by Dan Pollock
“She’s on my ranch. Jesus, is she okay?”
“Yeah, she called in, but D.W.’s pretty crazed about her being down there with terrorists operating—her being the boss’ daughter and all. He wants her out of there fast.”
“Yeah, I agree absolutely. Tell D.W. I’ll cooperate in any way I can. I’ll call my foreman down there right now, tell him the same thing, make sure she’s got good protection.”
“Thanks, Sam.”
“Is there anything else you want me to do, or are you just keeping me informed as a courtesy?”
“Aw, hell, Sam. You’re still on the board, so you got to know what’s going on. And you’ll always be part of Proteus.”
“Let’s not get too sentimental here, Hardy. I tend to cry easy, and I don’t really figure D.W.’s looking for my input.”
“You’re right about that, Sam. But it occurred to me and Parry that maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad idea—getting your input. We got to remembering how you negotiated with those Colombian guerrillas back in the early ’70s, remember, the ones threatening to blow up our pipeline?”
“I bought ’em off is basically what I did, Hardy.”
“Right. Well, suppose things get out of hand down there and Caracas can’t handle it. Maybe we should think about that.”
“Maybe so. But D.W. surely knows how to make a payoff. Unless you want me to be your back-channel negotiator.”
“I’m just trying to keep you plugged into the war room, Sam.”
“And I appreciate that, Hardy. Keep me posted.”
Sam cradled the phone. Chick Hooper glanced over. They were bumping along over the brush, heading for the perimeter track. Sam gave him a shorthand summary of Hardy’s news.
“You thinking about heading back down there, Sam?”
He thought about it, then shook his head and reached for the phone again. “No, Chick. Got to make some phone calls is all. Then you can go back to teaching me the cattle business.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Jacqueline Lee had been able to document some of the sabotage from the air that morning, but, on the Cessna’s second low pass over Cerro Calvario, National Guardsmen had appeared, waving assault rifles. Under the circumstances, Jacqueline agreed with the ex-Air Force jockey that further overflights were not a good idea.
So that afternoon she and Dr. Laya squeezed in beside Enrico in his Ford pickup and jounced out to see what damage, if any, had been done to the railway-grading equipment along the ranch’s eastern perimeter. They had heard detonations during the night and smelled smoke and hydrocarbon stink. A trace of acrid stench remained in the air as they approached the long mesh-wire barrier that marked the rail corridor, and Jacqueline leaned out the truck window with her Handycam.
She didn’t have long to wait before the first casualty appeared. An enormous earth-mover had been turned into a fire-blackened hulk and its one-ton tires into steel-belted sludge. At Jacqueline’s request, Enrico stopped so she could jump out and poke the videocam’s eye through the woven fence. She zoomed close on the carbonized chassis, then up to the swivel-console cab, reduced now to a mangled metal cage. Panning beyond the wreckage, she came upon several uniformed guards patrolling the opposite fence alongside Route 16. An instant later, one of the men swung around, pointing his rifle directly at her.
She scampered back to the Ford, and they accelerated away along the barrier. Less than a minute later they came upon the charred remains of a giant Caterpillar rock loader. But as they slowed and Jacqueline steadied her Handycam, three Guardia men stepped suddenly from behind the ruin. The two flanking soldiers had their auto rifles unslung and trained forward, while between them an officer unholstered his sidearm and gestured for them to come forward.
As Enrico killed the motor and opened his door, Jacqueline slid the videocam under the bench seat. Then she and Dr. Laya followed Enrico toward the fence and the waiting officer—a teniente, first lieutenant, by the twin stars on his kepi and shoulder flaps. It was the second time in several days Jacqueline had been under the guns of the Guardia, and she found herself, incredibly, almost getting used to it. Her immediate fear was that they would confiscate her Handycam and the day’s footage.
