by Lou Cameron
“I said we understood your problem,” Captain Gringo cut in, as Gaston just sat there bemused. The tall American went on, “Smoking up the construction site with machine-gun fire would be the best way to call in outside help, general. What you want is a demolition job. The French canal builders down Panama way didn’t give up because half their workers died of yellow jack. They went bust when they couldn’t replace the heavy construction gear they were losing to flash floods and landslides.”
Portola nodded and said, “We do think the same way, I see! Bueno. I shall see you have all the dynamite your porters can carry.”
“We get porters? How about some fighting men, general?”
Portola frowned and said, “If I wished any of my soldados seen anywhere near the dam site, we would not be having this conversation. You have my permission to arm your peones and give them some basic training as you lead them through the jungle, of course. I have a dozen more or less reliable pobrecitos I can volunteer for your mission. They, of course, will insist on bringing along their women. If the women carry most of the load and I issue your porters a few guns to go with their machetes—”
Gaston cut in to ask, “Why can’t we find a couple of stout m’selles to haul a Mountain 75 at least? Shoving la boom-boom under someone’s derriere can be trés fatigue. While lobbing H.E. from a safe distance can become the soup of a duck, hein?”
El Generale just looked disgusted. Captain Gringo pointed at the map with the tip of his perfecto and explained, “When the contour lines get this close together, they’re trying to tell you the slopes are damned near cliffs. I see … four, make it five really nasty ravines between here and there that I’m not sure we’re going to get across, even with only our own bare asses to pack. Could I turn this thing around for a better look, general?”
Portola swung the plywood map table around on its lazy-Susan mount as an aide-de-camp ducked in, scowling. The tall American ignored him as he told Gaston, “Okay, I can see where they’d put the dam between these two peaks. Assume the crest meets this twenty-meter contour line if they’re talking about enough hydroelectric power to matter and … Boy, that’s going to be one big lake where this valley full of Indians is supposed to be!”
The junior officer had been putting a bug in the general’s ear while the soldiers of fortune were studying the layout. Portola’s voice dropped sharply as he cut in, “We have just learned that a patrol I sent out has been badly mauled. One squad wiped out. The others just made it back, carrying some wounded. I don’t suppose you could tell us anything about that, either?”
Again, caught by surprise, Captain Gringo was able to meet Portola’s cold suspicious eyes with an innocent stare as he replied, “Don’t look at us, general. The only patrol of yours that we ran into had the drop on us before we spotted them.”
Gaston had to ask, “Where and when did the outrage occur, mon general?”
So Portola explained, “When I heard the men I’d sent to contact you had been murdered, I naturally sent some men, in peon costume, to cover the escape route south of Greytown. I confess, at the time, I entertained doubtless groundless suspicions about your sincerity.”
The two soldiers of fortune exchanged glances. For once Gaston was smart enough to keep his trap shut as Portola added, “Si, they had set up an ambush south of Greytown. Fortunately for yourselves, you did not walk into it. Unfortunately for my muchachos, someone jumped them from behind and shot them up most severely.”
Captain Gringo smiled thinly, as Gaston studied the tip of his own cigar with sudden interest, and then, since someone had to say something, Captain Gringo said, “No shit? Did your boys get a good look at the sons of bitches?”
Portola looked up at his aide, who shook his head and growled, “The counter-patrol hit them from the dark in a coffee plantation. From the rapid fire they were subjected to, they feel sure they were jumped by at least a dozen hombres, armed with repeating weapons. Probably light carbines, judging from the flashes and reports.”
“Or one machine gun?” asked Portola, staring hard at Captain Gringo.
That was so silly that the tall American was able to laugh sincerely before he replied, “Feel free to search us for concealed machine guns, general. I can’t prove we didn’t check into that hotel in Greytown with no luggage, but you ought to have no trouble checking that out if you have pals in town. I like the lieutenant’s theory about carbines better.”
Gaston snorted in dramatic disgust and chimed in, “Merde alors, why are we having such a silly discussion? All of us are professional military geniuses. Any corporal would be able to tell us that one does not shoot up patrols with anything, unless one has a reason, hein? Let us assume for the sake of insane suspicion that two rude youths such as we jumped one of your patrols with our own squad of infantry, a mysterious machine gun, or, sacre bleu, our own two little pistols.”
