much.”

  Luis knew the expression well, but had never felt its force or futility before. He half checked his stride, thinking of Felipe and wanting to cry. Then he walked mechanically away.

  Throughout his current sojourn in Jaurez, Don Paulo had been staying at Hotel Catalina, the same pink-fronted establishment that his son, Luis, used. More precisely, he was staying in Luis’ room. His bodyguard, Eusabio and the rest of the team, which included Paulo’s personal cook and medic, occupied the remainder of the top floor. This had no impact upon Luis, who lived quietly with his American wife, Alex, in a distant desert suburb of El Paso. Like thousands of other Mexicans legally ensconced in the USA, Luis commuted back and forth across the border. Except for the recent addition of the scar on his face, this middle-aged and seemingly respectable businessman looked much like any other.

  That morning’s commute had gone smoothly, but rarely had Luis felt less like meeting his father. He had arrived home in El Paso late the night before, after his diversion to meet the woman in the township. He had neither had time to process the news of Felipe’s death, nor to tell his wife of their loss.

  By the time he reached the room, Gennaro, Eusabio and several others were seated around Paulo. Even as Paulo had aged, even after extended treatment for prostate cancer, he had maintained a defiant strength. Now Luis was struck by how incongruous this frail old man looked in a room full of gangsters. It was his time to be strong.

  “Papa, I’m so sorry about Felipe.” Just the saying of it made Luis almost break down. They had lost one of the cornerstones of the family. More than this, Luis had lost his boyhood hero and the only older male with whom he could readily share affection. Being strong was not going to be easy.

  His father gave him a baleful look then shook his head. Both understood that they would have to wait until they were alone to grieve for Felipe.

  “I feel like raising that prison to the ground,” Don Paulo almost hissed.

  “Someone
wants a war and we shall give them one, but first we need to be clear who we are fighting.” Luis slumped into the chair that Gennaro provided for him then looked up, expectantly. “Do we know any more about what Marcelo was up to?”

  Gennaro rested a comforting arm on Luis’ shoulder. “We think that someone powerful has been leaning on Barrio Fuerte. Whoever this was forced them to take a shot at Alfredo. It was probably meant to make us turn on them. Don Paulo asked me to get rid of Marcelo, but then we heard from our sources in his organisation. They were clear that Marcelo had decided not to go through with the assassination. He was actually doing his best to stop his brother. Now that his brother is dead it would be wrong to go after him. He may even work with us again. Perhaps he will have little choice?”

  “So who are we fighting?” Luis noted the frustration in his own voice, but Gennaro remained calm.

  “We’re still not sure, but it makes sense that when your brother, Alfredo, went away they would target someone else. Both your father and I know that we should have responded more quickly and increased security. I am very sorry for that, Luis. It must have been the same people who forced Barrio Fuerte’s hand who arranged the death of Don Felipe. Either that or God has finally tired of us.”