by Caryl Ferey
“Drop your gun or I’ll shoot her!” the voice repeated.
Etcheverry appeared at the corner of the hall, protected by his human shield. Anita raised her arms, terrified, the Glock’s barrel against her temple.
“I’ll blow off her head!” Etcheverry threatened. He moved forward a few feet, his pistol still pressed against her skull. “Drop your gun, do you hear me, Calderón?”
The killer was a good six inches taller than Anita. The others were hiding behind the wall, close to the bathroom. Rubén gripped his gun—it was too late to escape, he heard footsteps approaching behind him, at least two men who were now blocking any retreat. He leaped toward the hall, met in a fraction of a second the frightened eyes of his childhood friend, and shot her at point-blank range.
Hit hard, Anita fell back against Etcheverry, who still had his finger on the trigger. A fatal second for looking forward. The .45’s bullet had passed through the blonde’s shoulder, emerged above her scapula, and continued its deadly course: it hit Etcheverry right in the heart. A look of surprise crossed his face; he heaved a last sign as the cop collapsed at his feet and slipped with her down the wall of corridor. Running up behind, Parise fired from the debris of the French doors. Rubén jumped over the bodies on the floor, threw himself against the opposite wall, and emptied his clip on the moving targets. Fillol, reeling near the kitchen and holding the remains of his jaw, was slammed into the sink. Ardiles’s bodyguard, hit in the stomach, sprayed the floor with his submachine gun. Splinters of bone flew up in a cloud of dust; hugging the bathroom wall, Pina was dragging his leg—Anita had hit him a little earlier. Rubén fired into the chaos: the last bullet in the .45 fractured the arch of the killer’s eyebrows. Adrenaline was burning in Rubén’s veins. He stood up, drew his knife, and sensed danger on his right. He looked for the enemy and in an instant located him at ten o’clock and drove the blade home in a single movement. General Ardiles was waiting for him near the bathroom, a Browning in his hand: the knife went into his arm all the way to the bone.
Rubén was pulling out the blade, his eyes shining with hate, when he was hit with fifty thousand volts.
13
The Taser XREP could shoot small paralyzing cartridges up to fifty yards. At close range, it could cause cardiac arrest. Calderón had a strong heart. He was writhing on the floor littered with bodies, his brain fried by the electric shock. Parise sniffed, the weapon in his hand. Del Piro was moving toward him as if he were crossing a minefield.
“Catch the girl,” he told the pilot. “Liquidate her and meet us at the seaplane. El Toro, you secure the area. You,” he said, turning to his buddy, “take care of Calderón and get all you can out of him. You’ve got ten minutes. I’ll deal with the general.”
“O.K., boss!”
The smell of gunpowder was diminishing in the house. The soles of the killers’ shoes crackled on the glass shards and cartridge casings lying everywhere. El Picador dragged Calderón’s stunned body toward the bedroom while Parise assessed the damage. Six men were down, one on the terrace, four in the hall, another in the kitchen. Dead or dying. Streaks of blood and bits of flesh speckled one corner of the door and the walls, which were perforated by bullets. Etcheverry was no longer moving, collapsed against the wooden interior wall. On the other hand, the policewoman accompanying Calderón was still breathing: she was moaning in the middle of the hall, semi-conscious, with a dark hole over her heart. Parise pushed away the weapons on the floor, stepped over the bodies, and reached Ardiles, who was lying in the bathroom doorway, pale as a sheet.
“Will you be all right, General?”
Ardiles had a nasty wound in his forearm, which he was hugging to him as if to protect it.
“No,” he said, his eyes bloodshot. “No . . . ”
The blade had broken the bone. Parise passed his hand over his sweating face and put away his Taser. Ardiles was losing blood, and his friend the doctor was blowing bubbles near the sink, his jaw lying among the glass fragments.
“I’m going to patch that up,” Parise said.
