Montega's Mistress

by Doreen Owens Malek

  “What are you going to do?” Alma asked, aware that he wouldn’t wait around for that to happen.

  “I think I know where the rocket launchers are. I’m going to go up there and take them out.”

  “And the gringa?” Alma asked, standing up as Theresa signaled her for help.

  “We’ll talk about her when this is over,” Matteo concluded, taking a sip of his coffee and putting the cup down. He headed for the rear of the tent where Helen lay.

  He pushed aside the curtain and saw her. She was sleeping on her stomach with both arms trailing to the ground, one cheek pressed against the cot. He reached out and touched her hair gently, then withdrew, not wanting to wake her.

  Helen sensed his presence and opened her eyes just as he was leaving.

  “Matteo!” she said, struggling into a sitting position and blinking the sleep from her eyes.

  He turned and bent toward her, catching her in his arms.

  “I was so worried about you,” she murmured, resting her head on his shoulder as he sat on the edge of the cot.

  “Nothing ever happens to me,” he said quietly, sliding his fingers under her hair to cup the nape of her neck.

  “You’re saying that to the wrong person,” Helen reminded him. “I know better.”

  “I made out a lot better than some of my people,” he said flatly.

  “Is the damage very bad?”

  He nodded grimly, pulling back to look into her face. “The worst we’ve ever sustained, by far. They didn’t stumble on us the usual way this time. This was planned.”

  In answer to her questioning glance, he added, “They never launched a full scale attack on us like this before. They didn’t have good enough information on where we were to come so well prepared.”

  “But how...” Helen began, and then the answer presented itself. “Olmos,” she said miserably.

  “He had to have told them,” Matteo agreed. “He was the only one who could have given them our location.”

  “Oh, Matt, if you hadn’t fought with him over me none of this would have happened.”

  “Don’t say that. It isn’t true. The problem between Olmos and me wasn’t about you; it had other causes, other roots. Something would have brought it to a head sooner or later; you were just handy, that’s all.”

  “He picked me because I was unpopular,” Helen said bluntly.

  “Then he was mistaken,” Matteo said soothingly. “Everyone has seen how you’ve taken hold here. Even Theresa, who would have thought Saint Joseph was lazy, has nothing but praise for you.”

  “He told them you were here. That’s why they’re pouring it on,” Helen said, returning to the subject of Olmos.

  Matteo didn’t contradict her. “Our camps are scattered all over the country. I could have been in any one of them, and it would have been a waste of energy and ammunition they don’t have for them to firebomb them all trying to hit one man.” He let her go and got up, pacing in the small enclosed area. “But they’re not shooting in the dark any more. This attack was intended for me.”

  “Cut off the head and the animal dies,” Helen murmured.

  “So they think,” Matteo said softly, and the look in his eyes frightened her.

  “What are your plans?” She struggled with the words, afraid to hear the answer.

  “My men and I were able to pinpoint their nest on the ridge just above us. They’re launching the rockets from there. If I can hit them with a couple of grenades, it’ll break the back of their assault.”

  “You’re going now?” Helen whispered, horrified. “In daylight?”

  “We can’t survive another night like the last one,” he answered simply.

  Helen jumped up, grabbing his arm. “Why do you have to go?”

  He stared at her, puzzled. It would never occur to him not to take the risk himself.

  “You’re the leader, you said it yourself. You’re more important than the others. Let someone else go.”

  He took her fingers and gently disengaged them from his arm. “Helen, you’ve seen the people in this camp. You know how they reacted to this attack. They’re scared, and with good reason. We’ve never been in a position like this before. They’re guerrillas; they’re used to being the aggressors, hitting and running, not being picked off like sitting ducks. They need to be shown that we can endure an assault like this and come back from it. Will any of them fight if I hide? They know what has to be done, and they have to see me do it. Otherwise they’ll run off into the jungle, scatter like the loners they were before I organized them. And that’s exactly what the government would like to see. Do you understand, Helen?”

