El Mono, page 8
Some discussion took place between the two men through the open door window of the four-by-four. Smith knew what this was about and was meanwhile searching the surrounding vegetation to see if he could see anyone else. There was some fidgety movement directly above the point where the FARC soldier had first emerged on to the road. Scouring this place minutely, Smith could see evidence of another man there.
The conversation by the road was getting a little louder; so much so that Smith could pick out individual voices, though their language was indecipherable. The deeper notes were Cortés; the lighter ones his adversary. Training his binoculars back on to the two of them, the latter could be seen to pull out a walkie-talkie with the clear intention of passing a message to someone.
Moments passed. Then, higher up but still on the same line above the point on the road where the first man appeared, there was more movement of bushes. Smith strained his eyes through the binoculars. Three people? It looked like it. Perhaps this was García being presented as proof of life? Slowly panning down to Cortés again, Smith could now see he had been given the walkie-talkie. No doubt he was being invited to talk to the hostage. So far, so good. He still could not be sure who the individuals were higher up in the bushes, perhaps they were better seen from below where Cortés was, but whether or not García was there, Smith at least knew they were his targets. It was Cortés’s decision whether or not he had seen what he wanted.
Smith continued to scan the mountainside, up and down, left and right, taking his time to try and estimate how strong the FARC party was. While he was doing so, he heard the Land Rover start up and, sure enough, it seemed that Cortés had concluded the arrangements and was preparing to back his vehicle round and leave. Swinging down his glasses to the road once more, Smith saw the FARC soldier walking away from the Land Rover, slowly retreating with the attaché case in his hand. The drop had been achieved. All parties seemed happy.
Now it was getting interesting. Would the four or five people he had detected on the mountainside meet up and withdraw above? Smith hoped so. It would signify that only one FARC encampment existed and García would be with them. He sat tight and watched the proceedings.
Half an hour passed – the two he had identified by the road slowly made their way up slope, climbing towards the others. This was good news. As they did so, Smith continued to search the area. He had to ensure that there were no others, like him, just lying low and watching. He was anxious to move out upslope himself so that he could track behind his quarry and see where they were heading but he dare not take that risk just yet. Thinking it through, there were at least five persons he had confirmed in the FARC party with García probably handcuffed or some other way shackled among them. That would slow their movement down. He was probably three-quarters of an hour behind them from his current position – he figured it would take him that long to traverse round and up to the place where the three highest individuals had shown themselves. But he could very quickly make up that time as he would move fast and they could not, so there was no question he would lose them just yet. He could afford another twenty or thirty minutes just sitting here, quietly observing, making absolutely certain there was no other FARC agent out there, undetected so far.
Fifteen minutes passed and the persons he had seen had all come together and moved out, leaving the place seemingly deserted. Checking once more, there was no sign of any movement below. Smith very slowly stood up, stretched and then trained his binoculars once more to examine every point above him that had been obscured by the tree he was hiding beneath. He was glad he did so. There was a dwarf tree with branches twitching unnaturally that he could clearly pick out not a hundred yards directly above him. Examining the place with heightened interest, he watched as what seemed like one person left their place of concealment and headed off above.
Smith waited, watching for a few minutes more, then set off in pursuit. Moving unhurriedly vertically upward, he reached the dwarf tree with little difficulty. The path that was being made by the person he had just seen was not too difficult to follow, so he moved along without delay. The higher he reached the more the slope receded, until he could begin to see further and further in front. It was now mid-afternoon, however – the sun was burning brightly and a heat haze interfered with long-distant vision. Providing he made no obvious noise and did not catch up too fast with those in front, Smith was confident his stalking would go unnoticed.
The route the FARC had chosen continued to rise but also now trended back west in the direction from which the Land Rover had come in. The party in front were moving away from the peaks behind them, towards a shoulder that would take them into the next valley and into which no motorised access was possible. Smith guessed that, once over the shoulder, they would swing back easterly once more and probably spend the rest of the afternoon descending into thicker and thicker vegetation.
He was now around one hundred and fifty yards behind the last of the party he had seen. Smith came to a halt and waited until the first among them reached more open ground at the top of the shoulder. Raising his binoculars he peered intently at everyone that passed over the horizon, unobstructed for a moment by any shrubs or bushes. The man in the lead carried an AK-47 and wore old combat fatigues and a lighter-coloured sunhat. Following him was a woman in similar fatigues, long black hair, no hat and with no obvious weapon that could be discerned from this distance. Then came a group: two men with rifles slung on their backs, one of whom was the man who had met Cortés on the road; the other was a larger, older guy with a grey jacket, black or dark brown breeches and long, lace-up combat boots. The two pulled ropes between them, on the other ends of which was García, stumbling along in a totally incongruous, screwed-up pinstriped suit and with body language that showed he was seriously unhappy. Last of all was another guy fully clothed in ex-army combat gear from his hat to his rubber boots, carrying the attaché case and what might have been a handgun or similar weapon tucked into his webbing. Smith guessed he might be the leader of the group, directing from the back, an experienced soldier who would keep the party closed up while they were following a pathway that was familiar to them. Five soldiers in all, moving along slowly but confidently with their hostage.
