The Evening News (52 page)

During the preceding fifteen minutes, since landing and taxiing in, the
four Medellin group members had remained aboard the Learjet on Miguel's
orders. Then, after the engines were shut down and both pilots
left-Underhill to file a flight plan, Faulkner to supervise
refueling-Miguel talked seriously to the other three
.
He warned them of the possibility of a Customs inspection and that they
must be prepared to play their rehearsed roles. There was a sense of
tension, clearly some anxiety, but all indicated they were ready
.
Socorro, using the mirror in a makeup compact, slipped a grain or two of
pepper beneath each lower eyelid. Almost at once her eyes filled with
tears. Rafael this time said no to the pepper and tears; Miguel didn't
argue. Baudelio had already disconnected his exterior equipment from
the three caskets, after making sure their occupants were still deeply sedated and would not stir for an hour or more if left unattended
.
Miguel made clear he would be principal spokesman. The others would
respond to his prompting
.
Consequently it was not a total shock when Underhill made his
announcement and a Customs officer appeared
.”
Good evening, folks
.”

Amsler used the same polite tone he had with
Underhill. At the same time he looked around, taking in the caskets
secured on one side of the cabin and the passengers on the other-three
of them seated, Miguel standing
.
Miguel answered, "Good evening, officer
.”

He was holding a sheaf of
documents and four passports. He proffered the passports first
.
Amsler accepted them but didn't look down. Instead he asked, "Where are
you all going and what is the purpose of this flight
?
”

Having seen the flight plan, Amsler already knew the declared destination
and Underhill had described to him the journey's motive. But a Customs
and Immigration technique was to start people talking; sometimes their
manner, plus any sign of nervousness, revealed more than actual answers
.”
This is a tragic journey, officer, and a once happy family is now
overwhelmed with grief
.”

"And you, sir. What is your name
?
”

"I am Pedro Palacios, not a member of the bereaved family but a close
friend who has come to this country to give help in time of need
.”

Miguel
was using a new alias for which he had a matching Colombian passport. The
passport was real and the picture inside was of himself, but the name and
other details, including a U.S. entry visa dated a few days earlier, were
skillful fakes. He added, "My friends have asked me to speak for them
because they are not proficient in English
.”

Amsler looked at the passports in his hand, located Miguel's and
,
glancing up, compared the photo with the face in front of him
.”
You speak
English very well, Seftor Palacios
.”

Miguel thought quickly, then answered with assurance, "Part of my
education was at Berkeley. I love this country
dearly. If it were for some reason other than the present one, I would be happy to be here
.”

Opening the remaining passports, Amsler compared the photos in them with
the other three people, then addressed Socorro
.”
Madam, have you
understood what we have been saying
?
”

Socorro raised her tear-streaked face. Her heart was beating fast
.
Haltingly, forsaking her normal fluent English, she answered, "Yes .
.
. a little
.”

Nodding,
Amsler
returned to Miguel
.”
Tell me about those
.”

He gestured
to the caskets
.”
I have all the required documents
"I'll look at them later. Tell me first
.”

Miguel let his voice become choked
.”
There was a terrible accident. This
lady's sister, her sister's young son, an older gentleman also of the
family, were on vacation in America. They had reached Philadelphia and
were driving . . . A truck, out of control, crossed the turnpike at great
speed . . . It struck the family's car head-on, killing everyone. Traffic
was heavy . . . eight more vehicles crashed into the wreckage, with other
deaths . . . a fierce fire burned and t
he bodies Oh, my god, the bodies!
”
At the mention of bodies, Socorro wailed and sobbed. Rafael had his head
down in his hands, his shoulders shaking; Miguel conceded mentally that
it was more convincing than the tears. Baudelio simply looked wan and
sad
.
While speaking, Miguel had watched the Customs inspector carefully. But
the man revealed nothing and simply stood waiting, listening, his
expression inscrutable. Now Miguel thrust the remaining documents
forward
.”
It is all here. Please, officer, I ask you-read for yourself
.”

