Colombiano

  Buitrago’s Blackhawk landed near the farmhouse. The sight of the colonel reassured Fabián further, but when Buitrago went to inspect Zorrillo’s corpse, Fabián hardly knew where to cast his eyes. Twenty-six blood-soaked bodies lay sprawled in the yard of his boyhood homestead. There were five more near the trees. Fabián couldn’t bear to look at any of them. Zorrillo had murdered his father, but he didn’t seem happy the man was dead.

  Witnessing Fabián’s distress reminded me of how, in only eighteen months, I’d become accustomed to guns and battles and blood and dead bodies. During that first skirmish at Puerto Pescador, I’d been petrified. At the Jaguar River, I’d been revolted and, afterwards, depressed by all the killing. But this ambush elated me.

  Trigeño’s helicopter touched down with Javier aboard. When they saw each other, Trigeño and Buitrago raised their hands uncertainly, like secret lovers who didn’t know whether to acknowledge each other at a party.

  Javier sprinted across to Fabián. The brothers hugged. Their mutual terror during this incident seemed to have brought them closer together, and I was glad. They’d kept their word and would spend the coming months with their mother in the capital. After some pressure from Trigeño, they’d agreed to leave their bodyguards behind with Mamá, who would stay on at Javier’s hacienda. Mamá would be completely protected there until I could safely reclaim our finca.

  Buitrago approached me by the farmhouse. He must have been pleased, but he veiled his delight. We were professional soldiers, and victories that involved the extinguishment of human life had to be chalked up privately on blackboards in our minds.

  Buitrago mustn’t have heard my transmission on the Guerrilla frequency because he congratulated me for an operation that had been executed flawlessly.

  ‘No civilians injured. No army soldiers killed. Thirty-one guerrilleros dead and, as I instructed, no one tortured.’

  An army cameraman filmed the bodies strewn around the ranch as soldiers packaged them in black plastic. Of course, we six snipers, still in ghillie suits, were careful not to be caught on camera, but this time I didn’t mind that the images of the dead would be broadcast – these were all genuine guerrilleros. Buitrago would have preferred to parade Zorrillo alive in front of television cameras at a press conference, but it was still the first time a mid-level comandante had been killed in decades.

  After years of continual losses, this operation would give the Garbanzos battalion a much-needed boost in morale and public prestige. Accolades would be heaped upon Buitrago by his generals and the North Americans. As a result, Buitrago’s trust in me and in the Autodefensas enjoyed a manifold increase.

  The colonel called to the cameraman, ‘Enough filming. Turn that thing off!’

  While we stood there, a corporal arrived bearing a radio backpack. He relayed the message that Buitrago’s soldiers had rappelled into the jungle from helicopters to intercept the fleeing guerrilleros. They’d managed to capture seven, who were being marched back to us with their wrists bound and bags over their heads.

  ‘They’re already blaming each other,’ the corporal said with satisfaction. ‘They claim they hate Zorrillo and have wanted to desert for a year. And they’re promising to reveal everything they know about Caraquemada.’

  Leaving me, Buitrago signalled to Trigeño for a private word. As I climbed aboard Buitrago’s Blackhawk to be airlifted back to the battalion, I saw Trigeño and Buitrago – the illicit lovers – hugging in the shadows. It was the first and last time that I saw the army and Autodefensas embrace.

  The dark alliance I’d helped form was now on a fast-moving upward trajectory. And although the journey ahead would be long and arduous, I felt like I was on a steam train accelerating quickly away from the station. We had a fresh victory behind us. We had confidence. And our momentum was unstoppable.

  113

  HAVING KILLED ZORRILLO, I was now confident that we’d succeed in reclaiming Llorona and the river villages. For Phase Two of our operation, I’d be second in command under Beta, supported by thirty Autodefensas from La 50, including Ñoño and Mona, who’d arrived in two tarpaulin-covered trucks.

  Palillo still hated Beta for forcing Piolín to witness torture. But I didn’t mind the idea of serving under him. Now that he’d seen my resilience in La Quebrada, my successful implementation of the Zorrillo operation and also how much Trigeño relied on me, he showed me greater respect.

