by Rusty Young
I now had more than his permission to see his daughter; I had his blessing and encouragement. This was to be my happiest period with Camila since Papá’s death – our honeymoon period. We spent long Sundays in my dinghy, with my men nearby protecting us. I dismissed them to make love to her by the rope-swing tree, this time on a picnic blanket.
By then, Camila was halfway through her final year at high school. With buses now running, attendance at her colegio was back up. The students felt safe, and Camila held her head high when I dropped her at the school gates each morning on a Yamaha.
In February, she was due to commence university. I’d hoped that she’d change her mind and decide to stay once Llorona was safe, but her heart was still set on studying and me going with her. That gave me seven months to finish off Papá’s remaining killers and request a discharge from Trigeño. Having that deadline looming over us made every moment together more valuable.
Mamá was overjoyed to have me home. She cooked me dinner once a week and I accompanied her to the Llorona church for Mass on Sundays. On my few rest days, I toiled to restore our finca. My platoon became a work crew, painting the walls, mending blocked pipes and rewiring the chicken coop. I had a carpenter repair the floorboards in my room and nail together furniture.
I bought new frames for the cherished photos I’d kept in my locker at La 50 and Camila retrieved Papá’s bullet-pocked cross from under her house.
Javier Díaz made good on his promise of promoting investment, accompanying a caravan of architects, engineers and national politicians on a tour of the region. The Díaz brothers won a government contract to build a new asphalt highway to replace the dirt road leading south from Llorona to Puerto Princesa. A Telecom tower was erected on the crest of the hill a kilometre and a half from our headquarters to provide cell phone coverage for Llorona and parts of Puerto Galán. Trigeño also trucked in a VHF repeater antenna, which we attached to a tall tree outside the camp’s perimeter where it was guarded by a fifth German shepherd. This gave us direct communication with the army and local taxis.
Iván, the young boy Ñoño had brought back from our trek, slotted into camp life like a bolt into a nut. He slept when we did, in a hammock next to Ñoño’s, and woke when we woke. During the day, he performed camp duties – sweeping the sheds, peeling potatoes and fetching firewood. He was a hard worker and, while it may be difficult for people born in cities to believe, his quality of life actually improved.
When I complimented him on the trenches he’d drained of water, Iván replied, ‘This is easy compared to el monte.’
Life in the mountains, as the son of subsistence farmers, had been tough. He’d worked all day, from dawn to dusk. His father went away for days on end and Iván often went hungry and was filled with anxiety, not knowing when – or if – his father would return.
Even those of my men who’d initially begrudged Iván’s presence as a trifling nuisance, mumbling that he was a garrapata – a tick that had latched on and knew where his food was coming from – were eventually won over by having their dirty plates washed and their hammocks aired out in the sun.
In July, for my next rotation of men, I had Coca-Cola transferred back into our unit. His limp prevented him from being a front line soldier, but he’d always dreamed of being an urbano with plain clothes, a pistol and a motorbike. Well, now he was.
After Coca-Cola’s successful transfer, it was only a matter of time before Palillo came to me with a special request.
‘You’ve got Camila. Other commanders get to live with their novias, so …’
‘I’ll try.’
Palillo was still only a squad commander, but after the successful Zorrillo operation and trekking mission, his star had risen. Trigeño sent us Piolín the following week.
‘Discretion,’ I told them on the first day. ‘No distractions. Are we clear?’
They were still smitten with each other, but rather than hugging in front of the others, they nodded their greetings. This time, they gave me no trouble and I allowed them one privilege – a screen partition in the corner for privacy.
It felt good. Our old team was back together, minus Tortuga, MacGyver and Yucca, who were sadly missed. But together, we now ruled the town.
To restore security we behaved like new schoolteachers stamping authority on unruly students – strict at first with plans to ease off later. Drunks and brawlers were fined half a month’s wages or, if unemployed, were required to perform a month’s community service digging drainage canals and filling potholes. Theft ceased. Locals said if you left your car’s engine on and doors wide open, it would run out of gas. Domestic violence was severely punished.
