Six Minutes To Freedom

by John Gilstrap

  Rod was an interesting duck. Never a supporter of the administrationhe served—certainly not in the years since Barletta had stepped down in favor of Noriega’s marionette—he was officially first vice president now, but he’d months ago stopped doing any of the administration’swork. Neither DelValle nor his master needed him any more than he could tolerate them, so he had busied himself with perpetuatingthe medical practice he had built over a lifetime. He was, in fact, the man who had brought both Kimberly and Erik into the world. He was also a Rotary brother.

  “If they get him, they’ll kill him,” Kurt said to Pablo.

  Martinez shook his head. He didn’t believe that for a moment. But they would certainly arrest him and put him in a place where a man as fine as he did not belong. “We should warn him.”

  “Surely he knows.”

  “About the firing, perhaps, but how could he know the rest?”

  Fair enough. The orders weren’t yet five minutes old. But once warned, what was next? He needed a place to go, a place to hide.

  “Do you have his phone number?” Kurt asked.

  Pablo shrugged. “I have it here somewhere, I’m sure.”

  “Then call him. Tell him I’m coming to get him.”

  Martinez looked stunned. “Coming to get him? Then what?”

  “I don’t know. But we have to do something.”

  “You’re not Rambo.”

  There wasn’t time for this. “For two years we’ve talked the talk, and we’ve said all the things about rising up against the Pineapple, and now it’s time to walk the walk. I can’t leave Rod out there to twist in the wind.”

  Pablo knew Kurt was right. But he also knew it was a foolish thing to do. In just seven more months it would be time for the elections, and they had all promised each other to keep a low profile. To be detected was to be defeated. It was one thing to make a phone call, but somethingelse entirely to actually harbor the target of an active coup. Suddenly,the stakes had risen through the roof, and all the conspirators’ profiles rose with them. Pablo didn’t worry about himself—none of the team worried about themselves. But he did worry about his son, Antonio,whose hot-headedness gave him too high a profile as it was.

  But there really was no choice. Rod Esquivel was a friend. A brother. And they shared a common enemy.

  “What do you want me to tell him?” Pablo asked.

  “Tell him to drop what he’s doing and wait by the door. I can be there in five minutes.”

  Pablo cast a glance back toward the scanner, where the radio trafficwas growing exponentially. “Better make it three.”

  Kurt split the difference, arriving in four minutes at the entrance to Rod Esquivel’s medical office, where the vice president was waiting for him at the door. Offering up a silent prayer of thanks that he’d driven the Cherokee today instead of his usual Volvo, Kurt threw the transmissioninto park and ran around to the passenger side back door. “Climb in here on the floor,” Kurt said, opening the door.

  Rod moved with a deliberate speed and professional grace that both impressed and infuriated Kurt. If someone were watching, Rod didn’t want to give them the satisfaction of seeing him ruffled. Kurt saw it a little differently. PDF officials were on their way, and if they were close, he’d just as soon get the hell out of here. Rod climbed into the back and sat on the seat, as if he were any other passenger.

  “On the floor, Rod,” Kurt said, pointing to the crap that littered the floor of the backseat.

  The vice president hesitated.

  “You can’t afford to be seen,” Kurt explained. “I don’t know what Pablo told you, but DelValle just fired Noriega, and Noriega has dispatchedhis goons to take you to prison. If you could hurry a little, that would be really good.”

  The Cherokee was the vehicle they used to transport the kids from one event to the next, and like kid-mobiles all over the world, this one was a mess on the inside. On a different day, Kurt might have been embarrassed.As it was, he was relieved to be able to cover Rod with the blanket they normally used to sit on the grass at soccer tournaments.

  “Stay down, be still, and hope we don’t hit any road blocks,” Kurt said, tucking the blanket in around his passenger then hurrying back to the driver’s seat.

  The road block was the nightmare scenario. Ever since the National Civic Crusade had begun wreaking havoc, road blocks had become a way of life in Panama. Kurt never got the sense that the soldiers were ever actually looking for anything; rather they were just rousting peopleas a way of flexing their muscle—rousting people because they could. A little rousting would go a long way on this particular afternoon.

  As Kurt pulled away from the curb, Rod asked from the back, “What about the president? Who’s taking care of him?”

  Kurt had no idea, but in deference to the high office held by his passenger,he refrained from saying what was really on his mind: “I could care less what happens to that pussy.”

  “Where are you taking me?” Rod asked.

  Another very good question. This entire operation was way beyond the scope of anything they had planned for. This was improvisation in its most deadly form, but he hesitated to confess as much for fear of seeming less ... noble in the mind of the vice president.

  “We’ll go to my house,” Kurt said, trying his best to make it sound like a well-considered decision. “Once we’re safe inside, we can figure out the next step.”

  “I need to get word to my family.”

  “I think Pablo is already doing that, but once we get to the house, my home is your home.” In a country where virtually every phone was tapped, Kurt wondered if his bravado sounded bold or merely stupid. If Pablo had, in fact, called Jean Esquivel to warn her of the family’s impending arrest, then the PDF would know more about the conspirators’operation than any of them had ever imagined. Surely, he would not have done that, Kurt told himself, and as the words formed in his head, he knew instinctively that he was right. Never once in the two-plusyears of Radio Constitucional, and more recently, La Voz de la Libertad, had any of the team made so foolish an error as to use the telephone as a means for conducting their business. They had their radiosfor secure communications.

