The Viper Squad (14 page)

Other things also combined to make ordering and picking up military-grade weapons one of the big areas of vulnerability for
the soldier of fortune, not least among
them the very possession of weapons of this grade. It is kind of hard for guys with rocket-propelled grenades and a kilo
of plastic explosives to claim they are after deer.

Often a mission doesn’t take shape till the weapons pickup is made—it’s only a conspiracy till then. Thus the professional
soldier never knows how secure his arrangements are until he has a gun in his hand, and it’s mostly too late to make changes
at that point.

Mike Campbell solved these difficulties by dealing through Cuthbert Colquitt. Cuthbert believed that a gentleman kept his
word; and he dealt only with those he believed to be gentlemen, regardless of what nefarious activity they might be up to.
Colquitt’s code of honor was simple: the customer paid what, where and when he promised, and Colquitt in turn delivered what,
where and when he promised. It was up to each side to overcome its own surprise difficulties without disturbing the business
arrangement. Cuthbert was known to have a number of associates, anything but gentlemen, who were willing to see that no one
took advantage of his good nature.

Colquitt Armaments consisted of a small office building and large warehouse in an industrial estate on the edge of Mobile.
The place had a bland look—it could have been trading in wholesale Bibles. Neatly cut grass with P
LEASE
K
EEP
O
FF
signs, sprinklers, trimmed shrubs and strictly arranged flowers created a button-down look despite the frivolity of Southern
spring. Mike left the taxi he had taken from the airport and entered the glass double doors to the offices.

“Hi, honey,” a leggy blonde with a husky voice said to him. “You have an appointment?”

“Yes. Mike Campbell is the name.”

“Okay, Mike.” She popped her gum. “I’ll see if Cuthbert is free.” She picked up the receiver and pressed a button. “Sugar?
Mike’s here.” She listened a moment, then dissolved in giggles.

Mike headed for the door to Cuthbert’s office. Colquitt
always hired pretty girls who weren’t sharp enough to get too nosy about his business. He seemed to go through quite a few
of them, so maybe working for him fell short of being a dream job.

Cuthbert was cradling the phone between his shoulder and the rolls of fat on his neck when Mike walked in. His big paw clutched
a gold Cross pen, and his square white teeth, spaced far apart, were clamped on a cigar.

“Gotta go,” he said into the phone, hung up and heaved his great bulk out of the chair to greet his visitor. “Hey, boy, you’re
lookin’ real good. I sit here and age and worry while hound dogs like you go out and chew on the world, havin’ yourselves
a fine old time.”

“Cuthbert, men like me toil so that men like you can sit back at your ease.”

“That ain’t the way it is here with me, Mike. Look at me, worn away to a frazzle”—he stuck out his huge belly and shook his
loose red jowls like a turkey cock—”just a shade of my former self. Work and worry. Worry and work. You look younger all the
while. Touch of good bourbon?”

He sloshed the amber liquid over ice cubes in two cut-crystal glasses the size of jelly jars.

“You off on one of your little vacations, Mike?”

“El Salvador.”

Cuthbert shook his head. “I’m afraid to go to Chicago, and you go to places like that. I don’t mind telling you, Mike, I meet
a lot of men on their way to dangerous places, but you’re the only
repeat
customer I have who goes all the time. And it’s not that the others don’t come back again because they’re dissatisfied with
my services. They don’t come back. Period. You really want to go to El Salvador?”

“Looking forward to it, Cuthbert. Any problem there for you?”

“None at all. Business ain’t big there for me because the U.S. government sends them arms for free, and the
pols and army boys down there sell the guns off to anyone who wants to buy. I can’t compete with that. What I do sell there
is what I’m going to recommend to you. If you carry M16s and other American weapons there and get caught, you could be charged
with stealing them or with being equipped by Washington on top of everything else. If you’re caught with Eastern-bloc weapons,
they’ll claim you work for Nicaragua or Cuba. I sell nice neutral European guns—from Germany, Belgium, Sweden, Israel, France—to
people who don’t want any misunderstandings to arise. The weapons are mostly for guards who patrol private houses in wealthy
sections of the cities.”

