Orinoco

by Dan Pollock

  Yet everything seemed normal. Beside him, Angel was sprawled on his back, limbs thrown out, head thrown back, mouth agape and snarling with each inhalation. A dozen paces away, old Oscar also slept on his back, fingers curled around the handle of Chucho’s machete. And beyond Oscar, turned away, with her wrists secured behind, was their captive. She stirred restlessly now in her sleep.

  But Chucho had heard something.

  He reached for his blowgun and darts, moved past the sleepers and over the rocky slope bordering the pond and headed back downstream, keeping within the trees. Again, he heard the noises—rocks dislodged, shoe thuds, labored breathing. He crept to the edge of the trees, peering through screening undergrowth. Thirty meters down the riverpath, there were four men—coming to shoot them, Chucho decided, or else take them back to filthy prison cells.

  Two of the men Chucho did not know—the tall white-haired one and the thin dark one in the straw hat. But the one carrying the blue bag was Señor Lee coming to steal back his daughter. Oscar had shown Chucho magazine pictures of the hard-faced millonario before they attacked his ship in San Félix.

  And the fourth man was from their old village—Julio, once a thief, and now a traitor, leading even more outsiders to the sacred cave of the Kamarakota.

  Chucho raised his blowpipe. He wished for his old two-meter cerbatana, not this half-size toy for turistas. He selected a mamocori—a curare-tipped, fire-hardened palmwood dart with a band of jungle-cotton on its tail—slid it down into the mouthpiece. Then, as the four men moved up into range, he slowly hyperventilated, sighting down the wooden shaft.

  Then, with lungs and abdominals at full distention, he erupted air through the blowpipe.

  Whoough!

  Chucho watched Julio slap his neck and scream like a woman, then fling himself into the brush. The other three looked on in puzzlement. But Chucho had already fingered his next dart, twirling it down the tube and swinging to the next man, targeting his white hair. Then, as he sucked in his air, he saw the man in the straw hat reach into his shoulder pack. A rifle barrel flashed in the sun.

  Chucho adjusted his aim, exploded his cheeks, sending the dart flying. Then, having been shot at by a Guardia soldier once in his life, and knowing also that a single curare-dart would only temporarily disable a man, Chucho whirled and fled back into the brush.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  In frightening succession, Sam heard the men on both sides of him cry out in pain. On his right, Julio went sprawling on the trail, then slithered forward behind a rock; while on his left, Enrico, reaching for his rifle, glanced down in puzzlement at the wooden spine suddenly protruding from a reddening ring just above his shirt pocket. Then both men locked eyes and made a dive for the shelter already occupied by their Indian guide. In the scramble, Sam lost track of D.W., who had been right behind them.

  “Curare,” Julio gasped, examining the brown-smeared tip of an eight-inch dart. His other hand was pressed to the side of his neck, with blood trickling through his fingers. “It is from Chucho or Angel. You shoot up there.” He gestured up into the flanking trees.

  Peering fearfully over the top of their rocky barricade, Sam quick-scanned the hillside and caught a flash of someone moving up there, brown skin with black-daubed stripes rippling through the greenery, then vanishing and reappearing higher up. An Indian—fleeing, he sure as hell hoped!

  Then, only a few yards away, a head appeared above the embankment on the other side of the path, and Sam ducked down. When he dared a second look, D.W. had struggled up from wherever he’d been hiding and was hurrying up the trail, toting his zipper bag.

  Sam shouted after him, “D.W. get back here!”

  But D.W. wasn’t listening. His commanding bass-baritone boomed across the valley:

  “Chucho, Angel! This is Señor Lee! Don’t shoot! I bring money! One million dollars! Do you hear me! Chucho, Angel! One million dollars! Let my daughter go!”

  He can’t help himself, Sam thought, and at least he’s doing something. Sam himself felt a paralysis of will in the face of these simultaneous crises. He forced himself to focus his immediate anxiety back on Enrico and Julio. At the Indian’s urging, Sam pulled the sharpened spine out of his friend’s chest, causing an outwelling of blood. Still, the wound didn’t seem grievous; it was the poison that terrified Sam. He had to get both men med-evaced somehow, and fast. Until that was arranged, he dared not go rushing off mindlessly after D.W., or even think about Jacqueline.