“Did you?” El Generale asked flatly.
Gaston grinned and said, “Mais oui! We did it to clear our escape route south, as you suggest. Then, having done so, we came right out here to you to ask if you approved, non?”
Portola looked relieved and said, “Bueno. Not even the mad and most unpredictable two of you have the reputation for total insanity. But somebody shot the pants off my muchachos and if I ever find out who it was …”
“How soon do you want us to leave for that dam site, general?” Captain Gringo asked to change the subject.
Portola said, “You shall leave at first light. My men will show you to your tent, and I suggest you get plenty of rest before morning. The target area is a good sixty kilometers cross-country, and the country, as you just noted, is muy rudo. We can discuss your porters and the gear you will require in the morning. Forgive me, señores, but I have other matters to deal with here. The mission I am sending you on is but a side issue of our more important civil war.”
They rose, but Gaston said, “Forgive me, M’sieur le General, but we did not eat dinner this evening.”
Portola waved a hand in dismissal as he muttered something about the officer leading them out getting them some grub as well. Captain Gringo nudged his small hungry comrade and they followed the aide out into the darkness. Gaston protested softly, “Merde alors, I am hungry, Dick!”
Captain Gringo didn’t answer. He was hungry too, but they still had their guns, extra smokes, and their lives. So what the hell.
The aide led them silently to a tent down the line and ushered them inside rather sullenly. They saw that the tent was illuminated by a kerosene lamp and furnished with pallets on the ground canvas instead of folding cots. Then-guide ducked back out with no further comment. They each flopped down on the bedding with the central tent pole between them, and when Gaston started to say something, Captain Gringo snapped his fingers and pointed at the thin canvas wall rising above him. Gaston nodded, blew a cloud of perfecto smoke, and said, “I told you what a nice man the great Portola was, Dick. Wasn’t it nice of him to give us these formidable cigars?”
Captain Gringo shot him a disgusted look and said, “Yeah,” in English, to make anyone listen work at it as he added, “I noticed that one of those hills they mean to plant one wing of the dam against is contoured like a Cheyenne lodge. Think it could be a volcano?”
“Hardly an active one, if they are professional engineers. But old cinder cones dot the landscape of Nicaragua trés fatigue. It must have been a trés smoky neighborhood when the world was younger, non?”
“Yeah. Negative on a cinder cone for a dam-foundation wing, though. The old volcano has to be solid basalt lava or the dam wouldn’t hold. I noticed on the map that there’s a good-sized crater topside.”
“So what? That blonde they sent to tempt you from the straight and narrow Cause of Leon said her side was hiring guns too, non?”
Captain Gringo stubbed out his cigar in a tin ashtray provided by the management and mused aloud, “Right, that’s where I’d have a lookout posted if I worked for C.C., Limited. That one fucking peak dominat
es the whole area, and we’ll have to work close!”
“Eh bien, it’s the rainy season and forest canopy covers everything even when the view from a mountaintop is more reasonable down here. Damn, I wish I had something to eat. Next to going to bed alone, there is nothing that keeps me awake like going to bed on an empty stomach.”
Captain Gringo started to undress as he said, “Quit reminding me, dammit. Get some sleep while you can. Want the light out?”
“Mais non. I am not afraid of the dark, but some few species of insects are afraid of the light. I am not quite hungry enough to eat rat-sized tropical roaches, and I no longer find it amusing to wake up with a scorpion in my ear.”
Captain Gringo nodded and finished stripping. He made a pillow of his shirt and jacket and slipped the .38 under it before stretching out nude under one thin sheet.
Gaston had just done the same when the tent flap opened and two adelitas ducked in, giggling. Neither of the camp-following dames looked bad, but the really beautiful sight was the trays of refreshments they carried.
