MAMista (9 page)

In keeping with the liberal persuasion of the newspaper proprietor, there were no servants. Lucas accepted a glass of cold wine and briefly conversed with a man who wanted to display his familiarity with London. He talked with a couple of other guests before catching sight of Inez. He picked up a bottle of wine and took a clean glass. He'd poured two glasses of wine as he felt a tap on his shoulder. ‘Inez,' he said. He had been about to use the wine in order to interrupt the conversation he'd seen her having with a handsome man in unmistakably American clothes.

‘You have been here for ages, and did not come across to speak,' she said. It was such a coy opening that she could hardly believe that she was using it.

He gave her a glass of wine and looked at her. She was wearing a simple black dress with a gold brooch. A patent-leather purse hung on a chain over her shoulder.

She sipped and, for a moment, they stood in silence. Then she said, ‘You were deep in conversation?'

‘Yes,' Lucas said. ‘An American from the embassy. He used to live in London.'

‘O'Brien. Mike O'Brien.'

‘Yes, that's right,' Lucas said.

‘CIA station head for Spanish Guiana, and maybe all the Guianas.'

‘You don't mean it?'

She smiled.

He turned so that they could both see the mêlée. ‘Well, he seemed a decent enough chap. You think he was sounding me out?' When she didn't answer he said, ‘Well, yes, you're right. We should assume that he heard someone like me was coming.'

As if aware that they were talking about him, Mike O'Brien smiled at Inez from across the room.

‘He knows you,' said Lucas.

‘My name is Cassidy. It goes back many generations here in Guiana. My great-grandfather Cassidy was the first judge. But O'Brien likes to joke that we are both Irish.'

‘Does he know …?'

She turned to him. ‘It's difficult for a foreigner to understand but many of the people in this room know that I am one of the people who handle statements for the MAMista command.'

‘The MAMista is an illegal organization.'

‘Yes, it is. But the Benz government officials tolerate me and others like me.'

‘And you get invited to drink with the Americans and the CIA chief smiles at you. I don't get it.'

‘It is expedient. Channels of communication remain open between all parties. Sometimes we give warnings about … things we do.' She didn't want to say ‘bombs we plant'. Neither did she want to tell him of the hostages that were sometimes taken: government officials that they held for
ransom. Inez Cassidy had handled such matters. It was not a way to make yourself popular. She finished her wine, drinking it too quickly. She put the glass down.

‘How do you know the secret police are not biding their time and collecting evidence against you?'

‘Our secret police don't bide their time. They send a murder squad to gun you down without witnesses.'

‘But the Americans? Do they know what you do?'

‘The American government is not wedded to the Benz regime,' she said simply.

‘That sort of expedience,' said Lucas. He could see she did not want to say more.

The music was switched off as five chairs were placed in position at the end of the room. Five musicians climbed up on to the chairs. They produced a chord or two on the electric guitar and a rattle of maracas. A sigh of disappointment went up from those guests who had been hoping that the Americans would produce a pop group or some American-style music.

‘Mother of God,' said Inez, regretfully noting it and adding it to her total of blasphemies that would have to be confessed. ‘I really can't endure another evening of that.'

‘Are you here with anyone?' Lucas asked.

‘Spare me a sip of wine,' she said, taking his glass from him and drinking some. The gesture was enough to answer his question. She was not here with anyone she could not say goodbye to.

‘Shall we have dinner?'

‘Yes, I'm starved.' It was the sort of archness she despised in other women. It ill suited a politically committed woman of thirty. She looked at the people dancing. The man who had brought her was dancing close with the editor's daughter who'd just left college in California. It was a modern lambada: danced to the rhythm of the samba. She was a good dancer but she was pressing close and smiling too much. The man would be a good catch: a young and
handsome coffee broker. He'd inherit plantations too when his father died.

‘Italian food?' He'd noted the neon sign for the San Giorgio restaurant as he was arriving here, so he knew exactly where it was.

‘Wonderful,' said Inez. She looked again at the dancers. Inez had been in her twenties before the plumpness and spots of youth had disappeared. The sudden transformation had been intoxicating but she'd never completely adjusted to the idea of being a beautiful woman. It must be much easier for pretty young girls like that one; they grow up learning how to deal with men. For Inez the prospect of another
relación
was not only daunting but funny.

