Echoes of a Distant Summer (97 page)

The truck pulled off the road and Jackson’s grandfather led a briefing on the attack. The plan involved a direct assault on the Jaguar’s home base, located in an isolated area fifty miles outside of Linares. El Negro stated that the Jaguar had sent a party of at least twenty of his top men
in the attack on the hunting lodge, and according to the radio transmission from the spies that Carlos had planted, the party had just returned within the hour. The report indicated that there were many injured among the survivors, which meant that the number of trained men left to guard the base would be significantly reduced.

King declared that the element of surprise was on their side because the Jaguar didn’t expect any assault until the next morning, but that there wasn’t much time because reinforcements had been sent for from Linares and surrounding towns. The additional men were expected to arrive in the next three hours. Jackson listened as his grandfather, El Indio, and Carlos discussed the strategy of the attack and gave out assignments. He did not hear his name mentioned. He was both relieved and concerned. He was not sure how he would react under fire, but he didn’t want to be left out of the action. Wooden crates were hauled out of the side compartments and carried into the truck. Carlos broke them open with a crowbar. Machine pistols with silencers and extra magazines were distributed. Out of another crate bulletproof vests were issued. From a third crate military-issue, thick-barreled M16s were handed out. The truck was abuzz with activity as men strapped on their vests and checked out their weapons.

King walked over and sat next to his grandson.

“This is a pretty fancy rig, Grandfather,” Jackson said nervously, gesturing around to the truck’s compartment.

“Yeah, we got a couple of these trucks. It’s a good way to command an operation. We keep in touch by shortwave. Carlos brought this idea from one of his security seminars.” King looked around at the rest of the men checking their guns and asked, “We’re about ready to hit it. You ready for this?” He stared at Jackson’s face.

Jackson took a deep breath and exhaled. “I think so.”

“Thinkin’ ain’t enough, boy! There can’t be no hesitation! This is life and death! Is you ready?”

“I’ve never killed anyone before, Grandfather. I don’t know.”

“Killin’ folk is the easiest part. Just squeeze the trigger. It’s how you react to them tryin’ to kill you that matters. People is different from pigs. They find a way to fight back.”

“I’m not coming with you because I want to kill, Grandfather. I’m coming along because I want to rescue Maria. I want to take her back to the States with me.”

His grandfather chuckled with surprise. “That girl is smarter than I
thought! Got yo’ nose open in four days! Many a man done lost his life over a triangle of hair. It be a hell of a thing to lose yo’ life just for some pussy. You sho’ this is what you want? You prepared to kill to get her back?”

Jackson stared at his grandfather’s dark, glittering eyes and retorted in clipped tones, “She’s not just some pussy to me and I’ll do whatever’s necessary to get her back.”

“Then we’s in business, ain’t we? You come with me and El Indio, but let me tell you straight up, Grandson. Here’s what’s necessary: Kill everyone you see, otherwise you gon’ put yo’self or somebody else in danger. If we want to leave here alive and uninjured, there can’t be no hesitation or mercy. This is for keeps! You ready?”

“I’ll do what is necessary, Grandfather,” Jackson replied in a flat, toneless voice.

“I’ll take you at yo’ word. Let’s shake on it.” His grandfather stood up and held out his hand. Jackson rose and took his grandfather’s hand. The old man turned and called to Carlos, “Toss me one of them vests for my grandson, and he needs an M16 too.”

Jackson put the bulky vest on underneath his sheepskin coat and waited for his orders. El Indio came over and knelt in front of him. By the light of a flashlight, he drew a diagram in the dirt and explained Jackson’s assignment. After everyone was briefed, they loaded back in the truck and rode to the point of disembarkation.

The wind whistled as it blew over the dark and broken landscape of the mesa, rustling the leaves and branches of the desert vegetation. The night sky was overcast and grim, hiding the moon and the stars with a dense layer of dark, moisture-filled clouds. Jackson turned up his sheepskin collar against the wind and followed El Indio up the steep incline of a brush- and scrub-covered ridge. In the darkness, he could barely see the ground beneath his feet and caught several branches across the face as he hastened through the underbrush to keep El Indio in sight. The old Indian was a silent silhouette moving quickly through the inky darkness. They reached the crest of the ridge and followed it until it peaked and descended to the mesa.