  But this was a palace coup, for God’s sake, and the key players had no radios. What choice would Pablo have had but to use the telephone?

  That’s when Kurt’s mind grasped the reality that Rod must have known from the beginning. It was he who was the vice president of the country, not his wife. It was he who must be whisked to safety. To includehis wife in the evacuation would be merely a gift, a courtesy. A wonderful bit of news. If she could not join him, then Rod would face the worst choice that patriots the world over have ever been forced to make: to stay true to his cause and principles even as his loved ones are tortured.

  It was only a few miles back to the house, and as Kurt negotiated the route in the Cherokee, he tried not to think about these things, even as he grappled with the reality of what he, Tomás, and the others had been playing with all these months. You can talk about toppling a government, and you can talk about taking on a murderous dictator single-handedly, but until you see a wanted man—a man who exuded dignity and political savvy—sprawled like a bag of grain on the backseatof a car enduring fears that no man should ever face, you really don’t understand the consequences of your political actions.

  At this very moment, as they had been for many weeks, the streets were filled with special listening trucks manned with Cuban audio technicians scanning the air twenty-four–seven, with the single goal of putting Kurt and his pals out of business. In the game Kurt had chosento play, the penalty for losing was a lingering, unspeakable death; not just for the individual perpetrators, but in all likelihood for their extended families as well. Just who the hell did he think he was to bring this kind of danger down on the shoulders of his family, merely in pursuit of principle? And of all the people in the country with cause to hate Noriega, who the hell was Kurt Muse, the towering blond-hairedgringo who could leave
the country in an instant and cash in on his American citizenship, to be leading the fight?

  He pushed these thoughts out of his mind. They didn’t matter anymore.What was done was done.

  Today wasn’t about La Voz, and it wasn’t about Kurt. Today was about Rod Esquivel and the preservation of the rule of law in Panama. There’d be plenty of time to worry about all the rest later.

  Unless Pablo had used the phone.

  Without a garage to cover their actions, they had to risk detection by prying eyes as Kurt whisked the vice president of Panama into the house through the front door.

  To watch Rod, who stood tall and walked with graceful dignity up the walk, you never would have known the danger he was in. If Kurt had had the power, he would have whisked the man to the door as if they were under fire. He hated being exposed like this. In El Avance, the upscale neighborhood where the Muses lived, they were surroundednot just by the successful business people one would expect, but also by senior PDF commanders whose second and third incomes from graft and outright theft allowed them to afford their mortgages. As the politics became progressively more bitter, and the protests were put down more violently, it only made sense that the PDF goons would be watching their neighbors even more closely than they’d been watchingbefore.

  Finally, they were at the threshold, and as Kurt reached for his key, his heart stopped for an instant as he realized that the door was alreadyunlocked. Is it even possible? he thought as his mind jumped ahead to a trap having been laid in his house.

  The ridiculousness of the thought became apparent as he pushed the door open and he heard Kimberly call from upstairs, “Hi, Daddy!”

  Overhead, he could hear her bounding footsteps as she came from her bedroom to greet him. She was halfway down the steps when she saw Rod, and she froze. Her face was a mask of confusion.

  “Hi, honey,” Kurt said. “You remember Dr. Esquivel.” Turning to their visitor, he added, “Rod, this is my daughter Kimberly.”

  Esquivel smiled and offered a courteous nod. “Nice to see you again.”

  Kimberly’s scowl deepened. “Hi.” To her father: “Is everything all right?”

  “Everything’s fine,” Kurt said. He marveled at his daughter’s intuitivepowers sometimes.

  “Have you heard the news about the Pine—” she cut herself off in deference to the vice president. “You’ve heard about General Noriega?”

  Kurt knew that she was putting the details together in her head, and he didn’t want her to go there. “We’ve heard, but that’s nothing for you to worry about. Go on upstairs and finish your homework.”

  She didn’t want to go. He could tell from her posture alone that she expected some answers.

  “Please, Kimberly,” he urged one more time. “Really, everything is fine. Dr. Esquivel and I just need to discuss some things.”

  Her eyes moved from her father to his guest and back again. She wanted to discuss some things, too, but she didn’t push the point. “Well,” she said, “nice seeing you, sir. Welcome to the house.”

  Another courteous nod from Rod, and then Kurt ushered the man upstairs into the master sitting room and offered him a seat.

  “Your daughter looks confused,” Rod said.

  Inexplicably, Kurt found himself defending her. “Oh, she’ll be fine. She just—”

  Rod interrupted with a flick of his hand. “I understand perfectly. It’s not every day that a young girl finds an exiled vice president takingrefuge in her house. Were I her, I think I might look a little stunned myself.”

  Kurt smiled. He appreciated Rod’s understanding, even as he dreaded Kimberly’s future questions. Annie knew everything about what Kurt and the others were doing, but they deliberately kept the children on the outside of that facet of their politics. The questions raised today, though, would likely end whatever reign innocence held over his daughter.

