Return to the Dark Valley

by Santiago Gamboa

  He told me that if that happened the contacts would try to figure out what was going on and would come to a decision based on their experience. And there was something else: if things got really bad, if I was in extreme danger for any reason, what I had to do was cry, “Help!” and throw myself on the floor or protect myself, because at that moment all hell would break loose from the window, the contacts would fire a volley at a minimum height of three feet, and he repeated this several times, three feet, remember that, three feet!

  I trained with men who weighed the same as Freddy, especially Contact C, practicing giving him a series of blows that didn’t seem very strong but had a tremendous impact in sensitive areas, the balls obviously, but not only there, the kidneys too, and that’s how we spent the week, including PowerPoint presentations about the various guys, who they were and what they’d done and how dangerous they were and how old they were and what vices and what diseases they had, plus physical exercises and combat methods, and the tactics I should use to make sure Freddy ended up choosing me; they knew he liked women who stood out from the crowd for some reason; they’d deliberately selected the other girls so that I would stand out, and anyway, I had to do everything I could to trap him, make eyes at him, give him signals, the kind of thing any woman can do, right, Consul? The training was good for me, and it was funny, I had to do it wearing just a top and boxer shorts, to be in the same conditions I was going to be in when I was in the house, so when I worked with Contacts A, B, and C, they kept looking at my tattoos, probably wondering, who is this crazy woman? where did they find this walking art gallery?

  At last, the day arrived.

  Tertullian doesn’t believe in God, but in a very strange thing he calls the Ancient Masters, and so he made us perform a ritual, grabbing handfuls of earth and kissing it. The contacts weren’t very eager to do it, because they were Catholics as well as one hundred percent Nazis. Contact C, the one I practiced self-defense with a thousand times, had a swastika tattooed on his left nipple, and it struck me that they were guys who’d had military training and were used to heavy weapons, so it would have been very strange if they weren’t army or paramilitaries, but I didn’t ask any questions, their uniforms were very tight-fitting black outfits, bulletproof vests, black ski masks and helmets, a pretty disturbing image! If you met one of these guys in the middle of the night you’d piss your pants with fright; the traffickers we were going to attack, starting with Freddy, had no idea what was in store for them, and eventually Tertullian’s undercover guy called and seven of the girls in the apartment, including me, had to go.

  They took us in an SUV to a house, which wasn’t the final one; there they made us change and gave us a thorough inspection, took away our cell phones, and even made us all take a shower, and then, a horrible thing that Tertullian had told us about: a security woman made sure none of us had anything in the vagina or anus, in other words, they stuck their fingers in on both sides, with a rubber glove and lubricating gel. After the shower, we were able to choose clothes from a wardrobe full of really tacky things, I put on a pair of skimpy denim shorts, and a top that left my tattoos visible, I knew that would mark me out from the others, who had really ordinary tattoos; there, they also gave us a few rounds of aguardiente to liven us up and took out pills and mirrors with lines of cocaine, white and pink, but I acted dumb and didn’t do it, I thought it was best to be clearheaded when we got to the place, at least until the plan of action got going, and anyway, around nine in the evening, they put us in another van and this time they did take us to the house, after half an hour of streets and traffic lights and sudden bends, I couldn’t have said where the hell we were and I didn’t once look back to see if A, B, and C were following us in a car, but obviously they weren’t going to let themselves be seen, they already knew where they were going, so we arrived and they let us in through a side door into a huge house with a swimming pool and a walled garden, and I thought: how are my ninjas going to get in? But if ninjas know anything, it’s how to climb walls.