Enrico, meanwhile, was his usual insouciant self, chatting with the scraggly-mustached lieutenant as one man of the world to another. The ranch foreman swept his arm back, first to include herself and Dr. Laya as his guests, then encompassing the entire La Promesa rangeland. The lieutenant returned a minimal nod, and turned to squint at Dr. Laya—who was much too fidgety, Jacqueline thought—and then at Jacqueline. She acknowledged the lieutenant’s inspection with an amiable smile, and maintained it even when his gaze slid down the front of her sweat-stained denim shirt and snug jeans. She damn well wasn’t going to react. She’d been peripherally aware that the rifle-toting soldiers had been conducting a similar surveillance. At least they’d untargeted their lethal toys.
She turned back to see Enrico push a soft pack of cigarettes through the mesh wire. The lieutenant shook one out and passed the pack back to his men. After savoring a few lungfuls, the lieutenant made a quick, dismissive gesture. Enrico nodded, mumbled something, then swung lazily toward the pickup, motioning Arquimedeo and Jacqueline to precede him. A moment later all three were bouncing around on the bench seat as the Ford angled off into the brush.
“Enrico, you were fantastic!” she said.
He shrugged, then explained what he had learned: “They don’t want us driving along here now, even to pick up strays. It’s for our own safety, he says. They’re looking for terrorists, at least four or five people. In addition to what we saw burned out, someone blew up a big pile of steel rail—the explosions we heard last night.”
“Well, I can understand their calling out the National Guard for something like that,” Jacqueline said. “But not to drag archaeologists out of their tents and herd them off a mountain.”
“Ah, but you see, Jacqueline, our Guardia is a most flexible force.” Arquimedeo was visibly delighted by her sarcasm. “The Armed Forces of Cooperation they call themselves—Fuerzas Armadas de Cooperación. Which means, in practice, they do anything they wish, and the rest of us must cooperate.”
Enrico chuckled. “They do have many functions. And among these are protecting natural resources, such as mines and oil fields—whether from terrorists or archaeologists, it seems.”
“Equally dangerous, in their eyes,” Dr. Laya said.
Enrico glanced over at him. “The lieutenant tells me they’re expecting some help from the Ministry of Interior. The DISIP are being sent down to investigate.”
“What’s that?” Jacqueline asked.
“Dirección de Seguridad e Inteligencia Policial,” Enrico explained. “The Directorate of Intelligence and Prevention Services.”
“Political police,” Dr. Laya added. “Descendants of the old, hated Seguridad Nacional, or SN. I expect they’ll want to interrogate me about my political sympathies, and how to locate dear old Uncle Oscar.”
“But Enrico just said they’re looking for a gang—four or five terrorists. Your uncle and those two Indians couldn’t possibly have done all that sabotage by themselves—could they?”
Dr. Laya shrugged his small shoulders. “It would seem unlikely. Personally, I’ve always considered Uncle Oscar to be an incompetent old windbag. But who knows? Perhaps he is good at something after all.”
*
The National Guard lieutenant had been correct in predicting the imminent arrival of federal security investigators. By the time they got back to the Casa Grande, a plain-gray Buick sedan was parked in the courtyard, and two shirtsleeved, sweat-drenched men were smoking in the shade of the big araguaney tree. Enrico pulled up behind the sedan, biting off a one-word comment: “Federales.”
And so they proved, flashing credentials from the Interior Ministry, specifically the DISIP. The spokesman was a bronzed man with a gray pompadour and a long, puckered scar down one cheek. He introduced himself, in a bass rumble, as Capi
tán Marco-Aurelio Siso. And he showed little interest in either Enrico or Jacqueline, turning his attention immediately toward Dr. Laya. He asked, in Spanish too rapid for Jacqueline to follow, how long the professor had been staying at the ranch.
Enrico quickly interposed. “Inspector, I can assure you, Dr. Laya was here with us at the ranch house last night, when the sabotage was committed.”
“Thank you for that, Enrico,” Arquimedeo said, also in Spanish. “Now, assuming that is sufficient to allay your suspicions about me, Captain, I have some work inside I’d like to attend to.”
Siso grinned. Jacqueline had fleetingly considered whipping out her Handycam—hoping that, by so doing, she might head off any rough handling of Dr. Laya, or even possible violations of his civil rights. But one look at the inspector’s grin, and the way it twisted his scar, changed her thinking.
