Chapter 15
San Pablo del Montana, Colombia, June 1998
He climbed out of his large and very new, four-wheel drive Jeep Cherokee and gasped as the wet heat of the Colombian summer night hit him in contrast to the air-conditioned interior of the car. He stood five feet nine inches tall and was slim and wiry with jet-black hair and moustache, both kept short and tidy. He wore a cream coloured, lightweight linen suit and beige pigskin shoes, with a silk shirt, underwear and socks. His features and colouring were those of the South American Indians, which can be seen from Mexico right down to the tip of Cape Horn, although his car and clothes screamed America and big money. He locked the vehicle and entered the lobby of the six-storey block of flats that he lived in and owned and took the lift to the sixth floor, where a modern penthouse replaced the four, two bed roomed flats that the rest of the floors held. Unlocking the double security locks he entered the luxury apartment.
The double security system was more a symbol of his status than a necessity, for in the small Colombian mountain town of San Pablo del Montana, Martin Torres was a big man. Only a fool or a stranger would try to rob him and strangers were not allowed. The respect he received he owed as much to his position as a senior lieutenant to Fernando Borrodo as to the esteem in which his fellow men held him, although of necessity, one went with the other in this town. Since his recent promotion, Torres now ran the Borrodo Cocaine distillery, located some five kilometres away in the mountains and employing over five hundred of the local population. He was also responsible for all distribution matters and that made him a man of some importance.
For those that worked for Borrodo and his brother Carlos the rewards on offer were high. In fact the standard of living for everyone in this part of the Colombian hinterland was higher even than in the capitol, Bogota. Here, unlike in many other areas of the country, electricity was taken for granted, as was a ready supply of piped, clean water and decent housing. Food was also plentiful and cheap, as were alcohol and tobacco. American TV was available by satellite and most homes owned a modern music system and fridge/freezer.
There was however, a price to pay. This particular two thousand square miles of Colombia was really a country within a country where free movement was restricted by armed "Soldiers" and no one left or entered without their permission. All the local officials and politicians held their posts on sufferance from the Borrodo's and received a monthly salary for compliance with the way they wanted things run. Lack of compliance was swiftly, savagely and sometimes fatally, dealt with. The main condition demanded in exchange for the high standard of living was instant and total obedience. Not just from employees, but also from their entire families, for those who broke the code brought suffering to all. The system would not have been unfamiliar to any member of the Sicilian Mafia. Torres had stayed fast to his masters through the years of inter-gang warfare that had eliminated many of the other drug barons and had established the Borrodo brothers as "Numero Uno" in Colombia and now he was reaping the rewards. Inside his penthouse suite Torres turned up the air conditioning and walking over to the corner bar, poured himself a large Jim Beam on the rocks. Taking it back to one of the deep leather armchairs he took a deep pull at the drink and felt himself start to relax. He picked up a remote control and turned on the hidden stereo system. Black Soul music filled the night and he put his head back on the soft white leather and breathed deeply. He thought again about what he did for a living and why.
His family had been poor people who struggled to find enough to eat and were almost pure Indian, apart from a token splash of Spanish blood, putting them at the bottom of the social and economical heap and last in the queue for anything, even working for the Organisation. Having spent most of his childhood underfed and poorly clothed, Torres had welcomed the chance to work for the Organisation with open arms. If it meant that he and his could live a better life, what did it matter to him if some rich Yankees ruined their minds with Cocaine. In his view the Americanos had held Colombia to economic ransom for years. His own father had died at the age of thirty-three, worked to death in an American owned coffee plantation, leaving him the man of the house at thirteen. He'd had to beg, slave and work as a general dogs body for over two years to keep them before he was considered old enough to work for the Organisation. During in that time he had learned all there was to know about poverty.
At fifteen he had gone to work in the Cocaine distillery, where his first job had been to look after one of the machines that crushed the Coca leaves. By the time he was twenty he was in charge of a whole section and his Mother and four sisters were living in a proper house. He discovered machismo and family pride. At twenty-eight he was in charge of an entire shift of one hundred and eighty workers and at thirty one, he was Assistant Manager of the Works. Since his latest promotion he now ran the plant completely as well as the distribution network and he was one of the top five men in the Organisation. Not bad for an uneducated Indian. He had invested his own money away from the distillery and now owned a considerable amount of property that included this building. His Mother and his two unmarried sisters lived in one of the ground floor flats, as did both of his married sisters and their families. Both married to Borrodo men of course. He drifted.
