Betrayed (19 page)

He showed no surprise at Vicki’s call. “We just confirmed delivery of the plane,” he informed her. “We take possession tomorrow and leave first thing the next day. Can you make it?”

Vicki hadn’t heard back yet from the mortuary, but with her change in plans, she’d be on that plane regardless of how it fit in with her original arrangement with Joe and Bill. “Give me a time, and I’ll be there.”

Only one number roused even a modicum of interest. “Archivo General de Centro America,” a female voice answered.

Vicki could think of no possible work-related reason Holly would have contacted the national archives. She decided to stop by after her appointment with the minister of environment tomorrow.

There was little else Vicki could do that day except hassle the mortuary. “No, next week is not acceptable,” she countered the mortician’s smooth excuses. “You said forty-eight hours.” She reminded him that she’d paid with Visa and could reverse the charges.

The mortician scrambled to be helpful, promising that a delivery messenger would drop by her lodgings by the close of business hours tomorrow.

The next morning  a secretary ushered Vicki into the minister of environment’s office and murmured that the Honorable Doctor Francisco Soliz would be right back. “He can spare you fifteen minutes, no more,” she warned as she returned to the reception area.

The office had Vicki wondering if all government appointees lived and worked in the sumptuousness of the colonial Spanish aristocracy. She sank into the red leather couch and looked around. If not as big as the police chief’s, the office was furnished with the same rich wood and polished leather, deep-piled carpets, and well-filled glassed-in library shelves. And the same photo display.

No, not quite. The group of framed pictures on the wall between two windows held a different woman and three much smaller children in various poses. But the largest photo . . .

Vicki rose and walked over for a closer look. Yes, it was the same group shot of men in uniforms she’d seen at the police headquarters, the same American colors on the lapels of those on either end, the same third American with his head turned away, hat tilted over his face. Like its counterpart, the photo was in black and white. Vicki guessed it had been shot for press purposes because even then surely color was the norm for photography.

“You find it of interest?”

Vicki turned around and realized the Soliz was the same man who’d presented Holly a posthumous medal at the funeral. A short, pudgy man, he rocked forward on his feet in a way intended to make him look taller, but which only made him seem self-important. If he was one of the men in that photo, he’d left behind any military discipline long ago.

Returning hastily to her seat, Vicki said cautiously, “Yes, very interesting. Wasn’t that the American training program carried out here?
El comandante de policía
has the same picture in his office.”

“You know Gualberto?” The minister of environment looked pleased. “Yes, we were brothers then, specially selected from the best officers of our army to receive the
americano
training. Ah, those were good times with
los americanos
. This year is the twentieth anniversary of our brotherhood. See—there I am.” He pointed out a slim, wiry young man Vicki would never have recognized, adding as he took his seat behind his desk, “It was good training too. Your country is most expert at such things. It proved very useful in pursuing the vicious war
la guerrilla
had unleashed on our country at that time.”

 “But you didn’t continue in the military. The Ministry of Environment is a very different career.” It was a question.

“No.” The minister’s face clouded over. “The peace accords stripped our military of strength and international support. So, one looks for other opportunities.

And other international funding
. Vicki’s distaste must have shown because Soliz added with an ingratiating smile, “Of course the preservation of our beautiful land is also a vital war. Which is why I would again express my  appreciation for your sister’s service to my country.

Vicki jumped at the opportunity to steer the conversation to her purpose for this appointment. “Yes, it is of my sister I wish to speak. You know I am looking further into her death. I understand she visited you to share some concerns a couple weeks ago.”

The minister’s geniality faded instantly.

 “Yes, she did come here. You must understand your sister was young and inexperienced. She did not understand how things work in this country.”

You mean, like bribery and corruption?
Vicki let go of that thought and said evenly, “She was worried that animals—endangered species the center was rehabilitating—were disappearing. I know she had some concerns about the zoo. She talked to the administrator there the same time she talked to you. Unfortunately, he appears to be out of the country right now. Is it possible he might know of these missing animals that distressed my sister so?”

Soliz looked even more wary. “What I assured your sister was that she was mistaken. I have known Samuel Justiniano at
el zoológico
for many years. He comes from the most respected strata of Guatemalan society. Like mine, his family has served this country in maintaining law and discipline for generations. In fact, it was I who recommended him for the position.”

None of which addressed a single concern Vicki had raised.

“No, if there has been a difficulty, it is possible that there has not been sufficient discipline among certain employees. The people do not respect the strong hand of the law as they once did. I assured your sister the matter would be addressed, and I can assure you that it has been done. We are not children to need foreigners to instruct us in how to preserve our patrimony. Now if you will excuse me.” He stood.