  That night, having been permitted by Buitrago to house my soldiers in a disused corner of his army barracks, I thought again of Camila, sleeping barely eleven kilometres away. It was painful being so close to her and yet being unable to visit. Since our upcoming mission was clandestine, I couldn’t even call her.

  With the successful operation against Zorrillo, my confidence was at an all-time high; we’d proven that the Guerrilla commanders weren’t invincible. And once the Autodefensas were firmly entrenched in the region, we’d be within striking distance of Buitre and Caraquemada.

  At dawn the following day, Beta and I met with Buitrago in his office, where he supplied us with two military maps and told us that the seven fleeing guerrilleros captured by the army the previous afternoon had already revealed the location of some temporary Guerrilla bases.

  Of course, with only a single platoon, we had no intention of attacking these bases. But we could at least make an incursion into the area to shake the Guerrilla up, oust their civilian supporters and interrupt their supply chains. Beta estimated that the mission would take five days.

  ‘Having lost a platoon, Caraquemada will be on the defensive,’ Buitrago told us. ‘He’ll move these bases further back into the mountains, temporarily reducing his capacity for patrols and attacks. But you’ll only have a small window before he decides to avenge Zorrillo. So be quick. And be careful.’

  The colonel provided us with a list of known members of Zorrillo’s Bolivarian Militia, each with a corresponding photo.

  ‘These men recruit campesino children, ferry supplies to Guerrilla camps and terrorise peasant families so that they’re too scared to talk to us. They don’t wear uniforms, but they’re armed and are not to be considered civilians. Yesterday, before we captured the seven guerrilleros from Zorrillo’s platoon, I would have told you to confirm their identity then bring them in for questioning.’

  ‘But today?’ asked Beta, smiling in anticipation.

  ‘Shoot them on sight.’

  Buitrago airlifted our platoon of thirty-two Autodefensas in two Bell UH-1 helicopters to a point south of Puerto Princesa, half a day’s march from where the roads ended. We trekked over hills, beside escarpments and along streams, wearing full combat webbing, face paint and black armbands with white AUC lettering. We wanted no confusion. We were not the army. We were a new force – a more committed and ruthless force – not bound by the ordinary rules of war.

  Here, campesinos’ lives were inextricably intertwined with the Guerrilla. Guerrilla patrols expected to sleep in their huts. They took a third of their crops, demanded information about army movements and expected their children to join the ranks once they were big enough to hold a rifle.

  ‘Good day, señores,’ Beta would say gruffly to the inhabitants of each dwelling. ‘We’re from the Colombian United Self-Defence Forces. This area is no longer under Guerrilla control.’

  We granted the illegal squatters three days to leave. While two squads formed a security ring around each hut, five soldiers forced the inhabitants to lie flat with their noses touching the dirt while the rest of us smashed their furniture, tossed out pots and pans, cut their mattresses to shreds and prodded the surrounding earth for weapons.

  A further day’s trek from Puerto Princesa, the huts were little more than a few wooden boards nailed together and covered with rusted iron sheets. We were greeted by malnourished children who barely spoke. Even Ñoño, who’d grown up in the rough frontier country of Northern Antioquia, was appalled at how peasants here lived so primitively.

  On the fourth day, we fina
lly struck gold. We were now deep in enemy territory; these mountains led to Caraquemada’s temporary bases. We had to tread slowly in this area with our eyes scanning the earth because Buitrago’s maps indicated that the Guerrilla had laid quiebrapata landmines.

  The knowledge that we were so close to the Guerrilla camps made us tense. I suspected most of the others now wanted to turn back. We’d complied with our orders. Why not return to Garbanzos? But Beta drove us on, determined to find something.

  As we approached one small wooden hut, a man sprinted out through its door. Palillo ditched his pack, gave chase and tackled him to the ground.

  I scanned Buitrago’s list and saw the man’s photo. ‘He’s one of them.’

  In order to be sure, Beta ordered Giraldo to search the hut. Giraldo emerged, triumphantly holding aloft a heavy satchel. ‘Looks like he was packing to leave.’

  ‘What are these for?’ Beta asked the man, opening the satchel and removing a handheld radio transceiver and a box containing fifty AA batteries.