“Sounds reasonable,” Mike confirmed. “Let me tell you what I expect. The north of El Salvador has poor soil and small farms.
There’s a lot of hills which grade into mountains up to five thousand feet high at the Honduran border. The guerrillas more
or less control this area, but I don’t expect to be coming up against personnel carriers and certainly not tanks. A few Jeeps
maybe, but not much more in the way of vehicles. So I don’t need anything armor-piercing, and I don’t want my men to have
to drag around awkward launch tubes that would only increase their visibility. We’ll be up against highly mobile groups which
travel light and know the country. It’s not jungle, so we may get into some open firing. I think I’d prefer a battle rifle
rather than an assault rifle like the M16 or Kalashnikov. The assault rifle is great for automatic fire at close range, but
it has its limitations beyond thirty or forty feet. A battle rifle will be better. And since we won’t have to carry food or
equipment, each man can carry a backup submachine gun like a Uzi.”

Cuthbert held up a chubby hand. “Best battle rifle you can buy today is the FN-FAL Standard.”

Mike grimaced. “It’s a little long to handle.”

“Take the Paratroop version. That has a grenade launcher, which the Standard doesn’t. It uses the same 7.62 mm ammo with a
twenty-round detachable box magazine.
The Paratroop model has better protection of the rear sight and has a really good folding stock that locks into both open
and closed positions with no give or looseness at all. I’ll take you out back and let you see for yourself.”

“The Paratroop has the folding cocking handle?” Mike asked.

“That’s the one. There’s no gouging, and as you know you can operate it easily without removing your firing hand from the
trigger group.”

“Give me six of them. No, make it seven.” Mike realized he was adding one for Andre Verdoux. Not that he intended changing
his mind about bringing him along. But just in case’… and anyway, a spare weapon could come in handy.

“Same with the Uzi?” Cuthbert asked.

“Sure.”

“Only complaint I ever heard about the Uzi was that there’s no bolt hold-open device, which I think is a valid objection.
Personally I prefer the Thompson over the Uzi any day.”

“The Thompson is a foot longer and five pounds heavier,” Mike pointed out. “I’m asking my men to carry this gun in addition
to a rifle in tropical heat.”

“No argument, old boy,” Cuthbert said. “I keep my Thompson under the dashboard of my car.”

Mike smiled and surrendered his glass for another bourbon. “Pistols? Semiautomatic.”

“The Heckler & Koch P9S is used by the German police. It takes 9 by 19 Parabellum in a nine-round detachable box. It has a
delayed blowback system like that of the G3 rifle. You know, the delay is achieved through the use of locking rollers which
must be driven down angled faces to the unlocked position before the bolt can make its major rearward excursion. The angled
faces and the return faces together present a resistance that results in a very small initial bolt movement while
the chamber pressure is high. You’ll get to fire one out back.”

“Sounds good,” Mike agreed.

“Beautiful craftsmanship. The barrel has polygonal rifling, which improves accuracy and makes it easier to maintain. And the
loaded-chamber indicators can be detected by touch.”

“I’m sold, Cuthbert,” Mike said in concession, knowing that the Southerner could go on in an endless filibuster about the
qualities and workings of any weapon.

“Seven?”

“Yes.”

“Think you’ll need to shoot down any helicopters?” Cuthbert asked solicitously.

“I hope not.”

“Grenades, old boy. That’s what you need. Grenades.” The way Cuthbert said “grenades,” he made them sound like vitamins. You
knew they had to be good for you.

Comandante Clarinero, as he was known popularly because of his cornet playing, commanded a brigade of more than 180 guerrillas,
the Padre Ernesto Barrera Brigade. It was called that in memory of a priest who had been killed in 1978 while he was with
the guerrillas. The brigade had six companies, each containing thirty or more men, commanded by Clarinero’s lieutenants. Each
company had three platoons of ten men or more, with a sergeant in command. The platoons consisting of trained and combat—hardened
men were divided into squads of two, three or four members; and each squad specialized in a certain activity, such as blowing
bridges. It looked great on paper.