A small, darkened guardhouse stood on the edge of the ridge, overlooking a large, walled compound. As he neared the small building, Jackson saw his grandfather drag a man’s body by the feet around the back of it. Jackson shifted the M16 to the crook of his arm and checked
its operation quickly. It was a customized weapon fitted with an extra-thick barrel which served as both a silencer and flash protector. Once he satisfied himself that all was in working order, he walked over to where his grandfather and El Indio stood waiting for a signal from Carlos. The compound consisted of a high wall surrounding a jumble of stucco buildings around a larger fortlike structure in the back of the compound. Jackson estimated that the buildings within the compound could easily house more than a hundred people. Three quick flashes of light emanated from the far wall of the compound and were repeated.

“That’s him!” King declared. “He’s cut the phone wire and disabled the radio antenna!”

Another light flashed twice and was repeated. This signal originated from the nearer wall of the compound. “That’s Hernando. He’s taken care of the two sentries guarding this side of the wall. We’ve got ten minutes to get over the wall before the outside patrol comes around again. Let’s get to steppin’!”

They started down the darkened hillside at a trot, occasionally sliding through the brush on the hard clay and laterite of the slope. Jackson kept his automatic rifle in front of him to protect his face from being lashed by branches in the underbrush. At the foot of the ridge there was about a fifty-foot strip of cleared ground to cross before the walls could be reached. Jackson waited behind a low-lying thicket for his grandfather’s signal. When the three quick flashes came from the edge of the wall, all three men ran full throttle across the security zone. Jackson was the first one to the wall; the two older men were close behind but breathing heavily. A ladder made of rope was thrown over the wall and the men used it to enter the compound. They dropped down into an unlighted alley between buildings.

Carlos led them through a maze of alleyways until they reached the base of the fortlike main house. They stopped at a small door opening down into a cellar. “This is the way in behind the bar. The passageway up to El Jaguar’s chambers is off the main room. We’ve got machine gun lanes set up at both ends of the street fronting on this building. Once you take care of the bodyguards in the bar, there should be no further resistance.”

King looked at his watch and asked, “How long do we have before the mortars start fallin’?”

Carlos answered, “Ten minutes. Then you have twenty minutes to
get the Jaguar and get out. We’ll open fire on this building with the bazookas in thirty minutes from now. The truck will be waiting around the back of the compound.”

“What about Maria?” Jackson demanded.

Carlos said, “If she’s alive and in this compound, she’ll be in this building. Tigre has a small apartment underneath the Jaguar’s suite.”

King opened the door and said, “Let’s hit it and quit it! The clock is ticking!” He stepped down into the darkness of the cellar and with the narrow beam of a flashlight led the way to a flight of stairs. Turning off the flashlight and using only the light which issued from under the door at the top of the stairs, he motioned to Jackson to stay behind him and stealthily ascended the steps. At the top of the stairs King pushed the door open a crack. He peered through the crack for a couple of minutes before signaling to El Indio to follow him. The two men squatted down and pushed through the doorway behind the bar.

Sweat was running down Jackson’s face as he climbed the stairs after his grandfather. The bulletproof vest and the sheepskin coat weighed heavily on his shoulders and obstructed his movements. Conversely, the rifle felt light as a toy in his hands. He pushed open the door and crawled to a kneeling position behind the long, wooden bar. There was no sign of either El Indio or his grandfather. The coarse sound of men laughing and telling bawdy stories in Spanish floated over the bar. Jackson did not know which direction to take around the bar, so he sat still and waited. His heart was pounding and the sweat fell in streams off his brow. He kept swiveling his head in opposite directions, trying to keep both entrances behind the bar in view.

A chair scraped at a table and a man’s voice said in the thick idiom of the local people of Linares that he wanted mescal, that he was tired of tequila. His boots trod unevenly toward the bar. Jackson could hear chairs being pushed aside as the footsteps came around from the left side of the bar. Jackson pulled the slide and fed a bullet quietly into the chamber of his M16 and waited. The man staggered into view and frowned confusedly when he saw Jackson on the floor. He swayed back and forth for a moment as he attempted to focus his alcohol-soaked mind on the image before him. The frown changed into an expression of anger and he reached for something in his belt. Jackson fired a burst into the man’s chest, sending him backward across the table behind him.