He dug through the medicine cabinet in the bathroom and found bandages and disinfectant. He had to cope with the most pressing things first, then get rid of the bodies, and take off before anyone else got there. Calderón had tracked them to the house in the delta, at least one policewoman knew about it, and perhaps others did as well. They had to throw the bodies in the river, and maybe set the house on fire. The seaplane was on the other side of the river, five minutes’ walk away. The old general was grimacing as he cleaned the wound.
“You’ve got to go back to the plane as soon as possible, sir,” Parise told him as he opened up the bandages. “You mustn’t stay here.”
The cut was clean. The old man was still bleeding and he was showing signs of weakness.
“Are you going to be able to do this?”
“Yes . . . Yes.”
“You’ll need stitches. We’ll take care of that at the monastery, not before, I’m afraid.”
“Where is Dr. Fillol?” Ardiles asked.
“Sorry, sir. He was killed in the firefight.”
Parise put a bandage on the wound and attached it to the general’s arm with adhesive tape. Ardiles gritted his teeth; all he was thinking about was getting out of this house. El Toro returned from his tour of inspection, his clothes covered with thorns and pollen.
“I found an old man hiding in a boat, not far down the bank!” he reported. “He’s the one who brought Calderón and the cop here. He told me they were alone,” the fat man added, as he caught his breath. “If there were other cops, they’d be here!”
“O.K. What about the guy in the boat?”
“Sleeping with the fishes.”
Parise grasped his superior’s good elbow to help him get up.
“O.K.,” he said. “Go see about your buddy while I take the general to the seaplane. Make Calderón tell us everything he knows and then kill him. We’ll meet at the dock in ten minutes. Get going!”
El Toro nodded mechanically, stepped over Etcheverry’s body, and disappeared toward the bedroom. Parise supported Ardiles, his red polo shirt soaked with blood.
“Can you walk?”
“Yes,” the general said with annoyance.
“In that case, go ahead. I’ll meet you there.”
He let the general make his way past the dead men, checked his Glock’s clip, and turned to the blonde lying on the floor.
Anita was regaining consciousness after the chaos of the firefight. Rubén’s bullet had passed through her without hitting any vital organ, but a sharp pain was radiating from her shoulder. The hall where she was lying stank of hemoglobin and gunpowder, and a great chill was invading her numbed body. She tried to get up but the hydrostatic shock had nailed her to the floor. She shuddered when she saw the bald giant coming toward her. An ugly face and a feeling of emptiness that urged her to act. Anita stretched out her right arm, looking for a weapon, but found nothing but blood and dust. Parise briefly sized up the blonde lying at his feet.
“The cops are coming,” she whispered to get him to leave.
“They aren’t going to save you, old lady,” he said, cocking his gun.
Anita had a defensive reflex, but it was in vain: the Glock was pointed at her head.
“Dirty rat,” she cursed between her teeth.
Anita had no last thought about Rubén, who was being held prisoner in the next room, or about her cat who was waiting for her, or about the men whom she had loved: Parise shot her in the face.
Anita died in the middle of the hall, her eyes wide open.
*
Cartridge cases lay all over the worm-eaten floor of the torture chamber. The French door was half off its hinges; the curtains were billowing in the wind, letting sunlight filter in.
El Picador had tied Calderón to the table, in the same position as the tranny, t
he bloody doll lying a few steps away.
“You waking up, Cinderella?” the ignoramus asked.
Rubén was coming to, his stomach next to the iron plate. He was immediately gripped by fear, a child’s fear returning to him after its stint in hell. From the ESMA, El Turco, and the others. He didn’t know if Jana had managed to escape, if they had killed her, or where Anita was: his muscles ached after the electrical shock, he was tied down and a guy with an emaciated face was digging around in an attaché case on the next table. He saws the picana and his throat closed up.
Then El Toro came into the room, his brow beaded with sweat after his run around the house.
“We’ve got ten minutes!” he announced.
