“Did you see weapons? Is the bedroom door open?” I asked.
“Yes, they have weapons they are wearing. The bedroom door is open.” She smiled. “I must hurry before they come to see me.”
“You’re through, Conchita. Just knock on the door and make sure they know it is you. Then get out of the way.”
As I was talking, Conchita was adjusting the top of her peasant blouse, pulling it far down below her breasts and exposing a brassier. She reached behind and then shrugged the bra off. I heard Manuel gasp.
“When the man opens the door, he will be distracted,” she said. “I will get him into the hall and do not worry about him. Isabella and I can handle him.”
The distractions would no doubt work—they were almost working at the moment as I tried to think of a response—and for some reason I believed that she and Isabella could handle one of the Colombians.
Rodrigo and Manuel flattened themselves against the wall on the far side of the door, Rodrigo with pistol in hand. Isabella and I did the same on the near side.
Conchita rapped. “Estoy aqui,” she sang.
The door opened a crack and then wider as a young man stuck his head out, grinning. It was the man from the car bombing. The one who gave me the finger as he escaped.
Conchita leaned forward, smiling broadly. She slowly brought her hand up toward the man’s face, then abruptly grabbed his tie and yanked him into the corridor. Isabella rushed to help Conchita as Rodrigo and I burst into the apartment. I had my pistol in the face of the Colombian next to the stove before he could react. The door to the bedroom slammed shut, nearly hitting Rodrigo in the face as he lunged toward it.
“He is jumping out the window,” Rodrigo cried.
“Let him go,” I said. “We’re after Pablo.”
By now, Manuel was leading Pablo from the room. I backed away from my target after taking his weapon. He kept up a steady stream of angry, sneering language, most of which seemed to concern the short yet painful life I was going to experience.
A non-verbal response from Rodrigo—the barrel of his pistol across the man’s forehead—silenced him. He hit the floor and was still. Rodrigo aimed his pistol point blank at the man’s temple.
“No,” I said, not sure why.
Rodrigo hesitated and then kicked the man in the chest. You could hear the wind rush out of his mouth.
In the hallway, the other Colombian was well under control, blindfolded, his hands and feet tied, and mouth gagged.
“Give him to the Halcones,” I said. Behind me I heard a noise and turned to see the bedroom door burst open. I raised my pistol and shot the Colombian squarely in the chest, knocking him back onto the bed. Evidently he had not tried to escape when he had the chance. Rodrigo brushed by me, stood over the Colombian on the bed and put three more slugs into his chest.
“You must have missed him, Jack,” he said as he rejoined me at the door.
Manuel and Pablo disappeared down the stairs, the disheveled younger boy murmured “gracias, gracias.” Conchita was arranging her blouse, moving toward the stairway right behind them. Isabella stepped over to me and took my hand.
“Hasta luego, Jack.” She left with Conchita.
“We must leave now, Señor Jack,” Rodrigo said. He was clearly relieved and much happier than he had been half an hour before. “Someone will come. This one,” he pointed to the bound man, “will tell us what we should know.”
We stood for a moment and my heart dropped to a normal pace. We shook hands and I stepped over the trussed Colombian.
“I’ll see you later, Rodrigo.” Gearheardt was wrong. Rodrigo was a good man, a family man. Like most of the Mexicans I had come to know who were not attached to military or police organizations.
“Thank you, Jack. Thank you very much. Muchas gracias.” He didn’t turn away quite fast enough to hide the tears in his eyes.
I stopped by the bar, but didn’t see the women. At the curb I caught a taxi.
“Colonia Polanco, por favor. Ibsen.”
Celebration and emotional release should follow action. But I was always too tired. I leaned my head back against the seat and wondered how Isabella knew my name was Jack.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
DAISY SAY SHE GOT THE WHOLE WORLD BY THE BALLS
Back at the apartment Gearheardt was dispatching Marta to meet with Victor. “See if you can find out if he’s buying into the plan,” he said. “Jack and I will meet you later. Come to the Camino Real hotel about five and wait in the bar.”