Piolín was particularly adept at earning victims’ trust. She had a calm, open nature – like a counsellor you immediately wanted to confide in. The abuse she’d suffered at her father’s hands made her sympathetic to battered women, but also passionate about preventing further violence.
‘We’ll talk to your husband,’ she’d say. ‘Don’t worry, he won’t be harmed. But he needs to know that we know.’
‘If he discovers I’ve spoken to you, next time might be worse.’
‘Señora,’ she’d say earnestly, ‘there won’t be a next time.’
While we weren’t able to stamp out cocaine production entirely, we limited its effects in the villages. Anyone smoking drugs was given three days to leave. Rapists and child molesters were sent to La 50 for a protracted death. Married men were forced to be faithful. The Autodefensas believed affairs broke down social order, eventually leaving women destitute and causing abandoned children to skulk around the streets looking to steal something. Broken families were ripe fruit for Guerrilla recruiters.
Unfortunately, nothing could be done about promiscuity. Womanisers like Uncle Leo would always find some foolish girl to believe their false promises. But for the unfaithful husbands who Piolín identified, Palillo added personalised touches to their punishments. For a cheater’s first offence, Palillo would tie him to a fence post all day in the sun, wearing only his underwear. Local women could taunt him.
‘Are you caliente?’ they’d ask, hurling buckets of water to cool him off. During Fashion Week in late July – when the nation stopped to watch television coverage of models strutting in bikinis along Medellín catwalks – one man reoffended. Palillo got inspired, parading the cheater through the plaza in high heels with his lover’s G-string over his face. Old Man Domino was the only man not whistling.
‘Not enjoying fashion week, viejo?’
‘Are you a policeman?’ he demanded grumpily, glancing at my pistol. He was drunk and it seemed he’d forgotten his normally impeccable manners. I still owed him for his bravery and kindness, so I was courteous.
‘No, señor. I’m not.’
‘Didn’t think so. Haven’t seen a policeman around here for some time.’
Sober, Old Man Domino was delightful – often betting against Ñoño in checkers and beating him using the D’Orio triangle opening. Drunk, he became cantankerous. But he was right – villagers had never enjoyed a proper police force. However, as their trust increased, complaints to us soared.
Once villagers circulated our phone numbers, trivial neighbourhood disputes and age-old family grudges bubbled to the surface. Every downtrodden citizen wanted a piece of justice – preferably local justice, Palillo-style.
Palillo had found his niche. He’d always wanted to be a soap actor. But this was better. This was real life acting. He was now director and writer of his own show. The plaza was his set, villagers were cast members and Ñoño his best supporting actor.
On payday in August, as his stepfather stumbled home from the cantina, Palillo trailed alongside like he used to as a skinny thirteen-year-old on a pushbike, trying to protect his mother. Only now, he rode a Yamaha 200cc, wore designer sunglasses and kept a Taurus clipped to his hip.
‘What do you want?’ grumbled Diomedes, the engine’s growl visibly taxing his nerves.
‘Nothing,
’ replied Palillo, revving the Yamaha harder. ‘Just out for a ride.’
‘I ain’t done nada. You got rules to follow too. I ought to report you to someone.’
‘Let me call my boss.’ Palillo unclipped his radio then slapped his forehead as though he’d just remembered. ‘¡Ay! Here he is right behind me!’
Riding pillion passenger, I fluttered my fingers in a wave. Diomedes knew we couldn’t act without cause, but he didn’t trust Palillo not to invent an offence. So he bowed with begrudging courtesy. ‘Señor Pedro.’
But Palillo wasn’t finished.
‘What are you cooking for your family tonight? Look!’ He handed him two bags of groceries that were dangling from the handlebars.
‘This simply ain’t right,’ grumbled Diomedes turning into his house. ‘World’s turned upside down.’
‘You’re free to leave,’ Palillo called after him. ‘Doubt anyone will miss you.’
Late at night, Palillo sat revving the Yamaha outside his stepfather’s house. ‘Just try it!’ he seemed to be saying. ‘Lay one finger on her and you’ll see who I am now.’