  “I understand,” Helen murmured, wishing she didn’t. Appearances counted for everything here; she had to act courageous when she didn’t feel that way, and he had to be courageous, all the time.

  “Are you scared?” she asked him, stepping closer.

  He enfolded her, rocking her to and fro. “Nah,” he said, putting just enough emphasis into it to convince her that he was.

  “Can you say Connecticut?” she asked, and he smiled.

  “Do you mind if we don’t test that right now?” he answered, looking into her eyes.

  “You can fool the rest of them but you can’t fool me,” she told him.

  “What? You don’t believe I’m Superman?”

  “No.”

  “You won’t tell on me, will you?” he whispered, hugging her tighter, holding her for a moment and then letting her go.

  He got up, pushed the curtain back and said to Theresa, “Tell everyone who can walk to come to the center of the compound by the water pump. I want to talk to them.”

  Theresa nodded, and Matteo took Helen’s hand. “Come with me,” he said. “You won’t understand what I say, but I want them to see you by my side.”

  Helen followed him, past the wounded reclining in Theresa’s tent, out into the morning sunlight.

  The debris from the firestorm was all around them. Most of the tents were down. The ground was littered with bits and pieces of everything from cookware to exploded grenades, which had gone off on the impact of the rocket bombs. Helen could see why Matteo had chosen the spot he had for the meeting; it was sheltered by a natural outcropping of rocks and thus not visible from above, where the government troops might still be watching. The members of the group assembled slowly, many wearing bandages, some with arms in slings. Matteo surveyed his ragged crew, and Helen could see him wondering how to boost their spirits, how to convince them that he had not given up and that they shouldn’t, either.

  When he was satisfied that all had arrived, he propped one foot, still encased in a combat boot, on an overturned crate and leaned forward intently, turning his head to look at each of them, one by one.

  He began speaking in Spanish, and Helen watched the reaction of his listeners, since she couldn’t follow his words. They were immobile, their eyes fixed on him, hanging on every syllable. She saw Alma in the middle of the crowd, leaning on a machine gun, looking every inch the freedom fighter she was, surrounded by faces Helen had come to identify with Matteo and his cause.

  Helen yearned to know what Matteo was saying. She glanced around for Theresa and saw her not far away. Moving almost imperceptibly, she cut a slow path to Theresa’s side.

  “Translate for me,” she said to her friend. “What is he saying?”

  Theresa glanced at her, then at Matteo.

  “Run,” she whispered to Helen, picking up the narrative in the middle, “if you believe that what we’re fighting for can’t stand this test. Go back to the lives you had before, full of fear, without self respect and without hope. But if you know, as I do, that our struggle is the only way for our country to be free, never stop working to make the dream a reality.”

  Helen listened as Theresa’s hushed voice echoed Matteo’s ringing forceful one, repeating the speech in the first person, just as he said it.

  “If I don’t come back today, go on without me. Find the other group
s and join them. I’ll die in vain if the cause dies with me. It’s not one man, but all of you, together. If any of you can remember a time when I let you down, when I didn’t do myself what I am asking of you now, then let my name be cast into oblivion with the weaklings and the traitors who couldn’t put their lives on the line for the future.”

  Helen’s eyes filled with tears at Theresa’s emotional translation of Matteo’s simple, eloquent words. She took Theresa’s hand and held it, feeling closer to the other woman than she had ever felt to her own mother.

  “But if you know, as I think you do, that the name of aquatar stands for a new day in Puerta Linda, then stay here and fight. Be brave, like el jefe Montega. Be brave, like Montega’s woman,” Theresa concluded, turning to look at Helen as she said the last words.

  Even as the tears ran down her face Helen could see that his tactic was brilliant. He was shaming them into a show of courage, comparing them to himself, whom they knew to be valiant, and to Helen, whom they had shunned as an outsider but were now forced to recognize for her loyalty to their leader. Walking back through the crowd, she took her place at Matteo’s side and confronted them, her eyes moving from one face to the next, showing them that she was not afraid.