“Okay, Pepe,” she said. “You and Jack will be careful. Also, I am …”
She grabbed Gearheardt by the shoulders and kissed him. Then she turned to me and kissed me without grabbing me. “I will see you later, Jack.” She remained close for a moment, and put her hand to the side of my face. She left before I could think of anything to say.
“Seems like her old self, Jack,” Gearheardt said. “Maybe she’s made her choice.”
I blushed, then realized that he was talking about us or the Cubans.
“The story about her father?”
“More or less true. And her step-brother is Gon. That’s how I found her. I think at one time she believed she was the mistress of Victor, when he was a Cuban army officer. But he started passing her around. She told herself it was for the good of Cuba, a service for her country. One day she realized that she was just a whore.”
“She still seems friendly with Victor.”
“She knows now that he is a source of information and access. She’s pretty smart, you know.”
I wanted to ask him if she had been in a bordello when he found her, but didn’t feel ready for the possible answer.
“So how did the rescue go, Jack? You seem pretty calm with just a taste of cockiness. You get the boy?”
“We got him. And two of the Colombians. One dead and one delivered to the Halcones.” I dropped into a chair.
Gearheardt didn’t seem particularly interested. He bent over his paperwork, humming and ignoring me. I rose and went in to take a shower.
Afterwards I returned to the living room dressed in slacks and a shirt. I looked for my blazer for a minute before I remembered Gearheardt had borrowed it. At the cleaners, he said. I put on a dark blue wind-breaker and we left. Gearheardt was dressed in a gray suit, light blue shirt and a maroon regimental tie.
“Where did you change clothes last night? You said you didn’t sleep, but you obviously cleaned up.”
“As a matter of fact you’ll know in a few minutes, Jack. You see, I haven’t totally leveled with you about everything going on.”
“No shit?” I said.
The Mercedes was at the curb. A mangy yellow dog had his leg lifted against one of the tires. Gearheardt went to the back of the car and deftly removed the license plate.
“Let’s find another car, Jack. This damn thing looks like crap.”
We walked through the quiet streets of the apartment buildings. Gearheardt spotted a fairly new Impala that was black and recently washed.
“Here we go,” he said. He knelt behind the car and switched license plates, giving the Impala instant diplomatic status. I just watched and didn’t ask questions. An elderly couple rounded the corner as he was leaning in to hotwire the ignition. “Buenos dias,” Gearheardt said. “Como esta?”
The couple grinned and responded. “Muy bien gracias, y usted.” Their fritzy poodle sniffed my leg. The man and woman seemed interested in Gearheardt’s work under the steering wheel, peering in the side window.
“Esta es su Impala?” Gearheardt said. He rose and pulled a wallet from his jacket pocket and flashed a badge.
“No, no. Aya.” They pointed across the street to a brown Ford.
The engine caught after a few turns and Gearheardt got in. “Let’s go, Jack,” he said. “Adios,” Gearheardt called to the couple. We burned rubber to the corner and screeched around it with the back of the car fish-tailing wildly.
“Why do you always drive like a maniac,
Gearheardt?”
“For the sheer hell of it, my friend. No worries about insurance and I’ve got diplomatic immunity. Why not enjoy the thrill?”
“I’m not sure diplomatic immunity applies to stolen cars.”
“Damn, then we’d better get the hell out of here.” He accelerated through a four way stop.
On Paseo de Reforma, a six lane street, Gearheardt slowed to only twice the speed limit. There was little traffic.
“Okay, Jack. You’ve been a good and faithful companion. You deserve to know what’s taking place in Mexico City.” He mercifully slowed to circle a glorieta. “Actually you know more than you know you know. When I fill in the pieces, you’ll say ‘oh yeah.’” He was steering with his knees while he lit a cigarette with the car’s lighter. My feet were pumping the floor in front of me as if I could brake from the passenger’s side. I was beginning to hate him again. Finally he blew out the smoke, shook the cigarette lighter and tossed it out his window. “Oh, shit,” he said. “Where was I?”
“I know more than I know I know.”