His motorbike vigils wasted fuel, but I couldn’t complain. I owed Palillo big time.
121
AFTER TWO MONTHS we exchanged the checkpoint’s pull-up chain for a proper boom gate with concrete ballast. Although we patrolled Puerto Galán by day, it was too dangerous to do so at night so we closed the highway at 7 pm and re-opened it at 7.30 each morning.
Earth movers, tractors, excavators and graders arrived on semi-trailers to begin work on the Díaz brothers’ new highway. We believed the Guerrilla would try to destroy the machinery, so it was parked each night on Old Man Domino’s property, where it was protected by its proximity to our headquarters.
The Díaz brothers were flourishing – Javier returned permanently to his luxury hacienda and Fabián came on regular flying visits from the capital in his new Cessna. Now that a respectful period had passed since Don Mauricio’s death, Fabián announced his candidacy in Vichada’s senate elections the following year – the outcome that he, Javier and Trigeño had probably wanted all along.
I couldn’t help but wonder how our efforts to eradicate cocaine production were affecting the Díaz brothers. US fumigation planes were doing three runs per day from Buitrago’s airfield to destroy coca plantations, no longer fearing the Guerrilla would shoot them down. Trigeño assisted those campesinos who wanted to sow legitimate crops, setting up a similar Agricultural Co-operative to the one run out of La 35. The barn beside our headquarters acted as a storage depot for seeds and fertilisers. From time to time, trucks arrived loaded with yellow barrels of herbicides. They were collected by Lulo Martínez, a trusted campesino boss from Puerto Princesa, who ensured they reached the right people.
Colonel Buitrago seemed happy with me running things south of Garbanzos. In September, the destroyed police garrison at Llorona was rebuilt.
Of course, we’d been expecting retaliation from Caraquemada for the limpieza and killing Zorrillo, and it was not long in coming. His men set up a surprise roadblock between our Llorona checkpoint and Puerto Galán and kidnapped a Telecom engineer who was planning the construction of a second cell phone tower further south.
‘Secure the highway,’ I ordered Palillo as soon as we learned of the kidnap. ‘And block access to the river.’
I radioed Colonel Buitrago, who sent two platoons – eighty soldiers – into the jungle in pursuit.
A Blackhawk flew overhead, its gunners firing .30-calibre ráfagas into the canopy at the Guerrilla’s estimated location. Although unlikely to hit them, this would slow their progress. A second chopper flew five kilometres ahead. Soldiers rappelled into two clearings and spread out, forming a loose net to block the kidnappers’ escape, while the army and Autodefensas closed in from behind.
Buitrago’s men found the engineer abandoned in a clearing. When he’d sprained his ankle the guerrilleros had been forced to leave him behind. The army airlifted him back to safety. The Guerrilla squad got away, but the thwarted kidnap made national headlines. Colonel Buitrago felt vindicated. Footage showed him in a flak vest assisting the limping engineer onto a transport helicopter. When the helicopter landed in Bogotá, cameramen filmed the engineer hugging his wife and children.
Victories like this were a boost to national morale. Buitrago’s message to the Guerrilla was clear: Whatever move you make, we will block you. Wherever you go, we will chase you. At any cost, we will stop you.
‘Finally!’ said Alfa 1, who’d come down to join us for celebrations. He’d lived his life by that creed and for once was not jealous of the army taking credit. He even patted me on the shoulder. ‘Good work.’
For several days, the family reunion footage played on loop. After watching it many times, I punched the OFF button. I was glad for the engineer but also glum.
‘That should have been you, Papá,’ I said. ‘That should have been us.’
To have risked kidnapping the engineer so close to my checkpoint, Caraquemada’s frente must have been desperate for funds or a military triumph. But they’d failed, making the rescue another turning point – a far happier one than the limpieza. The Autodefensa takeover of Llorona was flourishing. After yet another news feature portraying Buitrago as a fearless rescuer, he rang me.
‘Caraquemada is still far from defeated,’ said the colonel. ‘But thank you, Pedro. Now I think it’s just a matter of time.’