‘What are you smiling at?'

‘I'll tell you later,' she said. ‘You leave now. Don't say goodbye to anyone. Drift out slowly. I will be downstairs in ten minutes' time.'

He nodded. It was better that they were not seen leaving together. The music changed to a habanera, a very old Cuban rhythm in which gringos often detected the very essence of Lat in American
amor
. Over the fast tempo, words were sung very slowly.

Lucas knew that listening carefully to trite lyrics was one of the symptoms of falling in love, but the words – a tryst under a star-studded sky – seemed curiously apt. He avoided Angel Paz and Chori, who were drinking, eating and talking and seemed oblivious to the music. He edged out into the corridor.

As he got there he saw Mike O'Brien leaving, preceded by a short dark man who was frowning and looking at his watch. Lucas did not want to see O'Brien. He stopped and pretended to study the notice board. There were small ‘For Sale' notices: microwave ovens, cars and TV sets being disposed of by Americans on their way home. In one corner of the cork board the front page of tomorrow's edition of
The Daily American
had been posted.

‘Benz Representative at White House Meeting' shouted the headline over a story about the Benz government's young Finance Minister who was in Washington asking for money, tanks, planes and military aid and anything he could get. The reporter thought the US President would demand a crack-down on Spanish Guiana's drug barons as a condition for aid.

Lower down on the page under the headline ‘State of Emergency Laws to be Renewed', an editorial said that the ‘Orders in Council' by means of which the Benz government ruled were expected to be renewed when the current term expired in two weeks' time. Meanwhile the Prime Minister controlled the Council of Ministers, Council of State, Religious Affairs, Public Service Commission, Audit and Privy Council. The Minister of Finance controlled the Customs, Tax Department, Investment Agency, Economic Development and Planning and the Department of Computers and Statistics. And ‘Papa' Cisneros, the Minister of Home Affairs, from the fifteen-storey building that dominated the skyline, controlled the National Police, Municipal Police, the Federalistas, the Prisons and Places of Detention, Immigration, Labour, Municipal and Central Security, Weights and Measures and the Fire Service.

In effect, said the editor, the country was in the hands of three men, all of them close to the President, Admiral Benz. The Constitution forbids legislation without the approval of democratically elected representatives, the editor reminded his readers. He added that the elected council had not met for almost ten years. It was as near to open rebellion as anyone could get away with in Spanish Guiana, tolerated only because it was printed in English for a small number of foreigners who would tut-tut and do nothing.

Having given O'Brien time enough, Lucas followed him down the corridor, opened the door and went out on to the dark landing. He could see the illuminated red buttons of the elevator and he sniffed tobacco smoke. There was too
much smoke for it to be from one man waiting there. Lucas looked round. Out of the corner of his eye he saw a movement. As he turned he saw a figure rushing at him with hands upraised to strike. Had the man known Lucas he would not have raised both arms while approaching him with hostile intentions.

Lucas kicked. He hit the exact spot he wanted on his assailant's knee, aiming his blow to knock the man in the direction of the staircase. Now Lucas brought his hand down sharply. The pain that burned the attacker's leg was equalled by that of the sudden blow that Lucas delivered to his kidneys. Bent over and off-balance, the man toppled and went crashing down a long flight of concrete steps emitting a shrill scream of agony. More shouting came as he hit four men who were standing at the bottom step. They all fell down.

From the dark staircase above Lucas, voices shouted, ‘Federalista! Stay where you are! Federalista!' and men came rushing down and swept him back into the newspaper offices. Lucas ran with them, pushing back through the crowded room as if he was one of the policemen. The music stopped in a discordant sequence of notes and all the lights went on to flood the room in the glare of blue office lighting. A woman screamed and everyone was talking and shouting at once.

A police captain with gold leaves on his hat climbed up on to one of the chairs that the musicians had vacated. He shouted for silence and then he made a short announcement in Spanish. Then a bearded interpreter got up and repeated the same announcement in English. While all this was going on, Lucas edged his way further into the room to get as many innocent people as he could between himself and the man he had injured. Soon they would start trying to find out who had kicked one of their officers down the staircase.

