The Street Angel

by Robert Gollagher

  “He has blonde hair?”

  “Yes, Captain.”

  “I see. Turn around, boy. Turn around and face the wall.”

  Paulo did as he was told.

  “You swear you have told me the truth? This Junio has the necklace?”

  “Yes, I swear. I will help you find him. I will take you to him.”

  Sollo pointed his revolver close behind the boy’s head, without letting it touch the skin. “Of course you will, boy.”

  “Yes, Captain. I will find him for you. I promise.”

  “Good,” Sollo whispered. But Paulo did not hear the word. He did not hear the gunshot, either, the explosive sound of the hollow-point bullet being hurled by a fireball of hot gas and gunpowder out of the barrel and into the base of his skull. There was only silence, only silence, and there was death.

  Paulo’s legs buckled under his dead body and his smashed head slammed into the dirt. Sollo leaned over the body to make sure it was dead. Where the bullet had entered there was a small hole, but where it had exited in multiple molten fragments, there was a huge cavity. One side of the face was missing, replaced by a grotesque pulp of red and grey, a hollow cup like the shell of a rotten melon. Sollo was satisfied. The boy was dead.

  On the warehouse wall was an obscene, spattered patch of blood and brains and tiny splinters of bone from the dead boy’s skull. Some of this had been blown back by the force of the impact and had spattered onto the sleeve of the captain’s arm. This annoyed him. He wiped at his sleeve.

  In the little shack forty yards away, Susan was hyperventilating. She was crying. She could hardly see down the viewfinder of the video camera. It was all she could do just to keep it blindly pointed in the right direction. She was so sickened, so scared, she thought she would pass out, but she told herself she could not. She must film this, or there would never be any justice. She was the only hope for these children, the only hope. She wished she had never come to the slum that day. But she had come.

  Behind the tree, Junio was crying too. He moved all the way behind it, so he was completely out of view to the warehouse, and gripped his arms so tightly that his fingers dug into his own flesh, bruising himself. Paulo was dead. The soldier had killed Paulo. Junio prayed for his own life.

  Captain Sollo called the two soldiers out from inside the warehouse.

  “Get this carcass out of here. We have another boy to find.”

  “Yes, sir,” said the first of the soldiers. “Right away.”

  Chapter 12

  Susan kept the camera rolling while the military police van trundled slowly up to the side of the warehouse, and as the soldiers threw Paulo’s body in the back of the van. She stopped only when they and the captain had gotten into the van and driven away. Then she waited a few minutes to be sure all the military police had gone, bade Silvia and Pedro goodbye, and despite their protestations she went to the warehouse.

  She walked over slowly, as if she were being forced to do so against her will. It was her intention to go to the wall of the warehouse, where the boy had been murdered, and photograph the site up close, but as she walked over she saw a blonde-haired boy nervously walk out from behind a tree near one corner of the chain-link fence. The boy approached her until he was close enough to be recognised. She could see he was crying.

  “Junio?” Susan said, unsure if it was really him. He was very dirty.

  “Yes, Senhora.”

  Susan felt tears welling up in her eyes again. She ran over to him and whisked him off the ground, hugging him. She was so distraught that she forgot to speak Portuguese. “Oh, thank God. Thank God. You’re alive. Oh, God, Junio, we were so worried. Where have you been?”

  For once, Junio did not mind being hugged. He pressed his face into Susan’s shirt and cried, not understanding a single word of the English.

  At last, Susan remembered what language she was speaking, and switched to her shaky Portuguese. “Thanks be to God, Junio. Thanks be to God. We must go. We must go now. The soldiers can come back. Quickly.”

  Susan took Junio’s hand and led him back to where her car was parked, past the shack of Silvia and Pedro. She put him in the back, then got in and started the engine. Soon they were bumping slowly across the dirt roads of the slum. In only a few hundred yards, she came to a military police checkpoint. There was a parked van and several soldiers asking the locals questions. Susan wondered if she should turn back, but they had seen her.