We had reached the center of town. Cars and people with fruit and flower-laden pushcarts filled the road and Gearheardt slowed to their speed. We entered the Zona Rosa. The shops were still closed, but a few tourists in their colorful native costumes roamed the streets.
We pulled to a stop in front of a small, three story building that sported a green awning reaching to the street. A restaurant was on the street floor called Los Palomas.
A smiling Mexican boy came out of the building and approached Gearheardt, who began a rapid conversation in Spanish.
Gearheardt turned to me. “I told him to get the plates and then ditch the car.”
“Your Spanish is better than you’ve been letting on, Gearheardt. What’s that all about?”
“Good question, Jack. Let me ask you one. Did you ever wonder why the CIA would send you down here when you only know a smattering of Spanish? Doesn’t it seem to be a handicap to not know the language of the people you’re working with?”
I didn’t answer. I had wondered about that almost every day. I assumed that the Agency thought I was sharp enough to do a job and learn the language as I went along. It didn’t seem reasonable.
“The Company has dozens of agents in Mexico City, Jack. How many of them do you work with? Any of them?”
“Eric helps me out. I just assumed that everyone operated in his own little world.”
“And you’re partially right.” He opened his door. “I have a better explanation that is becoming more than a hunch. I’ll tell you inside.” He turned back. “And my Spanish is damn near perfect. The less people that know the better.”
I was a bit hungry but Gearheardt passed by the inside entrance to the café and went up the stairs one flight. At the landing, double doors faced us. Los Palomas (Private) was painted in flowers above the doors. Although the hallway had been shabby, inside the Las Palomas private club was nice. We were in a large waiting room, leather chairs, a large leather couch, and dark wood tables and trim around the walls. A men’s club atmosphere.
Two young women, maybe seventeen or so, sat cross-legged on the floor in front of a gas fireplace. They were eating tacos and rice. As Gearheardt and I approached, one of them placed her hand under a breast and lifted it up, as if offering it to me. She made a kissing sound.
Gearheardt raised his hand as if to slap the girl. The girls looked at each other and began giggling. Gearheardt laughed.
“They’re Daisy’s daughters,” he said. “They mock the girls all the time and flirt with the customers. If you touch one of them, Daisy will have your skin hanging on that wall over there.” He pointed to a wall which had mounted game heads. “Come here,” he said, and walked to the wall. He pointed to a wooden plaque upon which was nailed a brown shriveled pouch. “The sign says The Balls of Hector Ortega. Hector didn’t get the message about not touching the teenagers.”
I heard the girls giggling behind us. I didn’t turn and look at them again. They were very nubile young women and I didn’t want to chance offending them.
Gearheardt spoke to one of the girls. “Chiquita, go tell Daisy that I am here. And tell Benito that I would like coffee and rolls brought to the office.”
The girl rose quickly, brushing off her blouse and approaching Gearheardt. “Someday I will be working, Señor Gearheardt, and you will be my first customer.”
“Not likely, Chiquita. Someday soon you will be a nun and your mother will be at peace at last.”
Gearheardt beckoned me to follow him through a door next to the fireplace. Down a dark hallway, and up a metal circular staircase. “It’s quiet in a bordello in the morning, isn’t it Jack? The customers usually come in starting around lunch.”
Gearheardt unlocked a door. When he flipped the light switch I saw a large room with four desks and a great deal of radio equipment. He sat down in front of a teletype machine. “Let’s see what the night’s traffic brought.”
He flipped through a number of light brown pages, pausing occasionally and humming. He extracted half a dozen pages and dropped the remaining in a wire basket on the desk.
“Here’s something that should interest you, Jack. A certain military strongman in your favorite Asian country is moving a lot of money to Switzerland. A lot of money. And it’s a guy that the U.S. is counting on for stability in his country.” He threw the page onto the pile.
“How about this? The South African government officials visiting Thailand are making private investments with government money. Let’s see. One bought a house. One a villa on the island of Phuket. And another is gambling his money away.”
I walked to his side and took the paper. “Where are you getting this?”