This time Amsler took the papers and leafed through them. The death
certificates appeared to be in order; so did the body disposition permits
and the entry permissions for Colombia. He went on to read the press
clippings, and at the words "bodies burned . . . mutilated beyond
recognition
,”
his stomach turned. The photographs were next. One glance
was enough and he covered them quickly. He was reminded that earlier
tonight he had considered calling in sick. Why in hell hadn't he? At this moment he felt physically nauseated, and sicker still at the thought of what he had to do next
.
Miguel, facing the Customs inspector, had no idea that the other man was
worrying as well, but for a different reason
.
Wally Amster believed what had been told to him. The documentation was
okay, the other material supportive and nobody, he decided, could fake
the kind of grief he had witnessed in the past few minutes. A decent
family man himself, Amster's sympathy went out to these people and he
wished he could send them on their way right now. But he couldn't. By law
the caskets had to be opened for inspection and that was the cause of his
own distress
.
For Wally had a quirk. He could not bear to see dead bodies and was
filled with horror at the thought of seeing the mutilated remains
described, first by Palacios, then in the news clippings he had read
.
The problem had started when Wally, at age eight, had been forced to kiss
his dead grandmother lying in a coffin. The memory of waxen, lifeless
flesh against his lips while he struggled and screamed in protest still
caused him to shudder, so that for the rest of his life Wally never
wanted to see a dead person again. As an adult he teamed that psychiatry
had a name for what he felt-necrophobia. WaJly didn't care about that
.
All he asked was that the dead be kept away from him
.
Only once before in his many years as a Customs inspector had he viewed
a dead body in line of duty. That was when the corpse of an American
arrived late at night from overseas when Amster was at work alone. An
accompanying passport showed the deceased's weight as a hundred and fifty
pounds, yet the shipment weight was three hundred pounds. Even allowing
for a coffin and container, the difference seemed suspicious and Amster
reluctantly ordered the coffin opened. The result was horrible
.
The dead man inside was gross, having put on tremendous weight since
issuance of the passport. Even worse, death and a botched embalming job
had horribly bloated the body, causing it to putrefy and produce an
unbelievably offensive stench. As
Amsler breathed the disgusting air, he frantically motioned for the coffin to be closed. Then he ran outside and was violently sick. The sense of sickness and that awful smell remained with him for days afterward and the memory, never eclipsed, came back to him now
.
Yet stronger than memory, stronger than his fears, was that inflexible
sense of duty. He told Miguel, "I'm truly sorry, but regulations require
that the caskets be opened for inspection
.”

It was what Miguel had most feared. He made one last attempt to win by
reason
.”
Oh, please, officer. I beg of you! There has been so much
anguish, so much pain. We are friends of America. Surely, for
compassion's sake, an exception can be made
.”

He spoke in Spanish to Socorro,
"El hombre quiere abrir los ata
des
.”
She screamed in horro
r, "ay, no! Madre de Dios, no!
”
Rafael joined in. 'Ee sup
licarnos, senor. e
n el nombre de decencia
,
Porfavor, nol
”
Baudeli
o, his face ashen, whispered, "Porfavor, no lo haga, sefior!
No
lo hagal
”
Without knowing all the words,
Amsler
grasped the essentials of what was
being said. He told Miguel, "Please inform your friends that I did not
write the regulations. Sometimes I have no pleasure in enforcing them
,
but it is my job, my duty
.”

Miguel didn't bother. There was no point in prolonging this charade. A
moment of decision had arrived
.
The Customs idiot was prattling on
.”
I suggest the caskets be taken from
the airplane to somewhere private. Your pilot can arrange it. He will get
help from Hangar One
.”

Miguel knew he could not allow it. The caskets must not leave the plane
.
Therefore only one recourse remained-armed force. They had not come this
far to be de
feated by a single Customs cabro
n, and he would either kill
the man here in the airplane or take him prisoner and execute him later
in Peru. The next few seconds would decide. The pilots, too, must be held
at gunpoint; otherwise, fearful of later consequences, they would refuse
to take off. Miguel's hand slipped under his coat. He felt the Makarov
nine-millimeter pistol he was carrying and
slid off the safety. Glancing at Rafael, he saw the big man nod. Socorro had reached into her
h
andbag
.”
No
,”
Miguel said, "the caskets will not be moved
.”

He shifted position
slightly, placing himself between the Customs man, both pilots and the
clamshell door. His fingers tightened on the gun. This was the moment
.
Now
!
In that same instant, a new voice spoke
.”
Echo one-seven
-
two. Sector
.”

It startled everyone except Wally
Amsler
, who was used to hearing the
walkie-talkie he carried on his belt. Unaware that anything had changed
,
he lifted the radio to his lips
.”
Sector, this is Echo one-seven-two
.”

"Echo one-seven-two
,”
the male voice rasped back, "Alpha two-six-eight
requests you terminate present assignment and contact him immediately by
landline at four-six-seven twentyfour twenty-four. Do not, repeat do not
,
use radio
.”

"Sector. Ten-four. This is Echo one-seven-two out
.”

Transmitting the
acknowledgment, Amsler found it hard to keep elation from his voice. At
this very last moment before removing the caskets he had received an
honorable reprieve-a clear order he could not disobey. Alpha
two-six-eight was the code number of his sector boss for the Miami area
and "immediately
,”
in his superior's parlance, meant "move your ass
!”