El Picador sorted his utensils, keeping one eye on his victim-to-be—a tough guy, huh? He chose a banderilla while his acolyte was tearing off the prisoner’s shirt to get him ready. He positioned himself over the naked back, concentrating on the muscles that protruded below the little bones, and chose the point of impact. Rubén pulled on his bonds, a desperate, useless effort: the killer bent over and thrust the banderilla into his spinal column. The excruciating pain took his breath away. The sharp point had lodged itself between two vertebrae, literally nailing him to the iron plate. Rubén gasped for air, his brain in a panic, but life seemed to be running away.
“So, you fucking dandy, now you’re looking less clever,” El Toro gloated.
Rubén smelled his fetid breath like the fumes from a slaughterhouse.
“You’re going to tell us everything you know,” El Toro said, “and fast. Where did you get the document about Campallo? Huh?”
“Go . . . fuck yourself.”
“Ha, ha, ha!”
El Picador put the picana’s clamps to the detective’s ears. The machine was rudimentary, a portable, manually operated electric generator, but the damage done to the parts attached to it was irremediable. El Toro was jubilant: Calderón was there, pinned down like a butterfly on the plate.
“Let’s see what you’ve got in your belly, my darling . . . ”
*
Jana had lit out without thinking of anything but running. She’d seen what they did to Miguel, what El Toro would have done to her if Rubén hadn’t gotten her out of there. She ran straight ahead but the world was howling around her. The Mapuche didn’t feel the guts under her feet or the blood that was running from her wounded nose, nor the branches that were scratching her: her calluses were thick and fear made her run fast.
She rushed headlong into the jungle, carrying her clothes in her arms. Shots rang out behind her, a brief volley, she didn’t know what had happened, if Rubén had escaped as well—Rubén, Rubén, her heart was beating like a bird against the windowpanes. He had remained behind, in the nightmare house. She was doing battle with the bushes and roots that stuck to her skin, her blood was running down her neck onto her torso, and then there was the fear, the wild thoughts that were coursing through her mind, asphyxiating her. Jana ran straight ahead but her lungs were short of air. She stopped, out of breath, and put on her T-shirt and jumpsuit. The birds had fallen silent, her pulse was beating against her temples. Her whole body was dripping with sweat. She looked all around her, lost. It was dark under the roof of greenery, she didn’t know where the canal was, whether she was going in the right direction. Quick, get a hold on herself. A boat along the shore, Rubén had said; that implied that they were on an island. The Mapuche hardly had time to dry the warm blood running over her mouth: she heard the sound of a machete over the buzzing of the insects. Someone was following her. Someone who couldn’t be Rubén . . . Jana gritted her teeth and ran to her left.
The vines and branches scratched her skin, the roots made her stumble, but she bounded over the rough terrain and escaped the traps set for her. She stifled a scream as she crossed a wall of brambles, flattened nests of ferns, the calluses of her feet like bloodied soles, tripped again, caught herself on the branches, and then suddenly the landscape changed.
A few giant pines lined the shore, which was flooded with sunlight. Jana filled her aching lungs. The pine needles were softer under her bruised feet, and black birds were zooming along the horizon, but the world was still hostile. She was still bleeding heavily from her nose, and the machete blows were coming closer to the edge of the forest. Reeds and water lilies were growing in inlets along the shore. Jana ran toward the aquatic flowers and reeds swaying gently. The water, earth-colored, was washing up in little waves at the end of the beach. The Mapuche climbed a small rock, let herself slip into the cool water, and noiselessly hid among the reeds.
Del Piro extricated himself from the jungle, his machete in his hand. Drops of blood marked the trail of the fugitive up to this open area dotted with big pines. No one in sight: but the trail was fresh. Del Piro walked toward the shore, his cheeks covered with scratches. He pushed aside the walkie-talkie to stick the machete in his belt and pulled out his Glock: the Indian woman was there, somewhere.
“Where are you hiding, you little whore?” he murmured into the void.
Del Piro gripped the handle of the pistol in his damp hand, his senses on alert, but heard nothing but the lapping of the wavelets. A few bird cries in the distance disturbed the silence. He scrutinized the surface of the water, looking for a head sticking up, but the canal was smooth, without foam. The pilot went toward the reeds, his finger on the trigger—yes, the fugitive was there, somewhere.
