January Justice (33 page)

“I just told you.”

“How did you know about Ernesto’s restaurant?”

“I’m a professional sleuth, remember? That’s why you hired me.” I had my hands free by then but continued to hold them behind my back.

“I dislike speaking in clichés, Mr. Cutter, but sometimes they are most appropriate. So forgive my lack of originality when I say we have ways of making you talk.”

“Ways? Who has these ways? Him?” I nodded at Ernesto.

“Exactly,” replied Vega.

“Nah,” I said.

I set my weight on my right foot, delivered a lateral left kick to Ernesto’s ribs, and followed through to take his gun before he hit the floor. He lay clutching his chest and moaning as I covered Vega with the weapon. It was over in less than a second.

To Vega I said, “Lock your fingers behind your head and turn around.”

He did as he was told. I approached from the rear and removed his holstered Glock, I also took a knife he had slipped into the top of his right boot.

On the floor Ernesto continued to groan. I spoke to him in Spanish. “Ernesto, my friend. I am truly sorry about that. Can you breathe?”

He said, “Yes,” through gritted teeth.

“Excellent. That means your lung is not punctured, so you will be okay in a few days. Someone cracked some of my ribs only last week, and look how great I am doing now. You just stay down there on the floor and rest, okay? And Valentín, put your hands in your front pockets and call the others in.”

Vega dropped his hands to his pockets and called, “Mario, come in here. Bring the others.”

I gripped Vega by the back of his shirt and pulled him with me into a corner where I could cover the whole room from behind him. His men came in with their guns holstered. Distracted by Ernesto on the floor, they didn’t realize I was positioned to their rear until I said, “If you go for those guns, I will shoot your boss in the head.”

All three of them turned to look at me. “Vega,” I said, “Tell them to put their right hands in their pockets and then reach around and put their weapons on the floor with just the thumb and first finger of their left hands.”

They all looked at Vega. He said, “Do it.”

After they had kicked the guns into the corner where I stood, I told them, “Put your other hands in your pockets too and sit down on the floor.”

With a nod from Vega, they all did as they were told. I released Vega and told him to go across the room and sit with them. Still covering everybody with Ernesto’s gun, I stooped to pick up their weapons one by one and pitched them through the open door into the jungle. They all glared at me, watching my every move.

When I held the only gun in the room, I relaxed a little. I switched to English. “Hey, Valentín. Don’t look at me that way. I know this is awkward, but it’s not my fault. All you had to do was ask me nicely for a meeting, but were you polite? No, you sent these guys to kick in doors and tie me up and scare me with their great big guns.”

“Why are you here?”

“Always the same question. But since you’re being more polite now, I’ll tell you. I’m here for you. We’re going down the mountain in a minute, straight to the American embassy. When we get there, you’re going to tell them that the Montes’s home invasion was your idea and that I had nothing to do with it.”

I was betting Vega didn’t know the embassy security detail would probably arrest me and send me back to Los Angeles as soon as they found out I had violated my bail. And I was betting he would want to avoid a visit to the embassy as much as I did.

He said, “You must be insane.”

“That’s definitely possible. But we’re still going.”

“I have men positioned all throughout this part of the country. You will not survive the walk down to the road.”

“In that case, neither will you.”

“But even if we get there, why would your people believe a witness with a gun to his head?”

“You’ll give them details. Inside information. Things you couldn’t know unless you were in on the crime.”

“I cannot do that.”

“You’d better.”

“It is impossible. I do not know any details. We were not involved in the attack on Mrs. Montes. Also, if you force me to go there, I will surely be assassinated by the junta. Is that what you want?”

I said, “I’ll shoot you here and now if you don’t do exactly as I say. Do you believe me?”

Vega nodded. “I am certain you will shoot me.”

“Then stand up and let’s go.”

“Mr. Cutter, you must understand that this is all for nothing. I cannot clear your name. I know nothing of this home invasion, except what I learned from the television in my hotel room in California. I only know one of two things has happened. Either Fidel attempted to betray our cause for money or else the junta was behind what happened.”

“There’s a third possibility. You and Castro set me up. You sent him and Delarosa in to kill the congressman, and you played me for the patsy.”

“It is not true. I swear it. The proof is that Fidel is dead, and I am back here in the jungle, hiding from the junta again as if all our progress over the last ten years had never happened. I tell you, they are the ones behind this. They would do anything to keep the URNG from getting more political power.”

“That would be a lot easier to believe if you hadn’t left me there to face the police alone. You know I had no connection with Alejandra Delarosa. You can verify my reasons for investigating the Montes’s finances, and you can verify that I had no reason to attack the congressman or his wife. But you left town as soon as news of the attack came out. And there I was, swinging in the breeze.”

“I am sorry, but I had no choice. If I had remained there, I would probably be dead. Listen. Here is how it happened. Fidel said a couple of men approached him, claiming that they represented Congressman Montes. They told him the congressman wanted to make a private deal with us. They said the congressman had recognized his mistake and decided to shift his support to the URNG, but he needed to meet with us first to get certain assurances.

“Of course I knew it was nonsense. Nothing had happened to explain such a complete shift in the congressman’s position. I refused the meeting. But the men had filled Fidel’s head with visions of himself as a great hero. Fidel argued with me. He became quite angry. And I think he went ahead without my permission. I think he walked into the Montes’s house expecting a warm welcome, and received a bullet instead.”

Vega shook his head. “You cannot seriously believe that silly female shot him? After all his years in combat? Ridiculous. One of the junta’s men shot Fidel, and they left him there to discredit the URNG once and for all. And if I had not left town immediately, they would have found a way to kill me too, and make it look like I was resisting arrest or some such thing.”