  “Junio, listen,” said Susan. “There is a blanket. Get into the blanket and sit on the floor of the car. Do you understand?” Then she said in English, “Oh God, let me get it right.” She tried again. “Junio, get under the blanket! Get under the blanket and lie down on the floor! There are soldiers!”

  Junio understood at last, and did as he was told.

  Susan drove slowly up to the checkpoint and stopped.

  A soldier walked over to the car. “Good day, Senhora.”

  “Good day,” said Susan, still in Portuguese.

  “What is your business here today?”

  Susan stumbled nervously on her words. “I bring food for ... the poor families. I am from the church. I bring food for the poor families. Now I am finished. I go home now.”

  The soldier peered in the window of the car. There was still a parcel of food on the back seat, and a blanket covered what looked like more parcels on the floor in front of the seat. “Okay, Senhora. You can go.”

  “Thank you. Thank you, officer,” said Susan. The man was a private, but she only knew the word for ‘officer,’ something the locals had told her would come in handy if she were ever pulled up by a traffic cop.

  The soldier waved her on.

  Susan put the car in gear and drove slowly down the dirt road, heading for the highway. When she finally reached the sealed road, she pulled onto it and accelerated rapidly away from the slum. It was only then that she finally said, “Okay, Junio. Let’s go. Sit up now.”

  Junio came out of under the blanket and got up on the back seat. He said not one more word until they reached the orphanage. All he did was look through the box of food and open some biscuits. He began to eat them slowly, one by one, as Susan navigated the busy roads of Recife and raced back to the orphanage. She had already decided what she would do. She would call Bob. He would know what to do, she was sure of that, and she herself was so wound up she could hardly think straight.

  But first she must talk to Junio. Once she had parked the car, she took the boy to her private bedroom at the orphanage and sat him on the bed. She closed the door so no one would hear her questions, then she pulled the chair away from her little desk and put it next to the bed. She sat down and looked at Junio, thinking of the Portuguese words she needed to say.

  “Junio, are you all right? Did the soldiers do anything to you?”

  “No, Senhora. They did not see me. I was hidden from them.”

  “Okay. Junio, did you see ... did you see what happened to Paulo?”

  Junio nodded his head slowly, to say that he had seen it but more than anything else in the world he did not want to remember it.

  “Oh, no. I am sorry, Junio. I am sorry that you saw.”

  Junio looked down at the floor.

  “Junio, my little Junio, you must tell me about Paulo.”

  “Tell you what, Senhora?”

  “Why did the soldiers come for Paulo? Why did they shoot him?”

  Junio looked straight at her, his eyes wide with terror. “The soldiers came for him, Senhora, because Paulo stole from God. He stole from God, Senhora, and God was angry. God made the soldiers come ...” Junio was crying again. Susan reached out and hugged him.

  “It’s all right, Junio. It’s all right. It will be okay.”

  “But he stole from God, Senhora, and I was with him when he stole. God will send the soldiers for me, too, and I will never see my mother in heaven, Senhora. God will never let me go to heaven and see my mother...”

  “No, no, Junio. How could you think such a thing?
God loves you. It will be all right. God did not send the soldiers, Junio. It was not God.”

  “But Senhora, I saw it on the television of Senhora Vientes. They say that those whose steal from God are little devils. They say the children on the streets are from the devil, they say God will punish us.” Junio was crying almost hysterically now, a child’s tears, almost unable to breathe.

  Susan hugged him tightly and stroked his filthy hair as he wept. “No, no, Junio. You are not a devil. You are my little angel, Junio. You are just a little boy. Don’t cry. Everything will be all right. You are my little angel.”

  Junio looked up at her seriously. “You mean it, Senhora? I am?”

  “Yes, of course, Junio, dear Junio. You are my little angel of the street.”

  Junio gradually stopped crying. The sense of panic had left him.

  Susan smiled at him. “Everything is going to be all right, I promise.”

  “But we stole from God, Senhora. The soldiers will come for me, too.”

  “What is this you are saying, Junio? What is this, ‘We stole from God’?”

