Heart of the World (28 page)

We hadn't walked far, uphill granted, steeply uphill, but I was practically winded, far wearier than I expected, overheated. I stay in shape. I don't work out at a gym, but I play volleyball and swim at the Y. I sucked in deep breaths and wondered what the altitude was, and how far we were planning to climb up the endless slope. The next clearing was barely visible through the trees when the DAS guard motioned me to halt.

“That man in the hut with you, he was hurt cutting down trees. The doctor will come soon. It doesn't concern you.” His voice was far too casual.

I nodded.

“It would perhaps be better if you didn't mention him to El Martillo. He is a busy man, a great man. We don't want his mind troubled by this small matter.”

Interesting, I thought. The guard was lying about the wounded man, but why? Did the boss not know about the captured American? The possibility seemed remote.

I was out of breath and thirsty again by the time we neared a large circular hut in the clearing. A bare-chested man wearing jeans tucked into combat boots and carrying the required rifle stood guard at the door. Faint music joined the bird calls and insect chatter. The bare-chested guard nodded curtly to my escorts, ducked his head into the low doorway, and in quick Spanish identified me simply as the prisoner.

“Let her come in.”

Carlos Roldan Gonzales's voice had a touch of sandpaper gruffness. An attractive voice, it had made an impression the few times we'd spoken on the phone. Now the smooth baritone flowed on, asking the guard to bring some tea, please, and if there was some fruit juice, that would be excellent. Music played in the background, cheerful and upbeat, a Latin dance tune.

The bare-chested guard motioned me inside. I told him to untie me first; he seemed to find my request amusing. I had to duck my head to walk through the low door.

I'd expected military fatigues, the Che Guevara look, a couple of gold chains, whatever passed for macho chic in a guerrilla encampment, but the hut's sole occupant wore a tunic of pure white cloth and trousers of the same material, the legs rolled almost to the knee. He was barefoot. A single polished stone bead dangled from a cord around his neck. He sat on a folding chair at a desk made of wide planks placed across two packing crates. My approach was far from silent with the rope dragging between my legs, but he didn't look up, immersed in what seemed to be intense scrutiny of his fingertips. I studied his profile, a profile I'd never seen in newspaper or magazine photos. Paolina had his stubborn chin.

He was thinner than he'd been in the photos, older. A scar cut his face from the left corner of his mouth across the cheekbone to the corner of his eye. His eyes were Paolina's eyes, deeper and older, but the same shape and color. He turned to face me and a faint smile tilted his mouth.

Music swelled from a small cassette deck. He fiddled with the knob and lowered the volume. The hut was dim and slightly smoky, light filtering through the thatched roof and glowing from a small fire on a rock hearth. It was much like the hut in which I'd awoken, but better maintained, the stone floor neatly swept. One hammock was tucked away behind the rafters, another swung low, weighted with heavy books.

He said nothing.

I've used silence for my own ends. It's an old interrogation trick. Say nothing. Let the perp fill the silence because even lies tell you something. But this stillness was something else. I thought of a crafty reptile lying on a sunken log, waiting, waiting for his prey to emerge from the woods.

“Where is she?”

My question seemed to summon some genial being who lived far beneath the surface of the craggy face. Roldan shook himself as though waking.

“Welcome,” he said, “welcome to the MM-19 Hilton! I hope you have had a comfortable stay. We have no mints on our pillows, it's true, but we have many other amenities.” His eyes crinkled and his wide smile took ten years off his age. “We will drink together before we speak. I believe there is
lulo
juice.”

“Where is she?” I repeated.

“The
lulo
is something like a pomegranate, but the juice is the nectar of the gods. With
lulo
juice and salsa music alone, one can always have a fiesta. You saw the mountain? The high peak is called Simon Bolivar, after the great liberator. It is 5,775 meters high.”

“I don't care how high the mountain is,” I said. “I don't plan to complain about being kidnapped or locked up or—”

“We have no locks here.”

“Just guards with AK-47s?”

He shrugged. “The show of arms is regrettable. We are a farming community.”