I said, “I need you to prove it.”

“I tell you it is impossible.”

“You’re lying. Get up. We’re going to the embassy.”

“Wait. Let me think. Possibly there is another way…”

“Hurry up, Vega.”

“I have an idea. Your theory is that Fidel and Alejandra Delarosa attacked the Montes’s on my orders, yes?”

“Yes.”

“What if I could prove to you Alejandra Delarosa was never part of the URNG? Would you then believe me when I say the home invasion was not our doing?”

“If you can prove that, why did you hire me in the first place?”

“Of course you are right. I cannot prove it legally, which is what I wanted you to do. No judge would accept the proof I have to offer, but you, as a good man, you will understand it and believe.”

He seemed confident of that, so I considered the situation.

If Vega could convince me that Delarosa had never worked for the URNG, then my theory fell apart. I’d have to come up with another explanation for the Montes’s home invasion. It might mean she simply wanted the Montes’s money. After all, kidnapping had worked for her before. Or maybe she was still jealous of Doña Elena’s relationship with her old lover, Arturo Toledo, and wanted revenge. Even after so much time, it wasn’t unprecedented for jealous rage to lead to such a crime.

Or maybe Delarosa was working for the junta. Maybe she had been working for them all along. It would explain why she had forced Doña Elena to make those famous videos claiming responsibility for the URNG. Ransom notes would have been safer, but the videos of Doña Elena begging for her life had done more than anything to turn American public opinion against the URNG and engender sympathy for the old men of the junta. If that was true, it might also explain why Alejandra Delarosa had settled for two hundred thousand dollars. Maybe money was never the point. And if she had been working for the junta all along, it would explain how she had managed to elude capture for seven years.

I said, “What is this proof you’re talking about?”

Vega said, “It is not a what; it is a who. And you must hear what he has to say with your own ears.”

“All right,” I said. “Let’s go.”

37

The man who had restrained my wrists
earlier still had several twist ties in his pocket. I covered Vega with Ernesto’s gun as he bound the other men’s wrists and ankles. I made sure the ties were tight, and then I listened as Vega used a handheld radio to call for the van to return to pick him up. When he was done, I took the radio and put it in my pocket.

The walk down the mountain to the road was uneventful. Vega seemed comfortable. I assumed that meant he either expected his people to take me out at some point along the way, or he really was confident that I would be satisfied with the evidence he planned to offer.

When we reached the road, the van wasn’t there yet. I directed Vega to a spot about fifty yards downhill along the road, where we would be concealed from anyone who emerged behind us from the path up to the shed.

A few minutes later, I heard the whine of the van climbing the road in first gear. It passed us, went to the same place where it had stopped earlier, and parked. I warned Vega to be silent and placed the muzzle of the gun against his skull. I watched the van, wondering how many men might be inside. After a moment the driver emerged. He lit a cigarette and walked a few feet away to stand looking down on the city.

I gave Vega the radio. I put my mouth against his ear and whispered. “Call and tell him you’re running late. Tell him to be ready with the doors open when you get here.”

Vega called. The man heard his radio and hurried back to the van. He got inside and responded. Vega said exactly what I told him. The man got out of the van and opened the side door. I could see inside the van. It was empty.

“Let’s go,” I said. “Walk in front of me. Don’t say anything. If he speaks to you, just wave and smile. If you speak at all without permission, I’ll kill you.”

We stepped onto the road and headed toward the van. The driver stood on the far side and didn’t hear us coming until we were almost there. I clutched the back of Vega’s shirt with one hand and jammed the muzzle of the gun into his ear with the other. “Tell him to throw his sidearm into the bushes.”

The driver did as he was told. One minute later, we were rolling downhill, with the driver at the wheel, Vega in the passenger seat, and me sitting on the floor behind them with the gun.

Vega stared straight ahead through the windshield. “We are the same, you know. Both of us are fugitives because of crimes we did not commit. And we both know what it is to suffer the burden of a shame we do not deserve.”

I said, “All those mass graves in the mountains, and you expect me to believe your hands are completely clean?”

“I expect you of all people to know what it is like to be accused of wartime atrocities that you did not commit.”

So even there in Guatemala, they knew about the butchers of Laui Kalay. I sighed. I watched the back of his head for a few minutes. Then I said, “What makes you think I didn’t do it?”

“You just overpowered me and four of my men. You did that alone, although all of us fought in the mountains for many years. All of us are warriors. You could have killed us. You could have killed Fidel when he came for you. But you exercised restraint. You used only the necessary force, and no more. A man with that kind of self-control does not do what they say you did.”

“They convicted me.”

“I am sure you had your reasons for allowing it.”

As before, I couldn’t tell much about our route, since there were no windows in the back of the van, but I did make an effort to rise to my knees and look forward through the windshield whenever we turned. The return trip to the city seemed a little faster. Maybe that was because we were going downhill, or maybe it was because I was the one with the gun this time.

I did my best not to think about Laui Kalay, but Vega’s words had stirred the memories again….my captain coming over to the hooch that morning to ask questions about a video on the Internet. When he had described it to me and told me who was in it, I had flatly denied that such a thing was possible. Then he had played it for me on his phone. I saw marines crouched over a haphazard pile of Afghan bodies, my comrades baring their teeth like ghouls, laughing, cutting away fingers, cracking teeth. I recognized those marines, my men, and knew that I had failed them. I hadn’t seen the signs. I should have sensed it in them. I should have saved them from the madness. I should have sent them home.