Lucas stood on tiptoe and saw Inez across the room
looking for him. She made a face of resignation. He nodded. The police captain – through the interpreter – said that everyone would be taken to Police Headquarters and questioned. Those who wished it would be permitted to make a phone call from there. No calls could be made from this office. The reactions were mixed. Local residents had seen it all before and stood sullen and resigned. A young woman began to sob in that dedicated way that goes on for a long time. The man with her began to argue with a policeman in German-accented Spanish.

The interpreter got on the chair again and said, ‘American nationals who have their passports with them will be permitted to leave the building after being searched. They must deposit their passports with the police clerk standing at the door. He will issue an official receipt.'

Lucas saw Inez. She no longer had her handbag. He supposed she had dumped it somewhere lest it incriminate her in some way. She saw him looking her way but gave no sign of recognition.

Chori was at the buffet table. He'd found a bottle of whisky and was pouring himself a big measure of it.

EMBASSY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
,
TEPILO
.
‘
No one's perfect, kid
.'

From the top floor of the American embassy building on the Plaza de la Constitución you might have seen the fifteen-storey building of shining bronze glass that housed the police headquarters. But one could not see the skyline of Tepilo from the top floor of the embassy because the window glass was frosted ever since rooftop spies had been seen with telescopes peering into it.

The top floor was the CIA floor. Even the ambassador asked permission before going there, although all concerned insisted that this was a mere formality.

Michael Sean O'Brien was a well-proportioned man of thirty-four. His unruly hair, once red, had become almost brown, but together with his pale complexion it marked him as of Celtic blood. So did his boundless conviviality and short-lived bouts of anger. His career through the Office of Naval Intelligence, the US War Academy and then as a State Department analyst had brought him to be CIA station head in Tepilo. ‘Next time, I make sure I get a post much farther east,' he said wearily. Still holding an unopened can of Sprite, he used his finger to flick through the latest batch of messages to have come off the fax machine. It had been a trying morning as he sorted out the flood of questions
that poured in from all quarters following the previous night's raid on
The Daily American
. ‘Much farther east,' he said.

His assistant didn't respond except to smile. Even the smile was not too committal. When O'Brien was angry it was better to remain silent.

‘This place is too close to the Washington time zone,' said O'Brien. ‘John Curl and his merry men snap at your heels all day long. In Moscow our guys can work all day knowing that Washington is asleep.' He sighed, knowing that Latin American experts like him were unlikely to get very far from the Washington time zone. It was one of the many penalties of that specialization. Sometimes he regretted that he hadn't worked harder at German verbs.

‘Can I get you a fresh cup of coffee?' said his assistant, who that morning had taken quite a lot of the wrath that O'Brien would have liked to expend upon his superiors.

‘No,' said O'Brien. He sat down behind his desk, snapped open his can of Sprite. He drank it, savouring it with the relish that Europeans reserve for vintage wine. Then he chuckled. ‘But you've got to hand it to these bastards. They've got the State Department jumping through hoops of fire for them, Pablo.'

‘Yes,' said his assistant. His name was not Pablo, it was Paul: Paul Cohen. He was a scholarly graduate of Harvard whose difficulties with the Spanish language had made him a butt of O'Brien's jokes. Calling him Pablo was one of them.

‘You saw the transcript of that phone call Benz took from his man in Washington. The White House said these boys here have got to straighten up and fly right, if they want aid. That was yesterday morning, right?'

The assistant treated no direct question as rhetorical. ‘Ten thirty-four local time,' he said.

‘So Benz phones Cisneros at the Ministry. Cisneros kicks ass and the Anti-Drugs Squad raid the
Daily American
offices and the airport. Notice that, Pablo: not just the
Daily American
offices. And to both places they take with them all five of those Drug Enforcement guys the Department of Justice sent here to teach the locals how to do it. And what do they find, Pablo? They find eight Americans carrying coke.'

‘Two carrying,' said his pedantic assistant. ‘The other six only had traces of it on their clothing.'

‘Tell the judge,' said O'Brien, who didn't like his stories to be dismantled. ‘The fact is that Uncle Sam reels back with egg on his face, while Benz and his boys are laughing fit to be tied.' He finished his drink and then bent the can flat and tossed it into the bin. ‘The whole raid was a fiasco. I was there at
The Daily American
. I could see it was just a show. The cops told me some yarn about their guys being beaten up and tossed down the stairs. But we've heard that story a hundred times before.'