“Yeah. You beat your plowshares into assault rifles?”

“The guns are a recent acquisition.”

I wished the guy with the juice would make it snappy. I tried to wet my lips. “Roldan, I don't want to discuss guns, either. I've come to take Paolina home.”

“I have seen your photograph,” he said, as though I hadn't mentioned Paolina's name, as though my words had no effect on him, as though I'd said nothing.

His utter unresponsiveness was starting to tick me off. I said, “I don't know why the hell you decided, after all these years, that you needed her. I don't know why a father with a daughter doing fine in the
States would rather have her live on a hillside in a camp filled with armed goons.”

“It did not truly catch your eyes, or the color of your hair,” he said. “It did not tell me how you chose your words when you spoke.”

If my arms had been free, I'd have grabbed him by the throat. “What the hell do you think you can offer her here? You'll never have a normal life. If the government catches you, they'll kill you. If a rival cartel catches you, they'll kill you. The paramilitaries, once they realize you're alive, will get in line, too.”

The guard entered with a squat ceramic pitcher on a tray and two mugs. Roldan grunted and the man left it on the corner of a crate.

“I will pour,” Roldan said, “since you are my guest.”

Since I'm tied up
. I thought about all the old tales in which once you accepted food in your captor's house you fell under a spell. Food, I could have refused, but water, juice, was another matter.

“You have found a trinket. May I see?”

Roldan took the string of beads from between my fingers. Then he handed me the mug, and the
lulo
juice tasted so incredibly wonderful, piquant and slightly tart, that I couldn't imagine why the Colombians didn't export it and make more profit than they did on cocaine.

“Freshly made,” Roldan said, as though he could read my mind, “it is what the gods drank on Olympus. Hours old, it is diminished. Day-old juice is not worth drinking.”

He refilled my glass and waited while I gulped it down.

“Now,” he said, “we will talk. First, thank you for the beads. Perhaps they will bring luck; I will return them to their rightful owners. Now, why do you ask about me in Bogota? You bring me to the attention of those who should forget my name. And pardon me for going through your things, but how do you come to have this?” The little birdman appeared as though by sleight of hand. “Did the girl give it to you?”

There. At least he'd mentioned her. “No.”

“You believe she's with me? Why would she come and leave this behind?”

“I found your gift in her locker. When your goons snatched her off the street, she didn't have a chance to come back for it.”

His eyes searched mine. “You are right insofar as it was a gift.”

“You told her to keep it a secret.”

“Her mother would have sold it for what she could get.”

“It's real, then? It's genuine?”

“It is what it is.”

“You wrote her letters. You sent other gifts.” “A gift is not a summons.”

“I picked up her trail in Miami. She flew to Bogota. She traveled with a man and a woman. Your people.”

“Not mine. If it is true, what you say, it is bad.”

“Everything I've told you is true.”

He lifted the birdman slowly in his right hand. The statuette's golden wings caught the light. “Then I cannot help you. She's been kidnapped, and she is without her guardian spirit. I cannot see her even in my dreams.”

“Secuestrada,”
the Spanish word for kidnapped, hung in the air like some foul-smelling bird of prey. It didn't matter that I'd been thinking “kidnapped” all along, because I'd assumed a different
kind
of kidnapping,
custodial
kidnapping; kidnapping by a parent. Kidnapped, yes, but stolen by someone who cared, who may have meant well, who was terribly misguided, but generally benevolent. “Custodial” modifies the harshness of kidnapping, gentles and tames it. “Kidnapped,” by itself, alone, is a savage word, a brutal word.

The air left my lungs like helium from a punctured balloon. If there had been a nearby wall, I'd have leaned against it, a chair and I'd have sagged into its depths. There was nothing, so I held myself upright, and some part of me stayed rational because it asked a question. Not really a question, not the way it came out: a demand.

“You know who has her.”

If he knew who had her, we could get her back.
He had to know
.