  The house was all lit up and before we went in they again inspected us, making us pull down our panties and giving us the once-over, this done by a woman who was eating a piece of chicken with her hand and had grease stains up to her elbow. As she talked, you could see strips of meat stuck in her teeth, and she dribbled fat, it was disgusting, Consul, and I thought, this is getting very strange; I moved my upper lip a little to check the two pills, which by now I couldn’t even feel, and they made us go into a dressing room to freshen up; in it, there was another tray with aguardiente and ashtrays filled with pills and coke, and a kind of madam said to us, well, girls, you already know what you’re here for, right? I hope your pussies are shaved and clean, they’re going to pay you like princesses and the only thing you have to do is forget all about the word no, just that, just remember those guys in there are the mambo kings, right? and if they tell you to open your legs above the table and fart you do what they say, okay, girls? the first one to say no gets kicked out of here on her butt, do you get me? and we all said, yes, and then she grabbed one of us and said, come here, let me test you, you’re . . . Selene, wow, that’s a real hooker name you gave yourself, now let’s see, if one of those guys tells you to pee in his shirt pocket, what do you do? and Selene, who was from Antioquia, and was dying of laughter because of this test, said to her, that’s easy, I lift my leg and piss where the gentleman tells me, and the woman applauded and said, good, next one, let’s see, and she looked at the list and said, which one of you is Mireya? and another girl from Antioquia said, I am, señora, and the woman said, what do you do if one of the gentlemen tells you to put a pencil in your ass and write your social security number with it? and she turned red and said, well, I’ll put in the pencil, señora, but I’ll write the number of my ID card, because I’m a minor, or if he prefers, my cell phone number, and they all laughed, and the woman called another one, Virginia, wow, what a name, you’re no virgin, and said to her, well, Virginia, if one of the gentlemen asks you to eat Mireya’s pussy, what’ll you do? and Virginia said, well, I will, but only if she lets me, and Mireya said, of course I would, you cleaned your teeth, didn’t you? you aren’t dirty? and they kept laughing until they opened a double door and let us through into the living room where the men were.

  There were two very big white leather couches arranged in an L and a whole lot of chairs and armchairs: it was a big room that extended out onto the terrace and then to the swimming pool, a huge house. The woman, announcing us, said: Sorry to interrupt you, gentlemen, the girls have arrived, don’t these cuties deserve a round of applause? and they all applauded and I looked over them one by one until I saw him, there he was, in the angle of the L, that was him, Freddy Otálora: in front of him he had a dark bottle of whiskey, and I saw that each of them had a different bottle. There were bodyguards near each of them, but it turned out they were more like waiters, one for each guest, because whenever someone wanted to light a cigarette or have another drink or snort coke all he had to do was signal and the servant would attend him, and so we launched ourselves into the room and sat down where we could, I took up a position opposite my target, without looking him in the eyes, and started talking to another guy, who offered me a vodka; they must have been going for a while because their eyes were shiny, and then one who I recognized as the host, also known as Camándula, said to us, what would this world be without women? and he raised his glass and said, well, these beauties are here for you, my guests, make yourselves at home! But someone replied, forget it, Camándula, the last thing I’d want right now is to be at home, with a wife on top it’d be a prison! and they all laughed, and another one said, I also prefer this house to mine, and they raised their glasses.