  The man broke free and ran for the cover of the jungle. Beta shot him twice in the back and he fell instantly. I fired the tiro de gracia into the back of his head.

  ‘Find a shovel and bury him,’ I ordered Tarantula, a broad-shouldered soldier who’d make light work of it.

  ‘We haven’t got time for this shit, Pedro!’ said Beta. ‘If they heard those shots …’

  I knew Beta was no coward. To him, the mission was complete; we needed to turn back immediately. If the Guerrilla surrounded us, there would be no escape.

  ‘Give me three minutes,’ I said.

  Tarantula and I hacked into the ground, while the others fanned out with their rifles covering the densely wooded mountains. These were the tensest moments of our trek. I felt exposed in the clearing. But I kept digging.

  As we rolled the man into his shallow grave, Mona suddenly waved her hands for everyone to stop what they were doing. She placed her finger to her lips and pointed to the house.

  Beta signalled for us to surround the dwelling. Ñoño whispered, ‘I’ll go in.’

  He slipped his pack from his shoulders, flicked his Galil off safety and crept inside. He came out leading a little boy by the hand who looked about ten. He’d been hiding under the bed.

  Beta berated Giraldo for not checking the hut properly.

  ‘What’s your name, little man?’ asked Mona, bending down to the boy’s height.

  His lip trembled. ‘Iván.’

  ‘And where’s your mother, Iván?’

  He pointed up the hill; she’d probably fled to the Guerrilla.

  ‘Where’s my papá?’ the boy asked.

  Beta and I looked at each other, not knowing what to tell him, but Ñoño took control.

  ‘He’s dead,’ he said softly, taking the boy’s hand again and leading him towards the grave. ‘You need to say goodbye to him quickly.’

  ‘We can’t take him,’ stated Beta. ‘The rules are clear. He’s too small for the Autodefensas.’

  ‘That’s what you said about me. La 50 is the best place for him. He can do camp duties until he’s big enough to carry a pack and rifle.’

  ‘We don’t take kids.’

  ‘But the Guerrilla will. Then he’ll grow up despising us and wanting revenge. That’s one more enemy soldier we’ll have to kill. But if we take him ourselves, that’s one more soldier for us.’

  Beta continued to argue, but Ñoño had already made up his mind.

  ‘I’ll take responsibility for Iván,’ he said, and without looking back he began dragging the crying boy down the hill, away from his dead father.

  ‘Get down!’ Silvestre crash-tackled Beta as a volley of shots struck the hut behind us. Silvestre covered Beta and returned fire. Out in the open, and with no clear view of the enemy, we had no option but to scamper down the hill as fast as we could.

  We marched all day and all night, and the following day we reached the thin woodlands on the outskirts of Puerto Princesa.

  I looked up when I heard Trigeño’s helicopter flying overhead; a cloud of leaflets fluttered down like confetti. I bent down to pick one up.

  THE AUTODEFENSAS ARE HERE

  YOU HAVE THREE DAYS TO LEAVE

  YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED

  Reading this filled me with pride. I’d painted similar words on my house eighteen months earlier when they represented little more than a dream. But now my words had come true; the Autodefensas were actually taking over, driving out the Guerrilla.

  Suddenly, a hundred metres ahead of us, at the edge of a clearing, a man in camouflage uniform emerged from behind a tree, holding his rifle horizontal and high above his head.

  ‘Pedro, take the shot,’ ordered Beta. ‘It might be a trap.’

  But the man knelt, slowly laid his rifle on the ground, placed his hands behind his head and yelled out for us to please spare his life.

  His name was Rafael. He was handsome and looked about twenty. He was a guerrillero and had assumed we were the army. He wanted to hand himself in and would co-operate in every possible way. In fact, he claimed to be a member of the team protecting Zorrillo when he went to meet Fabián Díaz. But when we opened fire and they’d fled in confusion, he’d become separated from his squad and decided to hide in woodlands to avoid his pursuers, thinking he’d return alone to camp later. However, after days of hiding, he’d had second thoughts – he now wanted to desert.

  ‘If you have to kill me, please make it quick. But I’ll never go back. My commander executed someone very close to me. I know I’m next on his list. I hate him. I want to join your side and kill him.’