The security man unleashed another guttural burst of Spanish, and Arquimedeo turned to interpret: “It is precisely what I was just telling you, Jacqueline. He has come here to ask—I should say to demand—my help in locating Uncle Oscar and his ‘pals.’”
The archaeologist swung back to the plainclothesman, maintaining that he had absolutely no knowledge of his uncle’s whereabouts for the past several days—and had, moreover, absolutely no intention of ever seeing the old man again.
Though unable to fathom Dr. Laya’s rejoinder, Jacqueline could certainly detect its pompous and pedantic tone, and thought it unlikely to satisfy the DISIP cop. Her intuition was quickly confirmed, as Captain Siso growled back forcefully. She appealed to Enrico, who obliged with a running translation:
The federales weren’t just investigating sabotage, she learned now, but threats of further terrorism. In response, Dr. Laya was offering to cooperate fully, suggesting, with Enrico’s immediate acquiescence, that they all go inside to continue the interview. But Captain Siso was shaking his pompadoured head, requesting instead that the archaeologist return with them to their offices in Puerto Ordaz.
At this juncture Jacqueline whirled on Siso:
“But why take him away for interrogation? He’s being candid with you right here. And anyway, Dr. Laya’s uncle and those two Indians couldn’t possibly have set all those explosions and fires—at least not according to the Guardia lieutenant who spoke to us out there. He told us you’re looking for a gang of four or five terrorists, not an old man and a couple of innocent natives. When is this official harassment of Dr. Laya ever going to end? He’s an archaeologist, a scientist, not a common criminal!” She turned to Enrico. “Please, tell him what I said!”
“That is no necessary, señorita,” Siso replied, looking faintly amused. “Believe me, I understand very good.”
The dark-sunglassed agent behind Siso, meanwhile, looked eager to end the parley and to simply toss Dr. Laya into the back of their Buick. Jacqueline was particularly unnerved by the way this man was resting his big palm on the checkered butt of his belt-holstered revolver. Captain Siso, however, persisted in his calm rumble, switching to English for her benefit:
“Let me say that we are making the investigation here, Señorita Lee, not a ‘harassment.’ Who you are speaking to in Guardia Nacional is no my business, but I telling you that no one can say how many terrorists are doing these thing. So we are looking at everything and everybody. As for Oscar Azarias Rivilla”—he glanced down at some notes—“on one of the big machines somebody is writing”—he mimed a moving spray can—“‘Bandera Roja.’ It signifies Red Flag. This is a group of guerrilleros urbanos, how you say?”
“Urban guerrillas?” Jacqueline suggested.
“Bueno! Urban guerrillas. Bandera Roja is a group that Oscar Azarias is joining many years ago, after he is leaving a Mexico City prison for robbing banks, and before he is working for Carlos Lehder. You know this name, señorita?”
She shook her head.
“A very famous man.” He turned and snickered to his deputy.
Enrico provided an explanatory aside: “Lehder was a big Colombian coca smuggler, now in prison in U.S.”
“Captain, you don’t have to recite Uncle Oscar’s criminal record,” Arquimedeo protested. “I am aware of it, and properly ashamed of it. And, as I keep telling you, I have every intention of cooperating with your investigation.”
“Yes, I know. I am explaining this now for Señorita Lee, okay, professor? There are other things written, señorita.” Again Siso pantomimed the spray can. Then he paused, scratched his scar, and reverted to Spanish, which Enrico quickly interpolated into English:
“The inspector is saying there were revolutionary slogans painted on one of the bulldozers which wasn’t set on fire: ‘Proteus out of Venezuela!’ ‘Death to Yanqui Fascists,’ things like this. He says they aren’t ruling out other likely groups, but his job is to investigate Dr. Laya’s uncle and all his activities while he was down here.”
“Okay! But why do they have to take him to Puerto Ordaz?”
Captain Siso heard and obviously understood her question, but was unequal to an English reply. Once more, Enrico provided the translation: “He says it is unfortunately necessary. For instance, he says, they may wish to attach Dr. Laya to a polygraph machine, which he does not have in his car.”
“And if Dr. Laya refuses to go, or to take the test?”
“Jacqueline!” Arquimedeo cried out, “I appreciate your concern, but, please, don’t get me in any more difficulty than I am already!”