His secretary appeared at Vicki’s elbow to steer her out. For all her caution, she’d fared no better than she’d once warned Holly, Vicki admitted resentfully. As to the absent zoo administrator, it was clear class and family counted for more than whatever the truth might be. But then, again unlike Holly, Vicki hadn’t come for the truth. Especially since she cared only academically whether this man or his associate had been using their positions to feather a replacement nest for those lost with the loosening of the military’s stranglehold on this country.

No, Vicki was here only for Holly. And though she might have her doubts as to whether this particular minister was more committed to his cause or the fat funding of the international NGOs, Vicki couldn’t see him killing an American volunteer to silence her complaints. Not when he had only to ignore her or pass the blame back down the chain of command. And since according to his secretary, who’d had no reason to fudge the dates, the zoo administrator had been out of the country since before Holly’s death, he too was cleared of murder, if not fraud.

Not a dead end, just elimination.

Chapter Fourteen

The national archives was a tired-looking building , its atmosphere as heavy with dust inside as the exhaust and smog and dirt of the street outside.

Vicki handed the clerk a photo of Holly.

The young  Ladino woman took one glance and shook her head. “I’m sorry. I may have seen her or I may not. There are many foreigner scholars who come, and you must forgive me if I say that they all look much alike.”

The apologetic expression drew Vicki’s first real smile in a week. “I’m afraid a lot of gringos say the same about Guatemalans,” she said candidly. “I was just hoping you might have a record of what she was looking for.”

“No, if materials are removed, they must be signed out with the proper identification. But just to look, it is not required.”

“Well, let me leave you my phone number in case you remember something.” Vicki was scribbling on a business card when she had another thought. “Would it be possible to look at any of the major newspapers you have from twenty years ago? Specifically any coverage of an
americano
military exchange program that was training Guatemalan army officers. I’m looking for a picture with some of the Guatemalan officers and their American trainers.”

“That’s it!” The clerk’s pretty olive features lit up. “That was her. That was what she asked about too. Come.”

The archives were little more than tied-up bundles of every newspaper or magazine that had ever sprung up and died in Guatemala. Despite a card catalog whose contents were as dusty and dog-eared as the bundles, Vicki could not see how any effective research could be done. Fortunately, several of the larger and more enduring periodicals had been transferred to microfiche. In minutes the clerk had pulled up a front-page spread dated twenty years earlier. There was the photo, a much smaller version, and above the accompanying columns of print was the headline:
Estados Unidos y Guatemala: Aliados Contra el Comunismo
. “The United States and Guatemala: Allies Against Communism.”

The article gave details. The dozen Guatemalans in the picture were a unit of D-2, the elite Guatemalan military intelligence branch handpicked to participate in a counter-insurgency course sponsored by a US MAP—Military Assistance Program—training team on loan from the American military base in Panama. Such training programs were common enough throughout Latin America, from counter-narcotics to the military police courses such as Michael was teaching to weapons training and war games.

Of more interest to Vicki was the caption below the pictures listing the names of the officers who’d graduated from the program. She picked out Colonel Gualberto Alvarez and Colonel Francisco Soliz. But when the name
Samuel Justiniano
looked familiar, she dug into her handbag for the notes she’d made for her last appointment. Then the zoo administrator was part of that same brotherhood Soliz had mentioned.

Vicki frowned. Even she, a newcomer to Guatemala, had read of the infamous D-2, responsible by all accounts for thousands of
los desaparecidos
and political assassinations of the 1980s and 1990s. Under international pressure, the D-2 had been disbanded after the 1996 peace accords. But far from paying any reparations for their actions, it would seem this unit at least had simply shifted to other powerful and lucrative positions.
And after all these years they’re clearly still scratching each other’s backs
, Vicki thought bitterly.
No wonder their wall of silence is so powerful
.

The American advisors were not named. An oversight or an intervention by the embassy or Pentagon?

“Do you know what else this woman was looking at while she was here?”

The clerk shook her head. “She was here a long time, but this is the only one I am sure of because I helped her with the finding of it.”

“Would it be possible to print this picture out?”

The printout was a full 8 ½ by 11 page, and a chill raised hairs on the back of Vicki’s neck when she saw the words
Jeff Craig Productions
at the bottom right-hand corner.

Her birth father. What bizarre coincidence was this? Was this what Holly had been after?

As Vicki studied the picture, logic restored her equilibrium. Evelyn had said Jeff Craig had been earning a name as a photojournalist when this picture was dated. The picture involved a US embassy-sponsored event right here in Guatemala City. That her birth father would have provided the photo to a local Guatemalan newspaper wasn’t a coincidence.

Besides, to Holly, the photographer’s name would have meant nothing.

Vicki understood exactly what Holly had been doing. She must have seen those photos and figured there was a conspiracy—or at least a cooperation—between the men, so she was digging out anything she could find on their background.