A year ago, he himself had been on the brink of marriage. Christina Morrel was the beautiful, dark haired daughter of the owner of the local Cantina and he had watched her closely since she had first drawn his attention at the age of fourteen. It had been in the local church, he saw nothing strange in a man of his profession being a devout catholic. She had been chosen that year to bring the flowers to the altar on the Day of Our Lady of the Mountain and she had been wearing the statutory, pure white muslin dress. It had been a modest enough affair, but as she had walked down the centre aisle with the flowers held out in front of her, the sunlight streaming through the widows had revealed in silhouette her young body, with Its newly formed breasts and long slender legs. Torres had found it the most incredibly erotic thing he had ever witnessed and had worried that his erection would still be obvious when the service ended and he had to leave his seat.
He had continued to watch her for the next two years with the heat building in his loins. At almost sixteen she'd had the face and body of an angel with enormous dark eyes, jet black hair down to her waist and a figure that fevered his blood and kept him awake in the heat of the night. He had already let it be generally known of his interest so that her father would not promise her to any other and was only waiting for her sixteenth birthday so that he could formally approach her him and ask for her in marriage. He had no qualms that it would not please her to marry him for he had bathed in the smouldering glances she had sent him when she felt she was not being observed. No, he been sure that she would not object to the match, after all, at that time he had just been made Assistant Manager of the whole factory. He'd had only one more month to wait when a problem arose.
Christina had a brother, Pepito, who was not the brightest of boys, but may have been one of the stupidest. At the age of eighteen he'd felt that the Organisation had not recognised his true talents, as they had refused to let him join the "soldiers." This was actually a reasonable decision and they correctly considered him too volatile to be trusted with weapons, and they sent him to work in the factory. In his anger he had applied to leave the town and go to Bogota to seek work, but he was not a trusted man and permission was refused. Torres had agreed with these decisions, but Pepito had been incensed. He had made stupid threats against the Organisation and intimated that he would be going anyway. After three days of his continual badmouthing of all things Borrodo, action was taken.
At two in the morning, four men arrived at his father’s bar. Dragging him still half asleep from his bed they had thrown him into the street where with long bamboo canes they had spent fifteen minutes beating him into unconsciousness and had then left him lying there in the road. No one else in his house, including his father or four brothers, had dared to leave their beds. No bones had been brok
en although the youth had been unable to walk properly again for some eight days. At the end of that time he'd gone meekly back to work in the boiling sheds and for once worked efficiently and silently. Other men nodded to each other and tapped their index fingers against the side of their noses. Borrodo's law had shown another young hothead the error of his ways.
Martin Torres had been relieved. To marry the sister of a known troublemaker may have endangered his place in the Organisation. Thankfully, the boy seemed to have seen the light and by the time the wedding took place after the proper courtship period it would have all been almost forgotten. As for Christina, he had only another month to wait before he could officially declare his interest. Then he had gone down to the coast for a few days, to help sort out a packaging problem and field-test some proposed solutions. When he returned the plane was, as usual, met by some of the soldiers who would safely escort them back the twenty kilometres to the town along the rough jungle road from the airstrip.
The man chosen to be Torres bodyguard for that evening was an old acquaintance, as he and Juanito Perres had joined the organisation at the same time. Although he had known there would not be the same potential for advancement, Juanito had wanted to join the soldiers. He liked guns and he enjoyed being outside. Normally when the two of them were alone they would forget their relative positions and act like old friends. Tonight though, Juanito was being a lot more formal than usual. His speech contained to many Jefes and Señors for Torres liking.
Torres had declined to drive. He did not mind how dangerous a road journey was, but something about flying about in between the mountains in a small twin engined Beechcraft, ruined his equilibrium. Now he was leaning back in the passenger seat, smoking and listening to a South American dance music station and trying to get his nerves back to normal. Perres was driving unusually gently, as he normally revelled in a chance to gun the big Ford off-roader along the mountain roads with his foot hard down. Torres was about to remark upon this when the soldier suddenly pulled the car off the road and to a stop. Torres sat up and looked around, suddenly anxious.
"What is it, Juanito?"