Smith reckoned it was time to call Cortés. He watched the party in front disappear over the bluff, out of sight and sound, then he removed his pack and found the two-way radio inside. It took him a moment or two to raise his colleague who was parked three miles down the road and out of harm’s way
‘Cortés?’
‘Yeah.’
‘There are five of them, plus García. They are now in the next valley. They’ll need to rest soon, so I hit them as soon as it’s dark. Hopefully before they meet others. You leave now and come back tomorrow at daybreak. Same place as cash-drop. Savvy?’
‘Yeah. Do you want me to tell Fields?’
‘No. See you tomorrow. Out.’
Smith easily followed the party in front. García was unfit, ill-equipped, probably malnourished and clearly unable to move fast. Smith could hear voices snarling unsympathetically on occasions and he guessed they were García’s captors encouraging him to keep moving. A few hours of this and the party was moving slower and slower. Now the sun had gone down, the jungle of low trees and bushes was covered in strange, eerie shadows of black and grey. Smith wondered when the party would stop. They were following a track through the forest that they obviously had carved out earlier and Smith had closed the distance between them as near as he dared, waiting for the opportunity to attack. His prime objective was to free García unharmed and secondly to gather as much evidence from them as he could to discover their motives in killing Triple F staff. But he couldn’t see any way of achieving either just yet. He had to wait.
The evening advanced and still the party kept moving. They obviously had some destination in mind and were working towards it, slower than the FARC leader wanted, by the sound of the abuse that rose into the forest night. Then suddenly the path swung downslope and the group’s noise level increased slightly. The air of anticipation increased with it. Smith could hear a stream cascading down somewhere in front and at last the FARC stopped. They had reached the place where they intended to bivouac overnight.
Smith ducked upslope, away from the jungle track his quarry had made, and hunched down. He had night-vision goggles in his backpack but he did not need them; all the FARC soldiers were now wearing head torches and they were creating enough light between them for him to make out what was going on. A small clearing opened out on some flatter ground near the stream. The FARC had probably done this earlier. Two men seemed to be tying García to some tree roots, giving him only enough space to lie down. His hands looked like they were chained somehow together in front of him. The leader of the party was preparing a sleeping space for himself; the long-haired woman appeared to be doing the same, next to him. The fifth one of the party, the one in a lighter-coloured hat that Smith had seen furthest ahead, seemed to be busying himself with several boxes and packets. This clearing was obviously a small base where a variety of equipment had been dropped: cooking and sleeping gear and a certain supply of food. Smith settled down to wait for his quarry to arrange all their affairs, eat something and then bed down for the night. He knew now what he would do.
García was clearly pleading for better treatment, more comfort, more food or whatever. Smith didn’t understand a word of what was being said but García wasn’t getting anywhere with his demands. The interplay this generated, however, was useful because Smith could more easily see how the group interrelated. The leader of the party issued all the orders and suffered no argument from any. The woman was his partner, second-in-command and clearly a favourite. The two men who had roped up García were detailed as his guards; the one in the sunhat was the smallest, possibly the youngest of the party and some sort of scout and general dogsbody who was sent to fetch water, help cook and run errands. So far as weapons were concerned, Smith had already established that the three men all carried AK-47s and the leader and his woman had handguns. Given the confined space they now inhabited, Smith estimated that the AK-47s were the least appropriate weapons to wield, while the two soldiers with handguns were the most dangerous, especially given their evident authority and likely initiative.
The older of the two guards was placed on watch while the others settled down to sleep. The leader and the woman got into sleeping bags. Excellent, Smith thought – that restricted their movement. The two other men wrapped themselves in blankets as well as they could to keep out the cold. García had also been given a blanket, though he continued complaining. The leader clearly told him to shut up and then one by one the head torches were switched off.
Half an hour passed in silence, broken only by the sound of the cascading stream and by García moaning and shifting in position. The older guard on watch moved a few paces away from the others and switched his head torch back on. He was preparing to have a pee. Smith silently rose and crept out on to the path where he could move quickly and without noise. He drew out his Commando dagger.
The guard stood by the stream, just where it broke through the undergrowth, chattering against stones and broken branches that blocked its way. As he silently approached his target, Smith couldn’t help wondering why people urinating in the open seemed to want their waters to join with those from the earth. A bizarre question to ask, perhaps, as he snaked one huge hand around the man’s face and mouth and, with the other, plunged the dagger deep into his throat. One swift movement sideways followed, with enough power to almost cut the man’s head off. There was a horrible gurgle and Smith held the guard’s weight as he collapsed. He dropped him carefully into the undergrowth. No unusual sound was audible above the splashing stream.