  But Enrico, though looking pale and frightened, was way ahead of Sam, grabbing his belt radio and barking into it, “Kavak Dos, Kavak Dos, cambio. Kavak Uno, Kavak Tres, adelante. Kavak Two, calling Kavak One and Kavak Three, over. Go ahead, Kavak One. We have an emergency—”

  As Enrico continued, Sam turned quickly to Julio. “Padre Uribe will radio the authorities for help. There could even be a military helicopter in the area to pull you guys out of here. But, Julio, what can I do right now?”

  Julio shook his head. “It take four, five darts to kill a little monkey. If no more curare, I think we okay, just long sleep.”

  “You’re sure?”

  Enrico glanced over from his radio. “It’s not really a poison, Sam. It’s a son-of-a-bitching muscle relaxer, which I can already feel. They even use it in surgery now. But get enough of it, and your diaphragm stops working, and you stop breathing. As long as that cabrón up there doesn’t come back for more target practice, I think we’ll be okay.”

  “Did you reach Uribe?”

  “Yes. We’re in luck. A chopper full of those red-beret guys already landed at the mission. Uribe just ran outside to find them. I’m waiting for him to get back.”

  “Okay. Then I’ll stay here to man the radio, and talk ’em down.”

  Enrico shook his head, his voice already alarmingly weaker. “I know you want to go after her, Sam, so do it. Take my rifle.”

  “Rico, you can hardly talk. How the hell is the pilot gonna find you?”

  “I told Uribe where we are—above those pools. And Bernardo knows. They’ll find us. Go on, caballero. And watch your ass.” Enrico made a feeble gesture of dismissal, then got back on frequency: “Kavak One, adelante...”

  “You go,” Julio said, trying to smile. “Me and your friend, we just having a little siesta.”

  “Son of a bitch!” Sam snarled—more at his own irresolution than anything else. Then he snatched up Enrico’s pack with the rifle barrel still protruding and sprinted up the path after D.W.

  *

  Jacqueline had quickly rubbed her ankles raw against the ropes, but persisted through the pain, using it to fight off sleep, while she strained and flexed her legs. When she saw the blood on her feet, she simply shut her eyes, gritted her teeth and kept going. Finally she felt the knot give way. It was a moment of pure exhilaration, though her wrists remained bound behind, and her shoulders ached from the prolonged backward stretch.

  But this was only a tiny victory. She rolled onto her back and swung her head over to check out her captors. Oscar still slept a few paces away. Farther down the pebbled slope, she saw Angel splayed out, still venting those ferocious snores she’d heard, still clutching the bamboo tube. But on his other side, where Chucho had collapsed after snorting the powder, there was no one. The little Indian was not in sight.

  Dammit! Where had he gone?

  Still, she had to take the chance. She wasn’t likely to get another one. Maddeningly, it took another minute on her back of thrashing and kicking before she loosened the ankle knot enough to free one foot and leg.

  Thank God! Now to get out of here!

  But she discovered that, with her hands tied behind her, it was no easy matter to stand up. In junior high gymnastics, she’d been able to kip off a mat and onto her feet. But she wasn’t going to pull that stunt on this rocky slope, with rope still looped around one ankle. She did manage a situp, though, putting her legs straight in front of her. Halfway there. Then she tried curling them underneath her—and immediately top
pled over. Shit!

  She rolled again onto her back, did another situp. Don’t panic. There has to be a way to do this. She tried bracing herself with a forearm while drawing her legs up, ignoring the grinding pain on the point of her elbow—and still couldn’t maintain her balance. Down again, sit up again. How could standing up be this hard? Think, dammit!

  Jacqueline spotted a boulder several feet behind her, and scooted back to it. By jamming her elbow even more painfully against this, she was able at least to lever her butt off the ground. But it wasn’t until she wedged one bleeding foot against another rock—screw the pain!—that she was able to get her legs underneath her, elbow herself upward and balance her shifting weight all in a single teetering motion—

  And it was done! She was actually on her feet! Her coveralls were soaked with sweat now and blotched with blood, but that only enhanced her sense of triumph.

  Now to get the hell out of here.