Sometimes bands of outlaws haunted the forests, men so desperate that even the fear of Borrodo soldiers didn't keep them away. They would strike at any vehicle that came their way, steal what was worth stealing and leave the car and its occupants burning. That was the reason for the armed escorts. The soldier didn't answer him. Opening his door he stepped down to the ground and spoke through the open doorway.
"I thought it best that you saw this for yourself, Jefe."
He pointed towards the trees. Torres stared out into the night, but the darkness defeated him.
"Come." said the soldier and walked towards the shadows outside of the cars headlights. Torres got out of the car into the damp heat of the night, feeling the sweat immediately start to form in his armpits and around his collar. He walked around to the driver's side via the rear of the car, making sure that he did not ruin his night vision by crossing the headlights. As he did so he was assailed by an unholy and indescribable Stench that had him gagging for breath.
There were a row of them, five males and three females, the entire Morrel family. The father and four sons, aged twelve to seventeen, had been tied to the trees in a line. They had been there long enough for decomposition to begin and for the insects to begin attacking the softer tissues of the eyes. Their legs and arms had been pulled hard behind the trees and then tied tightly, this having the effect of bringing them down onto their knees. Another rope had then been taken around the tree across their open mouths and pulled tight. Bringing the heads upright and causing the now sightless eye sockets to stare out across the red dirt road, but this is not what had killed them. Driven through each chest and into the tree behind them was a one inch diameter, hexagonal headed, twelve inch bolt of the type normally used to hold large steel girders together. Torres knew that the other end would have been ground to a fine point. With mounting dread he stumbled after the soldier to where the women were.
The bar owners wife and her two daughters had died a different and perhaps crueller death than their men folk. They had been tied to the trees in a similar manner, but in such a way as to leave them standing and in their case there were no metal spikes. Their clothes had been ripped open down the front so that they now hung loosely over the ropes that bound their hands behind the tree. The black blood matted in the hair between their legs and down there thighs, showed where all three, including the twelve year old, had been repeatedly raped, before a single shot had been fired into each forehead bringing a final, merciful release.
Torres felt the black roaring tide begin in his ears and would have fallen if the soldier had not taken his elbow to steady him. He fought hard to prevent the vomit that had surged into his throat from crossing his teeth and swallowed repeatedly to return the bile to his stomach. He took a long, shuddering series of deep breaths to bring his ragged breathing under control and blinked his eyes furiously to prevent the tears that welled up from escaping. Finally he felt control return, all apart from a slight trembling of his limbs and he turned to the soldier.
"When and why?" he ground out. "The whole damn family?"
The soldier looked at him as if gauging the reaction he would get.
"Borrodo's law, Jefe."
He turned and walked back to the Ford and opening the door swung him self up into the drivers seat, the interior still cool from the air conditioning. He started and then gunned the engine a couple of times, while Torres climbed into the passenger seat. Taking out his cigarettes he lit two from the dashboard lighter and passed one to Torres. He put his own into his mouth and took two deep drags before he spoke.
"I'm sorry, Jefe." Still the formality, showing he was not enjoying this experience. "But I thought it best that you saw for yourself rather than heard about it unprepared."
He took two more deep drags on the cigarette, making the end glow furiously in the darkened interior.
"I know you had your eye on the eldest girl."
He paused and lit a second cigarette from the stub of the first before opening the window and throwing it out into the jungle. He turned to Torres.
"You remember a couple of months ago it was necessary to discipline the eldest boy, Pepito?"
Torres nodded, realising for the first time that Pepito had not been with the others among the carnage in the trees. The soldier continued.
"Well, we all thought that he had learned his lesson. For the last few months he has been as good as a nun in a convent, working hard and no more mouth. Everybody was happy. Family and the Organisation."
He took some more smoke from the cigarette, but more slowly and calmly now he was into the story.
"Three days ago he volunteered to stay behind and clean the vats out for another hombre who had a really hot date." He sneered. "A real reformed character."
He took another lung full of smoke.
"Anyway, a couple of hours after Pepito was supposed to have left for home one of the factory security patrol didn't show up where he was supposed to. At first they thought he might be banging some girl out in the trees, it does happen when they get horny enough to forget the risks of being caught off station, but when he was still missing after another hour the alarm was raised and a full search carried out."
He slung the second butt out of the widow and removed the burnt down and untouched stub from between the fingers of Torres left hand. He lit himself a third cigarette and closed the window.