  Kurt ushered the vice president to a chair in the living room and asked, “Can I get you something?”

  Rod waved off the gesture. “I don’t need you to get me anything,” he said. “But I do need you to carry something for me.”

  Kurt felt his stomach tighten.

  “A message,” Rod clarified. “To Jean. By now, she should be at the U.S. ambassador’s residence. I spoke to her after your initial phone call to me, and that’s where she said she was going to go.”

  Kurt found himself nodding his agreement to visit the residence beforehe even had a chance to think through the consequences. For a man who had valued stealth and low profiles for so many months, he sure as hell was playing fast and loose with his profile now. He listened to the message and committed it to memory, understanding right away why it had to be delivered in person.

  “Can you do that for me?” Rod asked. “Are you willing to do that for me?”

  “It would be an honor, sir,” Kurt said. He found himself swelling with pride as he considered the mission that lay ahead.

  “Thank you, Kurt,” the vice president said. “And while you’re on U.S. sovereign ground, there’s one more favor I’d like to ask of you.”

  39

  The home of U.S. Ambassador Arthur Davis quite literallyoccupied the high ground in Panama City, perched atop an area known as La Cresta—the high ground. Kurt had been here several times in the past for official receptions and the occasional cocktail party—nothing unusual for any American ex-pat in the relatively closed community of Canal Zone employees and military officials—but never before had he been so aware of the houses across the street from the elaborate security gates, where he knew for a fact that Noriega henchmencarefully noted the comings and goings of visitors. For an Americanto show up on a day as politically crazy as this one would not necessarily be cause for concern in and of itself, but this business of playing fast and loose with all of La Voz’s long-standing obsessions with anonymity were beginning to wear on Kurt.

  “American citizen Kurt Muse to see Ambassador Davis, please,” he said to the young embassy guard at the guard house. “I bring a very important message.”

  It wasn’t until the guard started to speak that Kurt noticed the M-16 slung on his shoulder. Clearly, security had been ramped up considerablysince President DelValle’s announcement. “I’m sorry, sir, but the residence is closed to visitors this afternoon.”

  Kurt shook his head. “But it’s important,” he said, recognizing as they left his lips that these were words that the kid with the gun had heard a dozen times every day.

  “Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to turn around and try again anotherday.”

  Damn. There was no other way but to spill the beans and hope that the goons across the street didn’t have state-of-the-art listening devices. “Look,” Kurt said, leaning closer through the open window, even as the guard leaned cautiously away from him. “I need to speak to someonein an official capacity. I have a message from Vice President Esquivel,and he asked me to deliver it personally.”

  The security guard’s eyes narrowed as he considered the ridiculousnessof the claim. But there was a spark of belief buried just under the surface of his suspicion. “Pull over to the side there and wait, please.” He gestured to a parking slot off to the side of the gate that seemed designedprecisely for the purpose he described.

  As Kurt moved the car, the guard made a phone call. A moment later, the guard emerged from his hut and gestured for Kurt to leave his car where it was and walk closer. He did exactly that. Off to the right, beyond the gate and ahead near the house, Kurt saw Susan Davis, the ambassador’s daughter, approaching him from the residence. The personnel gate to the side of the vehicle gate buzzed, and Kurt confirmedwith a glance back to the guard that it was all right for him to pass.

  Susan Davis was the reason why Kurt and Annie had been invited to the embassy events that they had attended. In her thirties, they were more or less the same age and frequently ran into each other on the socialcircuit. As he neared, he noted an air of tiredness about her this afternoon.They were still in plain sigh
t of any and all prying eyes from outside the compound.

  “Hello, Susan,” Kurt said when they were within easy earshot of each other. “I need you to do me a favor and give me a big hug, as if I were your best friend back from a long trip.”

  Sensing the need for high drama, Susan’s face broadened to a bright smile. As they embraced, Kurt whispered, “I’ve got Rod Esquivel hidingin my living room. I have a message from him for your father.”

  “How nice to see you again,” she said, for the benefit of long-range microphones. “Please come on inside and have something to eat.”

  “Is your father here?” Kurt said in a barely audible voice.

  “Let’s go in and get something to eat,” Susan said again. Neither one of them believed that the PDF had listening equipment sharp enough to hear them, but it made no sense to take the risk when a completely shielded residence lay just a few yards ahead.

  The ambassador’s residence was palatial in both size and grandeur, befitting the nation that brought Panama into the twentieth century. The last time Kurt was here, the ornate marble foyer was filled with visitors, all of them having a marvelous time. Today, on this afternoon, the tension in the house took on a physical weight.

  When they were inside and the door was closed, Susan said, “My father is not here. He’s at the embassy, but I can take you there. Come with me.”

  She led the way through the center of the house, through an official reception area. It was there that Kurt stopped dead in his tracks, stunned at what he was seeing. On the left hand side of the room, the entire DelValle family—minus the president—sat scattered among the various pieces of lush antique furniture. They spoke in hushed tones, and when they noticed the towering blond-haired gringo staring at them, all conversation stopped.