Charlie

13.

"THAT IS NOT VERACRUZ," said Bradley, poking his finger against the window gla.s.s of the Chinook. The air was spotted with turbulence and the ride was rough. "It's Guadalajara."

"There has been a change," said Fidel. He had piloted the craft for nearly seven hours. They had gotten a late start from El Dorado, which had greatly angered Bradley. "We will stop near Guadalajara."

"But Carlos has a safe strip for us in Veracruz."

"We need to see some people."

"We need to get Erin off the Yucatan. We're eleven hundred miles from the Yucatan, Fidel. You start late. You make changes. You're making me angrier."

"I am so sorry for that. But we have new information. The man I told you about. The one we were questioning."

"We've been in the air all day."

"It came yesterday."

"This is bulls.h.i.t and I don't like it. Carlos won't, either. He recruited you to help me, not to risk Erin's life."

Fidel gave him a dark look that encompa.s.sed Erin within his own history. Bradley saw that his quest to save Erin was only a part of Fidel's quest, a subordinate fragment of the dream that was to avenge his wife and family, and he felt the nearly blind fury stirring inside again. It was always right there, up near the surface, invisible and powerful.

"Would you like to fly us to Veracruz, Bradley?"

"I can't fly this thing."

"No, of course not. Then you be a good soldier and do what I tell you to do."

Someone pushed into the flight deck. Bradley heard the roar of the motor and rotors when the bulkhead door opened and he turned to see Caroline Vega glaring down at him.

"You only missed Veracruz by six hundred miles."

"I was just explaining that to Fidel," said Bradley.

"And I was just explaining to Jones that we have a change of plans," said Fidel.

"Like what kind of change?" asked Vega.

"We need fuel."

"What are all those drums of fuel in the back for? I kicked one of them. It wasn't empty."

"You can never have too much fuel," said Fidel. He turned and smiled up at her. "So now we stop for fuel."

"Who's in charge here, Bradley? Is it you or him?"

"I will let you two decide who is in charge," said Fidel.

With this he clicked off his shoulder restraint, stood and left the c.o.c.kpit.

"Can you fly this, Brad?"

"No. You?"

"I don't believe so."

Vega worked her way into the pilot seat and surveyed the instruments before her and reached out her hands but wasn't sure where to put them. She looked helplessly at Bradley.

He felt the big machine groaning along but it felt different to him, as if a great weight was climbing onto its back. There was a hesitation and a dreamy yaw that brought his stomach up into his throat.

"Do something, Brad."

He climbed from the copilot seat and clambered out of the flight deck with his hands on the bulkhead for balance and support. He looked back into the huge cargo and pa.s.senger bay, where the four black Yukons waited and most of the twenty men napped on litters. Most of the men wore the tan camo fatigues and shirts and desert boots of their leader, but two had changed into navy pants and light blue shirts with white oval patches over the left breast. Fidel was about to open a bottle of Bohemia and sit down with them.

Bradley approached. "You made your point."

The men looked at him with boredom or contempt.

"Good," said Fidel. "In another twenty seconds you would have been too late and we would all soon die."

"And I have a point to make also, Fidel." He swung the barrel of his AirLite flush up against Fidel's forehead, c.o.c.king back the hammer mid-swing. "If you're not on your way to the c.o.c.kpit in five seconds I'll pull. I'm sure one of these guys can fly this thing. I will not wait six seconds, Fidel. I simply will not wait. And we are not stopping until we get to Veracruz. So now, five, four, three..."

Bradley counted fast and on "one," Fidel shrugged away from the pistol and started for the c.o.c.kpit. Bradley fell in behind him, gun still up and ready, scanning the hostile eyes of the men as he walked. "Remain clear on who's running this show, s.h.i.tbird. And everything will be cool."

14.

SHE AWOKE TO SUNLIGHT DASHING through the open window shutters and a symphony of birdsong in the trees outside. A tangle of melodies, she thought. The sun looked in from the eastern sky like a big red face. The palm fronds lifted and dropped and lifted again.

She lay on her back in the bed with both hands spread over her belly and she silently told her son that everything was good now, everything was good. She thought of Bradley and wondered where he was and what he was doing. She thought of Felix the reporter and banished the memory, and she thought of Saturnino and banished that memory too, and she remembered waking up in this bed, with Armenta and Owens looking down at her as if she were a curiosity or something newly hatched.

The boy with the golden pompadour brought her coffee and breakfast. He said his name was Atlas. As he arranged her meal he asked her in good English if she had played the Gibson Hummingbird yet.

"I haven't touched it," she lied. It seemed mandatory.

"Mr. Armenta would be pleased if you did."

"Well, isn't that just dandy."

He looked at her and smiled shyly. "Dandy?"

"What I meant was, I don't care if I please that monster or not."

With a furrowed look he rearranged the cream and the coffeepot. He snapped the napkin in the air and folded it into a fan and set it to the left of the plate. "He is not a monster. The natives call him yaguarete, with respect. It is good to please him. This is his world and he rules over it."

"Will he feed me to the leopards if I don't play his guitar?"