"They finally found him in the managers office. Somebody had attached half a metre of wire to two six-inch bolts and used it as a garrotte. They had practically cut his head off."
Torres turned his head.
"How do they know it was Pepito?"
The soldier looked at him.
"I'm coming to that, Jefe. The man's machine pistol and his knife were gone. Two hours after they discovered the body, Pepito crept up on the men guarding the back trail from the factory up over th
e mountain and let them have practically a full magazine between them before making a run for it over the mountains."
He tapped his head.
"However, what he and nobody else knew, is that there is always a third man up there, just about another one hundred yards on from the guard post, to prevent any sneak approach in over the mountain. He heard the firing and just waited for the kid to come up the path. Then he emptied his magazine into him. One of the others had been his brother."
He looked across at Torres.
"You can expect to find that security is now tighter than a crab's arse".
He shrugged and then dropped the formality.
"Look Martin, I know you had plans for this girl, but don't you see, for someone in your position they were blown the first time her brother shouted his mouth off. I mean, if you had married her before he turned bad no one could have blamed you, but to marry her after the kid had shown what he was, that would not have helped you at all."
He shrugged
"Besides, you know the rules. When someone fucks up like this the whole family goes. Makes anyone else think twice before they try the same."
Torres looked at him for some moments before he spoke.
"Juanito, are you supposed to be on duty tonight?"
The formality was instantly back.
"No Jefe, but I enjoy driving your big car so I swapped duty with my sister's husband."
Torres nodded, showing an outward calm that he did not feel.
"Thank you Juanito, I won't forget this. Lets go home shall we?”
The soldier nodded and stepping hard on the accelerator moved off with all the wheels spinning.
Torres came out of his reverie and brought the room back into focus. He walked over to the bar and refilled his drink before returning to his chair and to his thoughts. Twelve months had passed since that night and he had tried hard enough to come to terms with his loss, but he had been unable to forgive them. He still carried on and did the job to the best of his ability, but more and more he had found himself nursing thoughts of black revenge. Of striking back on her behalf, to revenge her for the young life, so full of promise and so casually and callously snuffed out. He did not allow himself to admit that he might want to avenge his own loss, his own broken dream. He could not bring himself to examine the fact that a whole squad of men had repeatedly done to her sweet young body what he had waited two years to do and had never attained, although in the back of his mind the knowledge burned holes. He did not let himself dwell on the fact that he might even have forgotten the incident by now if it had been some other family involved. He just felt it sitting inside him like a cold heavy stone. With his newly discovered machismo in ruins at Christina's death and his inability to prevent it, he wanted to hurt them, to destroy the Borrodo's completely, but at that time he had not been in a position to do so. His thought drifted backwards in time again.
Following the deaths of the soldiers, Carlos Borrodo had swept through the security system like the grim reaper and heads had rolled. The two brothers and their three top lieutenants had sat into the night discussing the problem. As the result the factory manager was retired, fatally, and to his surprise Torres was given the factory. This gave him a huge salary increase and an enormous lift in status, but more importantly it gave him opportunity. He was now a member of the main decision making group. As head of the production facility he had to be, and that meant he could use that knowledge to strike back. As befitted his rank he was allowed to choose a new car. He gave the Ford to his brother in law and chose the top of the range model, Chrysler Jeep, complete with tinted glass, air conditioning and power everything. He was then given a few days in Bogota to collect it and to taste some of the joys of Senior Management.
On this journey Manuel Ramirez, who was along to show him the ropes and to grease the palms of some politicians, accompanied him. Ramirez at that time was in charge of distribution and the Senior Lieutenant to whom Torres now reported. As such he was a seasoned traveller and it was felt that Torres needed someone more worldly with him on his first visit to the big city. Also it was important for him to know something of the distribution system in order to match production to sales. After all, this was an international business they were engaged in.
They had arrived at eight in the evening, Torres in the usual state of nerves after a bumpy flight through the mountains. They booked into their hotel, the luxury of which amazed Torres and where Ramirez was treated like visiting royalty. Then, bathed and changed they were off on the town.
Ramirez's idea of a good time was fairly simple. First he picked somewhere for dinner, usually an expensive restaurant, where he ordered and ate the most expensive things on the menu. Then to go on to a nightclub where they proceeded to pick up two likely looking girls and get totally legless. All four then returned to the hotel where the girls would be given some Cocaine to sniff into their nostrils. When this had its desired affect, clothes were thrown off and the girls would be screwed in every known position, until all four collapsed in exhaustion, all good basic fun.