  The next instant the rocky canyon walls resounded with shouts:

  “Chucho, Angel! This is Señor Lee! Don’t shoot! I bring money! One million dollars! Do you hear me! Chucho, Angel! One million dollars! Let my daughter go!”

  Her father! Don’t yell back! Just run!

  But it was already too late. Oscar had leaped to his feet, machete in hand, scanning the circling hills for the source of the shouting. It took him a dizzy second to discover her, then another moment of blinking shock as he caught up to the reality of his trussed-up captive standing and staring at him, her legs unbound.

  Then she saw the next realization hit him, as it just had her, He’d awakened just in time to block her escape.

  Now she shouted back to her father:

  “Daddy, I’m here! But watch out! He’s got a machete!” She refocused on Oscar. “Didn’t you hear him? He’s got the ransom. Just take it and let me go!”

  Oscar’s face betrayed panicky calculations. Then he made up his mind and was moving purposefully toward her. Her father was calling her name, too far away to help. And backed into an angle of rock, there was nowhere for Jacqueline to flee. Instead, she pivoted a quarter-turn and crouched into her tae kwon do stance, readying a side kick. The old man growled:

  “Try it, and I cut you open. Stand still, and you live.”

  Oscar emphasized his threat by slicing the air with the broad steel blade. Jacqueline felt the wind of its whistling passage and her courage drained away. She stood in perfect, nauseating passivity as he moved behind her and grabbed a fistful of her coveralls. Then he pressed the blade point into the small of her back and marched her down the slope and into plain sight.

  Her father, red-faced and gasping, was staggering up the trail toward them, yet still about fifty yards away. He was carrying a blue airline bag.

  “Stop,” Oscar bellowed, “or I cut off her head!”

  Jacqueline saw her father cry out, stop dead, then throw out his arms. “Take the money! Take my life, señor! But please don’t touch her!”

  “Daddy!” she screamed back, and now felt the flat of the blade—scorching hot from the sun—against her jugular.

  Then—alas, too late!—behind her father, Sam Warrender suddenly appeared in a ragged run. He was holding a rifle in two pieces—barrel and receiver; buttstock and lever action—and trying to jam it together. D.W. whirled on him:

  “Drop it, Sam—or he’ll kill her!”

  Sam took in Jake’s peril at a glance, let go the rifle sections and halted in his tracks.

  “Thank you,” Oscar called out, keeping his tight grip on her coveralls, the blade against her neck. “No move! Now, Señor Lee, tell me. Where are the federales? They are waiting down there?”

  “No! They don’t know you’re here. We came alone—with an Indian guide.”

  Oscar vented a vile laugh. “This is not the truth.”

  “Yes, it is! The federales don’t know anything. Let her go, Señor Azarias! I brought a million dollars! I’ll show you.”

  “No, please don’t open the bag, papacito. And, you know, the figure was five millions.”

  “I raised the money before the note was found.”

  “Okay, you found the note! But how you find us?”

  “Through the Indians,” Sam spoke up. “Señorita Lee took videos on Cerro Calvario. An Indian recognized their tribe—Kamarakota. We flew to their village today. Another Indian mentioned this canyon—the brothers used it once before. And our guide found your boat. So we took a chance. But we never told the federales. We don’t trust them either.”

  “It’s true!” D.W. said. “They have too many guns. We just want her free. Please, we don’t care about you. You can tie us up, anything. Just take the money and go.”

  Oscar’s foul breath was against Jacqueline’s cheek now, and she sensed his fear and indecision. Meanwhile, Sam had taken up the appeal again:

  “Look, Oscar, if you think it’s a trap, take the money and march us ahead of you as hostages. But let the girl go. She’s suffered enough.”

  “Capitalistas sin cojones,” Oscar muttered under his breath. Then he spoke in full voice: “Okay, amigos, you can all be my hostages. You go first. But the little girl, I want her right next to me all the time.”