Voices of alarm were raised. Jackson heard some men get to their feet. Then he heard the soft, puffing noise of the machine pistols, followed by the sound of bullets chipping and glancing off adobe walls. There were groans and cries of pain as men fell to the floor dead or wounded. Jackson stayed on the floor behind the bar. He was afraid to stand up amid the whizzing of bullets.

A door across from the right entrance to the bar opened timidly and a head poked out. Juan Tejate and Jackson Tremain were staring at each other. Tejate rammed the door all the way open and sprinted to a long stairway leading to a level beneath the bar. Jackson was on his feet immediately and flying after Tejate. When he reached the top of the stairwell, bullets zinged past like miniature jets. Tejate had pulled a revolver and was firing up the stairs. Jackson reached around the corner and returned the fire with two blasts of his pig gun. He heard Tejate yelp in pain and fall down the stairs.

When he looked cautiously down the stairwell, Jackson saw a bloody Tejate pull himself to his feet and limp out of view. Jackson reloaded his pig gun as he descended the stairs. From the foot of the steps he saw Tejate at the end of a short hall struggling to open a heavy, wooden door. There was debris on the floor blocking the door’s passage, but Tejate only tried to kick it out of the way as he strained to open the heavy door. He had gotten the door cracked when Jackson put on a burst of speed and flung himself against the door. He hit the door full tilt with his shoulder, causing it to slam shut.

Tejate screamed as the fingers of his right hand crunched in the heavy vise of the door and the jamb. Jackson slammed the butt of his rifle into Tejate’s chest and the man fell backward onto the floor. Jackson pointed his pig gun at Tejate and demanded, “Where’s Maria?”

Juan pulled himself to a sitting position against the wall, holding his crushed hand in front of him. He was bleeding steadily from wounds in both his side and back.

“Who?” Tejate asked with a humorless laugh. “You want to know about that
puta
?”

Jackson threatened, “Watch your mouth, you bastard, or I’ll blast you where you lay!”

“Oh, you like her, huh? I’ll tell you about her,
maricón
. She was still tight and sweet when I had her, but I was one of the first. A friend told me that by the time he’d had her, she was all loose and bloody! She was
useless, didn’t put any effort in it. Some women forget where they come from! I think somebody shot her in the head and left her on the side of the highway.”

The hand holding the pig gun fell to Jackson’s side. The air was taken out of him. He could not have pictured worse news. Images of Maria flashed across his consciousness, reminding him that he would never have her company again, or lie sated from lovemaking in a darkened room with her. She was dead.

Out of the corner of his eye, Jackson saw Juan fingering his boot with his good hand and felt a sudden rush of anger. Here was one of the vandals who had robbed Jackson of his dream, this man who had no other purpose in life but to destroy the things he did not have the class to possess. Jackson fired both barrels into Juan’s body just as Juan pulled the knife from his boot. The acrid smell of cordite filled the small space. Jackson did not give Juan’s bloody body a second glance before he turned away.

Jackson reloaded his pig gun as he slowly climbed the stairs. He felt no regret at having killed Tejate yet he was despondent. He stepped out from behind the bar and saw carnage all around him. There were perhaps ten dead men lying about on the floor and the smell of their blood was sickening. From the other side of the compound he heard the explosion of mortars. The blasts shook the walls and rattled the windows. He picked up his rifle and climbed the stairs that led up to the Jaguar’s chambers and Tigre’s apartment. He went through Tigre’s rooms to ensure himself that Maria had not been hidden away, then continued up to the Jaguar’s suite. As soon as he walked through the doors of the lavishly furnished suite, Jackson heard someone screaming in agony.

He heard his grandfather’s voice growling out questions; there was a pause then more screams. Jackson pushed open the door slowly and saw El Indio’s gun pointing at him. His grandfather was standing over an old, bald-headed man with a pair of bloody shears. The bald-headed man was trembling on his knees with pain. Jackson’s grandfather looked at Jackson and said, “You don’t want to see this! I got twenty minutes to kill this fool and I’m gon’ take all of it! El Indio, take him out of here and cover the machine guns’ retreat.”