Kidnapped and a Daring Escape (25 page)

    
At the Yacinta, an elderly man answers the bell. His face reminds
André of a goat, and the nickname ‘
la chèvre
’ rises unbidden. He
scrutinizes them suspiciously. Their tired looks, disheveled hair, badly
crinkled clothes, and beaten-up backpack are not confidence inspiring.

    
"Yes, we have a room available," says ‘
la chèvre
’, seemingly
reluctantly, adding that they will have to pay for an extra half day, since
it is only nine in the morning. He wants their passports. André expected
that. He apologizes and explains that their passports and luggage, except
for the pack got stolen and that they will only be able to have new travel
documents issued in Bogotà. The man shrugs, crumples up the form he
has started filling in, and gives André the key to the second room on the
left along the upstairs corridor. Yes, he is willing to accept American
dollars, and he tells them if they come again down right away, they will
still be able to share breakfast with their other guests.

    
The room is luxury after the one in Las Delicias. It even has rugs on
each side of the bed and running water, but no shower or toilet. Its single
window overlooks a backyard, where two children play on a swing
attached to a sturdy branch of the only tree. André quickly removes a few
twenty-dollar notes from one of the bundles, while Bianca washes her
hands and face. She holds the nice smelling towel to her nose and
murmurs: "Back to civilization."

    
He also washes up, and then they go down into the breakfast room.
There is only one other couple there, who answer André’s greeting of
"
buenos dias
". The young woman smiles shyly and eyes them furtively.

    
Both dig into the corn fritters and spicy beans, oblivious to the stares
of the other couple. The coffee is hot and strong, just the way André likes
it best. After gratifying their first pangs of hunger, they eat in a more
civilized manner.

    
They are the last to leave the breakfast room. At the desk, he pays for
the room with two twenty-dollar bills. The old man gives him a twenty-thousand-peso note change. André figures that with the ten thousand
pesos change from Las Delicias this should be enough to have lunch and
dinner in a cheap restaurant. Hopefully Monday morning he will be able
to exchange a few hundred dollars into pesos at a currency exchange,
provided they do not insist in seeing identification papers.

    
They each take a long shower in the separate bathroom at the top of
the stairs. Bianca overcomes her fear to be alone, but insists that André
waits outside. He sits on the top step of the stairs. She wants to be locked
into their room while he showers.

    
When he returns, she is already asleep in the narrow double bed. He
joins her and snuggles up to her back, an arm around her waist, his left
cupping her right breast. She mumbles something, but he cannot make it
out. He too is asleep within minutes.

* * *

Bianca wakes, but keeps her eyes closed. She becomes aware that her
head lies on a hairy chest and that she has one arm around a torso. For a
moment she is confused, not knowing where she is. Then she opens her
eyes. She is lying partly on André. The covers have slipped. His
manhood lies exposed, a small, limp thing. She studies it. She has never
really seen a penis from close up. She remembers that Franco didn’t like
it if she touched him there. She reaches for it, lifting it up, and then lets
it slip from her hand. It is so pliable. It is hard to believe that this little
thing could grow several fold and become hard and rigid. She folds her
hand again around it. It feels cool and soft. She squeezes and notices that
it begins to swell. Amused, she slowly pulls the foreskin down, gradually
revealing a shiny pink tip with a small slit, slightly open, like the mouth
of one of the small fish in her fish tank at home. She almost expects it to
open and close. She pulls the foreskin down more. The shaft has become
hard and ribbed. She feels wet and has the sudden urge to have him
inside.

    
André’s low murmur startles her. She lets go of his penis and meets
his eyes. There is again that glow in them, the glow she knows means
love.

    
"Come, love, straddle me, ride me."

    
"How?"

    
He helps her. She has never done that. At first, she moves timidly up
and down. He guides her to increase the tempo and intensity. He cups her
breasts in his palms, letting them slide up and down with every bounce.

    
"I love you Bianca."

    
But she hardly hears his words. All her senses are focused on her well,
her rapture rising each time she takes his penis deep inside her. She tries
to fight the inevitable explosion of ecstasy, but it is too late. Bliss
suffuses into every cell of her body. She can only whimper.

    
She wants to collapse on André, but he holds her upright. "Come,
love, squeeze your thighs, contract your muscles, grab me … yes, like
this … let go, grab me again … and again … and again."

    
She didn’t even know she has muscles there. Each contraction shoots
her again to higher levels of pleasure and pain. She cannot endure it
anymore and sinks down on him. She feels the pulsations of his penis
against her lower belly and only then becomes aware that he is not inside
her any longer.

    
Eyes closed, she rests on him for several minutes, breathing deeply to
slow her racing heart. His featherlike caresses on her back send shivers
of pleasure through her.

    
"Why didn’t you stay inside?" she murmurs.

    
"Because I don’t want you to get pregnant yet."

    
"But I’ll soon have my period, so it should be safe."