  ‘Who’s your commander?’ demanded Beta, disbelievingly.

  Rafael’s answer set my pulse racing: ‘Buitre.’

  114

  BETA STILL WANTED Rafael dead. ‘The only good guerrillero is a dead guerrillero,’ he said. But I insisted we radio in the capture of an enemy soldier to Trigeño.

  When our platoon arrived at Hacienda Díaz, Trigeño’s helicopter was already parked next to the bullet-pocked farmhouse. Trigeño had disembarked and Alfa 1 was standing beside him. They’d flown down that morning from La 35 to drop the warning leaflets. Beta and I talked to them near the spot where I’d killed Zorrillo. Bullet casings and glittering shards of mirror from Fabián’s destroyed Mercedes were littered across the grass.

  Beta recounted the details of our operation, recommending that Rafael be turned over to his intelligence team. But after our recent successes, Trigeño was in a compassionate mood.

  ‘Get this boy’s story,’ he ordered. ‘Investigate it thoroughly. If it checks out, he can join the Autodefensas.’

  ‘What?’ cried Beta in utter disbelief. ‘You made the law yourself. Captured enemy get killed. No forgiveness. No exceptions.’

  ‘This one wasn’t captured. He isn’t even a deserter. He’s a defector. We pay him cash for the rifle he brought. He gets no weapon for a month. When we trust him fully, give it back to him and he’s one of us.’

  Alfa 1 and Beta were on the verge of mutiny; there was no way they’d ever accept a member of the enemy standing beside their own loyal men.

  Trigeño’s new policy, however, was both logical and strategic. Rafael had brought his own rifle, and he was already battle-savvy, which would save us money and training time. His joining our ranks meant one more soldier for us and one fewer for the enemy – an advantage of two. And he was highly motivated – apparently, conditions in the Guerrilla were appalling. Rafael was grateful to be alive and pleased he’d eventually be doing a similar job to before, only he’d get paid for it and also be permitted to take leave. He knew enemy trails, supply routes, radio codes, commanders’ habits and their camps’ locations.

  He could identify milicianos in the river villages. And, because he was an orphan, he wouldn’t need to conceal his identity with a balaclava to prevent reprisals against his family. Besides, he wanted the Guerrilla to know he’d changed sides. The psychological blow to his former camaradas wo
uld be immense. And it would also extend a small olive branch to the foot soldiers of our enemy. Guerrilleros knew when we captured them that a gruesome death ensued. But now there was an alternative: changing sides. Trigeño was a long-term thinker. In the bigger picture, a single defection was far more damaging to the Guerrilla than any number of losses in combat.

  In time, Rafael would go on to become a trusted and valuable Autodefensa commander. His defection inspired dozens more. The conversion of enemies into allies was pure genius by Trigeño and also the high-tide mark of my surging wave of esteem for him.

  Although this war is to the death, he was saying, in effect, everyone has a choice and no one has to die.

  According to Rafael, Buitre was still at large, roaming the dense jungles we’d just trekked through. He had multiple camps and never announced to underlings which one he’d visit next. This would make locating him difficult. However, he did know Buitre’s real name – Kiko Fuentes – and that he had a brother in a town called Barrancabermeja, who had blond hair and worked as a mechanic. That was sufficient for Trigeño to give the next order to Alfa 1.

  ‘Call the Northern Bloque commander. Get them to find Buitre’s brother!’

  115

  I WAS OVERJOYED to have Buitre almost within our sights. I had no idea how his brother, living in a faraway city, might be of use. Surely Buitre wouldn’t be stupid enough to visit him, even if he were allowed to. Nevertheless, the knowledge that Trigeño was dedicating significant resources from La Empresa to my personal quest made me feel special.

  Once more, I felt we were progressing in leaps and bounds.

  Trigeño flew back to La 50 with Alfa 1, Beta and Rafael, leaving me with a shoebox full of cash and orders to construct our local headquarters.

  He’d given no specific instructions about what to do with Iván, the young boy whose father we’d killed, leaving it to my discretion. Iván never strayed far from Ñoño, trotting around after him with the grateful, adoring eyes of a rescued puppy.