If he showed any concern for Paolina, it was only in his eyes. His face was calm as a mask and he was studying his hands again, his long elegant fingers. The golden birdman lay on his desk. “I receive many threats. Often they are nothing but smoke and mirrors. They are nothing but a pretense, a ruse to force action. If a jaguar is motionless in the bush, a gunshot might make him jump and betray his hiding place.”

I barely heard him because I was still focused on that one word,
kidnapped
.
Kidnappers aren't kidnappers for nothing. Kidnappers want something.

“They want to make you react, to stagger about in the bush. Then you become visible,” Roldan said softly. “For years, I have been invisible.”

“You've heard from them,” I said.

“I didn't believe them.”

“You're rich,” I said. “You'll pay for her. You'll pay whatever they want.” If my hands hadn't been bound they'd have been at his throat again. Those guards knew what they were doing, leaving me tied.

“I'm sorry,” he began, “but I—”

“He won't pay,” said a second voice. It was clear and level. And familiar.

CHAPTER 24

The journalist from Bogota, the small, slim woman
with the caramel eyes, walked in the door, dressed so differently that, at first, it was only her voice I recognized. She wore combat fatigues and high polished boots. A sidearm was strapped to her military belt. Her hair, which had hung loose in her Bogota office, was bound at the nape of her neck.

“I see you finally woke up,” she said.

“I prefer the black Armani,” I said. No wonder Luisa Cabrera got meaty quotes for her guerrilla stories, in-depth features, cooperative subjects.

“This is more comfortable,” she said. “This is who I am.”

I didn't really care who she was, so I turned back to Paolina's father and asked how much the kidnappers were demanding.

“He will not negotiate.” Unbidden, the journalist turned off the low music, and poured herself some juice, commandeering Roldan's cup. She strolled around the hut like she owned it.

“You give the orders around here,” I said. It wasn't a question, it was a way of telling her to shut up, to stop interfering. As far as I was concerned, this was a matter between Paolina's father and me. I'd have preferred to keep the decision entirely my own, but he had the money. The kidnappers wanted payment from him, not me.

“Luisa, untie her, please.” If there was irritation in Roldan's eyes, it was mild.

“Why?” she demanded. “Why do you even speak to her?”

“Don't question me!” His soft voice stung like the lash of a whip. He didn't move, didn't take a step or raise a hand, but suddenly he seemed like a dangerous man.

For a brief moment, I thought she'd refuse. Then she knelt to untie my legs, and I considered bringing my bound hands high, smashing her on the back of the neck, making a grab for her pistol. I might get the drop on Roldan, but the risk of alarming the guard at the door was too great.

“Her hands, as well,” Roldan prompted.

She used a six-inch hunting knife to slice the heavy rope, glaring as though she'd prefer to use it to cut my throat. In the room: Cabrera's knife and gun. Outside the room: an assault rifle. The most potent weapons Roldan seemed to carry were voice, charm, and charisma. I watched as he put them to work on the journalist.

“Luisa, I'm sorry to speak harshly to you, but I'm troubled.” He closed his eyes and his hand reached for the stone around his neck. “You move a rock, a tree dies,” he said. “You kill a bird, a snake lives. There are far-flung consequences and I cannot see the end from the beginning.”

“You can tell me what the kidnappers want,” I said impatiently.

He exhaled slowly, opened his eyes, and turned his spotlight gaze on me. “Miss Carlyle, my friend, Luisa, believes you are a grave danger to me.”

“Oh?” Cabrera said with a short laugh. “So it's just my belief? You want her to talk to TV reporters and show your photo to the police? I tried to stall her till I could make contact in the regular way, but she moved too quickly.”

“You hoped I'd get arrested at the museum,” I said.

“It would have been convenient. No one would have believed anything an accused smuggler said. But it was only a possibility. What I hoped was you'd go there and stay put till I could send someone to follow you.” She turned her attention to Roldan. “I had to get her out of Bogota. The Zona Rosa was one thing; anyone might go there to ask about drugs. But she knew about Eighteen. Next, she'd have asked for you at Base Eighteen. Should I have waited for her to do that?”

Roldan rounded on me. “How do you know about this place?”