Field by field, farm by farm, person by person, we were wresting the country back from the Guerrilla’s clutches. Every kidnap we prevented meant one fewer family devastated and one fewer Guerrilla bargaining chip against the government. Every bag of rice confiscated from Buitre’s logistics network made the Guerrilla hungrier and more demoralised. And every enemy or collaborator we captured brought me closer to my father’s killers.
A week later, I was at our base at sunset when Coca-Cola radioed me from Llorona Plaza. Two brothers who were well-known carpenters had stopped him on his motorbike, claiming they needed to see me urgently. They would talk to me, and only me. I agreed to meet them at our Llorona checkpoint and rode straight down.
‘We didn’t want to burden you with this,’ said the younger brother, toeing the dirt. ‘It’s a delicate matter – a family matter that we’d normally have dealt with ourselves.’
The elder took over, leading me away from my men. ‘It’s our sister. She’s pregnant. The father won’t recognise the child.’
‘But how does that involve us?’
‘We reasoned with him. We even begged. Then my brother here almost punched him, but we know you prohibit fighting. He taunted us, saying how could we be sure it was his anyway? But our sister’s not like that. She’s only seventeen. He said if we didn’t leave his shop, we’d have you to deal with.’
‘Who did?’
‘Your uncle.’
122
UNCLE LEO WAS behind his counter. The brothers arrived and politely invited Leo to accompany them to the civil registry where their sister was waiting. Leo jeered and pointed them to the door. His face dropped when he saw three Autodefensa soldiers gesturing for his customers to leave. A small crowd gathered, as Uncle Leo exited and then locked his shop. Of course, the townspeople didn’t know what was happening, although later, when his young wife’s bump showed, they would realise. When his eyes met mine, he flushed with embarrassment.
Coca-Cola stood there as witness while Leo signed the marriage certificate with Amelia.
Palillo didn’t approve. ‘Better to have no father than one who doesn’t want you.’
‘You really believe that?’ I countered.
Palillo’s stepfather had finally skipped town. His mother would no longer let Palillo near the house.
‘You should be glad to be rid of him,’ Palillo had said to her indignantly. But she wasn’t glad. Yes, he’d been a violent drinker. Yes, he’d been a womaniser. But he’d had a steady job, sometimes he helped with the kids and, on the nights he did c
ome home, he stopped her from feeling lonely.
‘Eventually she’ll realise she’s better off without him,’ Palillo declared. Fortunately Piolín got on well with Palillo’s mother and had bonded with his siblings. I had no doubt she’d eventually reconcile mother and son.
Even at fourteen years old, Ñoño had the sense to remain neutral. He enjoyed inspiring fear in men three times his age, not to mention the side benefits with high school girls.
‘Jump on!’ he’d say to a girl walking along the road.
‘Thanks, but I’m only going to the supermercado for my mother. It’s two hundred metres.’
‘Doesn’t matter. I’ll take you.’
Whether out of fear or daring, the girls agreed. Ñoño would speed off and circle the plaza three times before depositing them at the store.
In his spare time, Ñoño taught Iván how to disassemble and oil a Galil. He dragged up old planks from Uncle Leo’s timber yard and constructed a set of monkey bars, which he used to train Iván every evening, between sit-up and push-up sessions.
‘He’s only a kid,’ I said. ‘He’s not a soldier.’
‘Just in case he has to go to La 50.’
Thirteen was the earliest age Iván could commence basic training. That gave us three years to find a way for him not to join the war.
In the meantime, we tried to make his childhood as ‘normal’ as possible. Camila brought him her brothers’ old clothes. Piolín taught him to use a toothbrush and Mona helped him memorise the alphabet. On his days off, Ñoño took Iván to make friends with Old Man Domino. They played checkers in Llorona plaza and fed the pigeons.
When Palillo gave Iván his old BMX, the smile on the boy’s face was as wide as if he’d won the lottery.
After Iván had been with us a full three months, something Ñoño said struck me in the heart. ‘We made the right choice, Pedro. If we hadn’t taken Iván, he would have become a guerrillero. We might even have faced off against him in battle. What if we shot him? What if I shot him?’