  “Paulo stole it from the man. I saw it on television, Senhora. They say it is a gift from the angels, the angels of God. And Paulo, he took it.”

  “What are you taking about? Took what?”

  Junio reached into the pocket of his grimy shorts. “This, Senhora.”

  Susan found herself unable to reply in Portuguese. Junio had handed her a marvellous diamond necklace with three long strings of diamonds and two large rubies. It must have been worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. She spoke in English. “Oh, my God, Junio. Where did you get this? Where on earth did you get this?”

  “Oh what, Senora?” said Junio, puzzled by the strange language.

  Susan spoke Portuguese again. “Sorry. Sorry, um, from where is this?”

  “From the man, Senhora. Paulo took it from the man.”

  “What man?”

  “The man he shot with his gun.”

  “Paulo shot someone? Junio, did Paulo shoot someone?”

  “Yes, Senhora. He shot the man.”

  Suddenly Susan remembered that Bob had told her about an armed robbery at the Golden Beach Hotel, about a diamond necklace being stolen. “Junio, wait here. I’ll be right back.”

  “Yes, Senhora.”

  Susan hurried to the orphanage office, went to the desk, and hunted around for the newspaper she had saved a few days ago, the one with the article about the robbery. When she found it, she turned to the page that had the photograph of the stolen necklace, held up Junio’s necklace to the newspaper, and realised they were one and the same. She whispered the caption out loud, translating it to English. “The Tears of the Angels.”

  “Oh, God,” she said, as she dialled Bob’s number on the office phone. She was glad that the orphanage was quiet that afternoon. Fabriola and the others had taken the children on a church excursion. Even the blind boys had gone. There was no one to hear what she was saying.

  When Richards answered his home phone, he didn’t even get the chance to say hello before the torrent of words began.

  “Bob. Thank God you’re home. It’s Susan. Look, I’ve ... I’ve got the necklace. The Tears of the Angels. I’ve got it, and Junio’s here, too. There’s been a boy killed, Bob, they shot him, the military police shot him ...”

  “Susan? Susan, what are you talking about?”

  Susan tried again, speaking more slowly this time. “Listen, Bob, I’m not joking. I’ve got the necklace, the necklace that was stolen. They’re killing the children, Bob, they’re killing them.”

  “Susan, are you sure?”

  “Yes, of course I’m sure! Didn’t you hear me, Bob, they’re killing them!”

  “All right, all right. I heard you.”

  “Well, what are we going to do about it?”

  “Susan, stop talking. It’s not safe. I’m coming over.”

  The phone went dead. Susan put it down and went back to her bedroom. To her amazement, Junio was asleep on her bed. She looked at him lying there, hoping that his sleep was bringing him some peace from the nightmare he had just been through. Then she locked the door behind her as she left, to be sure no one could get to him. She was sure she had not been followed, but she would not be able to forgive herself if anything happened to the boy. She went back to the office and sat anxiously with the necklace in her hands for ten minutes, waiting for Richards to arrive. Ten minutes seemed like a whole hour to her.

  When Richards finally knocked on the lobby door, Susan would not open it without climbing onto a chair first and looking down through the louvred windows above the door so that she could see for sure it was him. Then she unlocked the door and locked it again behind him.

  “Bob, thank God. Come to the office. I’ve got to show it to you.”

  “All right, okay. I’m coming.”

  In the office, Susan got the necklace out of the desk drawer and handed it to Richards. He snatched it from her and shook his head incredulously.

  “Jesus Christ! Where in the hell did you get this, Susan? Jesus Christ! You weren’t kidding, were you?”

  “Junio had it, Bob. Junio had the necklace.”

  “Junio? The kid who stole my wallet?”

  “Yes! I found him in the slum today, and he had this.”

  Richards tried to think. “But that means that b.s. story about the street kids taking it must have been true. I thought it was a crock of shit. The little bastards must have taken it from the jewel thief, after all.”

  “They’re not bastards, Bob. They’re children. They’re just children.”