    
"Maybe yes, maybe no. All the emotional and physical upheavals and
stress these last few days could play havoc with your cycle."

    
She lifts her head, not knowing whether she should get mad or love
him all the more for his thoughtfulness. "How can you remain so rational
when we make love?"

    
"Because I love you."

    
"That doesn’t make sense."

    
"Yes, it does. Loving you means that your welfare is always uppermost in my mind."

    
She puts her head down on his chest and murmurs: "André, I love you
too. I thought that I loved Franco, but what I feel for you is … I don’t
have words for it."

    
"That’s the way it should be. But why did you let Franco into our
loving. Let him be banished from our bedroom. When he rises in your
thoughts, force your mind back to that moment on the shores of that
enchanted lake when you said: ‘Take me, André.’ And then let your heart
be filled by what your body felt then, because that’s when your body
knew that you loved me, even if your mind still fought it."

    
She kisses him and then says smiling: "
Se non è vero, è ben trovato
.
How many women have you seduced with your clever bullshit?"

    
"Bullshit? Did this word really cross your celestial lips? Come, kiss
me again so that I can lick off the stench that this word left on them."

    
"How about making love instead?"

    
"What a delightful idea! But first you have to wipe off that sticky stuff
from our bellies."

    
They do make love again. In fact, they stay in bed until late afternoon,
skipping lunch. As she lies sated and content in the crook of his shoulder,
she can’t explain what is happening to her. She, who has always
maintained that sex is overrated, can’t get enough of André. What she
experiences has no relation to the few tame, pedestrian encounters she
had with Franco — the words ‘dignified but bland’ flashes through her
mind, and she laughs silently. And then she notices that Franco has again
sneaked into her love-making, and she lets the vision of André’s
silhouette against the moonlight shimmering on the lake surface rise in
her mind.

* * *

Grumbling stomachs finally drive them out of bed in search of a
restaurant. The sun is already sunk below on the western horizon. They
pass by a telephone booth, which reminds André of their intention to
check if Franco is still in Popayàn.

    
"Let’s call the Cipriano and find out when Franco left," he suggests.
He is certain that the man left either with the students as scheduled or
maybe at most a day later. Bianca agrees. The problem though is that they
have no phone card or credit cards to pay for a call and André is not keen
to use the phone of the guesthouse. ‘
Le trapu
’ must surely know that they
have escaped, that 120,000 US dollars have gone missing, and that all
attempts to recapture them have failed. He could be waiting for them to
turn up at the Cipriano, expecting them to pick up their luggage, and
could well have either bribed or threatened the desk clerk there to inform
him. If the Cipriano has the caller-display facility, and as a four-star hotel
they may well have that, then ‘
le trapu
’ would soon know that they are
staying at Casa Familiar Yacinta. That means they could expect a visit
later that night. He tells Bianca his thoughts.

    
"André, how do you dream up these scenarios. You’ve such a devious
mind —"

    
"— but that’s what has kept us safe so far, and how do I do it? I
simply put myself in the position of these people and figure out what I
would do in their place."

    
"Oh, I’m glad you are that way. I know you’ll keep me safe."

    
He replies by kissing her cheek.

    
They find a public phone at the bus depot where they can pay cash to
the clerk at the ticket office. He also looks up the number of the Cipriano.
André disguises his voice to the lowest range he can manage. He asks to
be connected to Professor Visconti and is told that there is no guest of
that name staying with them.

    
"Are you certain? Professor Visconti from Rome? He is leading a
group of Italian students on an archaeology study tour, and they were all
staying at your hotel ten days ago. I understood that they still planned to
make several excursions."

    
"Ah, yes, Professor Visconti stayed here, but he and his party have
left."

    
"Oh, what a pity. I was supposed to give him some important
information. When did he leave?"

    
"They all left last Monday by bus."

    
"Even Professor Visconti?"

    
"Yes, they were actually scheduled to leave already on Sunday, but
then postponed departure to Monday."

    
"May I ask why?"

    
"Apparently one of the students, as well as another of our guests went
missing."

    
"Oh, I see."

    
"We have their luggage in storage. Would you by chance know what
we should do with it?"

    
"Oh, I guess, keep the things for another while. Did Professor Visconti
not leave any further instructions of what to do with them or give you a
forwarding address?"

    
"No, he only said to store the student’s items until he contacts us
again. He thought she might turn up later. But we have no instruction of
what to do with the luggage of the other guest."

    
"Oh well, keep it for another few days. Thanks for your help. Good
day." He hangs up.

    
At the start of the conversation, Bianca put her ear close to the
telephone. Her face gradually loses its color as she listens. Now she is
blinking away tears of anger.

    
"So, you were dead right about what Franco would do."

    
"Yes … You still have any doubts that he was behind the kidnapping?"

    
She hesitates only for a moment before shaking her head and saying:
"No … Oh, André, what am I going to do? … I mean, when I see him
again in Rome? How can I face him after he tried to have me killed? And
what do I tell my parents?"