Jana had let herself sink straight down; the muddy water and the lilies would protect her, but she couldn’t hold her breath for more than two minutes. The killer’s footsteps stopped in front of the mudbed. Duckweed was bobbing on the surface. Del Piro observed the little clump of reeds and the brown water that came up as far as his shoes. The reeds were bending gently in the breeze, the sun was shining in a limpid sky. He bent down, intrigued by the thin colored trickle that, being carried away by the current, was dissolving in the murky water. He smiled. The Indian was there, leaking blood.
The pilot pointed the Glock at the water lilies, bang, bang, when the walkie-talkie on his belt started to crackle.
“Del Piro, damn it, get back here!” Parise yelled. “Fast!”
Jana couldn’t see anything; mud and fear were blurring her circuits, and sounds reached her distorted. How long had she been underwater? One minute, two? She no longer had any breath, any autonomy, only a crushing pain in her thorax. They were going to cut her in two. Her lungs in agony, Jana rose to the surface, ready to die.
The sunlight blinded her for a second; she saw the deserted shore, the rocks, but not the man sent to track her down. He had disappeared. The Mapuche remained immobile for a moment, not daring to come out of the reeds. She soon heard a piercing sound: it was the police patrol boat’s siren.
*
Jana trembled all along the way. Her feet were lacerated, her arms, her hands, and blood was dripping out of her fractured nose. She made her way along the shore that led back to the house, dripping with mud and stress: where was Rubén? She hadn’t seen the seaplane take off earlier, just heard the roaring of the motors when it took off into the sky. The sun was filtering through the branches. She found the boat Rubén had mentioned, hidden under the trunk of a large willow; the leather bag that had belonged to his father had slipped under the seat. She turned toward the woods.
“Rubén?”
No answer. The house was no longer very far away. Her way blocked by thornbushes, she cut toward the jungle, which grew less dense as she approached the house. The voices soon became more distinct: the Mapuche crouched behind the thickets, some forty yards from the house, and observed the scene, the taste of earth in her mouth. The cops had taken over the place, some of them wearing bulletproof vests. Two civilians were fussing with bodies. There were about half a dozen of them, lined up on the ground. Jana shivered under the branches: a kind of odor of terror was floating there. Feverishly, she scanned the row of bodies, a
black shadow among the fronds, but none of the men lying there looked like Rubén. Police officers were exchanging a few words in front of the gray-hulled patrol boat tied up at the dock. One of them, who had been crouching up to that point, stood up and went toward the man who seemed to be his superior. Then Jana saw the two bodies lying on the ground some distance away: a blonde in uniform whose face had been blown away and Rubén, also inert, covered in blood. He was naked to the waist and lying on his stomach, his arms alongside his legs, with two banderillas still planted in his back.
Jana retreated under the branches, deaf to the world.
For a time she could never determine, she walked like a robot, haggard, and waited to lose herself in the jungle before she began to scream.
PART THREE
KULAN—THE TERRIFYING WOMAN
1
Time had passed, distorted—Mapuche time, which counts seconds as hours and begins the day at dawn. The spirits were floating, but Jana did not recognize them—not yet.
She had waited for the cops to leave before returning to the boat on the shore, hidden beneath the branches of the big willow. Once the police and their adjuncts had left, the island in the delta was left to the chaos of nature. Jana had disappeared. Her nose had doubled in size, but she didn’t think about it—she no longer thought. Her brain printed images, actions without goals, moved by an external force, a kind of stubborn will to live that she may have owed to her ancestors. The trip through the meandering canals back to civilization, the boat-taxis she met as she approached El Tigre, the motorboat abandoned near the port, the detour to the rail station, her frightening look, her naked, scratched feet, the streak of bloody snot on her T-shirt, her swollen face ringed with horror that made passersby shy away from her, the suburban train that took her back to Buenos Aires, the colectivo: all that remained vague, seen by the eyes of another moribund person.