  “Well, those children killed a man, or at least they would have, if the military police hadn’t finished the job they started.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Has Junio told you that, Susan? Did he tell you how they shot a guy in an alley in Boa Viagem and took the jewels he was carrying?”

  “He ... he said that Paulo shot a man.”

  “Who the hell is Paulo?”

  “He’s another boy. He’s dead.”

  “Dead how? When?”

  “Today! Just now, in the slum. The military police came for the children. I thought they were going to kill them all, but they just took one boy, Paulo, and let the other children go.”

  “What happened to Paulo? Did they interrogate him?”

  “Yes, I saw it.”

  “You saw it?”

  “I was in Silvia da Sousa’s house when the police came. I could see everything that happened, from the window. I saw them kill him, Bob.”

  “Oh, Jesus, Susan. What the hell were you thinking?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What the hell were you doing watching? Don’t you know if they saw you they might have just decided to go and kill you, too?”

  “Bob, you’re not listening to me. I saw them shoot a child. They ... shot him in the back of the head. They ... just murdered him.” Susan could feel herself beginning to cry, but she held back the tears. “There was an officer, a captain I think. He interrogated Paulo outside the warehouse. I couldn’t hear what they were saying. Then he made the boy turn around and he shot him. He killed him, Bob. I can still see the blood, all over the wall ...”

  Richards grabbed Susan by the shoulders, to steady her. “Shit, Susan, I’m sorry about the kid, I really am, but you don’t watch that kind of thing. You walk away. You might have gotten yourself killed.”

  Susan pushed him away. “Walk away? How could I walk away? A child has been murdered. Could you walk away from that?”

  Richards sighed. “This isn’t England, Susan. It’s Brazil.”

  “Does that make murder all right, Bob?”

  “Susan, come on. I’m on your side, remember. It’s just, I just couldn’t stand it if anything happened to you. Okay? Can you understand that?”

  Susan calmed down. “I’m sorry. I’ve never seen anyone shot before. It was so horrible. I’ll never forget it. It was so horrible.” />
  “Okay,” said Richards. “We’ll work it out. It’ll be okay.”

  Susan hugged him, at last. “Oh God, Bob, I’m glad you’re here.”

  “Well, we’ve gotta work out what to do next.”

  “What do you mean? We have to go to the civil police.”

  “The police? And tell them what? That you have a quarter-million dollars worth of stolen necklace in your pocket?”

  “No. I’ll show them the tape.”

  “Tape?”

  “Videotape. I had a camera. Everything I saw ... I’ve got it on camera. The interrogation. The shooting. It’s all on tape.”

  Richards turned his back to her and leant against the wall for a moment. Then he faced her again. “Susan, you’re not telling me you stuck a goddamn video camera out the window and taped an execution? Please tell me that’s not what you’re saying.”

  “I had to. It was the only thing I could do, to help those children.”

  “Oh, Christ. We’re dead.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, if anyone – anyone – knows you have that tape, and that necklace, it’ll get you killed, me killed, Junio killed, and anyone else who has seen the tape killed as well. Del Campo already told me if he finds any connection between me and the robbery, I’m a dead man. Do you think he’s going to let a tape like this exist? Jesus, Sue.”

  Susan said nothing.

  “Have you shown it to anyone?”

  “No.”

  “Well, all right. We know Silvia won’t talk. She can be trusted. The question is, How do we dispose of that tape safely?”

  “We’re not going to dispose of it, Bob. We’re going to take it to the police and we’re going to help save the rest of the children.”

  “Take it to the police? Which police?”

  “The civil police.”

  “Sue, don’t be a fool. This isn’t Wimbledon! They don’t fight by Marquess Queensberry Rules out here, pip pip hurrah and three fucking cheers to the victor. You can’t go to the police with this.”

  “Do you have to swear about everything, Bob?”

  “I’m trying to get through to you. Don’t you get it? If they find us with that videotape, we’re all dead. And that goes for the necklace as well. The best thing you could do with that tape is take it out and burn it, believe me.”