The next concern was to neutralise the other guard, nearest to García, without giving any opportunity for the others to react. Smith decided to wipe his dagger clean, place it back in its scabbard and draw his revolver. He also unclipped the small pencil light from his breast pocket. It was pitch black now, but Smith had memorised the sleeping positions of the others. Speed and surprise was of the essence. He loped back to the clearing, picked out the shape of the other guard, and knelt over him. He decided to hit him hard enough to concuss him but not to kill him: a big man, Smith had to be careful with his strength. Crash! He brought the gun down on top of the sleeping man’s cranium. As he guessed, this provoked alarm among all the others. García was calling out again; the two in sleeping bags struggled to sit up; the youngest soldier was probably trying to figure out who was doing what, where. Smith stood up, switched his penlight on to the two in sleeping bags, and fired one bullet into each of them from a distance of about four yards. He did not need to see their effect.
The noise of the revolver going off in the small space was deafening. The remaining soldier was clearly scared witless out of his sleep. He fumbled for his weapon, but before he had time to drag it round and aim, however, the penlight had caught him in its gaze and the red laser light on the revolver had caught him also. Another single deafening shot and it was all over.
Smith now returned to the soldier he had concussed, leaned across him and shone the light in his eyes. Vacant. He was not ready to speak as yet. Next García. The city boy was in a state of shock and clearly shivering in fright.
‘Martín García, I’ve come to rescue you …’ A simple monotonic statement in English but Smith could see it register in the frightened countenance of the poor man.
The rope tying García to the tree root like a dog on a lead was the first shackle to be removed. Smith thought of cutting the rope with his dagger, but his fingers were strong enough and agile enough to loosen the knots. García’s hands were a separate problem. Smith found the concussed man’s head torch and put it on so as to see better. A chain had been wound around and around García’s wrists and it took some time before Smith could sort out the mess of knots and locks involved.
‘Where’s the key?’ Smith asked the dazed captive. ‘Which guard? This one?’ Smith indicated the body lying next to him.
Martín García was shaking his head as if he was trying to come out of a nightmare. It was a truly horrific nightmare, but he found his voice.
‘Yes, that one I think. He was the last to tie me up.’ He watched like a stupefied, blank-eyed junkie as Smith rolled over the concussed guard and systematically searched his every pocket from top to bottom. A clip of keys was hanging from his belt on the side. Smith casually ripped this off and studied them closely in torch light to see if any of them looked like they might fit the padlock he needed to open. Moving across to García, he tried one then another and then he grunted in satisfaction as the second key turned and the chains were finally released.
The guard was now moving, moaning and beginning to revive. Smith hauled him up off the ground with one arm, held him standing in front of him and shook him from side to side. Smith’s commandeered head torch burned into the man’s eyes.
‘What’s your name?’ he demanded. The guard was still half concussed and anyway did not understand English. Smith turned to look at García and told him to stand up, too.
‘Ask him his name,’ he ordered.
Martín had not been knocked on the head but he seemed almost as dazed as the other. He struggled to get up, wringing his hands, but then he staggered beside Smith and asked their prisoner, his ex-prison guard, what his name was in their common language.
‘Diego Torres,’ came the answer. The man was still very weak – his head was bruised and singing in his ears and he was barely able to stand. Smith held him easily as if he weighed a feather.
‘Tell Diego that, if he tells me what I want, I won’t kill him.’ Smith spoke as usual in a totally expressionless voice. García translated faithfully; the man nodded as if he understood.
‘Ask him: who is he working for?’
García asked and gained the reply.
‘He says he works for the FARC.’
‘Not good enough. Who pays them? Who provided the equipment to blow up Triple F’s Toyota and kill their staff?’
A lot of questioning and answering in Spanish followed that Smith couldn’t follow.
García passed on the information. ‘He says he doesn’t know. His leader who is lying over there gets the gear and tells the team what to do. He has no idea what happens with the money. He sees precious little, he says.’
Smith was annoyed. His face was a mask as always but he lifted the guard bodily in the air and shook him like a dummy.
‘He knows something. He must know something. Who did his leader meet when preparing for the attack? Where did the landmine come from? What sort of people made contact? Ask him which leg or arm he wants to lose first?’
García was almost as terrified of this monster as the guard who was now being shaken like a piece of paper.
A torrent of excited language flowed between the two native Spanish speakers. García spoke less and less and listened more and more as the threat of mutilation frightened the other into blurting out as much as he could to save himself.
‘He says he honestly doesn’t know who the people are. He said that the last contact he knows of was when they met a jeep with three men a couple of weeks ago on a road some way south from here. Packets of explosive were handed over. The leader said nothing to them, but he and the other guard reckoned the stuff came from a mining company. He heard them speaking English.’
‘How does he know it was English if he doesn’t understand it?’
Another pause while this was translated.
‘Because it sounded then like his younger brother used to speak, and like we speak.’
‘The jeep these men were in, did it have any company markings?’
The question was relayed to the other.
‘He says he doesn’t know; he didn’t get close enough to see.’
Smith’s left hand slid up to the man’s neck. The right hand held his T-shirt, hauling the man up off the ground, his legs dangling like a puppet’s.