No doubt Holly would have thought it would be enough to force some action. Except she didn’t realize the whole country—or at least the ruling class—was one big network.
Hermandad
, or “brotherhood,” got things done around here.

Still, Vicki folded the photocopy carefully. This was one small link she now possessed with her birth father.

Vicki’s cell phone rang as she was walking down the cracked marble steps.

“Señorita, you are the one offering an award for certain information?” a man asked.

Vicki questioned him, but he refused to talk over the phone.
Afraid I won’t pay his reward once he’s coughed up the data
. So she gave her present location.

Less than ten minutes later, a yellow cab drew up at the archive steps.

Climbing in, Vicki counted out the one hundred quetzals so the driver could see them and added directions to Casa de Esperanza.

When she showed the driver Holly’s picture, he only waved it away. “I never saw the woman. But the request I received from the dispatcher was to pick her up outside the hostel. That girl in the photo—I have picked her up there on other occasions. I cannot say it was her because I did not speak to her directly. But if the request was made at the time you say, it was her. There was none other from that location.”

“But where did you take her?” Vicki asked impatiently.

“That is what I am trying to tell you, señorita! When I arrived, she was not there. I honked. I waited. Then I knocked. The doorkeeper told me the fare had already emerged. I assumed she had grown impatient and taken a taxi that passed by. A dangerous practice for a young woman,” he added severely, “for one never knows what such a driver might be.”

A reality of which Holly had been well aware.

Vicki handed over the one hundred quetzals and directed the driver to the WRC hostel instead.

This was siesta hour when few people visited, so the doorkeeper was dozing in the watch shack that was also his home just inside the walled compound. He was as helpful as the taxi driver. Yes, he’d let Holly out that night, as he’d informed
la policía
. No, he had no idea where she was going. No, he hadn’t seen who’d picked her up. His responsibility was to keep a guard eye on the interior of the compound, not what was happening on the street.

“Vicki!”

Vicki swung around into an enthusiastic hug. “Lynn, it’s good to see you. Hey, are you staying here?”

“Just for a day or two. My apartment’s being fumigated.” The Amazon Watch environmentalist grimaced. “Cockroaches.”

Then she hadn’t been here during Holly’s stay. A sudden thought had Vicki digging out the photograph she’d copied. “Lynn, you’ve been here awhile. Do you recognize any of these people? Think twenty years back.”

Lynn glanced over the printout.  “Why, of course, there’s Soliz, our beloved local minister of environment. Who’d have thought he ever had that much hair! And that’s Justinianio over at the zoo. I hadn’t realized they were ex-military. The others . . . " She studied the photo again. “Can’t say I recognize any of them. The embassy could probably I.D. the Americans, though I doubt they’d just hand out kind of info. Especially Mr. CIA there.”

“CIA?” Vicki eyed the turned figure in floppy hat under Lynn’s tapping fingernail. “Why do you say that?”

“Come on—an American civilian in there with our military advisors? Trying to hide his face from the camera? If that guy’s not CIA, I’ll give up my time share in Cancún.”

“You think? But what would he be doing down here in Guatemala?”

“Oh, my dear, where have you been?” Lynn’s exclamation sounded pitying. “You’re in Guatemala, and you’ve never bothered to learn the story of the United Fruit Company and their nice, little CIA-sponsored coup?  President Arbenz  and Guatemala’s famed ‘ten years of spring’?

“Well, I read something—”

Lynn interrupted Vicki inexorably. “Back then in the fifties, the American-owned United Fruit Company was the largest landowner in the Caribbean. So large the locals called them ‘
El Pulpo
’ or ‘The Octopus’. Banana and coffee plantations. Railways. Roads. Postal system. What they didn’t own, omes a reform candidate, Jacobo Arbenz.. He had wild ideas like a minimum wage law, freedom of speech, education, eealth care, redistribution of unused land back to the Mayan communities from which it had been originally misappropriated. Worst of all, taxes to redistribute some of the country’s wealth from the one percent enjoying it back to the other ninety-nine. All the things American workers had fought for and won.

“The Guatemalan aristocracy was screaming. But nothing like the United Fruit Company. Fortunately for them, Eisenhower was in the White House, and two of their major stock-holders just happened to be Allen Dulles,  Eisenhower’s CIA director, and his brother, Secretary of State John Dulles. They yelled communist plot, and Eisenhower signed on the dotted line to send in the CIA. Arbenz was replaced with a U.S. backed military regime that immediately rescinded all those nasty tax reforms. And that was the end of Guatemala’s experiment in democracy. And the beginning of a long and close relationship between the Guatemalan military and the CIA.”

Vicki felt as though she’d been caught inadvertently in a flash flood. “But that’s all ancient history. I mean, that was more than fifty years ago!”

“Yeah, well, tell that to the Guatemalans.”