Gearheardt leaned around and pointed to the top of the paper in my hand. “Those numbers are the time sent. Those letters are the code for the city. And those letters are the code from the location in the city.” He turned back to the desk and spoke over his shoulder. “You might recognize the one you’re holding, Jack. Shows it was sent last night from Bangkok. And those letters mean the information came from the Happy Times Massage Parlor. Near Pat Pong to refresh your memory.”
“You mean this is your network? You actually have, what do you call them, agents, in these places?
“That’s exactly what I mean. Of course those are raw reports. If we see something we have an interest in, then we cable back for verification. We get lots of reports that are just guys mouthing off. But if the information is more or less critical, we cross-check using those forms there.” He pointed to a bookshelf with stacks of forms in various languages.
“You have radio and teletype equipment in every bordello and massage parlor?”
“Just the major cities of the world. A few minor cities that are hot spots. And we have stringers in even smaller cities that report to girls in the larger cities.”
“Amazing.”
“Not really. We’re coming out of the dark ages of interrogation, Jack. I just happen to be the technology leader. I use alcohol and sex to get my answers. Saves hauling car batteries around to attach to genitals.”
“The girls are able to do this? I mean the gathering part is probably easy, but the reports and the analysis follow-up? Come on.”
“Jack, I have yet to visit a brothel that didn’t have girls working there who would have been lawyers and doctors had it not been for some bad luck. Usually in the form of some asshole raping them when they were kids. Or their parents exchanging them for cash. No, it’s not hard to find good agents. Just takes a lot of work. I spent about two years on it.”
“So you weren’t in Angola?”
“Not all the time. The Company sent me over there after I got out of the hospital, but there wasn’t much I could do. So I hired a guy to write reports for me and took off traveling around the world visiting whorehouses and massage parlors.”
I sat down at one of the desks. “This is all a bit much, Gearheardt. You must have a huge network.”
“Probably the biggest in the world, Jack. But it’s all CIA now, or at least it’s on contract to the CIA. I do some work for Mossad and even the French sometimes. But mostly just the boys in Langley. Oh, last year I did some work for the Russians. But those bastards would just get drunk and brag about how they had a new intelligence network. They got tired of paying to see themselves blabbing about hiring me. Intelligence is not a pretty business. You have to—”
The door opened and slammed against the wall. I jumped up and watched Gearheardt to see if I should be reaching for my pistol.
“Gearheardt, you son of a bitch,” a massive Mexican woman yelled. “Chiquita told me you promised to be her first customer. I’ll have your balls on the wall before—”
“Daisy, this is my best pal, Jack,” Gearheardt said calmly.” He’s going to be working with me here for a while.”
Daisy laughed. It was a joyous sound. “You don’t scare so easy, Gearheardt. I’ll give you that. Chiquita is telling me this every time you come here. She likes you.”
“And I like her. Say hello to Jack.”
“Ola, Jack. Como esta?” She came toward me like a bulldozer, the chair in front of her swept aside.
“Muchas gracias,” I said stupidly. “I mean—”
“Another gringo who speaks third grade Spanish, Gearheardt. Where do you find them?”
Daisy was probably fiftyish. A classic Castilian beauty with layers of makeup to hide aging skin. She only looked massive, now that I had a better look, because her enormous breasts hung the black dress far out from her body. At seven in the morning, her face had already undergone the plastering job for the day. She wore high heels and I crazily imagined a garter belt. This was a ‘Madame.’
“Gearheardt has talked to me about you, Señor Jack. You save his life. You screw his girlfriend. Es correcto?”
“That pretty well covers the high points of the relationship, Daisy.” I stuck out my hand. “Pleased to meet you.” Her grip was powerful and strangely comforting.
Benito, I assumed, brought coffee and rolls and we gathered around one of the desks to fill our cups. The coffee was the best that I’d had since I came to Mexico. This pleased Benito to no end. His enthusiasm for my pleasure made me quite sure he was homosexual. Probably a good thing to be for a man working in a brothel.
Goodbye Mexico Page 19