‘Yes, we have,' his assistant said. ‘They didn't try to detain you?'

‘Cisneros sent someone to get me out of there before the cops went in.'

His assistant looked at him sympathetically and nodded.

‘They didn't even detain that Cassidy woman,' O'Brien said bitterly. ‘I saw her getting a cab in the street outside. I told her, “I thought they were only releasing people depositing a US passport.” She said, “That's what I did.” I said, “You're not American.” She smiled and got in the cab and said, “That's why I didn't need it.” A cool nerve she's got, Pablo. That was who that phoney US passport belonged to.' He picked up the forged passport that had come from the police that morning for verification of authenticity. He flicked it open. Only the cover was genuine, the inside pages were forged. ‘She didn't even bother to put her own photo into it. The woman doesn't look anything like her,' he said disgustedly. ‘A cool nerve. I love her.'

‘She's a terrorist,' Paul said.

‘No one's perfect, kid. And what a figure!'

‘Something else came up,' his assistant told him gently.

‘Oh yes?' O'Brien allowed his voice to show that his exasperation was almost at breaking-point. He'd begun to hope that his troubles were over for one morning.

‘That Britisher. The one John Curl's office asked us to make sure was free and on his way south.'

O'Brien, chin propped on his hand, said nothing.

‘The one we hoped they would forget about,' said his assistant. Actually O'Brien had screamed something about Brits not being his damn problem, screwed-up the fax and thrown it into his burn bag. ‘Curl's office sent three follow-ups.'

‘Three?' O'Brien looked at the clock on the wall. He'd only been out of his office for about an hour.

‘Yes, three,' said his assistant. ‘I thought it was rather unusual. Sounds like Washington is getting into a flap. He's got to be important. Did you see the priority code?'

‘Look Pablo. I know you say these dopey things just to set me up, but you know that code is no more than a priority. This guy might just be doing something we're interested in. He might not even know we exist.'

‘Is that right?'

‘Sure. I've seen random selected tourists get higher ratings back in the bad old days when we put things into their baggage so it would get to East Berlin or Havana.'

‘I see.'

‘It doesn't mean a thing,' O'Brien said. That was the end of that. ‘So how is the Spanish coming along?' It was a standard question and usually indicated that O'Brien was in a good mood.

‘What a language. In my dictionary it defines “político” as politician but it also means an in-law.'

O'Brien laughed. ‘You're getting the idea, Pablo.'

His phone buzzed. It was his secretary. ‘Professor Cisneros is returning your call, Mr O'Brien.'

‘At last,' said O'Brien while keeping the mouthpiece covered with his hand. He'd been trying to talk to the Minister of Home Affairs ever since early morning. ‘Pick up your extension. I want you to hear this guy wriggle.'

‘My dear Mike,' said the Minister of Home Affairs. His English was perfect and fluent but he had the attractive foreign accent that certain Hollywood film stars of the Forties cultivated. Slang does not always go with such accents, so when Cisneros said, ‘We have one of your buddies here,' it sounded arch.

‘Is that right?'

‘You don't know, Mike?'

‘We don't have anyone missing from roll-call,' O'Brien said sarcastically.

‘Mike, my friend. I am talking about this delightful Englishman, Lucas.'

‘Englishman Lucas?'

‘Don't prevaricate, Mike. You were talking with him last night. And this morning someone in your ambassador's private office has sent him a delicious breakfast and an airmail copy of the
New York Times
.'

Mike O'Brien capped the phone. ‘Jesus suffering Christ.' He'd gone red with anger. To his assistant he said, ‘How can Junk-bond do these things without checking first with me?' He hit his desk with the flat of his hand to emphasize the last word. With a superhuman effort of will, O'Brien recovered his composure and uncapped the phone to talk. ‘You're not making sense to me, Professor.'

‘Don't hedge, Mike, we are both busy men. And I know you only call me Professor when you are put out. If he really is not one of yours, I'll tell my boys to lose him in the
Número Uno Presidio
.'

He was talking about a primitive labour camp for political prisoners. The inmates worked at clearing jungle. The climate, the conditions, and the lack of medical services and hygiene ensured that not many prisoners returned from it.
‘Anything but that, Papá,' O'Brien said in mock terror that was easily contrived.