  Gradually, as if at some unspoken signal, they dispersed, going back to the places they had come from, and everyone knew that not one of them would leave. They trusted Matteo and on the strength of his word they would stay.

  Matteo waited until they had gone and then lifted Helen into his arms, swinging her in a circle.

  “What a woman I found in Florida,” he exulted. “How did you know just when to appear like that?”

  “I joined Theresa in the crowd and she told me what you were saying,” Helen replied, as he put her down but continued to hold her.

  “I wondered why you left me,” he said. “I’m glad you let them see you like that. Your presence persuaded them more than I ever could with words.”

  “You give me too much credit,” Helen murmured. “You know how to hold your audience, Matt.”

  “Public Speaking 101 at Columbia,” he smiled, rubbing at the wetness on her face with his thumbs.

  “I doubt it,” she answered, in no mood for jokes. “When are you going?”

  “Now,” he said flatly, releasing her. “Why don’t you stay with Theresa? I’m sure she could still use your help.”

  “She must be sick of looking at me,” Helen said. “It’s hardly the glorious work of the revolution she envisioned, riding herd on a Yankee tenderfoot.”

  “She likes you; you know she does,” Matteo replied, turning her around and facing her in the other direction. Helen could tell that he wanted her to leave so he could get moving, and she took a few tentative steps, looking back at him over her shoulder.

  “Will you say goodbye before you go?” she asked.

  He eyed her speculatively, and she could see him trying to decide which would upset her less, a brief farewell or no farewell at all. He opted for the former, nodding shortly.

  “You have my word on it,” he said, and she turned away.

  Helen went directly to Theresa’s tent, where she did whatever anyone asked her to do, acting as general dogsbody. About an hour later Theresa pulled her aside.

  “Matteo is waiting for you in the back,” she said, jerking her head toward the curtained-off space where Helen had slept earlier.

  Feeling as if she were walking in a dream, Helen put down the basin she was holding and walked to the rear. Matteo looked up as she drew the drape back and stepped into the cubbyhole with him.

  He was dressed in camouflage fatigues and loaded down with weaponry: a pistol and a knife at his waist, a sash filled with bullets across his chest and a row of hand grenades dangling from his belt. She stopped a couple of feet away from him, loath to get too close.

  Matteo saw her reaction and knew its cause. One by one, he removed the offending items, setting them on a crate at his elbow. When he was clean he opened his arms and Helen walked into them.

  “You’re not going alone?” she said, her voice sounding strange to her own ears.

  “I’m taking two of my best men. More than that might attract attention as we move through the jungle. We have to avoid being spotted until we’re close enough to destroy the nest.”

  “You could be gone a long time.”

  “I don’t know. We might have to wait until dusk, when visibility declines, but we can’t wait until full dark. That will be too late.”

  “You’re very good at this, aren’t you?”

  “What?” he said, his mouth against her ear.

  “This guerrilla stuff.”

  “I have to be. That’s why I’m still alive.”

  “Come back,” she said softly, stepping away from him.

  “I will.”

  Helen turned her back while he reclaimed his hardware and didn’t look around until she heard him leave. Then she followed, watching from the tent entrance as he joined the two men waiting for him. All three walked to the stand of shade trees at the edge of the clearing and fell to their knees. Helen stared, fascinated, as they smeared their faces and hands with mud, a product of the recent downpour, gouged from the base of the big jacaranda. Elsewhere the earth had already been dried by the hot Puerta Linda sun, but in the dim shade of the giant tree’s branches the ground was still soft, ready for their use.

  Matteo didn’t say anything to the others, but at some hidden signal they rose together and melted into the trees, their clothes blending in with the foliage so well that after a few seconds they were invisible. She looked at the spot where they had been for a moment longer, then went inside.

  “Is he gone?” Theresa asked.