Captain Siso grinned, mopping his forehead. The sky was thickening with thunderheads, and the humidity becoming more and more oppressive. He spoke in English: “If the professor refuses, we must to insist.”
Jacqueline looked at Arquimedeo. “Do you have an attorney?”
“Well, there is a law professor, a colleague at the university.”
“Why don’t you call him?”
Laya glanced apprehensively at the captain, who gestured acquiescence. “By all means, professor, call your lawyer. And you may call him again from our office in Puerto Ordaz. Believe me, you will no be incommunicado.”
So Enrico accompanied Dr. Laya inside to the telephone, and Jacqueline, suddenly uncomfortably alone with the two government cops, turned quickly to follow. But halfway to the entrance, she heard the thumping approach of a vehicle on the ranch road. She looked back to see the midnight-blue Proteus Land Cruiser run under the big crossbeam gateway into the courtyard. She stood motionless as it slowed and crunched over the gravel, then slid under the araguaney’s leafy shade, close enough for her to make out the front-seat faces. Owen Meade was behind the wheel, Ray Arrillaga beside him.
Jacqueline had the absolute and instantaneous conviction that they, too, had come here to take someone into protective custody—namely herself, and obviously on her father’s orders. Well, she decided on the spot, they would both go back empty-handed!
As the two men from Proteus climbed out, she wheeled back toward the ranch house, hurrying around the brightly tiled fountain. Then a third door slid open behind her and slammed shut, and a voice boomed out:
“Jacqueline!”
She froze. It was her father.
Chapter Thirty-Four
She ignored the greetings of Ray and Owen, glared past them at the smaller man in the mirrored sunglasses, pink golf shirt and twill slacks. D.W. looked, in fact, exactly like he did stalking a fairway after maiming a tee shot, his face every bit as grim. Jacqueline spoke first, without a greeting:
“What are you doing here?”
D.W. shook his head gravely—obviously ruling out the very question.
“Dammit, D.W.,” she said, knowing her use of his initials would wound him, “what right have you to come here? This is Sam’s ranch.”
“I have the right to protect my daughter.”
“Well, your daughter doesn’t want to be protected—by you.”
D.W. did not flinch. “You have a very strong will, Jacqueline. Many times, even when you were very tiny, your will was stronger than mine, and you got your way. B
esides, what father wants to say no to his child? But this, this is not a contest of wills you can win. You will come back with me. I am prepared to discuss it with you, but the issue is already decided.”
She shook her head. “Look around. Does this look like the Proteus boardroom? Your word is not law here, Chairman Dad. I’ll do as I damn well please. And I damn well please to stay here.”
“You can hurt me, I accept that, Jacqueline. But I will not let you hurt yourself or endanger yourself. And I will not let you bring anxiety to your mother.”
“Dammit, did you call her and scare her? You’d better not have.”
“No, she knows nothing of the danger you are in. But if she did know—as is her right—and if she knew that I permitted it, she would condemn me as a terrible father, and she would be right. Do you hear me, Jacqueline? You are in danger here, and I will not permit it.”
“I feel perfectly safe with Enrico.”
“You are not his responsibility. You are going back with me, Jacqueline, so please gather your things and say your farewells. You may curse me all you like, but you will go. The Kallisto is sailing in the morning.”
“Not with me aboard.”
D.W.’s mouth tightened below the sunglasses. He uttered one word: “Ray.”
Jacqueline tensed, ready to flee as Ray Arrillaga took several steps forward. But when the mining executive merely cleared his throat to speak, she swung her attention angrily back to her father:
“Do you really imagine I’m going to listen to Ray, or Owen, or any of your other flunkies?”
“Jacqueline,” Ray cut in, “you can go ahead and hate my guts, along with your dad’s, for whatever you think we did to Dr. Laya or Sam—”
“Thank you, Ray. I’ll do that.”
“But please, just listen to one thing. You can’t stay on this ranch. Hell, you can’t even stay in this country now. Maybe you have some idealized sympathies for these terrorists, or for whatever you imagine they’re protesting, I don’t know. You may even think they’re your comrades—”