On their third and final night Torres held back on the drinking. Firstly, he had not the head or the experience of his companion, but more importantly, while he had sat in his room that afternoon recovering from the night before, he had been idly glancing at a map of the city that the hotel provided. Down one side of it was a list of the places of interest and importance. He was reading down them haltingly, struggling to pronounce some of the foreign names, when he stopped dead. One of the entries was for the American Embassy and it gave a phone number.
His heart had started to pound and a vein in his temple begin throb at the sheer terror of the idea that had come to him. He had got up and gone into the bathroom and splashed cold water over his face and wrists and then back into the bedroom and switched on the television to distract himself, but his eyes had kept being drawn back to the map. He paced around the room stopping to stare out of the window at the passing traffic and people, down below. There he stood, gnawing at the knuckles of his right hand until his eyes lost their focus as his thoughts came back to the map. He turned, and reaching the table in three quick strides, grabbed up the map and studied it. He checked the reference numbers for the location of embassy and the street name. There it was, only two blocks away from the hotel. No! It would be madness! If he were seen there it would be him who was nailed to a tree next time.
It was the last thought that had strangely calmed and decided him. He remembered what they had done to his bride to be. There would be no need to visit the embassy as that would be suicide, but he could telephone them, although not from here. He thought it through. After his efforts of the previous night Ramirez did not usually rise until well past midday. He on the other hand was usually up before nine thirty and went out to one of the innumerable local cafes for a breakfast of black coffee and toast. That was when to do it.
So here he was on the next morning about to embark on the most dangerous day of his life. He forced himself to go through his established routine, going down to the foyer and handing in his room key as usual. He joked with the receptionist about the hour that they had returned the previous night, while a nervous sweat formed in his armpits and soaked into his new silk shirt beneath the light cotton jacket. On the way out he stopped and visited the hotel shop in the foyer and bought a small note pad and a pencil, before stepping out into the bright morning sunlight of the Capitol.
This time he walked past the coffee houses and cafes closest to the hotel and from memory followed the map towards the American Embassy, as it was fairly close, only minutes away from the hotel in fact. At first he didn't see it, as it was a surprisingly small building and he'd been expecting a much grander affair. When he had seen it he didn't know why he'd needed to as he was only going to telephone them anyway. Perhaps it was just to be sure it did exist. He walked slowly past it, his eyes scanning the plate that told the public who's building it was, and then walked around the corner and into the first cafe he came
to.
Here he ordered a coffee and took it to a table at the rear where it was darker and quieter. He spent the next half an hour trying to write down the gist of what he was going to say when he got through. This was difficult for two reasons. Firstly, he didn't know exactly what he wanted to say and secondly, with his poor education he couldn't write a lot of the words he wanted to use. He cursed the lack of proper education that until now had not been a problem. When you worked for the Borrodos you only needed to be numerate and he was good with figures. Finally, he tore all the discarded paper into small pieces and for security reasons, set fire to them in the ashtray. They made a surprising amount of smoke, which annoyed the other customers and drew their unwanted attention to him. He frantically waved the smoke away.
He Beckoned to the waiter and paid for his coffee, remembering to ask for a lot of small change for the telephone. The waiter gave him the look he reserved for country hicks and Indians who didn't know their place in life, while pointedly replaced the brimming ashtray with a clean one. Torres took his change and to cover his confusion gave the waiter a big tip, which only drew him more contempt for being a jumped up peon with too much money. He left quickly feeling their eyes watching him as he went, so much for not drawing attention.
Outside in the street he walked around until he found a small Plaza with some stone benches where he sat and tried to restore his damaged equilibrium. He thought it through again. In all the television programmes he had ever seen the CIA always had a man in the embassy. Perhaps that was true. If so, he only had to ask to speak to the CIA man and after that it should be easy. He looked around for a pay phone. When he found one he carefully placed his pile of coins on top of the telephone books and took out of his wallet the piece of paper with the embassy number on it that he had copied out in his hotel room. He swallowed a couple of times to lubricate his suddenly dry throat and remove the lump that had suddenly appeared there that he thought must be his heart. Wiping his soaking palms on the front of his trousers he took a deep breath, fed some coins into the phone and dialled. There was a lot of clicking and whirring before he heard the phone ring and he prayed desperately that no one would be able to overhear the following conversation. He knew all phone calls in San Pablo were regularly monitored as a matter of course, those houses where phones were allowed of course. His suit now had dark stains under the armpits and down the spine.