  Helen nodded .

  “Now comes the hard part. We wait.”

  “For what?” Helen asked.

  “The explosion. If we don’t hear it by nightfall, we’ll know the cabos got them.”

  The cabos were the government troops. The name, an abbreviation for caballeros, or horse soldiers, had originally referred to the mounted police. It had passed into general usage as a synonym for gentlemen, which was ludicrous when applied to the military arm of the current regime. But the title stuck, and among the rebels it was another word for butchers.

  The afternoon was a torment for Helen. She had thought the night before was bad, when they were under attack, but at least then she had been busy. Now there was nothing to do except change an occasional bandage, get a drink of water for a thirsty patient and listen. She listened so hard that she felt her eardrums should have burst from the strain, but she heard only the usual camp sounds, the birds in the trees and the ominous, larger silence.

  She was sitting on an overturned box, staring into an empty cup, when Theresa sat on the ground next to her and handed her a banana.

  Helen shook her head.

  “Take it,” Theresa said. “Maybe you’ll want it later. If you get any skinnier even Rafaela’s clothes won’t fit you anymore.”

  Rafaela was the smallest of the women, and she’d been supplying most of Helen’s things. Helen accepted the piece of fruit, peeled it and took a bite.

  “The waiting is a brujata, no?” Theresa asked, using the peasant word for a bad dream, a nightmare cooked up by a bruja, or evil witch.

  “Yes,” Helen replied.

  “Now you really know what it is like to be one of us,” Theresa commented. “If you can stand this, the rest is easy.”

  “What can they be doing out there?” Helen asked rhetorically.

  “Taking care,” Theresa said. “Matteo is very careful, very...” She tapped her temple with her forefinger.

  “Smart,” Helen supplied. Theresa’s English came and went in spurts; at times she could wax eloquent, at others the simplest words failed her.

  “Si´. Inteligente,” she agreed. “We’d all be dead if Olmos had been in charge from the beginning. He was fearless himself, but foolish, too quick to act.”

  “Where do you think he is?”
Helen said to her.

  “Olmos?”

  “Yes.”

  “In hell,” Theresa replied. “He betrayed his friends; he is a Judas. There’s no place on earth for him now.”

  So Matteo wasn’t the only one who’d figured out the source of the previous night’s attack.

  “I feel responsible,” Helen confessed, alluding to her role in Olmos’s defection, which continued to haunt her despite Matteo’s dismissal of it.

  “Nah,” Theresa said, waving her hand, agreeing with Matteo. “Those two were like a couple of roosters in a henhouse; one had to give up and go away or they would have killed each other.”

  “They almost did.”

  Helen and Theresa both froze as they heard the distant roar of a tremendous explosion. It sounded like a powder magazine had gone up—or a cache of incendiary rockets.

  Helen threw her arms around Theresa’s neck. “They did it!” she yelped, elated. Outside she could hear the sound of cheering as the rest of the camp shared her joy.

  Theresa nodded. “So far, so good,” she said. “They still have to get back, and every cabo left alive in the jungle will be looking for them now.”

  “They won’t move until it’s dark,” Helen guessed aloud.

  “You’re learning,” Theresa said approvingly. “Come on, help me get the food ready for tonight. It will help to pass the time.”

  It did. Helen worked at Theresa’s side, secure in the knowledge that Matteo had accomplished his objective, hopeful that she would see him in a few hours. Her good spirits were deflated only slightly by the presence of Alma, who kept surveying “the gringa” with a curiously triumphant look that made Helen extremely nervous. Anything that made Alma happy, especially where it concerned Helen, was surely open to question, but Helen tried not to let it bother her. Matteo had survived the trickiest part of his mission, and fate would not be so cruel as to let something happen to him now. This was a routine trip for him, she told herself; he did this sort of thing all the time. So she doled out the evening meal, watching the light fade as darkness fell, hoping that the genius that always seemed to protect him would not fail him in this.