  I saw that Freddy was drinking a very good whiskey, Johnnie Walker Blue Label, in an aguardiente glass, and I started doing this thing with my eyes, which is what you have to in order to make a guy look at you, and which consists of looking about four inches above his
head, it never fails; I started sending him visual signals; the other guys offered me drinks and talked to me, but I avoided anyone grabbing me until I asked to go to the bathroom, which was behind Freddy’s couch; when I asked the woman she said, no, girl, if you want to do coke do it here, but I said, no, I’m sorry, I really need to take a leak, and she said, oh, a leak? good, if it’s like that go take a leak, it’s that way, and she showed me the way, which I already knew; so I paraded in front of Freddy with all my artillery, I passed close to him and when I got to the bathroom I thought: if it works I’ll take off my hat to myself; when I came out and passed him again, very slowly, he said to me, you aren’t from Cali, are you? and I said, no, I’m from Bogotá, and he said, come sit with me a while, I like girls from Bogotá, and I said to myself: first phase of the plan successful, now I have to make sure of him; he offered me a glass of whiskey from his personal bottle, and when he said he liked it without ice I said me, too, you had to spend ages getting it out, and so we started talking, and when he made a place for me beside him on the couch, I realized it was in the bag, all I had to do now was wait. Men are so . . . predictable! Soon he’d suggest we go to the room, so I relaxed and continued drinking, and of course, he made me drink whiskey at his pace, and I had to do a bit of coke, too, the pure white stuff, to be strong and get through, and then he said, don’t you like pink coke? and I said, I’m scared I’ll freeze up, later when we’re alone you can let me try it, and the guy said, sure, darling, you’re the queen here, for now do the other, it’s good, really good, these guys have good stuff, but the pink stuff I make myself, and so I said, acting dumb, really? so you must be a very important person, what an honor it is that you’re with me, and he said, when we’re alone, darling, you’ll tell me all about these pictures you have on your body, and I said, you can’t see the best ones because they’re lower down, you’ll be surprised; I put my hand around his waist and now we were bang into phase two, the bird entering the cage alone; a couple of hours passed like this, talking nonsense, dancing very close, what can you talk about with a guy like that? I saw that he was strong but that he was also nervous, and he had a gun in his boot, I noticed that when we were dancing, and I remembered that those hands had raped Manuela when she was a child and burned her mother, and I looked at him and said to him in my mind: enjoy this dance, you son of a bitch, because it may your last, your last tango even if it isn’t in Paris, and anyway, the thing continued, the other girls had already been paired up, they kept giving us booze and drugs, one of the girls from Antioquia who was smoking crack with the bodyguards was already being groped in full view of the audience and she didn’t notice or didn’t care, she was already so far gone; others were already kissing while dancing and letting themselves be touched. I felt nervous because it struck me that I wasn’t going to be capable of letting Freddy touch me, let alone fuck me, that part of the training hadn’t worked, I’d thought I was colder and harder and more professional than I was; I started to feel disgust and what I did to contain it was to say to him that I’d like to do everything but when we were alone, not in front of everyone like the others, and I started criticizing my colleagues, saying that those girls doing crack and letting themselves be fondled were the worst, and then Freddy, incredibly, said, oh, darling, it’s because you’re special, you’re not just anybody, that’s obvious.

  Suddenly the host said we should have a dance contest and whoever won would take away a bag with twenty-five thousand dollars. He took it out and showed us the money, and Freddy said, good, who will the judges be? and the host said, we’ll all have a vote, I’ll hand out papers and pencils, each of us gives a mark from one to five and at the end we add them up, whoever has the highest score gets the money, shall we start? One of the couples went out on the terrace to dance, with the guests making a circle around them, and Freddy said he was going to the bathroom for a moment. I thought: this is it. He left his whiskey on the table, so I took out the ether pill without anyone seeing me, broke it with my nail, poured it in the glass, and stirred it with my finger; I grabbed the glass and, taking advantage of the fact that everyone was distracted by the dancing, I headed for the bathroom to wait for him. But on the way there, through a door that led to the kitchen, I saw some guys passing; they were bent over and had weapons, and I thought, something bad’s going to happen, they weren’t my contacts A, B, and C, so I kept walking, and got to the bathroom just as Freddy came out.

  You left your special whiskey behind, darling, I brought it for you, and he said, you’re a princess; he knocked it back in one go and just like it was a cut in an action movie the first shots rang out. Gunfire, yells, things breaking. Freddy rushed back into the bathroom, grabbing me by the arm; we closed the door and I switched the light on and off a few times, and he said, what are you doing? And I said, nothing, switching it off so they don’t see us; at that moment his head fell forward; he took his revolver from his boot and stammered: what the fuck did they give me? And he fainted. The windowpane shattered and one of the ninjas jumped inside. Come on, Susan, he said, let’s get out of there, the shit’s hitting the fan; in the house there were sounds of gunshots and cries of pain, and also orders. The host was saying to the hit men, this one, and that one over there! and I even heard, where the fuck is Freddy? where’s that son of a bitch gone?