  Hearing that malevolent mumble in her ear—and not even understanding the slang—Jacqueline got a sudden psychic fix on Oscar Azarias Rivilla. The old man was not, obviously, a calculate-the-odds criminal, just out for a big score. Nor, obviously, was he a revolutionary idealist. He was a dangerous outcast, a predatory one, who had seduced two other outcasts, innocents by comparison. And the main purpose of this whole deranged enterprise was not to succeed—like most terrorist objectives, it had been doomed from the start—but to create maximum havoc along the way. It didn’t matter if he failed, so long as he took a lot of people down with him.

  And that reckoning had just come due, Jake thought. Oscar must know his dangerous game was over, that he’d never get away from this canyon or the savanna or Venezuela, no matter how many hostages he paraded ahead of him. What he was obviously savoring now was bloody revenge on her father and Sam—in exchange for his lifetime of failure. Whatever happened, Oscar would make sure at least one of them died. And she couldn’t let that happen.

  Chapter Fifty

  Now, she thought, you’ve got one chance, so do it right!

  She scythed her right leg out and around, kicking viciously back at Oscar’s right leg. At the instant of contact, calf to calf, she ducked under the machete blade and spun behind him, tearing free of his grip.

  Oscar yelped and stumbled, dropping the machete. On the point of running away, Jacqueline stopped to grab for the weapon. It was a mistake. Oscar reached it first and swiped viciously at her ankles. She screamed and dodged away—and in so doing, allowed him to scramble up and again block her escape.

  Behind him now she saw her father and Sam rushing forward—but still precious seconds away. Oscar, meanwhile, seeming more eager to kill her now than regain her as a hostage, closed in with the machete, backing her down toward the pond.

  There was only one way for her to go. She dashed down the rocky incline and—because her hands were still tied behind—overbalanced and nearly pitched face-forward. Oscar’s crunching footfalls were right behind her. And just ahead, the big Kamarakota rolled in his stupor and opened one bleary eye. Then she had raced past, plunging at full stride into the cool, reddish-hued water.

  Angel, returning slowly from the first stage of his mystic journey, heard a piercing scream and sensed immediate danger. With his soul still far away, he opened an eye and watched the girl, her arms bound, flee past his sleeping body and into the pond. Then the old man clumped after her, brandishing Chucho’s machete. Angel blinked. Farther away, two other men were also running toward him.

  A dream? Or was Oscar was going to kill the adored one?

  Even if it was only a dream, still Angel must enter it—and save her spirit-form. He dare not even wait for his soul’s orderly return. With a shout, Angel ripped open the cloy
ing cocoon of sleep. Then he leaped up and charged into the water, using his powerful arms to shove it out of his path, churning his strong legs over the pond’s slick-paved, shelving bottom.

  He glimpsed her sleek black head out where her feet would no longer touch bottom, and Oscar right behind her. He watched them slide, one after the other, from sunlit surface into cliff shadow. He could imagine her kicking frantically, trying to stay afloat and move herself forward without the use of her arms. Didn’t she see she was heading into the dead end of the far canyon wall? And bobbing along on the surface not far behind her was the oily-silver head of Oscar Azarias, clawing the surface one-handed, while the other certainly grasped the unseen machete.

  She must flee into La Cueva! Angel thought. As he bulled forward through the water, he called out to the ancient Kamarakota chief: Open your cave to her, let her find its entrance, and she will be saved. I will slay her enemy.

  *

  Jacqueline had planned only to flee into the small pond. She had not considered that the water might be over her head; or that, if it was, she might have difficulty, without the use of her arms, keeping her head above the surface. But both those unfortunate circumstances proved true. And though she considered herself a strong swimmer, it took all her panicky reserves, and a constant scissoring of her coveralled legs, just to keep from drowning.

  Great! she thought. Who needs Oscar? I’ve just engineered my own death.

  Except for a rocky shelf on the far side, the pond was hemmed in by vine-draped cliffs, so there was nowhere to swim to. Instead, Jacqueline thrashed around, trying to kick back into the shallows—just as Oscar’s grizzled face came out of the water a yard away. He spat water, grimaced with effort, then lifted the dripping machete blade into the air and brought it down, cleaving the surface inches from her shoulder.

  Jacqueline gasped, swallowed water and sank. Why was he still coming after her? She flail-kicked away at an underwater angle, then kicked hard again, arrowing upward—but failing to reach the surface. She managed one last frantic kick—and burst into blessed air.