Clarinero’s big trouble, however, was that many of his troops were only fifteen or sixteen years old and far more liable to
shoot each other or themselves accidentally than pick off the enemy as sharpshooters. Balancing this was the fact that the
government forces were equally young and inexperienced. Many had joined the army solely because
of its pay, which was good at two hundred colones a month, about eighty dollars, and because of the regular meals, which
they could not depend on getting elsewhere. Needless to say, the less these men had to fight for their pay and food, the happier
they were.

When a young man turns down a comparatively soft life in a backs to live as a fugitive in wild places, knowing he can never
return to his family and village unless his side wins, he has mostly been forced into the decision. He has an ax to grind—a
family death to avenge, an eviction or some other injustice to settle, a seething hate to release.… The field of combat is
a very effective training ground. A man learns fast or he goes under fast.

The brigade had attacked a small town and held it for two days until a superior government force arrived. They had then retreated
and seized another town, which government soldiers had to retake with heavy losses later in the day. The guerrillas fled to
the mountains, pausing only to burn the tobacco—drying sheds owned by a powerful right—wing family. As always, the army soldiers
were reluctant to follow the guerrillas into the dense cover of the foothills. They liked to stop fighting well before dark
so they would be back in camp in plenty of time for their evening meal. Besides, most of their officers had to bathe before
their dinner engagements.

It was not until nearly midday the next day, having been away four and a half days, that the guerrilla companies began returning
to their burnt-out camp. Comandante Clarinero himself found Sally Poynings. The comandante was touched by the sight of the
pretty blond girl all alone by the side of a mountain stream, not far from the blackened cinders of his bombed and burnt forest
base. Clarinero had seen too many things gutted by flames to be either particularly impressed or surprised at the remains
of his camp. at he had never seen before was a beautiful foreign woman who, as sole survivor, waited helplessly on a mountainside
for his return.

Sally in her turn was struck by the handsome young comandante with his Pancho Villa mustaches and decorative silver work on
his black leather riding boots and gun belt. He was being so gallant and treating her like a damsel in distress, she decided
not to tell him how she had found undamaged food stores and a sleeping bag and had taken off on her own. He seemed to want
to believe she had sat by the edge of this stream like a wilted flower waiting for his return. When a man formed a romantic
notion like that, Sally was not the kind of girl to spoil his illusion.

Of course, what had really taken place was quite different. Sally had said to herself, after her first nervous traumas had
subsided, that this whole country was only a little bigger than New Jersey and was crawling with people. All she had to do
was walk down from these mountains and hitch a ride to San Salvador, which couldn’t be more than fifty or a hundred miles
away. Even if she had to walk that distance, it would be better than being stuck up on a mountain with charred corpses for
company.

She carried food and drinking water in a canvas bag and made her way down the slopes. Before she emerged from the timber belt,
she heard male voices. Instead of running toward them for help, something made her conceal herself in some bushes. The voices
came nearer along a forest path.

Four campesinos walked together, armed as always with their machetes, passing a bottle among them which she guessed was cane
liquor. Sally broke out into a cold sweat as she realized she would not have survived this encounter if they had seen her.
She knew for certain they would have raped her, killed her and hidden her body in the forest. Why she was certain of this
she could not explain, even to herself. Hands trembling, she stayed hidden till long after the men’s voices had faded in the
distance. She determined she would not approach any man—she would stay out of sight until she spotted women working in the
fields and go to them.

Sally had noticed that in El Salvador it was always easy
to find women working and men resting. The first woman she approached would not speak to her. A pretty girl about her own
age, who was picking coffee beans with the others, called to her.

“She can’t help you. She’s already lost one son; she doesn’t want anything else to happen to her. Talk with me. I have nothing
to lose.”

Sally walked over to where she worked. “I don’t want any of you to suffer because of me.”

The pretty girl laughed bitterly. “Norteamericana, you run from the guerrillas or the army? Maybe from both. Anyway, they
both blame us for helping you to escape. You see what is happening here? I am the only one who is talking to you. Everyone
can point her finger to me and say it was me who helped, not she.”