  I went close to the window and an arm pulled me up, but just as they were hoisting Freddy up I heard pounding on the bathroom door and a number of gunshots, I don’t know if the bullets came through the door. The door finally yielded and they opened it just as my ninja B was about to jump through the window, so he had to turn and mow down the hit men, who fell, but other killers arrived and a shoot-out started. Then I heard cries, on the roof, on the roof! And more shots. I ran over those tiles in the tennis shoes they’d brought me and the guys in the house kept yelling, who are those people on the roof? And a voice said, it must be Freddy’s security people, they’re getting him out! When we got to the wall I saw the van and sighed with relief. We set off at high speed, while they were still shooting at us.

  Inside, the shooting was still going on, some of Freddy’s bodyguards had managed to barricade themselves in and retaliate, I don’t know how because supposedly they were unarmed, although they must have had concealed pistols; anyway, before we left, as part of the plan we called the police; what we hadn’t reckoned with was that the people throwing the party were planning to kill Freddy, so in a way what we did was save his life; every second that man breathes from tonight on is borrowed time, but maybe he’s going to be sorry he didn’t die in that house.

  We came out onto a big avenue and in the other lane saw a number of patrol cars with their sirens on and a special forces truck. Tertullian, who was in the van, said, look, it’s worked out better than we thought, we have the sausage in the hot dog and the shooting in there will cover our tracks, it’s great!

  I saw Freddy trussed up like a package, with straps tying his arms and a plastic tape around his neck that held his head to the floor, in case he woke up, although one of the ninjas, I think it was C, was sitting next to him.

  Tertullian patted me on the leg and said, congratulations, Juanita, you’re great, was it a good party? did he enjoy himself? and I said, he wasn’t aware of much, when he opens his eyes he’s going to think we’re from the other gang, and Tertullian said, that’s good, that’ll cover us. But I tell you this: right now, sleep is protecting him, because when he wakes up what’s waiting for him is hell. Those minutes will be his last bearing any resemblance to life. He’s going to realize that he’s sitting in a frying pan with oil, and the stove is on! He’ll regret ever being born and he’ll probably end up cursing the bitch who gave birth to him. As I told you, I don’t even consider these guys to be human: putting these humanoids out of circulation is good news for any living being, even in the vegetable kingdom. Now, let Manuelita come and we’ll see what she wants to do, although I’m already starting to get a few ideas, things I haven’t done in a w
hile, Tertullian said, in the refuge there are decent surgical instruments; but I didn’t even see them because when we arrived I felt terribly homesick for my son and longed to be surrounded by people and not by murderers, so I changed, burned the clothes I’d been wearing, and rushed back here, and when I saw you in the door, Consul, I swear to you, I thought you were the first good man I could embrace on the surface of the world.

  8

  He remained in Harar for three more years, the last years of his life, devoted to his work as a commercial agent: the same post he had had with Bardey before his experience as an arms trafficker and had repudiated. He was back where he had started, although part of his business still involved arms, and even slaves, on the Tadjoura road, the very route he had advised against in his report for the French Geographical Society.

  It was a period of great commercial activity. Menelik had finally unified the territory, proclaiming himself negus of the region, a word that means “king of kings” or emperor. And Harar was the hub, an obligatory staging post for the caravans traveling toward the Somali coast from inland. It was also a special place, thanks to its pleasant climate. Addis Ababa had not yet been founded, so the city where Rimbaud lived seemed the best place for someone with good business sense and the desire to strike good deals. And this, according to Starkie, was precisely what Rimbaud lacked: business sense. Which is why he never managed to amass a solid enough fortune to allow him to change his life. It might be asked: what kind of life did he want, and for what purpose? Although an experienced traveler, he was hopeless when it came to solving practical problems, and at the same time he was too proud to lower himself to negotiating with certain people or reaching agreements that would make his life easier to survive; he wasn’t very skillful at obtaining favorable conditions in negotiations, as we saw with Menelik in the matter of the rifles and with the creditors of his dead partner, Labatut.