The one who’d seen Captain Gringo first dropped to her knees beside him, presenting the corn bread and chili con carne she’d brought as well as a carafe of red wine for his inspection. He propped himself up on one elbow and told her he loved her. She giggled and said she was called Dulcenita. He said she looked sweet to him, too, and dug into the grub. It was spiced enough to make most Anglos wince, but he was used to Latin cooking and hungry as a bitch wolf, so what the hell. If he washed it down with the dry peon wine, it probably wouldn’t detonate in his guts. Dulcenita seemed to be hanging around for something. He knew you had to be careful about offering tips anywhere but in a cantina. So he asked her if she’d like some wine.
She giggled, took a swallow, and said, “El señor is trying for to get me drunk, no?”
He said she could get as drunk as she liked. Then, catching sight of what Gaston was doing to his own waitress across the tent, he added, “Hey, Gaston, for chrissake, these dames could belong to somebody with a gun!”
Gaston murmured something in the ear of the one he’d been feeling up, and as she rose to snuff the lamp, he said, “I most naturally ask about such things before I slip my hand under any skirt, my prim and prudish schoolboy!”
As the tent was plunged in darkness, Captain Gringo growled, “Jesus H. Christ, if I get any of this chili in my eye it’ll never heal! Couldn’t you have waited until we finished eating, you old fart?”
“Mais non; I eat lightly, when I anticipate a grand dessert. Excuse me, Dick, I can’t talk to you right now. I seem to have a tit in my mouth.”
Captain Gringo laughed, shoved the tray up against the tent wall where the bugs could get at it without crawling over him in the dark, and reached for the wine Dulcenita had been holding when the lights went out. As his hand landed in her lap, he didn’t find himself grabbing a drink. The little adelita had pulled her skirt off over her head, and, like most Indian or half-Indian girls down here, she’d either shaved or plucked the fuzz from around her snatch.
She laughed and climbed on top of him as he held on to his advantage. Dulcenita whipped the sheet from between them and forked a firm, chunky thigh across him to settle on his semi-erection before he’d had time to really get hot. As her warm wet flesh enveloped him he rose to the occasion as any gentleman would, of course. Dulcenita lowered herself gingerly, gasped, and said something in her Indian dialect to her unseen companion across the tent. From the answer she received, one could tell she was forced to speak with her mouth full. So Captain Gringo’s bedmate laughed and started moving up and down, taking it deeper with each stroke as she got used to the unexpected blessings she was receiving.
He reached up to fondle her top-works, noting with mild surprise that she still had her blouse on. It was odd how working-class American and Latin American girls shared the same odd shyness about total nudity in bed, even though they screwed everyone they knew, if asked at all politely. As a Mosquito or at best a backwoods mestiza, he knew she probably didn’t know how to kiss, either. But she sure knew how to move her broad brown ass.
He let her bring him to climax. It was still hot and muggy. But he wasn’t even sweating as she milked his first discharge out of him and kept going. He ran his hands up under her blouse. Her breasts were filmed with her own perspiring efforts and he could tell she was getting there herself. He suggested taking everything off. Dulcenita murmured, “Oh, no, por favor, only wicked girls allow men to see them naked, señor!”
“Call me Dick. I can’t see a fucking thing in this darkness, querida, and, speaking of fucking …”
He rolled her over on her back without withdrawing and pulled her blouse up to expose her sweat-slicked breasts to his own heaving chest as he proceeded to do it right. She moaned in pleasure and said, “Oh, Deek, you are so thoughtful. This feels so much nicer for me. But are you sure you do not mind my enjoying you so selfishly?”
He shoved her blouse off over her head as she started to protest, then wrapped her soft plump arms around him and sighed, “You are right. It does feel even better this way. But please don’t tell anyone I took all my clothes off. I have my reputation to consider!”
He kissed her to shut her up as he pounded her to glory. She kissed at first like a little girl, or an Indian. Then, as he felt she was starting to climax and parted her pursed lush lips with his tongue, Dulcenita showed she was willing to experiment and a willing pupil. She sucked his tongue almost out by the roots as she locked her strong legs around his waist and tried to pull what she had in that end out by the roots as well.