"It is your guitar. When something appears in your room it means that Mr. Armenta has given it to you. My casita is filled with treasures. I have beautiful clothes. I have Rosetta Stone for English. I have a smart phone. But I cannot use it here for reasons of security."

"I don't want the guitar. I have plenty of them at home."

He looked at her and seemed about to speak but did not. He collected his tray and stand and carried them to the door and got his key from his pocket. "Mr. Armenta will be here at twelve o'clock noon, and he will wish you to perform."

"Perform?"

"On the Hummingbird."

"p.i.s.s on him. p.i.s.s on his Hummingbird too."

Atlas's smooth fair face flushed pink and his breath caught. He smiled very slightly and his eyes held both mirth and shame at the mirth, and he backed through the door with tray and stand and was gone.

Armenta stood formally beside the handsome leather armchair. His back was to the window and the shaded sunlight. His hair was a neglected heap and the lines of his face looked like they had been powdered with ashes. He wore a white Guayabera that called attention to the grayness. He was barefoot. He stood a long while in silence and no birds sang.

Erin sat at the head of the table watching him. She felt some fear but mostly anger and helplessness. She wondered what would happen to her and her unborn son if she killed Armenta right now. A quick trip to the bathroom would give her the means. She wasn't sure she could do it but she thought she might. But then what, kill Saturnino too? Then all the Gulf Cartel?

"What is just is not always popular," he finally said. "And what is popular is not always just."

"What does that mean?"

"I'm sorry for what you saw."

"But not for what you did?"

"No. What I did was just."

"I'll never agree with you."

"Justice is nature and I have been just."

"You don't believe that. Your face betrays you."

"Oh?"

"Yes."

"Explain my face to me."

"It looks like something death brought with him in his suitcase."

He studied her. "I loved Warren Zevon. I miss his music. Please. Play one of his songs for me on the Hummingbird. Do you know 'Keep Me in Your Heart'?"

"I know that song."

"When he writes that he is tied to her like the b.u.t.tons on her blouse. Oh. Perhaps the last song he wrote and he knew this was to be the last. Valentia. To create while he is dying."

"Don't we all."

A small twinkle came to Armenta's depleted eyes. "Yes. And what bravery it is."

"The reporter was struggling bravely when the leopards dragged him off."

She looked away from him and out a window to where the palm fronds lifted and rode the steady breeze. A cursed beauty, she thought. Two pigeons sat upon the railings of her balcony outside looking down on the coop as if awaiting an invitation. She saw two men dressed in white with white balaclavas covering their heads and faces walking slowly up a path toward the castle. The breeze rippled their garments and they looked insubstantial, she thought, like ghosts.

"Who are the people in white?" she asked.

"The lepers."

"Why are they the only ones who go to the third floor?"

"It is theirs."

"Why are they here?"

"Their colonia was destroyed by a hurricane so I brought them here. Once, many years ago, I was pursued by killers. I ran until I was exhausted. My friends were all dead. I had a gun but no bullets. I ran to a leper camp. I did not think my enemies would pursue me but they did. The lepers hid me. I buried myself in a leper's bed that stunk with the smells of his disease. Men with guns poked the blankets but not me. I told you I am loyal and do not lack compa.s.sion."

She was aware Armenta had not taken his eyes off her. "So you murder reporters but comfort the sick?"

"The lepers are loyal and grateful. The reporter was not."

"You aren't G.o.d."

"I do not want to be."

She stood and walked into the bathroom and locked the door. She ran the faucet and found the derringer at the bottom of the flush box and pulled it out and let it drain over the bowl. It was a heavy little thing with a curved rosewood grip and a stainless-steel body and a funny name-the Cowboy Defender or the Texas Slayer or something like that. It fit easily within the span of her hand. The barrels were "over and under," as Bradley had said, and it fired two different and powerful charges but she couldn't remember what they were. He said if she shot at somebody from less than ten feet she'd probably hit her target. More than fifteen feet away just forget it. Head if you can, heart if you can't. Squeeze the trigger, never yank it.

Shoot him, then what? she thought. Easy: dress in new designer fashions. Use his key to leave the room. Outrun Saturnino and all of the Gulf Cartel gunmen, dodge the loyal servants and the gun-toting padre and the lepers and vanish into the jungle. Live on roots and bugs and dew collected in palm fronds. Move by night. Find a village. Use the cash to get a car or boat to the nearest airport. Done. One blast of the Cowboy Exploder and I'm home free with my son safe and sound inside.

She looked down at the thing, its barrels gaping like the nostrils of a pig, then she ran faucet water and quietly set the gun back down in the tank. She thought: I'll kill someone when it will do me some good. Yes. Her hands trembled badly as she splashed water onto her face and dried it and when she went back into the room Armenta was watching her with his lugubrious eyes.

He held the Hummingbird toward her with both hands. "Please now perform."

She took the instrument because her nature was to play it and because playing gave her strength. She heard the faint harmonics of the box and strings brushing through the air as she walked across the room. She sat down on one of the dining room chairs and played the first few phrases of Zevon's "Keep Me in Your Heart."