"Buenos Dias, United States Embassy, Bogota. Diga?"
Relief. The woman was speaking in Spanish. He had feared they might answer in English.
"Buenos Dias. Could I please speak to the CIA please?"
There was a moment’s silence on the line.
"Could you please give me the name of the person you wish to talk to, Señor?”
The voice was calm and level, but Torres knew something was wrong.
"I don't know what his name is, I just want to speak to the CIA. Can't you just put me through for Gods sake?"
Sweat was breaking out all over him, made worse by the bright sunlight pouring in through the glass windows of the booth.
"I'm sorry Señor." The Señor no longer had a capitol letter. "But this is the American Embassy, not the CIA. I can give you the number for the Washington office of the CIA, but unless you know the name of who you wish to talk to here, I cannot help you."
The voice was still calm and well modulated. Torres broke.
"Listen to me you stupid cow. I have got information I want to give to the CIA. Now you get one of those bastards to the phone or I am going to walk away and leave this thing. Do you understand me? Do you?"
His voice had risen to a near shout on the last two words causing him to glance wildly around to see if anyone was within hearing range outside of the phone box. The phone was almost slipping out of his hand from of the amount he was sweating; combined with fierceness of the grip he had on it. The voice on the other end was still very cool.
"Just one moment Señor."
The line went dead apart from some static and various background clicks and buzzes. Then a male voice spoke.
"You still there?"
"Yes"
"What information do you have?"
This was better.
"I work for the Borrodos and I can tell you about drugs."
"What about drugs?"
"You know, where they are going and when."
"Go on then, I'm all ears."
"Not now, not today, in the future. When I hear things and can get to a phone."
There was a brief silence on the other end of the line.
"Where are you now, Bogota?"
"Yes."
"Phone me back in half an hour. Ask for Señor Garroda."
The phone went dead. Torres staggered out of the booth and collapsed on a bench. He was drenched in sweat from head to toe and close to vomiting from tension and fear. Then he controlled himself and thought about what he had done. Would he call them back? He had half an hour to decide if it might not be better to drop the whole thing. He walked along the main boulevard until he found a men's clothing store, where he went in and bought himself another white linen suit, silk shirt and underclothes and asked to use the men's room. There he undressed and using the cracked and grimy sink and his handkerchief, washed himself all over as best he could before putting on the new clothes. The discarded clothes he screwed up and put in the carrier bag. He gave these to the shopkeeper, telling him to get rid of them and walked back out into the street feeling better.
This time he chose a different cafe and had a cold beer and by the time the half hour was up he felt like a new man. The cafe was crowded and noisy with workers taking their mid-morning break. He decided to use the wall phone, as the noise would cover his conversation. He took out the piece of paper from his wallet and dialled.
"Buenos Dias. United States Embassy, Bogota. Diga?"
"Señor Garroda please."
There was the usual static for a couple of moments and then a mans voice spoke to him in fluent Spanish.
"You in a pay phone?"
"Yes."
"Same one you used before?"
"No."
"Good. Now listen, here is your contact telephone number."
He gave a series of digits, easily remembered as they all repeated twice. He went through it three times and then asked Torres to read them back, which he did.
"You only need to remember that number. Its in Washington DC and Its manned twenty-four hours a day. You can get the country and area codes in any hotel telephone directory. Is all that clear?"
"Yes"
"Right. When you call, the first thing you do is give your code name. That tells us who is calling. Yours is Snorter."
Torres failed to see the irony in this, but repeated it back dutifully. The voice continued.
"The call will be taped so don't hang about waiting for a conversation. Just give your information, say how much you want and where it is to be paid and then clear the line. If we like the information and it gets a result we will pay any reasonable amount requested. Understand?"
"Yes, but I don't want anything...." But he was talking to a dead phone.
That had been the start of it. So far in the last year he had only used the number on two occasions. Times when he was away from San Pablo and when he'd had good information he had picked up at the weekly meetings. Now though, it was different. Two months ago Manuel Ramirez had been killed when his plane had crashed in a sudden storm. Torres had known nothing of this until Fernando Borrodo himself had called at his apartment and asked if he could come in. From a Borrodo this behaviour was astonishing. Although almost always superficially polite, the direct opposite to his brother Carlos, Fernando Borrodo owned this area and everybody in it. For the mountain to come to Mohammed was unheard of.