He was still inspired, very inspired, when she went limp in his arms and lay quietly pulsing in post-climactic contractions until she realized he wasn’t even slowing down. She gasped something in her Indian dialect, and the unseen girl with Gaston giggled and said something back that sounded dirty, even when you couldn’t understand it. Gaston growled in English, “Can’t you two make love without distracting conversation? I am trying to teach this adorable child how we do it in Paris with our, ah, best friends.”
Captain Gringo laughed and said, “Kiss it once for me. I don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about. But we both seem to be doing something right.”
The conversation had distracted him as well, so he had to start over to catch up with his own bedmate. She murmured, “Wait. My friend, Rosa, says she has just discovered a new way to please a man. Roll on your back, my toro. I wish for to see what she finds so amusing about this French business.”
That sounded fair. So Captain Gringo rolled off, albeit halfway to the edge and sort of anxious as Dulcenita groped for his erection in the dark, then lowered her head until her long black hair was sweeping his naked belly, and proceeded to act French indeed.
As she started blowing the charge on his bugle, Captain Gringo chuckled and muttered in English, “I’ll be damned. I think they’re playing follow the leader!”
Gaston replied, “Oui; now aren’t you glad you teamed up with a man of my vast experience? What do you suggest I suggest next for Rosa here? She seems the eldest and more willing pupil, and I fear the ruffians they usually service know nothing about the subtle ways to enjoy a woman, hein?”
Captain Gringo didn’t answer. He was coming. He grabbed Dulcenita’s well-lubricated crotch in the dark and encouraged her flute solo by massaging her wet clit with one hand as he ravaged the rest of her goodies with the other. She went nuts on his shaft and took it deep throat while he tickled her, finger-fucked her, and got a pinkie up her winking anus so it wouldn’t feel left out. As he fed her his wad he could tell from her pulsations that she was coming too. She fell limply on her side with a thigh across his chest and proceeded to give a blow-by-blow description of what they’d just done to her pal across the tent. As Rosa responded by following the leader, Gaston sighed, “Oh, thank you, Dick! I’ll never forget what a friend you’ve been tonight!”
Captain Gringo woke up with a start, reached for his .38, and relaxed as
he realized he’d been awakened by the distant sounds of pots and pans. He was alone atop his rumpled bedding. He didn’t worry about that, either. He muttered, “Hey, Gaston?” and when the Frenchman answered in a sleepy voice, he added, “I think it’s getting dawnish outside. Someone’s cooking breakfast up the line. Can you see what time it is?”
“Merde alors, you have the watch, and it’s still pitch black in here. Go back to sleep, you species of early bird-life. They shall blow a bugle when El Generale wants everybody up, you idiot!”
That sounded sensible. Captain Gringo lay back down, albeit now wide awake. The chili con carne was repeating on him. He groped out some matches and found the stub of the perfecto he’d stubbed in the tin ashtray before turning in. It only tasted like shit for the first few puffs. Then the good tobacco took over from the overnight mildew.
The tent flap opened, exposing a flash of dismal gray light as the girls came back in with hot coffee and tortillas, bless their little hearts. He sat up and groped for the breakfast Dulcenita had brought him. She sat giggling while he consumed it. Then, feeling better, he groped for Dulcenita for dessert. Only, it wasn’t Dulcenita, as he discovered when he laid her across the bedding to undress her again. Great minds running in the same channels, Gaston observed, “Excuse me, Dick, do you have Rosa over there?”
“I think so. Want to swap?”
“Mais non; but I think they do. Shame on you, Dick, this one is built like a little girl and … Mon Dieu, who taught her to grab a man’s foundations with such a firm hand?”
Captain Gringo laughed and didn’t answer as he explored the surprise in his own bedding with his own hands. Rosa was built much bigger and softer. He didn’t kiss her lips. None of them had had a bath since the two girls had played follow the leader on everyone’s dongs a few hours ago. But as he explored between her soft fingers, he could feel she’d at least dunked her crotch in a nearby creek, so what the hell. He could tell because her lap, unlike Dulcenita’s, was well thatched with thick moist pubic hair. Everything else about her was a novel challenge too. So he rolled into the saddle of her welcoming raised thighs and said, “Oh, yeah!” as he sank into a totally new experience.