‘One of yours then?'

‘One of ours, Papá.'

‘You're not a good loser, Mike. Now you owe me one, remember that.'

‘Did he really have a breakfast sent over?'

Papá laughed and hung up the phone. That's what he liked about dealing with the
norteamericanos
: who but a Yankee would take a joke like that seriously?

Everyone called Cisneros ‘Papá', even the prison trusty who came into his office each day to polish his impeccable shoes. This sort of informality in the
burocracia
, like the computer filing system, legal aid and the shirt and tie uniforms that he'd given to the
municipales
, were pet ideas of Cisneros. He'd been talking about reform ever since he was one of the most vocal elements in the opposition.

Papá Cisneros was at heart an academic. He only went into the lawcourts when there was a subtle point of law to argue. The first signs of political ambition came when he made headlines as defence counsel at the treason trials. That was long before Benz came to power. In those far-off days Cisneros had been a real professor: a law professor at the university. Protected to some extent by the privilege of the courtroom, he'd denounced the use of the Federalistas against the coffee growers who wouldn't – or couldn't – pay taxes. He convinced everyone, except perhaps the Tax Department officials, that the farmers were hungry. He'd criticized the way that internment without trial had been used as a political device, and the fact that rightwing groups seemed to be immune to it. At the time Papá was the spokesman for middle-class liberals who wanted to believe that there could be an end to violence without the inconvenience of reform. Or reform without higher taxes.

Papá Cisneros had become the darling of the coffee farmers. He still was. But nowadays the coffee farmers were
growing coca, and Papá was not doing much to stop them. Three years before, the Municipal and Federal police had been brought together with the Political Police and Tax Police, directly under Cisneros. The figures indicated that cocaine traffic had increased sharply in that three-year period. All the changes had been announced as necessary reform. Cynics had other theories, the least defamatory being that it was simply a way of using the nice new fifteen-storey building.

In any case the present situation seemed to be the worst of all worlds. The large conscript army was ‘exercising in the provinces' but never mustered strength enough to tackle the MAMista communists in the south. Neither did the army move against the Pekinista communist forces who had established a state within a state in the fertile Valley of the Tears of Christ where the coca and the coffee bushes flourished. In the panelled gentlemen's clubs of Tepilo's business district, it was said that as long as Papá Cisneros – the farmer's friend – had control of the police, the drug barons could sleep without troubled dreams. This was said with a smile, for there was no one in such Tepilo clubs who didn't in some way benefit from the wealth that came from the export of coca paste.

 

‘Bring him in,' called Cisneros.

Lucas came into the room that Cisneros used as an office. Papá extended a hand towards the chair. Papá was dressed in an expensive dark suit with stiff collar and silver-coloured silk tie. There were four inches of starched linen, with solid gold cufflinks, around the wrist of the extended arm. The stiffness of the low bow, the full chest and slim hips betrayed the tight corset that vanity demanded. Papá was an inappropriate name for a man who looked like an Italian film star or a fashionable gynaecologist.

Somewhere nearby a door banged. It was a resonant sound, as one would expect from a building composed of
prefabricated pressed steel units with glass and plastic facings. The monolithic fortress that had occupied this site in the days of the monarchy had been replaced by this tin and glass box. Yet the oppressive atmosphere remained unchanged. Lucas recalled his father's description of the premises the Gestapo had used in Rome. It was part of a pre-war apartment block. Some carpenter must have worked overtime to convert the rooms and kitchen into cramped solitary-size cells. The interrogation room wallpaper had shown outlines of the bed-head and wardrobe. In one cell his father said there was a shelf that still smelled of Parmesan. But those domestic traces had not lessened the terror of the men brought to that SS office in Rome. And the modern fittings and office equipment did nothing to lessen the anxieties of men in this building.

Lucas brushed the cement dust off his jacket. In Spanish Guiana there were as many grades of cell as there were grades of hotel room. Lucas had spent the night in a cell equipped with heating and a shower bath. He'd been given a blanket and his bunk had a primitive mattress. It was by no means like the comfortable quarters provided for deposed Cabinet Ministers, but neither was it comparable to the stinking bare-earth underground dungeons.