Torres had been terrified that he had been discovered and in his fear had almost bowed the elder Borrodo into his apartment, much to that person’s amusement. Borrodo had drunk a lot of his twelve-year-old whiskey and made small
talk for almost half an hour, continually admiring the furnishings and decor of the Torres apartment before he had finally got around to the reason for the visit. It came out of the blue.
"Martin, you are not to report for work at the factory in the morning. Do you understand?"
Torres shuddered and swallowed hard.
"No, Jefe. Have I done something wrong?"
Borrodo ignored this and carried on speaking, looking directly at Torres who was by now sure he had been discovered.
"Angel Morro is to take over your duties there from now on, do you understand?"
Torres dropped his eyes and let his shoulders sag. They knew.
"Yes Jefe."
But now Borrodo started shaking with laughter and Torres was completely confused as Fernando Borrodo slapped him on the back a couple of times, having difficulty speaking through his mirth.
"Martin, Martin. Do you know why you are not to report to the factory in the morning?"
"No Jefe."
"Because Ramirez is dead and you are now in charge of distribution. It makes sense to have both jobs under the same man. So you are taking over from poor Ramirez as of tomorrow, but unlike him you will be in charge of the factory also, Angel Morro is your new assistant." he waved a hand in the air like a matador. " And now," he picked up Torres jacket and threw it to him, "we celebrate."
And with that he dragged the by now incoherent Torres out into the night.
On his next rest and recreation visit to Bogota he had called the Washington number and asked for certain communication equipment to be left in his hire car. In the last three months he had learnt a lot about communications and he at last had seen a way to really hurt them. The result was now hidden in his wall safe. It was not much bigger than a laptop computer and had fitted easily into his suitcase for the return trip to San Pablo
Coming out of his daydream he finished his drink and returned the glass to the bar. He then opened the double doors to the large terrace and stepped out of the air conditioning and into the steamy night air. Although his flat was not overlooked he walked to the edge of the terrace and leaning on the balcony studied the street below. The only cars there were his and those belonging to the other occupants of the flats and he knew them all. He looked along the street. Nothing unusual. He threw the butt of his cigarette over the edge of the terrace in a long fiery arc and went back into the room. Lifting a picture from the wall he revealed a large safe. He dialled the combination and then took a key from around his neck and opening it, took out a black leather case. It had practically the same dimensions as an ordinary laptop, but deeper.
Carrying this out on to the terrace he placed it on a large, marble topped table and opened it. From the first compartment he removed what looked like an old fashioned flash bulb reflector, except that it was around three times as large and of satin finished aluminium. He fanned it open so that it formed a shallow dish of some two feet in diameter. Next he took out a bundle of Aluminium tubing, which he assembled into a small tripod with a universal head on the top. To this he screwed the dish. In the centre of the dish, standing straight up on end, he attached a cylinder of about six inches long and two inches in diameter.
He opened another section of the case revealing a small miniature tape recorder set into a sophisticated control panel. He plugged two fine wires into the control panel and ran them into sockets in the top of the cylinder. Next he took out a small compass and using this turned the tripod and dish to point almost due north. From the calibrations on the side of the tripod head he angled the whole dish at precisely twenty-two and a half degrees from the vertical. Watching the control panel, he gently swung the whole array to the left. Nothing. He brought it back to its original position and swung it gently to the right. A red light began to blink. He continued to make minute adjustments until a green light appeared next to the red, and glowed steadily. He locked off the universal head.
He had done this several times since he'd had the equipment, but not gone any further. Now it was decision time, for he had information that could greatly damage the Organisation. He switched on the tape recorder and taking from his pocket a piece of paper, he read out his code name and a stream of information and co-ordinates. He then switched the unit into standby mode and rewound the tape. Taking a deep breath he stabbed a finger on the start button before he could change his mind and the reels of the recorder became a blur of motion, as a forty five second message hit the distant satellite in less than five.
Staring out at the unseen satellite Torres lit another cigarette and started to dismantle the equipment. It had started. He knew that sooner or later they would realise that they were being betrayed and from there very quickly work out by who. He must now make sure that he did as much damage as possible before they came for him.
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